Mother says her autistic son, 9, died after she accidentally unlocked car and he ran out into traffic
An Irish woman recently opened up about how she had blamed herself for the death of her autistic son. The boy was killed after she hit the wrong button on her car key and he ran out into oncoming traffic.
On September 20, 2018, Janice Bradley, 35, from Maghera, County Londonderry, was on her way home with her nine-year-old son Daniel when she decided to stop at a service station to grab some milk. Since she would only be gone a few minutes, she decided to lock Daniel in the car. She buckled him into his seat and handed him a phone so he could watch a lumberjack video.
"I was standing at the fridges when I heard my car alarm going off. Fumbling for my key, I pressed the lock button to stop the noise. Moments later I heard a scuffle at the front of the shop. There was Daniel. I must have hit the button to unlock the car by accident," Daily Mail reported.
She added, "I called to him in my special singsong voice, trying to keep him calm, but he grabbed a troll glow stick from a display near the counter and bolted back out of the door as the shopkeeper shouted after him."
Bradley quickly rushed to the front of the shop, explained to the shopkeeper that her son had autism and that she would fetch him back before heading to the door. There she was stopped by a woman who told her that a young boy had met with an accident outside. Fearing the worst, the mother ran across the forecourt where there was a commotion and a woman was crouching over a body on the tarmac, administering CPR.
"I screamed Daniel's name. He was flat on his back, with one trainer on and the other at the side of the road," Bradley recalled.
Daniel ran out in front of a car being driven by an off-duty nurse. The nurse had started to resuscitate him. However, it was too late as he had suffered a massive head injury. The paramedics arrived and he was declared dead at the scene.
She said that over the years she had struggled to raise a child with autism. She said that lessons that children usually learned on their way to adulthood were not grasped by her son.
"When Daniel got upset or panicked, he had a tendency to bolt. I rarely took him out without safety reins strapping his wrist to mine. I often worried that one day he'd get the better of me," she said. "He was particularly naïve around traffic – I tried so many times to teach him the green cross code, telling him to look left and right, but he just couldn't grasp that roads could be dangerous."
Bradley added that she felt it was important to share the story of her loss so that it resonates with other parents who are attempting to raise children with special needs.
"I needed eyes in the back of my head. It took some time and some counseling, but I've finally stopped blaming myself for Daniel's death," she said. "I'm telling his story to raise awareness of how tough and lonely it can be to parent a child with autism. So many people just don't understand their needs or why they might react differently."