leaving children on their own?

peachyprice

Someone is determined to have the last word emsy, irrelevant of the fact that they've been going round in circles for the last 10 pages.

Dog with a bone springs to mind.

FBaby

emsywoo123 wrote: »

Please for the love of God can someone make this thread stop. :eek:

No offense, but you are not forced to read it! Regardless of the emotions shared here, which are inevitable in light of the subject, I think many will find it an interesting thread. Those who don't are welcome to move on as I've done with other threads.

elaine373

The fact that you are unsure enough to ask on a public internet forum, indicates that its probably not the right thing to do. Take them with you.Half an hour from them is too long.

poet123

FBaby wrote: »

Poet, you totally missed my point again. The reason for my providing 'evidence' was purely to substantiate the point that people take risk every day taking their kids in their car, and that is often by choice rather than necessity, which is where the thread had evolved to.

I really didn't miss your point, you changed your point because you could not find evidence to back up your assertion that the stats you stated "clearly showed that a mature nine year old home alone was less likely to be in danger than a 12 year old walking to school" existed. At that point, and even now afaik you hadn't actually looked for any.

FBaby wrote: »

We had reached an consensus that the decision to leave a 9 yo alone came down to the level of risk parents are prepared to take. You then went on to say that there was a difference between taking risk out of necessity rather than choice. I have now given you something that says that the highest cause of death in children 5 to 14 is car accident, yet how often do anyone take the decision to minimize how often they take their kids in the car to reduce the risk?

I assume those stats also included accident to pedestrians from vehicles, so short of staying home permanently it is simply not feasible to do anything other than try to minimise such risk by wearing seat belts, keeping your child on the inside when walking, using reigns etc.

It is perfectly possible to choose not to leave a child alone. There are no guidelines saying do not take children in cars, do not take your child out for a walk, there are guidelines on leaving them home alone. Why is that? You are comparing apples and oranges.

FBaby wrote: »

My point is that many decisions we make about our children is often perceived risk rather than actual. Becoming a parent comes naturally with a huge sense of protectiveness. I remember when the pediatrician checked my daughter's hips after she was born and my baby started to cry, I felt an overwhelming urge to smack her! I was completely taken aback by the intensity of the feeling.

Of course becoming a parent makes you protective, but you have to rationalise if the action is being done for the greater good. You have just given an instance where it clearly was, but I feel you are rationalising leaving a child home using the same justification; that it is ok because it could foster independence. I think that is a distortion of the reality and the actuality. It is not a necessary risk because there are other ways of achieving the same ends.

FBaby wrote: »

The reality is that we naturally perceive our children in more danger when they are away from us because we are not there to protect them. Hence assuming that children are more in danger alone at home then with us in a car.

So why are there guidelines from two respected organisations which indicate the risks children run at home alone and what age it is deemed appropriate to leave them? Why bother producing these publications if the reality is that it is a risk we just perceive and which has no actual foundation to it?

There are risks we perceive to be greater than they are of course, many of them pushed by the media. This is not one of them, but it may suit many to see it in the same context. For expediency.

FBaby wrote: »

I remember the first time I put my children in the train on their own. When the door closed, I felt the urge to ask the guard to open it for me as it felt all wrong that the train was about to go with my kids in and me out. It felt like the worry I had when they were little getting on the tube. I had to remind myself that they were now ready to do these things without me, and that strangely, they were safer on the train than if I'd driven them there. After a couple of times, it became normal and I now don't think twice about them going on the train.

What is normal for a particular family circumstance is not always what is safe or right. Sometimes our normality is again, really expediency.

FBaby wrote: »

This is why I said previously that I believe the decision to leave a child alone at home is much more about the parent then the child, that of course assuming they have been assessed as mature enough to do so.

I agree that the decision to either leave a child alone, or ensure they are supervised is much more about the parent than the child, but I doubt that we are coming to that agreement from the same perspective.

FBaby

However you put it, there is still more risk of death to a child from a car accident then being at home, yet I'm sure that didn't stop you from driving them in your car. You took a risk, one that wasn't always necessary, and I have done the same.

poet123

FBaby wrote: »

However you put it, there is still more risk of death to a child from a car accident then being at home, yet I'm sure that didn't stop you from driving them in your car. You took a risk, one that wasn't always necessary, and I have done the same.

There may be more risk of death, but that wasn't the point of the thread. And that doesn't address the point you personally raised which was " a mature nine year old home alone was less likely to be in danger than a 12 year old walking to school" You have moved the goalposts.

There are many degrees of danger which I wouldn't want my child exposed to before we got to the ultimate one.

For me (and I assume the majority who voted on the poll) the bottom line is this;

Is there a viable alternative to going out of the house either on foot or in the car? The answer is clearly no, even if that was desirable. So you have no choice really but to be either a pedestrian, car driver, or use public transport and thus be exposed to the risks of the road.

Is there a viable alternative to making a conscious choice to leave a nine year old home alone? Clearly, there is, so the two scenarios are not comparable.

You cannot fudge the issue by pretending they are equal choices. Hence the guidelines and literature on one and not the other.

That said, if it is your choice (the general you, not you in particular) and you are happy with it and you are prepared to accept the judgement of others on it and any consequences resulting from it, then it is up to each individual parent to make that call.

emsywoo123

FBaby wrote: »

No offense, but you are not forced to read it! Regardless of the emotions shared here, which are inevitable in light of the subject, I think many will find it an interesting thread. Those who don't are welcome to move on as I've done with other threads.

Yes, it was an interesting thread. Was.