Rear facing car seats

[RcdM]

I have a question about rear facing car seats. My dd just turned 2, and she is very small, 21 lbs. She doesn't mind rear facing at all, so I don't really have any rush to turn her forward, but she's getting old enough to where she gets super bored after driving for a short time because she's staring at the back seat. I try to hand her snacks or toys but it's hard because I can't see her and it's hard to reach her, and if she drops something I can't reach it, etc. I have read so much about how rear facing is the safest, and I understand it for the most part. A friend of mine said it's helpful for their neck/neck muscles if we get into an accident head on, but what if we get rear-ended? Won't her neck still go forward in that scenario? Is it because it's at a slight slant that it's not as bad? I couldn't answer that question and it's had me wondering.

Since she is 2 now, are her neck bones/cartilage/muscles developed enough to face forward, or is it more about weight that's most important?

 

[Reidfidleir]

She could probably face forward but it's safer to rear face especially at her weight. What about her height? Is she under the height limit still?
Technically if it were possible they would recommend adults to rear face as well!

 

[MrsPear]

Yes rear ended they wouldn't have as much protection because like you're thinking they would technically be like forward facing for that. But statistically speaking, rear-ended crashes are much more likely to be slower speed so the impact would be far less. You're statistically more likely to be going much faster if you were to collide head on (e.g. on the motorway) and there would be greater chance of head and neck injuries and RF would give much better protection in that case. So statistically speaking RF is safer for the child.

Rear facing is safer, but you have to weigh up the pros and cons. A child that is terribly unhappy rear facing is going to make the car more dangerous generally if you're trying to pass items across. A friend of mine has triplets, one was lighter than the others so she kept her rear facing but she began to get distressed and twisting her body round to see her sisters. So she made that judgement call too, to put the smaller triplet forward facing. Your LO is above the minimum weight for FF in the UK. If your LO is unhappy RF I would consider FF at her age. But if she doesn't really seem to mind, just gets a bit bored, I would try and perserere longer and just take more breaks or something. x

 

[MumToEva]

Here's how I understand it -

If the car you are travelling in is doing a speed of 40mph, both the car and your body are travelling at 40mph. When you hit another vehicle, the car quickly decelerates from 40mph to 0mph. If you are not wearing a seatbelt your body takes longer to slow down than the car does, which is why you are thrown out the windscreen. If you are wearing a seatbelt, your body is restrained by the belt and slows down at the same speed as the car does, but your head which is not restrained takes longer to slow down and is thrown forward, causing enormous strain on the neck. If you are facing rearward, the back of the seat absorbs the strain that your neck would do if you were facing forward - your head does rebound in the other direction, but you have already slowed down a good bit so the force on the neck isn't as big.

If you are rear ended at 40mph, your body is already travelling forward at 40mph, so when a car hits you from behind at a higher speed (say 50mph) you are still thrown in a forward direction because the dunt from the car behind forces you and your car to accelerate quickly as they are travelling at a higher speed. Plus the difference in speed is only the difference between the speed the 2 cars are travelling at, so 10mph rather than the bigger speed above, Oslo nowhere near the same force anyway.

That's my understanding anyway!

 

[RcdM]

Oh, thank you so much everyone and MrsPear and MumtoEva that makes so much sense!! Your example was perfect, I'm so glad I asked, and I definitely feel more confident in leaving her rear facing for a while longer.

 

[SerenityNow]

The explanation above is close and gets at the general idea.

Another thing to keep in mind is that when you are rear-ended it is usually when you are stopped or slowing down and you then hit the car in front of you. That is how people hurt their necks, car travels forward due to rear end collision, car comes to a stop when it hits the car (or object) in front of it, passenger's heads are still moving forward while torsos are restrained resulting in strain on the neck.

 

[Take2]

Where i live baby needs to be 8kg to go from rear face to forward facing which is about 17-18lb…I think? So your LO should be safe to switch to forward. I agree its safer theoretically to keep rear facing for as long as possible but if you are distracted trying to hand toys and snacks back thats not ideal either. I was the same with my oldest and found not being able to see her and what was wrong with her was distracting me.

 

[morri]

Your friend saying going foward is good for the neck muscles is as much bull as grannies saying that letting babies cry it out is good for the lungs.

 

[BigAl]

What seat do you have? The bigger erf seats are usually higher. My lo is in the besafe izi kid and can see out of the back window. He often gives us a running commentary on whats happening, lol.

 

[Palestrina]

Good points made. However, snacking in the seat is never a good idea, she's alone back there and choking sounds like silence. I'd be deathly afraid of allowing my son to eat while in the car seat. I don't even let him drink water, if it's a long car trip we stop and I let him out of the car and sit up properly. If it's a short trip well then he just has to wait.

 

[RcdM]

The seat is very high, so I'm not worried about that. I was more just curious about the impact of a rear end accident and how it's still safer to be rear facing since I would think rear end accidents happen more frequently than anything else.

And no one said that going forward was "good" for the neck muscles, just that while rear facing, their neck muscles wouldn't be as strained in a forward accident, but would be in a rear end accident. So I was trying to understand the difference and you ladies have helped a lot, thank you!

 

[XJessicaX]

My daughter is 3 and she still rear faces in my husbands car. Loads of room still so she will probably stay RF until gone 4!

 

[morri]

rear end accident are just 5 % of all accidents.

 

[SarahBear]

Head on collisions are at a faster speed, generally speaking. You've got the velocity of your car plus the velocity of the other car. With rear end accidents, one car is often times stopped and the other is often times going slow. It's not as dangerous.