The Mistakes Parents Make
Yesterday was a terrible, horrible, no good day. And it was Joe's and my fault. Here's why....
Jamie is always losing his things. It's a source of constant frustration for me, even though part of me understands it's all part of the ADD. When he got his retainer a couple of weeks ago, I warned him that if he lost it, I was going to be very very upset, it being such a pricey little piece of equipment.
On Friday night, he went over to a friend's for a few hours, came back and went to bed. Yesterday morning, as he was getting ready to go to a babysitting course, I noticed he wasn't wearing his retainer. He said he'd left it at his friends, having taken it out when he was eating snacks there. I was late for piano teaching, and this was the last thing I was ready to deal with. He called his friend, who couldn't find the retainer. I freaked out, and left the house in a cloud of black smoke, leaving Joe to take Jamie to his babysitting course.
It turns out Joe was also angry about him losing this, so instead of taking him straight to the course, he drove him over to the friend's house to look for it. He left Jamie there while he drove Iris to dance, and then, Jamie disappeared. I came home later that day to a phone message from the St. John's Ambulance people - asking why Jamie hadn't shown up for the course. Joe wasn't around, I had no idea why Jamie wasn't there or where he was, and as the hours ticked by I went into panic mode, looking in every spot I could think that he would have gone.
I finally tracked him down walking along the road about 10 minutes from here.....he'd been afraid to come home because he still hadn't found his retainer and he knew how angry Joe and I would be. I felt like a total shit - Joe and I both behaved like idiots. It was a very scary three and a half hours.
And after all that, we found his retainer in the case, where he had put it the night before and had forgotten that he had.
Such commotion over a stupid retainer - what a good lesson in what really matters in life!
4:03:09 PM 
|
