When I think back to the night my in-laws kicked me out with my newborn son, I can still feel the sting of h.u.m.i.l.i.a.t.i.o.n, the cold air biting my skin, and the sound of my baby’s soft cries muffled against my chest. At the time, I thought my life had fallen apart beyond repair. But I was wrong; it was just the beginning of something they would come to regret more than I could have ever imagined.
My name is Hera. I married into the Patel family when I was twenty-five, fresh out of college, wide-eyed, and hopelessly in love with my husband, Kiran. He was charming, patient, and so unlike the rest of his family, or so I thought.
His parents, Mr. and Mrs. Patel, were traditional to the core.
They wanted everything done their way, the meals cooked a certain way, the home run to their exact standards, and their son treated like royalty. From the moment I moved into their house after the wedding, it became clear that I wasn’t a daughter-in-law to them; I was hired help who wasn’t getting paid. Still, I tried to adjust.
I told myself it was temporary, that once Kiran and I saved enough, we’d move into our own place. But every time I mentioned it, his mother would scoff. “You don’t leave family,” she’d say, as though wanting a bit of privacy was some moral failing.
Things got worse after I got pregnant. Instead of support, I received endless criticism. I wasn’t eating right, I wasn’t dressing modestly enough, I was “too sensitive.” I swallowed it all because I thought once the baby arrived, they’d soften.
Surely, a grandchild would melt their hearts. I couldn’t have been more wrong. When my son, Aarav, was born, he was the light of my life.
Holding him in my arms made every sleepless night, every argument, every tear worth it. But to my in-laws, he was little more than another thing to control. From the day we came home from the hospital, they took over dictating what I should feed him, how I should hold him, and even when I was allowed to nap.
My mother-in-law would snatch him from me, saying, “You’re doing it wrong, Hera. He’ll never stop crying if you keep babying him like that.”
Kiran, to his credit, tried to mediate at first. But slowly, he began to fold under their pressure.
His father would lecture him about “keeping his wife in line,” and his mother would cry about how I was “ruining the family peace.”
I could feel my marriage slipping away one silent dinner, one cold shoulder at a time. Then came the night that changed everything. It was late past midnight, and Aarav had a fever.
I’d been up for hours, trying to keep him comfortable. His little body was burning, and every tiny whimper tore at my heart. I was in the kitchen warming a bottle when my mother-in-law came in, her face twisted with irritation.
“What are you doing up again?!” she hissed. “You’re making too much noise.”
“He’s sick,” I said softly, rocking the baby in my arms. “His fever’s not going down.
I might need to take him to the hospital.”
She threw her hands in the air. “Hospital? Over a little fever?
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