Up to His Old Tricks

Jude has escaped his teacher or aide in the school building twice this year.  Once in the fall, and again yesterday.
He's a runner, a flight risk.  I have told the school this every way I know how to short of skywriting. When he did it in the fall, they were right on his heels and he actually did exit a door and LEAVE the building, but didn't get but a few feet out onto the sidewalk before he was dragged back, him laughing hysterically and the aide who had been chasing him having had years sucked from her life.  When his teacher called to tell me about it, she was nervous and afraid that I would flip out, probably. I didn't. All was well in that he was found and safe, and I am familiar with his work. I was actually sort of glad it happened that first time.  Now, I thought, they get it. They know. They won't take their eyes off of him and it won't happen again.

But then it did.
Yesterday when his teacher called to tell me about his escape, she was crying.  Jude had not left the building, but he really got away from them this time.  She didn't know how long he had been missing. She said it felt like maybe an hour.  AN HOUR.

AN HOUR.

They had every administrator and available teacher out scouring the building for him.  When they finally found him, he was in a whole other wing of the building from where he had escaped and had himself quietly perched up on a ledge above a drinking fountain. He wasn't laughing this time, didn't seem proud of himself.  But he wasn't upset either.  He was just chilling there on the ledge.  Probably didn't know how to get himself back down once he was up there.
The first escape had been in the hallway when he just ran from an aide and turned a corner and she didn't know which way he went, so the search ensued. It was all very quick and tidy, but just "whew, that was a wake-up call!" kind of a thing.
This time Jude had been in the classroom with his teacher and an assistant and he just bolted out of the open door and away before they knew which way to even look.

Now what am I supposed to do with this?  I felt bad for the teacher because I know how fast and unpredictable he can be and because she works so hard with and for Jude in so many ways, but really?  They know how he is. They know he isn't safe and that he WILL run.  Should this have happened again?  Missing children situations don't always end well.

I know this first hand.


I hate to call a big meeting, because I fear that it will only lessen the few freedoms that Jude now enjoys at school. He already spends so little time in the first grade classroom with his peers that now I am afraid he'll be on lock-down.  School jail.  But is this what it takes to keep him safe?  Jude also has been attending his own neighborhood school with his brother, though in our rural community the school with the life skills track and all the great resources for kids with mild to moderate disabilities while still spending as much time as possible in the general education classroom with peers happens to be in a different location, an alltogether different district.
Oy.

Ok. I just got off the phone with the principal. I feel better. It wasn't really an hour, for one thing.  Much less. Maybe 10 minutes.  Though that is about the time it took our son Seth to find that swimming pool.  As you might imagine, this missing child business would be upsetting for any parent.  For me, it is much more than upsetting.  It is a nightmare that I have already lived once and continue to relive in my head every day since.  It simply can't happen again.