To take them with me?

[Geckos48]

So my husband is away at the moment, he 'doesn't know' if he will be back tonight.
I've had to mess work around already this week and I dont think they could cope with me missing my shift tonight :(

My calls are in an incredibly rural location and its really safe round here.
WIBU to take the children? Make a little 'nest' in the back of the car and give them their bottles and put them down to bed in the large boot of our people carrier?

I could dress them up warm and I would only be out for around 2hours with them, checking back regularly and driving inbetween calls every half an hour or so?

I dont know what else to do!

No Henrietta I said what i have done, which is leave them while i go into the shop quickly/petrol station or to put someones shopping away

I've taken the night off work so I DONT have to leave them while I get someone dressed and so on.

And I wont give them biscuits anymore (they wont like it though ;) )

Geckos called the Mccanns 'neglectful scum' yet considered letting her baby and toddler sleep in the boot of a car unattended on a cold dark night whilst she worked.

How hypocritical Geckos!

Nope, don't think so. I would have had a lot more compassion for the McCanns had they needed to do what they were doing, which they didnt and I would certainly not do it night after night after night... I haven't done it at all, I was just stressed and trying to think of any possiblity that didnt involve letting work down, which I have done in the end.

Fail to see how that is hypocritical.

You don't "need" to leave your kids in the car when you go into the shop.

You don't "need" to leave your kids in the car to go to work, it's a choice, you can & have called your work to say you can't do it, so again it wasn't a need it was a choice.

You don't NEED to leave your children in the car while you do shopping or go into someone else house to put their shopping away. You can't slag off one person for leaving their children unattended then happily do so yourself.

I, as their mother, make a judgement call and that is that leaving them strapped in is safer than taking them into the shop.

thats all there is to it really, it is up to me and that is the judgement call I make.

I do live in one of the safest places in the country.

Make whatever judgement call you like, but don't expect to post about it online and for people not to tell you that they strongly disagree with it.

And yes, sometimes I do need to leave them to take someone up their shopping, because the 5 minutes that the children are asleep inconvenienced, means that someone gets their weekly shop.

I hope as there Mother your judgement call doesn't one day come and bite you in the arse big time, your there Mother & you are responsible for there safety and your there to protect them.

There is always that slim chance of something happening, if your happy with that risk, it's your choice, but don't be a hypocrite and slag off another parents choice when you are doing something similar yourself.

Please don't do this, OP. Your agency will have to get in cover. It is not worth the risk. Not just risk of harm b ut if someone sees and calls the police they will class it as neglect.

I am happy with that risk, I perceive it as less risky than the alternatives.

I hope that no parent has to suffer as a result as a choice they make. Unfortunately things can and do go wrong and we all must make our own decisions based on the information we have in front of us.

You and your husband sound a match made in heaven, long may you continue to make each other oh so happy.

i leeave my 3 in the car at the petrol station, way more chance of something happening yo them if they werer out of car

I hope that no parent has to suffer as a result as a choice they make.

So why so judgmental of a family who are suffering as a result of a choice they made?

They left their children alone sleeping.. sound familiar to you? NO different from what you are happy to do.

You don't need to leave your children OP.

You exert some control over them - you're the parent. Pop the baby in a pram, little life back pack for the three year old. Balance basket on pram. Easy.

I still will not allow my DD to remain in the car when I pop into shops whether it be for a pint of milk or whatever. She comes with me. Yes, the risk of anything happening to her if I left her is small. But it is a risk I can completely eliminate by taking her with me.

FWIW, a petrol station where you're simply paying for petrol is different as usually you can see through the window to your vehicle. having said that I would always choose a pay-at-pump when I had DD in the car.

Of course we all make choices but to leave a 1 & 3 year old alone is just insane and a stupid choice at that.

Is your husband happy with this choice too then?

Geckos your arrogance is astounding.

Your husband has been very unreasonable to leave you in the shit. Don't LTB though....because if you were a single mother you'd have to deal with this situation all the time....and I don't think your thinking skills are in the right place for that if this thread is anything to go by. Those children are at risk EVERY time you leave them alone in the car.....it's neglect and it's illegal.

OP, your perception of risk is really alarming, based on this and other threads. All the more so given that you are training to be a social worker.

Leaving your kids in the car to go into a shop is not neglect and it is not illegal.

Again, I have no issues with this, it happens frequently and I see lots of other people doing the same thing so can only assume this is a 'mumsnet no no' rather than a real world no no.

I will not drag my children across a forecourt to go into a shop, there is absolutely no way that is less risky than leaving them in the car and going in for 5 minutes to pay.

One involves young children and people who really should just stop for a second to do up their seatbelet/put on their radio/sip some coffee

and the other involves spending 5 minutes strapped into a car.

For me, there is no logic in taking them with me.

Geckos - I recognise your name and know we have disagreed with you in the past but in this case I don't think you've been unreasonable to have left your children in the car on occasion.

It staggers me that so many people on MN but not actually in the real world ime seem to have no concept of the actual risk of leaving a child for example to pay for petrol. I find it totally bizarre that people would go to the trouble of unstrapping multiple children, dragging them across a forecourt and then back to the car and resettling them for the sake of a couple of minutes to pay for the petrol.

Geckos I apologise for not RTFT. I see it is sorted.

I am genuinely concerned though about your perception of risk, as I have seen in other threads that you are studying to be a SW.

I understand your predicament but you must understand that that level of risk is unacceptable and you need to be careful with that in your future career.

I do mean that kindly, I promise - I am a social worker and weighing risk is such a vital part of our job you have to be good at it.

Training to be a social worker?!? If that is true how does OP not know what would happen if social services found out she was leaving 2 young children unattended in a car? Having been cruising around with them not strapped on, IN THE BOOT?

It would be a massive red flag for neglect and she would be being very carefully monitored.