A child’s greatest fear is when his mother gets lost. She leaves you at home to sit and say: “I’ll be back soon, I’m going to the store,” and then it’s evening, but your mom is still gone. And the lights are already on, and it’s getting dark outside, but mom is gone!
Then all the worst thoughts that can visit the child in one moment will fit in his head, tears and despair will come to the little heart.
And you can’t explain to a child that there was a line at the store. And then you met your friend, and chatted with her, as it happens with women. And then at home, the haggard child hiccups and sobs: “I thought you were stolen!”
Did it happen? I did. My biggest fear as a child was “Mommy was stolen. So when I became a mom myself, I completely eliminated those moments. I never left my son at home alone when I went shopping. I never lost him in big stores, and he just didn’t have this fear of losing his mom. Never.
Now my son is 18. A grown-up, independent man with a beard. If he doesn’t shave for a week, he looks like Barmaley.
He came home last night and went straight to bed. And my husband didn’t feel well either, and went to bed early. And at one o’clock in the morning it dawned on me: Who’s going to walk the dog? The men are all asleep. Not to wake them up? I got dressed, took the dog, went out with him away from the house, and I walk, I walk.
Well, how long did I walk it? About half an hour. I came back to the doorway, and my son was running around. He was dressed like a scout: in his underpants, slippers, and a down jacket on his bare body.
I tell him, his conscience is awake, right? – and I smiled sarcastically. And then I look at him, and he looks like someone died…
“You!” he yells, “You! You,….. Where have you been?! You’ve been gone for forty minutes! I’ve been running around yelling – did you hear that?”
“No,” I said. “I’ve got my headphones on, and it’s sad ’90s music. It’s about “Your Girl Gone.” You want to hear it?”
He opened his mouth to say something else to me, and suddenly he hugged me. He poked my neck with his nose and put his hairy arms around my neck, and stood silent.
I was frightened. I said:
“Well, what are you doing? Well, Dan? Well, where am I going to go? I’m with a dog. ”
And he said so quietly:
“I thought you were stolen… I called, your phone wasn’t available for some reason, I ran around the house ten times – you weren’t there. And you don’t answer your phone. Mom, I’m begging you, you better wake me up if you need me. I’ll be white-haired by the time I’m twenty.”
I hugged him, too. The dog’s bouncing, it’s raining, he’s standing in a puddle in his underwear and slippers… He lost his mother.
My childhood nightmare come to life…
And this fear, it’s unconscious. Even if you’re 20, 30, 50 years – you’re still afraid for mom. That she’ll leave home without her phone and get lost. That she will be stolen – and she certainly will be stolen, because she is beautiful! That’s why we swear at moms: Why did you go somewhere, and let me know where you are and when you’ll be back?
P.S. Take care of your children. Even if they are already gray-haired children, and they have their own gray-haired children. Having your mother stolen is very scary. I saw it yesterday.
