A Guardian Mum

Chloe was called a “substitute Mum,” the other day by a former friend of hers who is now incredibly critical of the role she plays in my son’s life.


“You’re just a substitute Mum and when he’s old enough he will resent you because his own Mother is dead,” she said of my son to her.

Chloe was incredibly upset.

This is the woman who gives up every free hour of every single day she has to make him happy, to make him smile, to entertain him and educate him. This is the woman whose arms he falls into when he just needs a cuddle or who sits with me as I answer questions he has. This is the woman who offers him all the support a Mother ever could. This is the woman who loves him as though he were her own flesh and blood, who would, without a second’s consideration, give her life for him. So it’s no wonder she was upset, right?

But the so called friend continued anyway:

“When you have your own baby, you’ll realise you don’t even really love the kid.”

That was the final straw for Chloe. She left and has no intention of seeing that former friend again.

Negativity seems to surround people who cannot just be happy for someone. Granted – she is not his biological Mother. Granted, she has not been in his life since he was a baby. Granted, the boy misses his biological Mother unbearably.

But who does he go to when he’s upset about it? Or when he’s had bad dreams about losing his Mum? Or when he wakes up in the middle of the night still looking for her?

He comes to me or to Chloe. He seems reassurance in her arms. He seeks comfort from her.

He calls her ‘Mum,’ not because we made him – but because it felt right to him. We didn’t even broach the topic with him. It was him – he decided that she felt enough like a Mother to him that he was going to reward her with that name.

They talk openly about Anje and how her death changed us. They speak together, Chloe and our boy, about that sad time and he is open about the fact he knows Chloe’s not his “first Mum.”

“I know she’s not my first Mum,” he told his teacher when, to my annoyance, he was questioned about referring to her as Mum. “But she does all the things that Mums do and I do all the things with her I did with my Mum so she’s like my guardian Mum.” His teacher told me he said that (cue my annoyance at him being questioned in the first place).

‘Guardian Mum.’ I like it though.

I asked him about that and he told me it’s

“A bit like a guardian Angel because Chloe came to look after me like a Mum when my first Mum had to go away.”

So to my darling Chloe.... his Guardian Mum, my beautiful wife to be.... don’t let negativity spoil that beautiful smile. You’re the best thing that’s happened to me and to him in a very long time. And it just fits. We all just fit perfectly... you, me, him and that space left for our new arrival. We work well together, our strengths and flaws complement one another. And you, my love, are stuck with me.