Kids in booster seat rule.

[jennyjinx3]

I recently took my dd9 out of her high back booster. She is tall enough to be out of one but I was keeping her in it because I heard it was safer. She had been complaining since sept that her knees were sore and legs would fall asleep every time we were in the car. We looked into everything..a nerve issues, lyme disease...damage to her knees. finally a doctor asked about how she sat in the car...turned out that even though she still "fit" in the booster seat, height and weight wise, the her legs were way too long and the seat was too small, so all of her weight was sitting mid thigh...effecting her knees and circulation.... as soon as we removed the booster, the pain and the issues stopped almost immediately. We did look for other boosters but they were all too short seat wise... For the record, the seat belt fits correctly and she is over the legal height and weight...

Hmmmm...you have given me some food for thought, DD8 is having issues in the car with her legs and feet falling asleep lately. Maybe I will measure her tomorrow and talk to DH about taking her out of the booster. Thanks!

 

[mrodgers]

Curious about those who are adamant about the booster seats and all the other safety by law stuff, how many of you had your kids climbing onto a school bus from the time they were 5 and less than 3 feet tall to go to school driven by someone you do not know without even a seatbelt?

 

[smitch425]

Curious about those who are adamant about the booster seats and all the other safety by law stuff, how many of you had your kids climbing onto a school bus from the time they were 5 and less than 3 feet tall to go to school driven by someone you do not know without even a seatbelt?

My DS was the smallest kid in his preschool class at 4 years old and was already over 3 feet tall. I don't think I've ever seen a 5 year old that was less than 3 feet tall.

As I mentioned earlier, DD9 is still in her booster. The seatbelt cuts into her neck without it. I am hoping she grows out of it by the end of the school year for convenience sake, but neither her nor I could care less if her friends think it is babyish. She has had friends ask about it before and she tells them that the seatbelt hurts if she isn't in it. No one has ever teased her about it. If they did, she wouldn't care to be around them anyway. No REAL friend would do that. She has an attitude. She'd come up with something witty to say if anyone ever gave her any flack. She can hold her own. I don't need to shield her from embarrassment, she could care less what anyone else thinks.

 

[Coconut36]

Curious about those who are adamant about the booster seats and all the other safety by law stuff, how many of you had your kids climbing onto a school bus from the time they were 5 and less than 3 feet tall to go to school driven by someone you do not know without even a seatbelt?

Mine walk but that isn't relevant. Buses are not comparable to cars and they don't just hire some random dude off the street to drive them (at least in our district..they are tested and screened and require special screening/testing of their driving ability in a bus). If you are sending your kid to a school where they just hire random unscreened, untested people to drive buses you have bigger issues. Do you not send your child to school? After all they will be taught by someone you don't know, right? (see how silly that is?)

As has been mentioned read up on buses and safety. Buses are not cars and buses utilize compartmentalization and thus do not need seat belts for safety purposes. So it wouldn't phase me to put them on a school bus without a seat belt because seat belts are not required/necessary on buses.

A properly fitting seat belt however is necessary for safety reasons in a car, truck, SUV, minivan..etc. If a child is not "normal sized" (wow..what a lovely statement..my 35th percentile child is apparently not "normal sized") and not in a booster the seat belt does not properly fit them and thus can result in severe injury or death. For me taking steps to prevent death/serious injury trumps legs falling asleep or teasing.

 

[jodifla]

So you draw your line in dollars and cents. How is that any different or more acceptable than drawing the line at social implications?

Again, there is always something we can do to be safer. Everyone decides for themselves where to draw the line. It is a personal decision and not as black-and-white as the "safety at all costs" types would like to make it.

Yes, great post. Everybody needs to make the choices that work for them. I just pulled our son out of his low back booster now at 10 years old and 4 foot 9 in both of our regular cars. But we stopped dragging the boosters along on airplane trips last year, and when we rode in other people's cars, we stopped using them long before that.

I didn't use a car seat on a plane a lot of time (statistically the safety improvement is completely insignificant).

For me, a safety issue that was non-negotiable -- but that others do all the time - is have a pool with a toddler. This is such a dangerous combination, and I would have never relaxed a moment if we had a pool when my child was that age. But many other people have pools and small kids -- then harp on the whole car seat thing.

OH, and when buses roll, people do die. Several people have been killed in bus accidents in the past few years.

 

[Colleen27]

Mine walk but that isn't relevant. Buses are not comparable to cars and they don't just hire some random dude off the street to drive them (at least in our district..they are tested and screened and require special screening/testing of their driving ability in a bus). If you are sending your kid to a school where they just hire random unscreened, untested people to drive buses you have bigger issues. Do you not send your child to school? After all they will be taught by someone you don't know, right? (see how silly that is?)

Buses scare me far more than the car, simply because I do feel like it is "just anybody" behind the wheel since our district started outsourcing drivers. Another district that did so ended up the subject of a "problem solvers" type news piece that turned up DUI, drug, and even one child abuse conviction among the drivers. I can't volunteer in the classroom without a district-run background check on file, but when it comes to bus drivers they take the staffing agency's word that their drivers are clean. There's also higher turnover and less consistency of which drivers are on a given route, so the drivers never get to know the kids and the parents never get to know the drivers.

Fortunately our current drivers are "grandfathered" in and our driver is about 10 years from retirement, so my youngest should be out of elem and walking to middle/high school before our route has one of these contract drivers. I am a world more comfortable with a neighbor that I see almost every day driving my kids than with a revolving door of contract employees.

For me, a safety issue that was non-negotiable -- but that others do all the time - is have a pool with a toddler. This is such a dangerous combination, and I would have never relaxed a moment if we had a pool when my child was that age. But many other people have pools and small kids -- then harp on the whole car seat thing.

That's one of my issues too. My youngest is turning 4 this month and a pretty competent swimmer for her age (another AAP recommendation I ignore - my kids start swim/water safety lessons even before they're walking) but I'm still not willing to have a real pool in the yard. For the 1-4 age group drowning is a more common cause of death than car accidents, and I lifeguarded in high school/college and have seen first-hand how quickly the poor impulse control of a toddler/preschooler can turn dangerous around water. We have a small, 12" deep wading/splash pool that we can set up easily when it is hot and drain when we're not using it, and that's all I'm willing to have while DD is small.

 

[Feckless]

This thread reminds me of the woman I met years ago that was talking about how uncomfortable she was with her 12 year old riding in the front seat now. I was sympathetic until he walked up - about 5'6 and 150 pounds!! Bigger than she was!

By the time my kids were 8-9, they were driving with tons of other parents. Even if they were still the size for boosters, it would have been impossible to keep up with it. Now DS's BFF is a teeny thing, and when we went on holiday last weekend together, they had him in a booster. I'm sure he was more comfortable in it, even though he's almost 10. But when he drove home with us, he didn't have a booster. I think that's reasonable - having one for long hauls where he won't be teased, but be flexible, KWIM?

 

[mad madam mim78]

Mine walk but that isn't relevant. Buses are not comparable to cars and they don't just hire some random dude off the street to drive them (at least in our district..they are tested and screened and require special screening/testing of their driving ability in a bus). If you are sending your kid to a school where they just hire random unscreened, untested people to drive buses you have bigger issues. Do you not send your child to school? After all they will be taught by someone you don't know, right? (see how silly that is?)

As has been mentioned read up on buses and safety. Buses are not cars and buses utilize compartmentalization and thus do not need seat belts for safety purposes. So it wouldn't phase me to put them on a school bus without a seat belt because seat belts are not required/necessary on buses.

A properly fitting seat belt however is necessary for safety reasons in a car, truck, SUV, minivan..etc. If a child is not "normal sized" (wow..what a lovely statement..my 35th percentile child is apparently not "normal sized") and not in a booster the seat belt does not properly fit them and thus can result in severe injury or death. For me taking steps to prevent death/serious injury trumps legs falling asleep or teasing.

I will assume this "compartmentalized" thing only works when the kids are seated and facing forward. I don't know about everyone else's bus experience was but my bus was packed on the drive home. Kids sitting 3 to a seat (only made for 2) and there were kids standing in the isles.

They weren't going to kick people off the bus. They had to get them home somehow. I'm sure that's how it still is.

 

[luvsJack]

I will assume this "compartmentalized" thing only works when the kids are seated and facing forward. I don't know about everyone else's bus experience was but my bus was packed on the drive home. Kids sitting 3 to a seat (only made for 2) and there were kids standing in the isles.

They weren't going to kick people off the bus. They had to get them home somehow. I'm sure that's how it still is.

That's how it is for the school dd just left, 3-4 to a seat and while some of the buses have a monitor some don't and the kids are all over the place.