Redditor leaves baby outside in rain and takes 2 hour nap. Police are called. She decides it was racially motivated even though she is “white passing”.

Someone called the police on me and said I left my baby out in the rain

I am feeling so many emotions right now: sadness, fear, anger, embarrassment… I am totally overwhelmed and I don't know what to do except to vent here on Reddit.

So my 7 mo baby is teething like crazy and struggling to nap. It's autumn where I live, and the past few days have been beautiful fall weather- between 13°C and 18°C, fresh air and just very pleasant. The past few days I've been taking her for a walk in her stroller to get her to fall asleep. At the end of the walk, I've been taking her stroller through my side gate, into my backyard and up on to my back porch to let her sleep. She usually only sleeps for about 30-40 mins. I leave the back door open, keep the screen closed and sit at my kitchen table while she naps. I'm no more than 7 feet from her stroller, I'm just inside while she's outside.

I want to reiterate, I'm practically next to her stroller. I can see her face. I can DEFINITELY hear her if she were to cry. She is just on one side of a screen door and I am on the other.

Today it was a little misty, but a very pleasant 17°C. It was technically raining, but barely. It wasn't raining enough to make any noise or even to have visible droplets on the stroller's rain cover. Again, she fell asleep on her walk and I took her into my backyard to sleep on the back porch. She had a horrible night last night- we both barely slept. I was so tired I actually went and got a folding reclining beach chair out from our basement and set it up in my kitchen next to the back door so I could have a nap. Me on one side of the screen, her on the other. We both ended up sleeping for about 2 hours.

When I woke up, she was happily playing with her toes, barely making a sound. She was so happy and refreshed. I took her inside, got her a bottle, and had a great afternoon with my baby.

WELL… a few minutes ago, two police officers show up at my door. Dog started barking, baby started screaming, just an absolute meltdown all at once. Once I manage to wrangle the circus, I let the 2 officers in (one woman, one man officer if that matters). The man officer doesn't say much, he just kind of stood behind and let the woman officer do the talking. She was very stern/acting like I've done something wrong from the first interaction.

She first asks why it took me so long to answer the door. I tell her I had to secure my dog first as I'm the only one home. She asks why I have to secure my dog and implies that he is dangerous. I tell her no, he is just excitable and is extra jumpy with strangers now that we have the baby. He is a large dog, and I want to give her my full attention instead of focusing on controlling my dog and reinforcing training.

She starts questioning whether I'm overwhelmed with the baby in a very accusatory way. Starts implying that I can't handle a baby while my husband is at work. Starts implying it's hard for me when there's no one else here. I am point blank with her in saying obviously it is hard, but she's my daughter and I love her and I've been doing a great job on my own the past 7 months.

She then gets to the main reason: “We've had a report that someone in this house left a baby outside in the rain for most of the day today. We were asked to investigate.”

I then show the officers the set up. Lead them to the back door. Show them where I set up the stroller and where I sit. Show them her stroller with the cover and the hat/sweater she was wearing etc.

The officer responds word-for-word: “Ok, so I don't think this baby is in any danger right now, so we're not going to do anything about it THIS time. BUT, I want you to know that leaving your baby OUTSIDE to nap is EXTREMELY inappropriate, and I don't want to get another call out here with this again. Ok?”

I nodded, let them out of my house and then just bawled.

I thought I had a very good relationship with my neighbours. We've always been friendly. I walk their dog out for them when they get called in unexpectedly (my neighbours are doctors), my husband will cut their grass sometimes. Another neighbour used to live next to my grandmother growing up… like, I don't understand? Who would do this?

What do I do going forward? Is there anything I can do about this?

Edit to add and clarify:

I mentioned I was 7 ft from her stroller. I'm 7 ft from her stroller if I'm sitting at the kitchen table. On the chair I set up, I could reach out and touch her stroller if the screen wasn't in the way. If it rained harder I would have gotten wet.

Whoever called the police did so HOURS after I had already taken the baby inside. I took her inside around 2 PM, it's not 8:44 PM and the police were here 2-3 hours ago. It was dark out when police came to my house.

People who are asking about intruders: I have a 7ft tall fence with a locked gait. I have a hedge of cedars along the fence which go several feet above the fence. I live in a very safe neighbourhood. You cannot see my yard from the street. I also have a very large dog who is very protective of the baby who was laying by my feet. There are no animals in my area that could hurt a baby.

EDIT 2 to add and clarify:

The more I think about this I also think it's worth noting I have a suspicion this was racially motivated. My neighbour who grew up next to my grandparents is white. My grandparents are black and Chinese. My grandmother is black, my grandfather is Chinese (both from Jamaica originally). My mother appears black. I look white like my dad.

There are no people of colour on my street/block. This is a very majority white neighbourhood.

This neighbour is one of the few people in my neighbourhood who knows that I'm mixed race. Looking back on our interactions, they would joke about my grandparents being kind of weird (they have some cultural differences), but my grandparents were always really nice to them and helped them out a lot, so I assumed we were on good terms. Now I'm looking back and realizing their “jokes” aren't so innocent.