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| even the cart tells you not to do it! |
I see parents pushing along their shopping carts with their baby buckets perched on top of the child seat part. The baby buckets are always full of baby.
I did this...a lot. Even when Oliver's carrier didn't quite fit snugly on top of the cart, I'd perch him up there and tell myself silly things like, "I'm right here holding the carrier, nothing can go wrong."
Then I read a story about a mom's friend pushing the shopping cart with a baby bucket on top over a speed bump in the parking lot. The cart tipped over and off came the car seat: the 3 month old baby died later.
First, if I was the friend pushing the cart I think I might be traumatized for life.
Second, this story scared the crap out of me: how many times had I done that very thing and put my baby boy at risk?
I didn't learn about the dangers of putting baby buckets on top of shopping carts until Oliver was sitting in the cart with a blanket behind him (for padding). I wish someone had told me sooner.
So therein lies the debate: should I say anything to this complete stranger?
On the one hand, I usually have a baby in my own cart, which might make it less awkward if I were to explain why I'm sticking my nose in their business. And I know I would have appreciated someone telling me in a non-aggressive way that what I was doing was dangerous.
On the other hand, I'm super awkward to begin with, and I know that a lot of people wouldn't take kindly to some random person coming up to them and telling them about how they're doing something wrong.
I just can't decide what to do here. Part of that is because I believe community has kind of died - I take neighbours knowing nothing about each other as evidence of this - and the other part is because I'm just plain scared of a negative reaction.
I know the right choice is to speak up, but no one ever said the right thing was the easy thing.
What would you do?
I have usually go over and talk to them. I say, really as casually as possible, that I do the same thing all the time but I just saw this story. What do you think?
ReplyDeleteThat's a pretty tactful way of saying something. It still leaves the problem of initiating conversation, which is something I am terrible at. Once I get over that, I might do the same thing. :)
DeleteMy Infant car seat is 14 years old and fits into the shopping carts, clicks and every thing. The newer ones meaning 10 years or less are not made like they use to be at all. That is the main reason I kept mine for all my babies to use. This little guy I am pregnant with will also use it. I would not use my infant car seat in a cart though that it didn't click into. I would put into the cart it self to let the little guy sleep while I shopped. It's okay to caution people when you see that they have their babies in a infant car seat on top of the shopping carts. Some might get mad but will still take it into consideration and some will be thankful. I am thankful to be reminded how fragile our babies are and how we as mothers and fathers need to take extra care of their well being.
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