I presume the marriage worked out okay, and you weren’t just foiling an escape attempt…
Careful, people have been known to choke on yummy baked goods, too, you know. So make sure you’ve got plenty of milk with those brownies (so you don’t require the Heimlich on yourself one day, and have to turn over your brownie points to the guy who helps YOU out…
Kinda sorta maybe on two occasions.
On one, my father and I saw a homeless person having a seizure and called 911, made sure he wasn’t choking on anything, etc. While most seizures would be survivable without help, I know there are risks.
On the other, I was a camp counselor and found a baby rattlesnake hiding in a kid’s shoe. Had the right chain of events transpired, that could have been fatal.
I performed the Heimlich Maneuver on my stepdad. He was bigger and taller than me, but I guess the adrenaline kicked in enough that I was successful in dislodging the food in his throat.
Chew before you swallow. And take smaller bites.
Pulled my sister to safety when she was starting to slide down a rock face while out rock climbing. She was definitely on her way down…and the fall was definitely not survivable.
Every so often, she bakes me “thank you” cupcakes.
Ex-EMT… Most situations are not immediately life threatening, but debilitating and will result in death if left alone for several hours.
Drag from burning car-pull from water-heimlich on choking person immediate situations, about 10-12 in 3 years…
I didn’t actually do it, but I did instigate it.
Couple of years ago the spouse and I were eating lunch at KFC when we noticed that this old guy seemed in distress. We watched him for a few seconds and it was clear he was choking. A few other people in the restaurant noticed too, but everybody (including the people who worked there) were just milling around and doing nothing. The guy was big, and kind of back in a booth–I didn’t think I was going to be able to get around him, so I pointed at the spouse and said, “You do it!”
He got up and went over there, but he wasn’t sure what to do. I told him to get behind the guy, get his arms around him, get his hands in the right position, and push in and up. (I demonstrated, as best I could remember, hoping desperately that I had it right). Spouse did as ordered and a wad of food popped out of the guy’s mouth. He thanked us and then the manager came over (great timing, dude!) to make sure he was okay and didn’t need him to call 911. The guy said he was fine and left shortly thereafter.
Spouse and I finished our lunch, shaking the whole time.
Not real sure. I was in Prague, waiting along with several other people for one of the streetcars. I saw it come around the corner and at the same time noticed that a woman was standing right at the curb with her back to the approaching streetcar. I thought she would hear it and turn around, but she continued to stand there looking the other way. Then I noticed the mirror hanging off the side of the streetcar right at head level. I was only a couple of feet away from her, and when it was apparent that she was about to be brained, I grabbed her arm and pulled her away from the curb. She was quite startled and said something to me in Czech, then suddenly became aware of the streetcar and turned and smiled at me.
I have a modest stack of letters in my desk drawer from people saying things like, “When you told me, ______________, it turned my life around.”
Most of them I can’t even remember having said the magic words. So I have to take the gratitude with a measure of humility.
But when I sometimes wonder if I ever made a difference in my little corner I get my fistful of letters out and reread them.
Never forget to thank people who have helped you. You may make a difference to them!
My husband has saved a woman from freezing to death in a ditch and two people from dying on the spot from a heart attack. Unfortunately one of those died shortly later in the hospital, but had a chance to say goodbye. None of those people were in a position or thought to find out who he was and thank him.
I’m not sure he needed a thank you but I have been especially grateful for the ones I’ve gotten.
My house mate. She tried to kill me by driving the car she and I were in into a train. She had poor timing thank Christ. Later on I had to pick her bodily off the railway tracks and sat on her moments before the train went through. Police arrived shortly after. It was a stressful night.
It was late one night, maybe 2AM or so, in the early 1980s. I’m driving northbound on Hwy 101 in south San Jose, CA, near the exits for Blossom Hill and Hellyer. A car ahead of me spins off the freeway and down the embankment to the right. I pull over to check it out, get over to the car and the driver, he’s unconscious, bloodied and not breathing. No other obvious injuries, and no other passengers. Another guy had also stopped to help and he was the first on the scene. The driver was not breathing and I was getting ready to perform mouth to mouth, but wasn’t looking forward to it because of his bloody face. Fortunately once we tilted the guy’s head back he started breathing on his own. Hearing him start breathing was a great sound, to our relief. We were on scene quickly so he hadn’t been out of air for more than one or two minutes, max. We held him that way until the paramedics came, and he kept breathing the entire time.
Hardly anyone else was on the road that late at night, and back then that area was more rural. Where we were, nobody could see us from the road, they could only see my stopped car on the shoulder. If we hadn’t done that the guy would’ve died.
I have no idea who that guy was. Once help arrived, I continued on my way.
This happened in 1969. My stepfather’s niece had a baby daughter named Christine, and I was looking after her while her parents were out.
She was in a crib in the living room. She managed to work a nut loose from a connection on the crib, and swallowed it. I was quick enough to see it. I picked her up and turned her upside down, and struck her lightly beween the shoulder blades; she spat it out. Of course, when the parents returned home I told them what happened. For all I know, Christine is alive today. 
Indirectly, when I was about 12 years old.
The older brother of my best friend got into his parent’s liquor cabinet while they were out for the day. He basically got very sloppy ass drunk, but nonetheless left the house and went to go hang out with his friends. I don’t remember the exact month, but it was cold and there was a lot of snow on the ground. Me and my friend (his brother) came across him and his friends. He was mostly passed out in a snowbank, and they were throwing snowballs and stuff at him (yeah, some friends!) and laughing at how he would just groan but not really move or defend himself. They were all older than us, so we couldn’t really do much to stop it. I told them I thought he needed help, but they said he would sober up soon and didn’t want to call anybody because he would get in trouble for drinking. He started shivering violently when I decided I had to do something.
I went home and told my dad. Funny thing is, at the time, I thought he was more in danger from the alcohol he drank than from the cold (i thought the shaking was something like the DT’s). But when my dad got there (and I got dagger eyes from all his friends for being a snitch), he immediately loaded him into the station wagon and took him to the hospital. I was told later that his body temp was down to 94 degrees (I might be misremembering that detail) but they said if he had spent another half hour out in the cold he would have died.
I don’t think he remembers much about the incident at all, and I’m pretty sure he has no idea that I’m the one that “saved him”. But I was shunned by his friends as a snitch (not that I cared, they were a bunch of assholes). He did enjoy a bit of schoolyard fame (“did you hear? he drank so much he had to go to the HOSPITAL and almost DIED!”) but my role was never part of the story that went around.
Like others, I may have. I was standing in the living room talking on my phone, when a van tore over the median and hit the house next to mine. And it was a handicapped van. (Is that OK to say?-you know, the kind with the lift gate door and high roof.) When it hit the house, it obviously stopped, but the engine was engaged and it kept revving and the tires kept spinning and now they’re smoking.
I ran out and opened the driver’s door, switched off the engine, and pulled him out. He was out cold, but didn’t appear to have any obvious wounds, and I feared the damn thing would catch fire. A neighbor ran out and we got the lift gate door open and pulled out 2 blind people and and guy in a wheelchair. Got them settled away from the van, and my neighbor called 911.
Dunno if I saved anyone’s life, but it felt good, and looking back I think OMG WHAT WAS I THINKING?
But you just don’t.
A long time ago I was in a bar late on a Friday night. Someone came in the bar yelling that a small apartment building was on fire. We looked outside and the flames were coming through the roof. Myself and some other guys ran down to the building and most of the tenants were out in the street safe. However a women in her 30’s yelled that her Mom was still in the building. I stepped inside the building and could hardly see with all the smoke but did see some image about 10 feet in front of me. it was the women and she was petrified as she was blinded by the smoke. I called to her to get her attention and walked to her grabbing her hand and gently walked out of the building with her. She was fine. Just then the Fire Department pulled up. For months her middle age Son couldn’t thank me enough. It turns out that her Daughters ex Husband set the fire. He was a career criminal and had been in trouble with the law before. He got 40 years in jail. I don’t know if he’s still behind bars or dead.
Death by brownie? There are worse ways to go!
The marriage is going well, one kid so far and there is pressure for more grandchildren!
I have been in a position to successfully save somebody’s life on several occasions, and tried unsuccessfully to save somebody’s life on one occasion. I almost never think of the successful attempts, but I think of the unsuccessful attempt often.
My wife and her friends were helping with some old lady in the park who was choking.
They’d tried Hiemlich and the lady passed out. They tried to go into the throat with knife and fork, but couldn’t budge the food.
A chinese lady, who had ER experience as a doctor, was doing vital signs…Heart stopped.
They started doing CPR (compression ) and EAR ( mouth to mouth).
Chinese lady couldn’t get any air in … not strong enough.
So I did. It… Took a really deep breath and blew just as hard as I could.
I cleared her sinuses, so second time I pinched the nose off.
So the old ladies air lag opened up like a hot air balloon being inflated - I got air into the lungs. I could hear the noise of the air going past the food (well sounds like an internal fart…)
Since she had oxygen in her blood again, (CPR moves blood from the lungs to the brain.) and she was lying flat and relaxed, and she had her lungs inflated with a higher than normal pressure, she coughed up the food and came to !.
I once stood between two young women and a knife-wielding maniac.
(To protect the young women, that is.)
I don’t know if they were really in danger of their lives, but they were petrified with fear.
(Of the maniac, that is.)
But you did try, which is more than many would do.
That, and the fact that it still weighs on your mind suggests that you have empathy and a strong appreciation for the value of life.
Maybe it’s a selfish thought, but I think if someone tried and failed to save me from death, I’d want them to think about me from time to time. Not in any kind of torment of regret, but just, . . . I don’t know, . . . as a kind of memorial from someone who cared enough to try.
OK. I’ll leave it at that before I screw it up any more.
But, good on you.
IIRC, because that was 30 years ago, the car in the accident was a Porsche 911. It had just passed me moments before and that’s why I noticed the car, because I’m pretty sure it was a 911 and I’m a fan of the car. My memory is a little hazy on the event, and I’d forgotten about it until this thread came up.
I still don’t know anything about that guy, who he was, or how he fared afterwards.