r/daddit • u/mithrasbuster • 19h ago
Discussion Lost stuffie
So back in April my daughter lost her favorite kitten stuffie. We looked everywhere for it. We decided, with her, to keep an eye out in stores to see if we'd come across the same stuffie, hanging out with new friends and bring her home from the store, we expected her to forget about it.
Well fast forward to now, we haven't seen the stuffie again in stores, she talks about finding her stuffie every week, she saves things for her, builds things for her possible return.
I'm wondering what the other dads think, do I just keep helping her through this loss, she's in good spirits about it, very matter of fact .. or just buy the damn kitten again and pretend maybe she's been out in the woods for the summer, this isn't her first loss, our dog died when she was 2, still says she misses him when she sees pictures of him.
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u/TheGauchoAmigo84 19h ago
You buy the kitten again.
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u/TheMorningMap 19h ago
And a backup, or two. Just make sure she doesn’t see the backups, or suddenly it will be 2 stufies being carried everywhere..
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u/Funwithfun14 19h ago
My kid knew the backup was a fake. I'd suggest finding a new best friend.
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u/mithrasbuster 19h ago
This is my concern with a new one 😅 we have so many stuffies in the house at this point. They all have their place in the stuffie hiarachy. No one has really replaced the original
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u/MrPandaOverlord 14h ago
I’ve seen people say that the stuffie was at the spa on vacation and that’s why they’re all clean and new
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u/Stormtomcat 18h ago
The kid is saving things and building things for when the stuffie comes home.
My heart couldn't take seeing her hope like that. Maybe tell her it's a younger sibling?
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u/UrzaKenobi 19h ago
Rookie mistake. Always have a backup, or multiple back ups, of favorite stuffies and blankies. Rotate them out so that they can be washed. They’ll all have the same smell and the kid won’t know the difference. They’ll eventually be old enough to figure out what you’re doing, but that’s usually the age where stuffies aren’t allowed to leave the house anymore.
We also started a game where, when we travel, we bring a few travel only disposable type things, then that leaves room to buy a stuffies when traveling ( which you were gonna prolly buy anyway).
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u/UrzaKenobi 19h ago
Bonus for those nostalgic parents that don’t just throw everything away, my wife and I both have identical copies of our son’s “favorite” stuffy bear named Brownie in our offices since he’s long outgrown them. It takes me back to his younger days immediately. When he finally gives up his blankies, I will be folding that sucker and putting it under Brownie on the shelf in my office for the rest of my days.
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u/thislooksprettyfun Girl 11, boy 7 19h ago
Santa "found a lost stuffed animal" of my daughters and returned it to her for Christmas. After she lost it, we bought the replacement (and another just in case), ran it through the washing machine, scuffed up the eyes and nose, matted the fur, etc. Santa left a note telling her how much fun he had with the stuffed animal after he found her in [random place we had concluded we lost the stuffie]. Kid was over the moon, crying, happy, didn't give a shit about any other toy that year on Christmas. Downside was 9 years later she's the only kid still believing in Santa because there's no way her parents would have been able to find the stuffie she lost in another state.
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u/Lagopomorph 19h ago
We did the same thing! She lost a kitten and remembered losing it for a couple years so I hunted one down and Santa brought it. So much better than her crying about how sad and lost the poor kitten must be.
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u/Major_Star 13h ago
If she's being matter-of-fact about it and not upset... are you sure she's not just using the 'lost stuffie' motif as a jumping-off point for other play? Sometimes kids want to have a story behind why they're building a farm, or collecting a leaf. It doesn't necessarily mean she's pining for it.
For what it's worth my kid lost a favorite ball in the ocean, and still occasionally talks about it. We handled it by saying yes it was sad that we lost it, but with any luck some other kid will find it and have a ball to play with. Then whenever she mentioned it we segued into making up stories about what adventures the ball had been on and what it was probably doing now. And we bought a new, different one.
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u/GreatbobUmber 19h ago
How old is your daughter?
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u/mithrasbuster 19h ago
She's almost 5
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u/GreatbobUmber 19h ago
Okay, so then I'm a little bit confused. You all on the lookout, at stores, for the specific stuffie that she lost?
If that's the case, I kind of feel like that's on you for giving her the hope/impression that it'll just magically appear in a store you all are visiting? My advice would be to buy the kitten again, and either tell her the truth, or tell her some variation of, "this is your old stuffie's twin sister/brother!" Lying and saying it is the exact same stuffie is not what I would do, my daughter (6) is inquisitive enough to see through that, and would 100% ask me why I tried to say it was her old one. But she'd 100% be on board with a twin showing up.
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u/GreatbobUmber 19h ago
If you're just looking for the same stuffie brand/style, then just fucking buy it and stage a lucky happenstance in a store, but I feel like if that was the case, you SURELY wouldn't need to come to Reddit for that.
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u/GreatbobUmber 19h ago
We lost her oldest stuffie, a cat she named "Purry" (ADORABLE) while on vacation. By the time we realized it was gone, we ordered a similar type for when we got home, and told her a new cat had showed up named "Jinx" that was related to Purry. She was very happy about it, and was even MORE excited when the restaurant called us back to tell us that they had found Purry under the table we had sat at the night before and now she has two cute tuxedo cat cousins.
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u/chowski28 19h ago
You have a picture of it? I think someone was also in your situation recently and posted a picture and some one found where to buy a new one.
And if you do end up buying a different stuffy, buy 2. Always have that back up
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u/mithrasbuster 19h ago
It's a TY kitten, so we know where we can order a new one from their website. It's more of whether we should or not. Backup would be a good idea for sure, you just never know if they're going to get attached. She loved her lamb for the first 2 years and then, bam, no interest after that
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u/Rdubya291 4 sons 19h ago
You buy it again. And explain it's a new kitten that can make her just as happy that she'll love just as much.
Buy. The. Damn. Kitten. lol
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u/Dharma_Bum_87 19h ago
We lost a crab stuffie on a trip to Hawaii 3 years ago. Crabbie continues to come up in conversation on a weekly basis
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u/seaburno 18h ago
My son had a plushie that was a Dalmatian called Puppy. Puppy was his constant companion from birth to about 30 months. At that point, we realized that Puppy was getting ratty, and we went to find more Puppies. Puppy was no longer being made, but we found 3 “identical” ones on eBay (and spent way too much for them).
We cycled Old Puppy (OP) out of use to save. The first day, he asked us “Why Puppys spots changed”
My wife had to do some fast thinking.
But we kept cycling through them. One day, at about 3.5 years, he came across all three 3 Puppies in the dryer.
Yeah, we got caught.
When our son went off to College, we went to visit, and took pictures of OP at all kinds of important places for him (his dorm, his on campus job, etc.) and made that a photo book for Christmas.
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u/wharpua 16h ago
Reposting this comment I made like three weeks ago in a different subreddit:
The Facebook group "Plush Memories Lost Toy Search Service" is legitimately a candidate for r/nextfuckinglevel — our (now 13yo) daughter's favorite stuffed animal was one of my wife's stuffed cats from the early 90s (it had a specific ball thing inside it that would mechanically make a purring sound when moved).
There was a brief stretch where we thought it lost, and they immediately jumped in and identified which one it was and tagged members in their group that they knew who collected that line, etc. We ended up having offers of not the identical cat but others in the line ("maybe a sibling from the same litter?") but got a happy ending of our own when we found it ourselves on a nearby playground.
But the effort and care behind that group still stands out in memory — they rejoiced when I told them the good news of us finding it again. Don't hesitate to keep them in mind for situations like this.
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u/TrialBornApp 16h ago
The part about her saving things for the kitten is really sweet. Since you know where to order another, you could involve her: “We haven’t found your kitten. Would you like another one like her, or would you rather keep looking for now?” That gives her a choice without promising the original will return. If she wants a new one, she doesn’t have to love it in exactly the same way. And if she still talks about the old kitten afterward, that doesn’t mean the replacement failed. You can listen without needing to make the missing feeling disappear.
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u/Drink_Deep 19h ago
As much as I support turning things into lessons, if this is easily accessible online, I would just replace it (and buy a backup). You can turn it into a homecoming of sorts, and I think she'd love the pomp and circumstance of stuffie's return.