Would You Jump?

I would say I absolutely would. BUT, my daughter was just shy of 4 and we went to a friends pool party at their house. My daughter jumped in and couldn't swim!! I was headed inside to change into my suit, and she was supposed to be waiting with my sister and my 8 week old. I just stood there screaming "someone save my baby!!!" Another mom jumped in fully clothed and got her out.

Hindsight is 20-20 and we all say we would, but when something happens, I think it's more typical to freeze from fear.

I used to work in some pretty hairy siutations. One thing that taught me is that NO ONE knows what they're going to do, or how they're going to react, until they're in that situation.

Some people run away
Some people hide
Some people collapse
Some people freeze
Some people are violently ill
Some people have heart attacks / strokes
Some people restrain others (whether right or wrong, they "leech" onto whomever is nearby)
Some people turn their back
Some people cheer
Some people leap before looking
Some people rally others into leaping before looking
Some people are business as usual

See that last one? That's what military, paramilitary, cops, firefighters, and other Emergency Response personell TRAIN for. Usually going through MOST of the above reactions at some point in the training process.

"Slow is Fast" is part of that, and comes from ...

Slow is steady
Steady is smooth
Smooth is fast
.....

Would I HOPE that I'd ninja in?
Sure.
Would I?
I'll let you know next time it happens.

Twenty years ago, when working in retail, I would sometimes encounter shoplifters. Big shoplifters. Guys who could break my spine like a toothpick. And not even thinking, I would chase them out into the parking lot. Stupid, huh? Yeah. I'm not sure what I expected to do about it, but I chased them anyway, shouting, "Shoplifter!!". Got some plates and car makes and the direction they sped off to. But I could have been punched, pushed, knifed or shot. Big dummy.

I don't think I would jump in to that pen because it would be the heroic thing to do, I think I would jump in because, like before, my brain would turn off and try to get the job done. "This can't happen, you've got to fix it, dammit!"

I can't believe the horror that child and his mother had to go through.

Heck I would want to jump in and save my child. But I know from experience that once my kid ran in front of a car. I just froze. I had absolutely no control over it....I wanted to chase her and grab her.....but I just screamed and didn't move.

She was fine.....close call....but enough to traumatized me.

Does that make me a bad mom? No, I would do anything for her. But Reilly's right...we don't know how our BODY will react in a situation. Every person and situation different.

I feel so bad for this family.

i agree with Riley J.

having said that, that was the first thing i thought. literally -OVER MY DEAD BODY.

i truly do feel very strongly that i'd mama-bear on this one and die trying if necessary.

but you know...we will never know, like Riley ALSO said. i hope we never have to find out.

Well, my child would never be held over a pack of wild dogs...so there's that. (I think she should be charged with a crime, for the record.)

Of course, I say I would jump. I don't actually know if I would, because I've never been in a "jump" situation. I hope I'm lucky enough to never be. I know I'm not stupid enough to be a situation like she was. Most hairy situations are blink of an eye, wrong place wrong time, bad luck. Hers, was not bad luck. Hers, was negligence and stupidity.

I have jumped into water after a child (not mine), and have Heimliched a choking child. I have pulled apart fighting dogs who each weighed almost as much as me. So I would most likely go into a dog pack after a kid.

I would jump. But no f'in way would I have held a 2yo on a railing over wild animals like that.

well, it would be stupid, wouldn't it? two dead people instead of one. i'm glad the other people stopped that poor mom, but i totally understand where she was coming from.
sensible doesn't factor in when it's this sort of split-second emergency. i'd probably have been right there with that mom, over the wall and damn the torpedoes. but that doesn't make it smart.
if i had been there that day, i'd have been one of the ones holding the mom back, i expect.
such a terrible thing.
:( khairete
S.

My child? Absolutely!
Someone else's? I would like to think so.

To be completely honest, I don't know. I hate to say that I don't think I would go in after someone else's child. I think it's a situation you have to be in to really KNOW what you would do.

I'd like to say I would jump in to save my child (and any other child) but I have never been in that exact situation. I KNOW my husband would jump in and not just for his child but for any child. Like Reilly said, its what he has been trained to do but its also who he is.

I have gone in, fully clothed, to save my oldest son from drowning at swim lessons when he was 2.5 and the instructor was on the other end of the pool while allowing the kids to be in the water and hanging on the edge.

I tend to react first, think later. Not always a good thing.

I would jump in after my child. I would rather be torn to pieces myself by dogs than to watch it happen to my kid while I stood there and screamed. I'd like to think I'd jump in and lay my body on top of his body to protect him. I think I would punch anyone that tried to stop me from jumping. God forbid.