I don’t take my kids out much. We may go to a store here & there & twice a month we go out to eat to a kid friendly restaurant. However I have realized how much anxiety taking my kids out in public causes me. It’s really stupid when I think about it, but I’m sure I’m not the only parent that experiences this.

Caring what other people think can be a good thing sometimes. It can help you to strive to be a better parent & help to produce better children to go out into the world. But on the contrary, it can create unnecessary fear and anxiety.

With my oldest, it wasn’t as bad. He was only one child and was a little milder than my twins. But with the twins, there are two of them and they can go into two different directions and cause twice the disruption.

Once I took them to the mall to play inside a gated play area. For some reason, my daughter decides she will slowly inch her way to the gate and start walking out into the mall really quickly. My son is within eye reach, but not hand reach and I have no choice but to leave him there and hope that she doesn’t get to far with a devilish grin on her face. I ultimately have to holler her name while everyone turns and stares. It scared her enough to make her stop and I was able to recover my son and leave.

There are all sorts of fun things kids can pull when out in public that range from unsafe to embarrassing. There is the scenario of the kid in the floor, kicking and screaming after being told no in the candy aisle. One of my favorites that my children have is pointing out people’s differences & loudly noticing it. There was the child that had some sort of helmet on for a disability, the extremely short lady (I’m not sure if midget is still used or PC) at the library or even the bag boy that has a bright & shiny “girl belt” as my son so nicely points out. Then I get the stares back. Some people have a good sense of humor and laugh, others may be offended and respond with their own in a negative way.

I try to “train” them. After each “episode” I give my talk about differences and how it is rude to stare and comments. They seem to understand, but these kids are curious & my son wants to know “why” someone looks different etc. And while I do take some responsibility for my children’s behavior and defend them enough to say they are overall pretty well behaved, they have their own personalities and having complete control over them is delusional!

As they get older, they do become a little more manageable and public outings will be more frequent. But I guess parenting jobs do come with levels of anxiety and this is just one of the highest for me.