I know...

The first time I understood that love could be unequal, I was six years old.

My younger brother had spilled milk across the dining table.

My mother sighed softly, wiped his tiny hands carefully, and kissed his forehead.

“It’s okay,” she whispered gently. “He’s still little.”

Two days later, I accidentally broke a glass while helping wash dishes.

The sound shattered through the apartment like a warning.

My mother’s face changed instantly.

“Can’t you do anything properly?” she snapped.

Before I could even apologize, rough fingers grabbed my wrist tightly.

The scolding lasted longer than the mistake itself.

And somehow, by the end of it, I felt as though I had broken something much larger than glass.

After that, I started noticing everything.

How my brother was protected while I was corrected.

How relatives laughed at his tantrums but called me “difficult” whenever I cried.

How adults described him as:

“sensitive,”

while describing me as:

“too emotional.”

Even though I cried less.

Even though I stayed quieter.

Even though I tried harder.

So I began building myself into someone easier to love.

I studied until midnight because good grades earned temporary approval.

I cleaned without being asked.

I memorized everyone’s preferences:

less sugar in tea

folded clothes a certain way

silence whenever adults were angry

At twelve years old, I already knew how to shrink myself emotionally.

Still, nothing changed.

One evening during a family gathering, my little brother accidentally pushed over a decorative frame.

The adults laughed immediately.

“Boys are naturally mischievous,” one aunt said fondly.

Later that same night, I forgot to bring extra plates from the kitchen.

My uncle clicked his tongue in irritation.

“What’s wrong with this girl? Why is she always so careless?”

Always.

I lowered my eyes quietly.

Nobody defended me.

Not even once.

Sometimes the verbal abuse became so constant that it stopped sounding personal.

It became background noise.

“Why are you like this?”

“You make things harder for everyone.”

“Learn from your brother.”

“You’re a girl. Behave properly.”

The words piled on top of me slowly over the years until they became part of my own internal voice.

By thirteen, I genuinely believed:

maybe being born as a girl was the problem.

Because no matter how hard I tried, I remained someone disappointing.

Then one night, I overheard my mother crying.

Not soft crying.

The kind that sounded buried alive.

I stood frozen outside the kitchen doorway while she spoke quietly to a relative over the phone.

“I was only twenty,” she whispered shakily. “I didn’t know anything. They married me off so quickly… I thought enduring everything was normal.”

Silence.

Then:

“I became a mother before I even understood my own life.”

Something inside me shifted painfully.

For the first time, I looked at my mother not just as someone cruel— but as someone wounded.

A girl forced into adulthood too early.

A woman who never healed.

And suddenly, years of anger became complicated.

Because I realized something terrifying.

My mother did not hate me because of who I was.

I had simply become the safest place to pour inherited pain.

The disappointment.

The resentment.

The exhaustion.

The life she never chose.

None of it belonged to me.

Yet somehow, I carried all of it.

That realization should have comforted me.

Instead, it destroyed me quietly.

Because if my mother suffered this much…

then maybe I truly had ruined everyone just by existing.

That thought followed me everywhere after that.

At school.

At home.

During sleepless nights.

I started viewing myself as a burden people tolerated out of obligation.

And deep down, a frightening belief slowly began growing roots inside me:

hatred toward me was necessary.

Necessary because someone needed to absorb the family’s unhappiness.

Necessary because if everyone blamed me, nobody had to confront the deeper wounds poisoning the house.

So I endured it silently.

The comparisons.

The criticism.

The loneliness.

Sometimes my younger brother would receive affection right in front of me while I stood invisible beside him.

And the worst part?

I never hated him for it.

Because he was only loved correctly.

That wasn’t his crime.

My tragedy was simply that I learned love through conditions, fear, and emotional punishment.

One rainy night, I sat beside my bedroom window while thunder echoed outside.

My report card rested unopened beside me.

First rank again.

Perfect.

Just like they wanted.

Yet the apartment downstairs still felt cold toward me.

Still heavy.

Still distant.

I stared at the rain sliding down the glass slowly.

Then I smiled faintly to myself for the first time in weeks.

Not a happy smile.

Just tired understanding.

Because I finally realized something.

No achievement would heal people determined to survive through blame.

And no amount of perfection could make someone feel loved if the family had already chosen them as the place where pain should live.

***Download NovelToon to enjoy a better reading experience!***