This past weekend my husband and I took a trip to our local fire station to help ease some anxiety in our little boy.
A few weeks ago, I was making some toast in our house and burnt it a little and that set off the smoke detectors in our house. This raised my son's level of anxiety to high alert, so much that he would not walk to his room by himself because he had to pass under the smoke detector to get there. This made me feel bad because I don't want him to be afraid of things in our home. This was also annoying because that meant he stopped doing things on his own the he had been doing for quite a while, like getting dressed in the morning and evening and even going potty by himself.
We decided to make a trip to the fire station in our town. We actually have 4 fire stations but decided to go to the main fire station because it is the "coolest" and pictured above.
The fire fighters were great! They brought him into the station and talked to him about the importance of smoke detectors and overall fire safety. He actually got to push the test button on the smoke detector and hear the noise (even though he heard it when I burnt toast). They talked about what needs to happen when they go off and what he needs to know when he calls 911. I guess we need to work on remembering our address!!
If any of you mamas out there have a child that has anxiety around these type of topics, I highly encourage you to take your kiddo to the fire station and make a fun learning moment out of it. Ethan's favorite part was that he got to sit up in the fire truck and got a CRFD badge sticker! (yes, I forgot to take the darn camera!!) I love that we have such great heroes in our community that can be great influences on our children!!
