Apologies for not being clear and for disappearing (time zones!)

So the situation would be something like this:

A 7/8 year old be would be throwing a tantrum because I hadn’t got my way or been told off. I would get upset and say “you don’t love me, I’m going to run away!”. (I think runaways were a common theme on tv back then). I don’t think I ever thought I wasn’t loved, I was just trying to guilt trip my mother and get my own way! I once packed up a little rucksack with a torch and not much else. I thought I might go to the park and sleep under a bush, but of course I didn’t go. All this to me seems standard childish tantrum stuff.

My mother’s response would be one of incredulity: “YOU’RE running away? I’LL run away”. With the sentiment being she had more reason to run away, what with putting up with me. I don’t remember feeling the panic after this, just concern that she would do this. In addition to knowing she had “running away money” it didn’t seem a bad assumption.

By the time I was a teenager I think I was confident that running away wasn’t really something a mum did. Maybe I then invented other ways she might disappear/abandon me.