Melissa Lorch got eight hours' sleep for the first time in five months on Thursday night.
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It's been about a month since her son, 10-year-old Charlie, escaped from her Buninyong home in the early morning and wandered onto the road.
Charlie, who lives with a disability - he's non-verbal and has a history of absconding - was spotted on the Midland Highway by a quick-thinking bus driver, taking a crew down to a regatta in Geelong.
Gold Bus driver David Hustwaite turned his bus around at the roundabout, pulling over to rescue the boy after a truck swerved to miss him.
The incident was the latest in a series of escapes, which had driven Ms Lorch to her wits' end.
After applying repeatedly for NDIS funding to increase security in her house, the agency finally came through - last week, the finishing touches were put on an integrated digital security system.
The difference between the week of the rescue and now is astonishing, and Ms Lorch still can't quite believe it.
The new system includes a fingerprint scanner for the front door, and alarms on all the windows, which is also connected to Ms Lorch's smartphone.
For a child that can remember safe combinations to access keys, and strips his clothes to remove GPS trackers, this will make a huge difference.
"I don't have to be in the same room as him all the time - I've never had that before with him ever," she said.
"We have (sensors) like a smoke alarm detector that go off, and there's also a handheld one, so if go outside to put the washing on the line, I've got it on me and it'll go bang."
Charlie's excursions, and the need for constant supervision, have taken a toll on the entire family, she added, and the peace of mind that the new system will provide will help each of his siblings as well.
"I'm hoping, from the kids' point of view, they have a bit more of a normal childhood," Ms Lorch said.
"It highlights that its not normal for a child to go off to school in the morning after searching for their sibling for half an hour, it's not normal to constantly check and double check doors and lock themselves in a house, a 12-year-old shouldn't have to think of locking the door behind them and think 'where's my brother?'
"I hope they get a bit of normalcy back without that anxiety behind it."
Mr Hustwaite also seemed relieved that there's a positive ending for the story.
"We're just so pleased there's been a good outcome and we've been able to get that help and the system in," he said.
"It was confronting, for Melissa on the day, and for us, but we were new to it, she's had to live with the problem for so long.
"I had to drive to Geelong twice that day and thought nothing of it because you're working, then it hit me like a tonne of bricks when I got home that night - I kept thinking, did that really happen?"
He added it will be good for Charlie to have more independence, noting he seems much calmer now.
Ms Lorch agreed, noting he'll have more freedom within the house.
"A week since installation started, I've just been thinking my boy is safe," she said.
"It's a restraint that's giving him safe freedom, instead of being locked in the bedroom, and I'm just floored, I never would have left him out of my eyesight (before).
"He's set-up in a way that he can have access to things and we're not stopping him from going into certain rooms because that window doesn't have a certain screw on it, or because we can't see him from there."
She also extended her thanks to the Buninyong community, and said she was humbled by the support.
"Places like EasyTec, Pinarc, Grampians Disability Advocacy, everyone has had this 'my goodness, are you okay' type attitude," she said.
Charlie himself seems quite taken with the new system so far, especially the fingerprint scanner.
"It's quite funny to see him put his finger in it and say 'beep beep', because it won't make the beep for him," Ms Lorch said, laughing.
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