Touch and Go

Rachel had always sensed something was off in her family but she couldn’t name it at first. It wasn’t until she was around twelve or thirteen that the weight of it began to settle quietly, like dust on furniture you didn’t notice until you touched it. Her sister, two and a half years older, had always been the center of their mother’s universe. She was the firstborn, the one who understood more when their parents split, and the one their mother believed needed protecting.

Rachel, only a toddler during the separation, was seen as too young to grasp the emotional fallout. Her mother focused all her attention on shielding the older child, and as Rachel grew older, she waited for her turn to be seen and supported but it never came.

By the time Rachel was fifteen, studying for exams that would shape her future, she had already learned to go it alone. There were no check-ins, no midnight revision snacks, and no gentle prodding to get rest. She became fiercely independent, not out of pride but of necessity. She never felt pity for herself but she often reflected through journaling and conversations with one or two close friends who stuck around.

As the years went by, Rachel started forging her own identity. She built friendships that were lasting, with some fleeting, and learnt how to navigate personalities and find her footing in a world where family was a shadowy concept rather than a foundation. Her relationship with her sister, already strained, continued to stretch thin. They were present in each other’s lives by default, not by choice. Rachel would still call her sister if something happened. She just never expected her sister to call back.

When her sister had children, Rachel grew incredibly close to them. She was there, filling in the gaps their mother didn’t seem to notice. Their grandmother helped too, but Rachel was the one who offered time, energy, and love – uncharted and unacknowledged. Her sister, buried in academia and ambition, never paused to say thank you. There were no words of gratitude, no moments of recognition. It was as if her presence had been expected, not appreciated.

The final blow came just days before Rachel’s wedding. She had carefully planned every detail herself. Her sister, feeling slighted over not having a bigger role, lashed out with words that cut and Rachel replied in kind. The result was devastating. Her sister didn’t show up to the wedding and the silence that followed stretched into years.

They talk now. Polite, even friendly on the surface. But that rift? It never healed. They never discussed it and the apology ever came. Their mother never tried to mend it and now, more than a decade later, Rachel still finds herself wondering how different things might’ve been if her family had shown up – not just at the wedding, but throughout her life.

Marriage brought its own battles. The first five years were hard and not having a strong family of her own for support made it difficult to command respect in her husband’s. She struggled to bond with his siblings, and if they tried, she couldn’t tell. She certainly wasn’t trying very hard herself. The connection eroded until it was little more than a civil nod across rooms and it turned into a family she never quite fit into.

Rachel often blamed herself, or rather, blamed the parts of her that had been shaped by her past. She had many insecurities and hesitations, and she had her sense of never truly belonging. It was hard to meet people halfway when you didn’t trust that anyone would stay for the full journey.

Then, nearly a decade into her marriage, Rachel became a mother and everything changed. Suddenly, her in-laws were part of the support system she had long resisted, and for that first year, they were a blessing – loving, attentive, and dependable. They stepped in where needed, sometimes even without being asked. They doted on her daughter in a way that both warmed her heart and made her wary because love, in her experience, always came with terms, silence, or resentment.

As her daughter grew and entered daycare, Rachel felt the need to draw lines. It was subtle at first. Her in-laws had grown attached, perhaps too attached. They loved her child, but it felt as though they believed they had a claim on her. There was an entitlement that made Rachel uncomfortable. It was an unspoken assumption that because they had been present early on, they were owed something permanent and binding.

She knew they meant well and she knew they cared, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that they still didn’t truly embrace her. They were kind, welcoming, even, but something in the dynamic remained off. Interactions felt careful and almost rehearsed. Rachel was never quite sure where she stood, even when the words suggested otherwise.

Over time, she found ways to navigate it. She kept a polite distance and stayed gracious, but guarded. It wasn’t out of malice, but out of self-preservation. There was always an unspoken rule and a line she dared not cross – because it was forbidden, but because she had never felt safe enough to step beyond it. They often told her to feel at home and while she appreciated the gesture, something in her hesitated. She could never fully settle into the role of daughter-in-law, not in the way they might have hoped, or the way she sometimes wished she could.

Rachel maintained a careful distance and for her daughter’s sake, she kept the peace. She wanted her child to feel loved, surrounded by people who cared for her, but she also wanted to make sure those people understood their place. It was a delicate balance of preserving her child’s joy while safeguarding her own boundaries.

Sometimes Rachel would watch her daughter laughing with her grandparents, running around the yard or snuggling on the couch, and a deep ache would rise in her chest. It wasn’t jealousy or sadness sadness. It was a kind of wondering, what would it have felt like to grow up wrapped in that kind of safety? What would it have meant to have someone’s arms ready to catch you, not out of obligation, but out of joy? She didn’t want to rob her child of that feeling but she also didn’t want to lose herself again and have to shrink in spaces where she had fought so hard to exist. So she walked the tightrope everyday because her daughter was always curious, alert, and always watching. Rachel was painfully aware of what that gaze absorbed. It was the tone of voice, the glances, the pauses at the door, the way Rachel hesitated before visits, and the way she never seemed to relax fully in the presence of others. Her daughter was learning, even without words.

Rachel didn’t want her to learn that tolerating discomfort was the cost of keeping the peace. She didn’t want her to believe that silence equaled maturity, or that emotional safety had to be sacrificed for appearances. Yet, those were the lessons Rachel herself had internalized so long ago that they now lived in her body like muscle memory. As she got older, she had expected more resolution and more clarity. Instead, life felt like a series of emotional negotiations with some loud, some quiet, and most ongoing. The past still tugged at her, the present still demanded performance, and the future was now bound up in the well-being of her child.

This was the hardest part for Rachel – loving her daughter so much that it required her to confront the very pain she had learned to live with. It meant re-examining her story, not for closure, but for clarity. It meant holding the tension between protecting her peace and fostering connection. It meant asking herself, every single day: how do I give my child what I never had, without losing who I’ve become?

There were no neat answers, but just deliberate and exhausting choices. choices. Rachel moved through her days softly, cautiously, and deliberately. She was still unsure and navigating, and still trying to believe that one day, she might walk into a room and feel entirely at home.

But for now, everything was still touch and go.