Nationwide — Brittney McWhite, an African American mother from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, made the heartbreaking decision to remove her two children, 11-year-old London Marie and 14-year-old Wadale, from life support after they drowned during a holiday pool party. She now hopes their story serves as a warning to other families.
The tragedy happened in Gloucester County, New Jersey, where the family attended a Memorial Day weekend gathering. Brittney’s daughters were playing in the pool with other kids. The game involved diving underwater, holding their breath, and calling out “Marco Polo.”
At the time, Brittney was helping set up food and didn’t notice anything wrong. But when she looked around, she realized her kids were missing from the water. “I was looking around or whatever I saw the water. I didn’t see nobody,” the mom said, according to Fox 29.
Though both children knew how to swim, they were pulled unconscious from the bottom of the pool just minutes later. Emergency responders arrived at 6:46 p.m. and tried to revive them. The siblings were placed on life support, but the lack of oxygen caused irreversible brain damage.
A week later, their parents made the heartbreaking choice to let them go. “Keeping my child hooked onto a machine for the rest of their life is not ideally what any parent should want for their children, so today me and dad decided to end life support,” she said.
She said London and Wadale were very different in personality, but they shared a close bond. London was about to turn 12. Wadale had just graduated from 8th grade.
“I know they’re at peace, it’s just very devastating,” said Brittney. “Not to lose one child but two. I think that’s more challenging because you can’t stomach that, but you have to keep going.”
Through her grief, Brittney is urging other parents to stay alert during pool time. She stressed the need for constant supervision, avoiding risky games, and making sure safety measures are in place.
“Make sure if it doesn’t look right, don’t do it. Because once you lose your child, it is hard. It’s really hard to stomach,” she said.