Parents Talk: Leaving Children Unattended In Vehicles

My birthday was about one month ago and to celebrate it, I went out to lunch with my 21-month-old daughter and her father. Usually when I take my daughter to a restaurant, she is an adorable, angelic cherub of a child who pulls in adoring fans by the time we hit the front door.

Not this time. I am pretty sure a demon crawled into my child and took over as soon as we sat down. To say she had a tantrum would be to call New York City a town or the Grand Canyon a hole.

Upon entering, she immediately began to size up her audience, instantly realizing she could "perform" better if she was not bound in a high chair. Next she rejected a booster seat and finally the actual booth itself. Opting to go underneath the booth, she then began her succession of high-pitched screams for our lunch-time entertainment. I desperatly tried to coax her back into the booth with crayons, lemonade, keys, basically anything I could find that would not kill her.

Nothing was working and she was doing the "back-arch thing" that we parents love and adore, the way we love and adore being bitten or the landing pad for vomit. Her dad decides that maybe she needs a walk, and for 20 seconds I am left in peace at the table. But then they return, and she is back up to the same tricks.

Finally, after many failed attempts, I wrangle her back into the booth and make her sit next to me. This lasts a total of four seconds and then she is standing up with her little face pressed against the glass on the back of the booth.

Next it's Daddy's turn to try again so I hand her off, over the table mind you. Daddy gives me a look like he has all the answers and is confident he is the "child whisperer." To his dismay, our sweet little princess decides it is now time to try and climb over the booth in order to entertain the couple next to us.

After another round of the crayons, lemonade and keys, anything is game. A waitress actually came to our table with a huge napkin full of cherries and oranges and says meekly, "We thought this might help."

It helped long enough for her to glance at them and try to push them off the table.

"Good God," said to myself. "These people think I'm one of those freak parents that can't control their child, and it's my birthday. I haven't even gotten to sip this Bahama Mama"

It is at this point in the lunchtime festivities that I decide to take her on a walk of my own. We go outside to a beautifully searing 100 degree afternoon and I sit down at a table, which happens to have a rock bed under it, and my child happens to be obsessed with rocks. So there she goes, under the table, on a rock mission. Only when she stands up she hits her head underneath the table. Hard.

And then the real crying begins. Although we are the only fools melting outside, amazingly, a woman comes out from the restaurant with napkins and hands them to me, "because she seems really upset."

I assume she was watching the events unfold from her air-conditioned table inside but who knows, maybe she was across the street at the supermarket and heard my child screaming form there. Would. Not. Doubt. It.

I decide I have taken all I can take and we head back inside to collect our boxed-up, basically un-touched food and drink, I might add. As we leave I can almost feel the staff and patrons becoming more animated and happy. Once she is in the car, she's back to being our sweet little angel baby.

The point of this rant is that it got me thinking the other day when I heard that a South St. Louis city mother left her 4-month-old, and twin 18-month-old children in a locked van while she went into Fazoli's to eat dinner. Was she trying to avoid a tantrum and eat in peace? Is a quiet dinner really worth the price of a deadly quiet car and home when you come back? 

Of course not. I'm just wondering if that was her reasoning. Regardless, there is nothing in this world, no quiet lunch, no amount of money, no anything, that could make me leave my sweet child in a car alone. Absolutely nothing.

Do you think parents should be given children back after they are caught abusing a child in such a manner? Does such a act require jail time?