Getting your kid in a car seat seems simple enough, right? You strap the car seat into the car, plop your kid in, and fasten the buckles and straps.
Well, there’s actually a lot of things that can go wrong in that process making the scenario very unsafe.
That’s why they give you full instructions and sometimes even make sure you’re car seat is properly installed before you even leave the hospital with your new baby.
Local police departments also hold events where they check car seats for local families to make sure they are correctly installed.
Rebecca Tafaro Boyer is a nurse so she knows the importance of making sure your car seat is in right.
Her medical background has given her a reputation as a “super annoying overprotective mom” but that doesn’t bother her one bit. She knows that annoying overprotectiveness keeps her kid safe.
She even saw that annoying overprotectiveness pay off when her husband and baby got into a car accident.
She had been nagging her husband to send hourly updates the first day that she went back to work after maternity leave.
Boyer reminded her husband to properly tighten the car seat straps and to adjust the chest clip when they went to the store.
She’s sure that he rolled his eye before following through.
And now they are both thanking their lucky stars that Boyer plays the role of “nagging wife” from time to time. Her husband’s car was struck during that trip to the store.
“At 2:30 my phone rang, my husband’s panicked voice came through the line, ‘Honey, we had a car wreck. We are fine, but the car is going to be totaled.’ The boys were less than three miles from our house when a woman pulled into oncoming traffic to try and make a quick left turn,” Boyer explained on Facebook. “David just didn’t have enough time to stop – it could have happened to anyone. He slammed on the brakes at nearly 50 miles an hour before colliding with the front passenger side door of her SUV.”
Thankfully her baby William was properly strapped in.
He was so well restrained that he didn’t even wake up during the crash.
“Even with the impact of the two cars, William only received a minor jolt – so insignificant that he was able to continue on with his nap, and then spend the next two hours flirting with nurses in the Le Bonheur ED,” Boyer said.
Her husband, unfortunately, broke his foot in three places and dislocated three toes.
The car, however, was totaled.
Boyer offered some tips about car seats to make sure other families are keeping their kids safe.
“All infants should be REAR FACING in the back seat until at least the age of two and snuggly secured in a 5 POINT HARNESS in a car seat base that does not move more than one inch in any direction,” she wrote. I am so thankful that my husband took the extra one minute that was necessary to put William in his car seat safely. I can’t even begin to imagine how different the outcome could have been. I truly believe that the reason my family is at home sitting on the couch with a pair of crutches instead of down at the hospital is because of my annoying nagging mom voice.”
Learn more about car seat safety at www.nhtsa.gov/equipment/car-seats-and-booster-seats.
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