God Gave Me A Free One Today

[GeorginaA]

At the risk of sounding horribly melodramatic, my ds1 almost died today because of my complete stupidity.

I gave him a boiled sweet - he's 3. I didn't even think it would be an issue... it was in a party bag from a party of a younger (by a few months) child. Then his younger brother woke up and started howling, I started to go upstairs to see to him. It was then ds1 started choking.

He'd got bored of his sweet and tried to swallow it I think. He was panicking, I could see it in his eyes... couldn't cough it up. I tipped him upside down and banged hard and it wasn't working. Didn't know what to do - 999 would be too slow, next door may or may not be in and probably wouldn't be able to help either. It felt like an eternity.

He FINALLY coughed it up, vomiting everywhere. He was sobbing, I was sobbing, I nearly cut off his air supply again by hugging him too tight. I must have been fairly hysterical because he started telling ME to calm down.

I can't believe what a near miss it was. It could have happened 60 seconds later while I was upstairs and wouldn't be able to tell...

I think the next boiled sweet he'll get is when he's 20...

Mears - fab website - have decided I'm going to sit down with my au pair and get her to go through it with me!

Hi
We had a resucitation talk at our weekly HV clinic one week covering non breathing and choking. The one thing I hadn;t realised that when giving kiss of life to a baby - you cover their mouth AND nose.
Also they recommend the St Johns Ambulance first aid book (Bout a tenner from book shops) - tells you all you need to know - keep it near the telephone as you can put all sorts of emergency numbers in it too.
ps my ds has fallen off the bed twice now!

oh poor you georginaA but like others have said try not to dwell on it.

god it scares you senseless when something like this happens

Glad he is okay Georgina; must have been horrid and scary. I think you deserve a large glass of wine tonight!

I remember my sister, aged about 5 or 6, choking on a long piece of stringy meat fat whilst out once. My mum actully had to just keep pulling it until it dislodged and came out. Poor sister was very sick as a result. Remeber my mum shaking afterwards - through shock I guess.

Glad everything turned out OK GeorginaA, it's scary. My DS1 was 5 months old when we had a choking incident, I did the same as you, put him over my knee and started slapping his back, he gagged and coughed and brought up some cardboard, which I was horrified he had been able to get hold of. I'm with Hula, have a glass of wine, you're a good Mummy for dealing with it well!

Yes you are definately not alone. Our 3yr old DS choked on a boiled sweet whilst coming back from hols last year. A 'nice airport man' had given it to him & in the chaos of us getting on the plane, we hadn't noticed he'd unwrapped it & eaten it. Luckily DH didn't panic & did the back slaps which got it out. It took 3 or 4 slaps though. Very scary !