10
Loading video...
By Jack Beresford
Senior Reporter
0
Share
Newsweek is a Trust Project member
See more of our trusted coverage when you search.Prefer Newsweek on Googleto see more of our trusted coverage when you search.
A mom has revisited the terrifying moment her 3-year-old son slipped out the front door at 4 a.m. and wandered into the darkness.
Britt, a mother of three from Indiana who asked for her last name to be omitted from this story, has watched the security camera footage of what her son Brooks, 3, did that night countless times.
"We had moved him from a crib to a big-boy bed, and he would always come to our room in the middle of the night," Britt told Newsweek.
Read More on Life
The challenges they were facing are not uncommon. According to the 2024 C.S. Mott Children's Hospital National Poll on Children's Health, 43 percent of parents of children ages 1 to 6 said their child moves into their bed during the night.
On this particular night, however, there was an issue. When Brooks went to snuggle with mom and dad, he discovered they were not in bed.
"That particular night, we were changing the sheets on our bed, so we were lying on the couch in our upstairs loft watching a movie and fell asleep," Britt said.
"Our son then came from his bedroom to our room, saw we were not there, and proceeded to go outside and look for us."
Though the front door was locked, Britt and her husband had not yet fully turned in for the night, meaning the alarm they usually set before going to bed had not been activated.
Britt said it's not uncommon for Brooks to step outside the house, as he did that night.
"When we're at home, since we work from home, he always wants to go outside and see if our car is gone," she said.
"So he unlocked our front door and went outside and, thank God, saw our car and turned around."
...
Britt said it was her husband who first woke up and heard Brooks crying. He went to find him and brought him back to snooze on the couch with mom and dad.
It wasn't until the next morning, when Britt checked the security camera footage from outside their front door, that she realized what he had done.
"My reaction was pure horror. I was so scared that happened," she said. "I was so upset that we didn't set the alarm and, even though we've told him numerous times not to unlock the door, clearly he still had a mind of his own."
The incident prompted Britt and her husband to renew their childproofing efforts and add a higher lock to the door.
"I was just sick thinking about what could have happened and so thankful it didn't," she said.
However, she's now worried the higher lock could prevent Brooks from getting out of the house if he needed to in an emergency.
"It's just a constant battle of wanting to do right by your kid and not knowing the future or what's best to do," she said. "We continue to lock the door, we now have an automatic alarm that activates every night, and we've changed the lock to make it harder to unlock."
She thinks the experience scared Brooks enough that he won't be in a hurry to go outside again at night.
Britt also decided to post the security camera footage on social media in the hope that it encourages other parents to stay vigilant.
"I never imagined this could happen because our door was locked. I think that's what scared me the most," she said. "Toddlers learn how to do things so quickly, and sometimes you don't realize they're capable of something until they do it. If sharing this makes even one parent double-check their doors or think about an extra layer of protection, then I'm glad I did it."
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Rebecca Flood and Emma Lee-Sang
View 0 Comments
Submit Correction
View Editorial & AI Guidelines