Good grief, a counsellor trained in coercive control would not be telling you to confront him. How incredibly irresponsible. As so ably demonstrated doing so just gave him the opportunity to manipulate you and screw with your head.
His response was textbook abuser. Right down to turning lovable at the end so you didn't feel able to stand your ground. That's not sweetness or whatever you've labelled it as. Abusing your spouse isn't lovable, even if your chosen tactic of the moment is false charm.
Did you look at any of the videos linked to up thread?
Turning on the charm is just as much pure abusive behaviour as his manufactured rage. It is about controlling you and manipulating you. The huge weight of guilt you're carrying has been largely created by his abuse.
Him curling up into the foetal position... Abusive tactic. He abused you in that situation by manipulating you into feeling guilty and responsible and unable to leave. Ergo he retained control - which is what abuse is, the pursuit of total control of you. Sometimes that is gained by nasty words and threatening behaviour, sometimes that is gained by being loved by your entire community and telling you it's your fault he's not like that with you, sometimes it is gained by crying and pleading or suddenly becoming charming and affable.
It's not locking you in a basement to stop you working, it's undermining you with manufactured rage on your way to work. It's not locking you in the house to prevent you seeing friends, it's telling you your friends are using you or coming up with his own plans when you're meant to see them or being so unpleasant you dare not invite them round. Or telling you after they visit how embarrassed he was to have them there when you can't keep the house clean and tidy.
You really need to keep reminding yourself that abuse in this context is more complex than the other definition of abuse used to merely mean insulting someone. That is not what anyone here referring to abuse means. And to do that you need to stop clutching at any excuse to label him "not that bad" or "not the worse abuser in the entire history of the human race and therefore not abusive".
In the months leading up to me leaving, things at home were very "calm". I was as obedient as I could possibly be to stop him kicking off because I was afraid I would not be able to leave otherwise. By the time I left I didn't feel like a person anymore. Those "quiet" months were probably more soul destroying than the rage filled ones that preceded them.
He didn't need to fly into rages, because I was scared to do anything he didn't like or permit or that might possibly set him off. The threat of rage was enough to keep me in line.
The "calmer" things are with a coercive controller, the more severe the abuse is.
If it was solely about the patently obvious things like black eyes then abuse would be easy to identify, easy to stop, and nobody would ever be abused.
And besides, even the men who beat their wives have moments when they're "loving" and "wonderful". It doesn't make the abuse acceptable or something that should be tolerated. Any abuse is too much abuse. It doesn't matter what goes along side it.
You can be fit and healthy and still get cancer. The fact you're otherwise fit and healthy does not mean you ignore the cancer or try to peacefully coexist with it.
Life is not that simplistic.