“I met ‘Mammy’s Boy’ in the late 1960s: a charming man with an eye for the girls (not known at the time). We quickly fell in love and a few months later, I fell pregnant with my first baby. Everything was great,” she writes.
“The ‘Mammy’ had not appeared at this time, but he never stopped talking about how old and frail she was and maybe we could all live together. I thought he was so kind. But from the start, she was jealous of us being together. When we moved to a few stony acres of land and a small house, she immediately took control of him.”
The reader goes on to describe how all money was handed over to “Mammy” and how she was frequently verbally abused by her mother-in-law and husband for getting pregnant and “messing up their lives.”
“I used to get up in the morning, milk six-seven cows by hand, wheel the milk churn to meet the wagon that collected the milk and look after the children. No transport, only a bike to do the shopping and in between take all this abuse every day,” she says.
“‘Mammy’ used to scream at me that I wasn’t the first ‘slut’ to get pregnant by him. This was my life for the first 20 years of marriage. I left the marriage four times to get away, but no one wanted the bother of a young woman and her children so I always had to return. He humiliated me any way he could, but during all that time I never once let her get control of me or my children.”
Today, her mother-in-law is deceased, but she says that any love she once felt for her husband has turned to “sheer hatred” and she can’t wait until the day she is free of him. “Even to look at him today makes my blood boil,” she says.
However, she adds that despite everything, her children have grown to be independent and kind and have become great parents to their own kids.
“Sorry for being long-winded,” she concludes, “but just to write about it soothes me.
“Tormented Soul.”
Miriam will be sharing her advice in the next issue of Irish Country Living, on shelves Thursday 22 January, but what words of wisdom would you share with this person about how she can move on and start living life on her own terms?
“I met ‘Mammy’s Boy’ in the late 1960s: a charming man with an eye for the girls (not known at the time). We quickly fell in love and a few months later, I fell pregnant with my first baby. Everything was great,” she writes.
“The ‘Mammy’ had not appeared at this time, but he never stopped talking about how old and frail she was and maybe we could all live together. I thought he was so kind. But from the start, she was jealous of us being together. When we moved to a few stony acres of land and a small house, she immediately took control of him.”
The reader goes on to describe how all money was handed over to “Mammy” and how she was frequently verbally abused by her mother-in-law and husband for getting pregnant and “messing up their lives.”
“I used to get up in the morning, milk six-seven cows by hand, wheel the milk churn to meet the wagon that collected the milk and look after the children. No transport, only a bike to do the shopping and in between take all this abuse every day,” she says.
“‘Mammy’ used to scream at me that I wasn’t the first ‘slut’ to get pregnant by him. This was my life for the first 20 years of marriage. I left the marriage four times to get away, but no one wanted the bother of a young woman and her children so I always had to return. He humiliated me any way he could, but during all that time I never once let her get control of me or my children.”
Today, her mother-in-law is deceased, but she says that any love she once felt for her husband has turned to “sheer hatred” and she can’t wait until the day she is free of him. “Even to look at him today makes my blood boil,” she says.
However, she adds that despite everything, her children have grown to be independent and kind and have become great parents to their own kids.
“Sorry for being long-winded,” she concludes, “but just to write about it soothes me.
“Tormented Soul.”
Miriam will be sharing her advice in the next issue of Irish Country Living, on shelves Thursday 22 January, but what words of wisdom would you share with this person about how she can move on and start living life on her own terms?
SHARING OPTIONS