humiliation, party of 2

I suppose it was inevitable that the airport incident wouldn't be the last time my child embarrassed me in public, but I didn't expect it to be so utterly and totally degrading when it did re-occur.

Molly and I decided to take our boys to McDonald's for lunch. It's a fun treat for them and it solves both the lunch problem and the need for a daily outing, while at the same time clogging their arteries and setting a poor dietary example right from the start. We always enjoy it.

Today, though, not so much.

I picked up Andy from school and we headed to the restaurant. It was lunch time-ish, so the crowds were starting to gather. (Keep this in mind; it's a key factor in the whole humiliation experience. Nothing like an audience.) I ordered him a Happy Meal and a chocolate milk. If you've read this blog in the past you know of Andy's dire need for mass daily quantities of chocolate milk, and how I'm okay with it because it still puts calcium on his bones.

So the chocolate milk was sitting on the tray, but the french fries were not quite ready. So we were asked to step to the side while the next customer in line ordered. Andy, however, had both heard me order his milk and seen it placed on his tray, and got antsy. As I talked to Molly while we waited I was conscious of typical toddler blather in the background, the stuff you hear them repeat over and over and over until they are both acknowledged and satisfied with that acknowledgment. I am sure he was requesting his chocolate milk.

But of course I had a tray of food and more to come, and the chocolate milk was sealed and required a straw, so I simply couldn't give him his milk. Moreover, I can't and don't give in to toddler demands in those situations. I told him to wait, that it was coming.

They put the rest of the food on our tray. I picked it up with one hand as best I could and reached out to grab his little hand with the other. He wailed about his chocolate milk and I said, simply, "Come on, Andy, let's go sit down and open your milk."

He lost it. I don't know if my message was unclear or if he was angry that the milk wasn't already being siphoned into his stomach, but he lost it. However, it wasn't a tantrum in the traditional sense. He didn't shriek or cry. He simply sat down.

Then he lay down. On the floor. In front of the register. At McDonald's. In front of the entire line of customers.

My child lay on his back on the revolting McDonald's floor and stared up at the ceiling with big tears rolling down his cheeks. The crowd had to part and one man had to step over him to get to the counter and place his order. I did not have the courage to look anybody in the eye. I bent down, still balancing a tray of food and drinks, and tried to get him up. He went as limp as a squid and fell back to the floor. The poor man trying to order stepped on the tip of his pinky finger. I tried again and he wailed, "I want my chocolate milk!"

This is my nightmare. He was THAT kid. The bratty kid lying on the floor in some public venue uttering those horrible words, "I want my......". How could my child do that to me? That was all that ran through my head. My child was the one on the floor causing a scene.

I had to suffer the extreme humiliation and awkwardness of pulling him up off the floor by his arm and solidifying his jelly legs while at the same time holding on to our tray of food. The whole of the restaurant simply stared at us. I did not bother to hold my head up as I dragged him off to our booth. I hung my head in parental shame.

For the next five minutes the man who'd had to step over Andy kept looking in my direction and trying to send me reassuring smiles. I could barely bring myself to nod. Finally he received his food and as he was walking out the door, he called out, "It gets better!"

Does it, sir? Does it really get better? Because this was bad.

And then, to top it all off, when I told my husband about this incident, his oh-so-brilliant words of consolation were, "Well I would have put him in time out."

Oh yeah, Shawn? You'd have put him in time out? Where?

"Andy Roberts! Get off the floor and go sit over there by the fryer for five minutes! You're in time out! Don't you move, mister! That's right! You stand right next to that bag of frozen patties and think about what you did!"

Or maybe I should have tossed our lunches and taken him to the car and put him in the Naughty Chair I carry around in the trunk.

I will never show my face in that McDonalds again.