Miracle Baby Helps Family Hold On to Hope

When Tiffany Sarabia heard the bang of a car door, her eyes widened into big saucers as she jerked her body around. The noise prompted her dad to kneel and embrace the 1 1/2-year-old toddler, who was called the Miracle Baby of Laguna Beach.

“No mija, esta bien,” cooed her father, Carmelo Sarabia, in Spanish, telling her things were OK.

Christmas will have a special meaning for the Sarabia family. “We’re thankful that God saved Tiffany and that despite our problems with money, we’re all alive and safe,” said Carmelo.

Ten months have passed since a wall of mud and debris crashed through the Sarabias’ rented house in Laguna Beach. One second they were watching television, the next they were tumbling down a hill, in the darkness, with such force that Tiffany’s mother could not hold on to her.

Her parents, trapped in mud and covered in lumber and debris, were unable to go after the child. Worse yet, mud had gotten into her mother’s mouth and, at first, she couldn’t scream for her daughter.

“I had to clean my mouth out and I was cleaning it out so I could yell for help for my baby,” recalled Teresa Sarabia, 43.

A short time later, a passerby plucked what he thought was a ball of mud from a watery flow and was surprised to discover it was a baby. The infant was passed to firefighters, who tended to her before she was sent to a local hospital with only a few cuts.

The family lost all their possessions. Gone are the cherished pictures the family kept of their older children, Ivonne, 20, and Efrain, 21, who escaped serious injury. Clothes, furniture, cash kept in the home, pots and pans, all became part of the mucky river that swept down Laguna Canyon Road.

The family has recovered from most of their injuries, yet Tiffany still startles easily. Carmelo, 40, has returned to his job as a handyman at a local animal clinic. But he remains cautious about the possibility of a blood clot that may have developed in his calf and he still has pain in his right knee where it was struck by metal debris.

Teresa has not recovered from the trauma. Her back, once bruised and discolored a dark blue, now has welts. Two large gashes in her calf never healed properly, leaving two wide, unsightly scars running down her leg that depress her.

But the human spirit is strong in the Sarabia household and this Christmas will be spent celebrating life, not chaos.

A local family who knew of the family’s plight visited several days ago, bringing cookies and gifts. Another family brought tamales, and a third family donated a Christmas tree.

Red and white Christmas stockings, the only items retrieved from the disaster, have been washed and hung.

A lack of money worries both parents. Teresa had been employed in restaurants and as a housecleaner. That helped them pay household expenses, which included $350 rent at their former house. But she hasn’t worked since Tiffany was born.

And, the money she earned is now lost. Teresa did not have a bank account and instead, secreted thousands of dollars in a jacket she kept in a closet.

“I didn’t think anything of it when the mudslide hit us,” she said. “But when I left the hospital that night, it dawned on me. Where is the money? I had almost $10,000. We searched and couldn’t find the jacket. It’s gone, lost.

“We were getting our citizenship finished and we needed to pay some attorney bills,” she continued. “I wanted to surprise Carmelo by giving him the money for those bills and have a little over to help buy a new car.”

Carmelo has been back at work for less than four months and his pay cannot kept pace with family expenses and the $1,245 monthly rent, he said. Carmelo also does gardening work on the side.

“Our lease is up in February and we don’t know where we’re going to live,” he said. “We need a secure home, nothing fancy but someplace that is close.”

Both parents do not want the older children, who attend Irvine Valley College, to leave school to work. Education, they agree, is more important at this point in their lives.

The good news is that medical bills that once mounted to $15,000 have been absorbed by a local hospital under an indigent-care program.

As for pain medication, and checkups, the Sarabias praised the Laguna Beach Community Clinic. “In the beginning, we had to visit some doctor’s office twice a day, either for us or our three children,” Carmelo said. “But ever since we started going to the clinic, it’s been really nice. They have been great to us.”

Emotionally, the family has been on a roller coaster. Both parents still cry when talking about the mudslide and what could have happened to Tiffany. She is the beacon of hope for them and the older children.

“You want to know who helps us remain stable?” said Carmelo. “It’s her, Tiffany. She doesn’t remember much. We do. We just love seeing her so happy bouncing from room to room. It’s been Tiffany, watching her play, seeing how happy she is, that has helped and kept the family going.”

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Williams and Mary Catherine Levin, who are Sarabia’s gardening clients, have established the Sarabia Family Relief Fund. Contributions can be sent to the Sarabia Family Relief fund, c/o Southern California Bank, 30000 Town Center Drive, Laguna Niguel, 92677.