Did you know going down a slide with your toddler on your lap is actually unsafe?

As a parent, our number one goal is to keep our kids safe. For toddlers at the park, that sometimes looks like going down the slide with them on our lap or in between our legs. But did you know that maneuver is actually not safe at all? Neither did self-described “toddler-expert” Devon Kuntzman (@transformingtoddlers on Instagram) when she posted a video on her story a few weeks ago where she was doing just that.

To her surprise, she was bombarded with replies from worried parents letting her know the dangers of going down a slide this way, and she shared a post with her followers to teach them the safety tips she learned after doing some research.

“I posted a story a couple of weeks ago of me going down the slide holding Arlo on my lap and I had a ton of story replies informing me that this was NOT a safe thing to do,” she captioned the incriminating video. “It’s unsafe because a child’s leg can get caught between the adult and the slide. When the adult and child keep moving forward the stuck leg can get fractured [whether they are on your lap or between your legs].”

“So, I did a little digging and it turns out…an estimated 352,698 children less than 6 years of age were injured on slides in the United States from 2002 through 2015, and many of those injuries were leg fractures, according to research presented at the 2017 American Academy of Pediatrics National Conference & Exhibition,” Kuntzman continued before writing what many of us are probably thinking right now: “I had no idea!!!”

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Devon Kuntzman PCC | TODDLER EXPERT | Ages 1-5 (@transformingtoddlerhood)

Most of us have done this, myself included, and Kuntzman assured that she wasn’t trying to shame anyone by sharing the information. “If you have done this it doesn’t make you a bad parent. I’m sharing the risks so you can make the best decision for your family,” she wrote. “I wanted to share this with all of the parents and caregivers who might not know the dangers of this seemingly harmless (and let’s be honest, FUN!) activity at the park in the hopes of keeping our toddlers safe.”

This type of tibia injury is so common in 9-month-olds to 3-year-olds that it’s actually called a “toddler’s fracture.” In addition to getting their foot caught on a slide, twisting the leg while walking and running is another leading cause for a toddler’s fracture.

Like Kuntzman mentioned in her post, going down the slide with your toddler seems so harmless and can be so joyful that it’s alarming to hear it’s actually unsafe. Thankfully she was humble enough to admit she was unaware and share her discoveries with the rest of us.