to think it's wrong to leave a baby/toddler sleeping alone in a hotel room?

[strawberry34]

When you have a monitor and are still in the premises?my friend says she does it when on holiday, she goes to the bar/restaurant and responds to the monitor if her 2yo dd wakes, I was shocked and said I wouldn't ever want to, I stay in the room and read a book/have a bath. Aibu to think what she's doing is wrong? I don't want to refer to famous cases but to me there's too much risk.

[curlew]

So the hotel staff are paedophiles?

[janey68]

Keys curlew. Those things hotel workers have.
Another key difference between a hotel and a private house is that most parents in a large house would probably leave the bedroom door ajar. They certainly wouldn't lock it, which slows down access in the event of an emergency

[curlew]

So you won't leave your sleeping child in a locked hotel room with a monitor because the hotel staff (who are the only other people with a key) might be a paedophile.

Or there might be an unspecified emergency. And it would take you 15 second longer to get into the room than it would at home.

[LookingForwardToMarch]

Depends which hotel you are at.

It's not like they crb check bell boys is it!

And before you start I am not suggesting that ALL hotel staff are pedos.

But ofcourse there is a risk.

It just boils down to whether you, as a parent, are willing to take it.

(and no it is not like just at home unless your house is full of strangers you don't know from Adam and all there is is a flimsy lock.on your door)

[janey68]

I'm beginning to pick up that you have an obsession with paedophiles curlew.

Look: hotel staff have been known to steal from hotel rooms. An unknown person entering the room would be extremely scary for a child.

(I am aware of course that fire, theft, medical emergency are all unlikely events; I am just suggesting to curlew that there are a variety of reasons why parents wouldn't feel comfortable, and trying desperately to distract him/her from the paedophile obsession )

[LookingForwardToMarch]

Lock on your *childs door

[prettybird]

Smites - the reason could be 'cos most people who would be ok with it can't be bothered coming onto threads like this.

People have already made up their minds and are quick to judge those who make different choices.

[primallass]

I have done it twice. Both times he was in a travel cot so could not climb out. Was before the Madeline McCann case though. Everyone did it when I was small, hotels had a listening service.

[TSSDNCOP]

I wouldn't do it. Not because of the paedophiles hiding in the maids trolley, but because my over active imagination means I wouldn't relax.

MM went missing about 3 weeks before I had my first DC. Would I have been different if she hadn't? Maybe. But I can tell you that although I'm fairly chilled about most things, leaving the DC unattended on holiday isn't one of them. Sad but true.

[janey68]

Primallas- yes, there's also the issue of them getting out of bed. God knows what my 2 year old would have got up if he'd found himself alone in a hotel room ...

[phantomnamechanger]

I have to disagree with those saying that a child upstairs in a hotel room is no different to up a few flights of stairs in your own large house.

For example - in the event of a fire alarm or other emergency, YOU would then be trying to battle your way through the crowds of people coming down the stairs to get back up to your frightened child, and having to waste precious time explaining yourself

I have also found a neighbours child sobbing in the street at 730 one morning not knowing where her mum was - mum as it turned out had popped down the road to another friends house for a few minutes thinkg DD would not waken. I know someone else who drove their Dh to the station leaving 2 pre school children asleep in their beds every day and thought this was fine as they were in a very rigid sleep routine and would not waken in the 1/2 hour she was gone. Of course she knew she would never break down or be delayed or involved in an accident.

[ParadiseChick]

Curlew you are being deliberately obtuse in asking people to explain their reasoning then twisting it.

Would you leave your passports and money on the bed of your hotel room? There's a reason hotel rooms have safes. I don't use one at home but sure as hell do in hotels purely for the reason that that any number of people have access to keys.

So for the same reason I agree as hell wouldn't leave my dc. But, as many people have said, there are numerous reasons why it's a stupid thing to do v before you even get to the paedophile with a key.

You seem quite quick to belittle people who choose to our their children's well-being over dinner in peace and quite quick to deny the fact there are dangerous people out there. It's not a myth. Rare, thankfully, but not non-existent. No one was being hysterical, you seem keen to imply they were though.

Why is that?

[catgirl1976]

Curlew - fear of abduction etc is a long, long way down the list of reasons I wouldn't do this

The top reasons are probably

Wouldn't feel right
Wouldn't be able to relax
Worried DS would be unsettled in unfamiliar surroundings
Concern over DS getting out of cot and having some sort of accident
Concern over fire in a place where I don't know they layout as well as home

etc

[janey68]

Id also add to catgirls list: my 2 years olds bedroom was child- friendly, so when he did climb out of his cot/ bed, he couldn't do much harm to himself or what was in the room .
Not so with a hotel room

[defineme]

I did it when ds1 was a baby several times (he's 11 now). Always with baby monitor. Usually in very small hotel, but once ot twice in a large one. I wasn't happy in the larger ones-so never went out for long. By the time we had the twins ds1 was old enough to wander so we just sat outside the room til they went to sleep and then read our books in the room with them.
Tbh I'd never considered the fire scenario and I always was very open with hotel staff and no one ever said anything. We used a baby listening service once in a very chic boutique family hotel-I thought it was a crap idea because ds1 only cried if he was upset and he's be hysterical if he'd been left to do it for 20 minutes. So I bolted my dinner and went back to him very quickly.
Would I do it now? Probably not because I'd feel uncomfortable, but I don't think it's logical. When my kids are in the back of a villa and we're in the garden or when they're in the tent and I'm in my friends gazebo the next tent along I don't really think anything about it.
There was a thread on here once about letting your dc camp out in the back garden-I said I wouldn't because there's been burglars in my back garden 3 times that I know of-lots of people thought I was mad.

[McNewPants2013]

I wouldn't do it, we tend to take the buggy on holidays ( DC don't need them anymore) but it provides a place for them to sleep.

[zoraqueenofzeep]

They are far more likely to harm themselves than come into danger from a stranger which is reason enough not to leave young children unattended, in saying that I wouldn't leave my most expensive jewelry/credit cards/passport/bank details on the bed while I went on the piss for obvious reasons. There are bad people in this world and it's the parents responsibility to be there to protect their young children from them. There is no excuse for leaving children unattended, if you can't get a babysitter or take them with you, then stay with them.

[prettybird]

Ds was always a good brilliant sleeper, so we had no issues with doing this.

Travel cot when he was 2 (which he never tried to climb out of), villa holiday/holiday with family for the next couple of years and then for the next 7 years, the same small family run Greek hotel where ds would sometimes sleep on the floor under our table (having gone up on his own to his room to get a pillow) and sometimes (or later) up in his room while we were still downstairs.

As parents, we all make our own differing judgements as to what is appropriate or safe. I'm comfortable with the decisions we made but am not going to judge other people for making different ones.

[thebody]

Not my way but not judging( for a change)

I think it all depends on specific circumstances as well to be honest. Size of hotel, room location, etc.

Certainly not abroad as its lovely to sit outside with a wine and a sleeping child in your lap.

[katydid02]

YANBU. It is wrong, totally and utterly wrong.
Curlew, there is every difference. You are in the same building, you would hear smoke alarms going off, you would have much more chance of hearing somebody breaking in.

[TerraNotSoFirma]

Absolutely no chance.
Leaving my hotel reception shift at 11pm once, I found a 2yo wandering the car park looking for his parents. Poor thing was distraught.
Found said parents pissed out of their heads at the bar.

He could have been run over, taken, fell into the river. Shudder to think.

[Drhamsterstortoise]

I've stayed in hotels several times where people have accidentally come into the room.Once someone was given the wrong swipe card.Another time as teenagers we had a separate room to our parents and someone came in during the night.Another time a man came into my sisters apartment.There was a security man on the front door who gave him access.Luckily he was just a drunk idiot and they weren't harmed.I'd bring a babysitter for peace of mind.