When Layla and Sam arrived home with their baby, everything seemed perfect. However, after several sleepless weeks, they faced a question they never thought they’d have to answer: “What would you do if your baby’s constant crying revealed a betrayal from someone close to you?”
Leo was our first child, and like most new parents, my husband, Sam, and I wanted everything to be perfect. We read every book, went to all the classes, and did our best to prepare. When Marta, Sam’s mother, offered to help, I tried to be polite but firm.
A serious young woman | Source: Midjourney
“I appreciate it, Marta,” I said, smiling gently, “but I want to figure things out on my own.”
She frowned, her lips tight. “You know, in my day, we didn’t have books and fancy classes. I raised Sam just fine without all that.”
I nodded. “I’m sure you did a great job, but I’d like to try it my way.”
A couple with their newborn | Source: Midjourney
Everything seemed perfect at first. Leo was healthy, and we were thrilled to be parents. Marta visited a few times, though she always looked like she was waiting for me to mess up. However, this never happened. My son seemed to be a perfect baby, never fussing or giving me a hard time.
But when Leo turned two months old, everything changed.
One night, out of nowhere, he started crying. His room was filled with full-on, heart-wrenching wailing. Sam and I tried everything, but nothing worked. The crying went on for hours.
A crying baby | Source: Pexels
We asked my mom for help. She had raised three kids, and I thought, surely she’d know what to do. But even she was puzzled. “Maybe it’s just colic? Babies go through phases, right?”
Well, the pediatrician said Leo was perfectly healthy. Still, the crying didn’t stop. Night after night, it was the same thing. Leo’s cries echoed through the house, and I could feel myself unraveling.
“I don’t know what else to do,” I admitted to Sam one night, rubbing my tired eyes. “I’ve tried everything.”
Tired young woman | Source: Pexels
He sighed, looking as lost as I felt. “Maybe… maybe we should ask Mom?” he suggested, his voice hesitant.
I hesitated, too. The last thing I wanted was Marta coming in and taking over, but we were desperate. Still, something didn’t sit right with me. Why was Leo suddenly so upset? What had changed?
Then I remembered the camera. A few weeks before Leo was born, Sam and I had installed a secret camera in the nursery. It wasn’t for spying on anyone, we just wanted peace of mind. No one knew about it except us.
A close-up of a camera shutter | Source: Pexels
That night, after another round of crying that left me feeling completely drained, I decided to check the footage. I wasn’t expecting to find anything, but something inside me pushed me to look.
As I scrolled through the recordings, my heart stopped. Three weeks ago, the day we had gone to visit my mother, the house was supposed to be empty. Or so I thought.
There, on the screen, Marta appeared. She walked straight into the nursery, her movements quick and purposeful. My stomach churned as I watched her head to Leo’s crib. I leaned closer, squinting at the screen. What was she doing?
A woman in a nursery | Source: Pexels
Then I saw it. Marta reached into her bag, pulled out a small device, and taped it to the underside of Leo’s crib. My breath caught in my throat.
“What is that?” I whispered to myself.
I rushed to the nursery and felt around under the crib. My fingers brushed against something hard. Pulling it off, I held it up in the dim light. It was a small speaker. A quick Google search revealed what it was—a device emitting a sound too low for adults to hear but enough to drive a baby crazy.
A small speaker | Source: Midjourney
My mind raced. Marta had put this here. She wanted Leo to cry. She wanted me to fail, to come crawling to her for help.
The next morning, I sat at the kitchen table, gripping the small speaker tightly in my hand. I had barely slept, my mind racing with what I had seen. Sam walked into the room, still half-asleep, but his expression changed when he saw the look on my face.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, concern already creeping into his voice.
A serious-looking man with his arms crossed | Source: Pexels
I took a deep breath and slid the speaker across the table toward him. “I found this under Leo’s crib.”
He picked it up, frowning. “What is this?”
“It’s a device that emits a sound only babies can hear. That’s why Leo’s been crying,” I said quietly, watching his face closely.
Sam’s eyes widened. “Who… who would do that?”
I hesitated. “I checked the camera. Sam, it was your mom.”
Woman rubbing her forehead with her hands in frustration | Source: Pexels
The blood drained from his face. “Mom? No, no, that can’t be right. She wouldn’t…” His voice trailed off as he stared at the speaker, disbelief and confusion clouding his eyes.
“I know it’s hard to believe, but I saw her, Sam. She went into the nursery and taped this under Leo’s crib. She’s been doing this to him—to us.”
He ran a hand through his hair. “Why? Why would she do something like this?”
“I… I think she wanted to break me. She wanted me to need her help, to prove that I can’t handle being a mother.”
A crying woman | Source: Pexels
Sam looked at me, his face torn between loyalty to his mother and the truth staring him in the face. “I… I don’t know what to say. This is insane.”
“I know. But we have to do something. We need to see her,” I said firmly.
He nodded slowly, the weight of the situation sinking in. “You’re right. We can’t let this continue.”
A shocked man | Source: Pexels
That afternoon, we went to confront Marta. The drive to her house was tense. Sam didn’t say a word, his hands gripping the steering wheel tightly. When we arrived, she greeted us with her usual smile, but it quickly faded when she saw our serious faces.
“What’s going on?” she asked, her voice sharp with suspicion.
“We need to talk,” I said, stepping inside. Sam followed, silent but tense.
Marta crossed her arms. “Talk about what?”
I pulled out my phone and played the footage of her in Leo’s nursery, setting up the device. Her eyes widened for a split second before she quickly masked her expression. “That’s ridiculous. I was just… checking on him. I didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Checking on him?” I said, my voice rising. “You put a speaker under his crib, Marta. A speaker that’s been making him cry nonstop for weeks. Why would you do that?”
Her face hardened. “You’re overreacting. Babies cry. Maybe if you weren’t so stubborn and accepted help when it’s offered, none of this would’ve happened.”
An elderly woman looking away | Source: Pexels
Sam stepped forward, his voice shaking with anger. “Mom, stop. We saw what you did. Why would you want to hurt Leo like this?”
“Hurt him? Don’t be dramatic,” she snapped, her eyes flashing. “I was helping. You and your wife are so obsessed with doing everything on your own, but you’re failing. I just wanted to show you that you needed me.”
“You wanted to break us,” I said, my voice cold. “Well, it worked. But now, you’re not coming near Leo again.”
A close-up shot of a serious woman | Source: Pexels
Marta’s mouth tightened. “You can’t keep me away from my grandson.”
Sam’s voice was firm as he said, “Yes, we can. And we will. Don’t come near our house. Don’t call. Don’t try to see Leo again.”
When Marta realized we were serious, her anger turned to pleading. “Sam, please. I was just trying to help. I didn’t mean for it to go this far.”
But it was too late. We turned and left. Our decision was final.
A mature woman crying as her family leaves | Source: Midjourney
A few days later, when Martha wouldn’t stop showing up at our door, we took the video to the police and obtained a restraining order. That should have been the end of it, but Marta still tried to push the boundaries. She even wrote a lengthy Facebook post, trying to convince everyone I banned her from seeing the baby because of my own insecurities.
After that post, I decided enough was enough. I opened Facebook, uploaded the video, and tagged her in the post. I explained everything—how she had planted the device, how Leo had suffered because of it, and how we had to confront her.
A woman writing on her tablet | Source: Pexels
The response was immediate. Friends, family, even people we didn’t know shared the post, horrified by her actions. “I can’t believe a grandmother would do this!” one person commented. “She should be ashamed of herself,” said another.
Marta’s reputation quickly crumbled. She called me, crying, begging me to take down the post. “Please, everyone is turning against me. I didn’t mean to hurt anyone. Just take it down, and I’ll stay away. I promise.”
A crying middle-aged woman on her phone | Source: Midjourney
But I stood my ground. “You brought this on yourself, Marta. The world knows now. This is the consequence of your actions.”
With Marta out of our lives, Leo’s crying stopped almost immediately. It was like the dark cloud over our home had lifted. We finally had the peace and quiet we had longed for, and we could enjoy being parents again.
A happy woman with her baby | Source: Pexels
I often thought about everything that had happened—how my instincts had saved us from something terrible. It wasn’t easy to go up against someone like Marta, but I knew I had done the right thing. I protected my son. I trusted my gut, and in the end, that made all the difference.
If you liked this story about an entitled mother-in-law, consider reading this one: Working as a nurse, Zoe often relied on her mother-in-law, Denise, to babysit Leo, her son. But when the little boy becomes visibly shaken by his grandmother’s presence, Zoe has to question the old woman’s actions, only for her to discover that Denise has a hidden agenda.
This work is inspired by real events and people, but it has been fictionalized for creative purposes. Names, characters, and details have been changed to protect privacy and enhance the narrative. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
The author and publisher make no claims to the accuracy of events or the portrayal of characters and are not liable for any misinterpretation. This story is provided “as is,” and any opinions expressed are those of the characters and do not reflect the views of the author or publisher.
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