I am resentful toward myself for how I raised my children.
Sometimes the deepest pain does not come from without. It lingers within, gnawing at the heart, eroding the soul drop by drop. I no longer feel anger—only weariness. A quiet resentment simmers, not toward my children, no… but toward myself. Toward the way I raised them. Somewhere along the path of motherly love, I mistook unconditional care for boundless indulgence, and now I reap the consequences.
Seven years ago, I buried my husband. We had shared forty years together, and all that time had been devoted to our family, to our children. We worked tirelessly—no weekends, no holidays, never sparing a thought for ourselves. Everything was for them. For their future. We bought them flats, paid for their education, gave them every comfort they could desire. And when my husband passed, I was left not just alone—but without an anchor. Now, after two years of retirement, I sit in this cold flat, wondering how it came to be that the children I lived for seem to have forgotten I exist.
My pension is a bitter joke. At least I secured a council subsidy for the utilities, or else the lights would have been cut off long ago. Even so, the money barely covers my medicine, food, the simplest necessities. I turned to my children. I did not ask for much—just a little help. But my son said, “What do you need money for?” My daughter replied, “We have our own struggles.”
Struggles? Yet they go on holidays, buy new clothes, drive nice cars. My daughter’s wardrobe bursts with designer labels, and her seven-year-old granddaughter gets fifty pounds a month for pocket money. Just fifty pounds—that’s all I would need for medicine, for groceries. But she claims she can’t spare it. How can that be? My heart aches when I hear it. I’ve worn the same boots for years—worn through, soles leaking. But I stay silent. Too ashamed to ask again. Because each plea feels like humiliation.
I see my friends, my neighbours—their children bring them groceries, pay their bills, take them in during winter. And me? As though I have no one at all. The cruelest irony is that I taught them this. My sister and I supported our own parents—with money, with food, with time—and we did it without complaint. With love. But my children? Mine have turned away. This is more than pain. It is emptiness.
Once, I suggested to my daughter—perhaps I could move in with her for a year, rent out my flat for extra income. They have plenty of space. But she wouldn’t even hear it. “Rent out a room and stay in the other one,” she said. So living with strangers is fine, but not with her own mother? I still cannot fathom where I went wrong. What misstep did I take?
Now every day is survival. How to stretch the last pennies to month’s end? How to avoid falling ill? How not to wither from loneliness? My husband and I gave them everything—every penny, every ounce of strength. And now… I linger on the edges of their lives. Silent. Resigned. Yet somewhere inside, a foolish hope still flickers—that perhaps one day, one of them will remember they still have a mother. Not once I am gone. But now.
Yet it seems hope is all I have left.
