To be furious that the kids were left alone?

[Therearenonamesleft]

My OH got home late last night after drinks with friends. He got a taxi home and this am forgot that his car was still parked at the station. I leave for work earlyish in the morning and he is responsible for taking the kids to school / holiday club most mornings. Today he suddenly realised his car was at station after I'd left for work so he gave the kids breakfast (DS is 7.5 and Dd is 5) and told them to be sensible and not go upstairs or open the door etc and that he had to go and fetch the car. He claims he legged it all the way and was back home in 8minutes.
I feel furious and sick with worry and unease. AIBU? I think they're too young to be left alone even for this short amount of time. I shared my concerns and husband said he sees my point of view but disagrees as he thinks the risks are minuscule. I've asked him not to do it again - at least until DS is competent at making a call on the landline should some problem arise. They are both very sensible children and I often leave them playing upstairs etc while I'm in the garden etc but they are always close enough to call me. Should I take this any further? Is this a safeguarding issue I need to be worrying about? I don't want to over react but I feel uncomfortable about his inability to guarantee it won't happen again.
Thanks for reading all this! Any sensible advice welcome.

"But I also do think it's good to look at our own actions and those of our partners and anyone else who takes care of our kids and try view through the lens of 'would I accept this if it were a childminder/ nanny/ au pair or grandparent doing it?' "

Actually, I am not sure that is a good idea. An au pair or a childminder does not have the same intimate knowledge of the child and, crucially, is not able to second-guess how much risk taking you are happy with as their parent. Childminders/nannies have a particular job description and have to stick with that; parents can make the decision that departing from the safest option can be beneficial to their own child at a particular time.

Most parent think it is a good idea to let their 10/11 yo children start going on little independent errands in preparation for secondary school. A childminder otoh is paid to supervise her charges at all times.

I'm amazed how my people think that this is ok.

Op, yanbu. They shouldn't be left alone at that age.

What a fuss, "furious and sick with worry and unease" - for goodness sake

I wouldn't be over bothered if my DH had done this.

Whenever these kinds of threads crop up and the opinion is always so very polarised, I wonder whether the opinions are divided by age?

Seriously, I do.
I'm 50. I have 4 children.
I'd have no problem with this situation - but that is personal to me, my kids, my husband, how far the station is away from our house etc etc.

I have a real fear that we are living in ever more anxious times when in fact we are actually safer than at almost any time in recorded human history. I don't fully understand why that is.

Why does he, if he is, refusing to promise that he won't do it again?

Surely he can see how upset and distressed you are and that a promise would reassure you. I think thar, in those circumstances, I might be prepared to warn him that if he does do it again, then I would be forced to seek advice from an appropriate agency.

Maybe, in the meantime and for your own peace, it might be an idea to see if you can change your working hours.

I'm amazed how my people think that this is ok

So amazed that you don't understand the difference between "this is ok" and "this may not be ok but fuck me are you over reacting"?

I agree Pacific.

You don't keep your children safe by constantly supervising them. You keep them safe by developing their ability to look after themselves when you're not there.

I'm 35 with 4 DC pacific - I agree with you and wouldn't be concerned as a one off.

Ritchy, you got my take on what parenting is in one.

I strive to make my role redundant.

There's not much 'looking after^ a 7 yo needs to do for a 5yo in a few minutes, is there?
Mine would be slack mouthed looking at the TV for longer than that, not noticing that there was nobody home

Also, wrt to house fires and boilers exploding: yes, random horrific things like that do happen, but I am not sure how much the presence of an adult would make a difference there. We take bigger risks crossing the road every day and do not stop to think about it much.

I accept that IABU to feel quite as relaxed about it as I do, but I still think that being 'horrified' etc is over the top.

Entirely agree with Hodooooooooor .

Really depends on a particular kid. I could leave ds2 at 5 because he would just play quietly with a lego or something. Ds1 at that age - no way. He would have decided to jump from the whole flight of stairs, kick a football into a dishwasher, and all sorts of nonsense. Not that much something would happen to him, but what he might do

Pacific "Also, wrt to house fires and boilers exploding: yes, random horrific things like that do happen, but I am not sure how much the presence of an adult would make a difference there"

wow, am I massively underestimating 7 and 5 year olds?!

My neighbour could have just ran out, not everyone would have stopped to try and evacuate the neighbours. So what would happen if kids had been left then?

Pearlman yes, of course, but a. how likely is a house fire to happen in the exact 8 minutes the OP's husband was away and b. if it is a sudden, say, gas explosion or meteor strike or whatever anybody in the house is likely to be doomed.

Aaargh, now you made me argue for and against just that kind of unlikely stuff that makes us unreasonably worried when the odds of them happening are so infinitesimal small that I personally just refuse to have my life governed by them.

No, you are not underestimating young children.
The house fire always comes up in these threads.
How many children have died in house fires recently because the responsible adult was away for a few minutes?

As a one off situation, this is a massively over thought issue. IMO.
It depends, as I said in my first post on this thread, on the parent, the child, the situation.
The situation as outlined in the OP would not have me horrified and uneasy.
It may well by that the OP and her partner have very different ideas on what they are comfortable with in which case this is a relationship issue. I am repeating myself, so off to make dinner

I'm 29 and agree with you pacific but then again I live in Finland where children are regularly left alone from 7ish years old and its normal to expect school age children to look after younger siblings for short lengths of time, say when at the summer house while the grown ups pick berries.

I have already said that I would not have been happy with this. So I am not advocating it. Just wanted that out there.

Having said this, I grew up in a country where this would have been totally normal when I was a child and would still be totally normal. I have checked the statistics and the figures for child fatalities or serious child injuries are actually rather lower than in this country. I suppose the answer to Pearlman's question is that in the case of a fire, the children would run out and call for help. I imagine that is what happens. Or do they not have fires?

Of course some children might panic. Some adults might panic. But I imagine the reason for the statistics above would be that if you are brought up with a certain level of independence you are less likely to wait around passively in an emergency.

I was about 5 or 6 when my little brother banged his head on a wire whilst playing in the fields. Big brother, who was supposed to be in charge, did nothing because he didn't want to lose face in front of his oh-so-grown-up mates. I otoh got help. My parents were not in the least surprised that I had acted sensibly. But they gave big brother the bollocking he deserved.

They still happen quite a bit, and are more likely to happen when a 7 year old decides to play with a candle and happens to be unsupervised

A candle isn't much use without matches. If you're leaving your 7 year old for 10 minutes with a candle and a box of matches, you're an idiot.
Presumably though OP's husband didn't leave the kids with such things?

Kids are ingenious. They know how to turn the hob on. They know where the knives are kept. They know how to get a stool and climb on to the work surface

They also know not to do such stupid things. If you really think your kid is going to climb on the cabinets, juggle with knives and light the hob to set the house on fire the very second you leave them alone for a few minutes, then you have much bigger problems with your kids than you realise.
And I hope you never go to the loo for more than 90 seconds, with such pyromaniacal homicidal kids in your house.

So Pearlman, to what do you attribute the fact that counties like Sweden and Finland do not have massively high child fatalities?

And incidentally, does that mean you would only leave yours with Grandma if you are convinced she knows how to give CPR?

I seem to be in complete disagreement with most of the other posters- I don't think it's acceptable to leave a 7yo in charge of a 5yo . It would have been very easy indeed for DH to walk with the children to the car and then drive them to holiday club.

While I do agree that we as parents should be teaching our children the skills to become independent, I believe we do that by judging the maturity of our own children, preparing them to cope with problems which may arise when alone, and giving them the skills and tools to be comfortable and safe with a particular level of independence. The DH in this case didn't do that at all.

And I don't think it's to do with age- I'm in my forties and wouldn't leave a 7yo and 5yo.