[well. shadowheart has shared her life story and waner supposes it's only fair if she shares hers, since this is supposed to be a two-way street...]

...my father claimed he was in love with my mother but married her sister, and then brought me and my mother into his household while promising to make my mother his wife and to acknowledge me as his daughter when I was fifteen. Instead he made her his concubine, allowed my half-sister to torment us, and then when she set my mother up and framed her for having an affair, he beat my mother and she advised me to run away and convince a nobleman to marry me so my father couldn't mistreat her anymore. ...only the man who promised to marry me made me his concubine instead.

[it sounds kind of petty and soap-opera dramatic in comparison.]