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It is uncanny--every single incident of a child forgotten in a car is a father or male caregiver, with the exception of one couple. There are some incidents of children leaving the house themselves and locking themselves in the car (presumably to "hide" or get some privacy from siblings) and in some of these cases they just say that the child was found.
I wonder if the reporting is skewed to report the father's mistakes while not noting if the mother was the one in charge, or if this really is a case of fathers being more likely to forget.
Historically it's not always a male that forgets. It might be that it's out of their ordinary routine more often, and someone else is usually doing to dropping off. I don't know. Most of these are tragic accidents but a few are just bad parenting especially when drinking/drugs have been involved.
It is clearly not always a male. But I did find it odd that it was so many men.
As to parenting, circumstances were not clear in many of those cases. I have had my kids leave the house (they are tall enough to unlock the doors) before I woke up, though! Drinking and drugs were not involved. I was just tired.
Lyn Balfour is a mother who is probably the most famous one of these events, because she herself has kept it in the spotlight. If you do a Google search, you will find her. IIRC, in the Washington Post article (linked in this one) about a man who left his son in the car by accident, there is another woman's story in addition to Lyn's.
I also wonder if there are unknown cases of parents who left their kids in the car when it wasn't that hot and only discovered the kid at the end of the day, but the kid survived.
I just don't understand how it keeps happening with so much attention being given to these cases. How do you NOT have a plan in place so it doesn't happen? I'm not one of those people who think it couldn't happen to me. It could definitely have happened when my son was a newborn/infant and I was barely sleeping. Why aren't people having the daycares/sitters call if the kids don't show up? Why don't you call someone every day after the child is dropped off so that person knows to check if they don't hear from you?
I just don't understand how it keeps happening with so much attention being given to these cases. How do you NOT have a plan in place so it doesn't happen? I'm not one of those people who think it couldn't happen to me. It could definitely have happened when my son was a newborn/infant and I was barely sleeping. Why aren't people having the daycares/sitters call if the kids don't show up? Why don't you call someone every day after the child is dropped off so that person knows to check if they don't hear from you?
Those are all good ideas. I think you hit the nail on the head with part of the problem right there. My memories of my daughter's first two years or so are shrouded in fog, because that's how I operated. She didn't sleep through the night until she was about three years old, and I had a long day with a long commute plus had to take her to my parents' house (they watched her while I worked). I left my car at my parents' house and caught a bus to the train from there, so they would have noticed if I didn't carry my kid into the house! However, this bs we have in this country about pretending we don't need sufficient sleep is harming us. I NEEDED more than four or five hours a night sleep when my daughter was a baby, and I didn't get it. I felt it--I had to concentrate extra hard at work to keep going, and then still try to stay awake at night to have time with her, which was my favorite part of the day. But then I'd wake up at 2 or 3 a.m. hearing her up and playing with her toys. My husband wasn't the type to help. Sleep deprivation could be a factor.
Those are all good ideas. I think you hit the nail on the head with part of the problem right there. My memories of my daughter's first two years or so are shrouded in fog, because that's how I operated. She didn't sleep through the night until she was about three years old, and I had a long day with a long commute plus had to take her to my parents' house (they watched her while I worked). I left my car at my parents' house and caught a bus to the train from there, so they would have noticed if I didn't carry my kid into the house! However, this bs we have in this country about pretending we don't need sufficient sleep is harming us. I NEEDED more than four or five hours a night sleep when my daughter was a baby, and I didn't get it. I felt it--I had to concentrate extra hard at work to keep going, and then still try to stay awake at night to have time with her, which was my favorite part of the day. But then I'd wake up at 2 or 3 a.m. hearing her up and playing with her toys. My husband wasn't the type to help. Sleep deprivation could be a factor.
It was brutal. I didn't have to go to work thankfully. But he didn't sleep during the day either so I couldn't catch up. There were times I realized I should not have been behind the wheel when I was driving and miles from home. And I've read studies that show that your brain will fill in a memory or something like that. If it isn't your routine, you can actually just not know they are still in the car. I was thinking of going back to work for a short time on a consulting basis and we were absolutely going to speak every day after drop off to make sure everything was ok. And why wouldn't a daycare call you if a child doesn't show up? If my son doesn't go to preschool I ALWAYS call to tell them he won't be in.
It was brutal. I didn't have to go to work thankfully. But he didn't sleep during the day either so I couldn't catch up. There were times I realized I should not have been behind the wheel when I was driving and miles from home. And I've read studies that show that your brain will fill in a memory or something like that. If it isn't your routine, you can actually just not know they are still in the car. I was thinking of going back to work for a short time on a consulting basis and we were absolutely going to speak every day after drop off to make sure everything was ok. And why wouldn't a daycare call you if a child doesn't show up? If my son doesn't go to preschool I ALWAYS call to tell them he won't be in.
In the Lyn Balfour case, which the lawyer called "a perfect storm", that's exactly what happened. She REMEMBERED having a conversation with the babysitter that morning, but she never really had the conversation because she never dropped the baby off. She was driving a different car than usual and had to drop her husband at work, and in his car the car seat was behind the driver. After she dropped her husband off, her work called her while she was still on the road, and she went into work mode.
Her babysitter was trying to call her all day wondering why she didn't drop off her son, but because she was in meetings all day, she didn't hear her phone in her purse inside her desk. When she finally saw the missed calls, she called the babysitter, and only then did she realize that the baby was still in the car. The 9/11 call is horrible to listen to. A woman calls and is talking to the operator, and in the background you can hear the mother screaming followed by periods of silence when she is trying to give him CPR.
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