You spend your life giving, thinking love will be enough. I’m Annie, 60, and I raised my son, Thomas, alone after my husband died. I scrubbed floors and worked double shifts just to keep us afloat. When he had a son, Max, I gave him everything—\$40,000 for their apartment, \$800 monthly for daycare—so they could live close to me. I thought I was building a future for family. Turns out, I was just making myself useful.

Max, sweet and innocent, gave me a toy walkie-talkie so we could “talk through the walls.” One night, after a long shift, it crackled. I smiled—until I heard Thomas and his wife, Lila, laughing. They were pocketing \$300 monthly from the daycare lie. Worse, they were planning to rent out my spare room—and send me to a nursing home once I became “less useful.”

I didn’t sleep that night. I replayed every sacrifice: the missed meals, skipped coats, unpaid time off. Saturday came—my birthday. They brought cake and plastic smiles. I smiled back and raised a toast. Then, calmly, I told them I knew everything. The fake daycare fee. The plan for my room. Their betrayal.

Lila tried to deflect. Thomas cried. I stood firm. I wrote a check for \$500—Max’s actual daycare cost—and told them the rest would go into savings for him, not them. No more free babysitting. No more blind trust.

That night, Max’s tiny voice buzzed through the toy again. “You still love me, Grandma?” I pressed the button, smiling through tears. “Forever, sweetheart. Always.”