“Won’t you take me in with you?” Mother asked resentfully. But I already knew the answer…
My name is Victoria. I’m thirty-eight now, married for fifteen years. My husband, Robert, and I have a son, a fine flat, and what should be everything one could wish for. Yet one wound has never quite healed—my mother, or rather, her ceaseless war with my husband, a feud that has dragged on for over a decade.
Robert came to our town from a small village in Yorkshire. Back then, he dreamt of university, but when he failed to secure a place on his first attempt, he took work as a plumber just to scrape by. He lived in a cramped bedsit, never complained, and kept at it. Eventually, he got into university, but he never gave up his trade—his skill made him indispensable. That’s where we met. I was a year ahead of him, but there was an instant warmth between us.
When I graduated, we decided to marry. Mother was furious.
“A plumber? Have you lost your mind? Some village boy with no prospects, no home of his own!”
I persuaded her to let us stay in her flat—just until Robert finished his degree. She agreed, grudgingly, her lips tight with disapproval. From the start, she treated him with cold disdain, no matter how hard he tried. In those first weeks, he fixed everything in the flat—the leaky taps, the oven, even the balcony door that hadn’t shut properly for years. All he got in return were icy remarks.
“I won’t be registering you here, mark my words!” she snapped once. Robert only replied, calmly, “I never asked you to.”
He endured it, day after day. But I saw how it wore him down. Then, I fell pregnant… and the worst happened.
“You’re mad, having this bumpkin’s child! I can barely stand him under my roof!”
Robert heard. Without a word, he packed his things. Then he turned to me.
“Either you come with me, or I go alone. But I won’t stay under the same roof as your mother another day.”
I went. We moved into his tiny bedsit. Our son was born. Those years were lean, but I never regretted it. Robert worked, studied, took on odd jobs. Two years later, we bought our first one-bedroom flat, then a two-bed. Now we live in a spacious three-bedroom home. Robert’s an engineer at a prominent firm, well-paid, but he still takes on side work—his skill keeps him in constant demand.
Yet from the day we left, Robert never set foot in my mother’s flat again. Not for holidays, not even by chance on the street. His boundary was firm.
“I won’t see her. I’ll send money for whatever she needs, but that’s all. She’ll get no visits, no pleasantries from me.”
For years, Mother refused to understand. Even now, she still complains:
“Will you always be led by your husband’s whim? What if I fall ill? What if I can’t manage alone? Will you abandon me too?”
I brought the question home, hesitant. “What if… she truly can’t care for herself?”
Robert didn’t hesitate. “We’ll hire a carer. You can visit. She’ll want for nothing—but she won’t be part of our lives. My line is drawn at your doorstep.”
I thought it over. And I realised—he was right. He owes no forgiveness to someone who belittled him. He won’t fix her pipes when she once scorned him for being the man who fixed them. He grew. He changed. She never did.
Just last week, she called, shouting about a leak in her bathroom. “You won’t even ask Robert to look at it!”
“Mum,” I said evenly, “he’s sent you the money. Call a handyman.”
She hung up. Hurt, as always. But I don’t regret it.
Sometimes I think that night, when I left with Robert for that drafty bedsit, was the truest choice I ever made. I chose family. I chose the man who never once failed us—who lifted us from nothing, who refused to let bitterness break him. And I won’t let anyone else try.
Let Mother sulk. She had time—and chances. She simply never took them.
