Closer to My Mother-in-Law Than My Own Mom: The Bitter Truth of My Life

“You’re not coming home for Thanksgiving?” My mom’s voice crackled through the phone, sharp as broken glass. I could hear her inhale, like she was getting ready to spit out another accusation.

I glanced at the clock on the kitchen wall. Ethan was chopping onions, his mom Linda humming softly as she kneaded pie dough—her hands dusted with flour, her hair pulled back with a red bandana. The kitchen was warm, alive, filled with the scents of cinnamon and roasting turkey.

I gripped the phone tighter. “Mom, I—Ethan’s family invited us to stay here this year. I just thought—”

She cut me off. “So you’d rather be with strangers than your own mother. That’s nice, Allison. Really nice.”

I could picture her: sitting alone in her apartment in Boise, the TV flickering, a glass of boxed wine sweating on the coffee table. I felt the old guilt gnaw at me, but I pushed it down. I was tired of letting her moods run my life.

“I’m sorry, Mom. I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”

I hung up before she could answer. My hands shook.

Linda glanced up and smiled, her blue eyes soft. “You okay, honey?”

I nodded, wiping my eyes with the back of my hand. “Yeah. Just mom stuff.”

She patted my shoulder. “You know you’re family here, right?”

That’s what gets me. Sometimes I think Linda is more of a mother to me than my own mom ever was. I was 26 the first time I met Linda, nervous and desperate to impress. But from the moment she hugged me, smelling like lavender and baking bread, I felt something ease inside me—a tightness I’d carried my whole life.

Growing up with my mom was like living in the eye of a storm. She was unpredictable. Some days she’d shower me with gifts or drag me to the mall, babbling about how lucky I was to have her. Most days, though, she’d snap at me for breathing too loud, for leaving dishes in the sink, for existing in a way that annoyed her. My dad left when I was eight. After that, I became a prop in her one-woman play—a daughter-shaped accessory for her Instagram posts, a built-in audience for her rants about how hard her life was.

I learned to disappear. I learned not to cry when she called me ungrateful or rolled her eyes when I brought home an A-minus instead of an A. I learned that my feelings didn’t matter.

But here, in this house in Madison, Wisconsin, I was learning something new. Linda noticed things. She asked how my day was, and she actually listened to the answer. She remembered my favorite foods, the little details I’d been trained not to expect anyone to care about. When Ethan and I fought—like the time I accused him of forgetting our anniversary, only to realize I’d gotten the date wrong—Linda didn’t take sides. She made us tea and told us stories about her own marriage, about mistakes and forgiveness. She told me being part of a family meant always having a place, even when you mess up.

One Christmas, my mom sent me a card. She wrote, “Hope you’re happy with your new family. Don’t forget who raised you.” There was fifty dollars inside, folded so tightly the edges cut my finger. I stared at her familiar handwriting, the way she always dotted her i’s with little hearts. I should have felt something—gratitude, maybe, or guilt. But all I felt was tired.

I called her that night. She didn’t pick up. I left a message: “Thanks for the card, Mom. I love you.”

She didn’t call back.

A week later, Linda asked me to help her with a new recipe. We burned the first batch and ended up sitting on the floor, eating cookie dough out of the bowl and laughing until we cried. She looked at me and said, “You know, Allison, I always wanted a daughter. I got lucky.”

My throat tightened. I wanted to tell her that she’d given me something I never knew I needed. But the words stuck.

Ethan sees the difference. He used to think I was exaggerating about my mom, until he spent a weekend at her place. We drove twelve hours to Boise, only for her to ignore us most of the time, glued to her phone or snapping at me for not helping enough. That night, Ethan whispered, “I’m so sorry. I had no idea.”

I shrugged. “It’s always been like this.”

When we left, my mom barely hugged me. She said, “Well, don’t be strangers,” like she hadn’t just spent two days treating us like furniture. On the drive home, I cried. Ethan held my hand the whole way back.

Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to have a normal mother-daughter relationship. To call her when I get good news, to show up at her place and feel wanted. But I’ve given up wishing. I found a mother in Linda, and I’m grateful. But there’s a hole in me that aches, especially when my friends talk about their moms like they’re best friends.

Last month, my mom called out of the blue. She was angry I hadn’t sent her a birthday card. “You never think about anyone but yourself, Allison. You’re just like your father.”

I bit my lip. I wanted to scream, to ask her why she never tried to be close to me. But I just said, “I’m sorry, Mom.”

After we hung up, I sat in the dark, the walls of our little apartment closing in. Ethan came in, rubbing my back. “You don’t have to keep trying if it hurts you,” he said.

But how do you stop wanting your own mother to love you? How do you grieve someone who’s still alive?

Tonight, Linda hugs me before bed. “Goodnight, sweetheart.”

I close my eyes and let myself believe, for a moment, that this is what having a mom is supposed to feel like.

Is it wrong to feel closer to the woman who married my husband than to the one who gave birth to me? Or is family really just about who loves you, after all?