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Parenting
Friendly PSA- water and kids
My sister just called me and said "When you have LO will you please please please promise me that not even for a second you'd leave him in the tub to get a towel. Even for a second?"
Being a former lifegaurd and KNOWING that a child can drown in less than an inch of water I said 'I promise"
She then went on to tell me a story about a 8 month old getting a tub by her mom. She had her in one of those "baby seats" and turned around to reach for a towel, and the baby reached up and turned on the HOT water, burned over 80% of her body with 3rd degree burns and later died 
Do not ever turn your back. I'm going to buy a special valve for my tub that turns the water to a trickle if it's too hot.
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Re: Friendly PSA- water and kids
i hate those seats in general...I think they give a false sense of security, but are really horrible...can tip over still etc.
I can't believe 80% of her body was burned that quickly! I don't think our water is that hot in our house. I usually crank it nearly to the hottest spot for my showers, so if I can tolerate ALMOST the hottest, it probably would take a lot of exposure to really burn.
but yeah, even now that my kids are 2, 4 and 5...only the 5 year old can shower by herself. 2 and 4 year old are accident prone as it is..so I am there watching.
When K was born I adjusted my parents water heater (older house) to make sure an accident like this couldn't happen.
Thanks for the reminder.
That is really sad.
what kind of faucet would allow this? I'm trying to envision this and I can't.
Not one single faucet in my house would do this --- except for my kitchen sink one. And that would have to mean that I left it pointing in the "hot" direction (which wouldn't make sense if I was just filling a tub).
I'm sorry--I have a hard time believing that a baby could be burned THAT quick THAT bad. The water heater should not be turned up that high with kids in the house. Our water is hot, but even at it's hottest, I don't think it could cause burns.
Either way, those seats are typically not recommended by safety experts. They can also cause drownings. I'm wondering why she left the seat within reach of the faucet and knobs.
I agree no way in hell. Our water gets hot, but it takes forever to do so and to turn it on that fast and burn that much, no way.
This also makes no sense to me. DS if off the charts tall and has very long limbs there is no way he could reach from his bath seat to the faucet even if he was at the front of the tub.
Good reminder for parents with infants, but I agree that the story seems made up.
That being said, however, friends of ours just got a new house with one of these new "green" water heaters that are pretty much instant. I don't know how it works, but you turn on hot and it comes out hot almost immediately. It's pretty awesome, but they complain that they run out of hot water often.
David "BD" 2/8/07 Spencer 9/12/11What an odd story.
We have adusted our water to not reach scolding temps.
That is weird. Ours is just one knob and the cold water comes out first. DS, at 3, can't even turn it all the way hot. And if I was just turning to get a towel he wouldn't have time to get it that hot even if he could.
Our master bath has both knobs but it still couldn't burn him that badly even if he did manage to turn it on when I wasn't looking.
At 8 months, I had DS in one of those seats but it was at the back of the tub and there is no way he could move the seat to the front. Something isn't adding up.
Liam is 5!
That's weird! We have one too and we never run out of water. It only heats the water you use. We also have a special faucet that has two levers, one for water and a smaller dial on top of that to control the temp. My kids still don't have the fine motor skills to turn the top dial, so a baby definitely could not. They can barely turn the water on themselves, (which could also be a hazard).
Something doesn't add up about that story. My 2 y/o has just now figured out how to turn the water on, so I can't imagine an 8 month old figuring it out that quickly. I find that story unlikely. Mom would have had to leave the room for a very long time in order for that to happen.
In terms of having the settings adjusted to prevent this, it's nice if you have that luxury. I live in an apartment building and don't have a choice on how our hot water heater is set and sometimes our water does get horribly scalding hot suddenly so my kids will never be allowed to shower alone here (not likely to be an issue anyway since we'll be long gone before they reach shower alone age). This is common in my area as it's all older buildings with very old steam heat/hot water systems, which are nearly impossible to regulate unfortunately.
Sad, but how the hell does an 8 month old turn on a faucet? Maybe I missed some clarification on that ...
On another note, my cousin was burned very badly by his bathwater as a child and still has the most awful scars. :-(
OMg, I would never make this story up!!! OMG. Maybe I have the age wrong... the story was told to me second hand she had just watched it on the news. I guess the story is wrong.
I did a google search..
https://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,580660,00.html
Ditto pp's, my PSA is to turn down your water heater so that there's ni risk of scalding. Every parent should do it.
those are two TOTALLY different stories. (not saying YOU are lying, but something is not being passed on correctly.)