What to Expect the Toddler Years (223 page)
Read What to Expect the Toddler Years Online
Authors: Heidi Murkoff
Jewelry. Most risky: beads and pearls, which can be pulled off the strand and swallowed, and small items like rings, earrings, small pins.
Mothballs. They’re toxic as well as chokable. Opt instead for cedar blocks (not small balls, which can be mouthed) and store out-of-season clothing in airtight bags or closets. If you do use mothballs, store them in an area not accessible to your toddler, and air clothing and blankets out thoroughly (until the odor has dissipated) before allowing anyone to use these articles.
Shoe polish. If your child gets into it, the results can be messy; if your child eats it, it can cause digestive problems.
Perfumes and all cosmetics. They are potentially toxic.
Vitamins, medicines, and herbal remedies (see page 593).
Whistles. A young child could choke on a tiny toy one, and on the small ball inside any whistle, should it come loose. Not a good toddler toy.
Latex balloons, condems. Uninflated or burst, they can be inhaled and cause choking (see page 659).
Dangerous party foods. Don’t serve small, hard finger foods (such as nuts, raisins, popcorn, hard candies, cocktail franks) at parties your child will attend and don’t leave them out in candy or nut dishes.
SAFE HEIGHTS
The “safety line” in your house will move higher as your toddler gets older and more proficient at climbing. Anything above the head of the crawler is usually safely out-of-reach. The early walker can often reach the edge of the dining table, end tables, and low dressers. The young climber can clamber up a chair or other furniture to get to something higher. The competent walker-climber can push the chair (or a box, or a pile of books) over to the kitchen counter, the washing machine, and anything else seemingly out-of-reach—and scale it before you turn around.
NO GUN IS A SAFE GUN
“T
OT
S
HOOTS
P
LAYMATE
W
ITH
F
ATHER
’
S
G
UN
.” It’s a headline we shudder to see, but we see it, or another like it, far too often. Yet tragedies involving young children and the guns they find at home are completely preventable. Not by hiding the weapons (children are capable of seeking out and finding, or simply stumbling onto, just about anything their parents try to hide). Not by locking the guns up (all it takes is forgetting to secure the lock just once). Not by teaching children to stay away from guns (curiosity can easily erase parental warnings and overwhelm a toddler’s underdeveloped sense of right and wrong). But by keeping guns out of the home—period.
Toddlers are impulsive and incurably inquisitive, perfectly capable of pulling a trigger on a gun, but not capable of comprehending the possible consequences of that seemingly innocent action. Keeping a gun in the home, whether you think your toddler can get to it or not, is leaving open the very real possibility of tragedy. The American Academy of Pediatrics and numerous safety organizations strongly urge: Don’t do it.
If you must keep a gun at home, keep it locked up, inaccessible, and unloaded; store the bullets in a separate location (even very young children have figured out how to load a gun—usually by watching the process on TV). And buy a trigger lock or other device to prevent accidental discharge.
Guns (see box).
Strangulation hazards: Strings, cords, cradle gyms, cloth measuring tapes, tape cassettes (which can become unwound), or anything else that could get wrapped around a child’s neck. Toddlers should not sleep with dolls or stuffed animals that contain audio tapes; a child might remove and unravel the tapes on waking and finding nothing else to do.
Holiday hazards. These include:
Decorative and symbolic items.
Check decorations as you would any other household objects for safety (examine for breakability, small parts, toxicity, size; tiny tree ornaments or dreidels, for example, are unsafe) or hang them high, out of the reach of young children.
Gifts.
Don’t leave gifts that could be unsafe under the tree or arranged anywhere else (perfumes, cosmetics, hobby kits, liquor, and so on).
Plants.
If you have holiday plants at all, keep them out of reach of children (some are poisonous if ingested; see page 658). For reducing holiday fire hazards, see page 639.