You swore you’d gotten used to missing him. But nothing could’ve prepared you for this. For the way your body changed when you first saw the two pink lines, trembling in your bathroom with your phone clutched in your hand, staring at his contact name. For the silence on the other end when you told him. Not because he didn’t want it, but because the weight of the reality—of being thousands of miles away while you carried his child—had hit him like a bullet.

He promised he’d be there. He promised he’d try. And he did, in every way he could. The calls every night, sometimes rushed, sometimes filled with static and background noise. The texts that came at odd hours, a single “I love you” or “How’s our little one?”—words that became lifelines. But promises couldn’t hold your hand when the contractions started. They couldn’t wipe the sweat from your forehead or kiss your tears away when your baby’s first cries filled the room. You held your child alone.

You learned quickly that raising a child without him was a war of its own. Midnight feedings blurred into sunrise. Your heart broke when the baby opened their eyes for the first time and he wasn’t there to see it. You’d prop the phone up so he could watch them coo, roll over, even take those wobbly first steps, but it always ended the same—with him pressing his forehead to the camera, whispering apologies through gritted teeth.

And you hated it. You hated how your voice would shake when you told him they said their first word, because you could hear the smile in his voice and the ache underneath it. You hated how he would sometimes go silent on calls, staring at you and the baby like he was trying to memorize you both. You hated how his eyes—those calm, steady eyes you’d fallen in love with—looked tired, frustrated, lonely.

But most of all, you hated how much you missed him. How much you wanted to scream that this wasn’t fair. That your child deserved to know his arms, his laugh, his warmth. And yet, every night, you’d whisper to them before bed: “Daddy loves you.” And you’d believe it, because you could still hear it in his voice, even oceans away.

When he finally comes home, you know it won’t erase the months of distance or the pain of doing it all alone. But you also know one thing—that when he sees your child for the first time, everything will change. And for the first time in over a year, you’ll feel whole again.