I am still very much a baby

In a good way.
What I mean is:

Here I am, sitting on the floor of a dark room, beside my daughter who has just fallen asleep to the sound of lullabies and the touch of my warm lap...and I lay her down in bed and tuck her in with Bunny, my old Bunny who heard a lot of my tears and kept a lot of my company when I most needed it...
I lay here with him when I feel particularly vulnerable, when I feel like we both need some sheltering form the world.

I worry. I worry I won't be able to shelter her for too much longer, and that breaks my heart. I know that's the deal, I know children aren't ours to shelter forever and so on...but still, it breaks my heart. She's a tiny baby, for christ's sake. I think I should be very well justified in protecting her like a mama LION from annoying family comments and interventions with her. Family scares me more, much more, than any stranger on the street with inconvenient nosing in. At least they are strangers I never have to see again. Family, no. Family I see over and over and over again. Family has power over decisions, over self-image, over ways of doing things.
I hate so many things about how some people treat her, disrespect her. It drives me nuts. Nuts? No, it drives me bloody rabies mad. So when I lay her down with bunny, when I kiss her goodnight over and over again, when I imagine all her owl-angels, I really am seeing me there as well, laying down with her, sheltered down there with her.

She's my best guardian angel.