After reading Kwickimom's heartbreaking post

[Remudamom]

I thought it might be a good idea to post weird things that have or could have hurt children.

 

One of our dds opened all the drawers of a small chest and it overbalanced and fell on her. She wasn't even climbing it. She was unhurt, praise the Lord, except for a cut on her finger, which eventually resulted in her not being able to bend that joint. We were blessed.

 

I caught another child in one of those little tyke climbing toys with a blind cord wrapped around his throat about to hang himself.

 

A cousin went down a flight of stairs in her walker when an aunt (NOT ME)left a door open for a cat. TWICE.

 

Please add to this list.

[AuntieM]

I went out in the yard one summer afternoon after going inside to check the stove for a couple of minutes. I came out to find my 5yodd spreading out leaves picked from a shrub. Her brothers, "the zebras," were getting ready to eat them.

 

She had pulled them all off an oleander bush.

 

The one I had asked my husband to remove when we moved in to the place and had never actually gotten around to removing yet.

[rafiki]

.

[NanceXToo]

I've had nothing really potentially life-threatening happen to any of my kids (thank goodness). The worst mishap we've had was back when my middle daughter was a toddler, she was wearing a pair of socks, and she was running across our carpeted living room floor and ran onto the hardwood dining room floor. She slipped in her socks and fell and ended up with a sprained ankle that required a little hot pink cast.

[secular_mom]

The fence around our backyard has the horizontal boards that the fence boards are nailed to on our side of the fence. I was happy to have a fenced yard for my Littles to play in. My (at the time) 5yod wanted to see what was in the neighbors yards, so she climbed those slats and hopped over the fence into their yard. I didn't know what was going on because I thought they were all safely in the backyard playing- thank goodness she didn't climb over the other side into the yard with the big grumpy dog. She had climbed into Cat Lady's yard instead. Cat Lady rang my doorbell and when I opened the door there was dd, begging her not to ring the bell or tell her what had happened, she really wanted Cat Lady to just put her back over the fence.

 

She has made attempts to climb the fence since then, so now my children aren't even allowed to play in our fenced backyard without supervision.

[simka2]

My house feels like a nightmare after reading that. We have a causeway that opens to a hard tile floor that I can just see my energetic 5 yr old launching himself over.

 

It has made me llok at izzy, one of the twins, and thank my lucky stars. 3 years ago he was kicked in the jaw by a horse. He has half a hoof imprint on one cheek. I'm so thankful it was only 3 surgeries...and not worse.

[KidsHappen]

Oh my goodness, I have six kids and sometimes I swear not a one of them have a lick of sense in their pretty little heads so I have enough stories to write a book. The worst one has to be when my son got hit by a car. He was crossing the street and got side-swipped by a driver who did not see him until he was already in the street. I don't blame the lady at all. It really wasn't her fault. My son was coming out from between two parked cars in the middle of the street no where near a cross walk. He saw the car and continued walking anyhow. When I got to the hospital, I ask him if he had looked both ways before crossing the road and he said that he had and that he had seen the car but the lady hit him anyhow. He just assumed that if saw her that she had to have seen him. So I had to amend the rule to, "Look both ways and then if you see a car, stop and wait until they pass!" I will give him a break in that he was only six years old at the time. He turned out to be fine (Well, maybe not. That might explain the series of other stupid things he has done in his life) Anyhow, not a scratch on him and all he was worried about was the he lost his bag of chips in the incident. The lady on the other hand will probably never be the same.

[extendedforecast]

When I was a kid we were playing hide and seek. We hid in the shower stall and my finger got almost cut off when a cousin accidentally slammed the door shut. My kids know they are never to play in the bathroom.

[hsbaby]

We have been fortunate enough to not have many close calls. The only time my heart stopped momentarily was when youngest was a newborn (2 or 3 days old) and ds (4 at the time) nearly jumped on her head. We were changing her on the floor near the couch. DS decided to get up on the couch and jump off the arm of it. He landed within inches of her head.

[Remudamom]

I've heard kids can suffocate underneath beanbag chairs, especially if they're rough housing around and someone sits on them.

[Mejane]

We've haven't experienced anything too awful IRL (knocks head.) The horrors I remember I saw on a tv show (Oprah, I think.) Kids choking to death on marshmallows, babies dying because they inhaled powder and baby oil, toddlers drowning in five-gallon buckets, an infant closed up in a sofabed, and a teen dying when sand collapsed on him at the beach. Those have stuck with me for years.

[dangermom]

Friends of mine moved into a new house that had a window seat with a lid, for storage. Their toddler boy dropped the lid on his hand, nearly severing his thumb. It took months to recover but he did keep the thumb.

[Susan in TN]

My then almost 14yo ds was taking a bath after a sleepover - I realized after a while that he was still in there and I found that he'd fallen asleep in the bath. I don't know if that was super dangerous, but it sure has made me super cautious when it comes to bath time for any of my kids.

 

My 3yo opened all the drawers in her dresser - God mercifully gave her the ability to climb up onto her bed before it fell on top of her.

 

When my two middle ones were about 5 and 3, they attached one end of a jump-rope to the stair railing and the other end to their necks and were jumping off the stairs.

[bairnmama]

I was leaving a Mother's Day Out one afternoon with my then 2 yr old dd when she suddenly darted out into the middle of the parking lot. I had my hands full of all the crafts she had made, her snack bag, blanket, etc., was opening the car door for her to climb in and didn't have a hand to stop her. It wouldn't have been so bad, except that this was a small parking lot that was often used as a cut through since it was triangle shaped where 3 busy roads met. I just stuck my foot out a quick as I could and sent her sprawling on the pavement. She started wailing, but I figured a couple skinned knees and hands was MUCH better than being hit by a car!

[asta]

DS, age TWO (!!), pushed a dining room chair into the kitchen, climbed onto the counter, reached into the cabinet and got the children's tylenol off of the high shelf, opened the CHILDPROOF cap, and drank most of the bottle.

 

Did you know that they have toddler sized straitjackets that they use so that they can administer activated charcoal in emergency rooms w/o a kid flailing all over the place? Me neither. I didn't realize how many kids died from tylenol poisoning, either. Sheesh. Never bought the stuff again.

 

He also decided it was a good idea to blow a fly off of the nose of a sleeping dog... that ended with a trip to a plastic surgeon. It wasn't the dog's fault: all it did was wake up.

 

 

a

[angela in ohio]

My youngest, as a toddler, darted out the door when we lived on a busy street and almost made it to the road. I was outside talking to a friend who was picking some things up. Between us, we headed him off before he got to the road.

 

I almost drowned in Inidian Lake in Ohio when I was a teen.

 

Dh almost froze to death when he was little. He got off the bus alone as a little boy, and his mom had forgotten to leave the door unlocked. He crawled into a corner of the shed for warmth, and someone finally came home many hours later and found him half frozen to death. He was neglected a lot, so I'm sure that wasn't the only time.

 

That's it for us. I thank God all the time that my baby/toddler days are over. I was a nervous wreck from all the little dangers everywhere. I'd read about this, or someone backing over their dc, or a little kid hinding in something and suffocating, and wonder how I'd keep them alive until the next day. Of course, we start the driving era soon, so that might not be much better...

[bluemongoose]

1) The plastic end caps on boxsprings can cut toes very very deep!

 

2) A kid will dart off in traffic without a moments notice.

 

3) A child can and will get the childproof caps off of an outlet and shock themselves. They will do it again to see how that happened to them!

 

4) They will attempt to scale the outside of the upstairs balcony by holding onto the railing and shimming down the 2 inch deep ledge.

 

5) They will also attempt to go up the outside of the open stairs (over slate tile floor) by holding onto the railing.

 

6) If Daddy leaves for work in an absent minded state and leaves the door to the garage unlocked and the garage door for the car up, the 2 yo just might notice while Mommy is going to the bathroom and decide to run after Daddy's car. Mommy will come out of the bathroom wondering where her naturally quiet DD is that she left playing with her dolls in the living room, only to see the door to the garage open and the garage door up and will run like she never has before!

 

7) The chandelier is fun for a 3yo to swing on!

 

These are all things one of my kids have tried. The only reason I dont have the dresser falling story is that we bolted ours to the wall!

 

I am sure I could think of more...but I have got to go teach now!:lol:

Edited December 15, 2010 by bluemongoose

[Mekanamom]

Ugh- the worst that happened to us was when my oldest was about 4yo. My MIL had my 4yo and 3yo in the hot tub with her, while I stayed inside with the newborn. At some point, I walked out with the baby in a sling just to check on them.

 

My MIL started talking to me and completely forgot about watching the children in the water. My 4yo had been standing on the seat ledge of the hot tub and slipped off while MIL was talking to me. 4yo dropped to the bottom like a rock, and MIL never noticed a thing. It was completely silent; no splash or anything.

 

I tired to tell MIL to get her, but MIL was too busy talking to listen to me. I could see my 4yo looking up at me from under the water. So I stepped in, one hand supporting the baby in the sling, the other hand hauling my 4yo off the bottom of the tub. (4yo was ok, but very scared.)

 

MIL had no idea what was going on until it was over. And though it may never have happened if I hadn't come out and distracted her, it did show me that it is NEVER ok to take your eyes off a child in the water for even a minute. Drowning is so silent, it can happen right next to you in an instant with no indication at all.

 

I didn't want my child to be afraid of the water, so after making sure she was ok, I let her go back in and splash around some more, but I stayed outside with them. And after that, I let many a phone ring and/or a doorbell go unanswered while the kids were taking a bath. And to this day, even my teenagers are never allowed to swim alone; buddy system all the way.

[delaney]

We have a pool so I am terrified of drowning until we get them all swimming and even then they are not allowed in it alone. My biggest scares have come from my kids and their nut allergies. A few too many trips to the ER for me but never anything severe. Needless to say I do not allow peanut butter or anything other than almonds in the house anymore.

[momofkhm]

My girls were aged 4 and 2. We were getting ready to go to the pool so everyone was in swim suits. We had put sunscreen on both girls and they were running around downstairs while dh and I got sunscreen on. Oldest dd slipped and bumped into the counter with her forehead. Of course we both hand sunscreen all over our hands and so couldn't do anything about the cut. By the time the we were clean and could do something about it, it had dripped all down her face. Off to the ER for 5 stitches. She missed her first swim meet because of it.

[kwickimom]

Just last week I started sobbing over something that didnt even happen. My DH was leaving to go to town and he forgot his phone. I asked my DD8 to run it out to him because he still hadnt pulled out of the driveway. I watched her...and she ran BEHIND the truck. THANK GOD in heaven he didnt just pull out. He would have just took off and not looked behind him because no one was outside when he left. I felt so horrible that I sent her out and didnt tell her to go around the front of the truck. I could have sent her off to her death and I would have died.

 

Then last week I woke up in the middle of the night for some strange reason and went to get a drink (I never do this) I saw a medicine cup of red liquid on the counter and couldnt figure out who I forgot to give Tylenol to. I dumped it and went to bed. DH wakes up the next morning and starts freaking out and asked who drank that stuff. Turns out it was some poisionous stuff for his muzzleloader. He had forgotten to dump it and thought a kid had drank it. He was beside himself. If that wasnt divine intervention that I got up in the middle of the night.......

 

These 2 things will haunt me for awhile. Thats why I totally lost it went I read Dana's story. I could have lost 2 children last week. I do try and be sooo careful.

Edited December 15, 2010 by kwickimom

[FriedClams]

My son, at about 4, almost strangled himself on blind cords. TERRIFYING. Please check yours and put them up.

[Murphy101]

 

2) A kid will dart off in traffic without a moments notice.

 

3) A child can and will get the childproof caps off of an outlet and shock themselves. They will do it again to see how that happened to them! (one of mine put the added effort of going back for a fork the next time and shoving that in the socket!)

 

4) They will attempt to scale the outside of the upstairs balcony by holding onto the railing and shimming down the 2 inch deep ledge. (Yes. And when my then 5 year old fell through to the living room below he said, "I was just like Batman until I landed!" and then he cried when I insisted he keep a bag of frozen peas on his ankle.)

 

5) They will also attempt to go up the outside of the open stairs (over slate tile floor) by holding onto the railing.

 

These are all things one of my kids have tried. The only reason I dont have the dresser falling story is that we bolted ours to the wall! (we only have one long, not tall one. The rest are those three drawer plastic ones and are kept in the closet.

 

I can't count how often my youngest has fallen down the stairs. Baby gates either don't attach or she climbs over them, so we gave that up. We try to keep a sentry on her, but no one can watch every second. And I swear those little ones have a lightning speed setting.

 

I had a two year old climb on top of the refrigerator when I while I was in the bathroom. (Am I the only one who thinks the most dangerous thing a mom can do is go pee?!)

 

I'm sure there's ton more over the years and among the 9 of them. I've probably mentally blocked the worst in an auto defense of my sanity.

[WarriorMama]

I try not to be too over-the-top, but I'm one of those anxiety-ridden moms whose paranoid fears usually cause me to see a source of danger before my kids get a chance to enlighten me. It's a terrible feeling, always seeing some sort of lurking danger.

 

And I STILL don't catch everything! I once walked into a room to see my then 1-year-old take a giant bite out of a Nerf football. I managed to get it all out of his mouth, thankfully. No more foam toys accessible to toddlers!

 

I also got rid of all our glass-topped coffee and end tables the day I caught a toddler standing on one. I can't imagine what would have happened if the glass had broken.

 

I definitely think that people forget about the blind cord thing frequently, and also about leaving hot foods or drinks where a little one can reach. I've known a lot of toddlers burned by pulling hot coffee, tea or soup on themselves. :(

[scmama]

The dressers falling over is the reason why we don't have dressers in the kids' rooms. We brought those large plastic bins to put their clothes in under their beds, now I'll have to watch for a kid sitting on top.

 

When my son was almost 2, he went running into his brother's room, tripped over a toy and banged his head on the edge of the bed. The bed had a hard pointed corner and it cut his forehead to the bone. A nice trip to the ER followed with 6 stitches.

 

The same kid a year later decided he would try to superman off the railing of the front porch of our new home, and landed on the ground, 6 feet lower. Not a scratch on him. He's a climber and can do things in an instant...enough to drive me insane most days.

 

My daughter, then 2, use to open the door for us when we were leaving, one day she forgot to move her foot, and the bottom of the door scrap her toe nail off. Who would have thought that would happen.

 

My brother had a fascination when he was under 5 about putting small things in little holes in his body. We were doing some remodeling and he found the little bunches of styrofoam. He took them apart into the tiny balls, and stuffed them in his nose. We couldn't get them out...ER trip. Then he did it again but this time in his ears a few days later. Back to the ER. After removing all the styrofoam from the house....the kid decided to take the earring post of mom's earrings and shove them his nose as well. Another ER trip. I have no idea what his problem was..lol...it's funny now. What is it with kids doing things like that?!?!

 

The little things are what scare me. Sometimes the tiny things can cause the worse problems. And things that you really wouldn't think are dangerous, can be seriously dangerous to little kids.

[Firefly]

Two years ago (she was 9 at the time) DD was helping me in the kitchen as she often does. She was standing at the sink putting the strainer in so I could drain the pasta. I approached the sink and let her know I was coming up behind her. I should have waited until she moved, because I assumed she was going to move to the right away from the sink-- instead, she moved left and right into me and boiling hot pasta water splashed out of the pan and down over her shoulder. I will never, ever forget the sound of her screaming. It was awful... even moreso because *I* had caused it. Stupid. That is guilt that will last me the rest of my life... I still get sick to my stomach thinking about it. She suffered a third degree burn and has a large, nasty scar there. I was just so thankful that it wasn't her face, or that she didn't lose an eye. :(

[Dayle in Guatemala]

A friend I know had a bunkbed for his boys and his ds3 was sleeping on the top bunk with a safety rail. When they went in to wake him up in the morning, he had rolled and his body fell through the space between the bed and the rail and he hung himself. This happened just 3 months after their baby had died of a freak bacterial infection.

[Violet Crown]

When dd14 was tiny, I was sitting on the floor reading a newspaper while she sat next to me, munching raisins and goldfish crackers. We were turned away from each other but only a few inches apart. It occurred to me, as I finished an article, that her usual non-stop monologue had been stopped for a while. I turned, and saw her blue in the face, silently clawing at her open mouth, with a look of terror I've never seen on a child before or since.

 

I grabbed her around the waist and turned her upside down, and a huge pasty glob of food fell out of her mouth. She inhaled hugely and started screaming. Thank God.

[WarriorMama]

(Am I the only one who thinks the most dangerous thing a mom can do is go pee?!)

 

:iagree: That seems to be the time of greatest potential hazard. They can be acting perfectly sane for hours, but as soon as you take a 30 second bathroom break all hell breaks loose! ;)

[texasmama]

When I was pg, I was loading things into the car and my toddler fell out of the cart onto the concrete parking lot on his head. He was just fine. I was horrified. Still am.

[littleWMN]

I've heard kids can suffocate underneath beanbag chairs, especially if they're rough housing around and someone sits on them.

 

This nearly happened to my 4 year old (delayed) recently. Her head was underneath a beanbag and two friends sat on top of it. Thankfully my 5 year old told me (I was just in the next room!) and so the boys got up. She immediately threw up. It shook me to my core. :(

[Meriwether]

When getting baby girl's pictures taken at 7 mos. I let her play with the kids in the little play area until everyone was ready. She was a bit fussy after that so I asked for a moment to nurse her. She wouldn't latch on properly so I tried a couple more times. When she did start sucking, she immediately threw up. Turns out a piece of plastic wrap had gagged her when she tried swallowing. I'll always check the floors of public play areas now.

 

My first pediatrician for the kids said that it is a miracle any child makes it to adulthood.

[WarriorMama]

Oh, I forgot - my son could, before even 18 months, open our dishwasher and oven. The oven door has a lock, but he learned to open that too. :glare:

 

Now we don't put knives in the dishwasher until it's getting turned on (after toddler bedtime), and I don't leave the kitchen while things are cooking unless he's with me.

 

My nerves will be shot before this one grow up, I'm sure.

[Old Dominion Heather]

My middle kid:

 

1. bashed his teeth in by falling head first onto cement steps off a trike.

2. Fallen out of a shopping cart head first.

3. BROKEN a bike helmet by wrecking head first into the sidewalk.

4. fallen off a deck onto a railroad tie, hitting his back.

5. Fallen out of a tree and broken his arm.

6. Rode his bike out into a street and nearly sideswiped a car... twice.

7. Wrecked sledding down a monster hill by running the sled into a rock.

8. Flipped his sled by going over a eight foot drop on a sled.

 

 

It is a wonder any of them live.

[Hockey Mom]

We had a problem with small rats invading our citrus trees. So we called out pest control, and he placed these blue cubes up in our gutters, and around the top rung of our privacy fence. They were well out of reach of my then-2 & 3 year olds.

 

I had my then-14 y/o DD babysitting them as they played out in the back yard.

 

When they came inside, the 3 y/o was telling me that he found a blue rock. I didn't think anything of it (I thought it was a leftover piece of chalk), and let him bring it in the house (it didn't look like a cube anymore). So then my 2 y/o starts carrying it around, and my Dh says, "why does the baby have rat poison?" My stomach sunk. I didn't recognize it as the bait the pest control guy had left! They must have walked around with it for HOURS!

 

We took them to the ER, and had them tested for the poison. They didn't have any in their blood, and ultimately they were fine. But for those few hours while we waiting for the results, I was just so angry with myself...and scared for my boys.

 

Our pest control guy was great though. He came over immediately, with a list of ingredients in the poison, and checked all of the places where he had left the bait. He believed one of the cubes from the gutter was either washed out on to the yard, or a bird dropped it there.

[Violet Crown]

:iagree: That seems to be the time of greatest potential hazard. They can be acting perfectly sane for hours, but as soon as you take a 30 second bathroom break all hell breaks loose! ;)

:iagree: I put dd-toddler into her playpen once so I could take a bathroom break. Right in the middle of all I hear screaming, and I came out to find her lip badly cut and blood all over her face. There was no blood on the playpen, and I couldn't find anything hard or sharp in it; I was never able to figure out what happened.

[Momofeat]

When my middle dd was a toddler, she wanted to nap in a sleeping bag on our bed. I went to check on her & found her completely in the sleeping bag, head first, hanging partially off the bed. (I don't remember now what kept her from falling all the way off.)

 

She was asleep & sweaty, but otherwise fine. Scared me silly, though!

[*lifeoftheparty*]

.

[Jennifer in MI]

When my dd was just under 2, my oldest child was carrying her into a store. He tripped over a spot in the sidewalk and dd landed on her head. I SAW her head bounce off the cement. She was crying, but not crying as hard as she should have been. Just kind of whining. And, she was quite limp in my arms. We threw her into the car and rushed to the ER. All the while, my oldest was sitting next to her trying to keep her awake. "Stay with me Meg!" he kept repeating.

 

She had a concussion, but was fine. I STILL tear up over it. I don't think ds will EVER forget how he felt. I never blamed him, but he still feels horrible about it.

[snipsnsnailsx5]

I can't get that post out of my mind either. :( My youngest is about the same age as that baby...about 23 months.

 

I seem to keep a stockpile of horror stories in my head that I've heard/read about over the last 11 years I've been a parent. They never seem to go away. Its like I hold on to them and replay them over and over so that I can remember to always be careful for those things.

 

I had a former teacher who backed over his own son and killed him a few years ago. So now I always make sure I know where every single child is before I pull out of the driveway, or before anyone does. To the point that I almost have a panic attack if DH starts to pull out and I can't find one of the kids...I'm yelling at him to STOP while I make sure all the kids are safe.

 

I also read a story in a Parents magazine (they used to have a lovely article about freak accidents that you'd never think could happen) - about a child losing his arm (or nearly losing it) by sticking it in a washing machine that was spinning. Since it kicks off when you open the lid, I assume he opened it too quickly and stuck his hand in before it stopped spinning.

 

There are so many choking stories I've heard, even where the food was small enough by usual standards.

 

Those are the biggest ones...

 

As far as personally,

Well once my adventurous 8 yr old who wins the award for most visits to the ER in our family -

He was playing on a weight bench at my parent's house and fell and hit his head on a heavy metal dumb bell. It cut his head open and was bleeding like crazy, but just a superficial wound thankfully.

 

Another time he was racing other boys at a soccer field after practice. Just racing on a grass field. How could he get hurt? Well someone's 3 yr old daughter wandered into the race and my son couldn't stop in time. By some miracle she was okay...I think she curled up into a ball and its her knee that hit my son. Because immediately his nose was gushing. I took him home and he kept complaining of a headache, then throwing up. They didn't do a cat-scan but just assumed it was a concussion. He was pretty sick that night. :( His nose wasn't broken,but it was a lovely shade of black and blue for two weeks.

 

I'm so very blessed and thankful that we haven't had any serious injuries. We've had our scare with asthma attacks, but no freak accidents or major illnesses. I will say extra prayers of thanks tonight for that!

[fairfarmhand]

we've had alot of close calls...two of the scariest...when we first bought our property, the grass was 6-7 feet tall. My dh was bush hogging and my two dd's (they were 7 and 3 at the time) decided it would be funny to hide in the grass where he was mowing. Then they could pop out in front of the tractor.

(bad idea...anyone who has driven a tractor knows you cannot stop immediately) My dh went around a corner and just happened to look back and catch a glimpse of color in the grass. He stopped and hollered for them to come out..then he put their hands up on the tractor tire and spanked them good. (they'd been told to STAY away when daddy was mowing) When I heard it I cried.

 

The second...when my dd was small we had a playground that had a swinging rope. ONe day while I was in the shower, she went outside, tied the rope around her waist and jumped off. When I got out she was dangling, screaming because the knots tightened and she couldn't get down. I was just thankful that she hadn't put it around her neck. yes, I cried about that one too.

 

And I posted about my dh's chainsaw incident here....

 

http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=227157&highlight=chainsaw

Edited December 15, 2010 by fairfarmhand

[ChristusG]

I'm a worrier by nature and this thread is totally freaking me out!!

 

When DD was just a couple of months old, I put her in the infant seat because we were just about to leave the house, but I didn't buckle her in yet because we were not getting in the car right away. On the way out the door I forgot something and I sat DD on the washing machine in the infant seat. She was still very small and immobile so I knew she would be fine. But I buckled the top buckle for good measure anyways.

 

I ran (literally) to the back of the house for only a split second. I heard a thump, then silence. I figured DD3 was doing something with toys. In a flash, DD3 (a very young 3) rounds the corner and says "baby fall." I was like "huh?" Then I was like "BABY FALL??!!!!" I bolted through the house towards infant DD.

 

She was lying upside down in her infant seat, the top buckle strangling her because I hadn't fastened the bottom buckle. She wasn't crying, wasn't inhaling. I snatched her up and undid the buckle. She started screaming. I was so relieved!!! God was really watching over her. She had tipped head first onto a pile of towels that were lying in front of the washer, waiting to be washed. If she hadn't fallen onto them, she would have smacked her forehead on the tile floor. And DD3 was the hero who came and got me.

 

So yeah, umm, never put your baby on the washing machine, no matter how much they don't move.

[JumpedIntoTheDeepEndFirst]

Back when we had only 2 kids...DH had helped DD5 out of a cab and I had just exited and was reaching back in to help DS3.5 out of the back seat. The cabbie hit the gas pedal without checking to see if we'd even shut the door. From what I understand the primal scream that emanated from somewhere deep within me caused said cabbie to slam on the breaks after moving about six inches. I can't even remember what I said to him as I clutched DS in my arms but it can't have been nice. Said cabbie didn't care and just left. I stood at the curb hugging DS and shaking.

[Aoife]

I try not to be too over-the-top, but I'm one of those anxiety-ridden moms whose paranoid fears usually cause me to see a source of danger before my kids get a chance to enlighten me. It's a terrible feeling, always seeing some sort of lurking danger.

 

And I STILL don't catch everything! I once walked into a room to see my then 1-year-old take a giant bite out of a Nerf football. I managed to get it all out of his mouth, thankfully. No more foam toys accessible to toddlers!

 

I also got rid of all our glass-topped coffee and end tables the day I caught a toddler standing on one. I can't imagine what would have happened if the glass had broken.

 

I definitely think that people forget about the blind cord thing frequently, and also about leaving hot foods or drinks where a little one can reach. I've known a lot of toddlers burned by pulling hot coffee, tea or soup on themselves. :(

:iagree: This almost word for word. it drives my DH nuts at times but I have paralyzing fear of injuries that causes panic sometimes.

 

As it is we own no dressers, Every outlet a child can go near has a screwed on safety cover that allows no access to the outlet, We use the really tall unclimbable top of the stairs baby gates, we only allow bathroom access to potty trained kids who know the rules and even then I am afraid of one of those horrible moments. In our house the kids own the upper floor, its 3 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, playroom and homeschool room. The toddler has a tall top of the stairs swing gate on his door and the only toys in his room are infant safe. The closets on the 2yo and 4yo's rooms are no accessible with glued on knob guards. We used to have toilet locks on the toilet until the 4yo got over his need to play in the toilet and now we just don't allow access to the little ones. The stairs going to the downstairs has another tall gate and the older kids have a gate as well to keep the littles out of their room. My worst fear now is a fire. I go through it time and time again in my head because it terrifies me so I play through the what to do. DH says I need to lighten up and while I agree I let it take over me a bit too much I would rather be paranoid then ever having to face something so heartbreaking.

[snipsnsnailsx5]

Also thought of two other important safety reminders...

 

First never NEVER leave your child in a hot car. :( Also, sometimes the little ones can sneak into cars and hide. I always worry about that during the summer so much that I make sure my car is always locked the moment everyone unloads!

 

Also, if you have those big glass sliding doors on your china hutch like I DID - watch them carefully! One day my then 4 yr old was pushing against one of them while I was changing our new baby's diaper. It was like slow motion, I was yelling at him to stop pushing against it and next thing I knew it had come out of its tracks and was falling on him. It was big and very heavy glass. It shattered on him and all around him. But miraculously he only got a small cut or two on his feet. Even the new wood flooring we had just put in had big giant gouges on it. Amazing! We took the other one out (we had two sliding glass panels on our large built-in china hutch) right away after that accident.

[amyable]

We've had a few of the usual accidents (teeth knocked out, etc) but the things that stick in my mind are the ones where the kids were fine but it could have been so much worse.

 

My second born was about 5 or 6 when she was swimming at a friends busy swim club. The dad thought she could swim better than she could and she drifted into a place where she couldn't stand, and was too tired to get back to a place where she could. That link that went around WTM a few months ago about how drowning is not all splashing and screaming help, but is silent? That's true. She was on her tip toes swallowing tons of water when I went to check on them. She was fine (after vomiting). But I won't forget that! Even to this day (at 11yo) she has trouble swimming despite years of lessons - I think it's psychological.

 

The only other awful thing I can think of was watching my 7yo (then 6) come within two inches of being run over by a car backing out of their driveway (way too fast). I think only my scream stopped them, because they seemed oblivious, and didn't even get out or say anything after my daughter got out of their way. :cursing:

 

ETA: forgot about all the "near miss anaphylactic allergy" incidents, like the time some stranger gave my 18 month old a peanut at a party...as I'm *leaping* over the couch and dashing across the room to get to her before she puts it in her mouth...

Edited December 15, 2010 by amyable

[Jennifer in MI]

My second born was about 5 or 6 when she was swimming at a friends busy swim club. The dad thought she could swim better than she could and she drifted into a place where she couldn't stand, and was too tired to get back to a place where she could. That link that went around WTM a few months ago about how drowning is not all splashing and screaming help, but is silent? That's true. She was on her tip toes swallowing tons of water when I went to check on them. She was fine (after vomiting). But I won't forget that! Even to this day (at 11yo) she has trouble swimming despite years of lessons - I think it's psychological.

 

The only other awful thing I can think of was watching my 7yo (then 6) come within two inches of being run over by a car backing out of their driveway (way too fast). I think only my scream stopped them, because they seemed oblivious, and didn't even get out or say anything after my daughter got out of their way. :cursing:

 

Pools SCARE me! This last summer, we were swimming at a friend's pool. Dd was in a ring floatie where she could touch. I turned around for a SECOND to grab some sunscreen for my 10 yo. When I turned around, dd was upside down in that stupid floatie. I jumped in and grabbed her. she was fine, but I'll NEVER forget the look on her face when she was under water. Sheer panic.

 

I'm always nervous about cars backing out of their driveways. Dd is SO tiny and doesn't think to look for cars pulling out. And, they don't always look for her. I always stay pretty close when she's out front!

[WarriorMama]

:iagree: This almost word for word. it drives my DH nuts at times but I have paralyzing fear of injuries that causes panic sometimes.

 

As it is we own no dressers, Every outlet a child can go near has a screwed on safety cover that allows no access to the outlet, We use the really tall unclimbable top of the stairs baby gates, we only allow bathroom access to potty trained kids who know the rules and even then I am afraid of one of those horrible moments. In our house the kids own the upper floor, its 3 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, playroom and homeschool room. The toddler has a tall top of the stairs swing gate on his door and the only toys in his room are infant safe. The closets on the 2yo and 4yo's rooms are no accessible with glued on knob guards. We used to have toilet locks on the toilet until the 4yo got over his need to play in the toilet and now we just don't allow access to the little ones. The stairs going to the downstairs has another tall gate and the older kids have a gate as well to keep the littles out of their room. My worst fear now is a fire. I go through it time and time again in my head because it terrifies me so I play through the what to do. DH says I need to lighten up and while I agree I let it take over me a bit too much I would rather be paranoid then ever having to face something so heartbreaking.

 

I'd rather be paranoid, too. But it would be nice if I could ditch the anxiety after I've done the very best I can do!

 

My worst problem now is how afraid I am to let other people take care of my toddler. He's an absolute whirlwind and things can happen so fast.

[Mejane]

My middle kid:

 

1. bashed his teeth in by falling head first onto cement steps off a trike.

2. Fallen out of a shopping cart head first.

3. BROKEN a bike helmet by wrecking head first into the sidewalk.

4. fallen off a deck onto a railroad tie, hitting his back.

5. Fallen out of a tree and broken his arm.

6. Rode his bike out into a street and nearly sideswiped a car... twice.

7. Wrecked sledding down a monster hill by running the sled into a rock.

8. Flipped his sled by going over a eight foot drop on a sled.

 

 

 

 

Heather, your son sounds just like my younger brother as a kid. It's a wonder my mother only smoked and didn't drink as well.

[kwickimom]

I just remembered (how could i forget) that my friend lost her 2 YO because he hung himself in the van window. She buckled him in and ran in to get the diaper bag and in those minutes he undid himself, climbed to the front, stuck his head out the window and accidentally stepped on the window control button and the window went up and he crushed his airway and stopped breathing. She was gone for about 2 minutes. I never ever even for a second leave my van running with kids in it. I taek the keys if I have to run in.