To leave Dd alone in hotel room?

[Shelby2010]

More of a WWYD really. We are going to be staying with Dd (18mths) in a hotel next month on holiday & then overnight for a wedding in July. How safe do MNetters feel it is to leave their sleeping DC in the room with either the listening service or a normal baby monitor while eating in the hotel restaurant or attending an evening reception?

Am I being very PFB to worry about how many members of staff could access the room (especially with programable card keys)? The fact that hotels do offer a listening service suggests that many parents are ok with this. I'm torn between thinking I'm paranoid and thinking that they always tell you not to leave valuables in you room except in the safe..... Help!

Babysitter jailed last year for abuse

babysitter jailed this year for sexual abuse

I won't list them all because they are all shocking and there are plenty of them, including a man who use to provide babysitting services to ex-pats and holidaymakers abroad.

So statistically speaking, you are more likely to come across an abusive babysitter than you are an abducter or a hotel fire.

Where did I say that all the hotel staff would be sex offenders? It only takes one. So now the argument is that strangers are perfectly fine and it is paranoid not to trust them but no the real reason people can't use babysitters is that they will abuse the children. Yes, the woman you know well, who is trustworthy and nice with a great reputation who costs you money might to rape your kids, lets leave them alone so that adults you have not met and whose backgrounds you don't know have full access to them instead.....might want to come up with a better excuse to save money. Why not just be honest, the kids aren't worth the price of a few drinks.

But,and I don't mean this offensively, your purse and passport would be far more appealing to a thief. Plus the number of petty thieves must be way way higher than the number of kidnappers!
I wouldn't do it, just don't necessarily think its a good argument.

babydubs, the people who leave their babies in their hotel rooms don't leave their "valuables" in hotel rooms either

I've never sat downstairs with the tv on so loudly that I couldn't hear odd noises from my DS's room.

I think you 'hear' odd noises in a way you don't hear the normal noises, and when you hear them you go and check it out. There is also the absence of the 'right' noises. I've lost count of the number of times I've told people to shush or turned the tv onto mute to listen more closely (whether on a monitor or not) - and it's things like DS being more restless because he's kicked his blanket off but not yet disturbed enough to have started crying, etc.

A wedding reception where it would take you more than a few seconds to move somewhere quieter to listen to the monitor more closely - it's just not worth the risk.

I think that the point isnt it Bee - the risks are the same for all of us - whether you could live with yourself in the unlikely event something did go wrong differs from person to person. If I decided to leave my child and something went wrong I would blame myself forever so leaving them is not an advisable thing for me to do. Only the op can answer that one.

I doubt the ones you've posted had a reputation as babysitters, sounds like scummy mother has her scummy friend mind child, scummy friend does what scummy people do. Not the type most people hire. Most of us use common sense and hire nice people we know well.

Dh still has nightmares about waking up in a hotel room his parents had left him and his brothers in. It happened twice to him.

We paid for a teenager to come on holiday with us when we had a hotel holiday with his parents as I knew his dad would make a fuss if we had an early supper with the kids. She had the room next door

Bee is right.

Midget much, bobble? it's you that sounds scummy.

Bloody hell.

So if people are unfortunate enough to have someone in their circle who is a paedophile, and their children are abused, then this must mean the parents are "scummy"???

Paedophiles don't have signs around their necks you know.
What a bizarre post.

You must have very finely tuned hearing ChitChat, I wouldn't be able to hear one of my kids being restless from kicking a blanket off from downstairs.

Judgey, not midget.

Thing is I work on the assumption that generally people are OK, and that my children will generally be fine.

It can't be much a a life for anyone, imagining all these awful things are going to go wrong the whole time.

Bee is right. It is knowing you can live with yourself if something does go wrong and your motivation for taking the risks in the first place.

Friend is distantly related to someone on the sex offenders register - if you met him you would think "what a handsome young man" not "scummy" at all on initial inspecation.

"Why not just be honest, the kids aren't worth the price of a few drinks."

Oh absolutely yes. I would having a few drinks way up the list of my priorities, of course! Tell you want, you just give social services a call and report me now if you think I'm so selfish and irresponsible. I'll happily give you all my details.

Earlier posters have given abduction as a reason why they wouldn't do it. Many people have said, why not just get a babysitter? So on those grounds it's worth mentioning the risks of abduction by a stranger next to the risk of abuse by a babysitter. Just for comparison.

Calculated risks. If knowing about the statistics on abuse by babysitters (not just sexual) and you still choose to employ the services of a babysitter then you make a calculated risk that you and your dh are happy to make. If knowing about the statistics on hotel fires and abduction you choose to leave your baby sleeping in their room then you take a calculated risk. I don't see the difference.

As for monitors. Well you can now get breathing monitors and monitors with built in webcams for less than a hundred quid. So you wouldn't need to rely on sound alone.

cause abusers are never people of good reputation in the community bobbledunk? they all look like Bill Sikes right?

In fact bobbledunk, now that I've read your last post. You're not worth engaging with anymore.

Bye bye.

I just think there are necessary risks and un-necessary risks...this, to me, is unnecessary.

Anyway id be glad to get away eventually and use the kids as an excuse anyway

You should read the link, nobody in their right mind would hand their child over to an ovbiously disturbed woman with a violent history. It is scummy and stupid to pretend otherwise.

There are 2 links.
They are examples of cases where babysitters have been abusive.

Way to backtrack on your idea that all parents who (unknowingly) allow an abuser to access their children are automatically "scummy".

Marvellous attitude.

Therhubarb is right though no point engaging.

IMO it's still not worth the risk.

Hotel fire, abductor, dodgy babysitter or even 'just' child wakes up scared silly after a bad dream somewhere unfamiliar.
The last possibility isnt' sooo bad, but any of the others are.
Very low chances of occuring, very big problem if they do.

bobbledunk, y'know people don't look like their mug shots PRIOR to being caught, everyone looks dodgy/guilty in mugshots!