A sailor who left for deployment when her daughter was just one year old ran through the airport in tears when they were finally reunited after almost a year apart.
Single mom Brittnie Bryce, a sailor in the U.S. Navy from Omaha Nebraska, spent the first year of daughter Cecelia’s life based in Sicily, where Cecilia was born, for baby bonding time.
But Brittnie always knew, one day, she would need to return to naval duty, so she traveled back home to Nebraska, where she dropped Cecelia off with her mom, and left for San Diego before her deployment.
The separation was tough, and Brittnie revealed at one point her daughter, who had not yet turned two, referred to Brittnie’s mom as her mother, which put into perspective how difficult the time had been.
When she received news she could travel home for good, Brittnie couldn’t wait to see her daughter once more – and there was a special surprise waiting.
Having landed in Eppley Airfield, in Omaha, Brittnie was expecting to meet two of her childhood best friends, who had arranged to take her home.
But as she made her way through the airport, she noticed two other familiar faces, as she laid eyes on Cecilia, who was one year and 11 months old at the time, and her own mom.
Brittnie ran in for an emotional hug with Cecelia, who also ran towards her, in a moment captured on video on March 14, 2022, but shared in 2025 after Brittnie left the Navy following 11 years of service.
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She said: “Getting to finally hold her in my arms again felt like that moment would never come but at the same time as I was alive again, if that makes sense.
“It was a day I had imagined over and over and over again laying there in my rack at night just waiting for the deployment to finally end so I could feel her tiny arms wrapped around my neck.
“I shared the video to show the sacrifices we truly must make no matter how old our children are or what we are going through mentally, the job must be done as we took an oath, but it doesn’t negate the fact for us that the love for our children truly conquers all.
“She truly is what got me through that entire time period singlehandedly.”
