An Alert for an 11-y.o. Missing for 2 Hours?

Wow. Three thoughts popped in my head near simultaneously when reading that last bit, about the mom who watches her ten year old on a baby monitor at night.

First thought: she’s going to get the surprise of her life pretty soon, when she finds out first hand that teenagers do masturbate.

Second thought: if it is considered ‘pornography’ if parents photograph their toddlers in bath (remember how a couple nearly permanently lost their kids after a Wall Mart 24 hour photograph booth employee reported them for taking photos of their – shock! horror! – naked kids in the bath?), how much worse is it to watch your kid masturbate in bed? (*sarcasm*)
Peeping Tom Mum!

Third thought: I watched a tv programme not long ago about the American prison system and a famous break out of one of the highest security prisons of the country, where inmates are watched, by camera, near 24/7.
What are you Americans doing, turning your kids into virtual prisoners? You tag them with electronic ankle devises, so they ‘can’t get lost or abducted’, you watch them, electronically if need be, 24/7 and you keep them locked indoors, all for the sake of ‘safety’.

The police is even alerted faster, and responds faster, after a twelve year old is missing then when an dangerous criminal is missing from a high security prison. Jeez!

PS, when I asked above, “what are you Americans doing”, I thoroughly realise that ‘Peeping Tom Mum’ with her baby cam is but the exception, not the rule. I know that most of you recoils in horror with that kind of obsessive behaviour. But apparantly, this kind of OCD behaviour is applauded in main stream American culture (any over-the-top behaviour is applauded, as long as it’s ‘For The Children’s Safety’) and that’s creepy.

The auto call is the part that seems odd to me. There are circumstances where it’s reasonable to call the police that soon when a child goes missing, but unless it’s believed that the child is likely in danger, it seems fast for auto calls around the area.

I don’t think ignoring the fact that an 11 year old has been missing for a couple hours is the right answer, but an automated call to EVERY person in town seems a bit much for a child missing a short time. There were many times when I was a kid when someone stayed out passed curfew. A police search and rescue party was not arranged until way more than 2 hours had elapsed. Mom called the kid’s friends, who called their friends, etc. until the kid could be found. Since this kid was “found” within 5 minutes of the alert going out, he wasn’t very lost and the parents probably could have found him without police involvement. But many people’s instinct seems to be to call the cops immediately these days.

Maybe they called the cops to avoid a Casey Anthony comparison (or a law, passed yet or not as media coverage, to some, means it already passed– and I’ve been guilty of not paying close enough attention to actual passage vs. coverage at times.)

Not to justify it as I think that police involvement is not necessary unless there’s true cause for immediate concern– the kid was seen being abducted or something of that nature. Otherwise, calling the most likely parties would seem to be the first course of action. (And some serious discipline might be in order too, for not being where he was supposed to be!)

As for the baby monitor… I worked with a teenager whose mother used a baby monitor in his room when his girl friend was over. Except, they just put a pillow over it and got busy anyway. I think I would be hurt if my mother showed that little trust in my ability to survive in my OWN BEDROOM. And what a way to teach the kid that the world is a terrifying place– someone could scale to the second floor and abduct him? Really? And I’m going to be appointed CEO of Microsoft…

And what if the boy was handicapped in some way; physically and/or mentally? What if there was some tragic event that meant missing for two hours was a bad thing? Yes, I know chances of that aren’t all that high but It would be nice if these sorts of posts had just a little more details. At least if we knew that were no unusually circumstances we could berate the parents and police appropriately.

I shared all the info that the police gave me, apart from what kind of clothes he was wearing. I’m sure the parents would have notified the police if he did have some type of disability.

I find it shocking that the police would notify all the residents. I’ve never heard of anything like that. When a kid goes missing in our area there is a SARA alert that goes across the bottom of the TV screen, but no personal calls! 2 hours seems soon to alert the town, but if I was the parent I could see alerting the police within 2 hours. It would depend on the situation. My son is only 7, I may feel different when he is 11. He is frequently gone for 2 hours playing in the neighborhood. He tells me who he’s going to play with and I tell him a time to be home. I don’t worry while he is gone. If he never showed back up and I called the friend and they had never seen him, or told me he left their house an hour ago, I would call his other neighborhood friends and check the subdivision myself. If a half hour went by and I couldn’t find him I would probably call the police. Again I may feel differently 4 years from now. So I could see alerting the police if this was out of character for him and the parents had checked with all his friends and looked around town at usual hangouts themselves, but I can’t see calling all the residents!!!

I do remember once as a kid playing hide and seek with a friend. I had a really good hiding place and wouldn’t come out even when I heard my mom calling that this was no longer a game and I needed to come out. I also remember the spanking I got when she found me 🙂

“do you know how many horrible crimes happen to 10 year old boys all the time?”

No, tell us. How many? (I’m betting the number will be astonishingly low)

I am thinking there may be more to the story (it is common for developmentally disabled kids to wander). Here we get auto calls for everything imaginable, it is the new phone tree. So while, depending on the circumstance, it may have been over the top I do think their are many situations where it would be warranted. It also may have saved resources by helping locate him quickly.

Oh, and if I couldn’t locate my kid, and it was a situation where he should here I would probably report him missing pretty quickly. My worry would more be along the lines of fell off his bike and got a broken ankle than abducted by strangers, though.

Uly, I agree. It could very well start a “Boy who cried wolf” situation, and people will start ignoring those robo-calls if they are overused.

I consider myself a free-range parent, but I think if I had exhausted all my own possibilities of where my 11-year-old could be after about a half-hour, I would probably call the police as well. There is a difference between allowing your child freedom and not knowing where s/he is. For example, it is reasonable for a pre-teen to ride a bike alone to the park AFTER s/he says “mom, I’m going to the park.” I’d like to know where this child was “found” and why he hadn’t checked in for two hours or told anyone where he was going.

@Dawn-Then your 10 year old would be missing out on some fantastic adventures and learning some life lessons that can only be learned outside of a parents watchful eye. My kids walk, bike and ride buses everywhere and they ar better for it.

I walked to and from school 2.5 miles everyday from age 10 until 15 (and had friends with licenses!). I’m 30 so this was 1991-1996… not that long ago. I also lived in southern California. (You know, the scary place with all those “gangs” just waiting to offer up a young and impressionable girl free drugs, of course!)

I happen to be a child-free, former teacher who now, on occasion, works from home. I live in an suburb where my particular neighborhood is quite cute… Lots within a 1-mike radius (schools, park, a pool with awesome slides, a grocery store, several convenience marts, etc). I was ASTOUNDED when I realized how many people drive their kids LESS THAN A MILE to the bus stop that is my front lawn! I couldn’t (and CAN’T) believe it!!!

An 11 year old totally missing for 2 hours would be a concern… I might wait a bit longer before informing the police… depending on the time of day… but by 2 hours I’d be thinking about it. I guess if “everyone was calm and the robocall was a ‘non-hysterical’ communication the way I might call one of my kid’s friends parents and ask if they’ve seen him I would feel that this was less “big brother” and more “family”. Whatever happened to the “it takes a village to raise a child” idea?

I live in a small town where everyone knows everyone and after 2 hours a robocall wouldn’t be necessary… either someone would have seen my kid or everyone would tell him as soon as they saw him or her that s/he better get home because their Dad’s looking for them.

To me part of what the free range movement is looking for is moderation and common sense and to not be judges. It seems it would be best to extend the same attitude to others who may react a bit sooner than we might. I see no cause for criticism or alarm that folks were aware and soon. If there was some accident then a response is best earlier than later.

Emily, hold on to this feeling. I think so many kids feel this way, and then completely lose hold of it when they themselves are parents. But you don’t have to–Lenore obviously didn’t, and neither did I. Keep your writings!

I have a few thoughts about this. First, we are relying way too much on our kids cell phones. If he had one and did not answer it, I’m assuming the parents would have no idea what other phone to call. That is a total assumption on my part, but as a mom with kids that don’t have phones I ask them for numbers of where they will be, just like my mom used to do with me.

Second, we heard about a woman with Alzheimers that went missing. First the police reverse 911’d the initial area where she went missing, and only later, the next day I believe, did they phone the whole town. Then the next day I saw it in the newspaper. Maybe the 2 hours was only in the immediate area, there’s not enough detail to know. But as others have said, if it gets used too often it will be ignored.

Oh, and the baby monitor, I never had one even when my kids were infants. I sure don’t want to know what my son does in his room alone. Sheesh.

As for a 10 yr. old missing, I hate that everyone involved thought worst case scenerio immediately. We had a boy in my son’s class last year go “missing” for several hours while I was away with my husband on a work trip. A friend texted us that someone was missing, and hoped our son was OK. We called home, son was reading, but the whole neighborhood/community was freaking out. Here the boy was being bullied on the bus, and decided to get his thoughts together alone at a playground . There were search parties, etc. My son said they were not allowed to talk about it at school.

As for the link above on walking/biking, I totally agree it is great for kids. My son practices his speeches (current events) in his head on his 1 1/2 mile trek each day. It is raining today, so they chose to walk in their rain gear. They are wide awake and ready to learn by the time they reach school. Going home, they can decompress and have fun with their friends (and jump in every puddle, if they want.) These are kids that are not clogging up the roads with more cars transporting short distances and they should be commended for being self sufficient at providing their own transportation.

Sera – Even if a kid hasn’t gone missing before I don’t think it’s reasonable to suspect foul play quickly. They are more likely to have got lost or had an accident than be prevented from going home by someone else. That doesn’t mean they don’t need help, just that it’s not evil people at fault all the time. In general, people are good and helpful. I think assumptions about bad situations always being caused by bad people really eat away at the trust we need for good communities.

It could also be that he had a medical condition they didn’t want to broadcast, that didn’t affect his mental state but meant he really needed to be home by 5 or 6 to take his medicine, and they were worried that if he had lost track of time he might not get it. That’s another scenario I can see that would lead to a quick choice to start calling out.

If the parents had already called his known friends – then I can see the response as potentially reasonable. We simply don’t know enough to be sure it’s not, or that it is.

The baby monitor for a 10-year-old…I *boggle*. And here I was debating whether I should remove the baby monitor from my son’s room now at 2.5 or wait until he turns 3. (Even now it is only there so that when he wakes in the night and calls for us, we can hear him, as our rooms are also on different floors and he doesn’t yet handle stairs all that well while half-asleep, though he’s largely mastered them awake. I’m thinking maybe I can move it to the hallway outside. At the moment it’s a moot point as he’s been insisting on sleeping in our room while he gets three molars in at once, poor guy, and as that means everyone DOES get to sleep, I’m very inclined to let him stay.)

I find the shift in mentality interesting.

In my childhood, if a kid was late coming home from somewhere, the parents were looking for him to beat his butt. The assumption was that the child was at fault for his own lateness – lost track of time, went somewhere he wasn’t supposed to go, was doing something that he wasn’t supposed to be doing, etc. Nobody thought foul play unless there was some indication of foul play. It was just a kid being a kid and not following rules.

Today, foul play is suspected immediately. Kids haven’t actually changed. They are still prone to occasionally disobey rules. But society seems to jump over that fact and move immediately to foul play.

If my 9-year-old weren’t home when I expected, I’d call around to her friends, and if I still couldn’t find her and she were late enough I’d call the police, but I wouldn’t expect a robocall to everyone in town. I would be nervous if I hadn’t seen her for two hours after I expected her home, though. She runs around the neighborhood, but I have a pretty good idea generally where she is and it shouldn’t take that long to find her.

@ helenquine –

Sorry, I misspoke. Probably better to say, “suspect that something has got wrong”.

It still depends on the circumstance. Kid went out to the shops or to see a friend or to the park, having told his parents, and hasn’t come back in a timely manner? Yeah, it’s more likely that he’s gotten hurt (sprained ankle, etc), or lost, or even just distracted and changed his plans. In those cases, he’s not in any sort of life threatening danger, generally. Well, not in the U.S, anyway. Australia is full of snakes that will KILL YOU (even in suburbia), and two hours is plenty of time to die if he gets bit by one of those and doesn’t get help. Snakes aside, even if a kid getting lost or broken-legged or whatever in a population center isn’t going to be dog food, even after dark. As long as the kid knows their home address and phone number, they should be able to easily find somebody to lend them a phone or give them directions (or tell the ambulance officers how to contact his parents, in the broken leg case).

Kid was supposed to be somewhere within the home/yard and has suddenly and mysteriously vanished, and that’s not something he’d do? Yeah, then it’s time to worry about that one-in-a-million abduction, and to act fast.

Talked to my son on Sunday. He’s 19, he’s been pretty free-range, and is now living thousands of miles away for university. This had been his first weekend in his new apartment. The one thing he was most blown away by? The number of kids his age (incoming freshmen – he’s a junior. Been living independently since 17, in college since 16) that were dazedly following their parents around, looking totally lost. He saw one kid get hit up for spare change by a random guy on the street, and the kid freaked out, and ran for Dad. This both cracked my kid up, and deeply disturbed him. He can’t envision getting to college age and never having dealt with that. He’s known how to manage that since he was about 13! He related watching parents attempting to hold every conversation FOR their kid, not letting their kids answer direct questions, taking over in the bookstore – “Wait out here with Dad, honey. I’ll go get your books for you.” Whooo boy. Yeah. Prepared to deal with independence. *eyeroll*

At 11, I know I was leaving the house on foot or bike with the coming home instructions being, have fun, stay out of trouble, be home at a reasonable hour. I didn’t have an ‘end time’ at which I had to be back. My husband had the same type of instructions, and thus would ride his bike for 15 or 20 miles, poke around a creek, or in the woods in the areas outside the town he lived in. My kids had the same general instruction when they were middle school aged. And no cell phones. Thus, I have kids who are completely capable of handling themselves in just about any situation they might encounter. It all transfers over. Point being, if you have fairly open, ambiguous freedoms to adventure and explore, when do you become ‘missing’ for 2 hours? We were much more the ‘when the streetlights come on’ than the ‘be back in 2 hours’ type parents by this age. But even then, it gets dark faster than one expects in late summer in northern latitudes. So, do you wait 1/2 hour after the lights come on? 1 hour? Two? There are just so many variable with what the expectations are, what will set a parent’s panic button off, when is ‘missing’ really missing…

The only ‘logical’ reason I can think of to do a robo-call like that would be if the parent was pretty sure the kid had gone somewhere with someone he/she knew, but didn’t know who. And the parent had political connections. *wink*

On another topic: Just read this in my insurance newsletter on the subject of Vitamin D: “Your body creates vitamin D when exposed to sunlight. It only takes about 10 minutes of sun exposure a few times a week to make enough. But, since this also exposes you to cancer-causing UV rays, some experts believe it’s not a healthy way to get it.”
Does this give other parents a feeling of crazy, or is it just me? (Ok, I tan really, really easily myself, which is why I carefully cultivate a tan in my lighter-skinned toddler– I’m not going to immediately think “Put on SUNSCREEN!” all the time. But somehow suggesting that 30 minutes of sun exposure a week in the US would be dangerous seems wrong.)

@ gramomster

I suppose having to deal with “getting hit up for spare change by a random guy on the street” is a must have skill where you live but I’ve never heard of that in my life so I would be pretty freaked up myself… I agree that the teenagers you describe seem rather poor at handling life in general but I wouldn’t be so quick to judge them on that. Chances are that they come from another town.

I also think that if you don’t let your 10 year old walk 2 miles, he’s not free-range!

And to add to my comment – I often ask myself why these parents ever had kids if they don’t want to spend any outdoor time with their kids on a beautiful Sunday afternoon? Oh but they are so independant?? How about delusional? All those questions and needs are just directed to other parents on the street and you still think their independant? The jokes on you!

Brad – you don’t have to. Really. Just turn them away. Stop watching them cross the street. Don’t offer them food or drink if you don’t want to. They will do just fine without freeloading off you. If they are rude or misbehave kick them out and/or tell their parents. But don’t blame other people because you haven’t learnt how to set effective boundaries.

@pentamon- yes, I felt that was the worst part of this. There was a huge teachable moment missed because legally they couldn’t talk about it. This kid was a transfer (was bullied) and was bullied again, but they are afraid of being sued, so no talk. I did talk to my kids about it. Asked them, what went wrong here? They said-tell someone where you are going and for how long, speak up about the bullying. Perhaps addressing the problem would break the cycle. Uggh.

@brad- you made me laugh! I am that house on our street, but I am actually proud of it. It’s the one with all of the bikes on the lawn or clogging the driveway with chalk designs, bases, and balls everywhere. I having neighbors that host the kids back and repay me with favors all the time. I don’t resent it, right now the little girl across the street stays here almost every day- her dad is getting cancer treatments at home, and I know that she’s scared. I’m happy she has a place she can go to when she needs it.

I recommend you use this word- NO!
Kids at my house know they can get water at anytime at the water cooler in the garage, but as a rule no inside our house unless it’s raining or thunderstorming or need a bathroom break. I send out food sometimes, not always. If I buy a giant watermelon, its food for a crowd and not much out on me. We also bake a lot (mostly fruits that we picked way too many of) and I like to send treats out so we don’t eat it all up. These kids play a lot outside so they are burning the calories up like crazy.
So, try saying “NO” to these kids you don’t like. They will appreciate it WAY more than your current passive/aggressive hosting at your house that you seem to not enjoy.

brad – I used to feel the same way about people having kids and then not wanting to spend time with them. Then I started thinking about it. I don’t want to spend every minute with my husband. I want to spend quite a bit of time with him (hence why I married him), but we both spend time apart and it makes us much more interesting people. We go out and do things and then come back and share what we’ve done with each other. Maybe I teach my husband something new because I went on a tour of Flushing Meadows park or he got to meet a celebrity at Comic-Con. When you spend every waking minute with a person, it can get boring. So it seems like it would create a better adult in your kid to be able to send them out to do things without you. Send them out to play for two hours on a Sunday. You can bake a cake to share with him when he gets back and he can bring you a lizard (or tell you about the new kid down the block, or about that cool bicycle he saw, etc. etc.)

Also, I agree. Don’t be responsible for those kids. They’ll go home. My grandma used to have this ceramic basket of apples (both basket and apples were ceramic) sitting on her kitchen table in her apartment, in full view of anyone who came to the door. One day when a group of kids were playing outside, one came up to her door and said, “I’m hungry.” My grandma told him she didn’t have anything to eat and he said, “What about an apple?” My grandma said, “I don’t have any apples.”

It’s a funny story, but even if those apples were real, I doubt my grandma would have given him one. He had a home and parents nearby. They took care of him.

@ pentamom – Some of the college kids are getting bit on the ass for interfering parents now. I live in a college town so I am acquainted or interact with many professors. One day this summer at the pool, a professor was talking about a student who did poorly on a test or a paper (I can’t recall which). He fully intended to allow the student to make up the grade if asked. Sadly, the student didn’t ask. Instead his mommy called the professor and demanded that he be allowed to make up the grade. Professor said “no” and the failing grade stood.

In Edmonton, Alberta last month, an amber alert was issued for a “suspected child abduction”. A “suspicious looking” man met up with a 10-12 year old child at a playground, and the child left with him. Turns out the man was the child’s uncle, who met him at the park to pick him up and take him home.

Brad, the kids and other parents aren’t the problem- you are. If you can’t tell them no on the food, drinks and entertainment that is your issue. If you want them not to play in your yard, tell them to go. It really is that easy. And if you don’t want to supervise them, don’t. Again that simple. I have kids in my yard all the time. A couple years back, before I had kids, they were leaving trash in the yard. I told them if they wanted to hang under my our trees they needed to pick up after themselves. They did. No problems. I don’t feed, entertain or supervise them. They have homes and parents for that. You might want to try reading “Boundries”. I think it’s by Henry Cloud.

I’d report a kid missing in an instant if I had reason to believe someone had snatched her (such as, someone saw her getting into a car that wasn’t mine). Within a couple of hours or less, if we were in a place that could be inherently dangerous and where I could think of no good reason for her to be absent. (Such as if we were hiking at a national park and she’d wandered off from her group.) Or if my kid had special needs such that she should not be wandering about for such a long time.

Other than that, I might be worried or upset, but I wouldn’t involve the police until it had gotten late. I would be oiling my paddle, though. (Just kidding, I don’t own a paddle – yet – but you get my drift.)

@brad – There is a huge difference between being free-range and being an irresponsible parent. Part of free-range parenting is teaching children to do for themselves and be responsible (and for us, to have appropriate manners when out and about without mom or dad), not just turning them out into the world for someone else to deal with. My kids come back home to get themselves a snack or drink if they need one when playing in the neighborhood – they have done so since they were pre-schoolers. If a neighbor offers them a snack, they are allowed to take it, but they aren’t supposed to ask for anything, unless it is a family we know well and have that kind of relationship with. I regularly entertain and feed the neighborhood kids at my house, but it is completely by choice, and I feel entirely comfortable in turning them away or telling them to run home for a snack (some of the neighbor kids will even go home to use their own bathroom). It’s up to each of us to set boundaries with our neighbors about what we are and are not willing to do – if you don’t want those kids in your house, don’t let them in – you are under no obligation to do so. I have returned small neighbor children home whom I thought were too small to be wandering safely by themselves – the parents are normally grateful, if not a little embarrassed.

As for the 11 year old – I have an 11 year old son, and if he was two hours late in coming home, and calls to school, neighbors, friends, his usual hang-outs, etc. didn’t turn up anything, I probably would contact police. While I do think as a society we panic too easily and resort to worse case thinking, I also don’t think it prudent to not take action when something unusual and potentially troublesome occurs. He’s probably fine – but in the case he’s not – for example, if he’s lost or hurt, rather than abducted – waiting many hours, or even days, to sound the alarm doesn’t sound smart to me. We regularly have the police department helicopter flying above our neighborhood, broadcasting information about “missing” kids or teens – an automated phone call seems a lot more effective and less costly, and it looks to have worked in this instance, with minimal time and resource investment. We don’t have much information in this case, but unless this is a regular occurrence, I don’t know that it sounds too over-the-top.

My first reaction is to be shocked at the two-hour window. Sigh. I think there are better first reactions than calling the police. Call a few neighbors. Call the kids’ friends’ houses. At that point and no luck, I figure there might justification for calling the police. But in my head there was parents all “I can’t find my kid” and immediately calling the police. Not cool.

I wonder what will happen when Baby Monitor Boy goes to college. That range of baby monitor can’t be cheap.

I have to laugh at the college kids that can’t do anything for themselves. In 1982 I started college. My mother (parents divorced, dad not around) did NOTHING to help me. I filled out all my own applications, decided which one to attend, went by myself to campus the first time to the registrar and financial aid offices. My brother and sister helped me move in. I was only 45 minutes away in the city but to me it could have been Mars. Needless to say I bought my own books, I had a checking account and a MAC card. The worst moment for me was the first weekend I stayed on campus and realized that the cafeterias were not open so my meal plan was useless. It was a very long, hungry weekend, but it sure was a learning experience.

Unless my kids ask me to intervene, they will be on their own when they are in college. That may sound harsh, but they are both in high school now and are very independant. I also do not intervene with teachers unless asked to even though it’s quite expected.

As for talking to the teachers – even at age 4, I expect my kids to tell me what I need to hear from / about their teachers, and to tell the teacher what she needs to hear. Of course, if there are problems, I will step in, but that will be the exception. (I also expect the teacher to tell me if there’s an issue to address, not wait for me to address her first. But that’s a different issue.)

“obviously not a free range mom”‘s comments hit right to the heart of the problem. She states: “do you know how many horrible crimes happen to 10 year old boys all the time?”

That’s what the masses are led to believe by the media industry. They think these bad things happen “all the time” because that’s what the news reports. These things do *not* happen “all the time”. It’s just that you hear about *every single occurance* because they are *all* reported on the news. People don’t stop to consider all the other millions of children that horrible things didn’t happen to for each one that gets abducted. The fact of the matter is that your child is more likely to be struck by lightning than abducted by a pervert. To live life in utter paranoia over such odds is highly irrational and will be detrimental to your child’s upbringing. They are being taught to embrace the same paranoia and will live a sheltered existence as a result of being scared of the world.

@ gramomster

You want to be flabbergasted? I don’t know anybody that experienced that. Never heard of that expect on movies and such… If you want to know, I’ve lived in two places in my life: a 40K town and a 500K city, both in Canada.

And I can tell you that I walked alone at any hour of the day when I was of school age. (oh and I’m a girl…)

Gramomster, I didn’t say I’ve never been hit up for spare change. I have, in fact. It probably only happened to me a couple of times per decade before I started shopping at the seediest Walmart in town, where it tends to happen to me *indoors* about once a year. Outdoors, it doesn’t happen hardly at all to me. I have little call to walk around downtown here, though I’m quite “aware” of people panhandling in this city.

But then again, I don’t live in the Michigan UP. Some of those kids might. Some of them might live in small little towns where anyone who had to live hand to mouth like that wouldn’t figure it was worth sticking around, or coming to in the first place. They needn’t necessarily be sheltered, privileged, and unaware of poverty in their backyards. They might live somewhere where there is little of that kind of poverty — poverty, yes, but not a good atmosphere for someone to try to make a living on the streets.

Sounds like this mom had the police on speed dial and her finger surgically attached to the dial button. Did she ever … oh, I don’t know … call any of his friends’ parents to see if he was there first?

@triskelethecat
Birmingham! That’s the one I couldn’t think of! Yeah, Royal Oak is more middle class. That was a lovely town to go see music in. My kids mostly grew up in Grand Rapids.

The part about the nine-year-old with the baby monitor is deeply disturbing.

I’m still waiting on the figures that validate all these horrors that befall the hordes of 10 yr old boys…and on a daily basis, we would be led to believe.

I suspect there was no such data. Never is when talking panic justification.

The alert for an 11 year old missing for two hours probably is an over reaction, but I would like to give the parents the benefit of the doubt. As a free range parent I would say there is a difference between a child being GONE for two hours and the same child being MISSING for two hours. For a parent (and child) that is not free range, maybe there is no distinction. For me, I can think of numerous scenarios where a few hours “gone” would not be cause for alarm, and other times, when even 30 minutes would make me worried. Calling the police (AFTER looking myself and making calls) might be reasonable. I assume the police and not the parents decided to issue the robo-calls…

I don’t recall ever seeing a homeless person asking for money before I went to college (grew up in small town MA). My kids ride the nyc subway and walk around and see people asking for change (which they give them or offer leftover uneaten snacks) on a regular basis. When I first came to nyc for grad school, I still remember giving someone 5 dollars after he told me a very sad story about a health clinic being closed and needing to get back to brooklyn…he was standing on the same corner with the same story a few weeks later…good lesson learned…I figured he needed the $5 more than I did anyway, but did help me gain some street smarts.

There are more than a few students where I live that could end up at UofM (we’re about 20 minutes north of A2 anyway). And many of those would never have run into a pan-handler, depending on how or where they spend their time. I’ve never seen one in town or at the local malls that I can recall– maybe once or twice at Meijer, but they don’t last long before management shoos them away. There is very much a sense in this community that “those problems” only happen in other places, like Metro Detroit.

I wish people would stop assuming all wandering children must be free-range kids. Some may be, and some may be children of absent parents. And kids will ALWAYS try to see what they can get away with! Adults in the community can teach proper behavior, such as explaining that it’s impolite to ask someone for food– you have to be invited instead. When repeated by others, it reinforces what the parents have taught, showing that the rules really are ‘universal’ rules, as opposed to just a home rule.

Would a partial solution to the “missing child” issue be to have the child always have a cell phone on them? That has helped with my free range ways. Oh and the 2 mile walk thing…I would be fine with it if she was with a friend…just not alone…it wasn’t the distance thing..

In Brad’s defense as well I do know the type of parents he is referring to and yes, they do exist in abundance. They are not just free rangers though. They are more like just lazy. So I am on your side Brad, but it is not the free rangers to blame.

I have encountered these kids my entire life and I feel oh so sorry for them. I had them around when I was a kid and I have seen them as an adult. I don’t see them as much now, but I have met my share. The parents will just send the kids out to play to leave them alone and not care if the kids end up bothering someone else. There was a sweet little girl in my cul de sac when hubby and I were first married. I talked to her and would sit out on the porch with her and play board games or do puzzles, etc. I was afraid to invite her into my house because you never know what someone might accuse you of. She was knocking on my door everyday. She often smelled of pot smoke. I know the smell.

One day she shows up at my door asking if I would walk or drive her to the McDonalds down the road because her mother told her to ask me because she needs lunch but her mother doesn’t want to be the one to go with her. I don’t believe the child was making this up. Her mother did not want to get off her own lazy ass and walk her down there herself. I knew they didn’t have a car. I told her that she needed to get her mother to do that and sent her off. I hope she managed to get lunch that day. I eventually had to start distanceing myself because she started showing up at my door too much and the whole McDonalds request freaked me out.

So I validate Brad that those type of parents DO exist. I have met several in my lifetime. But it is not free rangers that are responsible for it. More like the lazy druggy parents.

Some of the comments about college kids not being able to do things for themselves (or parents not letting them) had me laughing.
For part of my career, I was instructor at a millitary engineering school, and the number of stories that my collegues who instructed the younger students (18-20 yr olds) told me of parents who called them to complain about grades, lack of sleep, and who was supervising them on their time off, really made me laugh. Really, these are grown men and women in thier first full time employment, my one friend would calmly reply, “ummm you know they are in the military, and you cannot fix anything for them right? one mom wanted to call our CO to complain that her son was living in a room with 3 other people. I fear there may be a whole generation of completely helpless people in the making.

“Yeah it is. Those of us who work with the poor on a regular basis are amazed at the lack of true understanding in the general public for how poor some people are in America. ”

Donna, I was referring to specific people. They DO know it exists. I realize many people don’t. I agree with everything you’re saying, about people in general. But the people I was talking about, they do know these things exist. There are reasons why I can confidently say that. But their perception of what it is like and how scary it is to be close to it, is somewhat distorted due to lack of close familiarity.

“Do you never leave suburbia?”

I know this wasn’t directed straight at me, but answering for myself, I live in an outlying part of the city itself, but I have little reason to go deeper into the city — at least to go to the downtown area of my city. (I go plenty of other places.) Retail is leaving downtown in most places, and most of what is downtown has more convenient locations closer to my neighborhood. I’m a SAHM, so I don’t go downtown to work. The only real reason for me to go downtown has to do with doctor and/or hospital visits, and my primary physician is in the suburbs. The major medical buildings downtown all have parking areas within a block, sometimes on the same property. I suppose if I had business to do with the city or the county, I would have to, but I haven’t ever had city business that can’t be handled by mail or online, and the last F2F county business I’ve had was jury duty, three years ago. We’re a small city, so the panhandling problem is small enough to be discouraged near government buildings and during the times I’m likely to be downtown, anyway.

So without “avoiding” going downtown, there’s actually little reason to take me there anymore. I don’t think I’m that unusual.

You do also have to consider that regardless if the children can get food at home or not, they should not be there begging for food and an adult to play with them. They should be getting those things from their own parents. They should be taught that they should not be asking for food at others homes. Parents should be involved more and talking with Brad and knowing the situation. If my kids told me they ate cookies at Mrs. Jone’s home, I would ask, “Did you ask for a snack or did she offer first?” I would also make sure I know Mrs. Jones well enough that the next time we are chatting I would bring up the fact my children ate cookies at her house and thank her for graciously giving them a snack. Then I would confirm that they weren’t asking for food and that she was offering. It is hard to turn down hungry children if you have a heart and if you aren’t sure whether or not their parents are meeting their needs. I would also mention to Mrs. Jones if my children ever did ask for food, to please send them home, because it’s not her responsibility to feed them. That way she feels comfortable knowing what our policy is and that we are taking responsibility for own kids. It’s like I said earlier, we need, as adults, to get to know each other in our neighborhoods better. Then there is no question about certain situations. And I still stand by my original observation that 2 years old is too young to be roaming the neighborhood. Brad did say he had children as young as two coming to his home. That in and of itself is an issue and shows bad judgement on the parts of the neighboring parents, unless they are with a responsible older teenage sibling who’s sole duty is to keep an eye on the toddler. Two year olds can just get into too many situations where they can be seriously hurt or killed in the blink of an eye and can’t just be randomly tagging along throughout the neighborhood with an 8 year old sibling who is busy playing – as it should be.

I also wanted to add that I think it’s the automated phone service that everyone thinks is going too far. I think we all agree it’s reasonable if your child was told to be home at a certain time and then two hours past and they didn’t show up it would be unreasonable NOT to call the police. Also, if you were personally calling the neighborhood asking if anyone has seen your child, I think everyone would agree that would be reasonable as well. If the police were going door to door asking if anyone had seen or heard from the child, that would be reasonable as well. It’s just the automated system that costs $ that is perhaps going over the top.

It’s been quite a while since I was a college freshman, but I can’t imagine parents acting in the manner described above. We did have a male friend who started to stink by the beginning of October, and shamefacedly admitted to my best friend that it was because he had no idea how to do laundry, and was too ashamed to try to just figure it out. My friend gave him laundry lessons at the weirdest time they could agree on, something like 2 a.m. Tuesday morning. He stopped stinking after that.

But yeah, back then, the involvement of parents pretty much ended at move-in day. To keep buying books for your college kid, sorting out their schedule, micromanaging their academic progress, that’s just insane. In four years, they’re going to wonder why their kid just boomerangs home and will complain about their unwillingness to even do chores, let alone get a job. Though I’ve heard stories that it doesn’t even end there: these same parents will then call employers on their kids’ behalf.

“I think we all agree it’s reasonable if your child was told to be home at a certain time and then two hours past and they didn’t show up it would be unreasonable NOT to call the police.”

I don’t agree with this statement at all. It would depend on the situation and the child in question. There are certainly cases when I would call the police immediately and other situations where I would not even after 2 hours. And I don’t think it’s ever reasonable to call the police if you haven’t done sufficient legwork yourself to find the child based on your own resources. Sufficient legwork may be none in the case of some evidence of foul play or dangerous situation (hiking in the wilderness, for example). Other times it would involve calling your kid’s friends, going to the place they were supposed to be, talking to neighbors — actually looking for your errant kid yourself before you bog the police down in what is likely a discipline matter.

“If the police were going door to door asking if anyone had seen or heard from the child, that would be reasonable as well.”

Depends on the situation. Is it likely that any of the neighbors would have heard or seen the child? Why didn’t you just ask them yourself before calling out the police?

Donna – I agree with you on this. The original story said the missing persons announcement was recalled after just 5 minutes. That means the child was somewhere that had a phone that got the call. I have to wonder how much leg work the parents did prior to calling the police.

One day this summer I dropped my daughter off at the movie theater at 4 in the afternoon to meet some friends. She does not have a cell phone. At 10 that night I logged onto her facebook page and started asking where she was. Instantly 3 of the kids she had been at the movies with told me she was still there with a few other kids. Within 10 minutes she had borrowed a phone and called me. She got in trouble, not for being out that late, but for not checking in to tell me she was hanging out for longer.

Robin and Donna,
It’s hard to say how much leg work was done. However this program that was used is FREE to use and literally takes less than a minute to activate. No big deal at all. Plus, I’m guessing unless the parents were extremely lazy people, they were out looking for the two hours prior. If you are worried enugh to call the police, you are worried enough to be looking. We don’t know the circumstances and shouldn’t judge accordingly. There’s a myriad of circumstances that we couldn’t possibly know about.

“If you are worried enugh to call the police, you are worried enough to be looking.”

That’s not necessarily true. Many call the police as a first resort, not last. They may have looked for themselves. They may have also did nothing for 2 hours and then dropped it in the lap of the police. Considering the whole thing was cancelled after 5 minutes, the kid was not difficult to find and was not dodging his parents.

I think Brad feels obligated because deep down inside, he feels guilty for “locking up”/helicoptering his own kids. So when his own kids get bored from being cooped up in their home, they look to the parents. Parents are too paranoid to let them go out and play, so they compensate by paying more attention, or giving them things to get preoccupied (pretty much called spoiling). So when their kids’ friends come to play (obviously in their home because Brad’s kids aren’t allowed out), Brad and his wife automatically feel they need to do the same with the neighborhood kids. Brad, this isn’t about YOU, and how YOU feel. This is about your kids, and how THEY feel.

Free range parents are not neglectful at all. Most work hard to provide for their family, which sometimes means coming home later. When I was growing up, me and my siblings learned to cook, do laundry, clean, and pick up after ourselves by the time were 6-7 years old. Coming home after school and no parents home from work yet, was normal to us. As was the routine that if they weren’t home yet, and dinner wasn’t made, we made dinner for ourselves. Of course it wasn’t a full on meal, but breakfast food is good anytime you have it. lol ie. eggs, bacon or sausage, oatmeal, even cereal. We ate, we got full, we did our homework. Then we’d go out to play with our friends…outside, sometimes even after the light posts went on. We learned to be street smart at a very early age, and we kept that with us as we got older. We had far more confidence, and self esteem than most kids our age. And we were also far more capable of taking care of things by ourselves. I instill those same core values and knowledge with my own. And I see the difference between them, and over protected kids. I also sometimes even see the envy in some of the parents eyes, when they see me with my kids, and how they are. Because I’m not constantly paying attention, being paranoid, and panicking at every little thing. Some have even asked me how come I’m not stressed out with my kids doing things on their own. I tell them, they understand (I know they do), but they let their fears over power them. It’s not the kids, it’s the parents. The kids just have to pay for the parents’ fears. Which is extremely unfair and cruel of the parents to put their own feelings ahead of their children’s. And no matter how they justify it in their heads, they all know they are in the wrong. Just because your a parent, doesn’t make you right all the time.

*whistles* Brad! Brad, please come back! We need clarification! LOL

@Sarah, maybe your community is light-years ahead in terms of reverse 911, but I work for the agency that does it in my community and it certainly isn’t free (think taxpayer dollars, equipment costs, personnel costs, etc). And, while it may take “less than a minute to activate” it takes significantly longer than that to set up the area to be called, program it, and record the message.

Erics: Being free range has ZERO to do with being a working parent versus a stay at home parent. That is doing a huge disservice to all the stay at home parents out there. If you or your kids were latch key kids that is all fine and dandy but that does not make your parents any more free range than the stay at home mother who allows her kids to go down to the corner store and buy something alone or lets her kids play alone outside, etc. Both can be equally free range. If I have to work a job and never be home and not see my kids as much to be a free range parents than I guess I would rather not be free range.

Thanks, Dolly, but I don’t “feel bad.” I was just explaining the circumstance to gramomster — how it’s possible to be comfortable with the downtown, but just find little call to be there and therefore not be exposed to specifically urbanized issues. But really, thanks. 🙂

I don’t think the parents overreacted. I think the police overreacted. I think a robocall alerting the entire town is an overreaction. I simply disagreed with you that is it is unreasonable to not call the police after a child is missing for 2 hours – meaning the only reasonable response would be to call the police.

I don’t, however, see a point in filling in blanks in any story with only one set of possible facts and believing that must be the case. It’s not being judgmental to say that we have no idea what happened and A is as possible as B. Yes, it is totally possible that the parents exhausted every avenue to find their child themselves before calling the police. It is equally possible that they did not and simply called the police. I see no reason to choose one interpretation over the other based on the facts that we have. I don’t know the parents so I’m not going to assume that they are reasonable or not.

Cheryl, you hit another element to all this fear right on the head. The Nancy Grace “Blame Game”. I do believe (know for a fact) that many parents are sociologically gripped in worst-case-scenario-fear. It is shoved down their throats both with sledgehammer media soundbites and a more insidious subliminal intrusion…and it is taken as outright gospel. But equally troubling is the fear that SHOULD something happen to their kids (even a tragic household or traffic accident) then they will be subject to unspeakable gossip and accusation – by authorities and neighbors alike. Definitely an internal self-preservation. And the way we see parents attacked in the media (and subsequent comment pages) when something happens, who can blame them. Talk about a double does of paranoia.

The monitor for a 10 yr old is an example of a greater pathology that is troubling this country. But these fears are so generally unfounded. Perceived “stranger danger” as opposed to genuine danger occurrence, to wit: how many kids are killed by house fires each year as opposed to the rare home invasion stranger abductions? And how many of the homes destroyed and lives lost had baby monitors…perhaps even security cameras?

Paranoid parents WILL produce paranoid kids. The apple from the tree, if you will. Watch the kind of laws that are surely to come from this generation. All will be suspect. Eric Arthur Blair (Orwell) may have underestimated how bad this could become.

I believe we ought to stay out of how someone raises their kids. After all, by today’s standards any “baby boomer” parent would be now deemed a horrible – even dangerous – parent for the way we all were raised and the freedom to roam and learn for ourselves that we all enjoyed.

If I started getting automated phone calls every time some kid in my city was missing for a couple of hours, I’d stop answering the phone when that number showed up.

It might sound heartless but that’s reality and I’d be willing to bet that many parents would just start ignoring the calls if they became a daily occurrence.

Jennifer: see that is what I don’t get. Car accidents and childhood accidents are things that do happen everyday to everybody. I am way more cautious when it comes to those type of things than worrying about someone abducting my kids or molesting them or attacking us.

A friend of mine brought to my attention this website. I did not know anything about this site and to be honest I had only thought about the term “free range” as applied to chickens. However, from reading the description on your site, I am a free range mom, I guess. My kids go to library, school, friend’s home, and parks by themselves quite frequently. (After around age 8, at least.) We are very involved in our neighborhood and community. The reason I am commenting now and that my friend showed me this site is because it was my child, I believe you are talking about. My 11 year old was told to be home at a certain time, 2:00pm, and did not show up, which was very much out of character. This can be concerning, because my child has asthma. We called everyone we could think of and drove around looking for almost 2 hours before we called the police. Thankfully, we recieved a call from the hospital right after this. He had been biking along some trails in a nearby park and had an asthma attack and had lost his inhailer. (He thought it might have fallen out of his pocket.) Thankfully someone came across him after some time, (who we did not know), and called for an ambulance. They were able to take him to the hospital and he is doing fine now. Actually the automated phone call system did not get a chance to do anything to help our child. The hospital called at that time out of coincidence. But of course right after we recieved the call, the officer at our home canceled the automated calls. Now you know the whole story. I would like to thank the few people on this site who chose to take the higher ground and not judge us when they had no facts. As for the rest, I hope you will be more compassionate in the future. Even though I will be continuing my “free range” ways, I will not be participating in this site, as it seems to be entirely too judgemental of others. We can show examples of being community connected and pass the word around without passing judgement on others.

No one is judging anyone, Rebecca… Anne. The entire point is to guard against living in total panic that that type of occurrence is as common as a trip to the mall. While certainly horrifying to those it happens to, the fact is that It IS an anomaly.

I had a friend whose young son was killed when a large truck tire fell off a flatbed and crashed through their windshield. Should I not let my kids anywhere near a car because, well…IT COULD HAPPEN? Sounds extreme, but that is becoming a conventional – albeit regrettable – thought pattern. I could totally understand if my friend was to be real jittery about driving his other kids around due to to what happened. I can’t walk in his shoes. I can only walk in mine, and I choose not to let fear rule.

Stranger abductions are extremely rare, but that doesn’t stop the Chicken Little Society from there daily rounds. Spider bites, down tree limbs, bicycle accidents, trip and fall resulting in severe head injuries… so many scenarios that lurk around every real world turn, yet we give them little or no thought. If we did afford them the kind of thought we save for the strangers on the mind we wouldn’t ever leave the house. Stranger danger has become a national psychosis. Serious mental issue. Fear will do that. And as long as “it COULD happen” means “it WILL happen” in the minds of many of today’s parents, the fear will only intensify. All the people here are trying to do is create a sane environment where fear doesn’t rule the roost.

I, like all, are glad your two events turned out ok and your children were fine.

And as long as we’re talking about being judged, let us not forget that the founder of this site was referred to as “the worst mom in the world.”

Thanks for letting us know the circumstances. I am glad your son was okay. I said it would depend on the circumstances to know if this was overkill or not and in your case, it wasn’t. I have an asthmatic child as well as another special needs child and like you, I have more cause to be worried if my children go missing since they are a little more fragile than other kids.

“The whole story that started these posts was about why it was overreacting to call the police after your 11 year old is missing for 2 hours.”

Not exactly. Here’s the the original writer’s complaint:

“That’s right, he was missing for TWO WHOLE HOURS before the police called every single person in the city, asking for any information whatsoever regarding his whereabouts.”

She was complaining about the quick reaction time of the police, not about the parents’ reaction.

So, no judging of parents in sight, but rather a complaint about a perceived excessive police procedure. And I think in light of the “whole story,” that complaint continues to have validity. Would it not make more sense to check medical facilities when you have an unexpectedly missing child with a known health problem before sucking the entire community’s resources into a hunt for a kid who was actually *not out in the community?*

“Would it not make more sense to check medical facilities when you have an unexpectedly missing child with a known health problem before sucking the entire community’s resources into a hunt for a kid who was actually *not out in the community?*

Pentamom, that’s a bit harsh, don’t you think? We can always look back as afterthoughts on what we shoud have done differently. (A child drowns and why didn’t the mother watch him closer?) Besides, who says she didn’t call the hospital first but he was not there yet? She didn’t say either way. Also from what she said, he WAS out in the community for a while, at least before taken to the hospital. Again, let’s not ASSUME anything. Besides, she was not “sucking the whole community’s resources”, or anywhere close to it. Google “A Child is Missing” and research it for yourself. It is a COMPLETELY free program offered to communities. Your community pays NOTHING for it. One officer is all that is needed to activate this automated service. That’s it. It’s actually more productive and less expensive than sending several officers out scouring the neighborhood.

“When did having a different opinion become synonymous with judging someone? Seems that no matter how it is worded, if the comment is not “Oh, I agree 110%” then it’s judgmental, amongst other things.”

Socalledauthor, this does not have to do with opinions. This has to do with judging someone’s circumstance unfairly without facts. If you read through the comments, you’ll find many of them (not all) were saying how ridiculous it was to call the police after two hours and how ridiculous it was to have automated phone calls put out. However AFTER we found out the details, I think most everyone agreed in this situation it was a good thing. There’s nothing wrong with stating an opinion on something you know the details about, but when we have little to no information about the situation, then it becomes wrong. Can you imagine thinking you are doing a great job teaching your children to be self sufficient and giving them the old fashioned childhood they deserve and then to have something bad happen and find out through a friend that the very people who should be supporting your way of raising your child, (free range parents), are taking your situation and assuming your are an overprotective helicopter mother who freaks out when her child is out of her site for 2 hours? I would think it would hurt. I’m also sure it’s a very real possibility that this poor woman has gotten criticism from others who don’t believe in a free range phylosophy telling her that she should have kept her fragile child closer and not let him out alone. She just can’t win either way. 🙁

“It is a COMPLETELY free program offered to communities. Your community pays NOTHING for it.”

That is physically impossible. Someone has to pay for everything that occurs that requires time and technology, unless you manage to get the electric and phone companies to work for free and have an all-volunteer police force and staff. If someone other than “your community” is paying for it, you are still sucking up someone’s resources, and probably eventually your own, in the form of taxes to some higher level of government.

My point wasn’t that they should have known that the child wasn’t in the community. But here’s the situation: you have a child with a known health problem. You have police who should have a protocol in a situation like this. Which makes more sense as a protocol in a case like this: first, check medical facilities to see if anything is known about the child, or first, contact thousands of people, 99.9% of whom won’t know anything, even if a couple do?

It just seems obvious that FIRST, you check the health facilities. In fact, that’s what people used to do on their own if loved ones on the road weren’t heard from — start calling the hospitals. IOW, first, you check all the possibilities that are reasonable given the circumstances. There should be a protocol different from, “The first thing we do is cast a wide, untargeted net.” As others have said, if you make this the first response every time, people stop listening to the messages out of fatigue or a sense that they’re run of the mill.

And as for “sucking up resources,” it’s simply a fact of human nature that if everyone is attuned to looking for amassing child that chances are they will have no contact with (whether they’re aware of that or not), there are other things they won’t be doing/noticing/prepared for. Is it likely to create some kind of nightmare scenario? No, it’s not. But the cost has to take these kinds of factors into consideration. There is no free lunch, either economically, or with citizens’ and a police force’s time, energy, and attention.

And it would not have had to be done if someone had thought, “There’s a missing child with a medical problem. First, call the hospitals, THEN put out a general alert.”

“It just seems obvious that FIRST, you check the health facilities.”

I agree with this. If I had a child missing, I’d hope that that’d be one of the the places on my list to check before calling in the police and should clearly be the first place the police check before notifying an entire town 99.9% of whom will likely know nothing. I don’t have a child with asthma or any other medical issues but the likelihood of my child getting hit by a car, falling off her bike or being seriously injured in some way, while very low, is still monumentally higher than her being a victim of something that requires police attention.

A worried parent can certainly be excused for overlooking an obvious place to look and defaulting to the police. The police should have procedures that require contacting places where the child likely can be found before sending out the bat signal to the entire city (thus getting half the people in a panic that there may be some crazed pedophile out there stealing children since that seems to be where many minds go first when a child is missing).

Thanks for sharing Anna! I’m sorry for all your family has had to go through and we’re so glad your little boy is safe! 🙂

Anna, again, I, at least, and I think most people here, weren’t saying *you* were over-reacting.

We were saying the police’s response of an immediate robo-call was not warranted. And remember, *it didn’t help,* so if you realize that we’re not criticizing you, I hope you don’t feel the need to defend it.

I never suggested *you* didn’t call the hospitals, but I would still contend that another alert should have been sent directly to the hospitals *by the police* before it was broadcast to the community — the police have the means to do that faster and more thoroughly than you do. If Sarah’s description that it takes only a very small amount of time to set up and issue a robocall is correct, then the likelihood is extremely high that the hospital would have responded positively to a police call before they had a chance to call you eventually.

I know a lot higher percentage of people with landline phones than Donna does, but even given everything she said, here’s the other kicker — since it’s a landline, you have to be home *and* able/willing to answer it for it to do any good.

So I think it’s fair to question whether robocalls, which sound like a good idea, justify the expense. Remember, even donations are money that could have been used more effectively, if in fact the thing they’re being used for isn’t efficient.

Anna, I totally believe you belong here. 🙂 I think most comments are going to be meant *in general* and not always going to apply to individual situations. Lenore is very supportive of parents doing what works best for them given the options they have, with tools to try and change those options (no sidewalks = install sidewalks; “walking school buses” as examples of barriers to walking or riding to school).

I’m very glad your son was found and that these strangers were willing to help! Lenore has shared a past story where a man in England, out of fear of being accused as a molester, didn’t stop to help a very small child and she ended up drowned.

Please do stick with us. We may get loud and vehement, but we’re all after the same goal. 🙂

Anna,

Thank you so much for coming here and sharing.

Reading your posts reminds me about point often made here about Free Ranging, we have the right to trust ourselves and our children and to make the right choices for our situations.

You responded great. Your kid is safe. If that first person had not come to his aid, the robocall did offer one lead, so that potentially worked.

As mother of asthmatic 2 year old that wants to free range, I’m glad to know there are parents out there from whom I can learn.