To Say The Least, The Week Was Difficult.

I am am a good mother.

There are few things I can say about myself with complete and utter confidence. More specifically, there is one thing I can say about myself with complete and utter confidence, and it is that yes, I am a good mother. Of my looks I will say "I have a great body-- but, I may have nursed a bit too long, and I have a little mommy tummy". Of my intelligence, I will say "I am very smart... but just in some ways". Of my house I will say "It's pretty much clean... but it's very cluttered" or "It suits me... but it's a little small".

But of myself in the end, of what I come down to and who I am, there is only the one thing I can say in complete confidence. One thing I have not and will not doubt: "I am a good mother."

End sentence.

My daughter is carefully fed. My daughter is clean and well rested and gets exercise and socializes with other children multiple times a week outside of school. My daughter knows she can talk to me about anything. She doesn't lie to me, she comes to me when she's hurt or sad or happy and because in all the world I am who she wants to go to. If she has days she hates me, she is allowed to. If she has days that she just wants to not talk about anything, just quietly sit and hold my hand or lay her head on my shoulder without getting into why she has had a bad day, that is allowed, too.

She is allowed to be a child, to say silly things like 'butt' and 'poop' or giggle at those words without being shamed. She is allowed to be 6. She is allowed to sleep in her undershirt for the next day because she gets warm when she sleeps in PJs and sometimes takes a full 20 minutes trying to put one on in the morning because she's like a 40 year old who is out of coffee when she wakes up. When it is only her sweater or long sleeves, she can put them on herself even tired, and feel like a big girl. Why this is, I do not know. But it works, and so it is done at my home.

My daughter is told precious stories about her father and his family, regardless of the living hell they have put me through, regardless of the values they have that I do not ever want my daughter to think are OK: Because if I raise her well, she will not develop them and part of raising her well is letting her love who she does and encouraging it no matter who I know those people to be.

And my daughters father files motions against her mother, who never raises her hand, enforces consequences in a loving but firm way only, makes sure there are frequent new experiences, educational toys, social interaction, who reads to her for hours and makes up stories on command, who walks 5 blocks to the laundry mat in the snow every single weekend that she can without said daughter having to come if it is cold, claiming she is an unfit mother.

And it makes me sick. Absolutely sick.

And the judge laughed. And everyone I knew first gawked then cussed and then laughed too... "That's absurd-- you're the best mother I know". This from the best mothers I know, this from teachers, this from people who admittedly hate me as a human being, can't stand the sound of my voice. This from a woman who I in younger wilder years slept with the boyfriend of... "I'll probably always hate you for how you were when we were teenagers, but even I can't believe that bullshit. You're an amazing mother. You never even say shit about that jack-ass in front of her, even the times it would be appropriate to. You're even too nice about him for some of the things she asks you about that he's suggested." And this person, if we may note, is in fact an early childhood educator.

And she agrees that I am if nothing in all the world, an amazing mother.

Because I am. I am a good mother. And now, I am a terrified mother. I am walking around on eggshells, scared to let my daughter sleep in bed with me because he may file a motion that it is indecent. Scared to joke about anything because if she repeats it he can twist it how he wants. But at the same time, scared to speak to her in any way, or to not say anything for fear that he will paint me as in-affectionate.

I spent the weekend in a bed and breakfast with my amazing boyfriend. We went antiquing, we stopped at totally random restaurants to eat, we went to the beach to look at the lake covered in snow. And I clung tight to the trip, not simply because this man is the man of my dreams, or because I have not had a Valentines Day in years... but because I'm so afraid. I'm so afraid that the man who came for a year to live near his daughter is laying the groundwork to take her away from me, and weekend visit with boys, homework that means nothing without the child who will benefit from the eventual degree, an apartment too quiet, will be all I have left.

Which is my worst nightmare, and one I never prepared for before-- one I never realized I needed to.

Because I am a good mother.