Let's hear it for the Met!
Hi everyone,
Thought you might like to hear about my husband's little escapade yesterday.
I left him at home (can do so quite safely for a few hours during the day) at midday to go and do some Christmas shopping. Got home at 2.30, to find a note saying that he had gone out and would be back by 3. (I should mention that he has been going out on his own less and less in recent months and usually only for a brief bus ride to buy a paper and home again.
As the afternoon wore on, and it got dark, I moved from slightly concerned to rather anxious to very worried to verging on frantic. At 6 o'clock I phoned the police. They took the details and said they would send an officer round but they had a lot of calls to deal with.
An hour or so later, the officer I had spoken to phoned to apologise for the delay and to say someone was now on their way. She was very understanding and kept me fully informed of what steps they had taken to start looking for him.
Two officers arrived shortly afterwards, who talked through where he might have gone and reassured me that, in almost all cases, the missing person arrives home five minutes after the police have left. They were very sympathetic and helpful.
Guess what? Five minutes after they had left to scour the neighbouring streets and High Street they were back with husband in tow. They had found him a couple of streets away, presumably on his way home. He had been "missing" for over six hours.
I know it's easy to say after the event, but I knew he would turn up all right and I also knew that the most frustrating thing (for me) would be that he would not remember where he had been all that time. Not only could he not remember, he was most put out at the suggestion that he had been gone so long. Wanted to know why I hadn't phoned him. "You haven't got a phone", I told him. "Well, what about your phone?" "I've got my phone", and so on in one of our familiar circular conversations.
As soon as the police had gone, he could not remember that they had been, and brought him home in a police car!
I talked this over with someone on the AS helpline, and they suggested that, unless this sort of thing became a regular event, I shouldn't try and stop my husband going out (as if I could) and everything was a case of weighing the risks.
Bets
PS Before anyone suggests my husband having a mobile phone, I tried that 18 months ago. He simply could not understand how to use it (he could have phoned home pressing only two buttons), nor could he hear/feel it when I rang him, so it would not have helped in locating him.
NB Someone, please tell me how to start a new thread! I didn't mean this to go on this thread but I can't seem to change it.
Hi everyone,
Thought you might like to hear about my husband's little escapade yesterday.
I left him at home (can do so quite safely for a few hours during the day) at midday to go and do some Christmas shopping. Got home at 2.30, to find a note saying that he had gone out and would be back by 3. (I should mention that he has been going out on his own less and less in recent months and usually only for a brief bus ride to buy a paper and home again.
As the afternoon wore on, and it got dark, I moved from slightly concerned to rather anxious to very worried to verging on frantic. At 6 o'clock I phoned the police. They took the details and said they would send an officer round but they had a lot of calls to deal with.
An hour or so later, the officer I had spoken to phoned to apologise for the delay and to say someone was now on their way. She was very understanding and kept me fully informed of what steps they had taken to start looking for him.
Two officers arrived shortly afterwards, who talked through where he might have gone and reassured me that, in almost all cases, the missing person arrives home five minutes after the police have left. They were very sympathetic and helpful.
Guess what? Five minutes after they had left to scour the neighbouring streets and High Street they were back with husband in tow. They had found him a couple of streets away, presumably on his way home. He had been "missing" for over six hours.
I know it's easy to say after the event, but I knew he would turn up all right and I also knew that the most frustrating thing (for me) would be that he would not remember where he had been all that time. Not only could he not remember, he was most put out at the suggestion that he had been gone so long. Wanted to know why I hadn't phoned him. "You haven't got a phone", I told him. "Well, what about your phone?" "I've got my phone", and so on in one of our familiar circular conversations.
As soon as the police had gone, he could not remember that they had been, and brought him home in a police car!
I talked this over with someone on the AS helpline, and they suggested that, unless this sort of thing became a regular event, I shouldn't try and stop my husband going out (as if I could) and everything was a case of weighing the risks.
Bets
PS Before anyone suggests my husband having a mobile phone, I tried that 18 months ago. He simply could not understand how to use it (he could have phoned home pressing only two buttons), nor could he hear/feel it when I rang him, so it would not have helped in locating him.
NB Someone, please tell me how to start a new thread! I didn't mean this to go on this thread but I can't seem to change it.
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