This week we took the kids and our niece to the Mall of America to play at the Nickelodeon Universe. After a fun-filled day of rides, we headed out of town to a hotel that had a cool water park. It was a long, fun, busy, exhausting day. On our way out of the park, the kids were eating their ice cream cones. I was leading the pack and instead of turning where we were going to turn, I went a few more feet to see the price of smoothies at a food place. When I turned around, we all turned around, and Drew was gone. Just gone. We looked around. We called his name. We didn't see him anywhere.
This is not the first time I have ever misplaced a child, I am ashamed to say. But it is the first time I lost one at the biggest freaking shopping mall in the country. Also the first time I had to get security to help me find a child. I went into the Lego store that was nearby. Even in an emergency, I wasn't thinking clearly, and tried to be polite and wait for the customer ahead of me before I got the attention of the person working there. Todd yelled, "Just grab him NOW!" So I did. He was a young, awkward-looking teenager. I told him my son was lost and I didn't know what to do. He asked his age and name, then called security. A lady in the store heard me and asked what he was wearing. She helped me look for him in the store while Todd looked around for him.
The other kids and I stood there silently. Grace handed me her ice cream cone and I realized my hands were shaking. I felt like I was going to throw up. Garrett said, "What if they never find him?" I started crying. The Lego Land guy came over to me. "Security is coming. They're going to help you find him. They're very good at finding kids. This happens all the time."
I was glad that he was assuring me like that. It really helped. The security guard showed up, and asked if I was looking for a little boy named Drew. I said yes. He said, "We actually have him down on the east end."
We waited for Todd to return, then followed the security guard for what seemed like an hour before we came to the information desk. And there was Drew, still eating his ice cream cone. I ran to him and hugged him. He looked up at me with teary eyes and said, "I got lost! It's all because of my stupid ice cream!"
We figured he was looking at his ice cream cone, lost in his own little world, instead of watching to make sure we were still in front of him. And even after he realized he couldn't see us anymore, he just kept walking until a security guard saw him and took him to the desk. Todd had a serious talk with him about what he should do if that ever happened again. He told him if he ever lost us, to just sit down and wait for us to find him.
This mothering thing is not for the faint of heart. I have had more scares than I can even count over the years. There was the time that Garrett was spraying carpet cleaner all over little baby Drew's face and I had to throw him in the shower and run him to the ER. The time Grace was a newborn and I had to hand her over to the O.R. nurse for a surgical procedure and I couldn't stop crying. The time we lost Drew at a high school football game and couldn't find him and it turned out he was with my sister's friend the whole time. The time we lost the boys at Kohls and were starting to get panicky when we found them hiding behind a rack of clothes. When Drew was a month old and had such a bad cold that he couldn't breathe and I had to rush him to the ER and he was in the hospital with RSV for a few days. When Garrett was about three and he got nosebleeds pretty much every day, and his doctor did a blood test, and she didn't tell me, but I knew she was checking for leukemia. The time Grace had to have a sweat test for cystic fibrosis.
I know it could be so much worse. The doctors could have found leukemia in Garrett. Drew could have been kidnapped. Grace could have had cystic fibrosis. Drew could have been blinded by the carpet cleaner. I have been lucky. And I belong to a group of people who all know exactly what it's like to go through all of these things and more. A group of very strong mothers and fathers who, after years of this stuff, can pretty much handle anything life throws at them.
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