A five-year-old girl cries, “that’s you,” as she reunites with her Navy-serving father while holding a sailor teddy bear he had gotten for her to remember him while deployed.
Martin Palomo, 29, was originally on deployment when his daughter, Lailah, was born, and when he met her for the first time at four months old, he gave her the little teddy with a sailor outfit on.
That was in 2016, and for his most recent deployment, Martin, an E5 with the U.S. Navy, headed off onboard the USS Chafee for seven months, leaving Lailah with the teddy sailor to keep her company.
The deployment was tough on five-year-old Lailah, her mom, Brittany, 27, said, and every night she would tear up and say that she missed her dad.
During that time, though, the teddy provided Lailah with some comfort: she would play with it and sleep with it, almost like a replacement for her father, Brittany said.
On February 19, the day of their reunion at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii, Lailah patiently waited for her dad to leave his ship, holding her teddy in one hand.
When they finally ran towards each other and embraced, Lailah held up her teddy, saying: “That’s you!”
Brittany said: “She would sleep and play with the teddy her dad had given her because she really missed her daddy – for the past couple of months, it was sort of a replacement for him not being home.
“It was a long seven months trying to explain to her where daddy was and when he would be home.
“When she was walking up with her teddy looking for her daddy, it just warmed my heart to know that she would finally see her daddy after so long.
“It warmed my heart even more when she reunited with her dad and told him that the bear was him.
“In her five-year-old mind, my daughter meant that’s been you for the last couple of months but now you are actually here.
“I felt so much joy seeing them reunite and over all that our sailor had returned safely home to us.”
