When Kayla abandoned her baby, I gave up everything to raise him as my own. Fifteen years of scraped knees, birthdays, and bedtime stories later, she waltzed back into his life with a car and stole him away. Five years later, a knock at my door turned everything upside-down.
I hadn’t seen my little sister, Kayla, for months, but now she was on my doorstep with a bundle in her arms — a baby boy, maybe six months old, half-asleep and fussing.
A person holding a baby | Source: Pexels
Her usually perfect eyeliner was smudged down her cheeks, and that designer perfume she always wore had faded to something stale and sad.
“Please look after him, Mae, just for a couple of weeks while I figure things out,” she mumbled, thrusting a diaper bag into my free hand.
“What?” My fingers clenched reflexively around the bag strap. “Kayla, what happened? When did you—”
A shocked and confused woman | Source: Unsplash
“It’s complicated.” She adjusted the baby as though her arms might break beneath his weight. “But I’ve got some opportunities lined up. Good ones. I just need breathing room, time to settle in. Two weeks, tops, Mae. Please.”
That was Kayla-speak for “I’m in trouble again.” Her eyes, so much like mine but always wilder, darted to her car.
A woman glancing anxiously to one side | Source: Unsplash
“Two weeks,” I repeated firmly.
“You’re a lifesaver, sis.” She flashed me a relieved smile as she handed the baby over. “I’ll call tomorrow.”
But weeks blurred into months, and Kayla vanished like smoke.
A woman resting her head in her hand | Source: Unsplash
The only communication was a text every few weeks: “Need more time” or “Can’t talk now.”
Then nothing at all.
Until three months after she left, when an envelope arrived in the mail. Inside, was the baby’s birth certificate, and a nasty surprise.
An envelope on a table | Source: Unsplash
The certificate was blank where a name should be. So, he was official, but nameless. It listed Kayla as the mother and no father at all.
I thought of my grandfather, Liam, the only stable male figure in Kayla’s and my chaotic childhood. He had been kind, steady, patient.
Then I looked at the little boy playing on the floor with his toys.
A baby playing with toys | Source: Unsplash
“Liam it is,” I decided.
That night became the first of many landmarks: first steps across my living room, first words, first day of kindergarten.
I became his everything — rocking him through fevers, staying sleepless through teething nights, and laughing as we built towers and chunky wooden puzzles, and stuck our tongues out at each other.
A woman playing with a toddler | Source: Pexels
When Liam was seven, his teacher called about getting him braces.
The cost made my stomach drop, but I picked up a graveyard shift cleaning offices downtown, scrubbing toilets with hands already blistered from my day job at the warehouse.
When Liam turned ten, the school required laptops for their new curriculum.
A classroom | Source: Unsplash
The pawnshop’s neon sign buzzed overhead as I traded my beloved guitar (the only thing I still had from my brief stint in a college band, my only real indulgence) for a laptop that would get him through.
“Where’d your guitar go?” he asked a week later, noticing the empty corner of the living room.
“Just loaned it to a friend,” I lied, hating how easily it came.
A woman sitting on a sofa | Source: Unsplash
Kayla remained nothing but a ghost. Maybe a birthday text every other year, brittle and hollow: “Tell him happy birthday from Mom.” As if the word “Mom” belonged to her by right, not by effort.
But everything changed on Liam’s 16th birthday.
I was setting up the small celebration I’d planned — just a few friends, pizza, and a homemade cake — when an engine purred outside.
A birthday cake on a table | Source: Unsplash
I peeked through the blinds to see a gleaming SUV that probably cost more than a year of my salary.
Kayla stepped out, looking like a stranger. Flawless makeup, expensive clothes, her hair highlighted to perfection.
Liam came downstairs, freezing when he saw her through the open door.
A stunned teen boy | Source: Unsplash
“Hey, baby,” she said. “Sweet 16, huh? I brought presents.”
He looked at me, confusion rippling across his face. I’d shown him pictures of Kayla, and told him the truth in age-appropriate ways over the years: his mother loved him but couldn’t take care of him. She had problems. Maybe someday she’d be ready.
Apparently, someday had arrived in a $60,000 SUV.
An SUV parked outside a building | Source: Pexels
She visited every day that week, whisking him away to amusement parks, buying him flashy clothes, and spinning tales of “complicated times” and “endless love” that had kept them apart.
Then she showed up with the most flamboyant gift yet.
One scorching afternoon in July, a silver convertible pulled up to our faded duplex. It was topped with a garish red bow.
A silver convertible parked on a street | Source: Pexels
I stepped onto the porch as Kayla climbed out of the convertible. Liam gasped at my side.
“What do you think, baby?” Kayla grinned as she strutted toward us, keys dangling from manicured fingers. “It’s all yours.”
Liam whooped for joy. He leaped down the porch steps and ran to hug Kayla.
Two people hugging | Source: Pexels
“You don’t need to struggle here anymore,” she declared, locking her gaze with mine over his shoulder. “Come live with me, baby. It’s time we were a family again.”
Liam turned to me, confusion, guilt, and yearning battling in his eyes. I saw the moment the yearning won.
And just like that, the boy I’d named and raised like my own was gone.
A woman with tears running down her face | Source: Unsplash
No hug. No goodbye. Just excitement overtaking guilt as he slid into the driver’s seat of a car worth more than everything I owned.
Two days later, I got the text: “Thanks. I’ll give her a chance.”
Alone in our silent house, I gathered up tiny drawings labeled “Auntie/Mom,” crayon Mother’s Day cards, and packed them in boxes.
Items packed in a cardboard box | Source: Pexels
I grieved like a mother without a grave to visit.
There were no casseroles, no sympathy cards, no formal ceremony to mark my loss. Just empty spaces where a boy had grown up and a silence where his laughter had been.
At work, people asked about Liam constantly.
A woman working in a warehouse office | Source: Pexels
I developed a script: “He’s living with his mom now. Yes, his actual mom. No, it’s great, a wonderful opportunity for him.”
Eventually, they stopped asking.
Eventually, Liam existed only in my memories and the part of my heart he’d taken with him.
A woman staring out a window | Source: Unsplash
Five years is both an eternity and nothing at all.
I’d downsized to a one-bedroom apartment across town, switched to a better-paying office job, and even dated occasionally.
Life had a new rhythm; quieter, steadier, lonelier.
Then came another knock.
An apartment door | Source: Unsplash
When I opened the door, I nearly didn’t recognize him.
“Liam,” I breathed.
He stood awkwardly, hands jammed into pockets, a duffel bag at his feet.
A duffel bag at someone’s feet | Source: Unsplash
“Hey, Aunt Mae.” His voice cracked. “She’s… she’s kicking me out. Said I need to figure out my own life now.”
I said nothing, just stared at this stranger wearing Liam’s face.
“College didn’t work out,” he continued, words tumbling out now.
A young man hanging his head | Source: Unsplash
“I wasn’t focused enough, she said. Wasting her money. And when her boyfriend moved in last month, things got worse, and—” He stopped, swallowed. “I didn’t know where else to go.”
He wasn’t here to apologize… he just had nowhere else to go.
The hurt and betrayal that I’d thought I was over returned full force.
An angry woman staring at someone | Source: Unsplash
But he was my little boy, and he had nowhere else to go.
“You can take the couch,” I said, stepping aside. “I don’t have a spare room anymore.”
Relief flooded his face. “Thanks. I won’t be any trouble.”
“I have rules,” I told him. “This isn’t like before.”
He nodded quickly. “Of course. Whatever you say.”
An earnest young man | Source: Unsplash
Liam did his own laundry and contributed to the rent from his part-time job at a garage.
Slowly, cautiously, we rebuilt something from the ashes.
Our conversations grew less guarded. He told me about the disasters of living with Kayla — the revolving door of boyfriends, the drinking, the expectations he could never quite meet.
A man glancing to one side | Source: Pexels
“The car was repossessed after the first year,” he admitted one night over takeout. “Turns out she hadn’t actually bought it. Just leased it to impress me.”
I nodded, unsurprised.
He looked up. “I should have called. After I left. But everything was so great at first. I was finally getting to spend time with my mother, and then, when things turned bad… it felt like it was too late, like I could never make up for what I did to you.”
A man looking at someone | Source: Unsplash
“It hurt when you left like that,” I admitted, “but you were a kid, as charmed by Kayla as everyone else she ever set her sights on winning over. I get it, but you still should’ve called.”
He smiled then, a small, sad smile that carried the weight of our shared history. “Thanks for giving me a second chance, even if I’ve done nothing to deserve it.”
I looked at him, this boy-turned-man who’d broken my heart.
A woman staring at someone | Source: Unsplash
“That’s what family does,” I told him, and for the first time in years, the word didn’t taste bitter on my tongue.
Liam broke. His shoulders shook as he buried his face in his hands. I didn’t think twice; just moved over and put my arms around him.
“I’m so sorry,” he said between sobs.
A young man crying | Source: Unsplash
Outside, rain tapped gently against the windows, wrapping our small apartment in a cocoon of sound.
Little Boy Cries & Begs Mom Not to Take Him to Daycare until She Storms into Facility – Story of the Day
A three-year-old throws tantrums and begs his mother not to go to daycare. Worried, she goes in unannounced and what she sees shocks her.
“No, mommy, no!” Johnny threw himself on the floor and started screaming. Marla Evans sighed. Not again! She looked at her watch. If he threw a full tantrum, she would be late yet again.
She gazed at her three-year-old with exasperation. Johnny had been going to daycare for two years and always loved it. For the last week, out of the blue, he’d been making a scene, begging Marla not to take him.
For illustration purposes only | Source: Unsplash
She’d spoken to her pediatrician, and the doctor had told her that toddlers often went through the ‘terrible threes.’ “Stop it!” Marla heard herself scream, then she saw the look of fear in her son’s eyes. Something wasn’t right.
Marla sat down on the floor next to Johnny and coaxed him into her lap. He sobbed, pressing his little face against hers. Marla decided this was more than a tantrum, but what could be wrong?
“Honey,” Marla said gently. “I’m sorry. Mommy didn’t mean to snap.” She rocked him until he stopped crying and asked gently, “Why don’t you like daycare anymore?”
Raising a child is about setting and respecting boundaries.
Johnny shivered in her arms and whispered, “I don’t like!”
“But why, sweetie?” Marla asked. “Are the other kids mean?” But Johnny wouldn’t answer. Marla sighed. “Baby, mommy needs to go to work, but I tell you what… I’m going to come and get you from daycare early today, OK?”
For illustration purposes only | Source: Pexels
Johnny sat up in her lap. “No lunch?” He looked up at her anxiously. “No lunch, mommy?”
Lunch? The worried mom frowned. What was happening with her son?
Marla dropped Johnny off after promising she’d fetch him before lunch. He walked into the daycare quietly but threw Marla a pleading look that left her heartbroken.
She went to work and asked her boss for the afternoon off to deal with a personal issue. Thankfully, her boss was a mom too and understood!
Marla was determined to get to the bottom of Johnny’s reluctance to go to daycare. She decided to drop in — not before lunchtime as she promised Johnny — but during the meal.
Johnny’s daycare didn’t allow the parents into the children’s playrooms or the dining room, but each door of the facility had a large, clear glass window. Hopefully, Marla would be able to see what — if anything — was going on.
When she arrived, the receptionist told her the children were having lunch. Marla walked to the dining room and peered in. The kids were all sitting at their tables, eating.
For illustration purposes only | Source: Unsplash
A teacher or an assistant supervised each table. Marla quickly spotted Johnny. There was a woman Marla didn’t recognize sitting next to him.
As Marla watched, the woman picked up Johnny’s spoon, scooped up a portion of mashed potatoes, and pressed it against his lips. “Eat!” she cried. Johnny shook his head violently, his mouth firmly closed, tears running down his cheeks.
“Open your mouth and eat!” the woman said angrily. Johnny was looking deeply distressed. The woman cried, “You are going to sit here until you clear your plate!”
Marla saw a small portion of mince, mash, and vegetables left on Johnny’s plate, and she knew her son. Johnny was not a big eater; she never pushed it when he told her he’d had enough.
Johnny opened his mouth to protest, and the teacher quickly pushed the spoon in. Marla saw her son choke and sputter. She’d had enough! She opened the door and stormed in.
“Get away from my son!” she cried.
For illustration purposes only | Source: Pexels
The woman looked up, and her mouth hung open. “Parents aren’t allowed in the dining room!” she cried.
“Then they should be,” Marla said, reining in her anger. “Can’t you see Johnny’s had enough? He’s a healthy boy, but he is not a big eater. As an educator, you should know how traumatic force-feeding a child can be.
“Being forced to clean up the plate is an old-fashioned notion. You should be aware of the statistics and the causes of obesity and eating disorders in children.
“And one of them is making food an issue! My little boy is an active child, and if he feels he’s had enough, you need to respect that and not force him to eat.
“As for shoving food into a child’s mouth in that way, it is reprehensible! You should certainly know better. These children are not puppets for you to manipulate at will!
“They are little people with needs and a will of their own. If you don’t respect their boundaries, you teach them they don’t deserve respect. I don’t think that is a message you want to pass on!”
For illustration purposes only | Source: Unsplash
The teacher flushed a bright red and got to her feet. “I never…” she cried.
“That’s a pity,” Marla said crisply. “Because if this happens again, I will ensure you are out of a job! I’m not sending my son to daycare to be brutalized!”
Marla walked over to Johnny and tenderly wiped his mouth. “Come on, honey,” she said gently. “Mommy promised you a treat this afternoon!”
Marla had a long talk with Johnny, and there was no tantrum the next morning. Over the next few weeks, she popped into the daycare at lunch times just to keep an eye on things.
The teacher never forced Johnny to eat again, and the boy recovered his good humor and enthusiasm.
For illustration purposes only | Source: Pexels
What can we learn from this story?
- Children and their boundaries should be respected. Johnny’s teacher was teaching him that adults had the right to impose their will on children against their welfare.
- Raising a child is about setting and respecting boundaries — theirs and ours. A child whose boundaries are not respected is insecure and has low self-esteem.
Share this story with your friends. It might brighten their day and inspire them.
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