"Missing"

*This blog is not about JA rather it is about how scary our afternoon was. I simply needed to get it out*



Have you ever thought about how you would feel should your child go "missing"? You watch the news and you hear about missing kids and your heart sinks because you think to yourself  "I have no idea how I would ever react should that happen to my family". Today I got to learn exactly how I would react.

Jackson is going to Summer Reading Camp at his school this year. I take him in the morning and he rides the bus home. I figured it was perfect for him to know what things will be like come August when school is back in session and Shawn is at a different school. When school is in session, the kids are usually home about 25-30 min. after they are released and the bus stop is two streets down. So today, the first day of reading camp, I figured the same. They are released at 1:25 so he should be dropped off two streets down from the house 25-30 min. later right? Wrong.

2pm rolls around and nothing. No bus, no Jackson, nothing. I was OK at that point because a storm had just went through so I figured wet roads, crappy drivers, later drop off time. At about 2:15 I called the school. I was told the busses were running late do to some mix ups but she took my name, Jackson's name, my number and then asked me what bus number he rode. Ummm I have no idea because I was never told that information!! She said no problem, that she could get the bus number and she would call me back. 15 min later, at 2:30, Jackson was still not home and she had not called me back.

I called the school again, this time my voice was less calm and I was going into panic mode. A different woman answers the phone and asks me to hold on because she is going to call transportation to she what she can find out. She came back on the line TWICE and asked me if Jackson was home yet, I said no both times and we could both hear the worry in each others voices now.  The third time she came back on the phone it wasn't her but a different woman who asked if she could call me back. What was I going to say? No? I said ok and began to pace my front yard. I called my mom in law and that helped a bit.

My child was over an hour late at this point and NO ONE knew where he was. I kept getting "he has to be on the bus" but no one knew that for sure. All those thoughts crept into my head, what if he is hurt? What is he has been kidnapped? WHERE IS HE?! 3pm, give or take, and the school calls me back. He is on the bus, and bus driver missed some stops but she is working her way back. I let out THE biggest sigh of relieve.  I called my mom in law back and told her he was accounted for and I would call when he was standing infront of me.

3:15pm my cell rings again and this time it's the bus driver herself. She is on 436 by the Chuck -e- Cheese and wants to know how to get to our house. Are you SERIOUS?!?!?!?! So calmly I give her directions and when I get to the part where I tell her to turn down the street to get to our street she says "We were over there, I dropped off a student right there". So I said well here's the thing, I was never told what bus number let alone WHERE THE STOP WOULD BE! Jackson and I both assumed that the stop would be where it normally is and that I had told Jackson his brother would meet him there. She says ok, that she is sorry and she will drop him off at the stop where she dropped off the other student.

I called the school back and started to tell the office staff that he was on his way home and then I was asked to hold because the asst. principal wanted to speak with me. Turns out he was about a second away from calling Longwood PD because he felt that transportation was dragging their feet on the whole thing. I explained everything to him and he apologized over and over again. Then he asks if the bus driver is dropping him off at the bus stop or the school, I said at the bus stop and he said that transportation told him that she would be dropping him off at the school. I told him that if that happened to call me, I would come get him, and then he asked for a phone call should the bus driver drop him off at the bus stop.

 Shawn and I then went to the bus stop and waited for Jackson to get there. 4pm he was safe in my car, two and a half hours AFTER he was released from school. That was the longest 2 and 1/2 hours of my life. The not knowing was horrible. Oh and come to find out, when the bus driver stopped at the bus stop Jackson got upset and said he didn't know how to get home from there. So the bus driver decided to just take him with her and finish out the route. Why she didn't use her cell phone to call her manager and let her/him know of the situation is beyond me.

In the end, he made it home, safe and sound, but believe me when I say that I NEVER want to feel that level of worry again.