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Parenting

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Original poster

Warning - bolt your chest of drawers to the wall!

5 replies

oddquestion100 · 29/05/2018 15:35

My two year old could have died last night. He tipped a chest of drawers over. We're so thankful he is safe and well.

We thought we were super careful. Every wardrobe and bookcase in our home is bolted to the wall. This chest of drawers looked small, flimsy and innocent to us, for some reason. We didn't stop to think it is packed with heavy items and higher than our toddler.

The crash was almighty. I was taken aback by the force with which it fell. We'll never forget those few seconds of running into the room, looking in horror at the overturned chest of drawers, wondering if our boy was underneath. (He was standing quietly in the shadows!) I'm lucky he was old enough to step backwards in time. Had he done this a few months ago or had a toy been lying behind him, the outcome might have been very different.

Please, please bolt your furniture to the wall and check the stability of your fireplaces. I've read those stories in the paper, thought 'how awful' and clearly not done enough.

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m33r · 29/05/2018 21:09

I hope you are ok OP. Our 4 high chest of drawers came down - luckily my LB was opening drawers from the side so ‘caught’ them. I ran in to find him stood at the side of them holding the top drawer woth it all tipped over.

Socrates73 · 29/05/2018 22:30

This happened to my ds, aged 18 months. Luckily I was sitting there, caught it but it was too heavy for me to push back into place. Ds was too little to realise he needed to get out of the way so I just had to sit and yell for help and hold it off him. My dad came round and nailed everything to the wall the next day!

gillybeanz · 29/05/2018 22:37

Ive never heard of nailing furniture to walls before, I guess it makes sense if kids are able to pull them over.
never seen it advised as a precaution either, it's times like this you realise how lucky you are to have raised 3 dc without furniture falling over.
No sarcasm in my tone, have really never heard of this, you'd think drawers would be sturdy enough not to move, especially if full of clothes.

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Caterina99 · 30/05/2018 20:32

The problem is if they open more than one drawer at a time then the weight will tip it forwards.

And yes it’s terrifying! You can also get child locks to put on the drawers which would help this too

user1471451866 · 30/05/2018 20:34

I have twins and was horrified to see film of one toddler twin climbing on the other and pull a TV over.

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