I still remember how Jonah said it—lazy, as if it were some other word he learned in recess.

But it wasn't.

He'd just gotten home from school. I was making a snack. He was telling me about how a kid in his school was "really slow" at building Legos during recess time. I smiled, half-listening.

Then he said it:

"He was being ret—

He paused, as though he knew he should not have uttered it. But it was already too late.

I froze in my tracks. "Jonah. Where did you hear that?"

He shrugged. "From the keyboard man. The one with the metal keyboard."

I was knocked to the ground. That absurd YouTube channel his father let him watch—the one I had asked him many times to screen. The one I knew was working too hard at being funny. I knew that. I knew that.

I called my husband immediately.

"Do you even watch what you let him watch?" I asked.

He sighed. "It's just technical stuff, Amanda. Chill. He learns about switches and Bluetooth and—"

"No. He learns slurs. Because the 'keyboard guy' thinks it's funny to use the R-word in front of a room full of children."

He lapsed into silence. Maybe he was embarrassed. Maybe he just didn't care enough.

That was the issue.

This was not the first. There had been previous instances—when I'd bemoan we needed more limits, more discipline, and he'd roll his eyes at me as if I was being a fool. When Jonah learned how to be sarcastic from one of his late-night TV programs, and my husband told me, "It's okay, he's being funny." When I begged him not to let Jonah watch a certain TV show, and he'd tell me, "You're reading too much into this."

But I wasn't justifying. I was hearing.

And now our son had used a word that, as a teacher, I've seen take dignity away from children. A word that hurts worse than feelings—it names. It dehumanizes.

That night, I lay awake. I kept remembering how easy it had been for Jonah to learn something so hateful, and how hard it would be to undo.

And for the first time, I let myself say something aloud:

We don't parent the same.

We don't value the same.

We don't shield the same.

Two months later, I left.

Not because of a word. But because of what came after it—excuses, deflection, silence. If he couldn't be held responsible for what Jonah listens to these days, what else would he shrug off later?

Sometimes the world hits you with a big wake-up call.

Other times, it weasels its way stealthily through your child's headphones, masquerading as a review of a keyboard.

And when it does, listen up.

Also, I am pretty sure my scummy husband decided to vent here and make me look bad, so this is me setting the record straight.

the yt channel if you wanna see the scum that ruined my life: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjS4Yrmif6Q