What age did you change your DC car seat from rear to front facing?

[pinkbottle48]

The advice in the UK seems quite different to other countries. A lot of friends I know changed at about 9 months. However, Sweden, for example, recommends not till the age of 4, the US I think is 2. DD is 16 months and still rear facing people here seem to think it's strange we haven't turned it around yet. But why do other countries have such different recommendations?

My dd just got too long for her rf seat when she was nearly 3. She was crying about her back hurting. We turned it round and she felt fine again. DS is still rf at 18 months and will be until he starts complaining too.

Four and a half for both of them. Bonkers to do it much sooner, the safety data is very clear.

Last week. DS is 2.5 and was starting to become very insistent on FF. We have a Joie 360 so it goes both ways. Would have kept him RF longer but it's a balance between safety and him being unnecessarily cross and distracting.

Any long journeys where we're expecting him to sleep he'll still go RF

You can get ERF seats cheaply now. The Joie Tilt for example is £75 which is cheaper than a lot of forward facing seats and you can buy it in Mothercare. That will rear face most children until 3 or 4 years. When I was looking for DS1 you could only buy them online or at specialist retailers and they were all about £3-400.

DS1 was 13 months in his dad's car (we'd split up so he made the decision) and 18 months for me when he'd outgrown the baby seat. This was 10 years ago and it was really hard to find ERF seats which were affordable and worked for a non driver. I got a Kiddy seat with impact shield which at the time were said to be an in between measure safety wise.

It's not just the UK that people FF early, it's also done in other European countries like France and Spain. Like here you can get ERF seats but they are harder to find.

The 15 month rule is not actually law, it is legislation which means it affects products being produced and sold, not the behaviour of parents who have bought seats produced under the older laws (which are still legal to produce and sell).

DS2 is only 3 weeks old so will be RF for a long time yet but I'm not sure what we'll do. Personally I think the evidence for RF is extremely strong until around a year of age so I would want to RF past a year, probably to 18 months minimum to be safe. Apparently across Europe when the only seats available stuck to the 9kg rule, there was a spike in child passenger road deaths at around a year of age and this was found to be attributed to children tending to be moved into forward facing seats around the end of the first year.

After two years although rear facing is still safer (it's always safer) you're not talking stark life or death any more so after that point IMO the safety is weighted as a bit less important, and other factors such as travel sickness, behavioural issues (escaping belt), social contact, space in car, cost of seats, ease to do up harness etc would all start to factor in more heavily to my personal decision making.

The law changed a while ago so children in the UK should be rear facing until at least 15 months. You also need to look at weight and height rather than age

According to the direct.gov website, 15 months is only for height based car seats, but weight based you can start forward face from 9kg! So a lot lot younger.
My sister RF my niece till she was 4ish and she HATED being turned! Kept trying to turn back to face the seat but they couldn't get a RF seat big enough for her then.

I will be RF until at least 2 then see how he is in terms of height/weight/available seat options as would like to keep RF as long as possible as it's the safest way to travel!

In fact I got told last night in an antenatal class that we should aim for 9 months rear facing before considering turning. I think that is really bad to be advising as some may think it's fine to just turn them then because a midwife said so!

My dd is still mainly rf at 2.5. We have a lighter seat to take on holiday and for grandparents cars (rarely used) that is ff only which she’s used a handful of times. We do need to remember to take off muddy shoes in the winter as the seats take a beating. She’s light and below average height so will be fine for a while yet and the seat is high so she can see out the windows.
DS is only 3m and over the 91st percentile for height and weight so we may have a different story using the same seats!

For those unconvinced about the safety of rf, look at the (frankly horrific) information about neck development in children and what happens in a front end crash situation. That convinced us 6 years ago when ds needed the next stage seat. And the neck isn't really strong enough until closer to 4 yrs than 2. Erf seats were really expensive but are more affordable now thankfully.

DS1 was about 6.5. DS2 (current age 5.5) will probably switch to forward but long after he is 6

It was 9 months a few years back and they started to outgrow the small car seat. I see the law seems to have changed.

But I am struggling to imagine a 3 it 4 year old sitting rear faced, where do their legs go? And they don't have a view? Mine used to scream the car down until they started sitting face forward.

They cross their legs and they have a view out of the back and the side windows. If a child hasn’t known any different it won’t be an issue. For me personally, safety far outweighs a nice view

My 9 month old is still rear facing in her infant carrier seat and will be until she maxes the limits of the seat. After that we plan on using an extended rear facing seat that can be used up to 25kg which should be around 6 going by the charts in her red book. I wouldn’t dream of FFing her any earlier than 4 years. People say we’re extreme but if you properly look into the statistics and stories you’ll find out a lot! We’ve had FFing seats in the past but we’re a lot less educated on the matter. So glad I know differently now. I think the benefits of extended rear facing needs to be publicised more in the UK.

My son is 16mo and is still in his infant carrier (so still RF) as he is under 9kg. His infant carrier is a 0+ so up to 13kg or until his head goes over the top of the seat, so he will be in it for a while yet.
However once he finally grows out of his infant carrier he will be going FF as we have bought his next car seat that is group 1-3.

DS1 is 4 next week and is rear facing in a 25kg seat. I think he will outgrow it by height before weight because he is very tall but we should get another year or so out of it I think.

We have a Joie 360 so can be used both ways. More recently he's been very insistent on forward facing (since he realised that he faces forward in my parents car as theirs is FF only) and is less likely to vomit on long journeys so we do FF most of the time.

DS is 4 and still rear facing. He's getting a bit big for it so we'll be getting a HBB in the next 6 months.

There was no such thing as a rear facing seat when mine were young. I've always wondered whether car sickness is a problem. Going backwards on trains always lead to sickness. I do wonder if the kids who scream and cry in their rear facing seats are actually feeling ill?

As soon as they outgrew the baby seat both mine went FF.
I don’t actually know a single person irl who has RF beyond about 1yr here (in Germany). It never came up when we were buying seats, either.

My DD is 2 and still rear-facing. My aim is to keep her that way until she is 4. However she is very rarely in a car at all, so it hasn't proved much of a challenge for us.

DS was rear facing until around age 4. I happened to read an article in the Sunday Times about extended rear facing seats, and then researched from there.

DS (7) was 12m. He was a long, lean baby so getting long for his 0+ seat and had begun to battle getting into the seat and scream through the journey. It's safer concentrating on the road if your passenger isn't screaming. ERF was still in its infancy, very expensive and few options avaliable that could work in my car.

DS2 (5) had a different build so although he was heavier, his head and shoulders fitted until he was 15m. Same car restricting options. Car seat rules hadn't changed and choice still wasn't as diverse as it is now.

My main problems with car seats is that my DCs get too long for before they reach weight limits. DS1 (7) is still a couple of years away from 25kg based on his patterns of growth, but his feet would be crushed against the roof of my car or his knees jammed against the car door if I tried to contort him into a ERF based on a weight guide alone. DS2 got too tall for the harness and headrest before I could buy a HBB for him because of his weight. Real life is more nuanced than guidelines.

DD was 3 when we changed to forward facing.
Would have liked to leave her rf for longer but she looked uncomfortable.

Jynxa
The Britax Two Way Elite has a very tall shell, fits most children until about 6, and it was on the market when your oldest was born. Yes, in “real life”.

Mine is still rear facing and will be 2 in November but she's the only child her age I know who still does in real life. There seems to be a larger percentage of rear facers on MN. My daughter is only just 10kg though so would be reluctant to move her FF until she weighs a bit more. My youngest is 4 months and has just gone into a Joie Tilt because she hates her infant seat. Turns out she just hates the car though!

6.4 in a Britax twe.