Babies in car seat carriers

[Embassy]

I am in awe of the many little babies I see totally content just sitting and looking around in their car seats. It seems like every baby I see these days is a content just sitting and looking around or playing in their car seat carrier while away from home. Mine were not like that. I commented to a mom at church how amazing I think it is that her baby is so content in his seat. She looked at me like I had two heads and told me that she trains them young. This made me think. Is this just a training issue or not? Now, my parenting philosophy would not have me training my kids to be independent sleepers/car seat sitters at that age, but I don't believe training would have been possible with my oldest - not even close. His needs involved being held a lot and plenty of interaction. I had to sit beside him in the car and engage him pretty much constantly. He didn't start falling asleep in the car until he was about 5 months old. My other two kids I probably could have trained, but I had no desire to train my babies. Is that the only way babies are content in their car seat carriers?

[Heather in Neverland]

Nope. It is a personality thing. I had two that hated them but my baby girl is happy as a lark and I didn't "train" any of them. I am not even really sure what that means? :001_huh:

[ashfern]

Three of mine hated that thing. I always call it "the bucket". :tongue_smilie: Mine were happiest on me in a sling of some sort so they could look around. Nosy buggers. :glare:

[Tangerine]

Forget the babies, I hate those things. Gah. So. Heavy. :svengo:

[Crimson Wife]

Nope. It is a personality thing. I had two that hated them but my baby girl is happy as a lark and I didn't "train" any of them. I am not even really sure what that means? :001_huh:

 

:iagree::iagree::iagree:

I had one who *HATED* the carrier (and the sling, swaddling, and basically anything that constrained her movement) and two that didn't mind it.

[higginszoo]

My boys would fall asleep in the car all the time. The girls, not so much, and then they would want to be entertained. We used the car seat for our second to sleep in for a while until we got her reflux straightened out. I also trained them to fall asleep on their own pretty early (except for the one who just wouldn't ... she's destined to be my high maintenance one). But even my laid back baby didn't want to be in the car seat carrier. The sling, yes, but none of them would just hang out in the carseat like I see many babies do. My girls wanted to be standing up. I have pictures of my youngest standing on her own against the couch at 3 mo. She would stand and watch the goings on for half an hour.

[Ellyndria]

DS hated his car seat, would fuss and squirm and try to get out, and also screamed in the car for months. I quickly switched to wearing him when I had to go to stores and such.

Edited October 21, 2011 by Ellyndria

[ChristusG]

I don't like just leaving babies in their car seats for extended periods of time....which is what you would have to do in order to "train them" as the lady said. We use them for safety when riding in the car and that's it. Now if baby is asleep when we arrive home, I will carry the seat into the house and let baby continue sleeping.

 

DD#2 HATED her car seat and screamed whenever we rode in the car for the first few months.

[ktgrok]

Fell sorry for those babies. They will end up with deformed skulls from sitting like that all the time. It is a real thing, and a medical epidemic due to everyone keeping their kids in those silly carriers all the time. My poor niece has it. My doctor went on and on about how happy he is that my daughter's skull is normally rounded because she isn't always leaning against something.

 

Babies biologically are designed to be held and carried, not left laying about. Stupid devices. Besides the things weigh as much as the child does, and are awkward to carry. I have no idea why people use them so much. I get using it if the baby fell asleep in it in the car, and you don't want to wake them up. But when they wake up pick them up!

[Tangerine]

They are so ubiquitous now. Try leaving the hospital with a newborn and explaining that you have a regular INSTALLED carseat, and no, you are not going to take it out of the car and haul it up to prove you have one. :glare: They can come down and look at it if they must.

[Frontier Mom]

I hope I don't step on toes, but today's "training" seems to be a passive approach at the best. Nothing is better than touching and loving on the babies or letting them lie on a blanket and observe the world while we sit with them. As you are sitting by your little ones, you are probably engaging them in conversation, etc. Now don't get me wrong, I did leave mine in them and carry them inside if they were asleep. However, I felt being a part of what was going on around them was important.

 

So many parents seem to think if the baby is quiet then all is good. However, a quiet baby doesn't necessarily mean the baby is engaged. I think babies were meant to make noise and experiment with their language skills. I wonder if these are the same parents that grow up to give their children portable game systems when they go out to eat so no one has to really communicate but the children are quiet.

 

I would be careful what we are training our children to do. I personally think quiet is over rated, just visit my house!

[linguistmama]

I tried to use the infant carrier with my oldest, but she hated it! With dd2 and now dd3 we use a convertible seat from birth. I see other babies at church who are content in the infant seat because that is their personality. The moms didn't train them to sit in it.

[mariposa]

My kids were never happy in their carseats for long periods of time, unless the car was moving (and with 2 we went through the screaming phase even in the car, ugh).

 

Interestingly, I was talking to my brother's occupational therapist, who told me that all of these seats (car seats, bouncy seats, etc.) are not good at all for babies' development. He told me that being either free on the floor on a blanket or in a baby sling is so much better. FWIW, my kids were always "early" in sitting, crawling, and walking (all walking before or at 12 mos.) The OT is from Kenya, and he said that children there are way ahead of the US (and his son was WALKING at 9 months). I kinda took some of that with a grain of salt (my ds walked at 10 months, and it was a challenge!) but from his explanation of development it made sense to me.

 

All that said, if my kid slept great in a carseat, I may have been pretty tempted to keep them there so I could get some sleep!

[Ellie]

"Training"?

 

:blink:

 

I remember going to my first OB appointment in 1974. I had never been around babies (only child, no younger siblings). I hadn't read anything about child development or anything so I had no pre-conceived ideas about almost anything.

 

So I was sitting in the waiting room...waiting...:D...and observed a young mother and her baby; he was in a bouncey seat, one of those light-weight plastic thingies (which was all we had back then, lol), on a table, facing away from her. She was reading a magazine; he was old enough to be sort of social, and he was looking around the room and doing the baby-wiggle thing, all ready to interact with someone. It occurred to me that because he was in a device instead of his mother's arms, both he and she were missing out on an opportunity that was surely an important part of his growth: mother-child bonding, face-to-face, touching, holding.

 

I purposed at that moment never to use one of those things.

 

Over the next few years I noticed also how difficult it seemed to handle the baby seat instead of just holding the baby. :001_huh:

 

Car seats--yes; carrying baby around like a bag of groceries--no.

 

I think there needs to be "training;" children do NOT come out of the womb knowing how to behave in a civilized manner, but isolating a child in one of those car seat carriers...I can't imagine what kind of "training" that might be.:glare:

[twoxcell]

Yuck! The idea of training a baby to be happy in a car seat just sounds wrong. Hopefully she didn't mean it the way it sounds. We used the infant car seats mainly for the car and sometimes I left my kids in them if they were sleeping and I didn't want to wake them. I much prefer holding or wearing my babies. All of my kids crawled, sat, and walked early too(9.5, 10, 9, and 11 months for walking), and they were held or put on the floor. We didn't really have any devices other than a sling, and one of those bouncy seats for when they were too little to be layed on the floor, but those are soft and craddle baby.

[vonfirmath]

Fell sorry for those babies. They will end up with deformed skulls from sitting like that all the time. It is a real thing, and a medical epidemic due to everyone keeping their kids in those silly carriers all the time.

 

Maybe not from sitting in a car seat. My DS never had any flat head problems. Nor have most of the kids I know, even though they spend time in car seats. But I know two babies whose plagiocephaly was so severe they had to wear skull helmets -both times the parents were HUGE sling wearers. They were in the car seat strictly for trips.

 

So there is something else going on here rather than use of car seats. Websites that talk about this say nothing about car seats--They seem to be blaming it on the position a baby sleeps in. http://www.askdrsears.com/topics/childhood-illnesses/flat-head (So the "Lie on back to reduce SIDS" campaign is a big part of it.)

 

No, a kid staying all the time in a car seat is not a great thing. But its better not to make it into more than it is.

 

I tried slinging with DS. He HATED it. He preferred his car seat. I could still interact with him in the car seat because I had a stroller where he faced me. No, I was not always interacting with him. But I see plenty of babies in slings where the parents are shopping, talking to other people and not focusing on just interacting with their kid -- I don't think its a bad thing for a baby to be part of the whole instead of always the center of attention.

 

Jury is still out on DD. I am more comfortable with her in her car seat (or the built-in seat on a cart, or the front of the cart in a blanket). I'm still afraid that she's going to fall out of the carriers I have tried. And that fall onto the hard floor at shopping places would be much more damaging. I don't feel secure. I've got locals helping me. But I'm not going to depend on baby wearing until I can feel secure with it when I am on my own without anyone to help me put it on/get baby in/etc.

Edited October 21, 2011 by vonfirmath

[GailV]

Three of mine hated that thing. I always call it "the bucket". :tongue_smilie: Mine were happiest on me in a sling of some sort so they could look around. Nosy buggers. :glare:

 

Yes, I always think of it as keeping a baby in a plastic bucket. And when I need to describe where a child is aloud I'll even use those words as a bit of commentary, acting as though I can't think of the appropriate term of "car seat carrier" (oh gee, I'm so absent minded these days :tongue_smilie:)

 

Fell sorry for those babies. They will end up with deformed skulls from sitting like that all the time. It is a real thing, and a medical epidemic due to everyone keeping their kids in those silly carriers all the time. My poor niece has it. My doctor went on and on about how happy he is that my daughter's skull is normally rounded because she isn't always leaning against something.

 

Babies biologically are designed to be held and carried, not left laying about. Stupid devices. Besides the things weigh as much as the child does, and are awkward to carry. I have no idea why people use them so much. I get using it if the baby fell asleep in it in the car, and you don't want to wake them up. But when they wake up pick them up!

 

Aside from the head deformity, they should be using their neck muscles. Also, they should have plenty of "tummy time" in which they use their entire bodies to try to look up and around.

 

Sometimes I wonder if this helped my kids be early talkers. I'm sure there are multiple factors, but they were always right in the middle of the conversations in a sling rather than over in a plastic bucket somewhere off to the side. They were using complete sentences early, and have amazing vocabularies to this day.

[Meriwether]

My kids were never happy in their carseats for long periods of time, unless the car was moving (and with 2 we went through the screaming phase even in the car, ugh).

 

Interestingly, I was talking to my brother's occupational therapist, who told me that all of these seats (car seats, bouncy seats, etc.) are not good at all for babies' development. He told me that being either free on the floor on a blanket or in a baby sling is so much better. FWIW, my kids were always "early" in sitting, crawling, and walking (all walking before or at 12 mos.) The OT is from Kenya, and he said that children there are way ahead of the US (and his son was WALKING at 9 months). I kinda took some of that with a grain of salt (my ds walked at 10 months, and it was a challenge!) but from his explanation of development it made sense to me.

 

All that said, if my kid slept great in a carseat, I may have been pretty tempted to keep them there so I could get some sleep!

 

There is a wide range of normal. I had one nephew walking well at 7 months and one who didn't walk well until past 18 months.

 

 

I remember sitting in church one Sunday as a high school student. A mother came in with her new baby and sat beside our family. Something seemed odd. It took me awhile to realize that it seemed odd because she was actually carrying and holding the baby instead of a car seat.:001_huh: She had almost grown children who were little before carseats were common. As a reaction to that experience, I rarely just left my baby in the car seat for convenience sake. I often left them in to go from car to building because of the cold, though. Upon entering a building, I took them out right away.

[katilac]

Over the next few years I noticed also how difficult it seemed to handle the baby seat instead of just holding the baby. :001_huh:

 

Car seats--yes; carrying baby around like a bag of groceries--no.

 

Yes to both of these! I swear, some babies get taken out of the crib in the morning, and then stay in those seats all day - in the living room with a toy gym in front of them, then straight into the seat base in the car, then into the base on the stroller, then reverse it all and put them back into the crib in the evening. I call them baby buckets, and cringe every time I see someone carrying an infant around while it slap-slap-slaps against their leg.

 

They can be useful, just like swings and bouncy seats and toys. My babies NEVER stayed asleep if I had to move them, and it's great if they solve that problem. But soooo many parents seem to think it's fine and normal that the baby spends much of the day in their baby bucket, and it's not. That very flat, very bald spot on the back of your baby's head? It's. a. clue!

[Embassy]

My kids didn't spend much time in car seat carriers and two of them had gross motor delays/issues. One did not.

 

Sometimes I wonder if this helped my kids be early talkers. I'm sure there are multiple factors, but they were always right in the middle of the conversations in a sling rather than over in a plastic bucket somewhere off to the side. They were using complete sentences early, and have amazing vocabularies to this day.

 

It certainly didn't hurt:) Slings or baby carriers where both baby and parent have the same line of vision are great for language development. The baby makes connections between words and their meaning a little easier when they can see what the parent sees.

[GailV]

Maybe not from sitting in a car seat. My DS never had any flat head problems. Nor have most of the kids I know, even though they spend time in car seats. But I know two babies whose plagiocephaly was so severe they had to wear skull helmets -both times the parents were HUGE sling wearers. They were in the car seat strictly for trips.

 

So there is something else going on here rather than use of car seats.

 

OTOH, the kids I've known with helmets (including our neighbor, who had one of her triplets in one this past year) were most certainly NOT in slings, and WERE in car seat style carriers quite a bit. (BTW, if I had triplets I wouldn't be slogging them around in a sling or in arms either, and would try whatever seemed to work for us all to survive without going crazy.)

[twoforjoy]

Nope. It is a personality thing. I had two that hated them but my baby girl is happy as a lark and I didn't "train" any of them. I am not even really sure what that means? :001_huh:

 

Yup.

 

I've never carried my kids in their car seats, because my babies are too darn heavy! (DD and DS2 both surpassed 15 pounds by the time they hit 2 months.) My first would NEVER have gone for being stuck in his car seat. My DD, if we bring the infant seat into the house, will actually climb into it, and just hang out there happily for as long as we'll let her. She's my baby who hated being in the sling (whereas DS1 loved it). She's affectionate when she wants to be, but most of the time she likes personal space.

 

The new baby so far seems pretty happy either way. The sling, a lap, the swing, a carseat, it's all pretty much the same to him right now, and he's fully content in any of them.

[Rtcrmine]

Training an infant? :001_huh: maybe she was joking? At least I hope so.

[Pretty in Pink]

IME little babies generally enjoy riding in their carseats. I mean, they sleep so much of the time anyway. I can't imagine needing to interact with a little baby while riding down the road. Mine have all just conked out in the car when they were small, provided they were fed and changed beforehand. It wasn't something I needed to train them to do.

 

If they are awake I take them out of the carseat to interact with them.

[MeaganS]

My daughters both enjoyed their infant carseats and do very well on car trips. I'd use them at the grocery store and at church for a month or two, but that was it. Everywhere else they were on the floor or in their fabric bouncy seat. By 2 or 3 months, even the car seat was a pain to carry around and they were too big for the bouncy seat, so they were on the floor full time or in a carrier (although I used a ring sling/Ergo often out an about before that).

 

I think it is more personality than anything. Oh, and one of my daughters did have a flat head, but that was from sleeping on her back and laying her head to the side to try to suck on her hand, not from the car seat.

[Meriwether]

Training an infant? :001_huh: maybe she was joking? At least I hope so.

 

Training takes place all the time. Even for little ones. I had to train Dd1 to nurse properly. I took the training statement at face value, meaning that the child didn't go from no car seat experience to sitting contentedly in one. Perhaps she started with very short times in the seat and increased it gradually.

[itsheresomewhere]

My oldest liked the infant seat, hated being held. My youngest hated the carseat with a passion. She was carried everywhere or in the stroller (bad back).

[Rtcrmine]

I'd call that teaching. Training sounds so rigorous.

[mommymilkies]

Fell sorry for those babies. They will end up with deformed skulls from sitting like that all the time. It is a real thing, and a medical epidemic due to everyone keeping their kids in those silly carriers all the time. My poor niece has it. My doctor went on and on about how happy he is that my daughter's skull is normally rounded because she isn't always leaning against something.

 

Babies biologically are designed to be held and carried, not left laying about. Stupid devices. Besides the things weigh as much as the child does, and are awkward to carry. I have no idea why people use them so much. I get using it if the baby fell asleep in it in the car, and you don't want to wake them up. But when they wake up pick them up!

 

I agree. Not to mention the recent warnings that even the manufacturers have started putting out because of deaths in the seat. Babies suffocate because it is not a proper sleeping position. It's very scary. I can see leaving a sleeping baby in one, attended, on occasion. I have done that. But to leave them in it so often and NOT while in the car, IMHO is dangerous.

[Tangerine]

The carriers can now go from the car, to the stroller, back to the car, and to the swing at home. I think the convenience can lead to too much time in one device, with one area of pressure on the skull.

[butterflymommy]

Some babies are screamers, some are sleepers. I think those who believe they've "trained" their babies really just have relatively easy kiddos. Most of my kisd were "high needs" babies and nothing could stop them from howling and screaming. I had one placid baby and my newborn is quite placid. But it's not due to anything I've done, it's just how they are.

[silliness7]

Yes to both of these! I swear, some babies get taken out of the crib in the morning, and then stay in those seats all day - in the living room with a toy gym in front of them, then straight into the seat base in the car, then into the base on the stroller, then reverse it all and put them back into the crib in the evening. I call them baby buckets, and cringe every time I see someone carrying an infant around while it slap-slap-slaps against their leg.

 

They can be useful, just like swings and bouncy seats and toys. My babies NEVER stayed asleep if I had to move them, and it's great if they solve that problem. But soooo many parents seem to think it's fine and normal that the baby spends much of the day in their baby bucket, and it's not. That very flat, very bald spot on the back of your baby's head? It's. a. clue!

 

My oldest two got those patches from sleeping on their backs. With my 3rd I switched to tummy sleeping and continued with each subsequent child. ...no more bald patch. :001_smile: All of mine LOVED their bouncy seat but had lots of tummy time and mommy snuggles and walked anywhere between 9 mos. and 14 mos.

 

I can't imagine cringing at the sight of a "baby bucket" when you have no idea what goes on at home. It is a safe place for baby when out and about and gives moms enough hands to keep the toddlers from running through the parking lots.

[Word Nerd]

Mine were content in their carriers for at least a little while, and I didn't do anything to "train" them to be so. They also never had flat spots.

[Momof3littles]

I don't like just leaving babies in their car seats for extended periods of time....which is what you would have to do in order to "train them" as the lady said. We use them for safety when riding in the car and that's it. Now if baby is asleep when we arrive home, I will carry the seat into the house and let baby continue sleeping.

 

DD#2 HATED her car seat and screamed whenever we rode in the car for the first few months.

:iagree: Except none of my kids enjoyed being in a carseat. And I do think some kids are more naturally content to be in them especially early on. I do think some parents leave their infant in it a lot, and don't remove the baby even if the baby is crying. The baby does become more accustomed to it, even if he or she wants out of the thing.

 

I have concerns about the effect of prolonged periods in the carrier on oxygenation in young infants, and plagiocephaly (flattening of the back of the head)

When my oldest was an infant I went to a local mommy club meeting for the first time and couldn't handle it when I noticed 80 percent of the moms left their babies, crying or not, in the carseat the whole time. If the baby was lucky mom would "rock" the carrier with her foot (baby still screaming). It made me cringe. This wasn't fussing, this was a case where the moms didn't feel like picking up the baby and baby was forced to hang out in the carseat whether he or she liked it or not.

 

None of my kids has ever been content to ride in a stroller for prolonged periods of time either (outdoors maybe, but not indoors like at a mall).

 

eta: oxygen levels:

http://children.webmd.com/news/20090824/infant-car-seats-may-lower-oxygen-levels

Edited October 21, 2011 by Momof3littles

[mommymilkies]

The carriers can now go from the car, to the stroller, back to the car, and to the swing at home. I think the convenience can lead to too much time in one device, with one area of pressure on the skull.

 

http://babyproducts.about.com/b/2009/02/06/babys-death-leads-to-warning-about-sleeping-in-car-seats.htm

 

http://children.webmd.com/news/20090824/infant-car-seats-may-lower-oxygen-levels

 

There are probably more reliable sources, but I always find it appalling that babies are kept in them so long.

[8circles]

Yes to both of these! I swear, some babies get taken out of the crib in the morning, and then stay in those seats all day - in the living room with a toy gym in front of them, then straight into the seat base in the car, then into the base on the stroller, then reverse it all and put them back into the crib in the evening. I call them baby buckets, and cringe every time I see someone carrying an infant around while it slap-slap-slaps against their leg.

 

They can be useful, just like swings and bouncy seats and toys. My babies NEVER stayed asleep if I had to move them, and it's great if they solve that problem. But soooo many parents seem to think it's fine and normal that the baby spends much of the day in their baby bucket, and it's not. That very flat, very bald spot on the back of your baby's head? It's. a. clue!

 

I agree that keeping babies in any kind of seat/carrier contraption is a problem & it isn't rare these days.

 

But. All of my kids had some degree of bald spot on their heads & they didn't spend any time in carriers outside of actually being in the car plus maybe 20 minutes a day occasionally. Slept on backs until about 6 months & then tummies mostly.

[redsquirrel]

Both of my boys were very high need babies. Both had acid reflux and were just... MORE. They still are, for that matter. I see a long career in the theater arts for both of them. :lol:

 

My SIL has the most placid child you have ever met. My sister (who also has some 'sparky' kids) and I are just in awe. My niece never moves off her little blanket on the floor, will sit for hours in a baby seat. She never fusses and just smiles and chews on her doll. She slept through the night at a few weeks old.

 

Sadly, this has made my SIL rather smug about her 'parenting skills'. My sis and I bite our tongues a whole lot.

 

And, FWIW, those car seats can either be really good or really bad with a reflux baby. Some parents swear by them. It made my boys worse. They only had that ejecting type spitup in the carseat. That was how we got a diagnosis with the youngest. He spitup and it hit the wall in the ped office,lol.

[mrs.m]

Well, I don't think I "trained" my 3 to be content in the car seat. It just happened. That may have been the wrong term unless she let her child just cry it out in the seat. :(

 

I find it sad that some moms were possibly judging my carseat carrier usage. (sorry, I didn't even get that memo.) It's hard enough to be a mom without that happening. :( There were times when I just didn't want to hold my baby at that moment. It doesn't mean that I never held or carried my baby. Or sometimes I kept them there because I knew they would fall asleep or I knew they would be comfortable and safe. At church it kept the random stranger from offering to hold baby which creeped me out!

 

Oh well! I have healthy and happy children that don't have flat heads. So we turned out ok in the end. ;)

[Momof3littles]

Some of my kids have had their hair rub off a bit in the back, but some children end up with plagiocephaly where they actually get flattened areas of their skull. Sometimes this requires the use of a helmet or band to reshape the head. Sometimes it isn't symmetrical flattening and it can actually change the facial features a bit (become asymmetrical).

 

Not all flattening/plagio is caused by parents leaving their babies in devices too long (bouncer, swing, carseat, etc. all add up), but leaving them for prolonged periods in numerous devices can increase the risk of plagiocephaly. I just want to be clear and state that I realize children get plagio even if they aren't spending excessive time in carseats, bouncers, swings, etc, but those devices can increase the likelihood.

[Crimson Wife]

Interestingly, I was talking to my brother's occupational therapist, who told me that all of these seats (car seats, bouncy seats, etc.) are not good at all for babies' development. He told me that being either free on the floor on a blanket or in a baby sling is so much better. FWIW, my kids were always "early" in sitting, crawling, and walking (all walking before or at 12 mos.) The OT is from Kenya, and he said that children there are way ahead of the US (and his son was WALKING at 9 months). I kinda took some of that with a grain of salt (my ds walked at 10 months, and it was a challenge!) but from his explanation of development it made sense to me.

 

It's my experience that the correlation runs the other way. Active babies who are destined to become early walkers tend to dislike being confined to the carrier. From BIRTH my oldest was a wriggler and hated to be in the carrier, the sling, a swaddling blanket, etc. She walked at 9 1/2 months.

 

Her siblings were much more "chill" babies and didn't mind being worn in the sling, swaddled in blankets, or put into the carrier. They were average-to-late walkers (the week of 1st birthday for DS, 14 mos. for DD). The temperament difference was readily apparent LONG before there was a difference in time spent in the carrier.

[ktgrok]

Well, I don't think I "trained" my 3 to be content in the car seat. It just happened. That may have been the wrong term unless she let her child just cry it out in the seat. :(

 

I find it sad that some moms were possibly judging my carseat carrier usage. (sorry, I didn't even get that memo.) It's hard enough to be a mom without that happening. :( There were times when I just didn't want to hold my baby at that moment. It doesn't mean that I never held or carried my baby. Or sometimes I kept them there because I knew they would fall asleep or I knew they would be comfortable and safe. At church it kept the random stranger from offering to hold baby which creeped me out!

 

Oh well! I have healthy and happy children that don't have flat heads. So we turned out ok in the end. ;)

 

Some use of the seats is fine, and I think all of us that spoke out against them agreed they have their place. What we were talking about is keeping the baby IN a type of contraption All. the. time. Where they go from carseat to swing to bouncy seat to crib to carseat all day long. It isn't about bald spots, it is about flattened, misshapen skulls. It can be very serious, and it isn't from keeping them in their during lunch every now and then,or church once a week, it is from prolonged use.

[mama2cntrykids]

I have four kids and ALL.OF.MINE.HATED.IT!! No way would I have trained them to sit there. They would have all screamed bloody murder.

 

Even now, with my 4.5 month old, I take her out of her car seat whenever we're out and about. She's just now barely tolerating it for rides, she'd scream if I just left her in it and toted it around. Gah!

[Lady Marmalade]

Neither of my two liked the car seat. At all. It was very tiresome to take them anywhere when they were infants, because they screamed bloody murder the entire time.

 

They seem so convenient and easy to use, but the reality was that those seats are HEAVY and awkward to carry. Within two months for both kids, we'd stopped using it as a carrier and simply left it in the car all the time. That way we were at least spared the awful screaming during the time it took to strap them in and carry them to the car.

 

So much nicer and easier to simply carry the babe and hold them.

[Miss Cornelia Snook]

It's one of those things that can be good when used by responsible parents, and bad when used by those who who are ignorant or neglectful.

 

I have a neglectful SIL who parked her babies wherever she could, and all four ended up with misshapen skulls. Her 7 year old still has a misshapen skull (she never sought treatment for it, or accepted it, as I imagine her pediatrician would have brought it up, it's so noticeable). It kills me to be around her children, knowing how they are treated. The other day, while MIL was watching these children, I butted in and adjusted the baby's carseat straps so that they were at the proper height, and not four inches above her shoulders! SIL and BIL often don't bother with carseats while driving, anyway.

 

I'm debating getting an infant carrier for our expected addition.

[jelbe5]

My son lived in his infant carrier for months . . . it was one of the few places I could put him where he did not cry and where he actually slept. He also liked the playpen. I think he felt comfortable in confined places.

[Veritaserum]

My babies generally only sit in a carseat in a car. The only time I bring them in the seat into a building is if I have a doctor's appointment for myself and I need a safe, clean place to put the baby. I use my arms or a sling everywhere else. I was a teen when the baby buckets really started getting popular and I hated seeing crying babies strapped into those things or babies being ignored while awake. We didn't use an infant seat with our first. We used a convertible. We did use an infant seat with the others, but it almost always stayed in the car.

[Celia]

I am in awe of the many little babies I see totally content just sitting and looking around in their car seats. It seems like every baby I see these days is a content just sitting and looking around or playing in their car seat carrier while away from home. Mine were not like that. I commented to a mom at church how amazing I think it is that her baby is so content in his seat. She looked at me like I had two heads and told me that she trains them young. This made me think. Is this just a training issue or not? Now, my parenting philosophy would not have me training my kids to be independent sleepers/car seat sitters at that age, but I don't believe training would have been possible with my oldest - not even close. His needs involved being held a lot and plenty of interaction. I had to sit beside him in the car and engage him pretty much constantly. He didn't start falling asleep in the car until he was about 5 months old. My other two kids I probably could have trained, but I had no desire to train my babies. Is that the only way babies are content in their car seat carriers?

 

I thinkj it's mostly personalilty. My dearest friend had two kids who were 'easy' likje this. And her reaction to other people's babies not sitting quietly was that it was the parenting. Then she had her third :lol:. She was a fiesty one, and just more challenging all around. Since then she's often commented that she's so happy she had a more challenging child, because she could now sympathize.

 

My kids went in the opposite order. My first was my most difficult. The kid screamed constantly whenever he was in his carseat, up until he was at least a year old. Probably longer... I've just chosen to forget!!! No amount of 'training', other than possibly complete neglect or brutality, could have gotten him to stop crying in the carseat.

[LizzyBee]

Forget the babies, I hate those things. Gah. So. Heavy. :svengo:

 

:iagree: I've never been able to understand why people lug those things around. It's so much easier to just carry the baby.

[Tangerine]

:iagree: I've never been able to understand why people lug those things around. It's so much easier to just carry the baby.

 

 

I saw someone the other day in Woodfield Mall (larger than Mall of America) with a teeeeeny baby in one. Lugging it. Not on a stroller. I would faint and fall out.

[Momof3littles]

Maybe not from sitting in a car seat. My DS never had any flat head problems. Nor have most of the kids I know, even though they spend time in car seats. But I know two babies whose plagiocephaly was so severe they had to wear skull helmets -both times the parents were HUGE sling wearers. They were in the car seat strictly for trips.

 

So there is something else going on here rather than use of car seats. Websites that talk about this say nothing about car seats--They seem to be blaming it on the position a baby sleeps in. http://www.askdrsears.com/topics/childhood-illnesses/flat-head (So the "Lie on back to reduce SIDS" campaign is a big part of it.)

 

No, a kid staying all the time in a car seat is not a great thing. But its better not to make it into more than it is.

 

I tried slinging with DS. He HATED it. He preferred his car seat. I could still interact with him in the car seat because I had a stroller where he faced me. No, I was not always interacting with him. But I see plenty of babies in slings where the parents are shopping, talking to other people and not focusing on just interacting with their kid -- I don't think its a bad thing for a baby to be part of the whole instead of always the center of attention.

 

Jury is still out on DD. I am more comfortable with her in her car seat (or the built-in seat on a cart, or the front of the cart in a blanket). I'm still afraid that she's going to fall out of the carriers I have tried. And that fall onto the hard floor at shopping places would be much more damaging. I don't feel secure. I've got locals helping me. But I'm not going to depend on baby wearing until I can feel secure with it when I am on my own without anyone to help me put it on/get baby in/etc.

When babies slept on their tummies, they got some relief. I don't think most professionals blame carseats in and of themselves. The problem is back sleeping in addition to all of the devices, leaving babies with pressure on that part of their skull for more hours per day than in previous decades.

 

A good number of plagio cases also coincide w/ torticollis. The rotation of the baby's head puts uneven pressure on one side of the back of the head, causing asymmetrical flattening.

 

Most professionals I know do feel the number of devices babies use today, coupled with the back sleeping, have an influence on plagiocephaly. It is the whole thing taken together that has caused an increase IMO.