Losing a lunchbox might not seem like a big deal, especially when you know you have a perfectly good backup. But for autism in our home Mr. L’s lunchbox is a key player in multiple routines.

At pickup yesterday I noticed something was off when Mr. C and a staff member at their school was trying to persuade Mr. L to walk to the car. As it turns out, one of the aids got mixed up and put my son’s clearly labeled lunchbox in another kid’s backpack and it didn’t get to come home with us.

The parent line got backed up because my oldest child refused to get in my van until he could open his backpack and show me personally that his Godzilla, pasta, cheese, and Doritos carrier was missing in action. Then with much convincing I was able to get all my kids in and whisked away before the other cars started planning a form of attack against us.

Can I just take a minute and say, if the school thinks even for a second that getting my kiddo into my car might be tricky, why wouldn’t they call and ask if I would prefer to pick him up at the front office that day to avoid being targeted as “that kid” who “holds up the line”? *sigh*

Anyways, back to the sacred lunchbox. This glorified fabric and zipper contraption is part of Mr. L’s get ready for school routine, his breakfast, lunch, and coming home routines. These are important check points in this kids day. I’m not mad.

I get it, lots of kids, lots of things to keep track of all day long. I just felt bad for my son who gets anxiety very easily when the plans sways off course. But that’s life right?

I took extra time this morning to answer any and all lunchbox related questions I knew my son would have before feeling safe going to school with an outer space box instead.

I packed all his favorite and safe school foods. And thankfully I got a message from my son’s teacher, soon after getting back home from drop off, that the holy grail of Godzilla themed meal transporters had been returned. My son had been reunited with one of his favorite checkpoints and life could move forward faster then Facebook’s outage yesterday.