The Request That Changed Everything

When my mother-in-law asked me to be her surrogate, I said yes out of compassion. She’d lost so much — her husband, her sense of purpose — and I wanted to help. My husband and I told ourselves it was an act of love, even though the request felt strange from the start.
The pregnancy was harder than I imagined — physically, emotionally, spiritually. But when I gave birth and held that baby for the first time, something inside me shifted. She wasn’t just a child I carried; she felt like a part of me.
Then everything changed. My mother-in-law took the baby “for bonding time” and disappeared. No calls. No messages. My heart broke with every passing hour.