To leave sleeping child in locked car?

[Wouldyoudothisiwonder]

Went to supermarket to get prescription for DD(2) and she fell asleep on the way. Would you lock the car and leave her sleeping while you run in? Or not?

I would absolutely fill a prescription for someone in your shoes.

Could you phone the pharmacy and explain and ask if anyone could bring it out?

Aw man, light sleepers are the worst. One of my DC would wake up if a mouse farted three miles away.

What about a local pharmacy rather than the supermarket one? The type with big plate glass windows where you can park outside and go in without her but can see the car.

Just yesterday I heard a horrific story about a toddler dying in a car they were left in I’m afraid OP - I might have gambled it before but I’ll never leave a child alone in a car after that - the dad came back but couldn’t open the door or break the windows and was banging on them trying to smash them as the fire told hold inside

My main worry would be them waking and being frightened.

Ask someone but be aware they'll need your address,child's name and possibly date of birth.

more an expression of absolute incredulity than a direct question.
you are absolutely insane to even consider this. You would prefer to avoid waking a sleeping two year old to the extent you’d abandon her in a locked car out of sight instead.

Child wakes up and is distressed

Child wakes up and escapes from child seat

Child is sick or has convulsions

Something happens inside the supermarket which means mum gone a lot longer than planned

Child is abducted

Mum forgets to put the handbrake on and car rolls away

They're all fairly unlikely (except for the first two) but possible.

Left field suggestion here but could you pay for px over the phone and ask a pharmacy assistant to come to car park entrance? Might be doable if they’re not very busy right now (if!)

definitely wouldn’t leave child in car - we have just had a horrifying story where a car was abducted from a car park with teenager in the back seat. Car crashed and teenager left with life changing injuries.

Absolutely not. I appreciate this is a supermarket carpark but this story would be enough to dissuade me. news.sky.com/story/kiara-moore-death-girl-2-left-in-car-which-rolled-into-river-after-handbrake-was-off-11565105 The little girl had been left for just 2 minutes.

She woke up as it happened - just honestly trying to minimise an unwell child’s needs

Many years ago a family near dm left a sleeping dc in the car on their driveway.
The car caught fire and they could not get the dc out fast enough and she died.
I would never leave a dc in a car.

Just to say, and it's not condoning randomly abandoning small children, but the stories about cars being stolen with children inside/randomly bursting into flames, etc are news stories because they're so rare. These are not every day occurences and the overall probability of something going wrong from leaving a child (or a teenager) in the car for a brief period is very low, its a matter of how much risk an individual parent is willing to take.

i left my 3 in and the older one rolled down the window and could have been hurt.
just carry her in op

No. But my kids tend to wake up as soon as the engine is off. And obviously they would be terrified in this instance.

If I could see the car and was going to be very quick, I might do it now if my elder child was there too and they were both strapped in. He is 6 and 2 yr old would be be fine waking up if he was there.

But unfortunately it's one of the great inconveniences of looking after kids. I often thought a drivethru window at supermarkets would be great for people in this position

As it is, I have often had to pick up my sister for exactly this purpose. She sits in the car while I run in somewhere then I drop her home again.

did you carry her in @Wouldyoudothisiwonder

Ask yourself one question. Would you be able to live with yourself if something bad happened?

People on MN will always go to massive extreme of cars randomly combusting or car thieves targeting occupied cars rather than the far more convenient unoccupied ones.

If you asked someone in RL they'd just say "nah mate, she might wake up and not know where you've gone" and that would be it. They wouldn't point the doom finger and tell you that someone will crash into your car.

I remember a story a couple of years ago were the mum forgot her purse, ran back into work to grab it, came back and the car with her DD was gone. Turned out the hand break had been left off/failed and the car rolled into the sea ahead of it and the toddler drowned. You can never tell what random freak events might happen.

@Wouldyoudothisiwonder do you have a busy day? Could you get a drive thru coffee from somewhere and just relax in the car while she sleeps? I definitely wouldn't wake her up if you can avoid it

The point is that if a crash happens and you're in the car, your child isn't alone and doesn't wake up screaming because they're scared and nobody is around to comfort them.

It also doesn't need to be a crash to wake the child and scare them - a trolley banging in to the car could frighten them, a car door banging into them etc. I wouldn't want to come back to the car to find my child screaming and distressed in the back seat and not knowing what had happened.

It’s your child, so it’s your choice, and ultimately if anything went wrong (God forbid) you would have to deal with the consequences not us, so it’s not our decision to make for you.

Never. At the very least it would be very embarrassing if someone reported you. At the other end of the spectrum remember Madeleine.

Just to say, and it's not condoning randomly abandoning small children, but the stories about cars being stolen with children inside/randomly bursting into flames, etc are news stories because they're so rare.

Cars bursting into flames is more common than you read about. I used to work in a vehicle related industry and lost track of how many cars it happened to. Recalls for this are not uncommon.

Good idea. Try this