When Jason passed, my world didn’t just fall apart—it collapsed inward, piece by piece. But what shattered me most wasn’t the grief of losing him. It was the cruelty that followed.
I expected to grieve alongside family. Instead, I found myself defending my children and our home against someone who should’ve stood with us—his mother.
He was there for bedtime stories, pancake breakfasts, school pickups, bike repairs. He never tried to replace their father. He simply became their home. Ours was not a traditional beginning, but it was a real one.
His mother, Eleanor, didn’t see it that way.
She never said it to my face—at least not at first—but I felt her judgment in every cold glance. I heard her, once, through the hallway phone line.
“She trapped him. They’re not even his.”
Her words cracked through me like ice. I stood there, dishes in hand, my body frozen and my heart bruised.
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