What does "mama bear mode" do to you?

[Xtina]

Hi BYC,

I'd love to hear some stories of a time when "mama bear mode" kicked in for you over something that happened to your child, and what it made you feel like physically.

Whenever a kid is mean to my kid (who is honestly too young to really understand how mean others are being, so it doesn't hurt him much), it really, really upsets me. Sometimes, my reaction is justified (when someone threatened to kill him and shot him in the face with a homemade arrow) and other times it's not (shoving him off a lap when he tried to cuddle with the wrong kid, making fun of his name and calling him bad names). I try very hard to keep my reactions under control and be the grown up. I try not to give in to the temptation to hurt a child's feelings because they hurt my child's feelings.

What really gets me though, is how deeply it affects me and how visceral and physical my reaction is. It's a complete, primal, uncontrollable, adrenaline rush. I get tunnel vision on the perpetrator, my pulse gets loud in my ears so that it dampens my hearing, I sometimes even see red! My blood pressure and heart rate shoot up, my head and heart pound, and I get shaky in my voice and limbs. After the fact, I get sad, depressed, nauseous, and so exhausted that I could crawl under the covers and fall straight to sleep. The feeling of anger and shakiness lasts a long time. I need a hot cup of soothing herbal tea and some chocolate to feel better. All of this, and my kid may not have even noticed the slight at all! I do my best not to clue him in to the fact that something bad happened if he didn't notice it. I don't want him to learn hypersensitivity from me.

And here's the kicker: I'm a total pacifist. I've been repeatedly complimented for my calm and stable personality and for how well I can control my emotions and reactions. I always look for the best in others, and even when the things they do seem indefensible I'm always trying to envision a scenario that would explain and justify their actions. I'm always looking to give folks the benefit of the doubt instead of jumping to the worst possible conclusion. I really try to assume the best instead of the worst. But when it comes to my kids, it really gets my ire up, very quickly, and with very little provocation. Does this happen to other people, or do I need to see a doctor?!

Let's all vent, please! What minor incidents set off your mama bear instinct, whether justified or unjustified, and what did it do to you physically?

 

[StupidBird]

Was at a fair when a bling mobile came by thumping some very nasty lyrics in front of a group of little kids. The car was crammed with, ahem, youths, dressed in hood style, so to speak. Little woman mama bear got all up in their faces asking them sternly to hey, there's little kids here and that ain't appropriate, turn it down.
Weren't even my little kids.
I still can't believe I do things like that. There are no brakes between observation and action when I perceive threats to helpless.

A few smart moth comments from that car, but they left.

Maybe all these years of perfecting the Mom Look has paid off. Or maybe i look scary crazy. I don't wanna know.

 

[write2caroline]

Sometimes you need to stand up and say no!.... I don't think Momma Bear mode is wrong when wrong needs to be stopped.

My Cousin's daughter was the victim of a violent, and heinous crime and they came to stay with me for a year because they lived in a small town and it was so sensational that people had nothing better to do than talk about it in graphic detail within her ear shot. ( Or worse would ask her about it!)

So they came to stay with me. On her first day at the new school, a security guard screamed at her in a quad full of other students and said her clothing was inappropriate - My daughter attends a private school so when we were actually careful to read the dress code and her clothing was not in anyway out of the code! Totally embarassed her made her cry.

Momma Bear was awakened! LuLu called to be picked up because she was so distraught. When she told me about it, I drove her home and went back, walked into the principals office and requested a meeting with him and this guard.

The security guard was not in charge of enforcing dress codes or any rules other than keeping strangers out of the high school and making sure students leaving had the proper passes to leave during school hours.

The principal was totally at a loss and the security guard was removed from that campus. That girl is the sweetest and no one was going to make her life miserable so long as I was around.

The principal made it a point to keep an eye out for her and no one bothered her after that. My whole point was that the security personal needed to know what their job descriptions were and that harassing anyone was not part of the job no matter whom they were addressing had no right to "scream" at and demoralize in public.

When I feel Momma Bear coming on. I make it a point to write down the issues because I had really wanted to kill that woman. She had such a attitude - Um It is a high school not a jail. When I went back to that campus I asked her to share her name with me and she gave me a whole lot of attitude also. - I read her name off of her name badge. She tried to tell me I could not go onto the campus so I pulled out my phone and called the office. I smiled at her and invited her to accompany me to the office if she preferred. I want to yell but I learned a smile and calm demeanor is much more effective....not to mention dangerous....bah ha ha haaaaa.

Caroline

 

[herfrds]

My DS had been bullied for quite awhile. Since he started hitting back they leave him alone. Did find out that he has been getting harassed about not playing football by some kids that do play.
They were in the store one night harassing the student who works at the store about not playing foot ball either. Well my mama bear kicked in and I stepped up next to the kid and told these guys to leave him alone, he has no interest in playing foot ball and they needed to get off his case. One made a comment, but he knows not to mess with me. They all left the store. Have been leaving my "boys" alone.