Separation Anxiety

When we had to switch daycare providers a couple of months ago Cory and I made a deal. I would work a slightly earlier shift and pick Leila up from daycare in the afternoon, and Cory would work slightly later and drop her off. Every morning I leave Leila at home happy with her daddy and when I go to pick her up she spots me across the room and drops everything to run to me yelling, "Momma, Momma!" As you can see, this is a good arrangement...for me.
Today was a bad day for Daddy. He came to work and found this article about separation anxiety. It described how when babies get to be 6-9 months old, they start to realize that they are separate from you, and that scares them, but they get past it when they realize all the cool stuff they can do on their own. Then when 18 months rolls around and they are now more mobile, they start to get scared of what might happen to them. Leila is at this place. She is constantly torn between running off and trying new things and sticking close to mom and dad who protect her.
The example in the article was about a child waiting for an elevator with his Dad. The elevator comes, the Dad gets in expecting the child to follow, but the door shuts. The author is left standing next to the child. He describes the child's reaction as being like his father was swallowed up, never to return.
Cory sent me the article and I had to respond to him with, "I think Leila and I are going through the same phase."
I am currently terrified that everytime someone I care about leaves my sight, that I will never see them again. It is a sad state when you have to admit that you are in the same developmental phase as your 1 year old, but that is where I am. So, please, take care of yourselves.
Alright, so it seems that lately I have turned mommytolbc.blogspot.com into listentotriciapout.blogspot.com. I hope that years down the road when Leila is reading my thoughts about her childhood, she doesn't think I forgot to love and adore her during my rough spots.
The past few weeks Leila has brought a lot of joy to the Howard family. Here are a few recent pictures of our princess.

Here she is trying on her halloween costume. She loves the costume and she oinks at it, but if you suggest she put it on, she says, "no, no, no!"



Here she is reading a book with Daddy. She is showing Cory where her eye is.



And here she is this morning before school, so cute in her new jogging suit!