Everything that we hear surrounding motherhood portrays a beautiful, nurturing, and a powerful bond that cannot be broken by any human being, or length of time. Nonetheless, this idealism is not the case for all mothers.

From her earliest memories at four years old, Callie Flinn began to notice that her mother differed greatly from the others around her.

Callie’s school friends had mums who were kind, warm, and selfless in nature, whereas Callie’s mother, Donna Flinn, was only able to mimic this behaviour in public. In private, Donna’s true and sinister identity would regularly emerge. Instead of providing care and an abundance of love for her daughter, Donna began to carry out wilful acts of spite, which included using violence, severe neglect, and intolerance towards her preschool child. Callie is parentified; she is used by her own mother and heavily burdened by Donna’s erratic and volatile emotional outbursts. Callie is unable to process the world around her and therefore, she begins to feel unsafe on a daily basis; Callie lives, day to day; in flight mode. She does not receive comfort from her mother; however, the expectation is for her, a small child, to provide this for Donna. Slowly, Callie begins to hear the same message repeated loud and clear, that her feelings do not matter and that she is to put the needs of everyone else around her first.

The situation would only become worst for Callie, as her mother and father split and Donna begins a new relationship with Allan.