After the wedding, we moved in with his parents, but we lived together for just over a month. My father-in-law had a calm personality, and we got along right away. However, my mother-in-law was critical of me from the very beginning, without even attempting to hide it. She watched me all day, making comments about everything I did, from the way I placed a saucepan in the cupboard to how I ironed the laundry. She nitpicked about everything I did throughout the day.
Arkadiy’s patience ran out, and we moved to a rented apartment. A week after the move, I found out I was pregnant. Arkadiy and my father-in-law told her to leave me alone and not bother me for the sake of her future grandchild. My father-in-law said she had been the same in her youth but had become even worse in her old age.
“I married her only because she waited for me while I was in the army, and she had dreamed about it her whole life. I put up with her for the sake of our son,” Arkadiy would say. As long as I was pregnant, she kept her distance. But when the baby was born, everything got worse. Our son was born four weeks early, but he was perfectly healthy. That’s when she started criticizing everything I did all day and turned everyone against me.
“It’s not your child; she had an affair. She’s lying to you,” she would say to my son. Arkadiy had enough and almost kicked her out of the house. She declared that she would never acknowledge her grandchild and stopped communicating with us. My father-in-law secretly visited us and brought toys for his grandson. God forbid she found out about it.
For three years, we had no contact with her, and she never saw her grandson. My father-in-law, influenced by various TV shows, decided to have a paternity test done secretly with our son to prove her wrong. One day, he took our son for a walk but instead took him to the clinic. A few days later, my father-in-law stood at our doorstep.
“Is Arkadiy home?” he asked hesitantly.
“No, but come in,” I said. “I don’t even know how to tell you this. It turns out my wife was right. The child isn’t mine.”
I hadn’t expected such a question. I was certain I knew who the father was. I had never betrayed my husband. My husband and I took the DNA test, and it confirmed his paternity. However, my father-in-law’s paternity test came back negative. It turned out that Arkadiy was not his son.
That’s why my father-in-law’s DNA test with our son was inconclusive. My mother-in-law begged her husband not to leave, but he did. Before accusing someone of anything, take a look at yourself and your own life experiences.
