Near-miss/accident with toddler

[ToadstoolFairy]

About an hour ago we had what I’d call ‘a near miss’ with my toddler in the garden. We live on a hill and so our garden is on a steep? If that makes sense. Outside of our patio door is our decking, which has a low ‘half wall’ separating us and next door. We have sofas outside against this wall and there’s about six inches between the top of the sofa and the top of the wall. Then there’s a huge drop to next doors garden, which is just concrete steps leading down into the grassy area.

My DD has just started climbing things, and what felt like the blink of an eye as I was sat on said sofa, I saw her climb the sofa, put her foot on the top of the sofa and go to climb the wall. My heart jumped into my throat and I grabbed her off and all but threw her inside the house. I was flooded with intense panic; my heart was racing, I started crying and I began shouting at my DH that she could have gone over. My DH who has always been incredibly laid back, simply said “well she didn’t go over”. I didn’t take this well and instead of brushing it off and thinking “phew, that was a close one, we’ll have to put something up” the image of her falling over, hitting the concrete and dying began playing over and over and over again in my head.

I’ve been sat on the sofa, alone, unable to look at her for about ah hour now with this image playing in my head. Every time I clutch and claw at my head trying to make it stop. I do struggle with anxiety and it feels like every day I have this images, which I understand are common with parents, but it’s like I’m unable to let them go, and instead, think about them more.

Every day out, trip into town, and now apparently just being at home, is plagued with me thinking about all the ways she could hurt herself. And it going over and over in my head in graphic detail.

I don’t know how to end this post, apologies.

I wouldn't think of this as a near miss tbh, if she had climbed the wall and was on it then maybe, but she WENT to do it, you noticed and handled it well.

I hate to be the one to say this but have you seen anyone about your anxiety? Life is scary and full of dangers so I think it may be worth speaking to someone about it otherwise your life will be lived in an endless state of worry.

She's fine. Every parent has these near misses, don't worry.
If she's a climber, just check everything and try to make it safe, but I remember mine climbing a bookcase at one point when I was on the phone! Move the sofa and put up a fence or whatever.
Just try to unwind.

Can you move the sofa will this stop her from being able to get on the wall for now? Then you can get a higher fence put up in your own time.

I wouldn’t say this is a near miss.
If you were in the kitchen and she went to grab a knife on the counter top and you were next to her and simply moved the knife, is that a near miss?

Surely that’s just part of normal parenting, constantly stopping your child doing dangerous things.

Now you know it’s a risk, make sure it can’t actually happen in the future.

It's OK. Breathe. You saw her, you stopped her. She wasn't out there unsupervised, you were watching, she never would have got that far.

You've noticed the danger and now you're going to put something up. She wasn't at risk because you were with her. It COULD have happened were she alone but she wasn't.

Try to reframe it in your head. It's something I use from therapy when i get caught in a loop like this. Compare it to something silly but equally unlikely.

She could get eaten by a shark if she were alone in the sea but she isn't. Because she won't be alone in the sea.

She could fall over the wall if you don't put something up but you will put something up before she goes back out there so she won't fall.

How high is the drop from the top of the wall down into the next door garden? You say it’s concrete steps? Your decking doesn’t sound safe for children tbh if there’s a big drop onto concrete the other side from 6 inches above the back of the sofa. Mine climbed everywhere and it would have been extremely likely that they’d get on to the top of the wall.

Honestly, you will spend your life trying to stop your child injuring themselves in all manner of ways. Toddlers are like lemmings.

It doesn't sound that bad - you were right there and stopped it. It's not like you grabbed her mid-fall inches from the bottom. Your reaction does sound a bit extreme so is there maybe more going on than this one incident?

Ah I just saw you have anxiety. These sound like intrusive thoughts. It's def worth speaking to your GP about it

Perhaps it’s not the definition of a near-miss
but I’d say she was mere seconds away from mounting the top of the sofa and toppling over.

Its definitely not safe for a toddler … we haven’t long bought the house and I suppose we’re still in the process of taking account of what we need to change. And like I said, she’s only started climbing and it hadn’t even occurred to me that she’d try and do that.

I definitely try and not be a ‘helicopter parent’ but
the anxieties are always there in the back of my head as I’m sure they are for most parents. She has bumps and falls most days - bumping her head, falling over on the pavement … just this afternoon she head butted the corner of a wall 🙄 so I’m not foreign to her having little accidents but this one put the sh**s right up me.

It sound like you are having a panic attack.

I get that she wasn’t actually on the wall yet, but how high is the drop from the wall? Because once my kids had discovered it was possible to climb up the sofa to the top of an exciting wall, they WOULD have done it. It would have been a magnet!

I agree that you’ve allowed this to affect you too much emotionally, but surely you need to move forwards now and work out very quickly what you need to do to make the decking child-safe - then do it. Even if it’s just a couple of rolls of bamboo screen for now.