Article: Why our little girl never cries: every mother wants to protect her child from pain. Ashlyn's mother wishes her daughter could feel it.(Family)(congenital insensitivity to pain: anhidrosis)

It's OK, Mommy," said three-year-old Ashlyn Blocker. Her mother, Tara, was weeping, so Ashlyn kissed her cheek. But everything wasn't OK. Ashlyn was badly hurt-though, amazingly, the little girl didn't even realize it.

On that day in 2002, Tara and her husband, John, had rented a pressure washer to clean the outside of their home. While testing the forceful machine, which was blasting out rounds of soap and water, they'd turned away from Ashlyn for just a few seconds. When Tara looked back, Ashlyn was staring at her own hand with bemused curiosity. That was all it took to get Tara's heart racing.

Knowing that look, and what it meant, Tara took Ashlyn's ...

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