Have you ever performed CPR or the Heimlich maneuver?

Yes… :-(
(CPR)

Yes I did. On Bouncing Betty the practice dummy~

Yes. As a lifeguard I had to perform mouth to mouth on a drowning victim while the other guard did chest compressions. We brought him back. Very intense experience.

Ah, nothing like getting puke in your mouth, eh?

@Cruiser Only 8%-10% of Out-of-hospital cardiac arrest victims that have had CPR, survive more than 24 hours. Your victim was lucky indeed. Congratulations.

We were always called to the scene after the cardiac arrest had happened.

@GloPro Not once but twice. After that happened I looked up at the other guards to see if they wanted a try and they all stepped back 3 steps! lol Maybe what they say about not swimming for at least and hour is true after all! O-o

@LuckyGuy That is what the paramedics said when they finally got there. We worked easily 5 minutes on that guy. He was in intensive care for a few days because of 3rd degree burns in his lungs. He is very lucky to be alive.

What was really sad though is the senior lifeguard in the tower chair by the deep end where this happened panicked. I saw her climb down from the chair and was walking around the chair taking her rings off one by one and I thought WTH is she doing and then I saw my supervisor come charging out of the office and dove to the bottom and pulled this guy up to the surface. He was so out of breath and why I got the honors to do the mouth to mouth. No one knew how long he was down there. Had to be pretty long to have his heart stop beating.

Thankfully the kid made a full recovery.

Tried CPR, didn’t work. A few years later got the chance to take the course and did it on the dummy. He stayed a dummy, so I guess he survived.

When my daughter was about three she started choking on something she was eating. I tried the Heimlich manouver but I must have done it wrong because it didn’t work. So I grabbed her by the ankles, turned her upside down and slapped her on the back. That worked. I don’t think I have ever been so scared as I was in that moment.

@downtide Nothing worse than a child in distress. Glad you kept it together and helped her out.