To think pushing a pram while smoking...

[Damash12]

Is just wrong!! I'm probably gonna get flamed but really??!! I see mum/dad pushing their babies with a fag resting on the handle, about level with child's head, all the fag smoke blowing nicely over the baby. And why do I find it even worse when it's a grandparent???

MIL smokes and when we walk somewhere together we all end up stinking of smoke - lifting the baby out of the pram gives you a waft of smoke smell. However, I dont say anything to MIL because we dont walk around on a daily basis and I wouldnt want to hurt her feelings - she is good to us. I would start to get twitchy if it was everyday simply because the clothes and blankets stink while the baby s parent facing!.

I smoke, I have small children. I don't push the pram and smoke, I fact the only places I smoke are my back garden and smoking areas outside pubs if I'm on a rare night out

I don't like smoking whilst walking down the street, can't be arsed with the Evil Glare Brigade.

The Evil Glare Brigade - me!

In the throws of morning sickness I swore the next smoker to unintentionally waft smoke my way (the smell of which made me sick) was going to have vomit on their shoes!

I do think smokers are obviously a bit thick or gormless. First for smoking in the first place knowing what we know now, and for being so easily led that they had to smoke to be cool (sheep). And yes my blood pressure sometimes rises about smoking (not probably as much as most smokers though) as I have a lot of childhood issues with it to say nothing of having to nurse a dying mother who died of lung cancer.

I was also a low birth weight baby-my mother took up smoking when she was pregnant I then went on to have a low birth weight baby. So smoking didnt just affect myself it also effected the next generation. Yet people will keep trying to jusitfy their selfishness

YANBU

I think it looks rough.

Yesterday, I saw a woman holding her 2 kids hands to cross the road with a fag in her mouth. She carried on down the road this way, just puffing away with no hands, letting all the ash blow whatever way it fancied. Looked so bad and she was so short that it blew all in her face.

I like the odd fag after a drink and have smoked off and on in the past but my DCs have never seen me smoke, I wouldn't want them to.

It does look rough, no matter who is doing. The queen could light up and she'd style look rough.

Style? Still

They are only being thoughtful, why should the smoker get all the fun? It seems nice that they are letting the baby get some of the pleasure too.

Anyway not all of us can afford to buy fags for both us and our infants. Mine would get through 40 a day given half a chance. A quick passive smoke for the baby seems fairest all round with an occasional packet just as a treat on the weekend.

Yanbu.
I'm an ex smoker and stopped when I was pregnant, basically because there was NO WAY I was pushing a pushchair around with a baby in a buggy .

Who are these inconsiderate fools who smoke while in the open air? Much better to do it indoors - everyone knows that children do not breathe when they're inside houses.

Wallison

I smoke. I have young DC. I have on rare occasions done what other posters have done, parked up and smoked away from the pushchair. Not proud of it and it has been a very rare occasion. Now I only smoke outside the house when DC isn't with me for one reason or another (asleep, with DP etc), or when I'm at work.

Obviously, I am both incredibly thick, gormless, and as common as muck.

OP, yabu to hoik on your judgey pants - and everyone insulting smokers is being massively U too - but yanbu because I imagine most parents could find a way to continue to smoke but without doing it right next to their baby.

But at the end of the day, if they do - it's their choice.

I's out in the open air.
This is about intolerance of others not health implications for our kids.

It looks tacky yes - but surely little one is in the pram/buggy below your hands..and unless fags have changed since I quite smoke goes up....so how exactly is the smoke in the child's face?

I'm not a smoker but I hate all the judginess about smoking. I am sure it is not at all easy to give up smoking and for people who don't smoke to say 'just don't do it' is really not understanding at all. Smoke is highly unlikely to blow into the babies' pram.

I eat and drink too much - does that mean I should not eat a bar of chocolate or have a glass of wine in front of my child? I know I would be far healthier if I lost a couple of stone but just telling me to 'lose weight' isn't really going to work is it?

I hope you are all the perfect mothers that you make yourselves out to be.

I agree that I don't like it. But I do do it. Shamefaced I know.

No there must be some health implications if smoke is blown all over baby 25 times a day even if outside!

It'd be going it some to take your baby out in the pushchair 25 times a day with a fag.

I like that I'm gormless, thick AND common, just for smoking, never mind doing it near my baby.

Very good point, ragwort. Is there a sliding scale of healthiness that is suitable to be an effective, 'intelligent', 'non-gormless' mum? So if you smoked, but also went to the gym and ate very healthily and were a target weight for your height, is that better or worse than not smoking, but never doing any exercise and eating an 'unhealthy' diet and maybe being overweight for your height? What about it you eat unhealthily in front of your children (so 'teaching them bad habits'), is that better or worse than smoking in front of your children?

Who is the final arbiter here?

Oh, and visualise - ditto. I love being judged entirely on my one, currently legal vice...

I like that you presume that we all smoke 25 (at least) a day. I have no more than 5 a day. I normally wait until baby is in bed before having a fag outside, but sometimes I have one earlier in the day. Smoking is normally my 'me time', when I can just sit and relax and everything is quiet.

I have the occasional one while pushing the buggy. Smoke is NOT 'blown all over the baby'. He is forward facing, and more often than not has the raincover on as it rains/snows all the bloody time where we live. I would never smoke while he was parent facing.

Do not make that horrible generalisation that all smokers are the same.

Thank you Thurlow - and I agree with you. We eat healthily, we (well, mostly OH..!) exercises regularly, we have an active, out-doors type of lifestyle and live in the middle of nowhere. I really, honestly, do not believe that my baby being near me while I smoke the odd fag is really that awful, when you consider our 'lifestyle'.

Our village has a fish & chip van on a friday about 8pm. A few weeks ago I was waiting and it was freezing (-3 and windy) and some girl came out of a pub with an approx 12month old child (baby + pub + 8pm. Not cute family dinner pub, locals piss up pub). She was wrapped up to the eye balls in a knee length puffa coat and scarf, fingerless mittens and bobble hat. Her poor poor DS in a buggy had a coat and a flimsy crochet blanket and no gloves or hat (just hood). She then stood there is the cold having a fag whilst the poor little thing sobbed and sobbed. She just waggled his buggy and didnt bother looking at him for 5 minutes, and then pulled a packet of mini cheddars out to feed him all the while with her disgusting fag. She tried to smile at me (I must have been open mouth staring, oops) but it took all my self control to to tell her 'that her DS was not hungry, but tited and freezing cold and needed cuddles and bed. I was so upset I burst into tears when I got home and was put right off my fish and chips. Poor little mite.
Yes I am judgy pants on this, but those who ask 'where should I have a fag' the answer is, 'when you are no where near your children or where they will be or when you will have to go near trhen within the next 20 minutes. (FSIDS website says it all). Smoking increases the chances of SIDS by 21 times. Not 21% but 21 TIMES.....