I check to make sure I can see the kids in front of me before leaving the car. If you can’t see them, picture that they’re in dire trouble, each and every time you leave the car, until you can see them. Force yourself to do this and it will eventually become everyday routine.
I now check the car for the kids when I know they aren’t even with me.
When the kids got big enough, I started intentionally not buckling their seat belts but still sitting down in my seat to drive. I did this to teach them to say, “I need my seatbelt!” So far, I have not forgotten to buckle them in. They won’t let me forget, but I also haven’t forgotten.
It’s similar to teaching a dog to bark on command. If you teach the dog to bark on command, the dog learns not to bark unless told. If you can teach yourself to intentionally (momentarily and under controlled circumstances) forget the children in order to make yourself paranoid to lose them, you learn not to forget the kids.
The amount of time you “forget” the kids can be as little as the amount of time it takes to walk to a different for to take the kids out of the car. By changing which for you use to remove the kids (or which you go to first if you have twins like me) you can interrupt the automatic processes which could otherwise cause you to forget the kids. Adding in the thoughts of “and now they’re being kidnapped” while walking to the different door reinforces your function of remembering the kids through avoidance of the bad thing. In this way it’s a function of negative reinforcement, which is highly effective at creating paranoia.
I’m trained in behavioral sciences. One of my friends went on to make rats super paranoid, and eventually the rest equivalent of religious, as part of his Masters research. It was fascinating.
