This morning after I had dressed Veronika, she went up to her room to ‘explore’, or as I would call it, pull things out of the cupboard….I gave her a few minutes while I did the breakie dishes, and then went to get her as we were off to BrightStars dancing class.

When I went into Veronika’s room she was sitting there, with these shoes in her lap, giving me the look she gives me when she has picked what she wants to wear…..my heart broke just a little, seeing her sitting there holding these shoes. They aren’t anything super special, they don’t have any super special significance, they are shoes that a friend passed onto Veronika after her daughter out grew them…. I had to explain to Veronika that she couldn’t wear them, (as they wont go over her AFO’s that she has to wear to keep her feet in the right position)….and well it broke my heart a little, not only because she was still giving me the ‘I really want to wear these look’, while she nodded to me to let me know she understood she couldn’t wear them, but then she gave me the ‘I want to take these in the car with me’ look(lately she has been insisting on taking something in the car just about every time we go in the car), the ‘you know Mummy, I just want to hold them while we are in the car’ look, so I let her take them in the car and she held onto one of them….and yes that broke my heart a little more, to see My Princess sitting there, holding a single shoe, that she will never be able to wear, because her feet just arent made to wear shoes like these. Veronika has one single pair of shoes that she wears, one pair of shoes that fit perfectly over her AFO’s, one pair of shoes that I had walked town and the local shopping centres to find, to go over her AFO’s, one single pair that I found on a second-hand baby to kids clothes/shoes site for the bargain price of $5…

one single pair that fit perfectly over her AFO’s so she can use her walking frame…

one single pair that fit perfectly over her AFO’s so she can practice her sit, to stand, balance and step…

one single pair that aren’t the typical girly shoes you would wear with a skirt or dress…

but one single pair, that fit perfectly so Veronika can find her feet and use them to weight bare in order to walk, something we were told she would never do…

and so for Veronika, one pair is enough…

but yes it does break my heart to know she can’t wear typical girly shoes…