Monday – Lost In the Craft Store
Sep. 20th, 2010 11:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ninanevermore.
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My almost 6-year-old son wandered off while I was looking at beads in the Hobby Lobby store on Saturday. He was pestering me to take him back to the Halloween section, which he found far more interesting. I told him to give me a few minutes and we could revisit that section before we left. When I looked up again, he was gone.
I didn't panic, at first. I looked on the first few isles around me, and didn't find him. I headed back to the seasonal decorations he found so fascinating, but he wasn't there, either. Then I started to worry. I pushed my basket through the store – the whole store – calling out his name every few isles. I checked in the displays of the sort he likes to hide in, like the t-shirts on hangers and the bolts of fabric in the notions section. I didn't find my Sweet Pea, though. Then I started to panic a little.
I wasn't worried that anyone had run off with him. My son's sensory issues would make him very difficult to abscond with unless the fiend had the foresight to use chloroform on him (and most fiends wouldn't, since he looks quite normal under most circumstance). If a stranger touches my child, he screams and goes into a sensory meltdown. In fact, that's what I was hoping would happen: that a store associate would notice him unattended and approach him. This would make him fall to the floor kicking and screaming, and then I could make a bee-line toward the sound of all the commotion.
What had me worried was his other sensory overload response he sometimes goes into: that he was curled up in a duck-and-cover position in the bedding or perhaps behind a stack of wicker baskets, which would make him very hard to detect. If that turned out to the be the case, I figured the only way to locate him would be to hang around until closing and ask the manager to turn off the lights in the store. The unexpected darkness would likely make my son go into a louder mode of panic, which would reveal his hiding place.
When I reached the front of the store after making a complete circle, I looked out toward the forayer. I did not think he would have wandered out into the parking lot (he does not like parking lots), but I figured he might like to explore the furniture and items on display up front. I sat my hand-basket down and walked through the first set of doors to see if he might be there. When I stepped through the sliding glass door, I heard a familiar high-pitched squeak from behind me. I turned around and walked back into the store. There was Sweet Pea, clinging to a support pillar in the middle of the store, looking horrified.
"Where were you going?!" he asked when I approached him. He looked like he believed I might be leaving without him. Because of where he was standing, central in the store with his arms and legs wrapped tightly around the pole for dear life, I wondered if he might not have been watching me search for him the whole time.
I told him I was looking for him, and thought he might be in the front of the store.
"Didn't you think I was right here?" he asked incredulously.
I told him I didn't know where he was, and that I was very scared that he might be lost.
"Why did you think that I might be lost?"
I told him it was because I could not find him and because he didn't come when I called his name. "Please don't do that again, okay? Stay close to where I am so that I can see you and you can see me. I thought I might need to ask the manager of the store to help me find you."
"Who's the manager of the store?"
"The manager is the boss of the store. Don't ever wander off like that again! Promise?"
He agreed this was a good idea. We walked back over to look at the Halloween decorations again as I'd promised we would, before making our way to the checkout line. The crises was averted, and my Wild Blue Eyed Sweet Pea was once again safe and sound by my side.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * # * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
.
.
My almost 6-year-old son wandered off while I was looking at beads in the Hobby Lobby store on Saturday. He was pestering me to take him back to the Halloween section, which he found far more interesting. I told him to give me a few minutes and we could revisit that section before we left. When I looked up again, he was gone.
I didn't panic, at first. I looked on the first few isles around me, and didn't find him. I headed back to the seasonal decorations he found so fascinating, but he wasn't there, either. Then I started to worry. I pushed my basket through the store – the whole store – calling out his name every few isles. I checked in the displays of the sort he likes to hide in, like the t-shirts on hangers and the bolts of fabric in the notions section. I didn't find my Sweet Pea, though. Then I started to panic a little.
I wasn't worried that anyone had run off with him. My son's sensory issues would make him very difficult to abscond with unless the fiend had the foresight to use chloroform on him (and most fiends wouldn't, since he looks quite normal under most circumstance). If a stranger touches my child, he screams and goes into a sensory meltdown. In fact, that's what I was hoping would happen: that a store associate would notice him unattended and approach him. This would make him fall to the floor kicking and screaming, and then I could make a bee-line toward the sound of all the commotion.
What had me worried was his other sensory overload response he sometimes goes into: that he was curled up in a duck-and-cover position in the bedding or perhaps behind a stack of wicker baskets, which would make him very hard to detect. If that turned out to the be the case, I figured the only way to locate him would be to hang around until closing and ask the manager to turn off the lights in the store. The unexpected darkness would likely make my son go into a louder mode of panic, which would reveal his hiding place.
When I reached the front of the store after making a complete circle, I looked out toward the forayer. I did not think he would have wandered out into the parking lot (he does not like parking lots), but I figured he might like to explore the furniture and items on display up front. I sat my hand-basket down and walked through the first set of doors to see if he might be there. When I stepped through the sliding glass door, I heard a familiar high-pitched squeak from behind me. I turned around and walked back into the store. There was Sweet Pea, clinging to a support pillar in the middle of the store, looking horrified.
"Where were you going?!" he asked when I approached him. He looked like he believed I might be leaving without him. Because of where he was standing, central in the store with his arms and legs wrapped tightly around the pole for dear life, I wondered if he might not have been watching me search for him the whole time.
I told him I was looking for him, and thought he might be in the front of the store.
"Didn't you think I was right here?" he asked incredulously.
I told him I didn't know where he was, and that I was very scared that he might be lost.
"Why did you think that I might be lost?"
I told him it was because I could not find him and because he didn't come when I called his name. "Please don't do that again, okay? Stay close to where I am so that I can see you and you can see me. I thought I might need to ask the manager of the store to help me find you."
"Who's the manager of the store?"
"The manager is the boss of the store. Don't ever wander off like that again! Promise?"
He agreed this was a good idea. We walked back over to look at the Halloween decorations again as I'd promised we would, before making our way to the checkout line. The crises was averted, and my Wild Blue Eyed Sweet Pea was once again safe and sound by my side.
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no subject
Date: 2010-09-20 06:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-20 06:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-20 08:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-20 07:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-20 08:58 pm (UTC)Beside, when you yell at that child he reacts the way you or I might if we were hit across the face. Everyone in the store would have thought I was beating him.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-20 09:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-20 09:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-21 12:30 am (UTC)It's part of growing up. The problem is that with my son, a simple getting lost in the store has the potential to escalate into something far more dramatic than it would be with a typical child.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-21 12:32 am (UTC)Firstborn was nonverbal, so that was a scary event.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-21 01:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 05:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 05:43 pm (UTC)The problem is, Sweet Pea would not cooperate with strangers. He would not tell them his name, or his parent's name, or anything really. He would scream until he was exhausted (about 2 hours). He would kick and bite and fight, and someone would get hurt. He got lost and found in Target a couple of years ago, and if I had not found him because of his screaming I'm not sure how the store personnel would have handled him. They looked pretty freaked out, and it had only been a couple of minutes.
I will pretend like I'm going to leave him when he gets stubborn, but I never actually would. It would not only be unkind to him, but to everyone else. And I wouldn't look forward to the follow up visit from Children's Protective Services, either.