Being a parent is a scary thing at times. You love your children so much and the thought of something bad happening to them is unbearable. I can not even comprehend how parents who lose a child can go on living. It doesn’t seem possible to me. That is my biggest fear in life. You do your best to protect them and keep them safe, but there are just somethings that are out of your control.
The scariest day of my life was 3 years ago, on a Saturday afternoon. Ethan was 2 years old. The fence on the side yard had blown down, and Tony and the neighbor were out back trying to put it back up. Ethan wanted to go outback to “help his daddy”, but I was afraid to let him because my neighbors have a pool and I didn’t want him wondering off. Tony swore to me he would keep a good eye on him, so against my better judgement, I let him go out there with his daddy. I couldn’t relax, I was nervous and had this uneasy feeling in my gut. I went out front and was talking to my neighbors wife, and I kept looking in the backyard to see if I could see Ethan. He was back there helping daddy, I could hear him and see him. I turned my back for a few minutes and got into a deep conversation with my neighbor. All of a sudden, I got this panic feeling and I yelled to Tony, “where is Ethan?” He said “He’s right here.” But in my soul, I knew he wasn’t. I took off running to their back yard, I slammed the gate opened and was screaming “ETHAN ETHAN ETHAN.” I heard a very faint cry. I ran to the pool and I saw a hole in the cover. OH MY GOD. I couldn’t believe this was happening. I ran to where I saw the whole and there was my baby. His entire body was submerged, his head barely above the water. He saw me and said, faintly “mommy.” I was able to grab him from the edge of the pool and pull him out. He started burping up air, and crying. My head was spinning, I felt like I was going to faint. I screamed “Tony, come quick our baby was in the pool!!!!” I was hysterical, I didn’t know how long he had been there, how much water he had swallowed, I was horrified.
Tony came running and the first thing he said was “Ethan, I told you to stay with daddy.” I was overcome with so many emotions, I started hitting Tony and screaming “YOU were supposed to be watching him, don’t you dare blame him, don’t you dare!!!”
I almost passed out, I was overwhelmed. I sat right there and held my boy and cried and cried and kissed him and cried and hugged him and cried. I thanked God for watching over him and keeping him for drowning. I do believe an angel held my baby up and kept him safe until I could get there.
I hope I never have to go through an ordeal like that again and I will forever be grateful that my child was one of the lucky ones.
No matter how good of a parent you are, or how hard you try to keep them safe, in an instant something can go wrong and disaster can strike. It can be an overwhelming thought at times, and I better stop thinking about it right now before I go and make myself crazy.
That must of been awful hon..
It is so easy for a minute to slip by and something like that happen..
Liam ran into the middle of a busy road once..
That was the most horrible experience of my life 🙁
But I was so frightened I shouted at him at first.. then I just broke down there in the street and we sat and the ground crying for what seemed like eternity 🙂
How horribly scary that must have been! Now that you’ve got it down on paper, try to relax, breathe deep, and thank God you still have your boys. It’s the scariest thing in the world to think something might happen to your children. It will never completely go away, but as time goes by it will get easier to live with the memory of the “almost”.
Mother’s intuition is not something I would ever discount. It is an amazing gift from God. Truly.
Y, twelve years of my life spent with a woman has TOTALLY convinced me that “woman’s intuition” is for real. ALWAYS go with your gut instinct.
And your reaction in that instance was TOTALLY reasonable. Tony blew it.
i can see why.
you are blessed, girl.
Holy shit…… what a scary story…. reminds me of something that happened to my Connor when he was 2, I think I’ll blog about it.
So glad that Ethan was okay and that your mother’s intuition was so strong!!!!
oh man. Thats some scareyshit. I don’t even like it when my boy hurts himself, its the worst thing, so I can’t (won’t) even imagine what it would be like to lose him….
omg…that brought tears to my eyes, girl…i can’t even imagine such a thing…you all were blessed that day…
Oh. My. Goodness. I had a near-drowning incident when I was little, and that was scary as hell for me. I can’t imagine what it would have been like for a parent. That’s the kind of stuff that makes you think there’s a higher power (if you don’t already).