My four-year-old son always cried when left with his grandmother. When I found out why, I was stunned.
I always thought of my family as rock solid. Sure, there were disagreements, but who doesn’t have them? Especially with my mother-in-law, Vera. We were never close. She looked at me as if I had stolen her son. Despite the tense relationship, I trusted her with the most precious thing — our son, Michael. I believed a grandmother could never harm her own grandson.
With work consuming us, we decided that twice a week, my mother-in-law would pick Michael up from nursery school in our town near Manchester. On paper, it seemed perfect: time with grandma for him, and a break for us. Everyone appeared content. But soon I noticed something was amiss.
Michael changed. Whenever it was her day to pick him up, he’d cling to my skirt, sobbing, pleading not to go. Initially, I thought it was just childish whims — perhaps he didn’t want to leave his friends or was simply tired. But my concern grew. After returning home, he was not his usual self: quiet, withdrawn, almost a shadow. Sometimes he refused to eat and stared blankly into space. One day, when the phone rang and I mentioned his grandmother, he flinched in fear, hiding behind the sofa. That’s when I realized it was serious.
I decided to talk to him. At first, he was silent, just clinging to me, trembling. I promised, “If you tell me, I won’t leave you with her again.” He burst into tears and whispered:
“Mom, she doesn’t love me… She says I’m bad.”
My heart sank. Tears stung my eyes, but I held them back.
“What does she do, my love?”
“She yells if I’m not quiet. Says I’m in the way. Sometimes she locks me in a room and tells me to think about my behavior…”
I felt the blood drain from my face, gripping the armrest so tightly my knuckles turned white.
“Were you there alone? For long?”
“Yes… And when I cried, she got even angrier.”
I was breathless. I couldn’t believe the woman I trusted could do this. My child, my joy, locked away like that! Something inside me shattered.
I immediately called my husband, my voice shaking with anger and pain. I told him everything. He was horrified but initially tried to defend his mother: “She wouldn’t… It’s a misunderstanding.” But when he sat down with Michael, looking into his tearful eyes and hearing the same words, his doubts vanished. His face turned to stone with shock.
We went to see Vera. She greeted us with her usual coldness, but when I directly asked why she locked up our son, her calm demeanor broke. She flared up:
“He doesn’t behave! He’s unruly! I was only trying to teach him!”
I shook with fury, barely containing myself:
“Teach him? By locking him in a room? Scaring him to tears? You think that’s normal?”
She remained silent, her lips pressed into a tight line. My husband watched her with such pain and disappointment as I’d never seen. That day we decided: Michael would never step foot in her house again. My husband attempted to maintain some connection with his mother, but I couldn’t. Forgive her? That was beyond me. No one should ever treat my child like that.
Time passed. Michael returned to being himself — laughing, playing, unafraid of every little noise. And I learned a lesson I’ll remember forever: if a child cries for no apparent reason, there’s a reason. Hidden, but real. Our duty is to find it and protect them, even if it means standing against those we once trusted. I will never again leave my son in the care of someone who doesn’t see him as a treasure.
