I've been meaning to write this down for a while, mostly because Lauren never would.

On November 4, 2023, we were photographing a wedding reception at Silvertip Resort in Canmore. Lauren Gardener, one of our photographers, was seated at a table with the groom's uncle during dinner when she noticed something wasn't right. He was choking.

As she later told Global News, "He was tearing up and wasn't able to get it out and he was having a hard time breathing."

I was in the room too. I heard some commotion and Lauren stood up and asked if anybody knew the Heimlich maneuver. Then she didn't wait for an answer. She gave him a few blows to the back, then abdominal thrusts. On the third thrust, he was able to cough it out.

A smiling woman with long hair sits beside an older man in a patterned tie at a banquet table during a formal dinner event.

"Thankfully he was able to get it out on the third thrust. He coughed it out a little bit, and was very grateful. His wife was sitting beside him, and she was grateful as well," Lauren said.

What stays with me is how fast it all happened. She didn't hesitate at all. The credit is all hers, and I'm proud of her.

Lauren will tell you it was nothing special. Her last first aid training was a babysitting course about twenty years earlier. As a mom, though, she had quietly prepared herself. "I've got kids, so I've always kind of walked myself through mentally what would happen if they were choking," she said.

It made me think about our industry. Wedding teams are at dinners with hundreds of guests, often several times a week. If anything, that night was a reminder for all of us, me included, to take a first aid refresher.

Bride and groom pose with three guests inside a rustic wedding venue with wood beams, string lights, and elegantly set tables.
Camera operator films a woman in an olive jacket being interviewed in a festive room with white Christmas trees and wrapped gifts.
A woman stands in a bright room with large windows while a camera operator films a second woman during an on-location video interview.

Thank you, Lauren.

Todd Kwiczak, Tkshotz Photography