Choking

The other day I had an interesting experience: for the first time in my life I choked. I know everyone occasionally coughs on chips that get stuck sideways or water that goes down the wrong way, but this choking experience was unlike anything I've ever had before.
The sun was going down. I was sitting on my parent's deck with a friend, watching the varnished wood gleam like gold in the evening light and feeling content and satisfied. I had a cup of tea and we had been eating stale chips and ice cream. I know what you're thinking, it must have been the chips. If only life were that simple.
I've been sick for the last two weeks and have been coughing a lot, uncontrollably at times, which makes it a bit difficult to drink anything as you might imagine. Well, I was taking a sip of tea from my cup. At that very moment my friend Forest was telling me a story of how that day at work a customer had flipped out at him and had been swearing at him. I know you should never laugh at another's misfortune, but it somehow struck me as funny and I started to laugh.
It was as if my epiglottis completely failed to do it's job and the tea all poured down into my lungs and suddenly it was like drowning. My face turned purple (okay, I didn't see it but I think it probably turned purple) and I couldn't breathe. I sprayed tea all over the table and began to cough and sputter and struggle for breath in between. To no avail. I jumped up from my chair and tried to cough. And then, my friends, I ran out of the room.
My motivation was simple: I was gagging and coughing and worried that I was about to vomit and that is not an attractive thing to look at. I wanted to maintain my dignity. They say you should never leave the room when choking and now I know why they need to say it. Well, anyway, I ran into the bathroom and gagged and coughed over the sink. Then I ran back into the kitchen and my friend was looking worried cause I could still barely breathe. I thought, maybe if I turn upside down the tea will drain out of my lungs. (Hello, anyone have any better suggestions?) I turned upside down and my friend whacked my back for about three minutes. It wasn't really super helpful, but eventually I was able to breathe again.
I spent the rest of the evening coughing and feeling like something the dog dragged in. But it got me thinking about all those people who routinely suffer from choking. People with pneumonia and collapsed lungs and no gag reflex and strokes and paralysis. Not being able to breathe is possibly the most terrifying feeling in the world. We are programmed to fight to breathe no matter what happens.
I remember as a younger girl desperately wanting to be able to faint (how romantic!) I remember holding my breath hoping that I would pass out, but inevitably, I would breathe. I just liked breathing too much to sacrifice it for being able to faint. Thank God.
But even though it was a horrible experience, I'm glad I know what it feels like to really choke now. Now when I'm working in the hospital and one of my patients chokes, and I see that panicked look on their face and after I get them breathing again they have that red-eyed exhausted look of someone who stared fear and death in the face, I'll be able to empathize with them. We don't always have to experience someone's pain to be able to suffer with them, but sometimes it adds the immediacy and the urgency to our response that would otherwise be lacking.