All it takes is one meal to make a parent panic..

So.. This is going to be something a little different than about photography I am afraid, if your after photography this one blog won't be for you. This is about something that happened very recently to me and Jamie, and it's something no parent wants to experience - when your child starts choking. So.. What's making me sit here on a sunny but freezing Saturday writing about this, it's because I want to stress how important it is to stay with your child whilst they eat, that when you think it will never happen to you, unfortunately it just might. Isabelle has had approximately 588 meals including breakfasts, lunches and dinners so far, including everything from weetabix, to chicken, to parsnips to custard. You name it our little girl has probably eaten it (apart from broccoli, we haven't got over her not eating broccoli yet 🤔) and all it took was one of those to make us panic. Like any other meal, the 3 of us were sat around the table for dinner (I'm sure your wondering what we had - breaded cod, mashed potato and peas.. Yummy!) So just like goldilocks and the 3 bears.. there we were with one big portion for Jamie, one medium portion for me and one baby portion for Isabelle - which isn't actually that much of a baby portion anymore. Isabelle has eaten this meal plenty of times.. She very much loves getting her hands in the mashed potato and then to the joy of mummy and daddy spreading it all in her hair, ears, lap, sometimes over the dog.. **Note the picture at the bottom for further reference 😂** Now I must give serious credit to Jamie, I always say he panics more than me and I'm more laid back with things like this, but this time he needed to do what he did.. I hadn't even noticed that Isabelle was struggling! (I do not get best mum award that day) Jamie noticed instantly that something was wrong, isabelle was squirming and looking panicked, then we noticed that she wasn't getting any air in and I froze, Jamie instantly took the tray off the high chair and gave it to me, unclipped Isabelle and held her up and started hitting her on the back, we were so lucky that a bit of vomit came up and then luckily whatever was lodged also freed itself. I was too much in fear to do anything as tears filled my eyes I couldn't even tell you what went through my mind.. There's no feeling we've experienced like it as a parent or pre-parent. Now, that all sounds very calm how it's been written, and I can assure you it wasn't. We were lucky enough that the worst thing that came out of it was Isabelle complaining and crying afterwoods because she was hungry, we popped her back in her chair and she carried on eating as if nothing happened whilst me and Jamie were sat staring at her whilst she finished her meal which felt like hours!

Now my lesson is learnt, always always watch your child whilst they're eating, I was obnoxious enough to think it would never happen to us, and it did, it does happen. Please if your not first aid trained, atleast know what to do in these situations, even reading up online, it could quite literally save a life. Luckily we have both been previously first aid trained, but even then I wasn't prepared mentally. Hopefully it doesn't happen to you and your child isn't a food monster like ours who shovels handfuls at a time in her mouth! **Unfortunately we don't have a picture of the mashed potato in the hair.. However we do have this mornings porridge, which was infact worse! Dried porridge and hair is not a good combination before 10am 🙈

Have a good weekend everyone 😁