What's a Girl to Do?

Elizabeth Anne is five years old now. She knows her letters and writes her numbers. She can fold towels and help make supper. But she has a secret.

If you know her well, or if you've seen her when she lets her hair down - literally - then you already know.

She's done it her whole life. What started out as cute, has lingered into a challenging cause for concern.

Every day, throughout the day, she sucks two fingers of her right hand while she uses her left hand to twist her hair.

The finger-sucking provides satisfaction.

The hair-twisting is comfortable when she feels anxious or bored.

She sucks until her teeth are protruding and her fingers are wrinkled; she twists until her hair knots up and is pulled out. 

So with gapped teeth, she sports moist, calloused fingers on her right hand, and short, frizzy, frayed hair on her left side. And I love her to pieces!!

Every morning when I brush her hair, we discuss her dilemma.

Thou Shalt Have ...

Two stories.

Once upon a time, I was the mother to two preschool boys. One day I was helping them pick up their room and I quite literally stumbled upon a broken clothes pin - one wooden side with the now-meaningless spring still attached. Just as I was about to toss it in the trash, my son screamed, "Mom! Don't! That's my thingie!!"

Duly noted. Keep calm and tidy on.

Later at the lunch table, I noticed he was having trouble holding his cup. As I tried to help him, I realized he had that silly clothes pin lodged into the palm of his clinched fist. I pried it from his milky grip and assured him that his treasured thingie would be safe on the counter until lunch was over.

Fifteen years later - so like, last week - is the setting for our second story.

Several of us were relaxing in the living room when I began to smell something awful. (This in itself is not at all remarkable.) But, it was a suffocating stench ... thick and nauseating. Others began to gasp and react with eye-squinting puzzlement.