Choking

The first question Dean's nurse had for him today was "Have you been chewing your food?" Then I remembered last week that Dean almost choked on a piece of meat from his "Meals on Wheels" while she was here. We both heard him say that his meat was too tough to cut, but we kept on with our conversation till he stood up suddenly with a scared expression on his face and we knew instantly that he was choking.

Even though Carla, the nurse, is a good foot shorter than my tall husband, I'm sure she'd have stood on a chair to give him the Heimlich any second if she had to. But he instinctively pounded his own chest and up came a gigantic piece of meat. It was a miracle it came up. And we were all shaken and thankful that the emergency was averted.

One of the first things that Dean said after it was over was that now he knows how I feel when I have breathing episodes and we've had to call paramedics. I said yes, that's exactly how it feels. It's pretty traumatic when you can't get air.

God breathed into us the breath of life. Our breath can't be underrated. Each one is a gift of God. I feel sorry for those individuals who feel they have to supplement their air with tobacco smoke. They are poisoning the air that God gave them to breathe. I know it's a hard addiction to break, but it's also worth every effort. Recognizing the true source of help in quitting should be easy though. If God gave us our breath in the first place, He must have an interest in restoring it to us. As a woman on oxygen myself and seeing my dad die of lung cancer and emphysema, I encourage everyone to keep trying as many times as it takes to quit the habit.