“What do you mean, who am I?” Helen said in a ferocious tone. “You know full well who I am. I’m your mother. The woman who gave birth to you. The woman who carried you in her stomach like an ulcer for 9 months. I even slept with your father to do it, and god knows how much he snores. I am the one who looked after you, fed you, clothed you and occasionally let you eat your dinner from out of an old hat. I think you’ll find, I am the woman who stayed here tidying your room instead of going to work while you were at school. I watched you grow up and turn into the hideous little boy you turned out to be, but still told all my friends you were the adorable little child that I dreamed you’d be. I give you pocket money every week which you probably spend on sweets that will rot the teeth that I pay dental fees for. I’ve hosted every one of your 16 birthday parties, despite your protests. I bought you socks when you said you didn’t need any, underwear when you said you didn’t like pink g-strings, bin liners which you just put in the bin. God knows I’ve done everything I could for you, and at the end of it what do I get? I get a son who can’t even remember his own mother. Well thanks a lot son! Thanks for absolutely bloody nothing.”

As she finished her rant, her son, Henry, managed to stop crying enough just to say “I think you misheard me mum. I said how are you.”