Vachon Imagined

I was at the playground with my son and his friends when one of those friends came running back to where the moms were sitting.

“A boy just kicked me in the stomach.”

Naturally, we were appalled. I immediately told him he had done the right thing by coming to an adult and reporting what happened.

Without hesitation, I got up and headed toward the scene of the crime.

When I arrived, I found my son standing between two boys: his best friend and another boy who looked equally prepared to fight.

Now, I’m a small woman. Five feet tall and about 115 pounds soaking wet—or perhaps a little more if I’ve recently eaten an entire bag of salty chips.

Intimidating is not a word anyone would use to describe me.

But protective?

Absolutely.

Nothing has revealed that more clearly than becoming a mother.

God help me.

There is something ancient that awakens when your child is involved. Something that has very little to do with size and everything to do with love.

That day, the mama bear appeared.

I walked toward those boys and a voice came out of me as naturally as wind moving through a tunnel. Loud. Immediate. Commanding.

There was no planning involved. No analysis. No carefully crafted response.

Only action.

Movement.

Force.

Later, people commented on it.

“I’ve never seen that side of you before.”

I smiled because I had.

I knew that voice.

I knew that fire.

It wasn’t new.

The difference was that this time I was in control of it, not the other way around.

There was a time in my life when that same force might have erupted from anger, fear, or the need to prove something. But standing there on that playground, it arose for a different reason.

Love.

Not the soft kind of love people often imagine, but the fierce kind. The kind that steps between danger and what it cherishes.

The protector wasn’t a stranger.

She was an old acquaintance.

This time, however, wisdom was holding the reins.

Life has a way of refining the forces within us. What once appeared as rage becomes courage. What once appeared as aggression becomes protection. The energy itself is not the problem; what matters is whether we possess it or it possesses us.

Protecting the people we love is one of life’s greatest tests. In those moments, there is no time for endless analysis or debate. There is only the instinct to shield, defend, and stop harm before it spreads.

And that instinct exists in all of us.

Big or small.

Mama bear or not.

It is useful.

It is purposeful.

It is part of life itself.

The challenge is not learning how to access that force. Most of us can.

The challenge is learning when to use it, and when to set it down.

Because strength is not merely the ability to protect.

Wisdom is knowing what, when, and how to protect.

And love is what gives that strength its direction.