When photos of beaten daycare owner of Martha McClure (who stood up to a non-custodial parent) went viral, she was hailed a hero. She had refused to let an intoxicated father pick up his children when it was clear he had no legal right to. Tdaycare owner attack
McClure says she was simply doing her job and that the the attention has been humbling. . . and slightly embarassing.
“To me, it wasn’t heroic. To me, it’s what I’m supposed to do,” McClure says. “The children in my care — I am their person. I am their momma bear when their mother isn’t there. Did I know he was going to hurt me? Yes. Did I hope he wouldn’t? Sure. Would I do it over again? Definitely.”
The three children she was protecting that day are in the foster care system and live with a relative. She has cared for the kids since the oldest was an infant, and she’s always been aware of the possibility of custodial issues disrupting her in-home daycare.
When the children’s father arrived at her daycare on October 7 and behaving aggressively and attempting to remove his kids from her home, her priority became luring the man out of her house and locking the door behind them.
Resulting from the attack McClure suffered several broken bones in her face and had to have surgery. She is still struggling with pain and vision problems, but feels thankful that she was able to keep the children in her care safe and unaware of the danger outside their door.
“They don’t know what all happened. We did the best we could to keep them safe and keep them innocent,” McClure says. “I don’t want (my home) to be a scary place where something scary happened. For most of these kids, my house is their second home.”
“I’m grateful that it wasn’t worse,” she adds. “It’s my job, what I did, and I will honestly say that the scars physically are going to heal. Had I given them to him — the emotional scars — I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself. Everybody that mattered in that moment was safe.”