This Week in Worry

Three parenting stories of the same stripe caught my eye in the past week. Like so many stories aimed at parents, all three of these articles plucked the mom-you-should-worry-about-this-either-retroactively-or-proactively nerve.

First up was a story I spotted at the New York Times’ Well blog, “Stairs at Home Remain a Childhood Hazard.” It cited a new study in the medical journal Pediatrics, summarizing that “from 1999 to 2008, an estimated 932,000 children under the age of 5 — or nearly 100,000 children each year — were taken to hospitals for injuries they sustained on a staircase, usually at home. Averaged over a year, the numbers mean that every six minutes, a young child is treated in an emergency room for a stair-related injury.” The blog entry pointed out that many homes, like mine, have staircases that simply won’t accommodate standard store-bought baby gates and should have custom-built solutions, but don’t (again, just like mine).

The next worry-laden story to cross my computer screen was also from the Times, with the headline “Is It Safe to Play Yet?” This story discusses all the toxins, both hidden and not so hidden, in the home. From household cleaners to cosmetics, there are “endocrine disruptors” everywhere, potentially causing harm to our children as they grow.

Finally, I spotted a Chicago Tribune story on the Baltimore Sun’s webpage decrying “'Grave concerns' about popular Bumbo baby seat.”  Nearly everybody I know has either bought or been given one of the ubiquitous foamy molded seats that help little babies sit up with assistance before their bodies can do it on their own. Problems can arise when a young baby does one of its signature flailing moves and accidentally tips over the seat, sometimes resulting in disastrous injuries if the Bumbo is up on an elevated surface – a no-no spelled out by the manufacturer.

So my house has all three of these dangers of the week – shoddy stairs, harmful chemicals and a tippy baby booster. The first two could still pose harm to my children, who are 4 and almost 2, despite our parental vigilance and attempts at baby-proofing. The latter is no longer a threat because my kids are too old now, and while both managed to get through their Bumbo days unscathed, admittedly neither of them were physically able to sit in the seat for long due to a genetic predisposition to juicy thighs that wouldn’t comfortably squeeze into the confines of the Bumbo’s leg openings.

I’m a well-documented worrier, and it’s an effort not to take the bait that’s laid out for me everyday as I troll the internet. I try to take a little kernel of helpful information from each story, stow it away, and then move on. But sometimes it’s not so easy. Parents, do you find yourself drawn into the worry trap of parenting stories? How do you avoid it, or how do you sort the useful from the not-so-helpful? Tell us in the comments section of this article.