A Lament No One Heard

Lin Youyou's life was a long journey beset by hardship. In a family that favored boys over girls, she was unwanted. She never got the good food or pocket money; all her parents' affection went to her older brother. When she was a child, her parents often locked her home alone so they could play mahjong, and nightmares and loneliness followed her everywhere.

After she started school, an accident left her with a scar, and her classmates called her an "ugly freak" and a "moron." Misunderstood by teachers and bullied by classmates, she was ostracized. Even her older brother would blame her for things she hadn't done. Desperate for her father's approval, she tried to imitate her brother, but only lost herself further, eventually believing she really was "stupid."

As an adult, she married under her mother's urging, only to find herself trapped in an even more suffocating life. Her husband and father-in-law were cold and cruel. She gave everything to her family, yet was accused of being "wasteful" and "incapable of raising the children." When she fell ill, she received mockery instead of care. She once hoped writing might offer her a glimmer of light, but reality was bleak. In the end, she died amid illness and despair, leaving behind a song of sorrow no one ever heard. Even after death, she could not find peace: she was buried in the ancestral graveyard of the in-laws who had suffocated her, while her husband soon remarried and doted on his new wife, leaving her suffering buried for good.