Tales from the Crib

After being in daycare for six months, my daughter has began — again — screaming and clinging to me when I leave. Really, it’s almost unbearable.

This is the girl who still immediately runs up to knock on the daycare door, giggles as we arrive and plays and dances all day with her friends and cries a little when we leave. We had just gotten into a great routine.

But something has changed. I’m not ashamed to admit that last week was the very first day I cried the whole way to work. I just felt something was wrong if she was reacting that strongly to my departure. Maybe she was sick and needed a little extra love and time with her mom!

Then our daycare director told me it was common for toddlers to go through a second stage of separation anxiety.

What?? That is completely not fair. We just got over round one of separation anxiety (hers and mine), and drop-offs just started going smoothly. Things were going so well that Nate and I had my mom babysit while we had our first child-free dinner since Anika’s birth 17 months ago.

And now it’s back? Separation anxiety again? I better start to toughen up because this stage is news to me. I’ve never heard of a second round of separation anxiety, but now I hear it’s normal.

Even if it’s normal, it’s still not fair.  Now I'm the one who wants to scream and stomp her feet each morning!