To feel so sad for this mum and baby but still think she could have been more careful?

[Vivia]

Was in Costa just now. I was in the queue getting a takeaway while two mums were sitting with their newborns on the comfy sofa nearby. Very gorgeous scrunchy babies. I noticed that one mum had the baby lying vertically on her lap, so baby's feet at mother's chest and baby's head near the table. I thought it looked precarious.

And it was. As I walked out, I glanced back I noticed the mum reach over her baby's head and pick up the piping hot mug of coffee. She dropped the large mug of black coffee on the child's face and body. In that split second, I almost didn't register what happened. I ran back in. The security guard from nearby was jumped over chairs and tables to get to the baby, the mother was screaming 'help me!' The security had whipped the newborn to a sink of water and staff were calling the ambulance. The baby screamed at first then went horribly silent. Poor child had been hit in the face by a large, falling china mug and thoroughly scalded by coffee.

I feel so sad but wish the mum had realized that reaching over a newborn to pick up coffee is a terrible idea? I don't mean to judge her but

Op I hope you are feeling a bit better now, it must have been a terrible shock for you and everyone who saw it

When DS1 was a toddler, barely walking, we had some friends round for tea/coffee and they kept putting their steaming cups down where DS1 could easily grab them and spill them over himself. I kept telling them but they kept forgetting and I ended up having to move their cups myself every time they put them down.
Needless to say, they don't have children and the danger didn't cross their minds (despite me telling them several times. Grrrr)

I don't believe it is true either.

In thr OP is states that the mums and the babies were sitting on sofas, babies on laps while the OP queued for takeaway coffee.

A few posts later, she is assuring us that the coffee was definitely piping hot, becuase she queued right next to them.

There is no way to new mums got mugs of coffees / buggies / trays across a cafe, settled on sofas, got babies out, on laps, got drinks on tables, in the time it took the OP to get a takeaway coffee.

Not saying the OP is a troll. Just that this didn't happen.

I know this thread really ain't the place for a chuckle, but at Morloth and Kimi and "stifling people's creativity"

JemL, I think she means she was standing in the queue right next to where they were sitting.

No she did say that they were in the queue in front of her at one point. Aaargh - I told myself I wasn't going to get drawn into this is it/isn't it true thing @ self

Not getting drawn in either. But people normally get a table and get start getting settled before one of them goes to get drinks. People donn't normally stand in the quque with all their mates and all their pushchairs.

I have no idea what OP wanted to achieve with this story but I am quite sure it is not true. To leave in a huff because a few MNetters questioned her, fits the behaviour of someone who is telling porkies. Terrible story , and one that will stick in my mind for ages, true or not.

But the point of the OP was to say that the mum should have been more careful, and that she "didn't want to judge her, but"

If she had posted elsewhere, just to offload the unpleasant experience, people might not have scrutinised her story so closely. SHe chose to put it in AIBU, where the maximum number of people would see it. She was also at pains to assert that the coffee was piping hot, and to reiterate this when some responses were to hope that the coffee might have cooled enough not to cause harm. Making it even more upsetting to read.

Why can't people read posts properly? Happens all the time, especially when people are looking for something that doesn't ring true

It's very clear, OP noticed them sitting while she was in the queue, she noticed the hot coffee while she queued next to them

Wish people would take off the deerstalkers and just take posts as they are

I really hope this little baby and it's parents are ok, horrendous accident to happen and so easily done

LadyBiscuit, read the thread again. What she actually said was "but I can say for certain it was piping coffee they had while I queued right next to them".
That could easily mean she was queueing near to where they were sitting. It doesn't say they were in front of her at in the queue. That's you putting 2+2 together to make 5.
I'm not saying her story is definitely true as I wasn't there but I can't imagine why a regular poster would make up such a horrible story. And I don't understand why so many MNers are so suspicious that they start shouting 'liar' at the first opportunity.

Crossed posts scaredoflove.

Maybe it's because I don't drink hot drinks of any kind, but I am mystified by the risks people are prepared to take with scalding hot liquids.

What kind of fucking gobshite would put lift a mug of boiling liquid right over their newborn baby's head? Seriously? Being a new parent isn't an explanation. She's presumably not new to the concept that coffee is hot and tends to come in spillable form?

People leave cups of tea on coffee tables in easy reach of toddlers because it is beyond their imagination to not forgo their beverage rather than avoid the very real risk of a toddler trying to drink it and scalding themselves. They pretend to themselves that they're being all careful and keeping an eye, but they aren't.

It drives me nuts.

And as for continuing to serve tea and coffee on a plane during turbulence?

"Yes, please serve the man in the window seat his coffee over me and my baby, putting us both at risk. It is obviously of critical importance that he have his caffeine."

Caffeine drinkers = selfish unthinking fuckers

It is an addiction skidoodle an addiction you should be offering me counselling not judgement!

"horrendous accident to happen and so easily done"

not easily done if you don't take stupid risks with hot drinks

it's pretty easy to avoid pouring boiling liquid on your baby

LOL @ Morloth

wow, I got distracted too many times mid rant and have ended up with extraneous words and several double negatives.

Oh well, helps to convey my impotent rage...

The op said she was in the queue getting a takeaway which would explain why she was leaving but the other coffee was hot.

This has really upset me. My sister is a nurse on a children's burns unit. She always told me off if I tried to drink a hot drink whilst holding one of my babies. She has also impressed on me the dangers from children turning the hot tap on in the bath and scalding themselves. I am really worried that this baby may not have survived and the thoughts will probably haunt me.

Accidents happen and they are easily done

There are many examples of bad things happening to other people on this thread. We try to keep our children safe but tiredness or a split second of not paying attention happen to most people

We all have hindsight after the fact and the obvious becomes apparent

We've not had any hot beverage accidents in this house but we've had many A&E visits and many a cold compress, few broken bones and a couple of stitches, probably all avoidable

These things do happen easily, all it takes is
a minute lack of foresight, especially when you are knackered

Skidoodle you are so right. However tired, the insanity of reaching for a large steaming coffee over your newborn baby's head is just incomprehensible.
Of course accidents happen, but that one is surely tantamount to negligence?

Ahh right lyrasilvertongue - I didn't go back through the thread to check her every post. I don't really have an opinion one way or the other on whether it's true or not

I don't think being a regular poster means diddly squat. The BF mum who made up the bus story was a regular, wasn't she?

How aweful, she certainly doesn't need judging, she'll be torturing herself enough...

And if the mum herself had started the thread I wouldn't have said anything. If she does exist, I doubt that she'll trawl through posts on Mumsnet at the moment.