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KINGS PARK, NY – At first, this might seem like a curious crusade, warning parents not to go down the slides with the kids on their lap. The slides are in virtually every playground in America. They are a base of youth and a favorite for parents who just want to play with their kids.
But each year, Heather Clare, a 35-year-old mother of three from Kings Point, takes it upon herself to publish her own public message on Facebook: "Never go down a slip with a baby on your lap. "
In September 2015, Clare took her 1-year-old twins, Matthew and Meadow, to Heckscher Park in Huntington. She first brought Matthew down to the playground, then slipped with Meadow. She decided to go with them because the park signage indicated that the park was recommended for children 5 years and older.
"As a mother, when I saw that, my thought was good, maybe going down with them would be safer," Clare told Patch.
She was wrong.
While Clare was holding her daughter on her lap, she felt her foot get stuck.
Clare's husband, Brian, took pictures at the bottom of the slide. His photo, intended to capture the cute, seemingly harmless moment, has instead captured a horrifying scene. Meadow's foot was wedged between the green slip and her mother's leg. He bent completely backwards – and broke himself.
"This photo is when his leg broke," Clare wrote Sunday in his annual Facebook post. "She's still smiling … because it was happening right now."
At the moment, Meadow was not making any noise, Clare told Patch. She did not start crying until they arrived at the bottom of the slide.
"When we looked at the picture, we knew right away that his leg was probably broken," Clare said.
They rushed Meadow to the hospital. She suffered a fractured tibia and fibula and had to wear a cast for four weeks. When the plaster came out, the girl had to go to physical therapy.
"She had just taken her first steps three days before," says Clare.
The grotesque injury might seem to be more associated with the NBA and the NFL. But it's actually pretty common for kids who go down with their parents.
"I had no idea," wrote Clare in the post. "I thought everyone took their kids on the slide."
She told US Weekly that a doctor said that the weight of a person – even a brother or sister – behind the child prevented him from stopping "if a member was caught ".
A big part of why she shares her story is what she calls, "the guilt of the mother."
"I took her on this slide," said Clare. "I put it in this position."
She cried for a few weeks. This kind of breakup could have left Clare's daughter with serious long-term problems, such as growing her legs at different rates.
Clare, a school psychologist, said she was paramedic and still did not know the dangers of getting kids off the slides. She thinks all playgrounds should display warning signs. She never sees them, so she shares the picture in the hope that her daughter's pain – and her own guilt – will prevent others from suffering the same fate.
"There is no SAFE way to go down a slide with your little one," wrote Clare.
A study published last year revealed that between 2002 and 2015, approximately 352,698 children under the age of 6 were injured on toboggans in America. Many of these wounded were broken legs and the youngest between 12 and 23 months old.
Overall, the most common injury was a 36 percent fracture, usually involving the lower leg, a study release said. In most cases, this type of breakage occurs when the child's foot "catches the edge or the bottom of the blade, then twists and leans back while sitting on the lap of the child. ;a parent".
"Many parents and caregivers descend a toboggan with a toddler on their knees without thinking," said Dr. Charles Jennissen, senior researcher and professor of pediatric emergency medicine at Carver College of Medicine. University of Iowa. "And in most cases that I've seen, parents did not suspect that it could give their child such an important injury, they often say that they would never have done it." They had known. "
Clare's message, embedded below, has been shared more than 57,000 times.
Attention: graphic image
Photo credit: Shutterstock
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