A Dreadful Scare …… Never Again I Pray

Last Sunday, we went to a party to celebrate a 7 year old’s birthday.  Usually with kids birthday parties, we would just leave our children at the party venue, and pick them up once the party was over.  However, on this occasion, as the birthday boy’s family were family friends of ours, we stayed on. 

Being a boy’s party, there had to be games involved.  So what better place to have a sports party than at an Indoor Stadium (incidentally, my youngest son, V, will also be having a party at the same venue next month).  So, not long after we arrived, the party host invited all the boys into the soccer area in the stadium for a game.  This was my opportunity to mingle with the other adults, so that was what I did.

A few moments later, I watched as my eldest son (8 year old, J) walk out of the soccer area towards me.  He looked as if he had tears in his eyes and I wasn’t at all surprised as J didn’t enjoy sports (unlike V who loves it!).  I thought that he had changed his mind about participating and decided to call it quits.  That was fine with me. 

He walked over to me and said in a quiet voice that he was hit by the soccer ball on his chest and that it hurt  a lot.  As would any mother in that situation, I rubbed his chest, said some comforting words to him and told him that he didn’t have to play soccer if he didn’t want to.  There….. that was all settled now I thought.  We stood there, my arm on his shoulder, watching V and the other young ones play.

All of a sudden, J slumped onto me, mumbling.  I held onto him, asking him what’s wrong.  Then I saw, his head tilt back and his eyes roll backwards.  He had gone limp - his eyes continued to roll.  I couldn’t even hold him, his weight seemed so, so heavy.  He was falling unconscious.  I screamed to hubby who thankfully wasn’t standing too far away.  Hubby ran over and picked him up.  That’s when I saw it…. J was convulsing… eyes still rolled back. 

Hubby ran with J in his arms to the reception area.  No one was there.  We screamed for someone to come quickly.  I am usually a very quiet person by nature, but thinking back as to how I was shouting for help at the top of my voice …. just doesn’t seem real.  Someone did stroll in a  moment later (which felt like eternity, so I cannot really describe how immediate it was).  By then, some of the other adults from the party had gathered around us too.  I held my son on the floor cradling his head on my knee.  He was conscious now but looked very, very weak.  Hubby explained what happened to the Stadium Manager- we wanted to know if we had an emergency in our hands.  The Manager tried to assure us that it wasn’t anything serious and that J should be out playing again with the other kids in no time.  Seriously!  If you had your semi-conscious son in your arms, how is that kind of response going to help!!  The other adults we just as ‘unexperienced’ as us, so they couldn’t really advise us any differently.  We decided we’d let J lie on a sofa for a while and see what happened.

J did gradually, very slowly, gain his energy back.  Not long later, he sat up and after urging him a little, he started walking around at the stadium a little.  His body was very cold for quite some time.  By the end of the hour, he was ‘back to normal’.  But hubby and I - we weren’t.

The scariest thing from this experience was that feeling of helplessness.  I didn’t know what to do.  Hubby didn’t know what to do.  And from what it looked like, most of the adults at the party were just as in-cognisant as hubby and I were.  No one could confidently tell us what was happening and what the best treatment for the situation was.  We were not in control.  And that is a terrible, terrible feeling when your child is having a medical emergency.  

Less than 24 hours later, I had signed up for a one-day training course on First Aid with the Australian Red Cross, which will be held on 26 June.   I will be trained on CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) and other key skills to carry out emergency first aid in life threatening injuries and illnesses.  I know that I can never be fully prepared for any emergency, but I pray that with this little bit of extra knowledge and skills, I can help provide an educated response in future emergency situations, be it involving family or not.