My kids were bumped by a car whilst in their pushchair (are OK) but how would you react?

[adamadamum]

Yesterday we were going on a trip with DD's nursery and close to the nursery I stopped for a moment to check something. It's a quiet side road and I stopped just inside a church car park next door to the nursery. There were no cars, and as I said it's a very quiet road, but I still felt safer parking the buggy there than on the narrow pavement, ironically.

Basically a car came into the car park when I had my back turned for a moment, and suddenly my kids were jolted by this car, not injured thank God, but someone had hit the buggy and knocked it (and obvously them) a foot or two...AND CARRIED ON DRIVING! Slowly it has to be said, I know it wasn't a dramatic hit and run, the driver had pulled into the car park to park there, but it was only when I was banging on her window shouting "You've just hit my children!" that she realised! She had no idea of what she had just done.

She was a rather senior lady let's say, and obviously felt terrible about it, and the kids were fine (more upset by my sudden outburst than anything!), and she was shaken when she knew what she had done, but how forgiving should I be?

A lovely member of staff from the nursery came over, and put her arm around the woman and told her not to worry as no harm was done etc., and not to let this put her off driving. We had already exchanged numbers and the woman said she would appreciate if I could call her on our return from the day out, to reassure her that everyone was fine. I said I would try - I kind of felt obliged to be more polite than I wanted to be because of the nursery teacher being so nice to her!!!

But all sympathy seemed to be for her rather than us...she rammed into my kids pushchair - we were stationary in an empty car-park fgs!

The lovely nursery woman, who I know quite well, later suggested that if I liked she would phone this woman to reassure her that all was well, and to try to make sure this didn't knock her confidence as a driver...anyway I forgot to give her the number so she couldn't and last night I was glad, as I am not sure I want to encourage her to continue driving after hitting my children! They weren't hurt, but they could have been, or worse. By the way she said she didn't see us, and as I said she didn't even notice that she had hit my kids.

Well, how sympathetic would you be? How angry would you be? What would your reaction be?

Am I right not to want to phone her and reassure her? to be too angry to?

To be honest my main thing is not the worry that she might hurt someone, but a more selfish thing in a way...SHE HIT MY CHILDREN WITH HER CAR! AND IT SHOULDN'T HAVE HAPPENED! What I feel at the moment is pure anger really. I have re-lived it all in my head several times and each time I am certainly not as nice to her as I was (I only acted as politely as I did because of the woman from the nursery being there a short time afterwards!) She could have seriously injured my children, or even worse. Every time I go over it in my head, I am absolutely amazed that she didn't see us, or feel the bump when she knocked my darlings.

quite right, adamadamum. If she hadn't been a little old lady doing nice things for the church, how would you have reacted or be feeling now. If she had been a guy in a suit in his 30s for instance? A car is a lethal weapon unless it is properly controlled and if you are not able to control it properly then you are a danger. I'm sure she's a very wonderful woman, and ferries people about like billy-o, but does it matter if you've driven 12 people to church and killed only 2 kids on the way? Is that a good score?

Don't think there's much you can do now though; with luck she'll consider her position carefully after this prang. Perhaps her priest or some other parishioner (and she's certain to have told people about it) will suggest something to her gently.

Do you think it would be too lat in the day to tell the police? I don't know how this kind of thing works.

I would have been furious in your situation. Screw the nurseryteacher and her reassurance I would have been on the phone to the police immediately.
You owe this old lady nothing, she is clearly a danger to the public with her careless driving.
I probably would have freaked out and dragged her out of her bloody window!!
Who's to say what she might not see or notice next time she is out in her car?

Also what do you think would happen if I reported it to the police? I don't want her punished in any way other than realising that maybe she shouldn't drive any more, but I am fuming so much. is it too late anyway? There were no witnesses anyway and no-one was physically injured, but sod being pc right now, she could have killed my children and just because she is a sweet old lady doesn't give her a right to do that to us!

Anyone guess I am a little angry?!!!

I have no idea about reporting it. Perhaps you could go to the police station and just tell them - calmly - what happened. Explain that you're not after charging her but wonder what the situation is with older drivers... any one around who knows about this?

Ironic thing, I didn't even know about that little boy who was killed in his pushchair until today when I told someone what had happened to us - hadn't caught any news or checked out MN for days and missed it all. I hope "my" "driver" has seen it all.

cal her "and to try to make sure this didn't knock her confidence as a driver."???????

I would have called to tell her maybe it's time she considered given up driving!! Make her understand that next time it could be worse and she might also end up in a wall. She did not see them FGS!

So far as go to the police...no. If you're not going to report someone, what's the point?
I always found it very strange that there is no periodical assessement of drivers over a certain age (say after retirement legal age)....

just call her and pour your heart out.

I think that you should contact the police and ask them if they could suggest about this, don't make it an "age issue", just tell them that you are concerned about this woman's driving due to not noticing she had bumped your children in an empty space.

TBH, as sweet as she could be she may not be so lucky next time. Perhaps by asking the police about this you may be helping to save someone else's life.

What Isababel said...
Seriously, be furious for yourself and at the same time you may preventing something alot worse happening next time she is on the road.

but because it was in a car park the police won't be interested will they? Traffic incidents in car parks (and I think that's how they'll see it) are beyond their remit 'cos it's private property (bitter experience of being crashed into speaking here). It was a church - could you try contacting the vicar for a quiet word as the lady is likely to be one of the congregation if she was parking there? (unless it's just a handy car park on a main road of course). I agree with you that she shouldn't be reassured to the point where she doesn't worry about what she has done, but would letting her know that no-one has suffered any after effects really do that? I'd phone.

I see what you mean about the private property BB but as OP is not seeking prosecution but is reporting the hitting of two children in a buggy by a car in an empty car park I would expect them to take it seriously! Could you fine out who the local community officer is, ours is lovely and they tend to have more time to deal with situations like this.

I think it's certainly worth asking the police what, if anything, could be done.

You ever every right to be very furious.

Could your DH (I don't know your situation, if no DH/DP, a sister/ mum, etc) phone the lady - if you are not emotionally in a position to do it - maybe someone else could get the points across calmly?

SWimilar thing happened to me, I had mindees (none of my own children were with me) I had two in a tandem buggy and one on reins walking beside me. I had stopped at a crossing and the green man was showing so I crossed - as I got off the kerb - bear in mind I had a tandem buggy so they were quite a bit in front of me, this car overtook the one stopped at the ligths and drove over the crossing hitting the front of the buggy. Luckily it wasn't a big hit, as he was going slowly, and I had a tight grip on buggy. The best of it was though that he pulled into a praking space just infront of the crossing and went into the shop! So of course I follwed him, got the lady in the shop to keep an eye on buggy and I went up to him and asked him what he thought he was doing his reply

"Well I could see you were going to take forever to get across the road so I thought I'd try and get past". I said to him that he was only going to the shop, what difference would a few extra minutes make and did he know that it was illegale to go through a red light.
He said
"yes, so what you going to do about it".

At that minute the police arrived, the man whop had stopped at the lights had pulled in and phoned them, he had also told them that the woman he nearly hit looked furious so they had better get there quick.

adamadamum, this just confirms to me what I think and its that when you reach a certain age you should be made to re-take some sort of test. I really don't want to sound horrible and disrespectful here to the elderly, but some of their driving is really terrible. My grandad was driving well into his 80's and it was REALLY crap and dangerous. I think I would have reacted the same as you. Thank god your kiddies are o.k. and she did stop when she did.

Message withdrawn

Yes and yes.
Yes you are right NOT to phone her and yes your are right to be angry,
I would be absolutely furious and probably be held back (I am not actually a violent person) but this would trigger me off, I wsa angry just reading it. WIth regards to the post from Saltire, I am sure I would have been the one arrested, what an ignorant pig that man was.
I know the best thing for your kids is to keep your cool in a situation like this but how can you?
Rant over.... me... well, I would phone her and tell her what I relly thought and that she should give up driving and get one of those electric wheelchair thingys.

I've finished now!

i would be furious - agree with people here who say not to phone her. if she has your number and is that concerned, she can bloody well phone you! also a good point about asking the vicar to have a quiet word i thought. isn't care for the elderly supposed to be part of pastoral duties??

i'm glad your kids are ok, but it could've been so much worse! she definitely needs an eye test (as she's over 60 she'll get it free ) if not refresher courses as well. hope you've calmed down a bit, i tend to go into mother bear mode when ds is threatened in any way!

You're naturally in shock and the woman was undoubtedly upset by the reaction if not the incident itself. I'd leave it a few days and see if she calls. If not, after the Bank Holiday call and say you had left it since you were waiting to check the kids were ok (as I'm sure they probably already are). Presumably there was no actual damage to the buggy ? If she has a conscience then she'll ring and/or send something if she has your details.

at the woman expecting you to phone her

saltire - what did the police do? well done for confronting the man but he must have been a total twunt!

I can't believe the number of times people go through red lights at pedestrian crossings, keeps happening in my local town, and I am hardly ever there, I have had a couple of near misses when I have been crossing... the thing is the drivers always look like thewy have switched off completely

I would be sympathetic for the old lady, but i would be severely worried about her driving skills. I bet she felt terrible about what she did, i bet it was an accident but i think it should be a wake up call for her. I dont think the nursery lady should have intervened to be honest. I dont blame you for losing your cool, i would have gone apeshit, but i would have felt bad too. I might have phoned her to reassure her and suggest she take another driving test, tactfully of course!

at the nursery teacher!

I would report it to the police so that they could make an assessment whether or not the elderly woman was fit to continue driving, before she potentially kills or maims.

the simple fact is, if she is not safe to be behind the wheel of a car, then she is not safe behind the wheel of a car. FULL STOP. It doesn't matter if she is a lovely, wonderfully nice little old lady, but if she can't drive safely, then she can't and that's that.

We can all feel sorry for the poor little old lady who isn't allowed to drive any more, but if she is not safe to drive, then it's just hard cheese, really.

My grandad continued to drive after he was classed as blind and as long as he knew where he was going and nothing actually stepped out in front of him, and there were no other cars on the road, he was fine.... he was a lovely old man too.