BIG CAT

Lynne, my friend and I were busy chatting away in the playroom of our house in Ilkley. Lynne has Harry who is very close in age to Ben, and then they were both just under two. Lynne had also just had a baby, Oliver, who was in the playroom with us.

Harry and Ben were chasing around like two year olds do, but seemed perfectly happy so we left them to it, giving us chance to coo over baby Oliver and have a good old natter.

Suddenly, there was screaming, real loud proper screaming - coming from one of the boys, from around the corner. I jumped up and diligently rushed in the direction of the noise.

What I saw will stay with me a long time!Bens bottom was up in the air and his arms flailing around whilst his head was nowhere to be seen. On closer inspection, I could see that it was stuck in the cat flap in the front door!!!!!!

Don't panic Ruth I said to myself, jumping up and down on the spot. Harry was screaming too by now as Lynne joined me in the hall carrying Oliver.

What to do now? Join in with the screaming?Phone the fire brigade? Saw off the side off the door? Pull Ben backwards? Push Ben forwards?

After assessing the situation for a few minutes (poor Ben, but we had to think about it!) Lynne and I came up with a plan. Much as both of us would have loved some hunky firemen to come rushing round we decided we needed to take matters into our own hands.

I took hold of Bens torso whilst lynne opened the front door, manouvering him backwards with the door keeping his head still. It was well and truly stuck and he continued to scream. I talked soothingly to him telling him of our plan.

The plan was this: Lynne pushed Bens head gently from one side, while I pulled the whole of him back from the other side. At first it looked like he wouldn't shift, but then he had a tiny movement, he screamed louder but we continued. Eventually, with a pop, his head came free.

Poor kid was traumatised for a while and had two lovely red raw 'scrapes' down either side of his head which took a week to disappear.

And the moral of the story is : cat flaps really are just for cats. A hard lesson to learn when you're just two!