My daughterinlaw keeps pushing to sell my flat so she can fund her sons house: I refuse to spend my remaining days under a bridge.
My heart is torn between pain and fear. My daughterinlaw wants to take away the home Ive loved all my life to fulfill my grandsons dream. Their vision of a grand family nest feels like a death sentence, and Ian aging woman standing alone dread ending up roofless. This tale is about filial love, betrayal, and the struggle to keep ones own corner in a world that grows ever more foreign to me.
My name is Élodie Lefebvre, and I live in a small town in southern Provence. Ten years ago my son Julien married Amélie. Since then they have been cramped together with their daughter in a modest tworoom apartment. Seven years ago Julien bought a plot and began building a house. In the first year nothing happened; in the second they erected a fence and poured foundations, then work halted again for lack of funds. Julien saved patiently for materials, never losing hope. Over the years they raised the first floor, but they still dream of a twostorey dwelling where I could also be welcomed. My son is a family man, and I have always been proud of his devotion.
They have already sacrificed so much for this project. Amélie persuaded Julien to sell their threeroom flat and move into a smaller one, putting the difference toward the house. Now they live in tight quarters, yet they do not give up. Whenever they visit me, every conversation drifts to their future home: windows, insulation, wiring My health worries and anxieties seem to mean nothing to them. I stay silent, listen, but a lowgrade dread grows inside me. For a long time I have sensed that Amélie and Julien intend to sell my threeroom flat to finish the construction.
One day Julien told me, Mom, well all live together in that big house you, us, and the little one. I dared to ask, So I have to sell my apartment? They nodded, speaking enthusiastically about the happiness of sharing one roof. But when I saw the cold look in Amélies eyes, I understood something: I could never live under her rule. She does not hide her dislike, and I am tired of pretending everything is fine. Her frosty glances, her sharp wordsthis is not what I want to endure at my age.
I want to help my son. It breaks me to watch him struggle on a site that could take another ten years. Yet I posed the question that gnaws at me: Where will I go? Move into their tiny flat? Stay in that unfinished house without comfort? Amélie immediately replied, Youll be perfectly fine in the countryside! We own a small holiday cottagea dilapidated building with no heating, usable only in summer. I enjoy the warm days there, but winter? Heating with wood, washing in a basin, stepping out into the frost to use the toilet? My rheumatism and frail health would not survive.
The countryside lives like that, Amélie declared. Yes, they survive, but not under such conditions! I refuse to turn my twilight years into a battle for survival. Money is short for the construction, and I feel my daughterinlaw driving me toward the abyss. Recently I overheard her on the phone with her mother: We have to move her to the neighbors and sell her flat, she whispered. My blood ran cold. The neighbor, Louis Morel, is an elderly solitary man much like myself. Occasionally we share tea and chat, and I bring him pastries. But to live under his roof? That is her planto discard me while appropriating my home.
I knew Amélie didnt want to live with me, but this level of treachery I cannot trust their promise of shared happiness under one roof. Her words are lies meant to push me to sell. I love Julien, and his distress tears at my heart, yet I cannot sacrifice my own house. It is all I have left. Without it, I would be nothing, abandoned like an old, useless piece of furniture. What if their building drags on for years, leaving me on the street? Or in that freezing cottage where winter would be a sentence?
Each night I lie awake, consumed by thoughts. Helping my son is my duty, but ending up homeless is a price too heavy. Amélie sees me only as an obstacle, and her scheme with the neighbor feels like a knife in the back. I fear losing not only my house but also my son if I refuse. Still, the terror of ending under a bridge, stripped of my last refuge, is stronger. I do not know which path will let me stay true to both my child and myself. My soul cries out in pain, and I pray the heavens grant me the strength to choose rightly.
The Daughter-in-Law Demands I Sell My Flat to Fund Her Son’s Home: I’m Not Spending My Final Days Homeless Under a Bridge.
