I’m currently writing a series of posts about our experience with “elopement.”
As I stated in my previous post, before “autism” entered our lives, I had never heard the term “elopement” in reference to children.
But it happens. And it is terrifying.
Imagine your non-verbal child darting away…completely escaping your vision and care.
Just… GONE.
Jonah is 8 years old. He loves to push his boundaries and he loves to run.
He has eloped on us FOUR times.
(Two of those occasions, I didn’t even know he was gone. Through fortuitous circumstance, strangers brought him back)
This is the second of four times Jonah completely escaped my vision and my care.
We were at a busy stadium. Jonah was four years old.
[September 25, 2018]
“Last weekend, we attended a Heart Health Charity Walk. It is a fundraiser associated with Mama’s work (as a nurse) and something my 10-year-old son Jonny loves to do.
Hundreds of people were in attendance.
The Walk started at a local stadium and meandered a few miles before looping around and returning to the stadium.
Mama and Jonny wanted to participate but Jonah wanted to stay at the stadium and play on the huge playground there.
There were slides and climbing cargo nets and even a miniature baseball field to run around on. Literally HOURS of “Ausome” entertainment for a little guy.
So we stayed and played.
The unenclosed playground was so big that I couldn’t stay in one place and see everything, so I had to follow Jonah around.
He ran around in a “pattern” from one apparatus to the next.
He ran back and forth from one side to the other, systematically climbing the play structures and going down the slides.
But since I couldn’t follow him up the cargo nets or down the slides, I would try to anticipate where he was going and meet him on the other side.
We did this for about half an hour. It felt like hundreds of times. Loop after loop.
It became a “routine.” Jonah LOVES his routines.
From a parenting point of view, routines make parenting more efficient, more predictable and easier to manage.
But routines can become a two-edged sword when they lull you into complacency. A behavior is repeated so many times, you begin to expect that behavior.
I just “expected” Jonah would appear in the same spot where he had been at the bottom of the slide the last hundred times we had done this “loop” over the last half an hour…
Until one time I walked back … and he wasn’t there.
I looked on both sides of the play area… up and down the slides, everywhere he had been playing for the last 30 minutes.
Nothing.
No Jonah anywhere. Jonah had literally VANISHED.
I panicked. And when I say “panicked,” that is the biggest understatement of the century.
It’s like a lightning bolt just SHOT through my veins.
I started running. I had no idea which way to run, but the more ground I covered RIGHT THEN, the better.
There was a busy parking lot immediately adjacent to the facility.
There was a huge open baseball field to run on INSIDE the stadium.
There were HUNDREDS of people around EVERYWHERE I looked.
All problematic.
When you have a child who is non-verbal, you HAVE to find HIM. He won’t find you.
He won’t tell someone he’s lost, or that he can’t find his parents. If someone asked him, he simply wouldn’t respond. He would run.
If I called him, even if he could hear me, he wouldn’t answer me. So I didn’t call out. Not even once. There was no point.
The other parents saw me frantically looking around the play area and the immediate vicinity. I asked them if they had seen the little boy in a blue coat leave.
Nothing.
I feared the worst. No. I didn’t fear it… This WAS the worst.
Jonah was GONE.
I didn’t know which way to go, so my first instinct was to check the parking lot since it had the most danger.
I started running that direction, countless cars everywhere. I didn’t know what would be worse; finding him here in the middle of the road, possibly injured (or worse) or NOT finding him here.
I felt myself starting to hyperventilate so I took three deep breaths, trying to calm myself down and to think rationally.
I had to THINK like Jonah.
Jonah most likely would not have gone to the parking lot. There’s nothing fun there. He had been learning about car safety and staying out of the street when a car is coming… at least, at home.
He wouldn’t be in the parking lot. Would he?
(unless he really wanted to leave and wanted to find our car)
😬😬😬
Maybe he wanted to find Mama and Jonny…
They were possibly MILES away. He wouldn’t have gone on the Walk too would he? I would have seen him.
I SHOULD HAVE seen him!!
Panic and frustration began mixing with anger at myself.
What kind of a parent am I? How could I have just “lost” my 4-year-old son?
I tucked those thoughts into the back of my mind, because precious time was ticking away. Every second that went by could be another step taking Jonah farther away from me.
How could I possibly find him? Where had he gone?
I had to think.
No.
I had to THINK. LIKE. JONAH…
Jojo had been to this stadium one time a year ago, for the same event.
And before he discovered the playground, he had run around the open field and in the grandstands with his brother.
I remember having to chase him around the stadium because I couldn’t bring the stroller up and down the stairs.
He would remember THAT. He would remember the field. He would remember the stairs.
So I ran onto the huge baseball field in the middle of the stadium. The Walk had already started and it was now mostly empty. This was good because I had a good view of the area.
Except there was NO Jonah.
Next, I turned around and looked in the grandstands.
If I didn’t see him there…
no…
I couldn’t even ponder that yet.
Because if he wasn’t there, that meant he went MISSING on my watch and I wouldn’t have the SLIGHTEST idea where he went, and not even the first idea of where to start looking after that.
I would start running to the parking lot. I would start asking everyone I saw to keep their eyes out for a little boy in a blue coat.
I would yell at the top of my lungs, regardless of if he would answer or not. I would notify stadium security. I would call the police. I would call news stations. I would do any and EVERY thing I could do to find him and bring him back safe.
Frankly, I would LOSE MY DAMN MIND.
And when I was at the point I thought my fear would completely consume me, THERE HE WAS.
A little boy in a blue coat…
My little boy.
My little, smiling, split-second running, escape artist was merrily walking up the stairs in the grandstands, oblivious to the near-terror I was experiencing.
A relief washed over me SO PROFOUND, it was palpable. I could hear my heart racing in my ears, and I gave Jonah the biggest hug ever.
I walked back and gave a thumbs up to the other concerned parents who had started to spread the word about a “little boy in a blue coat.”
Jonah was happy. Jonah was safe. I could cry. It felt like an eternity had passed, but it was really only like a minute, maybe less.
Less than a minute.
That’s all it took.
I wasn’t going to share this story because even though I found Jonah just fine, I felt I had failed as a parent. My only job was to watch Jonah and keep him safe. And I didn’t.
For that minute, I felt like the worst parent in the world.
Even after…
Even now…
I don’t share this because it “has a happy ending.” I’m not proud of this.
I share this with you because, despite our best efforts, sometimes things will happen. Life happens.
And if it has happened to you…know this:
“You are not alone. You are not a failure.”
It can literally happen to anyone. It happened to us. And it wasn’t the first time it happened to us, and it wasn’t the last.
I’m so glad Jonah did not go into the busy parking lot amongst the many cars.
It could have been so much worse.
…As I would soon discover.
#autism #elopement
