A mother has warned parents to avoid making the same ‘careless’ mistake as her after one mishap nearly ended in the death of her four-week-old daughter.
Lauren Parker, who lives in London, recently shared her story on TikTok, where she has 122,000 followers, warning fellow parents of the careless mistake that left her ‘screaming’.
Opening up about the terrifying incident, the mother said: ‘My daughter nearly died when she was a baby because of my own carelessness.’
It happened while she was living with her mother when her daughter, Brooke, now 13, was just four-weeks old.
Explaining the harrowing tale, she recounted: ‘It was about 7pm and I wanted to give my daughter a bath so I did that after her bath I took her into the room that me and her were sleeping in.’
She dressed her child in nightwear and began nursing her, where she then fell asleep in her arms.
Putting her daughter in a Moses basket, she then picked her up to take her downstairs, where Lauren’s own mother and sister were.
‘Now this Moses basket had two handles so in one hand I’ve got both the handles and then I support the basket with my other hand.
Lauren Parker, who lives in London , recently shared her story on TikTok, where she has 122,000 followers, warning fellow parents of the careless mistake that left her ‘screaming’. Pictured
‘I started to walk down the stairs and I’ve only walked two or three stairs when the cat ran up the stairs,’ she explained.
The cat then ran between her feet, causing her to trip.
Thankfully, Lauren managed to keep her footing before cascading down the stairs.
‘I managed to stay on my feet so I’ve still got the Moses basket and with my other hand I grab the handrail.
‘And honestly when that happened I was really scared and I sort of stood still for a second because I was thinking ‘oh my god’, that could have been so much worse.
‘Me and my daughter could have gone tumbling down the stairs. So I stay still and catch my breath,’ she explained.
She then looked down into the basket where she discovered her baby was nowhere to be seen.
Immediately looking towards the stairs, she saw her daughter ‘rolling’ down each step in what felt like ‘slow motion’.
Opening up about the terrifying incident, the mother said: ‘My daughter nearly died when she was a baby because of my own carelessness’
So in shock by what she saw, Lauren stood completely motionless at the top of the stairs.
She now believes her daughter wasn’t ‘flung’ from the basket, but that it had tipped and her baby had rolled out.
‘If I had run after her, I would have probably reached the bottom step before she did but I didn’t move.’
Unable to leave her position, Lauren began hysterically screaming.
‘The type of scream that can out my body was a kind of scream I didn’t know I could make, one I didn’t know it was possible to make,’ she admitted.
She then began screaming her own mother’s name in a desperate attempt to get her attention.
Still feeling like everything was happening in ‘slow motion’, Lauren then watched as her month-old baby reached the bottom of the stairs.
Hearing her screams, Lauren’s mother and sister then raced to the scene where they discovered what had happened.
Immediately responding to the situation, her mother took the baby to the living room while she remained statue-like at the top of the staircase.
‘The reason I didn’t go downstairs to check on her is because I thought I had un-alived her because she wasn’t moving,’ she explained.
‘I genuinely thought my daughter was dead so I just sat at the top of the stairs crying.’
Luckily, the family were able to call a family friend who worked as a doctor. The offered to drive them to the hospital, believing it a quicker option than waiting for an ambulance.
In such a state of shock, Lauren said she didn’t even remember how she got from the top of the stairs to the living room, but remembered just how ‘pale’ and ‘washed out’ her baby was immediately after the accident.
She said she was ‘convinced’ she had either died, or had been left with major brain damage.
But to her huge relief, once they arrived at the hospital, scans revealed that her baby was ‘completely fine’.
Her daughter unscathed, Lauren believes her survival was down to ‘pure luck’, but wanted to raise awareness of the dangers of not being cautious.
‘I wish mums would share more stories like that and I know why we don’t, it’s because we’re embarrassed and we think people are gonna judge us – trust me, I’m worried now people are gonna think I’m a really bad mum.
‘I think it’s important to show this really terrifying side of motherhood that people don’t talk about, that you do make mistakes and some of them can end really badly and some of them are just pure luck,’ she concluded.
