Two years have slipped by without a single word from my daughter: she has erased me from her life, and I am approaching seventy
In our block everyone knows my neighbor, ÉlodieFournier. She is sixtyeight, lives alone, and every now and then I drop by with a few pastries for tea, simply as a neighborly gesture. She is kind, an elegant lady, always smiling, who loves to recount her travels with her late husband. She rarely mentions her own family. Yet on the eve of the last holidays, when I brought her the usual sweets, she suddenly decided to open up. That night I heard a story that still chills my heart.
When I entered her flat, Élodie was not her usual self. Normally lively and energetic, she sat that evening with a distant look in her eyes. I asked nothing, just set out the tea, placed the biscuits, and sat quietly beside her. She remained silent for a long while, as if battling herself. Then, abruptly, she blurted out:
Two years she hasnt called me even once. No card, no message. I tried to reach her, but her number no longer exists. I dont even know where she lives anymore
She fell silent for a moment, as if years and decades were flashing before her. Then, as if a dam had broken, she began to speak.
We had a happy family. Charles and I married young, but we waited before having childrenwe wanted first to live for ourselves. His job let us travel a lot. We were close, laughed often, and loved the house we built together. With his own hands he created a spacious threeroom nest in the heart of Lyon. It was the dream of his life
When our daughter Amélie was born, Charles seemed reborn. He would hold her, read her stories, spend every free minute with her. Watching them, I felt I was the happiest woman alive. But ten years ago Charles left us. He fought illness for a long time; we drained almost all our savings trying to save him. Then silence. An emptiness, as if a piece of my heart had been ripped away.
After his death, Amélie drifted away. She moved into an apartment, wanted to live on her own. I didnt protestshe was an adult, she had to build her own life. She visited, we talked, everything seemed normal. Yet two years ago she came and announced she wanted to take out a mortgage to buy her own place.
I sighed and told her I couldnt help. The savings Charles and I had set aside had almost vanishedeverything went into his treatment. My pension barely covered the bills and my medication. She then suggested selling the apartment. We could buy you a studio in the suburbs, and the rest would be my downpayment.
I couldnt accept. It wasnt about money, but about memory. Those walls, every corner, had been shaped by Charles himself. All my happiness, my whole life, lived there. How could I abandon it? She shouted that her father had done all that for her, that the apartment would belong to her anyway, that I was selfish. I tried to tell her I only hoped that one day she would return here and remember us but she would hear none of it.
That day she slammed the door. Since then, silence. No call, no visit, not even at holidays. Later I learned from a mutual friend that she did obtain the loan and now works herself to exhaustion two jobs, an endless race. No family, no children. Even her friend hasnt seen her in six months.
And I I wait. Every day I stare at the phone, hoping it will ring. Nothing. I cant even call her she changed her number. She probably doesnt want to see or hear me any longer. She must think I betrayed her by refusing that day. Soon I will be seventy. I dont know how much longer I have in this flat, how many evenings Ill spend at the window hoping. I cannot understand how I could have hurt her so deeply.
Two Years Without a Word from My Daughter: She Has Erased Me from Her Life, and Soon I’ll Be 70…
