6-month-old boy dies in hot car after parent forgot to drop him off at day care: Sheriff
6-month-old boy dies in hot car after parent forgot to drop him off at day care: Sheriff
A 6-month-old boy died after being left for hours in a hot car in Louisiana, authorities said.
A 6-month-old boy died after being left for hours in a hot car in Louisiana, authorities said.
The baby was found dead in the backseat by his parent at about 5:46 p.m. Tuesday, according to the East Baton Rouge Sheriff’s Office.
When the parent went to pick up the baby from day care after work, they realized they forgot to drop him off at day care that morning, the sheriff's office said.
Every time this happens, I am reminded of this Pulitzer prize-winning article.
It can happen to anyone, but a large majority will never believe that. It's a heart-rending situation.
Ah that article, that scared me shitless when I first read it while my wife was pregnant. A single "oops" that really doesn't just fuck a person up, it ruins their entire life.
“Death by hyperthermia” is the official designation. When it happens to young children, the facts are often the same: An otherwise loving and attentive parent one day gets busy, or distracted, or upset, or confused by a change in his or her daily routine, and just... forgets a child is in the car. It happens that way somewhere in the United States 15 to 25 times a year, parceled out through the spring, summer and early fall. The season is almost upon us.
If you ever accidentally left food in the microwave for a few hours, this could be you with children.
Anyways here's the archive org link since the primary link is paywalled.
Thinks back to the time I made a giant russet baked potato and forgot about it until the same time the next day when I reheated something from the fridge and wondered why it was still cold after several minutes on high… only to find the dried remains of a flayed potato hiding underneath a paper towel. I set the second plate on top of it without even realizing it was still in there.
If you ever accidentally left food in the microwave
I've lost count of how many times. Now we have a microwave with a reminder beep that keeps going off every minute or so until you open the door. Best feature ever.
Having gone through what is essentially sleep deprivation torture when raising twins, I believe this and the guilt would be unimaginable.
A friend was taking a walk with her daughter, she called her from the other side of the street. She didn't see the car coming though. The daughter ran over the street and was killed by the car.
She couldn't see the car, because the parked cars were bigger and blocked the view.
An unfortunate accident, but she never got over it. It's been 30 years, but she's as devastated as before.
The daughter only crossed the street, because the she called her. This broke her.
You would not believe the downvotes I've gotten for saying this exact thing. I'm not a parent, but I do take the time to really consider what having to care for an infant would be like. I have been sleep deprived (edit: though, nowhere near the level of a new parent) so I perfectly understand how you could unintentionally cause the death of your kid. I think the hypothetical I gave was something like
You're out running errands with the baby on your day off while the spouse is at work. You got maybe 4 hours of sleep between getting up to feed and change, and you're lifting and carrying and running around all day. You stop home to drop off some shopping, you even leave the car running because you'll be right out. Quick plop on the couch just to rest your legs and back, and then suddenly it's five hours later and you start awake remembering you left the car running... and the baby in the car.
I know the terror I feel from that little hypothetical, I can't believe it doesn't hit close to home with actual parents too. And then, to be held socially - even if not legally - liable on top of your own guilt... an awful, horrible, soul-chilling situation to contemplate. I wish there were more compassion for new parents, I'd bet it's more common than we think that parents' bodies just shut down from the strain.
Sleep deprivation is no joke and doesn't take many nights at all. A while back, the worst upstairs neighbors on the planet woke me every night, multiple times a night. My cognitive function definitely suffered.
I hope those neighbors are miserable wherever they ended up. They deserve it. I asked them multiple times with decreasing politeness to not slam doors or fling objects around at 3 AM.
I was going to be dropping my son off at daycare before work (something I usually didn't do), and my normal routine was to stop at Wawa for breakfast. I stopped, got out, grabbed my breakfast, got back in, and only then remembered that he was in the back. He had been VERY uncharacteristically quiet prior, and I was tired, and I just... forgot he was in the back.
It caused absolutely no harm (I was only in the Wawa for 5-10 min), but it was a very sobering moment. I can definitely understand how it happens.
To a much less serious degree it happened to me/my daughter. Brought her in one winter in her car seat and set her down next to my bed with her coat still on. Instantly fell asleep on the bed for at least an hour. When I came to she was drenched in sweat. Obviously panicked and got her out but she seemed unfazed, stretched a little, and went back to sleep. Still feel bad years later.
I'm reminded of this short story
Thank you for the read. It's an imperfect world and these people have to live with their guilt for the rest of their lives.
It's amazing how the smallest routine deviations can change things.
I once put my 1 year old in the car seat before loading the rest of the stuff into the car. My kid has always hated being constrained, so I didn't bother buckling the seat belt, as I figured there'd be more joy in being able to reach and play with toys while I loaded the car.
All went well, we got underway, and upon arriving at our destination I realized I never actually did up the safety restraints.
Holy shit
I thought
If I'd gotten in an accident in the last 30m of driving, my kid probably would have died
What a shock and brutal realization to have.
Many people have complemented me on my parenting, complemented me on my nurturing and caring attitude towards my kid and other children too. I'd like to think I'm a good father...but the momentary lapse I had could have ended a life and ruined so many more.
Yes, it can happen to anyone. I feel nothing but sympathy for the parents who have lost a child this way.
While not every parent who loses a child this way is a good person, people like Lyn Balfour have demonstrated that many of the parents responsible for these cases are good people who simply had a momentary lapse in attention that resulted in the worse mistake of their entire life.
I think that it is not for the public to judge them, and it's not appropriate to publically shame parents who have been through a tragedy like this.
Those parents will be forever haunted by the waxy face of their dead child, will see other children playing in parks, and remember what their child looked like the last time they saw their remains, will remember how beautiful and vibrant their baby was - and know that it's their fault that the child is forever gone.
I think that's punishment enough.
When my oldest was about 1, I buckled him in, but didn't realize the carseat wasn't buckled in.
About a mile down the road, I turned and we went tumbling across the car in his car seat. It was completely upside down by the end.
The only thing that kept me calm was that he was cackling with laughter. He thought it was the funniest thing. Never made thay mistake again!
Does he skateboard now?
As a new parent... This terrifies me
There have been other suggestions in the thread how to avoid ending up in this situation that I think are good, like put your work bag or purse in the back seat too, or if you're really concerned, take off your non-driving shoe and put it back there.
Kidsandcars.org does great work too, and clearly the message is getting thru to auto manufacturers too.
My boss has a new ford ranger, it reminds him to check the back seat if it detects weight. There are lots of ways to prevent this happening to you, figure out what makes the most sense for you and go with it.
Also, you're going to be a great parent. I don't know how I know this, I just do.
It's the lack of REM sleep that really fucks you up. Those first months and years are brutal. I suggest making a habit of something that pulls you out of auto pilot. It can be as simple as a phrase like ''close the door, check the kid'' or ''turn off the engine check the back seat'' if it's a habit, it will reenforce what your doing even when you haven't had a solid 8hrs in almost a year. Also, if you have a partner, it can be a good idea, when possible, to switch night duty on baby so you can recharge, but honestly, it's impossible if you can ever hear the baby fuss your animal instincts shoot you right up.
All went well, we got underway, and upon arriving at our destination I realized I never actually did up the safety restraints.
This happened with my youngest once. I forget what lead up to it (this was 16-17 years ago), he might have climbed into his seat on his own or something that deviated me from my routine, but as we were driving he said something about his buckles, and his sister, sitting next to me started yelling at me because I forgot to buckle him.
i was a toddler in the 70's. i was never put in a child seat. i distinctly remember crawling around in the floorboard and watching the streetlights go past from a lying position. i'm glad i have those memories instead of being put in restraints every time i was ferried around. we were even in a car wreck once and i got thrown around a little bit. got a few cuts on my hand and that was it.
but i don't have kids so i don't worry about any of that shit.
i'm not sure if there was a point to this other than to be amused at yall for freaking out over everything.
I once lit a cigarette, but it didnt stay lit. So i guess that means that everyone who lights a cigarette has to light it twice....
Except that it doesnt and my experience put me in a minority that day.
Thats why we dont use anecdotes as evidence of facts.
People are right to be concerned about safety when the evidence shows that not being concerned causes more deaths despite there being some lucky idiots out there.
God, that's the ultimate nightmare scenario. Fucking up so bad it costs the life of your child, and it seems like no one will understand how you could have fucked it up and you're too overwhelmed with guilt and sadness to not defend yourself but to try to make people understand how this could have happened. You're no longer you to yourself, you're the monster responsible for your childs death. There's no way I could live with myself after that, though I do have suicidal thoughts at the drop of a hat
Now imagine if they weren't your only child.
I'd rather not thanks
I probably wouldn't be able to live if I caused this.
I'm gonna add this here in case it helps anyone else.
A friend of mine uses a long dog leash to prevent her from forgetting her kid in the car. She uses the handle end with a loop and ties that end to the carseat and then attaches the hook end to her belt loop or purse. Now she can't leave the car without acknowledging the carseat.
She just leaves the dog leash attached to car seat all the time and attaches it to herself when she puts on her seatbelt.
I thought it was a great solution that doesn't involve removing shoes or buying a new car with seat sensors. Hope this helps someone else, or at least gives them peace of mind if they choose this method.
The LOTO car seat lol
Yeah this is so incredibly sad, if I had come back to my car and realised that my own preventable negligence had caused my child not just to die, but to die so needlessly, so carelessly and so awfully I'm not sure how I would cope. How could you possibly go on with that on your shoulders? It would utterly crush me....and rightly so.
That parent/those parents are awful awful people. This should not be anywhere near possible.Edit: upon reading other comments, I've reflected on my own comment on the parents and have slightly changed my view; personally I think the gravity of the mistake outweighs everything else they have done in life no matter how good and so my statement on the balance of things is probably true, imo. However it is not something that needed to be said and nor is it a comment on the type of person/people they were up until, and after this.
If you have children (and your vehicle has this feature) make sure you have the back seat reminder turned on. We all have temporary lapses that usually have little consequence, and this could literally save a life
for me, i always put my work bag in the back seat for this reason. I would have to open the back door to get it out. Never happened but it was a concern and i completely have a tendancy to be on autopilot in the mornings.
If your car doesn't have this, you can put one of the shoes you're wearing in the back seat with the child... You will not walk away with one shoe.
The thing is, each day with a child in your care there's an infinite number of low chance / high consequence "risks" you need to navigate.
If you tried to mitigate all of them, you'd spend all day observing these weird "one shoe" type rituals, which isn't much of a life for you or the child.
We certainly need to be responsible parents, but in doing so we balance risk mitigation against simply living our best life.
So there is a feature that is put in a vehicle so people remember that their kids are in the vehicle with them?
What the actual fuck?
Child seats are supposed to face backwards and kids often fall asleep in the car so if you get distracted and thrown off your normal routine, it is extremely easy to not notice they are there especially if you are sleep deprived. So yes, there is a feature in newer cars that can alert you that there is extra weight or movement in the back seat.
The 40hrs are for father supporting the mother not for both to do 40hrs. This is why shit like this happens , they are forcing us to live a life we were never built for. The less working for some one else my wife does the more energy she puts into our family specially my son.
Tribes of 150 humans, mixed with all age groups. Mother often dies in labour plus no real way to tell who the father is means the whole tribe pitched in to raise the children.
I think about this a lot. When I say I never want to have children, this is probably the reason why. Like an animal in the zoo, I understand that the environment is not ideal to have offspring in.
I love how women "often" dying in childbirth is the ideal situation
A woman's place is in the home, right guys? Did you mean our son?
I think the point is valid, but maybe not presented well. When the 40 hour work week was established, the understanding was that a single parent could work and earn enough for the family.
Now, two earners are not just common they're almost required. People are stressed, wondering how they're supposed to juggle work and family and chores and all of the other things that need to get done and the answer is that they shouldn't have to juggle so much.
To be clear: women having the ability to work is undeniably a good thing. Women don't have to be beholden to finding a good husband, they have options now, and workplaces have benefited from new perspectives. But it also got messed up by capitalism making it the default expectation... More people joined the workforce, but wages just sat still and ate up the gains.
I'm not saying women should choose family over career, I'm saying that it should still be an option today for one parent to make enough for the family to live off of so that the other parent can help balance the workload of life better.
Daycare is probably not the only scenario in which this happens but I wonder if at least some of those cases could be prevented if the daycare reached out when an expected drop off didn’t happen.
In Massachusetts it is state law that a child care center/home/facility call parents if a scheduled child is late being dropped off. For this reason I think it's a great regulation.
Some do. However, a more common situation is that the parents have been dealing with a sick baby, and decided to let them sleep, when they finally went down. A phone call waking them, after a sleepless night can be met with inappropriate, but understandable, anger.
Many nurseries err on the side of politeness.
WOW. Sure he or she is a total fucking retard, but also this is incredibly sad and I can totally feel for the person. I am forgetful enough to have done this, my wife is the brains. I would feel like dying if this has happened to me. My wife would be at my face with the full force of the law too. Shit.
Anyway, just the other day I was playing with the kids near the laundry room and they both hid inside the dryer!!!! This became my moment of clarity. Nothing happened to them, they were just playing hide and seek, and I was there watching in horror as both climbed into the dryer and closed the door. I mean just imagine if I had run down to just press the button as I often do. Now, until they can't fit anymore, I have to check to make sure there are no kids in the dryer or the oven. It's sintered in my brains to do that.
I just can't imagine how the parent felt when they parked the car and realized what happened. Plus why didn't the day care call? Usually they will call if you didn't bring your kid. Not to detract guilt, just pointing that out.
Brain fog....
Well that's one thing a Tesla has going for it. Automatic 'pet mode'.
And in the case of my Magna, ghetto crank windows. Although I'm not sure a toddler would figure them out in time.
If the parent had line of sight on the baby, would they have forgotten about him?
Serious question: with today's cars and car seats, radically different survivability in crashes compared to when car seat laws were passed, would more children die from accidents with front facing seats or no car seats at all? I've heard about crash tests done in secret showing the answer is there is no measurable difference with modern bucket seats. (Edit: Struggling to find the paper with actual tests, but there was a separate statistical analysis backing this up, and here's a link to another paper confirming those results: https://docs.iza.org/dp8590.pdf )
Why in the hell would they have to do the tests in secret? So Big Carseat doesn't shut them down?
Struggling to find the paper with actual tests, but there was a separate statistical analysis backing this up, and here's a link to another paper confirming those results: https://docs.iza.org/dp8590.pdf
Because it's a huge chunk of the labs revenue, and there are other labs the companies would want to work with. Then the automakers who make up the rest of the labs business are now potentially liable for kids fitting without a car seat, instead of being able to transfer that liability to the car seat makers. What is the moral thing to do and what are you incentivized to do are very often opposite.
It just causes far less headaches for automakers to keep the existing laws mandating child safety seats, so the liability can be transferred to other companies that now have a reason to exist, and you have a way of feeling better by spending $500 on the fancy seat instead of 100 bucks on a cheap one that works just as well.
The tests were done in secret and yet you know about them? Humm
Struggling to find the paper with actual tests, but there was a separate statistical analysis backing this up, and here's a link to another paper confirming those results: https://docs.iza.org/dp8590.pdf
How can people be so stupid.. feels like we're living Idiocracy
can everybody just stop having kids ffs? obviously we got plenty of people and yall are too stressed to check the back seat for the damn kid. maybe this is all just a big stupid pointless cycle?
I don’t understand how people can be so stressed out with life that they get their children killed. For fucks sake be fucking adult and learn to tell people no. Stop living a life that is killing you. If you can’t afford to live somewhere fucking leave. Stop gas lighting yourself into believing you’re stuck.
Ah yes, "just stop stressing"
For most people it's not really a choice. It's much more of a societal problem
I hope this is just a moronic moment you're having and you aren't this stupid all the time.
A c/fuckcars post right there…
I mean it could happen anywhere.
I remember taking my 5yo kid to the park while also overthinking about work, and nearly walked home without him. I typically take both kids everywhere. But one was sick so not having both made me completely forgetful.
It's a haunting experience I live with.
But the difference is that leaving a kid at the park might be scary, but isn't very likely to be deadly. The presence of cars makes it deadly.
(This goes for @[email protected]'s anecdote elsewhere in the thread about a friend's daughter being hit by a car, as well: the presence of cars is what made crossing the street deadly. Streets predate cars by literally thousands of years, and for 90%+ of that time they've been perfectly safe to walk down the middle of, let alone cross.)
As a vegan and atheist, it’s such a relief to no longer be a member of the most obnoxious and hated group on the internet.
If this is a reference to c/fuckcars I do not understand you. This community might appear toxic, however it is quite reasonable and open.
You'd think by now cars would have some sort of safety feature to alert parents of this. Reverse cams are the norm now, surely it's not too much to ask for some sort of passenger sensor + temp monitor?
Most modern cars do have a warning you can turn on that sounds an alarm if you opened the back and put something in, and then fail to open the back door at your destination. Just as effective without any finicky expensive sensors.
When the parent went to pick up the baby from day care after work, they realized they forgot to drop him off at day care that morning
I do not buy it, but if it is true, that poor baby was going to die from neglect and soon even if it didn't happen then.
When my daughter was a baby, I was constantly checking on her while we were driving (at stoplights, don't get all het up) and I was very aware when she was in the car with me.
Some people should not be allowed to be parents.
There’s actually a great article on this. Warning, it’s a TOUGH read.
What kind of person forgets a baby? The wealthy do, it turns out. And the poor, and the middle class. Parents of all ages and ethnicities do it. Mothers are just as likely to do it as fathers. It happens to the chronically absent-minded and to the fanatically organized, to the college-educated and to the marginally literate[…]
Last year it happened three times in one day, the worst day so far in the worst year so far in a phenomenon that gives no sign of abating.
The facts in each case differ a little, but always there is the terrible moment when the parent realizes what he or she has done, often through a phone call from a spouse or caregiver. This is followed by a frantic sprint to the car. What awaits there is the worst thing in the world.
It’s a shockingly common occurrence and actually not due to neglect a lot of the time. The article posits that a large reason is because car seats were mandated to be moved to the back seat.
It's such a painful thing, and the scary truth is that it can happen to anyone.
I'm sure we've all experienced instances of this, in some smaller and insignificant way.
You take a packed lunch to work. Every day for five years you've taken a lunch to work, without fail. Its part of your routine, you don't even have to think about it. Get your wallet, get your keys, lunch out the fridge and into your bag, out the door.
Then one day you open your bag at lunch-time, and it's not there. Why isn't it there, you think? You remember putting it there like always, but then the memories of different days are all the same as each other, and it just blurs into one.
And then you remember. Just as you picked up your wallet and keys, your phone rang. And it's your Dad, who says he just had someone call to say he needs to transfer money to keep it safe, and you're telling him no no no Dad it's just a scam, don't transfer anything! And you have to go or you'll miss the bus, and did I get my lunch, yes yes I put it in my bag like always.
But you didn't put it in your bag. Its still sitting in the fridge at home.
And obviously a lunch is not a baby. But the principle is the same. That frightening realisation that your own brain didn't merely forget, but actually lied to you about what really happened that morning is the same.
And it could have been a baby instead.
Scary.
Ouch. I typically agree with all the comments you make around Lemmy.
But this one hurts.
I can be as wrong as anyone else.
Edit: Which apparently is a bad thing to admit?
It only needs to happen once. One bad day. One day when the brain isn't operating at full capacity, but absolutely has to. One day out of a couple of thousand at a deeply critical time. And something gives.
Are you the sort of person who falls asleep in front of the TV? There are millions of people like that. There might even be a billion. Sure, some will think "I'll just close my eyes a sec", but there are others who don't make a conscious choice about anything and find themselves waking up, unaware of when they fell asleep.
Forgetting something - even a baby - is a lapse like that. That's all it is. Just one tiny little lapse. We are not 100% in control of what goes on in our own heads.
"It won't happen to me" / "It couldn't possibly have happened to me." is the height of hubris.
As for making decisions like "Some people should not be allowed to be parents.", who's doing the allowing there? Because that's a horribly slippery slope. And frankly if Darwinism hasn't got it out of the gene pool at this point, it might well be all of us with the same fatal flaw... which I think is the point I was making earlier.
Not everyone handles sleep deprivation the same. Not every baby sleeps the same amount or at regular intervals. Some babies just never seem to sleep or have weird needs that require exhausting accommodations. It's terrible, but new babies are so vulnerable and there are so many chances for failure at the same time parents are at their most compromised. I have sympathy for the stupid, addled, forgetful mistakes anyone could make under constant, chronic exhaustion.
We were never meant to do it alone, the nuclear family is a myth.
Seems like an insane reach to say if this baby didn't die from that incident, they'd die from another neglect related issue.
Personally, I have a hard time judging parents in this position and I can't say I'm a fan of them being charged. All the system cares about is the illusion of justice served in the form of traumatic retribution via prison.
I'm in the same boat as you. I was more understanding before I had a child. I thought, you can forget your phone, autopilot, all other excuses. But after having two, there's no fucking way I'd ever forget them. They're always on my mind and the first thing I think of whenever I'm doing anything. I check on my children while driving too
Edit: I understand how easy it is to get into autopilot, and having understood that I do everything I can to change my routine. We take different routes, we stop and do something on the way, etc. But I realize that I'm speaking from a place of privilege where I can do these things and not everyone can. I recognize that it can happen to me, and I pray it doesn't. I truly am sorry for this families loss. No one should ever outlive their child.