I adore my children. I'm also scared my son might one day kill me

In the UK, 172 women have been murdered by their sons in the past 15 years. Here, one mother explains why she can't walk away - but often wishes she could

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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.

The women's backstories are all too familiar - that is, an adult son with mental health and social problems, drug misuse, neurological diagnoses and a history of controlling and violent behaviour. Invariably, the perpetrators have fallen through every net designed to safeguard them. Often such a net never existed.

It is a peculiar place to inhabit, to be simultaneously scared of your son while desperately wanting to hold and support him. It is hard enough to walk away from an abusive partner, let alone your child, whose vulnerabilities and misery claw at the heart. My son lives in a state of deep unhappiness, prey to stimuli he can't filter, fraught social encounters, chronic anxiety and physical discomfort. Life is bewildering, painful, hard.