St Andrews: Three months ago Marc Leishman was told his wife had a five per cent chance of living.

His life was about to be turned upside down – his golf career an afterthought as Audrey, the mother of their two children, lay in an induced coma in a Virginia hospital in the United States.

Leishman was in Augusta preparing for The Masters in April while his wife was at home with the children struggling with flu-like symptoms.

She would later discover that it was a rare life-threatening bacterial infection known as toxic shock syndrome, which began to shut down her organs as a result of fluid build up in the lungs.

Leishman rushed home, told the odds of survival were slim.

But three months later, Leishman sat in front of a packed media contingent at St Andrews following a tournament-best round of eight under to share his excitement in the fact "she's here to tell the story".

"Yeah, she looks completely normal. She looks just like she did before she got sick," Leishman said.

"She's just got no energy, no stamina. She's exhausted by lunchtime most days, has to take it easy after that. But that's a lot better than what it was looking like three months ago. It wasn't a good outlook, didn't look good for her, and this is awesome the way she's recovering.

"The critical illness myopathy is one of the side effects when you're in a coma for so long with your body working so hard to just keep yourself alive, your muscles just basically waste away.

"She's been strengthening or building muscles for 30 years. She's a pretty strong girl. And then all of a sudden when she woke up from the coma, she couldn't lift her phone. That's how bad she was. So you go from lifting weights at the gym to you can't pick up your phone to send a text message.

"That sort of thing, that hits home, that that's how she went from so strong to basically rock bottom and now she's recovering really well. She's getting stronger, and it's just going to take time. Might take a year, might take two years, who knows, but she's here to tell the story."

A remarkable turnaround

The 31-year-old Victorian was just one shot off overnight leader Dustin Johnson when he finished his third round.

The eight-under 64 was just one off the course record at St Andrews for The Open, held by Northern Irishman Rory McIlroy (63 in first round of 2010)

It's also one shot off a tournament record held by seven other players, including Australia's Greg Norman at Turnberry in 1986.

But three months ago, none of that seemed possible.

"Yeah, it was a huge possibility that I wasn't going to be playing golf anymore," Leishman said.

"Travelling with a one-year-old and a three-year-old by yourself isn't really ... well, it wasn't going to happen. I wouldn't do that to the boys. They're too young to know what's going on. At the time it was just, righto, you're going to have to give it away and stay home with the boys and be a dad, and that was the most important thing, and I was all right with that.

"Obviously the outcome, Audrey is all right now and it's a lot better. It's great that she's healthy again. But yeah, that was pretty rough there for a while, thinking about everything, the boys not growing up with their mum, me not playing golf anymore, not having a wife. It was just everything.

"Unfortunately it probably happens every day to people around the world. We were just really lucky that she's on the mend. A lot of people ... well, we know a couple of people that their wives didn't make it, which is really sad, but it does happen."

His wife's ordeal has given Leishman a new outlook on life, changing the way he approaches the sport of golf.

While it would take something special to claim the Claret Jug at St Andrews, he knows he has something special waiting for him at home.

"It has definitely ... changed my whole perspective on life," Leishman said.

"I feel like I've always had a pretty good outlook on life, but now just it takes a lot more to worry me. I don't get annoyed about little things that I can't really help, when you hit a bad shot there's no real point getting frustrated about it because you tried to hit a good shot, you didn't, move on. That frustration doesn't help. And I feel like even if I do have a bad day, I can still go home and hopefully give her a hug and cuddle my boys.

"There for a while it didn't look like I was going to be able to do that. I think in that way, it's really helped me. Yeah, I don't think about it on the course, but I think it's just changed me as a person, for the better.

"It would be great to get a hold of that trophy and nice to take it back for Audrey and the boys. But there's obviously a lot that has to happen between now and tomorrow night to do that. But that would be awesome. I'm sure it would be, yeah, a pretty big party."

THE LEADERBOARD

-12 Paul Dunne (a)
      Louis Oosthuizen
      Jason Day
-11 Jordan Spieth
​-10 Padraig Harrington
-9   Marc Leishman
      Jordan Niebrugge (a)
      Sergio Garcia
      Justin Rose
      Retief Goosen
      Robert Streb
      Adam Scott
      Zach Johnson
      Danny Willett 
-8   Steven Bowditch