I was sitting in the doctor’s waiting room when my phone rang. It was Angela, my only daughter. Her voice sounded strange, almost cold, when she said, “Mom, we’re going to Europe tomorrow. I already sold your beach house and your car.”

With each passing day, I grew more comfortable with this double life I was leading. On one hand, I was the poor, abandoned mother Angela believed I was. On the other, I was a wealthy woman, quietly orchestrating her daughter’s salvation and education. For the next two weeks, I watched Angela struggle with decisions she’d never had to make before: how to stretch money for food,
how to negotiate with creditors, how to find a job when your credit history is ruined. It was a cruel but necessary education. “Mom, I went to three job interviews today,” she told me one afternoon, arriving home with swollen feet and a tired face. “At two of them, they told me they couldn’t hire me because of my pending legal issues.
At the third, they offered me a part-time job cleaning offices at night. Are you going to take it?” “I have no choice. It pays very little, but it’s better than nothing. And I can work nights and keep looking for something better during the day.” Seeing my daughter, who had lived a comfortable life for over 40 years, preparing to clean offices at night broke my heart, but it also filled me with pride.
She was finally facing reality without waiting for someone else to solve her problems. “Are you sure you can handle so much physical work?” “I’m going to have to learn. I can’t keep being a burden to you, Mom. It’s enough that you let me live here without paying anything. This is your house, Angela.”

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