My baby just put a dead shrew in her mouth

[BaylisAndHardon]

Posting in AIBU for traffic, and to ask for a hand hold while I get over this horror.

We live in an old victorian house (with many mouse holes) in the country and have a cat to manage the rodent populus, but he also sometimes brings things in . I always check the floor of the snug for anything and disinfect/scrub if he has before putting her down to play.

But this time he put it under a toy in her play pen and I didn't see it and she picked it up and put it in her mouth before I could lauch myself at her to get it out. I am horrified.

Messages of support please. Also accounts of children who have survived to adulthood after putting disgusting things in their mouths. Tell me your worst. I need to hear it.

@MeringueCloud

My friend's cat brought in a dead baby rabbit and her toddler picked it up and carried it round the house.

Ooohhhh god 😂

One of mine was found sitting in the sunshine happily munching on rabbit droppings - I wretched and very nearly vommed, she on the other hand was absolutely fine!

It's fine. It's essentially raw but fresh meat and your baby didn't choke. I'm not suggesting you go to a shrew diet for them but honestly it will be ok. My SS ate a cat poo at an elderly relatives house once and it was everyone else who was feeling sick - he was totally fine!

Dd was once happily crunching on a snail before I noticed, she was not happy at me taking it off her and wiping out her mouth with bleach kitchen roll and brushing her teeth!

This did make me laugh. DS2 ate a snail when he was a baby, he's alive and well 18 years on!

You poor thing! How fond of dc (up to you if I mean child or cat ) are you? Can you return for a less furry dead thing eating one?

Ds licks the bottom of slides. And yesterday presented me with "look a bogey! Eat it mummy!". Reader, I did not eat it.

😂😂 yuk!!

If it helps. I caught ds eating the toilet cleaner gel thing stuck in the toilet bowl.... 🤢

He’s absolutely fine and a teenager now

My kid ate some snails when he was 3 on a dare

My dad (as a young child, obviously) used to pick chewing gum off the pavements and chew it. He's a very fit and healthy 72 now.

Oh and my eldest was crawling around what was normally a super clean, tidy local play area (with artificial grass). I suddenly realised he was reaching for a rabbit dropping which had somehow got in there and although I sort of did a slow motion type dive to get it he popped it in his mouth (and didn't spit it out 🤮).

My youngest ate a small snail once. She also used to eat clods of earth and small stones. Her favourite though was to pick dried bird poo off the pavement and eat it. I did stop her but sometimes I wasn't in time. She was very fast and determined!

The odd thing is, she's a very fussy eater.

Oh I’m sorry for how much I laughed at this.

I was in a pub garden once and saw a little girl proudly parading back to her parents’ table with a dead rat she’d found under a bush.

We're the only house in the area and we don't put poison down- it was definitely the (murderous) cat. Good advice re seeking professional advice if I'm concerned, although I'm actually a doctor myself in case of further worried posters.

Medical concerns aside... still horrified that my baby chewed a SHREW. ... definitely not envy

All the stories are helping! Surely it's on a par with the dead frog and the cat's arse

My very respectable and hygienic cousin gave up on worrying about what her children put in their mouths when she saw her three year old licking the hand-pole in the Paris Metro.

My (favourite) primary school teacher’s nephew once ate a jellyfish he found on the beach. He made it safely to adulthood. Imagine that was the last time she was allowed to babysit him though.

I also have a photo of her eating the contents of her own nappy.
Clearly my child is gross!

Oh dear OP . I once caught my two toddlers taking it in turns to lick the toilet brush

• cockroach
• chewing gum that was stuck on a lamp post
• cigarette butt found in a park
• their own shit
• some absolutely disgusting unidentifiable rotton fruit that was stuck to the bottom of a waste bin

All still make me feel ill now but DC are all completely fine!

My DD used to eat the sand on the beach in great handfuls - we had to watch her like a hawk. She loved it - I think it must have been the salt. She came to no harm, but the ensuing nappies were very interesting! - must have been a bit sore on the way out. Like passing sand paper.

Once your baby is a toddler he will run around outside getting covered in alsorts and licking everything in sight. I think it’s called building an immune system!

Cats won’t eat a shrew. No idea why, but they don’t. So highly probable that it was a gift from DCat.

I still remember the horror of DS2 picking up a snail, popping it in his mouth and crunching it! He’s 21 now...

My ds ate a bit of a disembowelled mouse as a baby. He’s 6 now and fine.

Sounds like a good, clean, country shrew (that just happens to be dead), and all will be fine! If it was an inner-city rat/mouse I'd be more worried, although I don't whether I'd be correct to be.