Showdown – Part 1

I’ve always worried that we might lose Grayson.  Though she does not run away, she has a history of running to. Something catches her eye, and she’s off running without a glance back.  Once when she was only 3, we were playing in the back yard.  I took a minute to screw a Dora the Explorer sprinkler into the hose, and when I looked up she was gone.  We had just moved into this house, and the yard was not fenced in.  With my heart in my throat, I raced frantically in all directions searching for her.  Into the cul-de-sac, Up and down the street… She was nowhere to be seen.  Blood pulsed in my face, I was dizzy, What should I do? Scenes from movies flashed through my mind,

“911, what’s your emergency?”

“My daughter is missing!”

“Calm down, Ma’am.  We need a description of your daughter.  What was she wearing?”

We had been playing in a little pool in the backyard.  Grayson was going through a phase where she refused to keep her bathing suit on.  She was missing.  And she was nay – ked.

Worse yet, Grayson had very limited language and would be unable to tell another person who she was or where she belonged.  No name, no phone number, no address; How would she find her way back to us?

Mark was 2 years old, running along behind me, laughing.  A little echo of my desperate calls for his sister.

Just as a fresh surge of Panic threatened to take over, I spotted her.  She was squatting down at the end of the cul-de-sac happily dropping pebbles into a storm drain.  Well within earshot, she had been unresponsive to my frantic, repeated calls to her.  She was completely unaware of the dangers of wandering off alone and of the indescribable Panic she had caused.

I was overcome with relief.  It washed over me as I sat with her on the gravelly road and scooped her into my arms.

My heart was set with a determination to never take my eyes off her for a split second ever again.   My mind recognized the impossibility of the notion.  So I spent that afternoon on the computer, searching the Internet for some kind of identification bracelet or necklace for her.

Medic Alert!  Non-verbal Autistic.  PDD-NOS.  Autism.   Large, clunky jewelry emblazoned with the international symbol of medicine:  a snake coiled round a rough staff.   Grayson’s personal information engraved on the back side.

No, this was not what I had in mind.  I did not want her walking around with an Autism label literally attached to her.  Yes, she’s got autism.  Yes, her language is significantly delayed.  And YES she needs a way to carry some identifying information on her person.  But I was hoping for something subtle, feminine, and pretty.

Finally, I found a simple little oval shaped silver pendant.  The front side was engraved with her name.  The back side with our phone number.  A dainty silver chain. Fastening that little chain around her neck brought tremendous relief.  It made it okay to drop her off at preschool in the morning.  To stand by while she boarded a school bus and drove off.  To sign field trip permission slips.  There would be a back-up plan.   Hope for her return should she wander off.

She has worn her pendant every day for almost 4 years now.

Until yesterday…

(Part 2 to follow)