A devastated father from New Jersey recounted the heartbreaking moment he found his 3-year-old son unresponsive in their pool over the weekend.
Elijah Stephen reportedly slipped out of his Blackwood home on Saturday and tragically drowned in his family’s pool, as stated in various reports.
Michael Stephen, the boy’s father, recalled being in the kitchen when he realized the back door was left ajar. “My heart broke,” he expressed in an emotional social media update on Monday.
Rushing to the backyard, both he and his wife, Sandra “Sandy” Chevilun, were met with “the worst sight a parent could ever see.” Elijah was face down in the water, blue-lipped and unresponsive.
“That image will be burned into my mind forever,” wrote Stephen, a police officer and military veteran, with great sorrow.
He lamented, “I wasn’t fast enough. I failed. I will repeat that every day.” Immediately, he began administering chest compressions, and paramedics arrived just two minutes after Chevilun called for help.
Elijah was taken to a local hospital, but, unfortunately, doctors were unable to revive him due to severe swelling in his brain.
“In the next few days, we will lose our sweet son, whether he survives or not, he won’t have quality of life,” Stephen shared.
Through social media, the family has expressed their intention to prepare Elijah for organ donation in the coming days.
“If I can help other parents avoid this pain, I will do everything I can,” he affirmed. “Illya would want that too.”
Remembering his son, Stephen described him as a “kind and gentle soul,” emphasizing, “He had a big smile that lit up a room.”
“I’ll spend the rest of my life wondering what went wrong,” he wrote, reflecting on the loss.
In a somber warning to fellow parents, he conveyed that just 10 minutes can be enough to “change a life.”
“Never take it for granted. Hold your baby. Hold them longer, hold them tighter,” he urged. “You never know when it will be the last time.”
