By Denise Crosby
Chicago Sun-Times
AURORA, Ill. — Jill Schmidt, an emergency dispatcher who has worked at the Aurora Police Department for 24 years, said she had “never seen anything like it.”
She took a 911 call Sunday afternoon and heard a youngster calmly say: “My mom needs help.”
The voice on the other end was a preschooler — 4-year-old Livia Jensen.
“She was amazing,” Schmidt said Wednesday afternoon, soon after meeting little Livia in person. “She stayed so calm, so in control. Then, after the crisis had passed and help had arrived, I heard her say in the background, ‘I did it, Mom!’
“That’s when I about lost it.”
Diana Jensen, who has been battling lupus for 10 years, was hit with a bout of pain so intense that she fell to the floor Sunday, unable to get up or even speak.
On the 911 tape, her daughter chats matter-of-factly with Schmidt, answering the first critical questions with poise; then calmly serving as the go-between for Schmidt and her mother, who was only able to respond with whimpers.
After Livia’s mom was treated and released from the hospital, Schmidt just had to meet the little girl.
Diana Jensen, a single mom who also has a 19-year-old son, said her daughter was plenty excited when she learned on Monday she was going to be on TV and in newspapers.
Livia’s new purple-and-blue print dress — the one she would wear with tights and brown-and-pink cowboy boots — hung on the back of her bedroom door for two days in anticipation.
The press conference in the park across the street from her house on Aurora’s far East Side held Livia’s attention for about 45 seconds. Then she was off and running, climbing the monkey bars and scaling the big rock.
“She’s had to go through a lot of grown-up situations,” her mom said. “She did what she was taught to do.
“I always tell Livia, ‘Do you know why I know God loves me? Because he picked me to be your mommy.’
“She is a gift.”
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