My son married a woman who already had four children and is now eight months pregnant. He left on a work trip, and at around three in the morning, she called me crying, begging me to take her to the ER. I refused and hung up — something I know sounds cold, but hours earlier I had discovered they both lied to me.

My son had claimed they married abroad eight months ago right after her pregnancy news, but that wasn’t true. Their relationship was unstable at the time, and they didn’t actually marry until much later. Worse, I learned she had still been seeing her ex — the father of her youngest two children — while dating my son. And my son knows this. He married her anyway, unsure if the baby she’s carrying is even his.

I couldn’t bring myself to rush to her side after learning all that. The feeling of betrayal and deception was too overwhelming, and I simply couldn’t pretend everything was fine. Still, I didn’t want her completely stranded, so I called her stepmother and asked her to take her to the hospital, even though she lived far away.

They got there, and thankfully both she and the baby were fine — it was a false alarm. Maybe it was cruel not to go, and maybe I should have been more compassionate. But I can’t shake the feeling that this baby isn’t my son’s, and that both of them have been lying to me all along.