As Usual, Let's Pile on the Parent

Katie recently wrote a letter to the home improvement retail giant IKEA via Planetfeedback. Unfortunately, her shopping trip ended in what could have been a horrible tragedy because she did what I, and other parents, have a tendency to do with our infants in their car seats: putting them on the front seat of the shopping cart.

In Katie's case, the car seat somehow came loose (she's still not sure how), and the seat and her infant went crashing to the concrete floor. Her infant was injured (the little girl went face first to the floor), but is in recovery.

I admit this letter gave me a jolt because as I said above, I've done this before. Just last week, I took my eight-month-old son to Target and stuck him and car seat on the front of the shopping cart. I made sure it was secure, but well, Katie did the same thing with her seat. Her letter reminded me, and should be a must-read for any parent of infants, why this isn't always the safest practice.

But that's not what her letter is about. Katie doesn't blame IKEA for having a concrete floor or a shopping cart that may not have been safe; she takes full responsibility for what happened and how it could have been prevented. But what she IS mad about, and I agree with, is this: not one single employee called 911 for her, despite her screams to do so. Not only did they not call 911, they actually "escorted" her out of the building and shut the door behind her.

There are a myriad of reasons why the store reacted the way they did, and my posting today was going to be on the store's reaction. But I changed it, because, quite frankly, the responses in the letter are beginning to hock me off. Despite clearly taking responsibility for the accident being preventable, and despite Katie's response that she will feel the guilt for the rest of her life, out come the people who just have to pile on more. Many have just reminded her of the guilt she has to feel (because of course she doesn't feel anything whatsoever), some told her how much she was to blame (because she of course doesn't understand that), and one even called her stupid and accused her of child endangerment.

I empathize with Katie a great deal.  As I said, I too have put my son on the front of the shopping cart, and if this happened to my son, the guilt I felt would stay with me the rest of my life. As I posted a couple of weeks ago, I left my son on our bed while I finished putting on my makeup. He fell off the bed. It was an incredibly stupid thing of me to do, and while he wasn't injured, I still kick myself for that blunder.

This is not the first letter I've read on Planetfeedback where commentators felt the need to pile on the mom about what a horrible parent she is, and it certainly won't be the last. But why is there such a need to do so, particularly from other mothers? I'm reminded of a quote I read not too long ago on the Internet. The writer mentioned the harsh criticism another mother was getting for her decision to not give her baby the father's last name (more on that in another posting), and said that it seemed mothers judged other mothers the most harshly. Is it because we fear we could be guilty of the same things? Or does it give us some perverse sense of relief to know someone out there is a worse parent than we are?

Let's face it, we've all done something incredibly stupid in our lives, parent or not. And the last thing we need, parent or not, is someone coming along and reminding us. But parenting is such a personal and emotional experience that it seems to sting more when someone decides to call us out for being a rotten parent, especially when, like Katie, we're just doing the best we can.

But I'm glad Katie's baby will recover, and I hope her letter serves its ultimate purpose which is to make parents think twice about putting their child and car seat in the front portion of a shopping cart. I know I will.

-Contributed by Dawn

Comments

[Lynn]

When I was a little kid, my mom sometimes went to Florida to visit her family, leaving me with my dad. He was and is a wonderful father, and he always did his best to make sure I was safe, happy, and healthy while Mom was out of town.

But one day, when he went down to the basement to do some laundry, I ran along after him. And fell down the flight of stairs to the concrete floor below. I've never seen him move so fast! I came through the experience with a black eye and a slight concussion, which I quickly shrugged off (anyone else ever notice that kids seem to be made of rubber sometimes?), but my dad to this day feels guilty. I was in HIS care, and I got hurt on HIS watch, in his mind. And he says that even as I was scampering down the stairs, he thought, "I sure hope she doesn't trip," and the guilt of knowing that he didn't say, "slow down," has stayed with him for over 20 years. But I'd run down those stairs a hundred times and been fine, so he'd had no real reason to think this time would be any different, until it was, just like Katie's situation.

I'm glad that Katie's little one is doing well. I'm sure that she feels bad enough without a bunch of people telling her she's a bad mom. And honestly, for her to take responsibility tells me she probably is a pretty good mom. Kids don't come with manuals, and what seems harmless can prove otherwise quickly. It doesn't mean you're a bad parent, just that you made a mistake. Luckily this mistake didn't have more serious repercussions, and she can move on, lesson learned.

[Dawn]

Thanks Lynn. It just irritated me that so many people were telling her it was all her fault when she already said she takes full responsibility. She said in her response that the guilt will eat at her for the rest of her life. I see no reason to pound her senseless with more.

Some of the nastier comments were removed before I did this posting, and those were the ones that really got me riled up.

[Venice]

I had to stop reading the comments because some of them were so disturbing. If commenters would just take the time and effort to carefully read the letter and subsequent comments by the letter writer before posting, I don't think we would see so many thoughtless responses.

Speaking as a mother, I think guilt is the most powerful emotion a mom can have. I'm still riddled with guilt about things that happened over twenty years ago. Whether or not the guilt is justified doesn't even matter, but the last thing a person needs is someone making them feel worse.

Katie made it perfectly clear in the letter that she was not blaming the store for her baby falling out of the cart and was taking full responsibility for it. Her letter was about what happened *after* the accident. Why do some people find that so difficult to understand? And who in their right mind would think the employees behaved appropriately?

Every once in a while I read a letter on Planetfeedback and think no one could possibly disagree with the letter writer or find fault in the complaint, but I'm always proven wrong. There will always be people just looking to stir up controversy. The thing I can't figure out is if they actually believe what they say, of if they just do it to get attention. I just don't know anymore.

[Julie]

I already posted this suggestion on the PFB site, but wanted to include it here as well, in case Katie reads this instead.

-Write to Parents magazine:
ihtm@parentsmag.com

I was just parusing an issue of Parents Magazine, and I can't believe I didn't suggest this before. There is a monthy "It happened to me" story, this month, a mother telling of how her son almost lost a finger because it got caught in the door when he stuck his hand out of the grocery cart on the way out. There have also been horror stories of moon-bounce injuries and improperly cared for ear piercings.

Please write in, if the story gets published in the magazine, more people will read it and in turn, tell a friend why THEY no longer use thier car seat in the grocery carriage, and then those friends will tell more...

You get the idea.

Make sure you include the fact that the seat "locked" in, yet still toppled over!