I jumped in, pulled her out and gave her to my husband, an emergency physician, who immediately started cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). She was not breathing, had no pulse, and her face was blue. To my absolute horror, she was dead. Three doctors rushed toward my husband and baby and started pulling at her saying they were doctors – only one of whom actually knew CPR, and he knew adult CPR. Although they had good intentions, this meant my husband had to actively remove their hands from Alexandra and ignore their instructions while he methodically performed child CPR. Eventually, she started breathing and threw up plenty of pool water. She was groggy as we rushed her in the hotel's truck to a nearby hospital. The exam and x-rays showed she was fine and, miraculously, within an hour of the drowning, she was acting completely normal.

Our story, as it turns out, is not uncommon. More than 600 preschoolers drown every year, and thousands more are hospitalized due to near-drownings. At the resort where we were staying three families told us remarkably similar stories. Since we've returned home we have heard several other similar stories. In every case, two responsible adults were taking care of a child younger than 5, and each adult thought that the child was with the other. In most cases, the incident occurred on the first day of a vacation (presumably when the exact rules of shared supervision had not been worked out yet), and, in many cases, the child died because there was no one around who truly knew how to perform CPR.

We are extremely careful parents who have made our child's safety a priority in our lives. We have carefully childproofed our house, and we never leave her unsupervised. We, of course, knew, as did all of the parents we talked with, that one should never leave a child without supervision near any amount of water. However, this accident was not about knowledge of potential environmental hazards, it was about knowing how to communicate effectively and the importance of not making assumptions.

We stayed at the resort for five days after the incident and, although we didn't sleep very well, we enjoyed and celebrated every minute with our loving daughter. To get through this incident we have decided on some basic rules. As far as communication, we have decided that the default is that Alexandra is always with me unless I ask my husband or he tells me he will watch her. Designating one adult as responsible leaves no room for assumptions like the ones we made that day.

Second, taking a first aid or CPR class once is not enough. I took such a class shortly after the birth of Alexandra and had read articles on CPR, but when I was confronted with my dead baby, I had no memory of what I was suppose to do. I now will take the class every year, as recommended, in case something should happen to my baby or anyone else's baby when my husband is not around. Finally, we have decided to tell all the parents we know about our story. It is awful to relive it with each telling, but it would be worse to have a family lose their child because they didn't have the opportunity to learn from our experience.

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