over a bloody booster seat 🥵

I live in Ireland and my children were all small for their age so they all used boosters way past the age their friends did.

My 12 year old dd is 142cm tall and nowhere near 36kg. She should technically still be using a booster but I just recently let her stop because I was happy with how the seatbelt in our car was fitting her, and her legs reach the right spot on the seat.

All my kids were in the position where they were in a friend's car and they were the only child made to take a booster seat. None of their friends ever teased them for it. They just accepted that because they were small they weren't tall enough yet to sit without one. My kids all have nice friends who wouldn't tease them for being small.

I feel your pain.
For what it's worth, the minimum height for children to stop using a booster seat in the UK is one of the lowest in the western world. It's 150cm minimum in the EU and 145cm in the USA. However, as 80% of parents stop using them often well before the legal minimum, it puts pressure on the remaining parents to concede or risk socially embarrassing their own children.

We probably need a public safety ad on this to educate parents on the risks that an adult seatbelt poses for children (and women as they were designed for the male of the species who is taller on average than most women).

Car companies should probably start from scratch and design new seat belts that suit women as well as men.

This. UK regulations on child car seats are actually very poor. Booster seat until at least 142cm is safer.

A child having a tantrum doesn't trump your responsibility to keep her safe. How would you feel if you give in and they are involved in a crash?

When my daughter was eight I refused to take one of her friends in my car without a booster cushion. Dad has driven her to ours without one. Fortunately a third friend’s parent had a spare one with them so we could use that. When she was collected in a minibus-type vehicle, she left, sitting on dad’s knee in the front. I do despair of some parents’ attitudes towards safety.

Government guidance says they don’t need one..

Personally I would just drive her there yourself.

In you car problem solved. Just say something like you're running late and meet them there.

Would you rather she be embarrassed or be making a decision to donate her organs? Grow up.

It’s the addition of lower bone density in children too that raises seat belt placement risk.

I would say yes they were sexist or thoughtless because we all know to some Women are invisible and yes women are more likely to die as a result!

If you want to get angry and frustrated as woman read this Invisible Women | Caroline Criado Perez https://share.google/KOneO9B7VLB3YkenW

Women and children are frequently left out of safety studies and data sets it's only recently that there was female crash dummies they were modelled on male bodies.

Excuse the copy and paste a quick Google presents this:

The first crash test dummy built to genuinely mimic the anatomy and biomechanics of an average-sized adult woman (5 feet 4 inches tall, 137 pounds) was only unveiled by a team of Swedish engineers led by researcher Astrid Linder in 2022.

Safety Disparities: Due to the male-centric design of safety systems, studies have shown that in a frontal collision of the same severity, women are 73% more likely to be seriously injured and 17% more likely to die than men.

Times have changed! We used to ride in the footwell of the car sometimes! No one would dream of that now.

my tall 9 year old is still in a high back booster along with most of her friends.

Honestly, I’d have died of embarrassment being seen using a booster seat at 9 years old. Children can be so cruel, don’t do this to her. Especially as she’s so close to the safety limit anyway.

Booster cushions have their place.

Remembering many tweens won't even have a seat of any description they might still be more comfortable on a cushion than not having anything for a short child.

Easier to get 3 in a back seat than 3 seats.

More comfortable to sit beside.

I don’t think this is a “these are not your friends” situation at all and the issue should not be moved onto her friends. Unless there’s a consistent pattern of the friends being mean rather than only teasing, then it becomes a much bigger conversation about the friendship group as a whole.

To me, this is more of a “you don’t need to be the same as everyone else, be yourself, every one growns at their own pace” moment. Part of growing up is learning to be confident and not feeling pressure to conform. If friends tease you a bit, it helps to be learn to be resilient, confident, and be able to laugh along.

SO why do they have to sit in booster seats - because they are not tall enough for the seatbelts to fit them properly. What do these seatbelts do in an accident (there will likely be motorway traffic involved here)?

I think those saying let it go are wrong and the law says so too - and this blatant disregard for road safety is dangerous

I bet most of the posters saying OP was being ridiculous put their DC in forward facing seats as soon as possible.

@Minniliscious I wouldn’t have a 7yo dictating what happens in the car. Statistically I think you are more likely to have an accident on short trip

Why do people think the height is the height? If it was safe for 134cm then the rule would be 134cm, not 135.

The ignorance that the big issue here is the driver getting a fine/points. You all understand what booster seats are for, yes? We have multiple children die every year in the A&E I work in because they were not properly strapped in - and that includes the shoulder strap not fitting correctly.

I’m really shocked at the replies you’re getting here OP.

My 9 year old daughter is 143cm so is tall and I still make her have a booster.

Without one the seatbelt cuts right into her neck and is definitely not in the right place

Ffs schools are fucking ridiculous for this trying to enforce friendships and minimising bullying. Saw this a lot at DCs primary. What’s the high school set up going to look like? Will she be with the kids in the next village?

My nearly 8 year old started to kick off massively over booster seats! He found them uncomfortable and every trip was a nightmare with him going on about it. Luckily he’s 133cm now so we allow short car trips without the seat. Most of the kids in his year have stopped using boosters as well.

Article from Which on the ineffectiveness of backless boosters

Should a child be in a backless booster seat?

Our car seat experts believe backless cushions are not the best way to transport children and we recommend using a high-back booster seat whenever possible.
In our rigorous crash tests, backless booster seats haven’t proved to be nearly as safe as high-back booster seats with a full-length back and wings, which provide extra protection for your child's head and chest in a side-impact crash.
Booster cushions raise the child’s position, but some struggle to keep the shoulder strap of a three-point adult seatbelt in the right place on a child, and provide virtually no protection from a side-on collision.
Some manufacturers of backless boosters argue that many modern cars have side airbags or other safety features, which should help to protect the occupants.
But our child car seat experts disagree, as not every car has added safety features. There’s also a risk that a young child sitting on a booster cushion could easily wriggle out of position – we’ve seen this happen in our fitting tests. What’s more, a young child might not be tall enough for their head to reach the side airbags.
We’ve tested a handful of multi-group seats that convert to a backless booster seat in Group 3 mode, and have given them our Don't Buy warning because of their poor crash-test results, especially for side-impact crashes. A good result in any other part of our crash tests can't compensate for this.
Booster seats are temptingly priced – some start from as little as £10 – and there’s no doubt they’re convenient. But while using any seat is better than using none, booster seats offer very little protection in a crash, particularly if the vehicle is hit from the side.

Late to this one but I'm with you OP - I'd be very concerned about not having the appropriate safety measures in place. That said, I believe that the necessity of booster seats is also calculated on weight, and that had some bearing on when we stopped using ours.
Prior to that, if we were going anywhere, or DC was, it was non-negotiable. No booster seat, no journey. We also insisted on the same with regard to any other children in the car.
I'd rather be unpopular for 'being square' than be responsible for someone's injury (Or worse).