My 2.5 year old with ASD climbed out the window and ran away. My nerves are shot to pieces.

[Devastatedm]

I've name changed for this.

I'm not sure what I want from posting really, I just need to get this off my chest as I'm absolutely gutted and I'm so upset with myself.

I live in a ground floor flat which is all on one level. It's opposite an old police station which is mainly used as a PSCO hub now.

This afternoon my DS who is 2.5 and has autism was laying in my bed watching videos on his tablet, he was perfectly settled and engrossed in his tablet.

My bedroom window has two openings, a small one at the top left hand corner and a large one which opens outwards that runs horizontally down the whole right hand side.

I wasn't far from the bedroom but the Hoover masked the sound of him rustling the blinds and climbing out. I was out of the room for a matter of minutes and when I went back in he had gone.

The bedroom window opens out into a large driveway / alley which leads to further flats at the back, then at the front of the alley is there is junction leading to three different streets so I didn't know which way he had gone.

I'm running back and forth screaming his name when cars start beeping at the end of the road, I looked and caught a glimpse of his yellow shorts at the end of the block.

The traffic had stopped and people were getting out of their cars.

A kind man managed to catch him and hold him until I could catch up and if he hadn't he would have almost certainly been run over as he would have ran into the road. He has no concept of danger and no understanding

This is a main road where I live and there has been 4 or 5 accidents down here in the period since I moved in so it couldn't have happened at a worse place.

I got him home and he's laughing like he's had a great time, a few minutes later the police arrive to see if I'm ok and what's happened as they could hear me screaming and didn't know what was happening.

I feel like the worst mother I've ever known. Who doesn't get child safety locks for windows for fuck sake?

My only defence, which isn't even a valid defence, is that he hadn't shown any interest in escaping before, but I should have pre empted it. It's basic parenting isn't it.

My nerves are shot to pieces.

I remember seeing something similar on TV once, a toddler escaped and ran away before being picked up by the police, yet I had the gall to judge the parents.

Has anything like this happened to anybody else?

I'm prepared to be flamed. I deserve nothing less.

Oh OP what a fright you must have had. Please don't beat yourself up about this.

My dd let herself out the front door aged 2.5 when I was changing ds nappy. She went down the long drive and had started walking up the unpaved road when my neigbbour 2 doors up grabbed her. It still gives me shivers and she's 10 now.

Oh that must have been scary! Children do like to do these things. DD opened the front door and walked out in her nightdress when she was around 3 or 4 years old, got half way up the street before I caught up to her. Worse though was last summer when she was 8, and she and a sleepover friend decided to go for a walk in the middle of the night - I was woken up by the police banging on the door, they had found her, by herself (friend had gone back to her own house), and brought her home. Still get panicky when I think about it.

Thank you ladies, and I'm sorry you've been through similar frights. This little boy will turn me gray in no time.

He's very overwhelmed this evening and had the worst meltdown he has had in months. He has been throwing himself on the floor, banging his head on everything, thrashing and lashing out trying to hurt me, throw and break things.

I think the stress of the day has lead to it, he has no concept of what happened or why I was upset, why the police came and why my neighbour rushed over and started drilling things (he hates loud noises)

Oh your poor lad :(

When mine were about 2 and 4yr they let themselves out and went to the park at the end of our road (not far)... naked as they were going through a getting undressed phase.

I wasn't home, my ex was with them, but we had a follow up visit from SS to check all was ok. They are in their 20's now so both survived this mortifying incident but it's not one I will ever forget - along with all the 'what if's'.

What an awful shock for you! Hope you are ok now, so thankful your little boy is safe

@Tumbleweed101 how did SS come to find out about it and what did they say when they came to check all was ok? If you don't mind me asking.

I'm worried sick about that happening with us

What an awful shock for you!
If its any consolation, a friend of mine (not in the uk) had the police ringing his doorbell at 2 am in the morning or so several years ago to bring back his at the time about 3 year old son. The little guy had decided to go to the playground in the middle of the night. How did they know his address? My friend lives in a smallish town and is a child psychologist who works a lot with the police on cases of child neglect etc, so when the little boy told them his name they knew who’s son he was...
He’ll never live that one down, and installed a door chain the next day.

My toddlers played Peter Pan. Window locks went up the next day. It happens a lot. There's a thread by MrsKoala about her sun taking a hideous tumble.

I really hope SS don't come and call this a child protection issue as I'm mortified enough as it is. I would hope that as these things are so common, they wouldn't hold it against me.

I doubt they will get involved, when my son got out, the 911 lady had notified the police, but my husband found him while I was still on the phone with them. She said they would drop by anyway, but they didn't bother. Even if SS did make one visit I doubt they would think they needed to again.

My DS is also 'resourceful' in his attempts to escape. He's roughly the same age as your child OP and I'm pretty sure that my son knows that twisting the key in the lock opens the door....I've got to keep a close eye on him...windows are extra interesting to him.. he managed to get past me the other day and bolted straight for the street. Give yourself a break. Being a mum is really hard!

My police officer friends toddler escaped while she was upstairs running his bath. She found him in the playpark around the corner at the end of the street happily playing, absolutely starkers, with a couple of mums looking on gobsmacked and not sure what to do.

I can't believe how many people this has happened to, I can't thank you enough for sharing these accounts with me and making me feel more human and less awful!

I confided in a friend about what had happened today and whilst he was sympathetic he added "that's why I would never take my eyes off DD when she was small, anything can happen"

I wanted to tell him how unrealistic that is especially when you have more than one child (I have a younger child too) and have them 24-7 and not just weekends.

I thanked him for his concern and left it at that but it did feel like he was subtly saying "I wouldn't have let that happen"

This has opened my eyes big time, both the event and hearing everybodies else's experiences of similar. You just can't prepare enough for this things and small children will always find a way of scaring us.

Also reassured to be told that SS isn't likely to take an interest. I'd have thought if the police were even slightly concerned they'd have taken details at least. They saw that DS was home and unharmed and could tell by his environment and presentation that he's not neglected.

These things*

Mind the type errors. My phone is rubbish.

You have been lucky, not far from where l live on the last six months two children have fell from first floor windows on separate occasions. I think a lot of people cut or hang up the cord for the blinds but not think about the windows.

I’m glad all is well now. I bet he is sleeping soundly dreaming about his big adventure, hopefully not dreaming up another one.

This exact thing happened to two parents I know about ten years apart. It was only when it happened to the second friend The first friends said it happened to her too! Parenting is hard and especially parenting a child with extra needs.
Don’t beat yourself up, these things happen a lot!

My neighbours wife came round to see how I was earlier, I was telling her how it happened and she said "no explanation nessecary" and just give me a hug.

I'm heartened by the lack of judgement toward me today, I was expecting people to give me an earful and I almost wanted you lot to do that as I felt so terribly guilty and as though I deserved it.

Thank you all for being so nice to me, in hindsight that's exactly what I needed

I'm so sorry you're going through this, I've been there with DS (his autistic tendencies weren't diagnosed until 19). I don't want to scare you, but ensure every incident is catalogued with the GP so that when the inevitability of Social Services involvement occurs there is a record - and be fully prepared for them to call you a shit parent (you're not, btw).

DS would sneak out the house at all hours, 3am. He'd also break things, steal from shops, money from my wallet/DPs purse, drink alcohol (we went 15 years with none at home), smash windows and much more.

Please feel free to PM me anytime if you want an understanding ear. I'm so sorry you're going through this.

You poor thing how utterly terrifying. My parents were once alerted to my brother hanging out the top floor window by cars beeping as the drove past!
When my son was 2 we went to a national trust venue. We were playing with some others in a (I thought) secure walled garden thing. Except it wasn't and there was a gap which he merrily skipped through and ran towards the massive fast flowing river. I turned round just in time to see him at the edge and by the time I stared running (with his newborn brother strapped to my chest) he launched himself straight in and sank like a stone.
Utterly terrifying, thankfully I'd seen him go in and managed to get there and fish him out (lying on the grass and squashing the baby in the meantime) but if I hadn't seen god knows what would have happened.
These things happen, they're utterly terrifying and I had nightmares for a while but I can just about laugh at it now! You weren't to know, now you do and can get some window locks sorted.

There’s probably not a parent alive that hasn’t had some kind of near miss op.

Mine was when ds2 was 2. Standing on a crowded beach, tide in, deep rock pools all around.

I said to dh ‘watch him a second, I’m getting the sun lotion’. He thought I said ‘I’ll watch him a second, get the sun lotion’.

This resulted in both of us rummaging though our bags looking for lotion - and a minute later we both looked up and he was gone.

After 5 frantic minutes of failing to find him in the crowds, the lifeguard called the coastguard and a full search ensued. 20 horrific minutes later he was found playing in a shallow rock pool, inches away from a deep 3ft rock pool and in an area nearly completely hidden from view of the beach. No one would have seen him drown had he chosen the other rock pool to enter. It still makes me sick to think of it.

Aww poor you OP. Similar happened with my DD also ASD when she was 3. Turned my back for a split second and she was out the front door. I lived on a ground floor apartment that was right on a main road. Even thinking of ot 4 years later gives me such anxiety and guilt. I moved into a house not long after and was petrified with suddenly having upstairs windows and I googled up alarms for windows and doors to get a price and discovered AliExpress sell battery alarms very cheap and I have them attached to all my windows and doors. They are exactly like a smoke alarm when they go off if a door/window is open and with her ASD she has extremely sensitive issues with her ears and won't risk the shrill of the alarms. Over 3 years later and I've only had to change 2 out of 7 alarms xx

Hope you are ok today OP and your nerves have recovered a bit. I wouldn’t take the slightest bit of notice of your friends comments. I am a 2 under 2 mum and I know how hard it is and how you can’t physically always have your eyes on them. No one can, it would be impossible. And my children have got into scrapes while I’ve had my back turned even for 10 seconds.

Don’t worry about social services. I’d be very surprised if they would contact you and even if they did you would just tell them what you’ve told us all here. You sound like a lovely, attentive mum and I hope you’re not beating yourself up about this because you really shouldn’t.

Hope you’re feeling ok today OP. Kids do this sort of thing sometimes.

When I was 3 or 4, I was a bit bored and decided to go outside and play.
So I opened one of the downstairs windows at the front of the house, climbed out, and went off to find something fun to do.
I remember feeling very surprised about how upset my mum was when I finally went back home. She’d got a bunch of the neighbours out to help look for me.
It had never crossed my mind that she might like to know where I was

Hi all, thanks so much for all of the replies

I'm feeling much better today now yes, thank you for asking. DS seems alot calmer and happier today too thank goodness

You poor thing. We all gave at LEAST one terrifying experience like this, please stop beating yourself up. Your son is fine, people are kind and it’s all sorted now.