Who should you fear more – mother-in-law or daughter-in-law?

As a loving mother and devoted carer to your son, you expect recognition and a warm welcome from the woman he chooses to marry. And well aware of the stereotypes of hassling, interfering mothers-in-law, you do your utmost to stay out of their newly-married lives. So how do you feel when your son’s new wife orders you out of the house barely a couple of months after their wedding? This is the heart-rendering story of Fatima, a cleaner at the Yemeni University, who works sweeping corridors in the Faculty of Arts.

“I have been striving all my life to bring up my son so that he has all the basic requirements in life,” explains Fatima, “sweeping corridors to the point of damaging my back. My son is the only twinkle of hope that remains for me in this life.” Should one pass the Faculty of Arts, they would see a smiling Fatima in her green boiler suit, smiling through her work despite a lack of reciprocal smiles from life

Fatima’s story, while one of its kind and indeed maybe difficult to imagine from the viewpoint of a kind a caring in-law family, is nevertheless genuine. “My husband passed away thirty years ago. I had just given birth to a boy,” recounts Fatima, “When my husband died of a heart attack, I was left with the responsibility of bringing up our son solely on my shoulders.

With nobody to help her in this daunting task, Fatima went to the university where her husband had been working with the hope that his friends would possibly be able to provide assistance of sorts. “Sure enough,” she says, “they offered me a chance to work as part of the cleaning staff. I was determined to do any thing in order to avoid prevent the suffering of my child.”

Fatima has since been working diligently for thirty years without respite nor complaints. She certainly did not see any point in sharing her hardships at work with her son; instead she steadfastly believed that one day he would  be proud of her. She admits however, that her son initially expressed shame and disgrace at his mother occupying such a lowly job, but she maintained that he had to acknowledge his mother’s vital role in bettering his living conditions.
“I have experienced the worst things in this life just for his sake, so he may hold his head high in society. I dedicated myself to raising him, buying him books and the best clothes. Moreover, after he graduated from high school I registered him at the university,” says Fatima proudly. After four years of studying in the Faculty of Accounting, he graduated and his mother was overjoyed to see her child becoming such a well-educated young man. Fatima thought to herself that her son would help her to fight through in this life of hardships.

 
Immediately after graduating and landing himself a job with a well known company in Sana’a, Fatima’s son began contemplating marriage. She says, “one day, he told me that I was to stop working right there and then. He wanted me to finally have a break from working as a cleaner, and he promised me whatever I wanted in life. It seemed as if he was promising me the moon.”

 
True to his word, the son rented a beautiful apartment for himself and his mother; it seemed that he was intending to make up for all the sufferings she had previously undergone for his sake. Fatima goes on to explain, “after getting this job, he met a young lady who was working in the same company, and announce his intention to marry her. I was so happy that my child had become a man, and that he was going to get married!” Yet little did Fatima know of the consequences that this marriage would bring.

 
Initially everything was well at home, with Fatima’s new daughter-in-law treating her with respect and charming tenderness. After the first couple of months of marriage however, disagreements started breaking out between the wife and the mother. Fatima explained that soon after, her son’s wife started complaining about her residing in their house; “I never offended her, hurt her, or annoyed her. I paid her respect and gave her love from the bottom of my heart. I treated her as if she were my own daughter.”

 
Fatima tells how one day her daughter-in-law spoke out frankly and said, “I cannot bear the fact that you reside with us. You are the source of my problems in this house. When I decided to get married, I envisaged marrying your son – not you as well!” Naturally Fatima was completely devastated and started weeping painfully. She tried to minimize her own presence in the house so that she would not affect her son’s relationship with his wife.

 
Yet day by day, her daughter-in-law became more aggressive and intensified her hatred and hostility against the mother. After receiving no support from her son despite warning him of his wife’s tendencies, Fatima took the words to heart as an insult against the dignity that she had tried so valiantly to preserve until then. She resolved to leave the house altogether and to withdraw from their lives completely.

 
Fatima speaks with tears in her eyes as she recalls leaving her home without even a farewell gesture or word from her own son, a son for whom she had strived so hard and toiled so long. She says, “I went to see an old friend and have been staying  in her home for three weeks now – thinking in vain that my son would come after me and persuade me to return. He hasn’t though – instead he practically sold me in order to satisfy the whims of his wife.”  

 
Fatima’s story descends to another level of betrayal. A month after leaving the house, Fatima returned to visit her son, only to discover the house empty and the married couple absconded to somewhere even the landlord claimed not to be aware of. Fatima never thought that her son would be this ungrateful and forget all the favours she had done for him. Putting her hands over her mouth she asks, “do you think he will come back to me someday? Do you think he knows that I have resumed my old, back-crunching job?”

 
Fatima, although speaking in a pained voice, does not seem saddened at being forced to resume work. She claims to be satisfied with the knowledge that she has performed her duties as a mother and kept her promise as a widow. Despite gaining nothing in return from her ungrateful son, Fatima continues to love him due to the fact the she carries the heart of a genuine mother.

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