Sharp Objects Don't Taste Good

Saturday morning started off just like any other -- Elena and I got out of bed, left DRL and Dog Sister sleeping soundly, and went downstairs to have breakfast. She crawled around while I cut up a nectarine and got out some Cheerio's. I scooped her off the floor, put her in her high chair and put breakfast on her tray. She eagerly gobbled up the nectarine, but seemed to be having some trouble swallowing it. I patted her back, she gave a little cough and then a little cry, and she reached for another handful. A moment or two passed, and the second handful was followed by more of the same -- she started gagging while trying to swallow. This time, though, she made a huge fuss and started flailing her arms and crying. She wasn't choking, as she was still able to breathe, but she had something stuck in her throat. I hurriedly got her out of her high chair and picked her up. I held her, and she started throwing up orange/red tinted spit. I assumed this was nectarine and saliva-which at first it was. I did a finger-sweep, hoping to find the culprit, but instead managed to induce more crying, gagging, and arm-flailing. Then, more vomiting, and suddenly - the orange disappered and only red remained. I realized that now there was blood in her vomit. {Insert PANIC}. I screamed for DRL - Twice. Thanks to the fan, the humidifer, and our super solid no-noise-is-getting-through-these-puppies door, the screaming failed to rouse my slumbering husband. I ran up the stairs, threw the door open and screamed for him to get up becuase our baby was throwing up blood and I needed help. ( A little melodramatic, yes, but hello....have you met me?) He jolted out of bed, ran downstairs in a frenzy, swooped her throat while I patted her back and out came the little round metal screen from our kitchen sink's broken aerator. Somehow it fell onto the kitchen floor and of course - being that she's a baby and must taste everything - ended up in Elena's mouth. The frenzied shoving in of nectarine pushed it into her throat at which point her esophogus attempted, with all of its might, to expel the foreign invader. Hence the vomiting and the gagging and the difficulty swallowing. The edges, being razor sharp and all, probably cut her throat up as she was trying to get it out - thus, the blood. She fell asleep after all the craziness, and was mostly fine for the rest of the day. I however -- was mostly a nervous wreck. I had convinced myself that she was crying to tell me that she was bleeding internally and that I need to hurry up and go the hospital already and that I am such a horrible mother. Turns out she was crying because she's a baby, and that's what they do.