29-year-old Marika Magriplis was holding her five-month-old son, Antonio, when he suddenly stopped breathing in her arms.
Doctors believe the “one-off, freak occurrence” could have resulted in fatal Sudden Infant Death Syndrome had Marika not performed CPR on her infant so quickly.
Highlighting the fact that her first aid knowledge was key in ensuring her son’s survival, the former body-building champion took to Facebook to warn parents how easily it can happen, and to learn first aid.
"A big scare for our little family today, when Antonio stopped breathing and I had to use my First Aid knowledge and perform CPR. While feeding him his bottle he suddenly stopped breathing and became unresponsive. As you can imagine it was immensely terrifying," she wrote.
The mum had recently completed a course which, thankfully, had taught her how to respond in a number of emergency situations.
Her partner, Luke Schembri, took to the social media site to praise her for her quick thinking: “To keep a cool, calm head and perform CPR on her lifeless child for 3 minutes Marika you really are a Supermum.[sic]”
They are now warning all parents about the importance of learning CPR, with Luke explaining: “For every minute that someone who has lost consciousness with no pulse and CPR is not performed immediately the chances of survival decrease by 10%. After 10 minutes pretty much no chance of recovery.”
“I can only recommend that everybody does a basic senior first aid course so if you're in a situation like this with a loved one you too can have the best chance of a good outcome,” Marika finished by saying.
