MiL and car seats

[Thistledew]

Would IBU to have angry words with my MiL for driving DD age 5 through a city centre without a car seat and just restrained with the lap portion of an adult seatbelt?

It was a 5 min journey, collecting DD from DH and taking her to MiL house. The journey could have been done by bus. MiL has a car seat for DD but had taken it out of her car to collect her friend plus bags from the airport and claims that she can’t manage to reinstall it by herself (it has simple isofix attachments).

You could as it was dangerous. Is she doing free childcare and ferrying ?

I’d start by being angry with DH for letting her take DD, to be honest. I always ask my mum if she needs help loading our children into their car seats. But no, you’re not wrong. I’d be furious, especially since alternative transport was available.

Why did her dad knowingly let her go in a vehicle without a cat seat? Surely it's him you should be annoyed at.

I agree with others, this one is on your husband.

I’m angry at both of them. DH won’t stand up to his mother in anything related to the children.

Don't be angry at your MIL be angry at your husband for not prioritising his child. As is so often the case on here you have a husband problem not a MIL problem.

Why couldn't DH spend the 2 minutes clicking the Isofix back in before waving them off? That's some real lack of initiative that she didn't ask and he didn't offer.

Oh did she not take it in the car to his at all? Jesus, no that's on her.

Oh I remember well the constant brain drain irritation of MIL ranting about how awful car seats were, even for young babies, "you were all fine squished in across the back" (completely ignoring all data on deaths, injuries etc).

It is also a MiL problem. She has done this once before with DS- he hadn’t been in her car for a while and the straps on his seat were too tight. She couldn’t work out how to adjust them so drove him unrestrained. So even if we make sure that the seat is in the car we can’t be 100% sure she will use it.

I know I have a DH problem. This unfortunate is but one of many.

I just wanted to check that IANBU to take this up in strong terms with MiL. I don’t want to go nuclear and refuse to let her drive them ever again if I can reasonably avoid it- the kids would miss out on spending time with her and we would end up having to use a lot more paid childcare, which we can ill afford.

She has driven him about with no seatbelt on at all? I’m sorry… but this is the sort of thing my dad would do and for that reason he does not drive my children around ever.

This would have been so simple- but like last time it just didn’t seem to occur to her to find a solution.

If she drove your other child with no seatbelt at all in the past then why on earth are you still allowing her to look after your children unsupervised years later?

Is the free childcare really worth it, your son could have died if she'd crashed the car.

If free child care wasn’t involved the Op wouldn’t be letting MIL drive the kid around. Sorry op but I don’t think it’s worth it.

She wouldn’t be looking after my children regardless of how much extra childcare would cost and in this case my husband would be expected to get a second job to help cover the costs as s he data not stand up to mummy

That’s unacceptable. Is her carseat a high backed booster that uses the seatbelt to restrain her? If so, it very likely doesn’t even matter whether or not it’s clipped into the isofix - on most models the seatbelt will hold her and the seat in place in a crash no problem.

Of course you are not being unreasonable!
She broke the law.Minimum age without car seat is 12 or 135cm and she was nowhere near either.
I'm not sure why you need to even ask if you are being unreasonable!
I would have been really angry at her and be concerned if she was actually capable of caring for your daughter anymore....she is clearly very lapse when it comes to safety! She must know that travelling without a car seat at that age isn't OK....it hasn't been for many years now.

YANBU

People are woefully ill informed about car seats. If you do not have the correct car seat, fitted in the right way, it massively increases the chance of death on impact in a crash.

I often read in the news of car crashes where only the baby died, and everyone else survived. That’s probably because they didn’t have a car seat correctly fitted.

Your MIL will be old school where kids sit in the footwell. She needs enlightening.

I’d be livid, it’s dangerous and illegal, no excuses. Bet she comes back with it being fine as she’s a safe driver, but it’s not about her, what if someone else drives into her? She put your child at risk, it’s not worth the free childcare.

Just seen this update after my previous post....can't believe it is the SECOND time its happened, and yet you are still debating whether to let her drive your precious children around.

Clearly she thinks she can do whatever she likes and has no care about your children's safety.

Come on....is offending nanny and losing free childcare really worth jeapordising your children's lives over?!?

So she has already driven one of your children without a proper seat before?

at the very least, you should no longer have her transport the children. You probably should stop having her babysit. She can still get plenty of visiting time with you or your husband present.

Presuming your 5YO is in a booster seat it wasn’t even necessary to use the isofix! The purpose is of isofix on booster is stop it becoming a loose projectile when the child isn’t in the seat and it’s totally optional to use it. I don’t see why this is even up for discussion since she’s done it twice now- don’t allow the kids in the car with her again.

She would never be transporting my child again.

It’s not just about the childcare being free. The kids enjoy days out with their nana and it would not be fair to them to stoop contact. Also, we live in a very rural area where it is really really hard to find after school childcare for the occasional times where neither I nor DH can be at the school gates for pickup time.

It does seem to be about the childcare to be honest. She clearly sees no issue with it and neither does your husband so she wont amend her behaviour.

If you had words with her and she refused to acknowledge the problem like she did before, would you still allow her to drive the children because you need the childcare she provides?

If so there's little point having a discussion really.