Loren, her husband and son are participants in my RIE parenting class, and have become my friends. They had a tragic experience with their beloved first son Chase. Loren courageously volunteered to share her story in the hope that it would help others, even though reliving these events has been extraordinarily difficult for her…
In her book, Dear Parent – Caring For Infant With Respect, Magda Gerber asserted that her greatest battle here in the United States was creating a physically safe space for infants and children. By ‘safe’, she meant an environment with age appropriate toys and furniture that would not harm a child in any way, so that if a child were left alone and unattended he could still play safely.
Several years ago, my husband and I became foster parents with the hope to adopt. As foster parents, we went through a very strict home study making sure that our home was completely safe for children. It seemed ridiculous at the time, but now I see the value. I was always surprised that our home, without a child, was more childproofed than my friends’ houses who already had their own children.
Our first boy came to us at fourteen days old, and due to circumstances out of our control, at eight and a half months we had to turn him over to his birth father. That boy, Chase, was to me my first son. We were lucky to be invited to stay involved in his life even after he lived with his father. We were named his God Parents. We went to visit him on holidays and his birthday. We watched him start crawling and walk while we were visiting.
In this birth family house nothing was childproofed. For some reason birth families are not expected to adhere to the same safety standards as foster parents. There were no gates, no locks on drawers, nothing of the kind. They had moved some plants and valuables out of the child’s reach, but that was about it. When I mentioned that I noticed that nothing was gated, were they concerned he might get hurt, they would just say, “Oh, he’s fine. He knows better. Nothing has ever happened.” I always thought: how can a nine month old know better? And, like Magda Gerber, I thought, “Nothing has ever happened yet.”
Well, he didn’t know better, and frankly why should he? A child’s safety is the responsibility of the parents.
When Chase was eighteen months old came the worst day of my life, with a call from his father: Chase had drowned. The family had had a party several days before. The sodas and beer were in coolers. Chase kept going in the cooler to get ice and chew on it. Everyone thought it was cute. The next two days the cooler was left in the kitchen. They thought it was out of his reach because it was on a table with the lid closed. But it wasn’t. The father, who worked nights so he could care for his child during the day, nodded off on the couch, just a few feet away. The child was left free to roam in an environment that was not childproofed or gated. He climbed on the chair, opened the cooler and reached in for ice – a behavior that had gotten positive attention just days before – and he fell in and drowned in just moments. Drowning like this is more likely to happen to toddlers because their heads tend to be heavy, and they don’t yet have the skills to know how to get out once they have fallen in.
When I told my friend, whose husband was a paramedic, she wasn’t surprised. She said it is very common that people leave out coolers of melted ice, buckets of water, and small swimming pools. It doesn’t take much water, even less than an inch and a young child can drown. The national average is 115 drownings per year. This includes toilets. When she and her husband tell people to empty their coolers, people look at them like they are silly. I had a similar experience with a friend and she said, “Oh, I know you’re sensitive because of what happened.” No, I’m not sensitive. I’m conscious of the fact that children die needlessly because of adult carelessness.
Our son is now two years old. He has two gated areas — a gate in front of the bathroom and a lock on the toilet seat. His play area is completely safe, so I can go to the bathroom, take a shower, do the laundry, cook in the kitchen, and he is free to move and safe to play. If I got locked out of my house, I’d only have to worry that he would have a dirty diaper or was hungry. This I learned at RIE.
Yes, we are the exception. Once, when we my father was visiting, he said, “Poor kid, they got you locked up in a prison.” I said to him, “Dad, that prison would have saved Chase’s life.” My mother thinks we are “worry warts” and should let him roam free. When she visits, she has let him roam free. She says she is watching him, but one day, when he was roaming free and she and I were in the kitchen making dinner, I turned around and he had a seven inch knife in his hand.
Does my son protest and want to be in the ‘free zone’, as we call it? Yes, often and very loudly. I acknowledge his feelings and tell him he needs to be in his safe area for right now. Within a few moments, he relaxes and finds something child appropriate and safe with which to play, and then we are both relaxed, safe and happy.
The tragedy of Chase’s death is that it was preventable. My experience speaking with other parents is that it is easy to focus on the fact that the father nodded off, and to ignore the fact that the father’s first fault was that the home was not safe for an 18 month old child. I know that even on my best moments and days I cannot watch my child every single second. So, for me, that gate and all the safety proofing is not only for my child’s safety, but also for my serenity — to be there to protect my child even on my most imperfect days as a parent.
This week is the two year anniversary of Chase’s death, and I think of him and miss him every day. Please take care of your children. Be mindful of empty coolers, buckets and swimming pools. Create safe places, learn CPR and get a good night’s sleep. 115 children drowning a year means 2 children die each week, and they don’t have to. We have the power to change this statistic.
Loren is a mom, acting coach and filmmaker in Los Angeles. www.LorenEChadima.com.
Thank you for sharing this!
Loren,
I’m so sorry for your loss. Thank you for sharing such an important message, even though I know how devestating it must be for you to relive the memory.
Warmly,
Melani
I thank you too for sharing!
that was a powerful story, thank you for sharing…
This story has given me goose bumps! It just proves how easy and quickly things can go wrong. Thanks for sharing your story.
im a nanny myself im glad that you are so brave to share your story.i hope many moms, and caregivers read your story and learn from it. once again thank you!!
Thank you so much for sharing. Just wondering, what kind of a lock do you have on the toilet seat. It seems like they are all flimsy, at least when I look on the amazon.com webpage. Also what kind of a gate to you have for the bathroom? When I read your story, I right away went on amazon.com to check for the items, but I am lost as to what to get. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.
I just checked – the toilet seat lock is Safety First and the gate in front of the bathroom is Safety First. The Gate in the hallway is DreamBaby, my son figured that out in a matter of months, so we put another child lock on the gate as well. Its good exercise for my hips as I step over. Thank you for your comments. I’m so glad the story has had a impact.
Loren
Lauren,
Thank you for sharing this. Through you Chase is making a difference, in the lives of others.
God bless you,
Katherine
This
Has just caused me to book time in tomorrow to
Finally go and purchase all the childlovks etc that I require in yet another new
Hosue (I’ve had to leave them behind three times now in rentals as they are the stuck on kind that you press the plastic hole
Ober…. But the plastic wears away and breaks
Anyway so I need a new kind. I have a 3 yr and 19
month old. And I have a slow combustion fireplace – I have half a massive playpen wrapped
Atound that atm as the fire gate I
Ordered was laughable…. Three pieces of very light metal that wouldn’t deter my chidlren
At all. They would pull or push it over in a haeartneat and open that
Handle….. I would LOVE any advice there. As it gets so cold
Here 3-4 months of the year I’m Australia down
South.
We had the dream baby gates too and they
Were useless the lock broke very quickly.
I’m glad we no longer have 23 spiral
Stairs and a mezzanine over hang that I kept imagining my
Kids looking over amd
Dropping onto the tiles below…. We are all
One level now… but I need to get gates again for the laundry door
And bathroom door and maybe my bedroom
Too.
I’m going to finish unpacking this week-
We just moved due to leaving DV. And go through my house with a fine
Tooth comb/audit list-
Maybe I can find a safety for kids in the home
Checklist…. And
Tick every single thing off…. I
Would
Die if
Something happened to the only souls on
Earth, even worth breathing for…. For me.
They are everything and more.
Sorry for the typos my phone is starting new sentences randomly and it’s 12am….. I need to
Get a good nights sleep! Just wanted to say how sorry I am about Chase and thank you so much for making me really rethink a LOT of
Things.
Thank you for sharing this difficult story! Through RIE I also have learned about creating a safe-space. I heard from a friend about a fantastic website and family-run business called Family First who help with all kinds of child proofing, and will come to your home and consult on difficult issues. I was so anxious until I childproofed my home, and never had such a difficult thing happen. Thanks again for the inspiration.
I know talking and writing about pain and loss is not easy and I just wanted to thank you for sharing this experience with all of us: mothers and teachers dealing with babies, toddlers and young children.
Wow- I just realized we have a cooler with 2-3 inches of water sitting on our patio– been there all summer where my daughter plays. I don’t even know when we put it there and it just blends with all the other toys/slides and plastic items. I’m really glad I read this–*runs to empty it*.
Thank you for sharing your story, which is terribly painful to read and must have been unimaginable to live.
I am a big believer in Free Range Children. You can google it to find her blog. My two boys (now 13 and 15) lived with some basic childproofing and a lot of free reign. I had toilet locks at the first house, but not at our second because, as a friend of mine wrote (http://www.deancameron.com/2011/04/27/fact-or-myth/) I could only find anecdotal evidence of toilets really being a risk.
Mostly, my rule was that there were areas (like yours) that I considered safe and was less vigilant if my sons were in. If they wandered out of it, I either lured (or moved) them back or I followed them.
Thank you for sharing your feelings in this blog. I think a big lesson is that the large ice containers can be dangerous/deadly to inquisitve toddlers and should be drained as soon as possible after an event. Raising awareness of a danger such as this and adults then ignoring the warning would be negligence in my eyes. I do agree with Colin that with my 4 children I did constant dynamic risk assessments knowing where my children are and what the risk factors are. I did not have locks on toilets or bathrooms but knew where the dangers were.
Thank you so much for sharing this. What a powerful and sad reminder of this important safety precaution.
Thank you for sharing your story.Sorry for your loss.I agree to many incidents can be prevented if taken the time to think it threw.You really have to think like a child in order to make the home completely safe.I am expecting in Aug. and hearing your story reminded me of how cautious and aware we need to be with our children to keep them safe. The most obvious interest to a child,may not occur to a parent or an adult.