so part 2: i'll try to be as brief as possible...
ezra gave us quite the scare yesterday. about 15 minutes before i went to pick Annabelle up from school, he started coughing very very hard. it sounded like he was trying to throw up and his breathing was so labored and wheezy.
he had been eating a small piece of apple, but then went to play with julian, so it could have been any number of tiny things that he swallowed.
i was so conflicted.
i looked in his throat and saw nothing.
i gave him something to drink, and between gulps, he would pause to cough violently.
i googled, "baby choking".
and that is where i was thrown off. he was breathing well enough for me to google an instructional for baby CPR. is that really choking?
regardless, i held him in the correct position and hit him in the right spot the way the website instructed.
that pissed him off. big time.
and yet he continued to cough and wheeze and hack away like an old man who has smoked for the past 60 years.
i finally called my mom, as he began to try to fall asleep on my chest. which wasn't normal, since he had just gotten up from a good nap 30 minutes earlier. i was also prompted by Julian's sobering statement, "Maybe Ezra's going to cough until he dies." Hm. Thanks for the encouraging words, buddy.
my Mom answered and in her calmest, bravest voice, she began to describe what to do.
i cut her off and said, "i did that. i googled it."
her concern was that he may pass out (hence the drowsy, attempt to sleep on my chest) from his air being too constricted.
i understood. i called 911.
i was brave. i did not cry. i did not panic. i freaking googled "baby choking" in the midst of all this.
and yet, when the woman on the other end of the line said, "911, what is your address?" i choked up. tears fell and my voice shook as i slowly enunciated each letter. each word.
i guess the times where i have seen 911 called on television, usually don't turn out so well. thus the emotion.
she commented that he sounded pretty bad, as he coughed into the phone while i talked.
5 minutes later a knock was at the door. i opened it and Ezra's eyes lit up at the shiny red flashing fire truck. he gasped, "Oooh". and like that, the coughing stopped. his breath was still coming out raspy and hard, but the coughing stopped.
i was a little embarrassed. why couldn't he have just choked for 2 seconds longer, so the firemen would believe me? silly thought but it did run through my head at the time, along with a thousand other random thoughts.
they listened to him, thought his breathing would calm down after he had a chance to rest from such a hard time, and stayed with me until i was sure all was okay.
in the midst of this, julian ran in with his doctor kit and stethescope, just like they were using, and shouted, "look guys! i got tools too!"
after it was over, i picked up annabelle from school. she sharply reprimanded me for being late.
julian told her what happened and said, "it was so cool to have a whole fire department at our house."
which is what it felt like, with 6 large men filling our tiny apartment.
we are all breathing easier today.
(photo by ezra. he loves to help me take pictures)