The Voice

"Every kid is different.  She will be fine.  Everyone goes through this.  She is so excited." 

I've repeated that mantra over and over again as my three year old daughter prepares to begin preschool on Wednesday.  It's only three days a week.  It's only three hours a day.  The church is only three miles from my front door.  My first two kids went to the same preschool and had fabulous experiences.  I'm certain I was a little apprehensive on their first day, but not like this.  Why is it different?

Because it's Rylie.  Because she has come such a long way since coming home, but has such a long way to go.  Because she is a daddy's girl.  

Because I am her voice.

Abandoned at two months old and fighting in an orphanage with hundreds of other kids for attention, she was hampered by a palate and lips not fully formed in the womb.  From the beginning she has been searching for her voice.  And as her dad I have spent the past two years trying to stand in the gap for her.  To love her and tell her she is beautiful (she so is).  To teach her that she can trust me to always be her advocate.

But questions remain.  What if her classmates and her teachers can't understand her?  What if they don't know that when she says "this" she means "that"?  What if other kids don't want to be her friend because she is so different than everyone else in the room? What if she gets frustrated when no one at school can translate her mumbled sounds like Daddy can?

Rylie is confident.  She is determined and strong.  God created her that way knowing what lies ahead.  I pray that she tackles the first day of preschool like the fighter she is.  I know her daddy can't be with her every second to speak when she struggles.  No matter how much I may dislike it, she has to grow up.  But praise God, her Heavenly Father is always by her side.  Let Him be her voice when she can't seem to find the words.