Son Cries at Daycare

I agree with making the goodbye short and happy. Children can read their parent's moods. If you are uncertain, your child might pick up on it. I was a teacher in a child care center for many years. I only had one child who never warmed up. She was two years old and cried all day long for weeks. If your son is engaged during the day I am sure he is fine. As for running to the door and asking for "momma", he would do that if you kept him home with you. Moms can't even go to the bathroom by themselves. You are doing everything right.

That's a pretty major change for a little guy. Plus, it's not like it's something he got used to when he was 3 months old... Toddlers have a hard time adjusting to new situations. I think you'll just have to give it some more time and try to make his time at daycare as short as possible each day. Can he take photos of you with him? Some of his favorite things?

Sounds very familiar!

When you drop him off in the morning, make the good-bye loving but short and sweet. Give him a hug and a kiss, promise him that you'll be back later in the afternoon to hear all about his day, and then get the heck out of dodge! The longer you linger there, the worse it is for the kids. Also put on your happy face because if the kid sees you upset, the anxiety will only heighten.

This happened with our son - he would have an absolute meltdown at drop off. We also knew, however, that literally 3 minutes later the crying had stopped and he was playing gleefully (typical of most children at drop off). We created a rock solid routine that we still follow to this day: Once he gets to the door of his room, we pick him up for those last hugs and kisses. Then, we literally hand him off to the teacher for his "Special Good Morning Hugs from Miss <teacher>!" She will pluck him from my arms and give him his special morning hugs. It's now part of the routine!

Maybe talk with the director and/or his teachers to figure out how to troubleshoot. Most of these people have dealt with hundreds, if not thousands of kids during their tenure and I'm pretty sure they've face this before. Form a team, an alliance with them to help your child.

Good luck - I know it can be tough at times :D

Make sure that he walks from the car into the daycare. It encourages independence. Someone on mamasource wrote this suggestion last summer regarding a poster's similar issue. I tried it since we started taking our son to our gym's child center. It worked right away!

Sometimes it helps if he has a picture of himsef with his daycare providers to keep in his room at just at your house. Just so he can see that it is ok to be with them and it shows how much they love him. His age is also a really big factor. almost every child goes through some sort of stage like this. hang in there and remember he WILL get through this!