Forgotten Baby Syndrome: How loving parents can forget their own baby in the back seat.

Had the temperature been a few degrees higher, had the sun passed farther across the sky, Tuesday August 18, 2015, could have meant something entirely different to Annie. It could have meant a lifetime of grief, of heartache.

Instead, it meant flashbacks, searing guilt. But also a saved life — her child’s.

The Aussie mum had inadvertently left her baby daughter locked inside her car for five hours while she was at work. Her mind told her she had dropped the little girl at daycare. But when she returned to her vehicle to retrieve something during the day, there she was, still strapped into her child seat.

Annie contacted Mamamia shortly after the incident to share a word of warning for other parents and guardians: “I had heard of this happening to other parents before and [I had] judged them, saying, ‘How could anyone forget their child’. I now know exactly how it can happen to anyone.”

Annie’s is an eerily familiar story, one that’s been told in the press many times before and since, albeit often with a more tragic ending.

Just this week, a baby girl died in Sydney after being left inside a car on a sweltering summer's day.

Little Olivia's devastated father, Etienne Ancelet, arrived at his daughter's childcare centre on Tuesday evening to pick her up, only to be told she hadn't been dropped off in the morning.

It was then he made the horrific discovery of his darling one-year-old's body in the backseat.

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Police are still working to piece together the timeline of events before Olivia was found. At this stage, police believe Olivia was left inside the vehicle for an "extended period of time".

Throughout the day, temperatures in the area had neared 30C. On a typical Australian summer day, the temperature inside a parked car can be as much as 30C to 40C higher than the outside temperature, according to Kidsafe.

Olivia's horrified parents say they want to save other parents from the same anguish.

"Olivia was a sweet and beautiful baby, who was the light of our lives," the couple told News.com.au.

"We are humbled and grateful for the time we had her. We are devastated by what has unfolded.

"We do not wish this on any parent.

"We will always cherish our time with our beautiful girl. She was loved by all that knew her".

"It is an unimaginable time of sorrow for us. Our hearts are broken."

What is Forgotten Baby Syndrome?

It’s a phrase coined to refer to cases like Annie’s and Olivia's, in which a parent or guardian inadvertently leaves a child behind, unattended —- generally in a vehicle or home.

While used widely in the media, it’s generally not a term favoured by psychologists. Because, as Associate Professor of Psychology Matthew Mundy explained during the inquest into the death of Noah Zunde, a 22-month-old who died after being left in a hot car in 2015, use of the word ‘syndrome’ infers “some kind of pathology at play in the brain”. And in the case of Noah's mum Romy’s circumstance, at least, there was no underlying disease or medical condition that led to her lapse in memory.

So what causes a parent to forget about their own child?

Professor David Diamond, a leading researcher in ‘Forgotten Baby Syndrome’, points to the interaction between two kinds of memory systems — prospective memory and habit memory.

As he explained via The Conversation, “Prospective memory refers to the planning and execution of an action in the future, such as planning to take a child to daycare. Habit memory refers to tasks that involve repetitive actions that are performed automatically, as in routinely driving from one location to another, such as from home to work.”

Habit memory can often prevail over prospective memory — say, when you forget to stop for groceries on your way home from work, or when you take the turn-off to your old address after moving house. And yes, Professor Diamond argues, sometimes in more extreme examples — such as when you drive home or to work, and forget your child is still in the back seat.

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In his research into such cases, Professor Diamond found this process to be so powerful that each parent even had a “false memory” of dropping their child off safely.

As Romy Zunde told the Coronor, “I was so confused. I had a clear memory of dropping him off. I think, now, that my memory was recalling the day before. I started to freak out on the lawn asking [the childcare centre operator] what day it was.”

Professor Diamond and Associate Professor Mundy both hold that this could happen to anyone. As the latter told the Victorian inquest according to ABC, "If you are capable of forgetting to post a letter, you are capable of forgetting to take your baby out of the car.

"Consciously, we know that child is way more important than a letter or your mobile phone, but your brain cells … are not making that discrimination for you."

Are there any contributing factors to the Forgotten Baby phenomenon?

Professor Diamond has concluded via his research that, while each case is different, there are a handful of common features:

“A change in the parent’s routine that leads him or her to follow an alternate, but well-traveled, route”;

“A change in how the parent interacted with the child during the drive, such as when a child might have fallen asleep en route”;

“and a lack of a cue, such as a sound or an object associated with the child – for example, a diaper bag in plain view”.

He also identified stress before or during the drive and sleep deprivation as common aspects of these cases. When combined, these factors can lead to tragedy.

Annie, for example, told of experiencing an intensely busy period at work and difficulty sleeping in the lead up to leaving her daughter behind: “She had been so quiet in the car and I had so much on my mind that I unconsciously went into auto-pilot.”

While Annie said her daughter emerged seemingly unaffected, she said she will never forgive herself for what happened.

“I have to live with what I have done for the rest of my life. Yes it was an accident, but that doesn’t change what happened.”

So how can parents prevent ‘Forgotten Baby Syndrome’?

The coroner recommended a review of Australian and New Zealand standards for child safety restraints, and some commentators have called upon car manufacturers to install audio/visual alerts that a child is in the rear of the vehicle.

But until — and even beyond — then, it’s down to parents.

One key tactic lies in creating your own audio/visual cues. The coroner’s findings in the Noah Zunde case, for example, noted that he was in a rear-facing child restraint, not visible from the driver’s seat, and that his lunchbox, which was normally placed in the front of the vehicle, was on his lap during the trip.

A cue could be as simple as placing a large stuffed toy in place of your belongings in the front seat, as Amy Noonan previously suggested on Mamamia — in her case a large, cumbersome teddy bear: “When the baby is in the car, Big Ted is riding shotgun upfront in the passenger seat,” and her bags are in back.

“Having to open the back doors to retrieve your stuff means you’re more likely to see your sleeping baby. And check whether your childcare centre or school will ring you — and keep ringing — if your child doesn’t turn up for school or care that day.”

This article was first published in April 2018 and has been updated.

Feature image: Getty.