My heart dropped last month when my son’s favorite occupational therapist announced: “It’s time to move on to speech therapy. I’ve done all I can remotely and he’s made great progress.” Throughout a lonely year of Covid disruption, we had joined M. for play therapy on Zoom once a week (and even biweekly when schools were closed). While grateful for the positive progress, I didn’t know if we could let her go.

M. had won me over in the first moments of meeting her in-person at the clinic a year before Covid hit. When my five-year-old son hid behind me as she approached to introduce herself in the loud waiting room, she made another pronouncement: “It looks like you’ll be joining us rather than waiting here with the other parents.”

I couldn’t have been more relieved. For months, I had tagged along with my son at birthday parties and playgrounds, riding down slides, jumping in bouncy houses and playing tag with other preschoolers (so well that one girl even asked her grandmother to book a playdate with me). While I worked up a sweat or tried to shrink into the shadows, the other parents chatted on the sidelines or drove away from the drop-off birthday parties. I hated apologizing for my presence and explaining R’s separation anxiety related to sensory processing challenges. And I exhausted myself second-guessing whether I was holding him back by staying. So when M. confidently pronounced I’d be staying, I felt validated.

Now we were saying goodbye to our play partner and therapist. We’d logged hours of dramatic play navigating the intricacies of screen-based sword fights, castle banquets and Viking voyages (I moved around the props and served as second-in-command while M was forever cast as the enemy sent to languish in jail or bake 20 loaves of bread in a hot kitchen). What would happen now? I would miss the 10-minute debriefing time we shared at the end of each session while R. cooled down watching a video. These mini-therapy sessions carried me through the week. M. seemed the only person who truly understood my son’s challenges and strengths and the only one with realistic and effective strategies. That was me. What about R? How would he react to a new speech therapist? Flexibility was not one of his strengths.

“Adults pass in and out of kids lives all the time,” was M’s response when I asked how we should break the news to R and whether I should mention we were likely to play with her again at the clinic. “I’ll just warn him that we only have two sessions left together.” And that’s what happened. At the end of the second session, M. simply smiled and said, “See ya.” When the screen went blank, I held off trying to give my son an empty promise.

The next morning, R. surprised me at breakfast when I overheard him announce to my husband that he’d had his last session with M. “What happens now?” my husband asked. I held my breath. “I move up to the next level,” said my ninja-loving boy with a grin.

A week later he was on the ground crying as we logged into Zoom to meet our new speech therapist. But when E. appeared in the Zoom box with sword and shield in hand (“M. told me you like knights and castles.”), R. stood up and grabbed his armor. And me? I sat on the sidelines, off camera for the whole session, and realized we had both moved on to the next level.