Has anyone had a front-facing toddler and then turned them back round to be ERF?

[StoodOnALego]

Trying to buy a new car seat for large nearly 3-year-old as he is too heavy for his i-Size. He is almost 18kg so very few options for front facing harnessed seats. Rather more options for rear facing and extended rear facing.

The reason I'm not sure is that as an infant/young toddler DS screamed holy hell in the car when travelling backwards, both in his infant carrier and his current i-Size seat. I'm not talking cried himself to sleep, I'm talking hysterical SCREAMING non-stop until he was sick. I had to pull the car over multiple times each journey and never drove for more than half an hour in any direction as it was so stressful. I turned him round at 15 months and the screaming turned to a whine, a murmur, and nowadays he chats away happily in the car.

I now don't know whether to risk a very expensive but much safer rear facing seat with the possibility he'd hate it, or just stick with a forward facing one (at a third of the cost) knowing he'll be fine with it.

Has anyone successfully turned a forward facing child backwards? Or can you think of a way I could test out a rear facing option without having to pony up?

The stopping screaming may just be him getting a bit older OP and would have happened regardless of front facing. Have always kept mine rear facing due to safety, but she used to scream blue murder. Now she can look out the window and chat to me on drives she’s happy enough. So he may well be fine!

There are lots of people on the Car Seat Advice UK facebook page who turned children rear facing at 3+.

Where are you finding reat facing seats for 18kg plus that are cheaper than a forwar d facing! I'm struggling...ds is 2 and huge. Really tall... and really heavy. He's almost out of our Britax dual fit and I need another seat that harnesses and is rear facing.

Britax Two Way Elite. It's one of the longer lasting, less expensive rear-facing seats, and you can use it forward facing too, so you have that option if rear facing makes him scream again.

Arkos Britax Two Way Elite is about £180. It's normally the cheapest 25kg ERF seat.

The newer two way elite one forward faces to 18kg though. The Diono is forward and rearward to 25kg (if your car has a top tether) and we got ours for £160 on Amazon.

how do you know if you have a top tether

Yes I want to buy a seat that will last. I want to keep ds rear facing for a long as I can but he's very strong and very strong willed so I can see eventually that he'll want to face forward maybe 3/4

Look at the back of your seats, the top tether point is normally there. This explains it:

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.goodeggcarsafety.com/blog/what-is-a-top-tether.html%3Fformat%3Damp

My DC are not the shy and quiet type. They're very strong willed but at 3.5 and 2 they both rear face in Axkid Minikids. There's no way I'll be turning them forward facing for the next couple of years. For me there's no compromise on this and if they start to complain about rear facing (they don't at all at the moment), they just wouldn't travel in the car. They'll be allowed to forward face when they outgrow these seats but I won't be happy about it!