Tracy Anderwald, 34, told ABC News today that she and her daughter, Allison Anderwald, had been "enjoying a mommy-daughter day" in her sister's backyard pool Friday when she suddenly had a seizure, blacked out and sank 4 feet down to the pool's floor. "Allison's been swimming since she was two-and-a-half," Tracy said. "Tracy is my sister, best friend, my whole world," Hunt said of her sister. After Allison realized her mom had not come up from the water for over five minutes, she jumped in, pulled her mother to the shallow end of the pool and flipped her body over so her head wasn't in the water. Hunt said she immediately called 911 and emergency personnel then took Tracy to CHRISTUS Spohn Hospital Corpus Christi-Memorial in Corpus Christi, Texas. One of the mom’s sisters, Tedra Hunt, said she happened to be walking over to the house when little Allison ran to tell her what happened.
– Last Friday was a normal "mommy-daughter" day for Tracy Anderwald and her 5-year-old daughter, Allison. The two were playing Marco Polo in a backyard pool in Portland, Texas, but the next thing Anderwald knew, she was waking up in a nearby hospital without a clue as to how she got there, reports the Corpus Christi Caller-Times. Home surveillance footage on YouTube and the shy voice of little Allison tell the story of a close call—Anderwald had suffered a seizure in four feet of water and, after a few minutes lying motionless on the bottom of the pool, Allison knew it had been too long and dragged her mother to the shallow end, where she rolled her body over. Anderwald's sister, Tedra Hunt, was walking to the house as Allison pulled her mother to the shallow end, and footage shows the girl running for help as soon as her mother's face was out of the water. "The doctors explained to us that had Tracy been underwater any longer, she probably wouldn't be with us right now," Hunt, 32, tells ABC News. "It is truly amazing that this little girl, who’s actually also pretty small for her age, was able to save my sister." Hunt says their father, who died two years ago, was a "guardian angel;" Anderwald, 34, will undergo neurological tests to figure out what caused the seizure, which she'd never had before. The sisters are sharing their story in the hopes of demonstrating the importance of teaching children to swim. Allison, their "little mermaid" and "little hero," has been swimming since she was a toddler. (This skilled Dartmouth swimmer drowned.)