At The End of a Long Day – Mommy Blogger

10/15/2018

Teri Parkhurst is a mom to a beautiful one-year-old boy and loves the joy and the challenges being a parent brings. Luckily, she has an amazing partner who helps her figure it all out. When she’s not busy with her little family, she works as a marketing and communications professional.

 My son turned one on September 17, and I went back to work the day after his first birthday.

I’ve written before about this major milestone—the end of maternity leave and the beginning of daycare. It was everything I thought it would be, full of mixed emotions and even a few tears here and there from my little man, who isn’t much of a crier. But on those days there were tears, as soon as I left (our amazing daycare worker assured me) he very quickly recovered and returned to his regular self. She marveled at what a happy baby he is, and talked about his amazing giggles. Aside from a cold that he caught almost immediately, followed up a few weeks later with an eye infection, the transition to daycare has gone as smoothly as possible.

Of course, smooth doesn’t mean it’s been easy. Work has kept me busy and days have been flying by. And it’s tiring, having to converse in intelligent sentences and produce work that’s coherent and useful, and participate in meetings and wear heels and top that all off with getting a little person ready to go, and dropping him off and picking him up on either end of my regular work day.

Luckily, at the end of these new long days, I have found a new favourite thing. A new best moment. Each day, I get to the daycare and park out front, and go in the side door. Usually a couple of kiddos poke their heads around the corner to see whose mom or dad is there, but my little guy isn’t old enough to notice or care yet that anyone is coming in. So I get to walk in and stand at the doorway to the playroom, and wait for him to notice me.

And then—the moment! I get to see his little face light up with recognition, and watch him scoot across the carpet as fast as his hands and knees will carry him, right over to his mama. And I get to pick him up and bask in his smile and give him a kiss on his sweet-smelling head. And then I get to take him home.

It might not sound like much to some, but I bet there are lots of moms and dads who know exactly what I mean. No matter what my day entails, I know I have that moment to look forward to. And it’s a moment that can’t be beat.