My children checked in on me constantly, their voices always carrying that particular tightness of unspoken suspicion, but I could never quite bring myself to let them actually see how badly I was struggling underneath the surface. I was a proud woman still, determined to survive on whatever scraps of dignity I had left, even as the walls of my own small house seemed to press slowly, steadily inward around me with each passing year.
Continue reading on the next page →
