I have been sitting here on the couch for like two hours just staring at the baby monitor (the little blue light is literally the only thing I can see right now) and I think I finally have to say this out loud because it is just... it is a lot. I used to be so focused on the whole career ladder thing, you know? Like back when I was in the office I was all about the performance reviews and the politics and trying to be the "perfect" young professional even though I was younger than everyone else. But then we had Leo and we decided I’d be the one to stay home since her job is the big one—the one with the real salary and the prestige—and I thought I’d be fine with it. I thought we were on the same page about everything. But tonight was just bad. It was really, really bad and I can’t stop replaying it in my head like a video I can’t turn off. Leo is only two, you know? He’s literally a baby. He was being kind of a handful at dinner—throwing his peas, just being a typical toddler who is tired—and I was trying to handle it the way we usually do, just being patient and whatever. But she just SNAPPED. She didn't hit him or anything, but she grabbed his arm way too hard and leaned in close to his face and started talking in this voice that I’ve only heard her use when she’s firing someone at the firm. It was so cold. It was like she was trying to break his spirit or something instead of just teaching him not to throw food. She told him he was being "unproductive" and that she wouldn't tolerate "failure to follow basic instructions" in her house. Who says that to a TWO YEAR OLD? He just looked at her with these huge eyes and he didn't even cry at first, he just went totally silent and started shaking. It broke my heart. Like, I’m the one here all day with him, I see his little personality growing every day, and in thirty seconds she just... she treated him like an underperforming intern who was ruining her bottom line. And the worst part is she looked at me afterward like I was the one doing something wrong for not being "tough" enough. I feel like I’m living in some weird corporate training video sometimes. When she gets home, it’s like she’s still in the office, you know? Everything is a metric. Everything is about "discipline" and "results" and she looks at me like I’m soft because I want to let him be a kid. I keep thinking about our future and I’m starting to wonder if we even see the world the same way at all. Like, if this is how she treats him when he’s a toddler, what happens when he’s ten? Or fifteen? Is he just gonna be another project for her to manage? I tried to talk to her about it after he went to sleep—I really tried—but she just gave me this look, like she was doing a mid-year review on my parenting. She said that if he doesn't learn "structure" now he’s gonna be "weak" later. It’s so weird because I fell in love with her because she was so driven and smart, but now that drive is being pointed at our son and it feels... it feels wrong. It feels like we have these fundamental values that are just totally different and I don’t know how I didn't see it before. Maybe I was too busy trying to impress her back when we were first starting out. It’s just heavy, you know? (And I hate that word but it really is). I’m sitting here and I’m realizing that I might be raising a kid with someone who doesn't actually like the person he is, only the person she can force him to be. I feel like I’m trapped between wanting to protect him and wanting to keep my marriage together, but how do you do both when the person you're supposed to be a team with feels like a stranger? I’m looking at his little face on the screen and I just want to go in there and hold him but I’m scared she’ll hear me on the monitor and think I’m "undermining" her again. I guess I just needed to put this somewhere so it’s not just bouncing around my brain while I wait for the sun to come up. It feels like a weight is lifting a little bit just by typing it out on my phone. Like maybe I’m not crazy for thinking this isn't normal? I keep hoping I’ll wake up tomorrow and it’ll be fine but I think I know deep down that it won't be. We’re just... we’re different. And not the good kind of different where you balance each other out. The kind where you’re standing on opposite sides of a canyon and you’re just realizing how far down the drop really is... I don't even know what I'm gonna do tomorrow when she leaves for work. I'll just be here with Leo like always, pretending everything is fine while I try to undo whatever damage that coldness did tonight. It’s 3am now and the house is so quiet but my head is just so loud. I just keep seeing his face when she grabbed him. I don't think I'll ever be able to unsee it. I really don't.