Ian had another breath holding spell today. This time it was at school. He really freaked out his teachers and some of the kids.

I guess he was on the playground and he had a little altercation with one of the other kids. He said that someone punched him in the stomach and he fell and hit his head. He ran up to the art teacher, Miss Julie. I think that by the time he ran to her, he was past the crying stage and in the gasping stage. She said that when she looked down at him his face was white and his lips were blue, and then he fell down. She picked him up and saw he wasn’t breathing. She grabbed him and ran into the school calling to the other teachers to call 911. Subie called, and then heard that it was Ian.

I had explained all about the breath holding spells to her at the beginning of the year. I told her what they were and how to deal with them. I didn’t want to scare her, but I wanted her to know about them, and know what to do in case he had one. When she heard that it was Ian, she remembered that he had breath holding spells, and she hung up with 911. I guess the call had already gone through, so they called back. They ended up sending a police officer later in the day just to check things out.

Subie called me right after it happened. At that point he was back to normal. I asked her if she wanted me to come pick him up, but she said no. I told her to just try to play it as low key as possible. Try to give him as little attention about the whole thing as she could. I didn’t want him to get a lot of extra attention about it. I wanted the rest of his day to be as normal as possible. I didn’t want them to do anything that would encourage him to do it again.

All the commotion scared some of the kids, and some of the parents were concerned about why the police had been at school. I was sorry that they had to experience the whole situation. I gave Miss Julie a hug when I saw her. I told them all that I know how scary it is and I have seen many, many of them. The first one is terrifying!

I guess the only positive thing is that it gave Little Miners a taste of what to do in the case of a real emergency. Subie said it was a good run through and helped them figure out some better ways to deal with emergency situations. So, maybe this will help another child in case of a real emergency.