A few months after a brutal birth, my husband started acting like my body was a problem he needed to solve. I told myself I was being sensitive. Exhausted. Hormonal. I didn’t realize how bad it had gotten until one family dinner cracked everything open.
I was only a few months postpartum, barely sleeping, living in a fog of feedings and diapers. Pregnancy had been rough, delivery worse. But our daughter, Emma, was perfect. She was the one bright, steady thing in my world.
Jake didn’t see it that way.
Not at first.
At first it was small comments, easy to brush off if you didn’t want a fight.
“You’re not really going to eat all that, are you?”
“Your face looks puffy. Maybe cut back on salt.”
Then his attention moved lower.
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