Stroller tip-over scare

So today was one of the scariest days since taking our son to the NICU on the fourth day of his life, a story I'll have to tell another time.  We went to the Blue Hills today to have a cookout in their picnic area.  We had some steak and hot dogs and potato salad and blood orange soda and had our Baby Jogger City Mini GT stroller with us, mostly to transport the charcoal and cooler and everything else we brought with us.  It's been a good stroller with lots of options, attachments, and off-road capability, but today we learned something about its balance.



When we finished grilling and it was time to eat we put him into his stroller with the back in the reclined or horizontal position, and he happily kicked his legs and looked out the mesh backing.  I even took a picture because he looked so cute, as if he was trying to see the kids playing at what looked like a birthday party on the other side of the field.  My wife thought the stroller seemed a little unbalanced, but I didn't think it would flip.  She suggested that we lock the wheels of the stroller to prevent its tipping, and against my better judgement I locked it.

We've had discussions about the stroller tipping when it comes to our cats jumping on it in the middle of the night.  There have been some mornings when we've found the stroller tipped backwards and knew it was from one of our cats jumping on it in the middle of the night.  We know this because sometimes the crash wakes us up.  I'm something of an armchair physicist, and I explained that the cart is more likely to flip when it's locked than unlocked.  When force is applied that would cause it to flip backwards and the lock is off, some of that force translates into the backwards movement of the whole stroller.  When the lock is on, it can only turn into rotational energy.  The stroller rotates around the wheel, the rotational energy combines with the gravitational energy and it flips backwards.

I was careful not to be accusative at all when the cart tipped, and am reluctant to mention this even now.  The whole rest of the afternoon I was careful not to mention any of this for fear of assigning responsibility for the accident to my wife.  I know I was the one that locked it, but we've discussed the physics of locking the stroller before.  I knew better, but I was also worried about it rolling over a rock or root or something that would otherwise affect it.  I didn't think the stroller tipping over was even an issue, so I went ahead and locked it.  The whole trip to the doctor I was thinking to myself, "I never should have locked the stroller," but never said it because I didn't want my wife to think I was blaming her at this emotional moment.  God forbid anything serious resulting from the accident, I didn't want to start any petty blame game between us.

So for some reason I ignored physics and locked the stroller.  I thought about putting the handle over the picnic table, so if it did tip backward it would only fall two inches before hitting the table.  But doing this would point the stroller away from the table and not allow us a view of our baby.  So I locked it and sat down to eat.

It felt like less than a second later, less than a nanosecond, and the stroller was on its back and he was screaming.  My wife flipped the cart up and picked him up, and the next few minutes were a blur.  From where the mark was he landed on the back left of his head, on the crown of his head by where his hair swirls.  He cried for a bit, and we hugged and kissed him and didn't know what to do.  This is really the first time we're on the spot to make an immediate decision that might have repercussions that affect the health of our child.  Do we call 911 and get an ambulance?  Do we take him to the doctor?  Are we overreacting because this is his first fall?

Right when I made the call to the doctor he began to calm down.  I explained that he fell a foot and a half, maybe two feel onto packed dirt when his stroller fell over.  While I was explaining this to the nurse, my wife started feeding him a bottle.  The nurse told us to come in, but if he exhibits any symptoms like vomiting or unresponsiveness we should call 911.  At this time I was feeling pretty good about his prospects; he wasn't crying anymore and seemed to be doing well.  When baby finished the bottle he went to sleep almost immediately, which started the worry again.

As we were going to the car I wished I knew the difference between sleeping and unresponsive.  When we're at home trying to get him to nap, he cries and whimpers and doesn't want to go.  When we're in the park shortly after a head injury TRYING to wake him up he sleeps like a log.  So we drive through the Blue Hills, an area with bad cell reception, waiting on hold to talk to a nurse for the second time to find out if we should go to the hospital.  I'm sure you know what happened, we lost the signal.  We called back and waited on hold again until we were at the doctor's office.

In the doctor's office they ushered us into a room immediately, and just as quickly he was awake and squirming and playing as always.  The nurse came in and took our information, and I think at this point we were dropped to the bottom of the triage list because it was about 45 minutes until we saw the doctor.  The nurse brought us a printout that explains head injuries such as fractures, concussions, and simple abrasions.  The printout put my mind further at ease, and when baby started trying to eat the paper on the bench in the office I started to feel silly for all the panicked thoughts I had all the way to the doctor's.  But I'm glad we went to the doctor (and glad we didn't need to go to the hospital instead).

Tonight he went to bed at his usual time, around 7:00pm, and I've only gone in once to check on him (without waking him).  During the night the doctor told us we will have to check on him twice, which is how many times he gets up anyway.  Usually we keep the lights as low as possible to send baby the message that it's nighttime and time to sleep, but tonight we're going to have to compare the size of his pupils to be sure that he isn't concussed.  For an older child signs such as confusion or trouble walking are more telling and can be observed before unequal pupils, but these are hard to see in a 5-month-old.  So for tonight we'll be shining a bright light when he wakes up, and may even wake him up on purpose to check before we go to bed.

It was a scary day; we'll see what the night brings.