Let me just say, I fully sympathize with these parents. Not only have I left 3-year-olds in bakeries and in elevators; but I also remember a particularly unfortunate incident from a number of years ago. I had taken the children to the neighborhood pool and, as a treat, Larry showed up an hour later and joined us. A lovely time was had by all. Then we headed home, in 2 vans. I got home first and was changing out of my wet swimsuit as Larry walked in with the kids. The phone rang. I picked it up.
"Mommy?" said a voice into my ear.
"Excuse me, who's calling please?" I asked, confused because I knew that anyone who should be calling me Mommy had just come through our front door with my husband.
"Mommy! It's Anna!"
Refusing to accept the obvious, I yelled downstairs to Larry, "Larry! Where's Anna?"
Said Larry, "I thought you had her!"
It's a good thing we can't afford plane travel...
Is Anna your 13 yr old? Is she maybe paying you back for leaving her behind years ago?
ReplyDeleteFYI: been there; done that; twice; same child both times!!
Haven't done it, yet, but I have actually considered it, intentionally. I know, stone me. Whatever.
ReplyDeleteKEEP BELIEVING
EIGHTEEN pieces of luggage? Okay, I realize that's for seven people, but still!! That's more than TWO suitcases per person!! I spent a month in Europe with one backpack. (When you have to carry it all on your back, you don't mind so much washing out your underwear in the sink every few days.) Maybe less luggage might have helped with the keeping track of the kids thing?
ReplyDeleteOh, I know, I know! You shouldn't be allowed to take your children swimming, period. Too many things can go wrong, like not recognizing them. True story: I once got a phone call from the school, asking me where I was. I FORGOT to pick up my three children. Oy.
ReplyDeleteToo many "me too" stories for a poor comment box to handle.
ReplyDeleteBwahahaha! I can laugh because I could very well see me doing that. (I won't admit that we nearly did once.)
ReplyDeleteHeh. Every kid needs the experience of being left behind at least once. That way they'll have something concrete to point to when they're in therapy as adults.
ReplyDeleteMaybe it's a good thing I only have one!
ReplyDeleteWho among us has not misplaced a child?!
ReplyDeleteOh my parents left my brother at a baseball game once and felt silly when a stranger from teh park brought him home.
ReplyDeleteYes a good thing you don't fly . . . :)
I'm waiting for this day to come. I know it's not far off. I've left one of my kids in their crib before, but I never actually left the house, just got in the car and declared that I was ready and then my other child said "where's the baby?" :)
ReplyDeleteOh man, that's gotta be a horrible feeling. Thankfully (and surprisingly) I've never forgotten my children anywhere.
ReplyDeleteNow we know, you act like Anna's the villan here,but we know now that she's just trying to deal with her PTSD from being forgotten by her parents.
ReplyDeleteOh and, yeah right, Minnesota, just like I looked at that sink full of dishes last night and "forgot" to do them.
Part of the reason we've decided to have only two children.....one in each hand and you know you've got them......organized we are not. Of course, we could still have the "I thought YOU had one!"........
ReplyDeleteNow you know why Anna has been behaving the way she is. (wink, smile)
ReplyDeleteLuckily I haven't forgotten the boy anywhere yet, but that's probably more due to Y's paranoia that we might, than my general care and attention.
ReplyDeleteI could so see me doing it though.
It's no wonder they left her....they had too much luggage to worry with!
ReplyDeleteMy biggest fear is leaving someone somewhere! A friend of mine left her child at a wayside restroom. All the kids were asleep in the car, she went in to go to the bathroom, while she was gone one of the boys got out to go as well. She had no idea anyone left and proceeded on her way. Luckily, someone saw her son running after the car on the on-ramp and notified the police. She noticed he was missing 30 minutes later and high tailed it back to the wayside, where Ted was happily waiting for them with the police officer. They laugh about it now, but it must have been mortifying!
ReplyDeletei could only ever confidently count to three, just as well i stopped there...
ReplyDeleteI count heads obsessively. Once, though, the system broke down when my short-ish sister joined the group and I forgot to change the number of heads I was couning. Imagine my shock when I got off It's a Small World only to have my 6 year old tug my hand from behind and ask, "Did you count and see I was missing? Did you cry? Were you scared?" I couldn't bring myself to tell her I had no idea she was missing for 10 minutes and had totally enjoyed the quiet ride!
ReplyDeleteI'm the oldest of 7 kids, and it happened to my mom quite a bit. :)
ReplyDeleteThe minute I saw Israeli, I thought the couple had to Ultra Orthodox. Then I saw 5 kids,I knew some Orthodox bashing was going to happen. Lo and behold, I was right. I wouldn't believe everything in this article simply because there's a big bias against Ultra Orthodox in secular Israeli media.
ReplyDeleteOh man...I have so been there!
ReplyDeleteHa. It has not happened to me. Yet.
ReplyDeleteI will blog about it when it does. Cause it is bound to happen soon. ;)
My parents left my middle sister in the van once when we went to a performance. She was three and sobbing hysterically when they realized they had forgotten her! Oh the trauma!
ReplyDeleteOh Crap! I count my kids already and I only have 2.... for 2 more months anyway....
ReplyDeleteReading posts like these is slowly solidifying in my mind: It's okay not to be a perfect parent. That's going to be a hard lesson for me accept, but I'm all too aware of how imperfect I am.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for posting this! Hysterical!
~Luke
Every day I live in fear that I will do this. Our three year old is really quiet, and I have to keep checking to see if he is with us.
ReplyDeleteWhen my husband was 5, his mom forgot that she took him to the mall with her (she dropped him off to look at toys while she was shopping) and she went home. After looking for his mom for quite a while, he walked home. It was well over a mile, and he had to walk under 2 interstate highways. When he got home, his mom was mad at him for being gone so long until he said "You left meeeeee!"
yup, been there, done that. Not proud, but definitely feeling empathy for others and glad that we never made the headlines.
ReplyDeleteEven with only 2, it has almost happened. I'm surprised we don't hear more of it.
ReplyDeleteThis has probably happened to more people than will admit it! Although, an airplane ride seems kind of extreme. You'd think they'd plop down in their seats and wonder why there was an extra one! It is kind of funny though, although I'd be sooooo sheepish going back to get my child.
ReplyDeleteThe grandparents lost Boy 1 at a carnival one time but I can still say that I've never lost one of them. I'm sure now that #3 is mobile it's more likely to happen!
ReplyDeleteMy mother and stepfather left my five-year-old brother at the church after the wedding. My grandmother had to go back and get him. Tell me that wasn't a bad omen for the little bugger... ;)
ReplyDeleteHeh. I left my five year-old standing in a parking lot at Walmart because I thought he had hopped in my friend's car.
ReplyDeleteParent of the YEar here I come.
I've done this twice. Once when I was very sleep deprived with a preschooler, a toddler and a newborn. We were out of something crucial, like coffee, so I packed up the two littles in the car and began to pull out of the driveway, but I happened to glance into the kitchen window and saw the infant bouncy seat on the table and instantly realized that it still held the baby! Nearly had a heart attack.
ReplyDeleteYears later, when the fifth baby was an infant, we were getting ready to drive to the grandparents an hour away. We loaded everybody in the car but then I realized the newborn needed a diaper change so I went back into the house to do that. Not sure what dh was doing but the two year old at the time slipped out of the car, unbeknowst to us to play in the brand new sandbox in our backyard. We didn't notice he was missing until we had driven for about 10 minutes. Those ten minutes driving home were some of the worst of my life. I was literally writhing in anxiety and emitting uncontrollable wails of horror. Poor dh drove as fast as he could. We got home and the 2 yo was happily playing in the sandbox. Never knew we were gone!
Those were the only two times I've actually forgotten a kid. Now the times they've gotten themselves lost . . . . .
Considering I stopped carrying a purse for a while because I left it everywhere, it was probably a good reason for me to stop at 1 kid. ;-)
ReplyDeleteOh yeah, I know this is where I'm headed now that I have two. And I'm truly surprised I never lost my first child--probably, because he is such a handful that even if I were to forget him, somebody would be chasing me down, mop-headed child in tow, virtually instantaneously.
ReplyDeleteAnd by the way, I have the next closet give-away up on my website! :)
We've all done it in some form, I think.
ReplyDeleteI forget to pick up my kids early on early release day at least a couple of times every school year.
My sister, with 7 kids, makes everyone "sound off" when they get in the car...it helps.
ReplyDeletemy third child was a good good baby and i would always dress him in his snowsuit, stick him in the car seat bucket, and chase the other two around to get them ready. winter is hell with preschoolers. i was at my daughter's preschool when the middle child spoke up and said where's a baby? crap. where is the fricking baby? still waiting in that bucket, sweating to death in his snow suit, but smiling. i blame the children for not speaking up sooner. what the hell?
ReplyDeleteComing from a large family, I can totally see how a kid could get left in an airport. What kind of shocked me, however, was that they not only left her behind, but got on the plane, took-off and were in the air for 40 minutes and STILL didn't know that the kid wasn't with them! Oy!
ReplyDeleteSomehow I never left a kid anywhere. However, I have threatened to leave them. My 2 oldest went through a period where they would wander away from me and instead of looking around to find me (I was usually within eye shot or where they had left me), they would march straight to the nearest employee and have me paged. A couple of times I actually saw them do this, but I just don't move that fast and they are apparently deaf, so I couldn't stop them in time. After probably the 4th time in a month, I told them that the next time they had me paged, I would immediately leave the building and drive home. they could call the police on me or whatever, but I wasn't ever going to answer a page like that again. I don't know if they think I would actually leave them or if they just figured they had finally pushed too far, but it hasn't happened since.
I know I'm focusing on the wrong thing here, but I'm SOOO JEALOUS that they get 18 suitcases for 7 people for VACATION, and we have to MOVE INTERNATIONALLY with only 10 cases. What is wrong here?
ReplyDeleteForgetting children? Done it, just haven't been caught. (i.e. remembered in time...)