There is a reason that people call mothers who protect their children, “mama bears,” and this is a prime example.

One mom from Canterbury, Connecticut, got an early morning wake-up call when she heard her daughter start screaming in terror after setting foot outside their house.

Rylee, the young girl, was heading to school at 7:45 a.m. on Friday morning when she was attacked by a wild raccoon. It grabbed her ankle and would not let go, even though she kept trying to kick it off.

Mom Kelsey MacNamara burst out the front door, spotted the offending creature, and immediately scruffed it — but it took some tugging to get it to let go of her daughter’s leg.

At one point, MacNamara was holding her daughter sideways, balancing her on her hip while holding the raccoon by the scruff in the other hand as she disentangled them.

“Go inside! Go inside!” she yelled to her daughter as she set her down and pushed the door open, while still trying to keep the scrabbling animal as far away from them both as possible.

“It’s a rabid raccoon, get in the house!” she yells to someone off-screen.

After one swing, MacNamara managed to grab the raccoon by the scruff with both hands and fling it far into the front yard, running back inside the house before it had a chance to consider a repeat attack.

After the harrowing ordeal, MacNamara posted the video of the attack on Facebook at her daughter’s request.

“Per Rylee’s request [to] ‘show everyone what the [raccoon] did’ we are headed to get checked out for rabies following this unprovoked [raccoon] attack,” the caption read. “I can’t tell you how proud I am of this Brave girl!!”

But more people had high praise for the brave mom, who didn’t waste a second grabbing the misbehaving animal with her bare hands and throwing it, protecting her daughter and warning others nearby.

In the comments on the post, MacNamara revealed that they were both at the hospital receiving treatment.