They told me to let my children drown, but I saved them

A mother’s love knows no limits and Rose Mueni is a true testament to that.

When floods devastated her home in Mathare, Nairobi, she refused to let go of her two children’s bed, even when her neighbors insulted her and told her to abandon them.

Mueni said some neighbors insulted her as she clung to the children’s bed while crying for help.

“People were yelling at me and warning me that I would drown with the children. “Some said I lacked brains, but I was willing to die with my two children,” he told the Star.

Mueni said she told neighbors she would not let go of her bed and was ready to die with her two children.

“I told my children to stand firm as I asked God to remember me,” he recalled.

He added that luck was finally on their side as the bed got stuck on a section of the wall, but the intensity of the flowing water was increasing more and more.

“Then a man appeared out of nowhere shouting ‘Where is that woman’? He also grabbed the bed and we managed to prevent her from being dragged along with the children,” she said.

Mueni said she was surprised when some neighbors told her she would have other children if the two died.

“They told me to let them go because I would still have other children and I still had my siblings that I was raising,” she recalled.

Mueni said it had rained all night, which kept her awake the entire time.

“I came out and discovered that the water had surrounded our plot and was already entering and entering our houses. I started waking up the neighbors and started with my children around 2 in the morning,” he added.

Mueni said he took two children out and left two others in the house.

“Then I went to knock on the neighbors’ doors to alert them of the danger. A neighbor woke up and I asked him to also help me alert others,” he added.

“We went out and found vehicles that were being swept away and then a wall collapsed and the water entered the land and began to destroy everything.”

It was then that Mueni remembered that he had left two children at home.

Mueni said her bravery and determination paid off and she was able to save her two children from the floods.