My heart sank this morning when I woke and did my usual check of my facebook news feed. Another 5 year old autistic boy wandered off and being hunted for…. Then further down my feed another young lad with autism wandered off and drowned… An all too familiar situation when you arw living in an autistic world.
From very young I have had a sixth sense with my 2 SWANS that given their learning disability (we didn’t have the autism ADHD diagnosis’ at that time) I had to always make sure doors, gates etv were locked. I remember visiting a close friend with my kids and was up and down from lunch closing doors, garden gates etc.. She told me at the time I had to teach my kids boundaries rather than simply making it safe…
Now I am confident I have to make it safe.. In fact to be fair my lovely friend having come on this journey with us would now understands that I am not just a paranoid mum.
Both Angel and Soldier would take themselves off for a walk, no looking back, no looking where they are going… And aoldier’s love of water is terrifying.
Our own home has house keys in coded key safes, up high is no longer an option and our outside doors sound like a shop alarm when someone opens them, our garden gate is always locked and despite all this security I still worry….
We are on holiday at the moment and even with a gated and fenced villa, pool fence etc I still go about checking doors are secure, won’t let the kids run free in the grounds unless they are accompanied in case the gardener or pool cleaner arrive and leave the gate open..
It’s so sad 😦 and seems like I am restricting their freedom and I know many friends and family think I am paranoid but they don’t live in our world….
This is an interesting link on autism and wandering (and this is without learning disability). 90% of tragic wandering results in drowning 😦 water is like a magnet to autistic children and they sense no fear.
My heart goes out to the family in the US who lost their son this morning, probably a loving, caring family who live in fear of their son wandering off…. Parents like us know only too well how easy it is for them to be here one minute gone the next….
I am glad to most parent’s this is an alien concept! Xxx
the angel and the soldier 