I am married to a woman who has a 2 young girls–6 and 3.
A few days ago, I’m not sure exact what got into her, but she was having a difficult time either trying to get the children to eat, or to behave–I’m not sure exactly what happened, but she started screaming something incoherently. That was when I went into the kitchen to try to diffuse the situation.
She threw a glass against the wall and screamed at the children, "You are my worst f*cking nightmare! I HATE BOTH OF YOU! F*CK YOU!"
I grabbed her by the arm and roughly escorted her into the living room while saying, "You want to act like a 2 year old? Then you’ll get treated like one!" and then forced her into a tiny timeout chair in the corner of the room and made her face the wall. I told her that if she got up, I would personally bend her over my lap right in front of her kids, and I wasn’t joking either. Then I wound up a chiming music box that we always play for the children at bedtime and said, "This should cool your nerves."
Afterwards, I went to calm her children down and read some books along with them in the living room while my wife sulked in the little timeout chair with the music box chimes playing.
Now for the past 4 days, my wife has slept in the guest room and she absolutely refuses to speak to me or even be in the same room with me. I just now looked at her myspace, and she has the status switched to "Divorced" and has deleted me off her list.
Honestly, I was extremely offended and appalled that she would use such venomous language towards her own children for any reason like they were 17 and 18 year olds. And I seriously doubt me calmly saying, "Calm down, take a deep breath" would have worked, either. I wanted to drive home a message that she needs to realize she is the parent–NOT THE CHILD. And by forcing her into the timeout chair, I was showing her she was acting like a child.
Or did I really go too far and just need to start looking for a new apartment?
John: It doesn’t matter whose kids they are. Are you saying that if I see someone beating a child, I should say, "I’m not the dad, so it ain’t MY business!" and go on like nothing is happening?
You do NOT curse at a child, I don’t care who is the parent!
John: Why don’t you just zip it, now? By the number of thumb downs you are getting, it doesn’t look like anybody here is listening to you.