“My son said there’s no place for me in his life anymore. How did it come to this?”
It was a quiet Saturday morning. The kettle hummed on the stove, and sunlight crept lazily through the curtains. I sat at the kitchen table, cradling a steaming cup of tea, when the phone rang. On the screen—my son, Oliver. My only one. My pride, my joy, my heart. Everything in my life had revolved around him. I’d given him all of me—love, care, sleepless nights, the last pound from my purse. Since his wedding, calls had become scarce, but each one felt like a breath of fresh air.
“Mum, we need to talk,” he began. His voice was measured. Almost cold. Unfamiliar.
Something clenched inside me.
“Of course, love. What’s wrong?” I asked, already feeling my pulse quicken.
He paused for a moment, as if gathering his thoughts, then spoke plainly.
“Mum, Emily and I… We’ve decided you need to understand—we can’t keep seeing you this often.”
I didn’t grasp it at first. Or maybe I refused to. He carried on.
“We’ve got our own lives now, our own plans, our own worries. And you… you’re too involved. Emily says you call too much. Drop by unannounced. We’re exhausted. We need space. Distance. Peace.”
I sat in silence, unable to utter a word. Only one question echoed in my mind: *What did I do wrong?*
“Oliver…” I whispered. “I just wanted to be near you. I didn’t mean harm. I just… miss you.”
“I know, Mum,” he cut in. “But things are different now. We want to live our own lives. We need… separation. Do you understand?”
I nodded, though he couldn’t see it. Tears welled up. My hands trembled. I forced out the words:
“Alright. I understand.”
The call ended quickly. He said goodbye calmly—maybe even with relief. I stayed sitting in the same spot, in the same kitchen, with the same cup of now-cold tea.
I turned to the wall where the old photos hung. There was Oliver—just a boy, grinning in his school uniform. There he was at graduation. And there, with a bouquet, standing beside Emily at the registry office. In every one, I was next to him. I’d *always* been next to him.
I remembered carrying him in my arms when he was feverish. Staying up late reading him stories. Helping him with school, with university choices, cheering him up after his first heartbreak. And now, when he was the only one left in my life—he was telling me there was no room for me anymore.
It seems ageing isn’t about years. It’s about feeling unneeded. Watching the people you once lifted to their feet now see you as a burden. Like an inconvenient shadow from the past, something to crop out of their bright new picture.
My friends chatter about babysitting their grandchildren, Sunday roasts, being asked for advice. And me? I’m afraid to call. Afraid to hear irritation in his voice. Afraid I’ll be called “too much” again. Afraid they’ll say, “We’re tired of you.”
The cruelest part? I never asked for much. No money, no favours. Just to be near him sometimes. To bake him a cake, ask how his day was. Was that really too much?
I’m no saint. Maybe I called too often. Maybe I was too emotional. I just missed him. A silent flat, the telly murmuring in the kitchen, a few dusty photos—that’s my life now.
Weeks have passed. No word from Oliver. No word from Emily. True to my promise, I don’t disturb them. I live in this quiet. Staring out the window, wondering—is this the end of the love I poured into him? So sudden, so cold?
I’m bitter. But I’m not angry. I wish no ill. I just don’t understand how the one person I lived for now wants me gone.
And the worst part? It’s not the empty house. Not the silence. It’s realising that to someone who was once your whole world—you’ve become nothing.
