It’s one of those warnings that are so ubiquitous, it’s easy to roll your eyes, thinking it’s overzealous CYA. I have put my kid in the grocery part of the cart. I did make her sit down the whole time, but you know there’s no guarantee they’ll stay down.
Enter my friend, who has to wake her daughter up a few times tonight to, you know, just make sure she isn’t going into a coma. The daughter and a friend were riding in the cart that way (I’m sure having two kids in there increases the odds of an accident), and she fell out on her head. This was followed by dazedness, lethargy, and lots of barfing. And an ambulance ride, then a CT scan.
She has a mild concussion, but they couldn’t detect any bleeds in her brain, so she got to go home after a couple hours.
Still, it was awfully scary. I know it will make me straighten up and fly right in the future!
Huh… reading that brought back a memory of that happening to me, probably no more than three years old at the time. I remember my head hurting, looking up at the ceiling of the grocery store and crying, but that was about it. No hospital visits or nothin’.
Haven’t thought about that probably since the day it happened. Weird.
I’ve never understood the “kid in the grocery part of the cart” thing. If the kid is too big to fit in the kid seat part of the cart, then the kid is going to consume all the space if you put him/her in the grocery part. Where do you put the groceries? I have seen carts with the grocery part entirely consumed by a kid or kids.
FWIW, I’ve seen as many heart-stopping instances of a toddler trying to climb out of the seat part. Are there any stats on kids taking headers from a grocery cart? How many were in the seat? How many were in the grocery part?
I had an enormous 3-year old who was way way too large for the seat, but tended to take off, or just generally dawdle and touch things if allowed him to walk through the store.
The cart is useful not just for moving a small child around the store, but keeping them corralled. I agree there is a safety risk in a kid taking a header, but I accepted that risk when I put my kid in the basket, and weighed that against the risk of destruction to the store - or pulling a display over on top of himself, and decided it was an acceptable risk.
(Pause for childfree lectures about how I should teach an energetic 3 year old to walk quietly and politely next to the cart, saying “Yes ma’am” and “Good afternoon sir” to every adult in the store. Or better, to not allow him out of the house at all. :rolleyes: )
Back in the real world…
As for the stuff, you can put some of the groceries in the seat, and wedge the rest in around the kid.
Looks like it’s about half and half, though this page has no info on what percentage of seat falls involved use of the restraint: http://www.cpsc.gov/LIBRARY/shopcart.html
Annual average fall injury number was 12,800 kids between '85 and '96. Thispost-2004 document says the average is 17,300.
You could have put him on a leash! Nobody would have commented on that.
Seriously, Hedda Rosa, I hear ya. With toddlers, you do what you gotta do.
The “fun-oh-boy-kid-friendly” nightmare in the store I frequent is the grocery cart with a big honkin’ plastic car on the front. Pop the kiddo in the car, and away we go. NOT! My son was always trying to climb out of the car, but now you’re six feet away from the toddler ready to take a header. Not to mention trying to maneuver around the store with that behemoth.
I have to confess that I cannot stand the kid in the cart part at all, and I look down on those people. Sorry, Hedda.
My youngest son and I used to do this thing when he got too big for the seat, where he would stand directly in front of me, with his feet up on the bottom rail of the cart. I’d wheel him around like that, with him holding on to the handle, sometimes leaning back on me and sometimes not, and we did that for a good while. He weighs too much now, but for a long time that kept him under control in the store.
Those kid friendly “race car” grocery carts suck. They are a lot harder to manuever around browsing old people in the store and don’t hold as much stuff as a regular cart.
Plus, your kid always wants to ride in one. “No, no, no!!”
Yeah, if I use those I spend the entire time in the store trying to keep the Celtling in the little car. Then when I finally make it out of there with only about 36% of the stuff I mean to buy because all my working brain cells have been too busy tracking her and trying to steer - we have an enormous tantrum in the parking lot because she doesn’t want to get OUT of the little car now.
There’s no good answer. I sure do miss the days when I could pop her car seat out and attach it to the cart! Celtling’s favorite thing is to surf through the store standing in the seat and holding on to me. (I refuse to carry her.) I think in the big part of the cart is safer than that! The key is just to never get more than an arms length away from her. Even if I have to rearrange the cart to get to the watermelons, I do it.
This thread brings to mind a memory from my early childhood. I was in the ‘grocery part’ of the shopping cart in a small store. Some old man shows up and starts yelling about how I shouldn’t be in there. In my memories he was shouting at me, but he may have been shouting at my mom (It was one of my earliest memories, I don’t even remember how old I was). I refused to go into that store for many years after.
Being the nosey busy-body that I am, I’ve gently told children to sit down in the cart basket. Most of the time they will listen to a stranger better than their parent. I usually say something like, “Oh honey, I’ll bet momma doesn’t want you to be standing up in the cart.” So far, I’ve only had the moms turn around and scold the kids for standing up. I’m waiting for the “I’ll-let-my-kid-do-whatever-the-hell-he-wants” counter attack but so far it’s been a good thing.
I just got an inspired idea - Kiddy Kubbies! As soon as you enter the store, you check your kids in at the desk. They pop 'em into an individual cubby with a safety door (No, it’s *not *a cage!!) and you can shop, knowing your child is safe and secure.
It’s sheer genius!! I’ll make a fortune! Don’t none of you steal my idea now before I can patent it…
Hey, you prefer to risk teeth getting knocked out over possible cranial injury - it’s cool.
You also shouldn’t ever wheel the cart around with your child hanging on to the far end, and then her Croc falls off and she gets down to get it, without warning, and you kind of run over her foot. Whoever would do that must be the worst mother ever. edges away, whistling
Seriously though, we seem to have a consensus - taking children to the grocery store is nigh impossible. Even my 6yo meanders around, getting in people’s way and endangering the neatly stacked shelves. You do what you have to to survive. (My favorite option - dump them with their father and shop alone - pure luxury!) I just never realized how bad it could be if you ignored the WARNING/CUIDADO! signs until yesterday.
That sounds kinda fun Alice, can I go grocery shopping with you? We could trade places being the pusher and pushee.
Some grocery stores have a coffee shop (allusion to another thread).
