The Smile That Ends My Day

Returning to work almost a month ago was definitely very hard to do.  Nathan and I had grown close and were used to our routine of having to be nowhere at no specific time (other than appointments of course).  I was anxious about thrusting him into a whole new routine and new environment---daycare.  I had so many questions spinning in my head.  Would it remind him of the orphanage and terrify him that I was "taking him back"?  Did he bond with me well enough to remember that I am his mother and not the women at daycare?  Would he quickly learn that I would come back for him each time and would he even care that I come back?

The first day of dropping him off at daycare was of course traumatic---for the both of us.  We had visited several times before the "big day" but that was different from me leaving him.  On that first day, and the next two weeks to follow, he cried and screamed when I left.  Thankfully this lessened each time after the first few days.  On the start of the third week he willingly left my arms and waved goodbye.  I was thrilled that he knew I would be back but also heartbroken that he could "do without me."  I think I cried leaving as much that day as the first!

The payback to all of this, however, is the greeting I get when I return at the end of the day.  Whether he is across the room or sitting at the table eating a snack, when he sees me he gets the most heartwarming, biggest smile on his face and barrels across the room into my arms.  Often times he is also giggling uncontrollably.  This makes even the worst of my days seem so insignificant.

I have often imagined what that little boy is thinking when he runs to me, smiling that beautiful smile.  This is a child who was abandoned and raised in an orphanage for the first fifteen months of his life.  He had no one person to call his own.  He had no one person to claim him as theirs.  Now he does.  I believe he sees me arrive and thinks "That is MY mommy and she is taking ME home---AGAIN!

"That is MY mommy and I am HER son!"



Leaving the orphanage in Ethiopia