I will never forget the morning I found Amila, my future stepdaughter, making breakfast and cleaning the house. She was only seven years old. After a while, I saw that something wasn’t right with it. At first, I thought it was cute. Amila’s desire to be a great housewife wasn’t just a phase; it was a desperate attempt to show how valuable she was.
After seeing how hard she worked, I couldn’t help but feel uneasy. What was she doing taking on so much at such a young age? Why did she think she had to be perfect? What these questions tell us would change everything.
I chose to dig deeper one morning as we cleaned up after breakfast. “Why do you have to work so hard?” I asked Amila. Her answer broke my heart. Ryan, her father, had been telling a friend that her mother wasn’t worth loving unless she got up early to cook and do chores. Amila thought that Ryan wouldn’t love her either if she didn’t do the same thing.
What she said shocked me, and I knew I had to do something. I couldn’t let Amila keep thinking that her worth depended on how well she could do housework. When things got out of hand, I decided to step in and do something.
The first thing I did was punish Ryan for being bad. He had to do a bunch of things, like mow the lawn and clean the windows. He was nice at first, but as the days went by, he became aware that something wasn’t right.
When I told him what I thought about his talk with his friend, he finally understood how serious things were. He felt shocked and bad about what he did, so he told Amila he was sorry right away.
What we talked about next changed everything for our little family. Ryan told Amila that he loved her no matter what and that she didn’t have to prove anything to him. He told her he would watch what he says and help her in any way he could.
I felt better and gave them hope as I watched them hug. Even though we still had a long way to go, we had already taken the first step towards being free of obligations. Ryan had learnt an important lesson about the power of his words, and Amila no longer felt like she had to be perfect.
When we sat down to breakfast together, I realised that love is more than just happy times and nice feelings. It’s about having tough talks, being responsible for each other, and changing bad habits that don’t help us anymore. It’s about putting the pieces together to make something better and making the house a better place for everyone.
