Well, I was that parent too. And then one day everything changed in the blink of an eye. 

It takes a while to come to terms with the fact when “that would be so terrible” turns into “I can’t believe this happened to me.” Shock and disbelief take a long time to get over. 

On August 6th, 2012, we lost our 4-year old son Xander to drowning. The day our lives changed tragically forever, we were now that family. On a summer day playing with my three children and our friends in the pool, two short minutes changed everything.

The kids and I had met my friend and her three children for an afternoon at the community pool in her neighborhood. We all swam numerous times a week and were in the water all the time.

Immediately I was confused by the layout of this pool and the sight obstructions from many angles. I said to my friend, we would just have to watch them closely in this odd pool configuration. We began our day of swimming after a quick lunch. My two older girls could swim proficiently and we were still working on Xander jumping in and getting his face wet. He didn’t love water on his face but we were making strides. 

All day my son was attached at the hip to my girlfriend’s daughter, who was 3, they were inseparable; he was very smitten that day. Always a very loving boy, compassionate and wanted to take care of everyone.

After following Xander with his friend on his hip around the bend of the shallow lazy river, my middle daughter asked me to help her get watermelon out of the cooler, so I asked my girlfriend to watch the little ones. Her son called her a couple feet away and when she turned back around, the little ones had stepped too far where the slope starts to get deeper. 

I’m sure Xander panicked when the water touched his face and couldn’t turn around. When my friend turned around his face was under and he was holding his little friend up above the water, which pushed him down. It all happened in less than 2 minutes. 

They were pulled out immediately but he had slipped unconscious. We were amazed that there was a nurse at the pool that day with her children who began CPR right away. Unfortunately, it took too long to get a heartbeat, his tummy was full of lunch. Paramedics finally got a heartbeat after what proved to be too long. We were immediately flown by CareFlight to Cook Children’s in Ftort Worth, Texas where we could not have asked for better care. They did everything they possibly could and took amazing care of our son in his last days. 

In the grief and suffering and disbelief of losing our third-born child, baby and only boy, our hearts and minds have been so expanded by the knowledge and love of the amazing nurses and doctors at Cooks Children’s. The support system they have is amazing.  When they told us he would never wake we immediately agreed for our son to be an organ and tissue donor, we are proud that he went on to save so many lives. And we are grateful for the love and support we received from Cook Children’s and LifeGift donation care at an unimaginable time of our lives. 

Do not buy the misconception from the movies of drowning. There is no splashing or screaming. It is silent and it happens FAST. My mission as his mother now is to carry on what I’ve learned in his name and work for safety and knowledge for parents and children.

It can be a pool, bathtub, toilet, sink or even a pail of water. I am now a fierce advocate with Cook Children’s and the Fort Worth Drowning Prevention Coalition to spread the word of the importance of water safety. I will honor my son until the day I die and I hope I’m teaching my girls to do the same. Even two seconds is too long to turn your back on a child in the water.

Unfortunately, I learned the hard way but I hope our story helps even one family be more aware. I would give anything in this world to kiss and hug my baby boy again. I pray no one ever has to feel what we have.  Please be aware and cherish every single moment you have with your children.

Dr. Aaron spent her morning on Thursday, July 24, doing interviews with newspaper, radio and three local TV stations.

“I’ve never been one to reach out to the media or certainly get in front of the camera,” Dr. Aaron said. “I’ve had those times where I’ve been asked to be on camera and needed to do that. This is the first time where I’ve ever picked up the phone and called our team and said, ‘Guys, we need to do something. We need to reach out because three in one week … that’s just too many.’”

The mother of a 2-year-old son, the swimming deaths hit way too close for Dr. Aaron. All three children who died were between the ages of 2 to 4 years old. The teams at Cook Children’s involved in the three drowning events met with Cameron Brown, a member of Cook Children’s Pastoral Care and a firefighter, who is specially trained to lead caregivers through a critical incident stress debriefing. To put it simply, they were heart broken.

“This is what we do. This is our profession, but it impacts us,” Dr. Aaron said. “We’ve had great sorrow. That is minimal to what we sense must be happening with these families and close friends. It’s unusual for us to have three cases in one week ... and we still have many weeks of summer left.”

What makes the deaths even more tragic is the fact that most drownings are preventable. Dana Walraven, Cook Children’s Community Health Outreach manager and Safe Kids Tarrant County coordinator, also spent the day with media to discuss drowning prevention steps. Texas has the highest incidence of swimming pool- and spa-related childhood drownings in the United States. All three children who died were pool related incidents.

Drowning is the leading cause of unintentional deaths for children 1 to 4 years of age. The common myth of children splashing, waving their arms around and yelling is simply not true.

“In many drowning situations, an adult was just a few feet away from the pool and didn’t realize anything was wrong because he or she didn’t hear any sounds of distress, such as splashing or yelling,” Walraven said. “Drowning is a silent event that can occur in the time it takes to send a text message. Should supervision fail for any reason, having multiple layers in place helps protect your child.”

Walraven offers these drowning prevention basics:

• Have your children take swim lessons.
• Have the entire family taking swim and safety lessons.
• Learn CPR.
• Provide 100 percent supervision without distractions.
• Use pool and child alarms to alert you if your child gets in the water without you.
• Isolate your pool from the rest of your backyards with a permanent, four-sided fence with self-latching gates to prevent kids from accessing the pool area without adult supervision.

“We realize that it could happen to anyone,” Dr. Aaron said. “It happens very, very quickly. We’re not being judgmental. We feel so strongly about this and knowing how it impacts us we wanted to reach out and raise awareness to the community.”

For more information:

• Drowning prevention
• Water safety
• Vento family story
• Cookchildrens.org/safety
• Backyard and Pool: Household Safety Checklist
• Household Safety: Preventing Drowning