I adore my children. I’m also scared that one day my son will kill me

‘It is hard enough to walk away from an abusive partner, let alone your child, whose vulnerabilities and misery claw at the heart’. Photograph: olga Yastremska/Alamy

I am staring at the faces of women on my screen, transfixed by emotions too complex to disentangle; discernible, though, are grief, rage... and fear.

For the women pictured are some of the more than 170 who have been killed by their sons in the UK in the past 15 years. Their appalling tragedy – being killed by the person to whom they gave life – has a chilling resonance. Like many of those whose deaths have been highlighted in the 2,000 Women report by the Femicide Census, I am a professional with adored adult children and a close circle of friends. I am also frightened of my son.