A simple stamp

...yes, that's where it all began. A simple ink stamp inprinted on Maggie's hand from Mother's Day Out on Tuesday. Honestly, I could barely see it but she was so proud. She was so proud of her stamp. The day came and went and Wednesday afternoon, I was wiping her hands off from something no doubt sticky and she pulled her hand back and pulled it close to her eyes and started crying. "Where it go?" I said, "where did what go, sweet pea?" "Where it go, Momma? It go bye-bye" And it hit me....the stamp. And then it REALLY hit me...oh no, THE STAMP IS GONE!

Some of you may remember me talking about this in the past but I can't remember. Maggie has always had a huge issue with seeing anything thrown away, put away, discarded ~ at first it was just food (and understandable with her history of not being fed) and then it was anything that she associated as being hers. So, we have become accustomed to throwing things away when she is sleeping. This is not just the typical 2 year old mentality of "mine" - this is a deep need to hold on to whatever she can because she went without for so long.

I tried to distract her but that wasn't working. It was bath time, which I thought would calm her down - boy was I wrong. She loves her bath time. She could sit in there and play for an hour if I let her. Not last night. Nope. She refused. She cried. She screamed. She kicked. There was NO way she was getting in there with the possibility of anything touching her hand with the stamp used to be. However, I put her in there and gave her the fastest bath ever. She was just over-the-top upset with the loss of this stamp. Michael kept telling her that "daddy would draw a butterfly or flower on her hand" - she refused. I pulled out my scrapbooking stamps, showed them all to her, gave her a choice of 10 different color ink pads...she wasn't going to have it. It took her nearly 2 hours to calm down. There was absolutely nothing we could do to replace that stamp or bring it back. All we could do was love on her and try to reassure her that it was going to be ok.

I was rocking her for a bit and she finally settled down. I asked her what she wanted and she just said "need rest momma's bed"...and that's what she did. She laid down in our bed for over an hour, just watching some tv and hardly moved. It's so heartbreaking to see this unfold before your eyes. Something so small, so trivial to the rest of the world, but the little girl that stamp was the world. We may never know the full extent of Maggie's past and all that she endured. All we can do is love her, protect her, provide for her, and comfort her in the days and months and years to come.

When I woke up Maggie this morning and told her she was going to school today, she immediately looked to her hand and looked like she was going to cry. But she looked at me and said - "ok, Momma. Go school. Be good girl. Have fun."....and thankfully, that's exactly what she did.