Arguement about car seat safety

[PloddingAlongLikeABean]

Sorry I didn't really know where to put this, but I would like to know who others think is being unreasonable. Because I really don't think I am.

I'm going back to work next week after mat leave. My mother has kindly offered to have LO couple days a week and that is absolutely wonderful.

But we've had a bit of a disagreement over car seats last night. She informed me that they had bought a car seat for their car so we don't have to be faffing with it in the mornings. Thought, wonderful that's a great idea. She showed it to me and I had to explain it wasn't a rear facing one and was pretty sure it was the law to have them in a rear facing? (Correct me if I'm wrong here but that's what I was told by HV). Needless to say, whether or not its the law, I said that LO is far too young to be facing forward if there is a accident etc.
She went on to say that it is from 9months of age and cost a lot of money and it is obviously safe or they wouldn't sell it.

Baby is 8 months old, is a small baby for age.

I tried to show her the guidelines but she wouldn't hear it and ended up quite awkward and upsetting.

This morning I have tried to broach the subject and say that we could perhaps look for one suitable in the meantime and then use the one they bought when LO gets to the recommended weight as opposed to recommended age.

She can't understand it from my point of view and I was hoping that if I asked on here and showed her what other people's views were that she may see it from the safety point of view?

My DS is almost 3 and he’s still rear facing, I’m keeping him that way until he’s at least 4 if I can.

Car safety isn’t something to fuck about with so I just wouldn’t let her drive your DC around unless she’s willing to change the car seat.

Will this article from the In Car Safety Centre help?

At 8 months it’d be unsafe to be front facing and quite honestly ridiculous before they’re the right weight. Also if you want her rear facing for longer then they should go with that; I changed my older DD round at 18 months as I didn’t really know about extended rear facing and now with my son my in laws and DH are acting like it’s some silly thing that I’m insisting on as he’s 1 and I’ve bought an extended rear facing seat. It makes me slightly rage filled how they disregard the evidence but they’re keeping to it

I believe the 'official' (govt? NHS?) advice is to rear-face until age 4 now. My 5 and 3yo are both rear-facing and will be until they exceed 25kg or get too tall for the seat. Ita a subject I feel very strongly about and can't really understand why anyone wouldn't RF their children after doing even the smallest bit of research internal decapitation, anyone?... But I'll get off my soapbox. I think ultimately your mum needs to respect your wishes on this.

I’m a stickler for car seat safety and would rather find alternative childcare than put my child in danger.

My Inlaws weren’t very good with car seat safety and regularly took my nieces out in unsafe car seats or no car seat. Safe to say neither of mine were ever in their car!

No way. My 3 yo is still rear facing and I won't be turning him any time soon. YANBU.

To save it getting heated, could she return her seat and you buy a new one for her car?

Front facing at 8months isn't safe. Some parents choose to do it, but all the research shows RF is much safer in an accident.

I would absolutely say no car journeys.

My mum uses a FF with my big 18mo but she only does local short journeys on slow roads and it saves the hassle of getting the car seat in and out 6x per week.

If she's doing some childcare for you then I think it's worthwhile for you to buy a seat that your happy with, after all it will only a few weeks to have saved enough on childcare to cover the cost of the seat. She's frustrated because she thought she was doing the right thing, and it's not totally her fault, any capable shop assistant should have steered her in the direction of the safest possible seat.

If possible get her one of the rear-facing seats that spin, I have a Joie i-spin 360 for my granddaughter to save my back from pain. It stays rear-facing for quite a long time and then will last up to 19kg in the forward-facing mode.

The law depends on which seat she's bought too, there's twos ETA of safety standards running concurrently so 9 months might well not be possible if it's a newer seat (I think). If you can get the exact model and post on the equipment forum there are some incredibly knowledgeable people on there that will be able to tell you what you need to tell your mother.

Stick to your guns, it'll be her pride causing the difficulties and she'll get over it. It's too important to compromise on like we do with other grandparent things like that extra biscuit or slightly late bedtime.

Don't let her read the thread though, it's quite harsh

Double check it's not a seat that has two modes? The seat ours used from 1-3 did IIRC have a rear-facing mode although I didn't use it - mine are now late teens so extended rear-facing hadn't really become a thing when they were small. Also, they were never that small, grew out of that seat well and truly by 3.5 or so.

Hope you can come to a reasonable compromise, agree with everyone that a small 8 month old has to be rear-facing one way or another for at the very least several more months.

We had this exact argument with my in-laws, they wouldn't listen even after I'd showed them all the evidence about why it was so dangerous and insisted on keeping the FF seat they had bought.
I told them she wouldn't be going in their car until she was old enough to FF in that case. Myself or DH drop her off and pick her up at theirs if they are having her now.
Car seat safety isn't something to take lightly and I don't understand why when the evidence is right in front of you someone would still choose to ignore it so you are 100% right to raise it with your mum.

An 8 month old shouldn’t be forward facing under any circumstances.

Take the seat back.

It's nice to see that some of your LOs are still in rear facing at much older ages and bigger centiles. Im just wondering how their legs are positioned (ie crossed) I'm going to have a look online now to see if I can get a good car seat that will last but I can't figure out where LOs leg's will go?

Honestly if she can't listen to you on safety issues, I wouldn't be leaving DC with her. It's pretty black and white: legally baby should not yet be forward facing, and from a safety point of view rear facing is considerably safer. It's nothing personal or ungrateful at all. If she can't see that on something this serious I think you're going to be having a lot of issues in future.

I rear faced my son till he was 5 in an axkid minikid, he is 99.6th centile height so outgrew it by height rather than weight. He hated it when I turned him forward because his legs hurt from dangling!

Both my dds were little and stayed in their baby car seats until about 16 months, so not YANBU

They just cross their legs or tuck them up. If anyone gives you any bollocks about how it can't be comfortable ask them if they think DC would happily sit there if uncomfortable? No, they'd be kicking up a fuss. Adults put their own comfort requirements on kids to explain away their reticence to rear face when actually they just want to do what they have always done, not what is safest/best based on current data. It's no judgement on what people did in the past, we just have better data/technology now, so why wouldn't we do what keeps them safest 🤷🏼‍♀️

www.google.com/search?q=where+do.they+put+their.legs.rear+facing&client=ms-android-samsung-rev2&source=android-browser&prmd=sivn&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi00-6EyavyAhVHPcAKHaiuCEQQ_AUoAnoECAIQAg&biw=360&bih=673&dpr=3#imgrc=qaUBN4pZBrklcM a good visual of what kids do with their legs rear facing. This may not look comfortable to you or I but kids are much more flexible that we are.

People can be a nightmare about these things! I worked in a baby shop many moons ago and you are dead right. Don’t cave on car safety stand your ground!!!

Mine are 2 and 3 and will be rear facing until 6 if I can manage it. Hopefully she can return the FF car seat. If she really refuses to rear face your child at eight months old I'd be finding alternative childcare. It's just not worth the risk.

My almost 6 year old is still rear facing! Have only agreed to let her face forward in granny’s car in the last year as she outgrew the up to 18kg rear facing one they had.

My 3.5 yr old is asleep in the car right now in her RF car seat. Axkid move. She's quite tall. Legs not squashed at all.

It is probably more comfortable to be sitting with legs crossed in a car seat than it is for them to have legs dangling.

My DD bends her knees outwards so she sits a bit like a frog 😂 she's two and not very big so hopefully she'll be comfortable for a long while yet.

She's never known any different to going backwards so I'll only turn her when I really have to as I don't think there'll be any going back. Never ever moans about going in the car and travels really well backwards, thankfully.

Hopefully she will be happy to face the same way as her impending sibling for as long as I can feasibly spin it out but I'm aiming for her to get to at least school age before we even start thinking about FF.