Not to leave child home alone

[EmbarrassedMum1]

Me and hubby are have a little disagreement about leaving our child home alone for an airport run.

For context, child is 10 and an overall sensible child, very well behaved and a great sleeper in general. DH and friends are off on a short trip next weekend and need to leave for the airport at 4am.
DH says leave DC in bed because I'll be back in 45mins (1hr max).
I'd planned on getting him up and putting him in the car in his dressing gown, but everyone thinks that's silly.
DC says he doesn't care about being left alone at home but he will ultimately do as told.
So am I being unreasonable to get him up to come with me?.

Are you overseas? Scandinavia or Finland? Because I dont know where it's normal for a 7 year old to be woken at 6am and then be left alone for the best part of 2 hours. How do they get to school?

If DH can afford the trip, they can afford the taxi to airport. Not really fair expecting you to get interrupt your sleep and get up in the middle of the night, let alone your child. Prioritise the safety and wellbeing of your child over making life easier for DH.

I would definitely have taken DS with me at this age. YANBU.

No way would I leave a 10 year old alone at home at night. DH should get a taxi or you take DS with you.

No way would I be doing this. Fires do happen, children don’t always hear alarms. Definitely he gets a taxi.

I know the possibility of anything bad happening is extremely unlikely but you've always got to have that in mind with children.

No, I wouldn't leave my 10 year old alone in bed alone at home although I'm sure it would be fine.

Need to have the 'how would I feel if sth did happen' button switched on. Xx

You are perfectly reasonable to not leave your child at that age alone in the early hours of the morning. Unfortunately your husband is putting his needs above your child’s.

No way should you leave him. It’s hardly too much effort to get him up and into the car.

What if there was a fire? Gas explosion? Just think very carefully. No 10 year old would be deemed competent to deal with emergency situations. Get your 10 year old out of bed.

Tell your DH to get a taxi. No way should you get your 10 yr old out of bed at 4am and no I don’t think it’s ok to leave him alone.
DH should get a cab or stay over with a friend he’s going away with and travel with them.

Finland. He'll be walking to school, its only about 20 minutes and its very likely he'll walk with others as there's two from his class living on neighbouring roads plus quite a few other older children from the school. Most children walk or bike without parents to school, always see hordes of them if I go through town on a weekday morning.
I am confident he'll be fine on the walk after I've practiced it with him and fine in the house, my biggest concern is him not leaving on time or forgetting his backpack.

So in reality what would make Scandinavian children more capable of taking themselves to school than British ones?

Your dh needs to get a taxi. Waking a child at 4am to drive a 45 minute round trip is silly when it would be a 20 min run in a taxi. I wouldn't leave a 10 yo unattended especially if sleeping. If there was a break in or a fire or if they woke up from an upsetting nightmare you're potentially 40 minutes away from being able to respond. It's one thing to leave them for a 15 min run to the shop and gradually build it up but this feels risky. Especially when your dh can just get a taxi and not put anyone out.

It’s fine. Obviously tell them you are going to do it, in case they wake up, but in all likelihood you’ll be back before they wake up and know you’ve gone.

Absolutely not! Anything could happen.your children are precious!!

This, don't leave the child alone and don't wake him at 4.00 am, it's not fair.

If it were me going away, it wouldn't even occur to me to ask for a lift if my husband was home with the children. If it's an hour's round trip he should get a taxi.

It will only be 10 minutes as long as you don't get involved in a RTA

You really must not leave the child on his own. A child of 10 doesn't understand his parents leaving for the airport and waking up to find himself alone in the house.

You shouldn't even think something like that. Let DH go to the airport by taxi whatever the cost if you don't want to wake the child up.

You will no doubt get a lot of people who disagree with me, because they did that with another thread.

I would ignore them. You might agree. Just be sure that you know all the risks you are taking, and you have an explanation if he wakes up and leaves the house looking for you, and imagine what can happen to him then, and all to save a taxi fare.

I honestly thought they people were being OTT here, as it's probably safest to left the child asleep (though why dad can't get a taxi I don't understand) and so I put 3 scenarios into chat gtp to analyse the risks. (1) Child walking home from school and crossing roads then spending an hour at home, but not cooking. (2)10yo left home for an hour at 4am (3) taking child with you for an hour round trip.
I'll paste it's conclusions:

"Summary and Ranking

Scenario Approximate fatality risk (rounded) Relative risk

🏠 Alone asleep at home, 4am ~1 in 4 billion Safest
🚶‍♂️ Walking home + alone for 1hr ~1 in 5–10 million Medium
🚗 1hr car trip at 4am ~1 in 3–5 million Riskiest

---

Conclusions

✅ Being left alone asleep at home at 4am for 1hr is by far the safest of these three scenarios, assuming the home is safe and the child knows what to do in a fire.

✅ Walking home + alone for 1hr is somewhat riskier, mainly from the road crossing — not from being home alone.

✅ The 4am car trip is the riskiest of the three, mainly because:

4am is a dangerous driving time.

UK roads at this hour have disproportionately more fatigue, alcohol, and poor conditions"

Turns out I wasn't crazy! We may feel that taking the child with us is safer, but statistically it's FAR more dangerous. 800 times greater risk of death.

If I'm in a horrific car accident, I'd much rather my child be tucked up in bed then in the seat next to me!

Also having child home alone whilst awake means they are squeezing on and off electronics, walking up and down the stairs, perhaps deciding to make themselves a snack, using a sharp knife, a whole host of everyday activities that could cause an accident or fire. That's far more likely than a spontaneous house fire at 4am

No, too young. Taxi!

Just to add, whilst some kids don't always wake to fire alarms:

• neither do all adults, especially if wearing ear plus, drinking or taking sleeping meds.
• a fire at 4am isn't going to be because of leftovers of smoking, as it would have happened earlier. Likely same for forgotten candles or abandoned open fires. These are also things OP could manually check before she leaves.
• cooking is the largest source of house fires and wouldn't be relevant here.
• dodgy electronics remains a risk, but it's a pretty small one.

Husband is selfish, I’d say. No need to leave your child. What if someone decided to break in thinking no one is home? It’s a few quid a 20 minute trip. Disgusting he asked.

It won’t be 10 minutes. She said 45 - 1 hr.

Dh +his friend stump up for a taxi
End of dilemma.