I am Maria. I entered the “job” of being a daughter-in-law at 26. At that time, my husband’s family had already gone through many hardships.
My mother-in-law had died young, leaving my father-in-law, Tatay Ramón, to raise four children alone. He grew rice and vegetables all his life in Nueva Écija, without a stable job or pension. By the time I married his son, almost all of Tatay Ramón’s children already had families of their own and rarely visited him.
The rest of his life depended almost entirely on my husband and me. I often heard the neighbors whisper:
“What is that? She’s just a daughter-in-law, but she looks like his servant.
Who would take care of a father-in-law for so long?”
But to me, I thought differently. He was a father who sacrificed his entire life for his children. If I turned my back on him, who would take care of him?
Those twelve years weren’t easy. I was young, often feeling tired and alone. When my husband was working in Manila, I was left alone to care for our little daughter and Tatay Ramón, who was already weak.
I cooked, washed, and stayed up late at night monitoring his breathing. Once, exhausted, I said to him:
“Father, I’m just your daughter-in-law… sometimes I feel a great weight on my chest.”
He just smiled gently and, with trembling hands, took mine:
“I know, daughter. That’s why I’m even more grateful.
Without you, maybe I wouldn’t be here anymore.”
I’ll never forget those words. From then on, I promised myself to do everything possible to make his life more bearable. Every winter, I bought him a thick coat and a blanket.
When his stomach hurt, I cooked him rice soup. When his feet hurt, I massaged them tenderly. I never expected that one day he would leave me something.
I did it because I considered him like my own father. As time passed, Tatay Ramón grew weaker. At 85, the doctor at the provincial hospital said his heart was very weak.
A few days before his last night, he used to call me to his bedside to tell me stories of his youth and remind his children and grandchildren to live with honor. Until the afternoon of his farewell arrived. While breathing heavily, he called me.
He held out an old pillow, torn on one side, and in a weak voice said:
“For… Maria…”
I hugged the pillow, not fully understanding. In just a few minutes, he closed his eyes forever. The Secret Inside the Pillow
The night of the wake, as I sat on the terrace, I opened the torn pillow.
The story doesn’t end here –
it continues on the next page.
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