I Sent My Son $700 Every Week for 3 Years—Then He Forgot My 75th Birthday
I still remember the exact tone of her voice. Not angry, not apologetic, just careless, like she was telling me the weather forecast or commenting on the color of a napkin. As if seventy-five years of living, loving, sacrificing, and surviving meant absolutely nothing at all.
For a few seconds, I couldn’t speak. My throat felt tight, my hands cold. The phone was still pressed against my ear, but I couldn’t hear anything except the sound of my own heartbeat. Slow and heavy, like it was struggling to keep going.
I just ended the call, didn’t argue, didn’t cry. I just stared at the quiet screen in my hand like it belonged to someone else. The house felt like it was holding its breath. I walked to the living room and sat down on the couch, still wearing my good blue dress. The one my husband used to say made my eyes look brighter.
I’d worn it for them, for the dinner that never happened. For the birthday no one remembered.
The truth is, I’d spent the entire evening at a restaurant alone, sitting at a table set for five, watching other families laugh and blow out candles and take pictures together. I’d told the waiter they were running late. Then I told him they were stuck in traffic. Then I stopped making excuses and just paid the bill.
The waiter had smiled gently when he handed me the receipt. “Happy birthday, ma’am,” he’d said, and that was the only time anyone said it that night.
That night, I realized something I’d spent years avoiding. I’d been funding people who didn’t see me as family anymore. They saw me as a bank account, a weekly deposit, a convenience. And the worst part—I’d let it happen.
That was the night I stopped being generous.
I need to take you back to where it all started. It began about three years ago. Every Friday morning, I had a routine. I’d wake up around 7:30, make a pot of coffee, take my blood pressure pills with a glass of water, and sit at the kitchen table with my phone. By 9:00, I’d open my banking app and send $700 to my son Michael’s account. $700 every single week without fail.
At first, it didn’t feel like a burden. It felt like purpose. Michael had called me one afternoon, and I could hear something in his voice I hadn’t heard since he was a little boy. Fear. Real, raw fear. His company had downsized. He’d lost his job. And with two kids in school, a mortgage, and his wife Clare working part-time at a dental office, they were drowning.
When he asked for help, his voice cracked. “Mom, I hate to ask, but could you help us for a little while, just until I find something steady?”
Of course, I said yes. What kind of mother wouldn’t? My husband had passed away two years before that. He left me his pension and some savings. It wasn’t a fortune, but we’d always lived simply. So when Michael needed help, I had it to give.
That first transfer felt good. It felt like I was doing something that mattered. Like even though my husband was gone and my body was slowing down and my house felt too big and too quiet, I still had value. I could still protect my child.
I remember Michael calling me that first Friday afternoon. “Mom, it went through. Thank you. I don’t know what we’d do without you.”
His gratitude was genuine. I could hear the relief, the weight lifting off his shoulders. “You’d do the same for me,” I told him. And I believed that. I really did.
For the first few months, I’d get a text every week. A heart emoji. A quick “Thanks, Mom.” Sometimes Clare would send a photo of the kids with a caption like, “Because of grandma, we’re okay this week.” It made me feel needed, connected.
But then something shifted. The thank you texts became shorter, then less frequent. Then they stopped altogether. Instead, I’d get a message on Thursday nights. “Hey, Mom, don’t forget tomorrow.” As if I’d ever forgotten. As if I wasn’t the one who set an alarm on my phone just to make sure it went through on time.
Then the requests started changing, too. “Mom, could you send a little extra this week? The car needs new tires.” “Mom, we’re behind on the water bill. Can you cover it?” “Mom, the kids need winter coats. Could you add another hundred?”
And every time, I said yes, because that’s what mothers do. We give, we stretch, we sacrifice.
I started skipping my own doctor’s appointments because the co-pays added up. I stopped buying the good coffee and started drinking the store brand. I wore the same three sweaters all winter because I didn’t want to spend money on myself when they needed it more.
My friends at church started noticing. One Sunday, Betty pulled me aside after service. “Honey, are you okay? You look tired.”
I smiled and told her I was fine. Just getting older. But Betty knew me too well. “Is it Michael?”
I didn’t answer right away. “He’s going through a hard time,” I finally said.
Betty squeezed my hand. “Just make sure you’re not going through one, too.”
I thought about her words all week, but when Friday came, I sent the money anyway. Because the truth was, I was terrified. Terrified that if I stopped, he’d stop calling altogether. So I kept giving, kept sending, kept pretending everything was normal.
But deep down, I knew it wasn’t help anymore. It was habit. And habits don’t require gratitude.
There’s a photograph on my mantle. It’s old now, the colors faded to soft yellows and blues. In it, my husband Robert and I are standing in front of this very house. We’re young, maybe thirty, and we’re smiling like we just won the lottery. We hadn’t won anything. We’d just signed the mortgage papers.
Robert worked at the post office for thirty-two years. I worked part-time at the library and took care of Michael when he was small. We didn’t have much, but what we had, we built together. Robert used to say, “We don’t need to be rich. We just need to be steady.”
When Michael was born, Robert cried. I’d never seen him cry before that. He held our son and whispered, “I’m going to teach you how to be a man.” And he did. Or at least he tried.
I remember Michael at eight years old standing in the driveway with Robert, learning how to change a tire. Robert didn’t just show him. He explained why it mattered. “One day, someone you love might need help, and you’ll know what to do.”
On Sundays, Robert would take him to the hardware store. They’d walk the aisles together, talking about tools and projects. “Money doesn’t grow on trees,” Robert would say. “So we take care of what we have.”
I taught him other things. How to write thank you notes, how to apologize when he was wrong, how to look people in the eye when he spoke to them. When Michael was sixteen, he got his first job bagging groceries. He came home that first Friday with a check for $83, and he was so proud.
The next morning, Michael handed me a small bouquet of daisies. They were a little wilted, probably from the discount bin, but they were the most beautiful flowers I’d ever seen. “For you, Mom,” he’d said, “because you always take care of me.” I kept one of those daisies pressed in my Bible. It’s still there.
Back then, I thought I’d done everything right. But somewhere along the way, something changed. Maybe it was when he went to college and met Clare. She came from a different kind of family. The kind that measured success by the size of your house and the brand of your car.
After Robert died, I thought Michael would step up. I thought he’d remember everything his father taught him. And for a while, he tried. He called more often. He helped me sort through Robert’s things. But then life got hard for him. And suddenly, I wasn’t his mother anymore. I was his solution, his safety net, his Friday morning deposit.
The thing about giving is that once you start, people expect you to keep going. It started small enough. “Mom, the landlord raised the rent. Could you help with the difference this month?” Each time I told myself it was temporary. But temporary has a way of becoming permanent when no one’s paying attention.
Within a year, the $700 every Friday wasn’t enough anymore. There were always extras, always emergencies, always something that couldn’t wait.
January: heater repair. February: dental work for Clare. March: new tires and a battery. April: spring break trip for the kids.
Wait, spring break trip? I remember pausing when Michael mentioned that one. A trip? “Just a little getaway,” he’d said quickly. “The kids have been so stressed with school.”
I wanted to ask how they could afford a vacation when they could barely afford groceries. But I didn’t, because saying no felt like slamming a door. And I was terrified of what would happen if that door closed.
The worst part wasn’t the money itself. It was what I gave up to provide it. I started missing my own doctor’s appointments. My knees had been bothering me for months, but co-pays were expensive. If I spent money on myself, that meant less for Michael.
My blood pressure medication ran out and instead of refilling it right away, I waited, stretched it, skipped days. Because every dollar I spent on myself felt like a dollar I was stealing from them.
One Sunday after church, Betty invited me to lunch. I almost said yes, but then I thought about the $12 it would cost. And I thought about Michael’s text asking for help with the electric bill. “Maybe next time,” I told Betty.
She looked at me for a long moment. “You’re allowed to live your own life, you know.”
I smiled. “I know.” But I didn’t.
A few weeks later, Betty and two other friends from church came to visit. They brought tea and cookies, and we sat in my living room talking. Then Betty said, “Sweetheart, we’re worried about you.”
“I’m fine,” I said.
“You’re not,” said Dorothy, the older of the three. “You look exhausted. You’ve lost weight. And you’re wearing the same coat you wore last winter.”
“It’s a perfectly good coat.”
“That’s not the point,” Betty said. “The point is that you’re giving everything away and leaving nothing for yourself.”
“They need me.”
“They need your money,” Dorothy corrected. “That’s not the same thing.”
“What happens if you stop?” Betty asked softly. “What happens if you say no?”
I looked at my hands. “Then maybe they stop calling.”
There it was. The truth I’d been avoiding for months. I wasn’t afraid of being broke. I was afraid of being unloved. Because at least when I sent the money, my phone rang. At least when I said yes, I got a text back.
But what I didn’t realize then was that I was already alone. I just hadn’t admitted it yet.
Holidays have a way of exposing the truth about relationships. That year, Thanksgiving was the first crack in the wall I’d built around my heart. Michael had promised they’d come for dinner. I spent two days preparing. I made his favorite stuffing, the one with cranberries and pecans. I baked two pies because I couldn’t decide between pumpkin and apple. I set the table with my good china.
By 2:00 in the afternoon, everything was ready. The turkey was golden. The house smelled like butter and cinnamon. I changed into a nice blouse and put on a little lipstick. Then I waited.
3:00 came and went. I texted Michael. No response. 4:00, I called. It went to voicemail. By 5:00, the food was getting cold.
At 6:30, my phone finally buzzed. “Hey, Mom. So sorry. Clare’s sister invited us last minute and the kids really wanted to see their cousins. We’ll come by this weekend, promise.”
I stared at that message for a long time. All I could see was “last minute,” as if I were the backup plan, the second choice, the option they’d consider if nothing better came along.
I didn’t respond. I just turned off the oven and sat at the table alone. The good china looked ridiculous now. Fancy plates for an audience of one.
Christmas was harder. I bought gifts weeks in advance. I wrapped each one carefully, writing their names in my neatest handwriting. I imagined their faces when they opened them.
“We’ll let you know,” Michael said when I invited them for Christmas Eve.
Christmas Eve came. No text, no call. Christmas morning, I woke up to a message sent at 11:42 the night before: “Merry Christmas, Mom. Sorry we couldn’t make it. Super busy with Clare’s family. We’ll grab the gifts next week.”
Next week turned into two weeks. Two weeks turned into a month. Eventually, I just left the wrapped boxes in the corner of my guest room.
When people at church asked about my holidays, I lied. I told them everything was wonderful. But inside, I felt like I was disappearing.
I started noticing things I hadn’t let myself see before. How they never called just to talk. How they never asked how I was feeling. How every conversation somehow circled back to money.
“How are you, Mom?”
“I’m okay, sweetheart. My knee’s been acting up, but I’m managing.”
“That’s good. Hey, speaking of managing, we’re a little short this month. Think you could help with groceries?”
Every time. Every single time.
My seventy-fifth birthday fell on a Friday. I woke up that morning feeling something I hadn’t felt in a long time: hope. Michael had called three days earlier. “Mom, we want to take you out for your birthday. Somewhere nice. The kids are excited.”
I’d felt my chest tighten with something warm. “You don’t have to do that.”
“We want to. You’ve done so much for us. Let us do this for you.”
That morning, I stood in front of my closet trying to decide what to wear. I settled on my blue dress, the one Robert used to love. I put on the pearl earrings Robert gave me on our thirtieth anniversary. I even put on a little makeup.
When I looked in the mirror, I barely recognized myself. I looked alive again, like a woman who mattered.
I got to the restaurant fifteen minutes early. It was a small Italian place downtown, with white tablecloths and candles on every table. The hostess smiled when I walked in.
“Good evening. Do you have a reservation?”
“Yes, under Michael Carter, party of five.”
She led me to a corner table near the window. It was perfect. I sat down and arranged my purse on the chair beside me. The waiter came over with kind eyes and a warm smile.
“Can I get you started with something to drink?”
“Just water for now, please. I’m waiting for my family.”
“Of course. And happy birthday.”
I blinked. “How did you know?”
He grinned. “It’s on the reservation. We’ll make sure you get a special dessert later.”
The restaurant filled up slowly. Families, couples, groups of friends. Everyone seemed happy. Everyone seemed to belong to someone. I checked my phone. 6:15. They were supposed to be here at 6:00. Maybe they hit traffic.
6:30. Still nothing. I texted Michael. “I’m here. See you soon.” No response.
By 7:00, I’d finished three glasses of water. The waiter came back. “Would you like to order an appetizer while you wait?”
“Not yet, thank you. They should be here any minute.”
But I saw something flicker in his eyes. Pity, maybe. Like he’d seen this before.
At 7:30, I couldn’t wait anymore. My fingers shook as I pressed Michael’s name. It rang four times. Then I heard his voice, slightly muffled, like he was in a loud room.
“Hey, Mom.”
“Michael, I’m still at the restaurant.”
A pause. Then faintly, I heard music, voices, clinking glasses.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry about that.”
“Where are you?” I asked quietly.
“We’re at a friend’s thing. Clare’s coworker is having a party. We thought we told you we couldn’t make it.”
My throat felt tight. “You didn’t.”
“Oh. Well, it’s not a big deal. Your age doesn’t mean anything to us anyway.” I heard Clare laugh in the background. Not at me, maybe, but it didn’t matter.
I couldn’t speak, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t do anything but sit there listening to them celebrate someone else’s life while mine sat alone at a table set for five.
“Mom, you still there?”
I ended the call.
For a moment, I just sat there staring at the candle flickering in front of me. Then I felt something warm on my cheek. I touched it and realized I was crying.
The waiter appeared beside me, his expression gentle. “Ma’am, can I get you anything?”
I shook my head. “Just the check, please.”
When he returned with the receipt, he said softly, “Happy birthday.”
I drove home in silence. Inside, I took off the blue dress and hung it back in the closet, put away the pearls, washed my face. Then I sat on the edge of my bed and thought about what had just happened.
And for the first time, I let myself think the thought I’d been avoiding: Maybe love shouldn’t cost $700 a week.
Saturday morning, I woke up at my usual time, 7:30. Made coffee, took my pills, sat at the kitchen table. But this time, I didn’t reach for my phone. I just sat there, hands wrapped around my mug, watching steam rise and disappear.
My banking app was right there, one tap away, like it had been every Friday for three years. But it wasn’t Friday anymore. It was Saturday. And something inside me had shifted.
“Your age doesn’t mean anything to us anyway.” The words circled in my mind until they didn’t even sound like words anymore.
For three years, I’d sent that money like clockwork. Never late, never questioned. And what had it bought me? Empty chairs, ignored calls, a birthday spent alone.
I picked up my phone, not to open the banking app, but just to hold it. I could send the money, pretend nothing happened, keep the peace. Or I could stop.
I set the phone down. And I did nothing.
Monday afternoon, my phone rang. Clare’s name lit up the screen.
“Hello?”
“Hey.” Her voice was light, casual. “Your transfer didn’t go through. Did you forget?”
There it was. No greeting, no asking how I was, just straight to the money.
“No,” I said simply.
A pause. “What do you mean, no?”
“I mean, it’s not coming.”
The lightness in her voice vanished. “You can’t just stop. We depend on that.”
Something about the way she said “that” instead of “you” made everything clear. They didn’t depend on me. They depended on what I provided.
“I know,” I said quietly. “That’s the problem.”
Her tone sharpened. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
I could have explained. Could have listed all the missed holidays and ignored calls. But the truth was, she already knew. They both did.
“It means I’m done,” I said.
“Done?” She laughed, but it wasn’t real. “We have bills. The kids need things. Michael’s still looking for steady work.”
“Then maybe he should look harder.”
Silence, cold and sharp.
“Are you really going to do this? After everything we’ve been through, after we’ve counted on you?”
“You counted on my money, not on me.”
“Neither was my birthday,” I replied.
When she spoke again, her voice was different. Colder. “Fine. Do what you want, but don’t expect us to come running when you need something.”
The threat hung in the air. But it didn’t scare me anymore. Because I’d needed them for months. Needed them to show up. Needed them to remember. Needed them to care. And they hadn’t.
“Goodbye, Clare.”
I hung up before she could respond. My hand was shaking a little, but underneath the fear, there was something else. Relief.
For three years, I’d carried the weight of their lives on my shoulders. But love shows up. Love remembers. Love doesn’t put a price tag on your worth.
For the first time in years, silence felt like freedom.
The messages started the next morning. Michael’s voice was strained, tight. “Mom, call me back. We need to talk about this.” By Wednesday, the messages had changed. The desperation had hardened into anger.
“You know what? Fine. Be selfish. See if we care. You’re really going to abandon your grandkids like this?”
Each message proved exactly what I’d suspected. They didn’t miss me. They missed my money.
Over the next few days, I got calls from cousins and family friends I hadn’t heard from in years. All of them had the same script. All had been contacted by Michael or Clare. All were trying to convince me to reconsider.
Not one asked me what had happened. Not one asked if I was okay. They all just assumed I was being unreasonable.
I started keeping a folder. Inside, I put printed copies of every bank transfer, every text asking for money, every bill I’d covered. Over three years, I’d sent them more than $100,000. And in return, I’d gotten empty chairs, forgotten holidays, and a daughter-in-law who thought my seventy-fifth birthday meant nothing.
Seeing it laid out in black and white made me feel less crazy, less guilty. I wasn’t abandoning them. I was saving myself.
About a month later, there was a knock on my door. It was Michael, holding a small gift bag. Behind him was Clare, arms crossed, wearing sunglasses even though it was overcast.
I opened the door but didn’t move from the doorway.
“Hey, Mom.” Michael’s smile looked practiced. “Can we come in? We’d like to talk.”
I let them enter. Michael sat on the couch, setting the gift bag on the coffee table. Clare remained standing.
“We wanted to come by and clear the air,” Michael said. “Things got out of hand, and we think maybe there were some misunderstandings.”
“Misunderstandings,” I repeated.
“Look, we know we made mistakes. Clare didn’t mean what she said about your birthday. She was stressed.”
I stayed quiet, just watching him fidget.
“We’ve apologized multiple times, but you won’t even talk to us,” Clare said, her voice tight.
“I’m talking to you now,” I said calmly.
“You know what I mean. You cut us off without any explanation.”
“Look, Mom, we’re family,” Michael said, standing. “Family doesn’t just give up on each other.”
I looked him dead in the eye. “Do you need me, Michael? Or do you need my money?”
His face tightened. “That’s not fair.”
“Neither was sitting alone at a restaurant on my seventy-fifth birthday.”
The room went silent. Michael looked down. Clare shifted uncomfortably.
“I gave you everything,” I said. “Money, love, my time. For years. And all I got in return were broken promises.”
Clare stepped forward. “This is ridiculous. You’re acting like we’re terrible people just because we needed financial support.”
“No,” I said, standing straighter. “I’m acting like someone who finally realized her worth, and it’s not measured in weekly deposits.”
Michael reached for the gift bag. “We brought you something. A peace offering. Can we just start over?”
I looked at the bag, at his desperate expression, at Clare’s barely concealed irritation. I thought about the woman I used to be. The one who would have accepted that gift and pretended everything was fine just to keep the peace.
“Michael,” I said gently, “do you remember what Clare said to me when I called that night?”
He hesitated. “She was upset.”
“She said, ‘Your age doesn’t mean anything to us.'”
He looked confused. “She didn’t mean it like that.”
“Maybe not,” I said, “but I decided to believe her. So I made sure my money means nothing to you either.”
His face went pale. “What does that mean?”
“It means I changed my will. It means every dollar I have is going somewhere it’ll actually be appreciated. It means you don’t have to worry about my age or my expectations anymore.”
His voice cracked. “Mom…”
“You taught me something important. You taught me that love without respect isn’t love at all. It’s just convenience.”
Clare grabbed her purse. “Let’s go. This is pointless.”
Michael picked up the gift bag slowly. He looked at me one more time, and I saw something flicker across his face—regret, maybe, or just disappointment that his plan hadn’t worked.
“Goodbye, Mom.”
“Goodbye, Michael.”
They left without another word. I sat back down in my chair, my heart beating steady and strong, and felt nothing but relief.
Life has a way of settling into new rhythms when you let it. I started noticing things I’d missed for years. The way morning light came through my kitchen window at exactly 8:15. The sound of birds in the tree outside. The way my coffee tasted better when I actually sat down to drink it.
Every Friday morning, I still open my banking app at 9:00. Old habits take time to break. But instead of sending money to Michael’s account, I transfer it to a scholarship fund I established for women returning to school later in life.
$700 every week, just like before, except now it’s going somewhere it matters.
The fund is called the Robert and Jean Carter Second Chances Scholarship. The first month, I didn’t hear anything. The second month, my lawyer called. “We have our first applicant.”
Her name was Linda. She was fifty-three, recently divorced, and wanted to go back to school to become a nurse. By the sixth month, we’d awarded three scholarships.
Then one Tuesday, a letter arrived. Handwritten on simple stationery.
“Dear Mrs. Carter, you don’t know me, but you changed my life.”
Her name was Patricia. She was fifty-six, had applied to finish her degree in social work after her husband passed away suddenly.
“When I got the letter saying I’d been chosen, I cried for an hour. Not sad tears, relief tears. For the first time in two years, I felt like someone saw me, like someone believed I was worth investing in.”
The letter ended with a sentence I must have read twenty times: “Your kindness gave me hope when I had none.”
I sat there with tears running down my face, feeling something I hadn’t felt in so long. Purpose. Real, meaningful purpose.
I started volunteering at the library on Wednesdays, helping with the children’s reading program. I planted a small vegetable garden in the backyard. I even took that painting class I’d always talked about.
My house is quiet these days, but it’s not lonely. It’s peaceful. Every Friday morning, I sit at my kitchen table with my coffee and send that $700 to women who need it. Women who will use it to build better lives. Women who understand the value of a second chance.
Last week, I received another letter. This one from a woman named Grace, who used her scholarship to become a teacher. She’d included a photo of herself in her classroom, surrounded by students, smiling like she’d found exactly where she belonged.
They taught me what my worth was by forgetting it, and I reminded them by walking away.
Lila Hart is a dedicated Digital Archivist and Research Specialist with a keen eye for preserving and curating meaningful content. At TheArchivists, she specializes in organizing and managing digital archives, ensuring that valuable stories and historical moments are accessible for generations to come.
Lila earned her degree in History and Archival Studies from the University of Edinburgh, where she cultivated her passion for documenting the past and preserving cultural heritage. Her expertise lies in combining traditional archival techniques with modern digital tools, allowing her to create comprehensive and engaging collections that resonate with audiences worldwide.
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