Never again

That was the worst Wal-mart experience I've ever had. And I don't plan to repeat it.

Here's the background:
I confessed to my husband recently that I never go to W-M with PJ5 unless I'm planning to get chicken nuggets from McD's as we go in (otherwise he'll get upset). Therefore I plan my trips to W-M around meal-times or times when I can go without PJ5. He thought that wasn't very good training for PJ5 and made it harder on me, so I told him I would go and NOT get chicken only if he were with us to help. We did this a couple of times and things were okay. I even recently went to a W-M that did not have a McD's and PJ5 was upset for about two minutes, but then he was okay for the rest of the trip.

So, this morning I had a long list of groceries and other various items I needed. Because of today's schedule it worked best to go in the morning. McD's does not serve chicken and french fries in the morning, but I went ahead thinking it would be okay.

Or not.

As we walked past McD's without stopping, he began to cry very loudly. I kept going til we were at the back of the store, then I talked to him and told him we would get chicken after we finished our shopping (that really was my plan). He calmed down but it was brief, because as soon as we left the aisle we were in and went in the opposite direction of McD's he began to cry again. He proceeded to cry loudly through the whole shopping trip. Did I mention I had a long list? And the items were in all parts of the store. I'm sure people could track our progress just by listening.

But that wasn't the worst of it.

I can ignore his fussing and crying. I am practiced at it. Of course I periodically tried to calm him down or distract him, but he was too worked up. I was determined to finish my shopping so I just tried to be quick.

No, it was the stares. I have never been stared at so much. Every aisle we passed, as I looked down the aisle to see if I needed to go down it, everyone was staring back at us. Men, women, and children. One old man tried to say hi to him, then when he didn't respond smiled and said "he's not very happy, is he?" At first, I just smiled at everyone and kept going, but no one was smiling back at me. I wanted to yell out "He has autism!". Some stared at me, some stared at him. For some of them, their thoughts were written plainly on their faces.

"Who IS that??"
"I wish that kid would shut up."
"Why doesn't she DO something?"
"ugh, there they are again, why don't they just leave already."
"That child is too big to be acting like such a baby."

After a while, I was no longer smiling. After a while, I was crying. I kept trying to smile but no one ever smiled back. They just stared. My eyes were dry by the time I made it to the check-out, but they still stared because he still howled.

The cashier kindly and sympathetically asked "Is he tired?" I was finally able to explain to someone that he had autism and he just didn't understand that you can't get chicken nuggets in the morning, and that it was really hard for him to calm down. She said "Ohh" and smiled and was nice.

We did not stop at McD's on the way out because I couldn't stand to be in that building any longer. By the time we got everything in the van and started moving, PJ5 was fine---even happy. We drove through somewhere else and got lunch.

It's back to planning my W-M trips around mealtimes. Never again will I take PJ5 without planning to get chicken on the way in. It's just so much easier that way.

Note: all that time NB was quiet and good, other than his normal 2-3 attempts to stand in his seat.