Apologies if this has already been said, I'm still catching up here!
I thought about the Cinnamon Toast Crunch incident earlier.
Today was hospital day for my medical kiddo. We regularly spend a day in peds hemonc getting treatments, testing, monitoring, etc. It's exhausting and overwhelming for the poor child. After we're done at the hospital, kiddo gets to choose takeout for dinner as a treat.
Kiddo wanted Burger King nuggets.
Okay. Not my favorite but I didn't have a big needle jabbed into my chest while attached to lines and wires and leads all bleeping day. BK it is. We get to the parking lot and I verify that child still wants nuggets.
Yes.
Do you want fries?
No.
Hm. That's weird. Child usually wants fries.
Child is quietly chanting "nuglets nuglets nuglets."
Hm. At this exact moment in time, child is focused on chicken nuggets. They probably will want fries once we're home with the food, but at the moment I'm asking about fries, they're not thinking about fries.
Kinda like how if we'd eaten a big meal in an overwhelming environment and I'd then taken child to another store with nothing of interest to them, then on to an overwhelming grocery store with a camera in their face and asked "do you want Cinnamon Toast Crunch?"
In that environment, at that point in time, my child probably wouldn't want cereal. They'd just eaten, they had been through a lot already, and now they're having more tit slung at them. No, they wouldn't want cereal, or they wouldn't be able to decide if they wanted cereal.
As their parent, I'd realize my question wasn't specific enough or I was asking at the wrong time.
Rather than continue to blather on, I got an extra order of fries at the drive thru. Worst case I'd eat the fries, right?
We got home, child was in their comfortable environment, child happily ate their fries and nuggets.
Abbie likely didn't want to eat any cereal when they were asking her. They'd just come from an enormous brunch and she was miserable in those stores. To her, "do you want CTC" means "do you want CTC now?"
Of course she didn't.
Will she later? Of course she will.
As her parents, this sort of thing should be instinctual by age 17. Why would they put so much pressure on her when she was clearly uncomfortable/distressed?
I do wish I'd gotten myself some fries at Burger King.
Oh well.
