When A Stranger Touches Your Baby

Here's the backstory of what happened. [Original Post Here]

After Liana’s appointments, we decided to do a little shopping for Ashton’s birthday. I was quickly distracted by the home décor section and spent a few minutes prodding through their new arrivals. I didn’t notice anyone else enter the aisle until I heard an abrupt and aggressive, “move.” The aisles are pretty narrow and he wouldn’t have had enough room to go around us because I had Liana in her stroller, but I still thought this was extremely rude. I apologized anyway and sped out of the aisle.

Naturally, we ended up in the baby section (we were shopping for Ashton, I swear!). As I was browsing through a rack of toddler clothes I heard the same man’s voice and realized he was speaking to Liana. I had no idea where he came from and never heard him approach from behind me. The handle of the stroller was next to my arm, but she is now facing forward (instead of facing me) so I couldn’t see her at the time. The man was telling her how pretty she was and commenting on how many teeth she had. I was a bit confused because of how rude he’d been to us earlier, but decided to let that go and return the friendly conversation. I made a comment about how she gets her good looks from her dad, but this guy was totally ignoring me and only focused on Liana. He tried tickling her belly, but she squirmed in protest and began whining. I immediately felt panic rising inside of me. I quickly and firmly said, “she just got shots earlier so she’s not happy with strangers touching her right now.” Still looking at Liana he replied, “well you’ve gotta get used to that”, and kept poking her belly. Seeing and sharing her discomfort with this man’s presence, I started backing up and wheeled her to the other side of the store.

As we were browsing in the men’s section, I was keeping my eye on the stranger. I got a little suspicious at this point because he appeared to be mindlessly thumbing through racks of clothes as he passed—including women’s and children’s clothes—and picking up random objects and setting them down, all while moving in our direction. While in line to pay I turned around and noticed him standing just on the other side of the shelf closest to us. I was too nervous to leave and since there wasn’t anyone else in line, I lingered and made conversation with the two cashiers and Liana entertained them with babbling and smiles. As soon as the man was out of sight, we exited the store and I made a mad dash for the car. I’m not sure if I had the right to be as paranoid as I was, but I kept thinking that the man was going to follow us out of the store and to the car. I detached Liana’s car seat and fastened her in the back seat as fast as I could and threw everything else in the trunk. As I hopped in the car and locked the doors, I was immediately thankful that nothing bad had happened. I reached back and squeezed Liana’s hand reassuringly and we went home.



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