DS came home from nursery sunburnt to f**k. AIBU?

[MamaBear89]

Hi there. Long time lurker, first time poster.
Yesterday, my son went to nursery. I dropped him off around 8am and went to pick him up at 5:30 as usual.
When I went to pick him up I immediately noticed he was heavily sunburned.
I coat him in factor 50 when I dress him in the morning, and (as per the nursery's rules) I send my son in with a sun hat and a bottle of sun lotion.
The woman working at the time said "oh, I don't know how he got that burned as it's been really cloudy, and so we haven't bothered applying lotion".
Not only that, but for the final hour/90 minutes of the nursery day, during which my son was inside, the nursery worker admitted that they had "watched his burn get worse and worse". Obviously, as with any burn, sunburn will continue to burn and needs immediate cooling and treatment, but this was not given.
My son was so severely burned that he's had a raging fever for the last 24 hours, is in pain with his burns, and is suffering from sunstroke. He's miserable and cuddly and very grumpy, which is understandable.
I'm absolutely livid. My son loves nursery, though, and is due to stay there until he starts nursery at the local primary in September. It would break his heart if I just pulled him out until September, so I don't want to just pull him out and be done with them, but I'm absolutely livid at the sheer negligence they've shown.

My intention is to inform the nursery that I'll be making a complaint to the LEA and then following through with this.

AIBU by being so angry? Or would you agree it's justified?
And AIBU by taking the complaint to higher authorities, or should I just let the nursery deal with it?

Any input would be greatly appreciated

I would talk to the manager. If they are anything less than distraught I'd give ofsted a ring. You might need to leave at that point due to lack of trust between patent and nursery.

I have a child with skin like a vampire's and he has never once in 5 years burnt at daycare in NZ. Your poor boy. I would be livid. It's as neglectful as saying "oh yeah, we saw him eating the weedkiller and he didn't look well".
I would expect abject grovelling apologies.

Having had skin cancer & totally admit I'm OTT with DS I would go apeshit. You have done nothing wrong OP & I hope he is better soon.

Unfortunately it's done now but I hope your actions make sure it doesn't happen to anyone else.

Your poor boy. That looks nasty. Imo schools in this country are crap at dealing with hot weather. My ds went to school for three years in the Middle East with temperatures of 30 plus for at least three months of the year. He never had a problem. He got sunstroke in his first school year in England because there was barely any shade in the playground and the temperature was in the upper 20s.

If it was my son I would put in a formal complaint to the nursery and also ofsted . It's a safeguarding issue and the nursery are negligent .
I manage a nursery and out policy is that parents must provide sunscreen and we apply before going out side ,
We have spare hats however not spare sun cream ( in case of a reaction ) if a child doesn't have any they stay inside ! Shocking behaviour from staff !

Can you find out if any of the other children were burnt too?

Children do water play, painting and eating throughout the day at nursery so any "all day" sun lotion would probably be washed away anyway on the arm and face area.

And yes I would be making a complaint because If I sent my son to nursery that badly sun burnt I would probably be getting pulled up about it at home time.

My goodness, I can't believe their attitude. We all know accidents happen but this is negligence. They watched his skin getting redder and redder but did nothing?!

I'm glad you've requested a meeting but for me this would be the end of the line. I couldn't leave my DC in the care of people that I didn't trust to keep them safe.

Hi op, how awful for you both. As a parent of 4 children and working in the early years sector I would be reporting this as neglect. You can report to ofsted due to failure of basic care of a child. (Sun cream/protection is a basic care for a child). Gp was right, it would be reportable to Social care if you had neglected to keep your child safe from the sun. I would call the local council based childcare team as in that team will be a safeguarding officer. Who will hopefully ensure that staff recieve training about sun protection.
If staff were aware about lack of sun cream and watched him burn then I'm sorry to say that they failed In there duty of care.
If you want support to find contact numbers for ofsted and your local childcare team please pm me.

Agreed with royalsighness - 8-hour sunblock is only valid for eight hours if the person doesn't do something to get the sunblock off, and these are toddlers. It needs reapplying.

OP, has your son's skin blistered at all? I got that numerous times as a kid, and that's what would probably be severe sunburn (severe burns from other causes are another matter). However, I also know that photos often leach out the red so I expect his burn was a lot redder than it looks.

You basically have a contract with the nursery and they have not fullfilled their end of the contract. They need to give you, at the very least, assurances with evidence (like extra training sessions) that this will not happen again. That woul dbe a good thing to ask for.

If he's generally happy there and there's nowhere else nearby that seems like it would be better then I can understand keeping him there till September - I would too.

Aloe Vera gel is very good for sunburn, as I found out myself on holiday last summer. Son was FIIIINE.. just me that I forgot..

I think that your nursery is utterly incompetent. to allow a little one to spend the entire day outdoors and ADMIT to seeing him get redder and redder is disgusting.

He should have come inside, he should have had sunscreen applied, ANYTHING other than how they cared for him would have made a difference.

Don't feel guilty here, this was not as a result of anything you should or should not have done. This is 100% the fault of negligence by the nursery. Your son WILL recover, and he will be fine in a day or so, cooling soothing baths, lots of aloe vera and cuddles and he should be fine. I would get him checked out by the doc though to log this properly.

I would strongly recommend the all day stuff, SPF50 stuff, we use the P20 I think it's called and it really does do the job. We used it on holiday last year and it was REALLY good. Try the one for sensitive skin though, as mentioned up thread. I'll be checking it out myself as it's always good to have a skin friendly alternative.

Oh and no need to apologise on my account, I know you were in a bit of shock at seeing your son so sunburnt. (((hug)))

P20 10 hour spray is extremely water resistant, so doesn't need to be reapplied. it doesn't wash off during normal hand washing.

I used to live in a sunny country and used THIS SUN PROTECTION. It's brilliant. It's a spray but it's not sticky or smelly. I used the highest factor and it would last for ages on the kids . It's a bit pricey to buy in the UK but I still get it as it's so good. I get mine from Amazon.

Hope your son is feeling better this morning. Do consider ice packs if the skin is still warm.

We are having an issue in town with a local daycare that let a child get sunburnt. We have had 3 news teams report it in the media. It's America and half the staff have been fired. I think they are going to have to close as no one in town will use them in the future.

The daycare my son goes to asks us to provide a long sleeved shirt for Ds. He is very fair and they worry that the 40min playtime is too long for his skin. If he doesn't put his shirt on he doesn't go out. We are going to the park today and hats and cream will be worn by all. I also pack dehydration powder for the dc. Yes it's a pita to haul the stuff around but I've been told im certain to get skin cancer and have already had 3 patches removed from my face. My kids are going to be given the best start in life I can give them unlike my stupid mother who let me burn to the point of blisters the size of 50p coins numerous times as a child. She wanted me to tan so put tanning oil on me that was SPF 5.

I hate the fact that there are nurseries out there with this level of sheer incompetence. And getting away with it. God knows how many other kids have suffered as a result of their behaviour.

Please do something urgently to see that they are dealt with before this can occur again.

Your poor boy

Also - may sound obvious but are you going to take him out of the nursery?

I understand it may be awkward but I would not trust these fools to look after a dog let alone a little child.

I don't think i would be sending him back to be honest. Did you say that he's only been there 3 months and there have already been other issues? The bond of trust has been broken and subsequently handled in a bloody shocking way by the manager. Not applying suncream, watching a burn get "worse and worse", not giving first aid, avoiding you- it's hardy one single, understandable error is it?

I'd be going fucking APESHIT, op.

And I'd move him after reporting it to OFSTEAD. That's a serious, serious issue and be keeping those pictures and showing them to the manager as pp have said.

Aloe Vera is great but you shouldn't be in this position.

Absolutely unacceptable and I say that as an early years teachers and former ofsted inspector. This should be reported to LEA and Ofsted.

I worry about this when I send my children to nursery so I plaster them in P20 factor 50 as it lasts 10 hours and is water resistant. I like to think that nursery is reapplying normal sunscreen throughout the day so this is a back up.

As I left DD in this morning the kids were all getting their cream on to go out in 20 mins.

We also provide a bottle of cream every year and hats.

Absolutely shocking.

Thats awful. The nursery are negligent. I hope he feels better soon. Take it further, its really not on.

This is dreadful, I feel so bad for you. I would be fuming.

I still know lots of people who believe that you can't get burnt when it's cloudy and you just can't convince them otherwise. My dc are on their residential school trip at the moment and the teachers looked at me as if I was bonkers when I wanted to talk about the importance of seeking shade, wearing hats and suncream.

That's horrendous. The concern and lengths I go to to protect my charges from the sun, and still I worry if I think they have caught the sun even a tiny bit at the end of the day (I never have).

Their nursery won't take responsibility for putting suncream on them at all so if it looks like it's going to be a warm and/or sunny day I put them in either soltan once or p20 and sun hats. If the weather changes before afternoon nursery, I always have a small pot of suncream on me to put on them as and when necessary.

Children should NEVER be getting burnt whilst in childcare or any other time either but particularly when they're being cared for by experienced professionals in the field.

I would be kicking up a shit storm if I was you.

Getting safe sun exposure every day is actually one of the best things you can do for your health. Sun exposure allows your body to naturally produce your own supply of vitamin D.

It's very sad that sun exposure is neglected and we choose to protect ourselves by using sunscreens which expose ourselves to the dangers of synthetic vitamin A and numerous other concentrated petrochemicals, with the approval of various government bodies..

He'll be over it in a couple of weeks..