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Parents who dont put kids in carseats..WHY????????
- Jul 8, 2008 at 1:30 PM
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- Comments (5) Total Views (131) Everyone can see this journal post.
The other day I saw a child who looked like she was maybe 2 years old in the backseat of a car without a carseat or seatbelt. Her dad was driving by and she was in the backseat just all over the place. It makes me sick to see that. I know that it might be easy to just put them in the car and drive down the street, but most accidents happen within 2 miles of your home.
I am proof of this. In the summer of 2001 I was driving to my in-laws house because My husbands grandmother had just passed away, and the whole family was getting together. When it was about time to leave, my 2 week old baby was sound asleep in his carseat with the strap over him but I didnt put the strap up to where it needed to be ( the little buckle that should go up to their armpits ) I felt like I should have but felt like he was sleeping and it was only 2 miles away...nothing will happen..WELL, something did happen. I ran a stop sign and we were hit by another vehicle on my sons side and then knocked into a telephone pole again on his side. When I got to him he was hanging out of his carseat..( still intact but just hanging by the straps )
He was not breathing and I had to do CPR on him. We shouldnt have moved him because later we found out that he had a broken neck but you dont think of things like that when you see your child laying there dying. He suffered severe brain damage, a broken collarbone, skull fractures and a broken neck..all this at 2 weeks old. He was in the hospital for 3 weeks and was given a very grim diagnoisis. They gave him a 20% chance of living and if he did live they said he would be blind and in a wheel chair the rest of his life and labled as a vegetable. He is now walking, talking, seeing and doing wonderful..all of course with delays but he is doing them and thats what matters. He has the mentality of a 3 year old ( lower in some areas )
I cant go back and live with the "what if's" because it happened and there is nothing I can do about it now, but just maybe if I would have put his strap up to where it should have been, he might not have had such a severe diagnosis, BUT just imagine if he wasnt in a carseat at all..the thought makes me feel sick, he would have flown right out the window 
It is hard for me not to judge these parents thought process because they dont realize the risk that is invovled when kids are not put in a carseat. Just going down the street, they still need to be in a carseat no matter what. We were 2 minutes from our house when our accident happened and it has changed our lives forever...Dont think it wont happen to you, just because your a safe driver doesnt mean everyone around you is..........It only takes a second for your world to be turned upside down.
Comments:
When my son was born, people would offer us a ride home, saying it's not far, who cares about a carseat. I would tell them everytime that it wasn't their driving I was worried about, it was everyone else's.
This is a great post, I see it all the time and it makes me so mad, and sad at the same time. i almost want something to happen, just so they'll learn. But I don't want an innocent child hurt because of their parents ignorance.
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