ID Helps for our Nonverbal Wanderers

As an autism mom, I'm grateful for products out there to help us mommies who are worried about our kids getting lost.  I know I recently addressed this when I was talking about big kid harnesses, but I just wanted to share a couple of other ideas.

First thing's first, an easy way to keep kids safe on family outings is to just write the necessary info on the back of their shirt.  Here's an example:

A similar idea that I find super cool can be found at https://www.qrcodeid.org/.  Basically, this website has a bunch of products with a scannable code, including shirts, bags, etc.  You register your child with the code, then if they are found while wearing the code, all someone would have to do is scan it on their phone to get the information needed to get your child safely back home.  I think this is a great idea, especially if you don't want the world to see your phone number, like they would in the shirts above.

There are some pretty high-tech products out there.  An example would be GPS bracelets.  These can be found at http://www.lifeprotekt.com/autism-community/.  We tried this once, but it was hard for us because the bracelet BUGGED Garrett, and wasn't worth his unhappiness, but if your child will tolerate it and has a big problem with wandering, it might be worth taking a look at.

Autism Speaks has a whole page dedicated to safety.  There are links to a bunch of great products on that site as well: http://www.autismspeaks.org/family-services/resource-library/safety-products

Some of my favorites are the Kid Safety Band 

These temporary tattoos are a great idea.  I tried them in the past, and I couldn't get my kids to hold still long enough to actually write our phone number on them.  They might now though.  If not, though, they have kits where you can custom order them with your phone number already on.  A couple websites for these tattoos are: http://safetytat.com/ or http://www.tattooswithapurpose.com/

They also have the link to the IDSafe Child Kits:

 "Each child safety kit includes forms to document each child’s medical and personal information, including allergies and medications, blood type, height, weight, hair and eye color, birth date, a dental chart for primary and secondary teeth, a 10-finger fingerprint chart with a safe, non-toxic ink strip, instructions for obtaining a DNA hair sample with a heavy gauge storage bag, two Safe Shoes Child IDÔ labels, two pages of comprehensive safety tips, and a chart to denote any unique physical features."

If you are like me, these are a little intimidating and kind of morbid, but they are important because they help law enforcement in identify your missing child.