How to Keep Your Child From Slipping Out of the Car Seat [updated]
For the car seat to function properly in the event of an accident, your child needs to be, well, in this thing. The shoulder straps must be in the correct position and fit snugly around the body.
This is why it is important to take action when you have a toddler who is trying to escape, slides over the chest clamp and pulls his arms out of the harness, even after being instructed not to. The problem is not uncommon – children get stuck in some kind of strange containment system for a long period of time, and it’s natural that they become curious, fussy, and sometimes provocative. “Look, mom, I pushed!” my daughter once proudly announced while I was driving before I realized that she was capable of such a thing. At the traffic light, I had to go back, slide it up, and tell her to never do this again. (Fortunately not.)
The Car Seat Lady, a group advocating for safe car travel with children, has come up with a way to help parents with what they call the “Houdinis” car seat – children who pull their hands out of their seat belts. Try the button-down shirt trick . This is how it works:
1) Put on a button-down shirt on your child. One with a few small buttons works best. (You can either dress your child in it or leave it in the car for this purpose.)
2) On your unbuttoned shirt, secure the belts and clips securely.
3) Button shirt over the straps.
As The Car Seat Lady points out, this is a good stopgap solution because most kids are unable to unfasten the little buttons until they are four or five years old, and it doesn’t interfere with the car seat clamping, unlike some other desperate measures parents take. tried it (for example with duct tape or rope). If the button-down shirt trick doesn’t work – and it might not work for older kids with special needs who are determined to get past it – The Car Seat Lady recommendsthis anti-escaping chest clip and buckle protection .
Know that the button-down shirt trick should be used in tandem with teaching your kids how to sit safely in a car seat. If they need something to play with on a long trip, try a toy .
Update (6/7/2018 – 11:54 EST): After speaking with Alice Baer, Pediatrician, NTSA Certified Car Seat Instructor and co-founder of Car Seat Lady, we removed erroneous information about potential injuries that could be caused improper placement of chest clamps.
Update (6/6/2018 – 9:50 PM EST): We spoke to Alice Baer, pediatrician and co-founder of The Car Seat Lady, who told us that it is actually a widespread myth that the chest clip is too low. will cause trauma to the abdominal organs in the event of an accident, or too high a position may cause suffocation. (According to Baer, strangulation from chest clips was only known when the parents unbuckled the crotch buckle and only used the chest clip and the young child slipped into the seat and was caught.) device to position the belts, which should fit snugly and in the right place. (See full explanation of children’s backsides here .) Baer’s Houdini trick was created to prevent the dangerous position of children from maneuvering cut down and slipping their arms out of the harness. We’re learning facts about car seat chest clips – stay tuned.