Chapter 3
Before I was discharged, things finally took a turn. The internet, it turned out, actually remembered.
A young man Rachel had once cursed out happened to stumble across her video.
Then he tagged more people to call her out.
The tide flipped fast. More and more people with a moral compass flooded the comments, roasting the creeps who had been trashing me until they started deleting their own comments.
For the past couple of days, Rachel had been soaking up all the praise and attention, feeling like she was on top of the world.
When she opened her phone and saw 999+ notifications, she thought one of her videos had gone viral.
But when she clicked on them, she was hit with a flood of private messages, all of them cursing her out.
[Old hag, you really thought I wouldn't find you just because you made a new account?]
[How dare you post your daughter-in-law's private stuff without her consent? You should be grateful that she didn't sue you.]
[Old lady, you're no better than those creeps in the comments. Disgusting.]
Rachel freaked out.
She was used to being the one dishing out insults in the comments. She had never been bombarded like this herself.
But she didn't dare clap back this time—afraid of getting banned again.
So she rolled her eyes, whipped out her phone, and filmed yet another video about me, posting it online like some act of defiance.
Rachel: [I'll keep filming. What, you gonna make her sue me? Go ahead.]
That video blew up even more than if she had replied to the DMs one by one.
Not only did it totally piss off all those people DMing her, but the platform saw how hot it was and boosted it.
The clip shot straight to the top of the feed.
More and more people piled into the comments. Seeing she still refused to delete it, they mass-reported her.
Rachel's brand-new account lasted just one week before getting banned again.
And after enduring her abuse for so long, I was finally able to leave the hospital.
*****
The first thing I did after getting discharged was post a video on my account.
In the clip, I sat at the dining table with my phone, while Rachel sat at the head like she was the queen of the house.
She stared straight into the camera and snapped, "You ate two slices of bread. Who told you to eat that much?"
That cold glare and her sharp, pushy tone made everyone's skin crawl.
I captioned it: [I'm the daughter-in-law in this so-called Evil Mother-in-law saga. Maybe she's not entirely wrong—older people tend to be thrifty. Maybe she just can't stand the way I live my life.]
Within half a day, the comments section totally exploded.
[Girl, you're just too much of a pushover. The more you let her bully you, the more that hag is gonna stomp all over you.]
[It's 2023 and stuff like this is still happening at home? Unbelievable.]
[Don't keep it all bottled up, girl. Share it here and we'll all roast her together—you'll feel way better.]
I scrolled through all those comforting comments, a satisfied grin tugging at my lips.
Rachel wasn't the only one who knew how to play the victim.
She twisted the truth in her videos, but I was just showing the facts.
I dropped two videos in one day, both showing how unreasonable Rachel was toward me.
Overnight, my account blew up with twenty thousand new followers—hotter than Rachel's had ever been.
People were mad that Rachel's account got mass-reported before they got their fill of roasting, but they found it cathartic to join forces with like-minded folks and drag a villain together.
My comments section became their perfect outlet.
[This is gold. We love it. Keep them coming.]
[I wanna see what other clown tricks this hag's got.]
[Don't worry, girl. Record every little thing. If she ever comes at you about not taking care of her, just show her the videos.]
Slowly but surely, more and more people started rooting for me to fight back against Rachel.
I sighed: [I want to, but the thing is, my husband and I actually have a really good relationship. When he's away, my mother-in-law manages the money. If I need to make any big purchases, I have to go through her.]
Eric and I had known each other since high school, and our bond was genuinely strong.
Even though he was away most of the time, he always sent his full paycheck back home.
At first, he deposited it directly into my account, letting me handle it however I wanted.
When Eric and I first got married, Rachel pretended to be generous.
But then she started saying, multiple times a day, that I was spending "her son's money."
Out of anger, I told Eric to set up an automatic transfer to Rachel's account instead.
My own salary wasn't much, but I could run the household just fine. Still, whenever it came to buying any big-ticket items, I always had to ask Rachel for the money.
But even with all that cash coming in, Rachel still wasn't satisfied.
She kept saying I was spending "her son's money," and after repeating it so much, she never stopped.
Like every single dollar I spent was a debt I owed her.
Someone left a comment under my video: [Girl, you don't have to spend her little stash of money. Don't let her have that kind of hold over you.
[She doesn't want you touching her money? Fine, flip the script and make money off her. Everyone loves watching this crazy old lady anyway. You're trending hard right now—you can earn a ton online, right?]
The replies blew up with support—everyone agreed she had a point.
It hit me—I needed to make the most of all this viral buzz.
So I started filming my daily life with Rachel—exactly as it was.