Gratitude for Mother's Love: 90 World-Class Mother Love Stories That Influence a Lifetime

Author: Wen Hua, Xin Tong / Country: Mainland China
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-05-01
Features: On a crisp autumn morning in October 1986, the sun shone warmly over a house in the El Mirage Desert area, not far from Los Angeles. Disabled mother Cindy Dunlop was watching her 17-month-old daughter, Kaila, playing happily by the swimming pool with her long-haired dog, Cross. Suddenly, the phone rang. Cindy maneuvered her wheelchair toward the nearest phone, which was located in the garage at the corner of the yard. Due to a car accident years ago, she was paralyzed from the waist down. As she rolled to the garage to answer the call, she learned it was a neighbor calling to chat. After just a few words, Cindy heard splashing sounds coming from the swimming pool. She thought, "It must be Cross jumping in again." The dog jumped into the pool several times a day, but the splashing stopped, and the dog began barking wildly. She instantly felt something was wrong—dogs that jumped into the water would splash continuously, not bark endlessly. She immediately hung up the phone and rolled her wheelchair around the corner toward the pool.
Just as she rounded the corner, she was startled to see her daughter Kaila had fallen into the pool, face down, floating there. The frantic Cross ran along the pool edge, barking and trying to grab the child in the water. Seeing this scene, Cindy nearly fainted. Her husband, Ron, was at work, a 90-minute drive away from home. The nearest hospital was 25 miles away, and the closest neighbor was half a mile away. At that moment, she realized no one would arrive in time to help her. She quickly rolled her wheelchair toward the pool. Her only thought was, "I have to save my child myself."
Cindy could swim, something she learned over the summer to treat her injuries, but Ron always helped her get in and out of the water because she lacked the strength to move her paralyzed lower body. Kaila was now floating far from the pool edge. There was no time to stop her wheelchair or reach the edge to get to her daughter. Cindy's only option was to keep rolling her wheelchair straight toward the pool.
When Cindy's wheelchair plunged into the water, she immediately sank. The cold pool water made it hard to breathe, but she struggled to swim with her hands, keeping her eyes fixed on Kaila, who was floating 25 feet away. She quickly swam to her daughter's side, grabbed her arm with one hand, and pushed her toward the pool edge with the other. When Kaila flipped over, Cindy saw her lips were purple and her eyes were closed, with no signs of breathing. Cindy pushed Kaila to the edge but couldn't kick with her legs, so she had to swim with one hand. Unconsciously, she slipped underwater and lost hold of her daughter.
Gritting her teeth, she swam back, took a deep breath, and put her arms under the child, gripping the pool edge with her nails and pressing her head against Kaila to push her up. Half of the child's body was out of the water, but the effort made her inhale water over her head, and Kaila slid off her head and fell back into the pool. Cindy took another breath and tried again, but failed once more. She tried quickly a third time, this time with more experience, keeping her head straight and her right shoulder higher. As she pushed the child upward, she felt her roll over her hands and land on the poolside.
Cindy grabbed the pool edge with her arms, pressing her body close to it, and began CPR on her daughter—once, twice—but there was no response. She felt desperate. Then she remembered her own struggle after the car accident years ago and started CPR again. Finally, Kaila began breathing, coughing and gasping, then crying. Cindy shouted, "Don't be afraid, Mommy's here." She noticed Kaila's lips were still purple and her eyes vacant. Knowing she could suffer brain damage from oxygen deprivation, Cindy immediately swam 15 feet across the pool to where Ron was waiting to help her out. She pushed herself up with her arms and chest, finally dragging her legs onto the shore.
Kaila was crying loudly on the poolside, and Cindy feared she might fall back in, so she quickly crawled toward her on the cement ground. After a while, she finally reached her daughter and held her tightly. Exhausted but determined, she put Kaila on her back and carried her toward the grassy yard. Suddenly, she noticed blood on the ground. Checking Kaila, she found the child was unharmed but realized the blood was coming from her own foot. Her foot was already raw from the cement, and her hands were cut. Once on the grass, farther from the pool, she gently set Kaila down. She knew she could quickly find the phone in her bedroom. Crawling across the yard, she reached the bedroom and picked up the phone on the nightstand, dialing 911.
Cindy spoke frantically to the operator, "My child fell into the pool. I've started CPR. She's crying now." The operator asked, "Where do you live?" She replied, "Ash Road." The operator said, "We'll send an ambulance right away." Cindy then called Ron. "The daughter's in trouble! She fell into the pool!" Ron heard Kaila crying on the other end and told Cindy not to panic. He quickly called their neighbor, Hugh Brown, who happened to be home and arrived within five minutes.
By then, both Kaila and Cindy were shivering from the cold. Brown picked up Kaila, took off her wet clothes, dried her with a towel, and put her in bed under the blankets. Then he carried Cindy to the bed as well, waiting for the ambulance to take them to the hospital. Once at the hospital, Cindy's hands and feet were bandaged. The doctor told her, "Kaila is doing well. There are no aftereffects from the lack of oxygen."
Though the doctors assured Cindy that Kaila would be fine and praised her bravery, she still felt down. Just then, Ron entered the room, scooped up his daughter, and asked Cindy, "Is Kaila okay?" Cindy nodded. Ron asked, "And you?" Cindy nodded again. Ron hugged her tightly and said, "Cindy, you're amazing. I knew you'd do this." Tears streamed down Cindy's face—tears of gratitude and relief.
([American] Jay Stuller) P3-5