One of my biggest fears is that something will happen to one of my kids .... one of them being kidnapped or molested being in the top few scariest for me. Yesterday, I was near panic trying to find Paige for about 20 minutes. In reality, that isn't much time but it felt like an eternity. I tried not to think the worst had happened but was getting more and more frantic as each minute passed. Here's what happened:
I drop Haley and Paige off at gymnastics together where they each have their own classes. Paige has a 1 hour class and then she sits and watches Haley for an additional 30 minutes until her class is over. Yesterday, Haley came out to the car alone and said she couldn't find Paige. I went inside to start looking, thinking she had just gotten side-tracked somewhere. But one sweep through the building turned up nothing so I had Christian come help me. We continued to look both inside and outside the building. I called a friend whose daughter takes a class at the same time and she said Paige told her she was waiting for Haley to finish. So Paige had been there half an hour before but where was she now??
After we checked every nook & cranny in the place and with both of my older kids in tears, scared for Paige, I finally went into the office to ask them to help me. And there was Paige, sitting on the floor in the back room coloring. She immediately started crying and ran to me. She started telling me about a boy who had been trying to "get" her. She said he followed her everywhere and so she started crying and another mom took her into the office. I immediately went into protective mother mode, asking her if the boy touched her anywhere, what he looked like or if he said anything to her. Then Paige started pointing and crying, "That's him!!" and I looked over and saw a down syndrome boy. Ahhhh.... I had such a wash of relief come over me as I realized that she wasn't being pursued by a scary guy. I tried explaining to her about him; how his mind doesn't work the same as hers and that he probably just thought she was cute. I didn't want to downplay the genuine fear she felt but I wanted her to understand that there wasn't anything really to be afraid of. She was freaked out, though. And I totally understood.
Needless to say, I won't be just dropping the girls off anymore. The poor girl wants to quit gymnastics because of that little boy. How do you help your kids to feel empathy for someone who is different from them, especially if it's a little scary? I'm not expecting her to be friends with him but I don't want her to run away crying from him either. Hopefully, my just being there will help her from now on.
6 comments:
I'm so glad Paige is alright...what a scare!
That is my biggest fear too! So scary!
Holy cow, you must have been freaking, especially when she mentioned being chased by a boy. I'm so glad she is okay. You should know, especially after her big fall, that she's got someone watching over her.
How that is so scary. That has happened to me a few times. Once I lost Liberty at the public swimming pool that freaked me out because I had evyerone looking for her at the bottom of the pool. The other time was at the fabric store. The employees and all customer stopped what they were doing and all ran around yelling his name. They actually closed the registers and ran outside to help me look. Turned out- Jack was hiding in a box in the back of the store- about a half an hour later he pops his head out- laughing because he was playing hide and go seek. Glad everything turned out okay- and I am sure your example around him in the future will help her alot.
Okay, that sounded terrifying! And I have a story for you. I'll call today or tomorrow.
Paige and Hailey said something so funny to Jason the other day. They were distressed about people that steal pumpkins and asked him who would do such a thing? He replied, "probaby some teenagers just looking for fun." She gets this shocked look on her face and says "Emily Pitt stole our pumpkin?" Jason re-assurred her that, "no, Emily did not steal her pumpkin" but the thought of Emily doing that gave Jason and I a chuckle.
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