Chapter 19 - Why Camilla did it
People wanted a simple motive.
Jealous stepmother.
Hatred.
Inheritance.
Secret affair.
None fit.
Camilla loved order.
She also felt powerless.
She had married a widower whose work regularly removed him from the house and whose daughter carried grief, anxiety, and the normal chaos of being five.
Every time Pippa called me crying during travel, I became softer.
Camilla became stricter.
Then I returned home and sometimes reversed consequences.
Not maliciously.
Because I had missed context.
Camilla experienced that as being undermined.
She began hiding disciplinary methods because she believed I would always choose Pippa’s distress over “consistency.”
She told her therapist later:
“I needed one rule that could not be negotiated through tears.”
That rule became the kennel.
Control felt efficient.
Then normal.
That was how abuse entered our home.
May you like
Not through one monstrous decision.
Through a series of decisions Camilla kept renaming until she could live with them.
