To still feel upset about this argument with DH

[grangeranger]

Yesterday, DH and I had the biggest argument we've ever had. It started over the stupidest thing - he rolled his eyes and sighed at me when I said we should go to the grocery store that day. I (calmly) asked him to please not roll his eyes at me.

He then exploded into a "why do you always have to escalate everything" kind of rage. He was holding DS (1) and I asked (still calmly) if I could please take him as I wanted to remove myself and DS from the situation. He refused, I walked towards him and he pushed me hard backwards. There were some further angry words - I was no longer calm. He was shouting. I told him that if he didnt give DS to me then that would be the end of our relationship there and then. He gave him to me and I walked away.

There were lots of tears from DH afterwards and a profuse apology, but he still doesnt accept that he had lost control. I apologised for making a nuclear threat about our marriage but did state that physical aggression and witholding DS from me were red lines for me that I would not tolerate.

Anyway, we calmly discussed it and moved on. But this morning I'm still feeling really sad about how something so trivial escalated into such a "thing". I am usually a pretty good communicator and DH is usually a very easygoing guy, although his mother has a towering temper which I have never seen in him before.

AIBU to still be upset and if so, how can I move on?

If my husband flew into a rage whilst holding our baby dam right I would take her off him . Shocked that people on here think any of his behaviour ok .

I think the baby would have been crying and upset if the DH had been in a real rage, I suppose, shamazing - I suppose I think of when I’m teaching and I raise my voice just slightly and I am accused of ‘shouting’ and I’m REALLY not!

Sorry OP,

Xposted. I think your update is much more balanced so all of what I said doesn’t stand.

I do not believe he 'flew into a rage'
I think the OP was potentially goady and manipulative and pissed him off.

My behaviour was also not ok and I've apologised for it. DH seems to have accepted that apology and is not (as far as I can see) dwelling. I've just got a niggly butterfly in my tummy this morning and not sure how to make it better

He will get slated here (probably rightly so) because he crossed the line WAY more than you did

Not by me he won’t. When we are pushed into a corner we lash out. Him being male though won’t play in his favour with a lot of people here.

So much misogyny and victim blaming on this thread. It's really depressing.

OP, of course you were right to want to remove your child from a person who had irrationally lost control of their temper. That's a no brainer (or should be) for any parent. And no, contrary to several other PPs, you didn't do anything at all to deserve the physical aggression.

I'm really sad that people who don't even know you would make excuses for your husband's behaviour and pressure you to see yourself as the guilty party. Some of the comments have been very forceful in their condemnation of you, with barely any facts presented other than you detailing a situation where your husband was physically aggressive towards you in the presence of your 1 year old child.

For me this would be a very serious line in the sand. If it was a one-off then I probably wouldn't end the marriage (although I wouldn't blame anyone whose tolerance for this behaviour was zero) but I would require a serious commitment from my husband to address the issue and not sweep it under the carpet. Any other incidents involving aggressive behaviour or a disproportionate display of anger would be the end.

When we are pushed into a corner we lash out. Him being male though won’t play in his favour with a lot of people here.

Who pushed him into a corner? OP calmly asked him not to roll his eyes. He exploded in rage. She calmly asked him to hand over their son so that she could remove them both from his temper. He refused. She stepped towards him. He reacted with physical aggression.

What kind of person defends this?

Right, so ‘rationally’ you can see now that your husband was not a threat to your son. I agree with Lweji that the push was defensive (and I am normally a LTB kind of person) because I do honestly think at that point you tipped the balance from equal parenting to you being the parent to you being the better and more rightful parent (I accept there are mixed views on this thread about whether you were right to do this) and then set your marriage on the line to force this through. I still think the second of your conditions (that he always give you DS when you ask) is perpetuating that shift. In a sense, the point that needs clarifying is the one you make that he would have reacted the same way (asked for DS if you were shouting) - because you don’t know that, presumably and have not discussed it. There is an assumption that you would have reacted differently from him, which is presumably an unknown.

By saying that you ‘rationally’ see things now, this suggests you were also acting in the heat of the moment, and while your voice may have been calm, your brain certainly was not.

So while I am normally a LTB type of person, I think the situation needs a bit more unravelling than he is the aggressor and you are the victim. None of it is great and it is not surprised you feel shaken, because as I said, the argument escalated very quickly to be about existential issues.

So he was shouting and being aggressive and people think the OP was being unreasonable to want to remove her young child from him? Really???

OP - I'd recommend a sit-down talk with your DH when your child isn't there. A good, calm discussion about what happened and why things blew up. You might find that he's been internalising a lot of things and might welcome the chance to get it out in the open (and it will help your butterfly tummy too - that's due to uncertainty). It will give you the chance to put your side of the story out too.

The other issue this demonstrates quite clearly to me is that if you do separate, you will have a fight on your hands if you want anything other than shared and equal parenting.

there are other ways in which I communicate which he doesnt like and I've done my best to adapt how I communicate so that its effective for him. I thought that was how a normal relationship was
Then the way to deal with this is to bring it up when you are both calm and in a talking mood. Mentioning it as soon as it happened, which will have been triggered by something you did or say is never going to work.

Let's say that you wanted to go shopping to stock up on pasta and loo roll (example) and he had said that he didn't think it was necessary and couldn't really afford it, but you insisted that you went which annoyed him, it would have taken a saint not to react at all, and eye rolling might have been the kinder way for him to express his disagreement or exasperation.

You would have been better off letting it go, but when seating on the sofa in the evening, cuddling, you could have mentioned that he's done it then and that clearly he'd been annoyed about something but you'd preferred if he'd bring it up rather than roll his eyes as you'd already discussed before.

I think the baby would have been crying and upset if the DH had been in a real rage, I suppose, shamazing - I suppose I think of when I’m teaching and I raise my voice just slightly and I am accused of ‘shouting’ and I’m REALLY not!

That's a fair point and the OP doesn't say (I don't think) whether her DS was crying or not. Another teacher here, so I do know what you mean when you are accused of 'shouting', when in actual fact you're just trying to be heard over 28 thirteen year olds.

OP, did he walk towards you to shove you or did he hold his hand out to keep you away?
Is it possible that the force you felt was actually from you walking towards him?
An aggressive shove would be him moving his body to push you. A defensive one would be him staying put and just holding out.
If it was the first, then I'd be very worried. If the latter then you mostly have yourself to blame.

I think a good conversation is in order to figure out what happened to understand both points of view and avoid reaching this point again.

If he did push you aggressively, then it's another matter.

I think you ought take the time to sit and talk with DH about the underlying issues. The real but you both felt angry. "You rolled your eyes, to me it feels like you think...." "you went to take DS, to me it feels like..." Arrange Relate if you need to. Your marriage needs it

This isn't about eye rolling, shopping or who DS is safest with, you admit you lost your calm too, enough to threaten your marriage ending, (were you shouting or using a menacing tone?) & then went to take your DS from his father in your (what might have seemed angry) flounce off . I suspect you didn't seem calm either to DH.

Instead of, "let's put DS down as neither of us want anyone shouting around him and we can talk about this calmly later". That's adult- adult conversation.

You and DH need to nip this dynamic in the bud before it repeats itself and you are then battling over who takes DS out of situation, as long as one of you does, that's what's important surely?

Even the calmest of people get grumpy moments and feel angry , both of you need to be aware of how you deal with it and agree a better way forward.

I don't condone the push at all, but wonder about his version, eg you appeared to DH as if you were out of control and trying to unsafely grab DS in anger?

Unless there's a whole history of this, then it's not unrecoverable

What kind of person defends this? I agree @IWantT0BreakFree

It seems to be that many posters just do not believe the OP's version of events, even when she says she knows she didn't handle it well herself.

I've not read the full thread but am absolutely flabbergasted that PPs are implying it's your fault he pushed you!!!

He was in a rage, you wanted to protect your baby and he pushed you!!

Fuck sake! What is wrong with Mnet this morning.

He pushed her

He laid his hands on her! This is not acceptable behaviour!

OP I think he needs anger management counselling ASAP.

So much misogyny and victim blaming on this thread. It's really depressing

My thoughts exactly. I despair at some of the replies on this thread.

Of course you wanted to remove your child from a massive angry man who was being verbally and physically aggressive towards you.

Him pushing you is a huge, worrying red flag. The butterflies feeling you have in your tummy is your instincts telling you you’re no longer safe with this man and cannot trust him not to harm you.

I would start reevaluating the relationship. Physical violence rarely happens in a vacuum. Are there other areas of your relationship where he tries to dominate and control? Does he sulk and give you the silent treatment? Do you have free access to money? Are you able to come and go from the house to see friends and family as you please?

Listen to your "nigly butterflies" OP, listen to what your subconscious is telling you.

You were there, you know what happened.

I've just got a niggly butterfly in my tummy this morning and not sure how to make it better

Talk to your dh about how you feel? Openness is the key to good communication and workithrough it togeth. I think any argument which culminates in the end of the marriage being proposed is going to leave its mark on both parties. It's been a shock from the sound of it and will take a bit of time to recover from.

We're just moving this thread over to relationships for the OP.

Of course you wanted to remove your child from a massive angry man who was being verbally and physically aggressive towards you.

How exactly was the man being physically aggressive towards the OP? The OP never said that.

And massive, really?

Get a grip.

*workiing through it together

You don’t have the default rights to your child. The two of you having a verbal argument doesn’t give you the right to demand your child from its own father. If you were physically trying to take the baby TBH I can see why it resulted in him pushing you away. You’d have done the same if the situation was reversed.