One of the things that I do with the girls that often becomes an adventure is a trip to the store. This has improved over time but it has been quite the event in the past. I will apologize to all of the other patrons of the various stores that I have victimized in the past. My girls (thankfully) seem to tag team so I rarely have to deal with the worst behavior from both of them at the same time. But each one has taken their turn being heard melting down over something that they wanted across the entire store.

They have each chosen (on more than one occasion) a store in which to have a complete melt down. Once the melt down starts I am left with three choices, give in to whatever is creating the meltdown, leave the store, or let it run it’s course.

I will not give in! I have suffered the consequences of my weak moments when I have chosen not to fight a battle on which I should have stood strong. In every case I have ultimately had to start from scratch to end the behavior. So I have learned to fight the battle at the beginning to prevent a future fight.

I won’t leave the store (which I am sure most people would prefer and I apologize profusely for disturbing your peaceful shopping trip). There are really two reasons why this is the case. The first is that this solution really only punishes me as I am the one that will pay the price for not completing the trip. They aren’t going to get what they want either way but if I leave, then I am not going to get what we need. The second (which is related to the first) is that as a single working mom, with two active kids who need a good night’s sleep in order to manage their behavior I have very few opportunities during the week to do my shopping. Typically the time I have selected is the only opportunity during the week that I can do the shopping. So leaving the store will leave us without the things we need.

So I chose to either ignore the behavior or institute consequences (loss of privileges). I have found that the emotional outburst are usually too deep in order to get them to calm down and remain calm with the use of consequences. I will finish the trip as quickly as possible and live without things that we don’t require until the next trip.

So the next time you hear the kid screaming from across the store while you are trying to complete your shopping, I will hope that it is not mine.