Upon arriving on the household’s house, the workforce was ushered into the kitchen. A baby who was three years previous, the youngest of 4 home-schooled siblings, peeked out from behind her mom’s legs, elevating timid eyes. She wore a free Minnie Mouse shirt and went to perch between her grandparents at a banquet, watching as everybody took their seats across the eating desk.
“Let’s begin from the start,” Dr. Tucker mentioned after the papers have been signed by Misty, the kid’s 28-year-old mom. “It began with the puzzle piece?”
Just a few months earlier, a mom and baby have been a picket puzzle of america, with every state represented by a caricature of an individual or object. Misty’s daughter excitedly pointed to the jagged determine depicting Illinois, which had an summary illustration of Abraham Lincoln.
“It is Pom,” her daughter exclaimed. “He has no hat.”
It was certainly a drawing of Abraham Lincoln with out his hat, however extra importantly, there was no identify beneath the picture to point who he was. After weeks of limitless discuss “Pom” bleeding after being injured and carried in a mattress that was too small – which the household started to suppose is likely to be associated to Lincoln’s homicide – they started to suppose that their daughter was current at a historic second. This was regardless of the household not beforehand believing in reincarnation, nor having any specific curiosity in Lincoln.
Throughout the journey to Amherst, Dr. Tucker admitted he was hesitant to tackle this specific case—or any case involving a well-known individual. “Should you say your baby is Babe Ruth, for instance, there’s going to be lots of data on-line,” he mentioned. “Once we get these instances, often the dad and mom are concerned. Nonetheless, it is all a little bit unusual coming from the mouth of a three-year-old. Now, if she had mentioned her daughter was a Lincoln, I most likely would not have made the journey.
Currently, Dr. Tucker has been giving the children image exams. “Once we suppose we all know the individual they’re speaking about, we’ll present them a photograph from that lifetime after which we’ll present them one other photograph — a dummy photograph — from someplace else to see if they’ll decide the appropriate one,” he mentioned. “It’s a must to have a number of footage for it to imply one thing. I had one the place the child remembered dying in Vietnam. I confirmed him eight pairs of images and two of them he did not make any alternative, however the others have been six out of six. So, you understand, it makes you suppose. However this lady is so younger, I do not suppose we are able to do this.
