My Fourteen-Year-Old Ran Away and Refused to Come Home

I am being forced to rethink how I think things should be

Last Thursday I came home from walking the dog to find my fourteen-year-old niece, who has lived with us since she was one, had left home without permission.

At first, I wasn’t sure that she had run away. She has been pretty wayward this last year and often stays out much later than our agreed on curfew, without letting me know where she is or who she is with.

I worried for a few hours before deciding, on advice from the social services, to report her missing to the police.

I finally fell into a restless sleep where I dreamt I saw her lying on the lower part of a bunk bed, reaching her hand out to me.

I reached mine out to her in response and saw in my hand a French loaf which she took and began to eat.

I woke up to find it was around 4 am and she was still not home.

I went through all the stages of grief – disbelief, rage, (oh the RAGE!) bargaining, guilt, then acceptance.

After two days of calling and texting all her friends I have access to, police Interviews and visits from the social services, I finally discovered she was with a friend (whom I don’t know) about ten miles away.

But we still didn’t know exactly where she was. It took terse hours of further painstaking negotiation before we received news that she’d contacted my brother and her siblings; the relief was overwhelming.

For now, it’s been agreed she will stay with her older sister for a couple of days until we work out what to do next.

What I learned

No matter what we think we know or don’t know, we are not in control of other people- not even the children in our charge. This is especially true when they start transitioning to adulthood.

Life is unfolding as it should. I tried so hard to make her into the person I thought she ‘could’ be. I could not succeed. She is who she is meant to be, in all her glorious imperfection. Just like the rest of us.

My other children ‘behaved’ – why couldn’t she? Every child is different and to compare is to despair, that’s why.

It was always pointless holding up her cousins, even if it was only in my own mind, as an example. She’s not them.

I recalled the struggles we had last summer when her behaviour got so challenging I had to call in help from ‘my village’.

I had to reach the point of acceptance. I had to let go of what could be is and embrace what it is.

It was sobering to re-read On Children (Kahlil Gibran, 1883–1931) over the weekend and to be reminded that “we can give them our love but not our thoughts/they have their own thoughts.”

Perhaps the greatest gift I got was the love, prayers and support from family and friends. From the cousin who gave up her morning to drive me to the other side of London and search empty streets, to the endless messages that poured in, I was nurtured and held together by it all.

I particularly loved the video my daughter from another mother shared with me.

It’s true, we don’t know what natural occurrences are ‘good’ or ‘bad’, no matter what we think.

As I moved into the evening of the third day of my errant teenager, went missing, I felt grateful she was now safe. I reflected that despite my every effort, I’ve been unable to stop my niece wanting what she wants and being with who she wants to be. And I made peace with that.

I ate a meal with my husband; broke bread, drank wine, and spent the rest of the evening playing scrabble. Then I went to bed and had the most peaceful sleep I’d had in three nights.

What the future holds

This morning I’ve learned that my niece has said she doesn’t want to come back home – though where she wants to go isn’t clear either.

That is not what I want; I want her to return, to go back to school and to continue growing into the fully-fledged young person I know she has the potential to be.

Life is unfolding as it should. I tried so hard to make her into the person I thought she ‘could’ be. I could not succeed. She is who she is meant to be, in all her glorious imperfection. Just like the rest of us.

Bur, she will do that wherever she goes. That much I know and accept.

As we move into whatever the next phase may bring, I remain grateful for the time I had with a beautiful young soul struggling to find her place in the world. And I send her wishes of love, hope, peace and safety.

©️marla bishop 2020

Marla Bishop is a writer and relationship coach specialising in helping others live lives they totally love. She lives in London UK with her husband and youngest two children. You can read more of her writings here: Lilith