Near misses, please tell me yours and steady my nerves...

[seriouscase]

I had a near miss today with DS2. He is fine, I am a wreck. Please tell me I am not alone. I feel crap. So scary how things can go wrong in a few seconds.

My sister found her ds who was about 18 months holding a drill that was plugged in . Standing next to him was her ds about 12 months. (shudder)

Glad this thread is here, needed to get this off my chest.

DD3 (18 months) was all ready to go to Nursery and I had a rare day off planned at the Spa with fellow Mums. Had to change DD nappy at the last minute so ran her upstairs to the change mat. She is obsessed with lids and tops to medicine bottles, usually I undo the bottle, put it WAY out of reach and give her the lid to hold. Was in a rush, gave her the bottle thinking that the lid would be on firmly as I know I always secure them and double check and set about the (nasty) nappy, she coughed, I looked up and she had calpol on her face and t-shirt. OMG I was nearly sick there and then. Run down to Docs who would not see her, said I had to go to A&E as I had no idea of how much calpol was in the bottle, such a DREADFUL mother!!!

Half and hour later after much panicking and running around DD was totally fine, took her to Nursery where her her lovely carer said she would monitor her for the next few hours and not to take her to A&E as was convinced DD could not have taken that much down as I was standing right there. Could not cope so got my husband out of a very important business pitch only for him to tell me he had put the EMPTY bottle of calpol there ready to throw away which is why the lid was not on. So, DD had only had the dregs, not even a full dose.

Went out, sobbed all the way to the Spa. The bloody HeadMistress of the school called saying 'I hear your Daughter has had rather a lot of Calpol this morning'... set her straight and sobbed even harder.

DD fine, DH now under the patio... mwhahaha!

OMG, I feel sick reading all of this. DD is 5.5mths old. So far, only rolled her out the moses basket when I was carrying it out of our room when she was about 6 wks. I had hysterics, She was fine. I am now going to be very careful going up and down stairs, leaving things lying around and all the other above scenarios.
I think I may just keep DD in an oxygen tent in the house until she is about 30!

I had a clothes horse leaning against my bannister on the upstairs landing. Came out to find him climbing up it and leaning precariously over the bannister. Quite a drop.

I did cry afterwards and never leave the clothes horse there

My DC are better then me in opening child proof stuff and one day they managed to open the kitchen drawer with the knives in and I was upstairs putting some washing away when I heard this cling cling noise. Trust me I have never been so quick in getting down there, turned out both DC had the biggests chef knives and were playing sword fighting like real pirates!Luckily nobody was hurt

On a funnier note, when DD was tiny (3 or 4 months), I went to do a quick shop and had to perch the basket across the bottom of her buggy, over her feet but resting on the lower part of the handles. Halfway round the supermarket, looked down to see her foot bent backward in a fashion that could only mean the weight of the basket had snapped her ankle . I bent down to take a closer look, hands shaking, Tesco's spinning, and discovered that her sock had half slipped off and was hanging on at a funny angle whilst her foot was quite happy and in one piece underneath.

No matter how much of a rush I was in I always transferred her to a trolley after that .

LOL MollyCherry, my heart was beating faster and faster as I read your post until the end!!

did seriouscase tell us yet???

damn
killed a perfectly good thread.....
A thread like this went on for days last year..

I'm really concerned about what the OP did to her child if after all these posts of incompetence she still won't tell us...

Today...
having words with ds1 while walking across carpark, ds2 who has never done anything like this before broke free from my grip and suddenly made a run for it.

He then ran full pelt into a (thankfully) stationary car, bounced off, fell backwards and hit his head on the ground.

I'm still shaken now but thankfully ds2 seemed fine after about half an hour.

Parenting is just one long list of near misses.

My DH is paediatrician. When he does A&E I feel sick when he tells me some of the near misses that aren't near misses, and what he has to deal with. I think it's made us both totally paranoid. My sister is paediatric nurse. This is what I have learned from them both: burns are the worst. Life long scarring, and painful. Her own daughter tripped over a cup of tea and burned her foot, but my sister rescued the burn with cling film. I would never have known that you should put something like clingfilm on a burn (I think with something like vaseline underneath). Followed close second by head injury, falling down stairs etc. Children just have this ability to head for danger, so we have to constantly remind ourselves of the risks. And the little near misses are a way for us to get a wake up call. I'm so glad yours are near misses, and you are not arriving in A&E to see my DH!

Really? Clingfilm on a burn? I thought that wasn't advised because it could tear off any healing tissue? I need to go on a first aid course!

no - I think that's the whole point. Apparently cling film will not take off the tissue when you remove it (unlike some other things like cloth / cotton wool / tissues / plasters / bandages / etc). I remember thinking "note to self - must have cling film in house at all times"
God I am hopeless, I can't bear anything like that.

OP I have been re-reading, "We Need to Talk About Kevin". The authour cites examples of how mothers who watch their children 24 / 7 minus 1 minute are criminalised for those seconds without ever having the credit for the rest. It's chilling, the practical and other implications.

just re-read what I wrote. This is what I meant to say: she ran her foot under cold water, she slapped on some vaseline. she wrapped it carefully in cling film and then went to A&E. After that there was no further use of cling film, and it returned to the kitchen for normal usage!!

Author,

I have had some horrific near misses with DS.

He escaped from the back garden and ran onto the main road at 12 months.

I lost him three times in busy shopping centres when he was three and a runner-awayer. Twice the search involved all the security gaurds and went on for 15 minutes. I was a wreck.

More recently, DS was cycling down a hill on a cycle path that lead directly onto a main road that had a big river running alongside it. He was eating a sandwich at the same time and instead of breaking and stopping where the cycle path joined the main road, he just sped down the hill and shot straight across the road and into the railings along the river.

It turned out his front brakes didn't work and he was only operating these as cycling one handed. I asked him later why he hadn't just used both hands and operated both breaks and he said he didn't want to drop his sandwich! We where both very shook up and DS was badly scraped, luckily there where no cars about.

We have learnt our lesson and DS doesn't eat while cycling anymore.

I have had 3 so far:

• DS was about 4 months old. I put him in his car seat in the lounge, left lounge door and front door open and went to put rubbish in the bin the garden through the gate. The wind was strong blew the garden gate shut and beyond the latch so I couldn't get it back open. (iyknim) All I could think about was DS on the couch asleep in his seat and ready to be taken (completely paranoid but made me sick to my stomach). I don't know how but I shoulder pushed the gate open the wrong way. DH had no idea how I'd managed it.

• DS bounced off the bead and caught his head on the bedside cabinet - cue bleeding. Head glued and ok - but a scary hour or so.

• DS was upstairs - (stairgate on) I ran downstairs to get something and ran back up - he was v.quiet and I found him in my room holding the calpol (that was stored under my bed in a medicine box) going mmmmm (he likes it). thankfully he hadn't managed to open it - but god there was lots of other stuff in that medicine box!

Needless to say, I have moved all medicine - leave the rubbish until DH is home and don't let him bounce on the bed.

Ok my heart still sinks everytime I think about this....

We were in sil house with all the family chatting in the kitchen and the kids running round the house playing. Next thing some stranger walks in carrying my dear little dd (2yo). I was in a moment of shock wondering who this stranger was and why he was holding my dd.

Well anyway to let you know what happend..the front door on their house didn't close properly unless you really banged it shut and she had got out! She was stood in the middle of a very busy road with parked cars everywhere and omg luckily a couple driving down the road had seen her and realised where she had come from (the house with the front door open).

I can't tell you enough how thankfull I am to this man for really saving my dd.
I felt like the worst mother in the world

My DS2 climbed up a cast iron 5 bar farm gate - aged 14 months. The gate wasn't attached and fell on top of her - amazingly her head was between the bars. i go cold at the thought and have never been able to tell DH

Today we went out in the car to get to somewhere for a walk. When we arrived I took DS (15 months) out of his car seat and crouched in front of him in the shelter of the car door to get his coat on. Then a huge gust of wind came and blew the door closed, whacking me in the back of the head and bowling us both over. DS was fine, thankfully, but after reading this thread i was thinking "What if I'd been a little to the right? What if I'd stood to the side at that moment?". I've got a bloody sore bashed head but he'd have been smacked full in the face by the metal edge of the door

Have two ( one for each as I believe in equaltiy for my children!)

1. DS1 aged just 2 'washing up' at the sink standing on a chair, next to the open dishwasher filled with knives pointing upwards.

1. was only last week and makes me cry still. DS2 (aged 17 months) walked out of house as I was strapping DS2 in car and walked into road. I scooped him up as a man was driving along swearing at me. Am in tears again.

Am so glad I'm not the only one.

On holiday this year we went everyday to the hotel swimming pool which was by the sea, a bus ride away off a busy main road.

Ds (2) and I were walking to the beach area when I went back to fetch his hat. When I turned back he'd disappeared. I ran after him but he could have either gone left down towards the sea or right towards the road. Unable to decide which way to turn and running around in circles for about a minute I then saw him being led down the ramp from the dual carriageway by a passing motorcyclist!

It was a Daily Mail headline waiting to happen.

Next year Centre Parks!

DC2 escaped out the school gate while I looked for DC1 coming out the school door. I couldn't find him for a minute, then realised he was on the pavement, had to barge through crowds of parents and children. He was walking back towards me, I think he had been all the way to the corner of the road before he had doubled back.
Not my only near miss though [liability emoticon]