Wow. This seriously brought a lump to my throat. The way you described what you were feeling is so powerful -- from knees buckling to the store spinning around you. And any mom who's been there knows exactly how it feels, how frightening it is, and how milliseconds turn torturously long when you've lost sight of your child.
I once "lost" one of my kids for a handful of minutes that were the absolute longest minutes of my life. We were staying in a vacation home way up high on a cliff in La Jolla, California, overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The view was breathtaking, but so was the danger of the rocky cliff, with nothing at all separating one from the edge. We were so diligent with keeping all windows and doors closed and locked in order to keep our 18-month-old from wandering outside. We weren't so worried about our 8- and 9-year-olds since they obviously knew better than to get near the edge of the cliff. But one morning someone accidentally left the back door open, and the minute I discovered it, I realized that I didn't know where my baby girl was.
Your description of what you felt in the store totally sums up what I felt at that moment when I was certain my little one had toddled off the cliff. It turned out that she was just toddling around the house in one of the back bedrooms, but that moment of terror is something I'll never ever forget.
I'm so glad your experience was simply a game of hide and seek and that it turned out so well at the end. Whew! This parenting gig can be hard at times, huh??
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Wow. This seriously brought a lump to my throat. The way you described what you were feeling is so powerful -- from knees buckling to the store spinning around you. And any mom who's been there knows exactly how it feels, how frightening it is, and how milliseconds turn torturously long when you've lost sight of your child.
I once "lost" one of my kids for a handful of minutes that were the absolute longest minutes of my life. We were staying in a vacation home way up high on a cliff in La Jolla, California, overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The view was breathtaking, but so was the danger of the rocky cliff, with nothing at all separating one from the edge. We were so diligent with keeping all windows and doors closed and locked in order to keep our 18-month-old from wandering outside. We weren't so worried about our 8- and 9-year-olds since they obviously knew better than to get near the edge of the cliff. But one morning someone accidentally left the back door open, and the minute I discovered it, I realized that I didn't know where my baby girl was.
Your description of what you felt in the store totally sums up what I felt at that moment when I was certain my little one had toddled off the cliff. It turned out that she was just toddling around the house in one of the back bedrooms, but that moment of terror is something I'll never ever forget.
I'm so glad your experience was simply a game of hide and seek and that it turned out so well at the end. Whew! This parenting gig can be hard at times, huh??
May 14, 2009 - 4:02pmThis Comment
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