<p>Kids have to get to school whether or not their parents walk with them.
I see kids walking alone all the time.
I always took my kid inside with me, but I lost count how many times I had to leave our groceries at the checkout counter because she was crying.</p>
<p>Small children, under the age of 5 or 6 definitely set off an alarm when I see them unattended. </p>
<p>OK, I’ll confess. I was a bad parent.</p>
<p>I raised my kid in a rural state, in a small city. My friends and I left our kids in our cars, either to run short errands (like paying for gas or mailing a package) or because they were sleeping. </p>
<p>The most extreme example: My playgroup met at a beach where the parking lot was far out of sight of the beach. One of the parents brought her daughter to the beach and left her sleeping son in the car. She left to check him periodically. But none of us ever dreamed of reporting her to authorities as a bad parent.</p>
<p>We didn’t lock our cars, either. Or our homes. </p>
<p>Funny story-many years ago we stopped at a gas station in a tiny mountain town and left the kids who were about 11 and 5 in the car so we could pay for the gas and get a map. I do not recall if we locked the car. the moon roof was open on the top of the SUV. from a few feet away we watched in horror a small dirt devil (a tiny wind tornado with a diameter of about 5 feet) came out of no where swirled over the SUV for a few seconds, and the went to the next car getting gas and lifted up a metal trash can and banged it into the next cars back window and did some damage. it happened so fast. we went back to the SUV and the kids were on the floor board and the little one was crying because they really did not know what happened. no one was hurt but they were covered and the floorboard was filled with sand. the teenage boy was frantic how he was going to explain his car to his parents. so, if your teen comes home one day from silverplume colorado and has a unbelievable story of how your car got damaged- believe him.</p>
<p>Back in the day I would, very occasionally, leave the kids in the car as I went in to pay for gas, keeping my eye on the car the whole time. It was probably safer than taking three kids under age 5 across a busy gas station at dusk.</p>
<p>I do think, however, that the current trend of kids being constantly supervised is not necessarily a good thing.</p>
<p>Guess kids left alone in a car could keep an eye on your car guarding it while you’re busy inside a bar drinking. Make sure kids left alone in car have guns handy to protect themselves too.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.newsherald.com/news/crime-public-safety/cop-charged-with-aggravated-child-neglect-1.147890”>http://www.newsherald.com/news/crime-public-safety/cop-charged-with-aggravated-child-neglect-1.147890</a></p>
<p>I can remember being left in the car with sibs once we were school age. I did the same with my kids if it wasn’t too hot out. They usually didn’t want to stay in the car, nor did I or my sibs. I can remember when a friend bringing my kids home from school left all the kids in the car when she ran into a store to pick something up and I was taken aback by her doing that. I wouldn’t have done that with someone else’s kids. (That was the point at which I realized that the kids were all old enough to be left, however. Until then I had been bringing them all in with me.)</p>
<p>Babies? I can’t imagine forgetting one in the car. I do remember the pain of shlepping the kid and the car seat in and out of the car on short errands. It was so much easier to run those errands alone. There were situations in which I left the kid in the car on those super short errands, like pumping gas or dropping off dry cleaning, in which I was steps away from the car and could see the car. Hot days never, but I can remember some sub zero days when Ieft kid in car. </p>
<p>Much like @Lergnom, I have a scary runaway car story. Dad left me in the car (parked at curb in front of post office), engine running. He just needed to drop an envelope in the outside mailbox, and it was warm, so I think he thought it was best to leave the car (and a/c) running. He thought the car was in park, but when he slammed the car door it slipped into reverse. Off I went, down the street, totally panicked. I watched my dad turn around, and begin sprinting after the car to no avail. My 6-7 year old self thought it would be best to open the driver side door and jump out. I remember seeing my dad’s head shaking back and forth, screaming NO! So thankfully I had the presence of mind to reach down and apply the brake with my hands. Thank God I didn’t hit the gas. The car came to a stop a few feet from another parked car. Yikes. My poor Dad sure learned a lesson. And the Mercury dealer got a call about this defect. Apparently it had happened many times before.</p>
<p>I can’t say that this had any real influence on my parenting decisions regarding leaving kids in the car. I did run in to the store briefly when DS was 5 and DD was 3. Both were sick, and my choices were limited. Barfing kids in CVS are not the best idea or well received by shoppers. When they put in the drive through I was so relieved! I did leave them in the car to do short errands, (picking up cleaning, dropping off mail at PO) provided I could see the car, and the temp was very mild. Never if the temp was above 75, or if it was very sunny. Even a 70 degree day that is sunny can warm a car up quickly. </p>
<p>I also left the baby in the car once. She was sleeping, I was unloading groceries. I realized after 10 minutes when I was unpacking the baby food and formula. Talk about a bad feeling…but sleep deprivation will do that to you. I used to laugh at my mom when she warned me not to forget the baby. Who “forgets” their baby? Uhhhh, yeah. I stopped laughing after that incident, and even put a sticky note on my dash which simply said BABY! </p>
<p>lizard, that is an awful story. What idiots.</p>
<p>I am not trying to make light of any of this but I do remember the moment when my paranoid self gave way to the realization that not everyone is out there to steal my kids, and that they are more wonderful and special to me than they are to anyone else.</p>
<p>I wonder how many cases of kids having accidents at the playground/running off/getting lost in stores/etc. these days are the result of their parents being focused on their smartphones? I see a LOT of people not paying any attention to their kids, even though they are “with” them.</p>
<p>Yep. Left my usually sleeping kid (when he was a baby, toddler elementary school aged) in the locked car to do very quick errand (like pay for gas, pick up dry cleaning) but only if I could see the car at all times and it was winter or cold out. He was never not sleeping in the car - even when a teenager. </p>
<p>I also left him sleeping in the car when we got home after nursery school - but in the garage - unless it was hot out. </p>
<p>I also put him outside on my front walk in his carriage to nap - even in dead of winter. </p>
<p>I didnt leave younger one in the car, even when I would just run in to tell older one I was here to pick her up.
As my younger one didnt like to wear clothes, I had to wrap her up in a quilt to carry her in ( she was about 3)
This resulted in exchanges like when one boy was told that his mom was there with his sister & she was naked!
Both I and the boy have red hair and his friend assumed I was his mom. This was hilar, cause his sister was actually quite a bit older than 3, and he came running out to see what was happening!
:)</p>
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<p>I see this on an almost daily basis but it’s not parents, it’s the nannies.</p>
<p>Everything involves some risk. Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death for children in the U.S., and hundreds are injured EVERY DAY. Pedestrian/vehicle accidents are pretty common for kids, too. So statistically your biggest risk is taking your children in the car with you in the first place, and then walking them through the parking lot. That risk far outweighs the likelihood of abduction from a locked car or dying on a mild day during a short errand. But even though safety-wise it would make more sense, we never suggest that good parents should always leave their kids at home. </p>
<p>There are a lot of scary stories in this thread, but almost none of them involve a short errand with the caregiver in sight. That’s probably why most of the statutes on leaving kids in cars have time limits (5 minutes for Hawaii and Texas, 15 minutes for Florida) and/or require “conditions that present a significant risk to the child’s health and safety” (California). Though Louisiana requires you be within 10 feet at all times–so good luck if you’ve got two deeply-sleeping toddlers and a parking space further away from your house!
<a href=“http://www.kidsandcars.org/state-laws.html”>http://www.kidsandcars.org/state-laws.html</a></p>
<p>And not to minimize heatstroke, but most of those cases involve children left in cars accidentally, locked in cars while playing, or left in cars for a long time (i.e. not a 5 minute trip inside to pay for gas). Still, I wouldn’t leave a child on a hot day, or a lively wide-awake toddler who might get out of their car seat. But I have left a sleeping child for a brief time, when I can see the car, especially if it’s raining, or icy, or I have to carry something else. It’s too bad that we don’t feel comfortable taking the village approach and just asking another parent in the parking lot to watch our car for a moment–that would be the easiest solution. I wonder if the reporting person would have helped if asked?</p>
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<p>That’s like saying that sleeping is more dangerous than helicopter skiing because more people die in their sleep than die helicopter skiing. The reason few kids die or are abducted after being left in a car is that most parents have the sense not to leave small children alone in a car.</p>
<p>Of course, there was the evening when both DH and I got home late, looked at each other, and said “Where are the kids?” We both thought the other person was picking them up at daycare…oops.</p>
<p>I guess part of the issue here is what we define as leaving the child alone or unattended.</p>
<p>I would not consider a child strapped into a booster seat or car seat to have been “left” if the parent driver has exited the car to pump gasoline at a pay-at-the-pump station. </p>
<p>I also would not consider a situation where the car is in the garage, baby is asleep in the car seat, and mom unloads the groceries first before going to fetch baby to be “alone.”</p>
<p>Another situation that has come up for me rather frequently in recent years with grandson. I drive to the park or zoo, grandson strapped into carseat. I get out of car in order to unpack and unload stroller from trunk of car. I then fumble around with stroller for a couple of minutes, probably taking about 3 times as long to get it unfolded and set up as anyone who was more familiar with stroller-mechanics would. Then I double check to make sure all latches and hinges on stroller are properly secured, before bringing stroller around to passenger side door where I can repeat my fumbling as I spent several minutes trying to get the car seat buckle unlatched. (Note to all manufacturers: any safety latch designed to be “child-proof” is likely also “grandma-proof”). Finally I manage to hoist still-sleeping toddler out of car seat and into stroller.</p>
<p>I suppose you could say that toddler was left “alone” in the 5 minutes it took me to assemble the stroller (or during the reverse process, even more comical, as grandma attempts to figure out how to restore stroller to the collapsed and folded position) – but I didn’t count those occasions as “leaving.” Nor do I think that the safe way to load up a bunch of luggage into the car is to leave the toddler standing in the driveway while hauling out suitcases from the house – generally, in my world, the kid tends to be the first thing packed, and, if asleep upon arrival, the last thing unpacked. </p>
<p>I also remember multiple occasions over recent years when either I or my son would find ourselves sitting in the car for extended periods in grocery store parking lots because grandson had fallen asleep in the car seat, and we didn’t want to wake him. I’m sure son learned over time to take reading matter with him in the car. (I live in a different city, so I only have the pleasure of being sole caretaker for beloved grandson a few times a year.) Basically, unless you are in a real hurry, that’s a better option than dealing with a just-woken, cranky baby inside the store. </p>
<p>But I do think that the blog post that was the start of this thread represented a no-no – parking lot of a strip mall is not the place to leave the kid unattended. The rather convoluted rationalization the blogger gave makes no sense either – they sell earbuds and headsets at airports. All over the place - kiosks, gift shops – a lot of airlines even sell them at the gate. So when the kid refused to get out of the car after insisting on going with mom, that was mom’s shining moment to say “no” --as in, “fine then, you won’t have headsets.”</p>
<p>A number of years ago, there was a freak accident near a Dunkin Donuts near here. I don’t remember the whole story, but power lines abruptly came down on a couple of cars, ignited, and the cars burned. Thank fully, no one was in the cars…they were inside buying their morning coffee.</p>
<p>A few people mentioned…it was good that no one had a child they left in the car while they ran in for the coffee that morning.</p>
<p>It’s not just heat, either. </p>
<p>I remember a few years ago there was a story about a girl who nearly strangled to death by a seatbelt while playing in a minivan while mom was outside talking to someone. </p>
<p><a href=“Mother Offers Warning After Child Nearly Gets Strangled In Seat Belt - CBS Colorado”>http://denver.cbslocal.com/2012/11/15/mother-offers-warning-after-child-nearly-strangled-in-seat-belt/</a></p>
<p>Yes, it’s rare. No one is denying that it’s rare. But one of the reasons that it’s so rare is because the opportunity just doesn’t present itself that often. It’s just like kids don’t often get run over by cars but that doesn’t mean they should play in traffic. They don’t often get run over because parents don’t let them do that! (Hyperbole but the point remains) </p>
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<p>Good heavens, it never occurred to me that anyone else would WANT them. I just worried they would hurt themselves (going back to the lighter incident from my childhood). We have had the occasional story of carjacking here when there was a kid in the car, and I think I remember a time when a parent left a car running when inside someplace and someone drove off with their kid. </p>
<p>I remember interviewing my first child’s daycare provider, and all I could think was what if she absconded with him and took him to some foreign place to raise as her own? (She already had 2 very active kids of her own…but my kiddo was jùst too cute to resist, right?). I was 6 weeks postpartum, sleep deprived, and clearly delusional to think she would want to keep my fussy, always hungry/wet, newborn! Even if he was the cutest baby on the planet. My mom assured me that she would be more than happy to give my baby back at the end of each working day. She was right. Lol. </p>