A Heartbreaking Goodbye

I have several other posts that are half-done, but I'm not in the mood to finish them right now. Therefore, for now, I'll just share this post from today...

It was absolutely heartbreaking to leave Shamrock today. I'll start with the good...

We had another wonderful and fun morning together. I put the shirt (with our family picture on it) on him, so he can hopefully wear it and look at it while we're away. We played with all sorts of toys in the playroom, but his favorites today were the piano, the kitchen, blocks, and looking in the mirror at his reflection with the red punch balloon. And oh yes, he liked wearing the Mickey Mouse ears on his head and the little drum around his neck!

He learned to say "uh oh" today, and at one point, he picked up a toy cell phone, put it up to his ear, and said, "Hello, Papa?" in Russian-so cute!

There was a bright blue spot on his forehead today over his cut from yesterday (will explain in another post). I guess it's antibiotic, but he looked pretty funny because it had smeared down his nose and across his forehead.

I gave Shamrock a juice box today, and he drank it all pretty quickly. At some point, I realized he had peed his pants, probably from all the juice he had. Whoops!

I brought him back to his group for lunch, and we got to sit together at our own table again. I tried to explain that his pants were wet, but his caretakers thought I meant that he needed a pad on his seat, so they gave him one. Today's meal was some sort of potato soup, bread, and noodles with beef. It's amazing how much a two year old can eat. After lunch, his caretakers sent him to the potty seat, and he started crying, probably because he had already gone potty! I was shooed away, and a few minutes later, they brought him out into the main room with dry pants and big smile on his face.

We then only had about five minutes before I had to go. We shared lots of hugs, banged the yellow punch balloon around, and soaked up our last moments together. I brought him back into the room where the kids eat and sleep and said, "Paka paka" (bye bye) as he walked inside. He turned around and ran back toward me for another big hug with a huge smile. Then I set him down, said goodbye again, and a caretaker told him to go to his bed (they take a nap after lunch). He obeyed, and I watched secretly from the door.

He sat in the middle of his bed, and his little bottom lip started trembling. Then he started crying the saddest little cry I've ever heard. I couldn't help myself-I ran over to him and gave him a big hug. I pointed to the picture I had taped above his bed and told him that his Mama and Papa would be back soon. Then I had to go, but I will never be able to erase the image of my little boy sitting on the middle of his mattress, crying crocodile tears, probably feeling like his Mama had just deserted him. It made me cry too. I'm absolutely heartbroken. March 18 cannot come soon enough.