One night in 2018, Buenos Aires police officer Celeste Ayala was on duty at the Sor María Ludovica Children’s Hospital in La Plata when she heard the cries of a baby who could not be soothed.
As she approached, she noticed that the little one was putting his hands in his mouth and quickly suspected that he was hungry. Ayala had recently become a mother, so she asked the medical staff for permission to breastfeed him.
The baby began to feed and, almost immediately, stopped crying.
“I approached and noticed that the child was crying inconsolably; I became a mother recently, and I realized he was hungry, he was putting his hand in his mouth, so I asked to hold him and breastfeed him”, she said.
The story became even more moving when it emerged that the little one had been hospitalized for malnutrition and had been separated from his mother by order of a family court.
“It was a very sad moment; it broke my heart to see him like that”, said the police officer, who assured that at that moment she did not act as a uniformed officer, but simply as a mother and as a human being.
The image of Celeste breastfeeding the baby quickly went viral and even ended up having consequences for her career: she was promoted to the rank of sergeant because of the impact of her gesture.
Sometimes, the smallest gestures happen when someone simply decides not to look the other way.