I refuse to bow to guilt. I will not be ruled by the most emotionally dishonest of all emotions. Guilt will not make me her bitch, no way.

I don’t care what evidence people might assume when they start pointing the finger (like they already have) – how because one thing happened, that it led to this other thing happening and that, in the end, when it all went horribly wrong, that it was all my (our) fault.

No, I refuse to let one argument, one attempt to make an unreasonable person see some sense, become a witch hunt in which the guilty must be punished, just because this other thing happened over which we (I) had no control.

What else was I meant to do? Let Mum walk all over us and don’t argue back, just because she’s pregnant? If she was so worried about her baby, she shouldn’t have been charging round like a mad thing, sticking her oar in where she wasn’t wanted; not listening when she bloody well should have been; getting herself all worked up over none of her fucking business.

I feel sorry for what happened. But that it is a very different thing to what I’m talking about here.

And I will not feel guilt. I refuse to feel guilty.