For a second year in a row, classmates didn’t show up for a little boy’s birthday party in Hurst, Texas, a suburb of Fort Worth. Instead of seeing her child heartbroken again, the 8-year-old’s mother decided to ask police to get involved. What happened next is still hard for her to believe.
Dallas News reports that even though not a single person had responded to Jennifer Day and her husband regarding their son, Graham’s, birthday invitations, she still bought pizza and baked cakes for his party. The little boy, however, saw that no one was there and tearfully told his mother that “this always happens.”
“He said it in the most broken voice I’ve ever heard,” Day told the Dallas News. “It happened once before, but this time something snapped in me and it was like no, this is not happening to him again.”
First, Day posted on the website Nextdoor, a site where members of communities and neighborhoods can post messages to each other.
“I think I’m posting this out of utter emotional distress … but I need to ask if anyone wants to come to an 8 yr old boys birthday party to show him that he’s loved and valued as a person. NO gifts are required other than the gift of friendship.”
She didn’t get any immediate responses, and out of desperation, she drove to the Hurst Police Department and asked if one officer could briefly stop by her home for her child’s birthday party, since he always talked of being a cop when he grew up.
To Day’s surprise, not only did one police officer show up, but the entire shift, along with a few firefighters came over to help her son celebrate his special day. Then, families from the neighborhood that she had never met before started trickling into the party after reading her message, and eventually, the party was packed with children and adults alike. Graham so was excited that he completely forgot about the kids at school who didn’t accept his invitation.
An emotional Jennifer Day fought back tears as she expressed her gratitude to the kind-hearted people who helped make her little boy happy on his birthday.
“Something like this, it literally guts you as a parent because you can’t fix it, at least in that moment. But the Hurst Police Department and the Hurst Fire Department, they went above and beyond and made his day.”
[Feature Photo: Facebook]
