11 month old injury

[Kellansmama18]

I need reassurance. I'm dealing with an immeasurable level of guilt at the moment. I have an 11 month old and we frequent a small playground near our house where he swings in the baby swing and occasionally we'll go down the kiddie slide with him in my lap. It's a small, short slide and we've done this several times with no issue.

Today we went down as usual, with him sitting on my lap. For some reason this time he decided to abruptly shoot his left leg out and place ir against the slide wall..which then caused enough resistance (against our motion of going down the slide) to then twist his ankle. I knew he was injured based on how he was crying. After rushing him to urgent care they confirmed with xrays that he fractured his tibia.

Naturally, I feel terrible and feel so much guilt. Wondering if anyone else has been through a similar injury at such a young age and how the recovery was. The doctor assured me the location of injury is such that I don't need to worry about it affecting his growth, development or normal ability to walk once healed. Just looking for some insight to ease my mind.

I'm sorry this has happened to your DS 💐 you mustn't blame yourself though, there's an awful lot of evidence that shows this happens a lot and people simply don't realise the damage it can do.

For future reference, the safest way to teach little ones to go down a slide is to show them how to turn themselves around to go down feet first on their tummies to begin with. Then when they're confident with that, show them how to go down on their bum - but always let them go by themselves. Stand beside the slide to catch them if they look like they're going to hit their head or their shoes stick or anything else that may result in an injury

Thank you so much! Initially I was consumed with worrying about his head hitting or him flying over the edge..the last thing I would have expected to happen would be his food twisting. Deff a tough lesson learned. I think we'll avoid slides moving forward until he's old enough to safely go down on his own. Thank you for the response !

I broke my leg at 11 months by trying to climb over the kitchen gate. Mum had to load 3 of my older siblings with me in the big pram, grab the oldest 2 and walk a mile to the local hospital. I'm 55 now, never had a problem with it. 😉