Mother-in-law dreamed of a grandchild for years… And now she wants nothing to do with him
Jack and I have been together for almost ten years. We married for love—no one pushed or forced us. It just happened naturally: we met, fell in love, and had a wedding. Everything was going well, except for one thing—his mother, Barbara. From the very beginning of our marriage, she obsessively repeated, “I need grandchildren, I want to cuddle a baby!”
At that time, I was only twenty-six. I had just begun building my career, Jack and I were living in a rented flat in Manchester, saving up for a mortgage deposit, and planning renovations and job changes. A child didn’t fit into that equation. I honestly explained to my mother-in-law, “Not now. We’re not ready yet.” But it was as if she didn’t hear.
She would get upset, cause scenes, and say that I was ruining her son’s life by not giving him a real family. According to her logic, if a woman isn’t having children, she’s useless. I remained silent for a long time, trying to smooth things over, but each month her insistence grew more aggressive. “You shouldn’t have married him if you didn’t want kids. He would’ve been better off marrying that girl from college,” she’d say over and over.
Maybe she would have been calmer if there were somebody else apart from Jack. But he’s her only son, so all her attention, unstable love, and pressure were directed at us. We bought a house, went into debt, and lived under the weight of mortgage payments, but that didn’t concern her. She wanted a grandchild. Right away.
Then another thing happened: one day, Jack’s cousin called him, surprised, and told him that Barbara had visited—not just for tea, but to ask her to sign over her property to her. Naturally, the cousin refused. Jack and I acted like we knew nothing and just didn’t discuss it further. And then, two months later, I found out I was pregnant.
This news was unexpected, but joyous. My husband and I hugged and even shed a tear. At last, our long-awaited baby. I thought—now everything would change. Now Barbara would be thrilled. She’d been striving for this for years, pleading, crying, shouting, accusing. Her life’s dream had come true. We invited her over when we returned from the hospital with little Charlie in our arms. She didn’t come alone—she brought relatives. I prepared the table and dressed up the baby.
Then I heard her say, “Well, scared you enough to have one, didn’t I? Like I had any other choice; it’s your own fault.” I felt sick. She made this biting remark with a smirk in front of everyone. As if she had beaten us. As if the child wasn’t about love, but just the result of her pressure.
From that day, something broke. She stopped calling. She showed no interest in how the baby slept, whether he was eating, or if he was healthy. Occasionally, out of politeness, she’d ask Jack, “Well, how’s Charlie? Not coughing, is he?”—and that was it. No toys, no blankets, no cards on his first birthday. Just coldness and indifference. Yet she had sworn she’d be the best grandma in the world.
I don’t understand how one could beg and insist for so many years and then turn away. My husband says that this is her way of manipulating us, that we are to blame for allowing her behavior. But I disagree. A mother, a grandmother, shouldn’t be like this. A grandchild isn’t a tool of leverage or a response to blackmail. He’s a person. A small, kind, innocent person.
It pains me to see my son grow up without the love of someone who shouted so much about her “right to be a grandmother.” It hurts because I believed that someday we’d have a strong, united family where both my mom and his mom would together rock the cradle. But in the end, only the two of us do that.
I no longer call her, nor invite her over. I’m tired of waiting for warmth that’s not there. I gave her a chance. She wrote it off. And maybe it’s time for me to do the same.
