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Well, I’d add a “volume” number to the end of that title because it surely isn’t the first, but I am about to confess to a parenting heart attack of epic proportions.  The circumstances weren’t really anyone’s fault, but I feel like my panic-stricken paralysis was definitely a major parental fail.  Yeah, another fabulous mea culpa post – consider yourself warned.

What is this all about, you ask?  Well, during the fabulous post-Christmas Vegas extravaganza, the tribe migrated over to the Forum shops at Caesar’s to do a little shopping and have lunch at Cheesecake Factory.   Now, for those of you that have been there, you know that rotunda area around the huge salt water tank is usually majorly packed with people looking at the fish, or waiting for the statue show, or whatever.

That day was no exception…it was so crowded that it was difficult to even wade through the masses to the restaurant.  K of course ran straight to the fish tank to ogle all the critters, and parked herself in a prime viewing area on top of the marble bench.  At various times during the restaurant wait, tabs were kept on her by me, Aunt Carole, and/or Uncle Bubba.  So I want to make it clear that she was in fact thoroughly supervised.

And yet, when we began the shuffle in to the restaurant for seating, I tried to hold her hand and guide her through the crowd.  She uncharacteristically pulled away from me and said something like “NO MOM, don’t crush my treat!”  Well, that quickly got my attention because none of our tribe had given her any kind of food…so she opened her hand to reveal some small, green, sticky looking glob of indeterminate origin.  I started to freak out and question her about where she found it; envisioning her vaccuuming up partially-digested snail food from the floor or something. 

She reported that someone “gave it to her”, which then started off a whole new set of alarm bells in my head.   Upon prompting for further details, she was adamant that a “big person, an adult” had given it to her, which naturally ratcheted up my impending heart attack yet another notch.  At that point, we got swept along in the current of people to the restaurant where I was finally able to talk to Aunt Carole and ask if she knew anything about the situation.

This is where the parental fail part comes in, because both FF and I felt pretty paralyzed and couldn’t figure out what to do.  We just kept looking at each other, back and forth, and at her, and at the sticky green glob, and I just couldn’t think what to do next.  I had horrible visions in my head of poisons, drugs, biological warfare, stomach pumpings, etc etc.  It was one of those surreal, horrific moments that feel like they go on forever.

Well, thank god for Aunt Carole because she sprang into action and very logically decided to go ask the kids and adults near the area where K had been sitting and watching the fish.  As it turned out, this European grandma type character was handing out these “candy treats” to her grandkids and kindly shared one with K.  Aunt Carole observed that the other kids did not appear to be keeling over or needing their stomachs pumped, so we breathed a collective sigh of relief and moved on.  But it was a chilling incident that I’m sure will stay with me forever.  And yes, we’ve had a very specific and serious come-to-jesus talk with K about the many nuances of stranger danger and related situations.

Thank whatever powers that be that it turned out to be an innocuous situation, but I can’t help but berate myself for my lack of ability to think quickly and react.  What if every moment had counted for the health and safety of my child?  Paralysis isn’t an option.  Well, I guess I’ll choose to treat that as a training opportunity, and hope that in the future, I’ll be more competent and decisive than your average bowl of jello.