**Diary Entry – When Illness Tears a Family Apart**
The kettle had gone cold hours ago, but Emily still clutched the mug between her hands, staring blankly at the rain tapping against the kitchen window. Another grey November day in our little flat on the outskirts of Manchester, and yet another storm brewing inside. Mum had turned up again—feverish, coughing, wrapped in that same old cardigan she always wore when she was poorly. It’s been years now. Any sign of a sniffle, and she’d pack her bag and come straight to us. Every time, I found myself torn—between caring for her, looking after little Sophie, and keeping my husband, James, from losing his patience.
Mum insists she can’t bear being alone in her own flat across town. “What if I get worse? What if I can’t manage?” she’d say, fixing me with that wounded look. But I know it’s not just fear. The moment she falls ill, she becomes this impossible, fussy thing—demanding soup (but not too salty), tea (but not too hot), the window open (no, shut). And if Sophie so much as whimpers, Mum sighs and mutters, “Honestly, must she make such a racket?” Even James, just walking past her room, earns a sharp, “Can’t he tread lighter? Slamming doors like a bull in a china shop!”
It wasn’t always like this. Before, James and I had our own rhythm—raising Sophie, visiting Mum once a month for a cuppa and a chat. She managed fine. Cooked, cleaned, even soldiered through colds without fanfare. But then something shifted. The calls grew more frequent—loneliness, aches, endless “What ifs?” I’d reassure her: “I’m just a phone call away, Mum.” But the worries piled up like snowdrifts in winter.
Then came the night she rang in tears, gasping that she’d called an ambulance. James was on night shift at the factory, so I bundled up Sophie and raced over. We brought her back, dosed her with medicine, fussed over her. And from that day, it became the norm. A fever? A cough? Within hours, she’d be on our doorstep. Sometimes for days. Sometimes weeks. Some nights, she’d lie there wheezing, demanding I stay, fetch water, listen. Meanwhile, Sophie would cry in her cot, and I’d dart between rooms, fraying at the edges.
Every visit was a battle. She’d sulk if the soup was wrong or threaten to leave, saying we “made her feel a burden.” I hated the thought of her going home ill, but worse was watching James’s patience thin like old paint. “She’s playing us,” he’d mutter. “She manages fine at home—comes here because she knows you’ll wait on her.” Deep down, I knew. But how could I say it? What if she shut me out for good? Yet something had to give. The cracks were spreading.
James stopped biting his tongue. “We need to talk to her,” he’d say, jaw tight. “Or she’ll bleed us dry.” He wasn’t wrong. But the thought tied my stomach in knots. How do you tell someone you love them without letting them drown you? I’d watch Sophie sleeping, see the strain in James’s face, and know—this couldn’t go on. The weight was breaking us.
**Lesson learnt: Love shouldn’t be a siege. Boundaries aren’t cruelty—they’re the walls that keep a family standing.**
