When I married Charles, I knew he had a daughter from his first marriage. His former wife, Margaret, had abandoned the child six years prior—packed her bags and left for France with a new beau, starting afresh. In that time, she’d had two more children, remembered her eldest only twice a month by video call, and sent gifts solely on holidays. I saw how the girl yearned for her mother, how she stared at the phone screen, hoping Margaret would say, “Come live with me.” But the invitation never came. Not once. She had simply erased her daughter from her life.
At first, the girl stayed with Charles’s mother, my mother-in-law. But the woman soon grew weary, struggling with schoolwork, tantrums, and meltdowns. So she sent the granddaughter back to her father. Charles brought her home, met my gaze, and said quietly, “Emily will live with us now. For good.”
I tried, truly, to be a good stepmother. I bought her clothes, cooked her favourite meals, collected her from school, and spoke with her heart-to-heart. I wanted to be her friend. But she shut me out, as if building a wall between us, making no effort to bridge the gap. She didn’t merely ignore me—she made it plain that, in her world, I meant nothing.
Three years have passed. The girl is now twelve, still living with us, acting as though this were her house, not mine and Charles’s. Every evening, she complains to her father: “Aunt Lily made me tidy up after myself,” or “Aunt Lily wouldn’t buy me what I wanted.” Then Charles’s mother calls, scolding me for “not giving the child enough attention” and saying, “You’ll have one of your own soon—better learn how to be a mother.” Yet she herself refuses to look after the girl, not even for an hour if I need to see the doctor or go to work.
It exhausts me. I work, keep house, cook, and now I’m expecting. Charles, though not siding with his daughter, still urges me to be gentler, more patient. But I’ve reached my limit. The girl has become nothing but a source of frustration—messy, rude, ungrateful, stubborn, perpetually dissatisfied. She isn’t mine, and I no longer pretend otherwise, even to myself.
Sometimes, I sit at the kitchen table late at night and wonder, “What if I’d refused to take her in? What if I’d stood my ground?” But it’s too late now. I can’t leave Charles—we’ll soon have a child together. And selfish though it may sound, I find myself wishing his daughter would choose, on her own, to return to her grandmother. To say, “I’d be happier with Gran.” I wouldn’t beg her to stay. I wouldn’t shed a tear.
All I want is peace. No more reproaches, no more fighting for my place in this home. I want my child to grow up surrounded by love and harmony, not endless tension and quarrels. Perhaps this is my only chance to keep my family intact—and not lose myself in the process.
