DH walked away from lunch date with me and the kids--am I overreacting?

[Anonymous]

I agree with your DH. This is what we do in life to prevent things from escalating. You mentioned you have a 3 and a 5 year old. I'm sure you put them in a time-out or tell them to count and calm down when they get out of control (at least the 5 year old).

Likewise, let's say you were at a bar and started getting into an altercation with someone. The best thing to do is walk away and not escalate.

So the same should apply in this situation also.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:1/ things that include kids are not dates. You were just going to have lunch with the kids, as a family, no "date".
2/ I think he used it as an excuse to be alone and chill instead of going on a boring and hectic "date".
3/ I am not saying he is right but he is trying to show you that he is sick and tired of the same old fight.

Make of it what you will.

Agree with this. He didn't feel like doing a family lunch, and may have (consciously or not) picked the argument to get out of the family outing. Whether he initiated the argument or not, he's going to be using this tactic in the future. Why not? From his perspective that doesn't consider the negative effect on his children to be a problem, it worked.

Regardless, the behavior you describe - his and yours - is immature and presents your children with a poor model. You seem to have some self awareness, OP, so the burden may be on you to bring about change.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I'm sorry this happened, OP. There was no right option, and it depends on personal preferences as to which option is the least worse, so don't overthink it. It just sucks all around. If he had said something really cutting, in front of the kids no less, you would resent him for that, too. All you can do is to state for future fights, that next time you'd rather he try to stay calm, or say the cutting thing publicly, instead of walking off. Fights can have ground rules like this of both parties agree to them.

My husband is impulsive and can act in a highly irrational manner sometimes. He has accused me of abandoning him, when he has gotten out of the car and refused to get back in, or stalked off without a word when we're going to a restaurant, etc. I can't put our lives on hold when he does these things, and go chase after him, so I've told him that if he does that, I will go on with the kids to whatever we had planned to do. It's sort of like a reverse-hostage situation. He still cannot see that it's abusive on his part and because of that, it's likely to re-occur at some point.

Oh, there's a correct opinion and the first 5 or so responses gave it. He was right and she is drastically overreacting. He's obviously much more mature and doesn't have crazy ideas like "we should fight in front of the kids". Grow up OP before you lose that tolerant man.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not sure op, who is right or wrong. But my sympathies to you and huge props for carrying on and keeping it together over lunch with the kids. It seems like it always falls to the mom to keep the kids held together when the dads get to stalk off and "compose themselves."

I don't think it's wrong to step away when you feel yourself losing control. But my beef with the husband is that he just left, and left her out with the kids to keep it together and feed them and get them home by herself. He should have taken a few minutes to compose himself and then joined the family and helped with lunch. If they had been at home and the kids were napping, then it's another story, but I would have been livid if I was left to carry out the family lunch adventure with two little ones while DH got to blow off steam on his own.

One or both of you should have nipped it in the bud, no matter who started it. No benefit to snapping at each other for several minutes in front of the kids. Model good behavior by saying I disagree, let's talk about this another time when we are calmer.

Helped with the lunch? Is that a major event for you? Taking 2 kids to lunch is not climbing Mt. Everest. It should be an enjoyable experience, not a chore.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think he was right. Sometimes you need to disengage in order to not have things continue to escalate. Since the fight continued once you got home, it seems your husband made the right choice to not have the fight continue in public.

I agree with this, and it also seems like you engaged in the fight with your kids around to sort of shield yourself, which is wrong. If you have something to say or fight about, donit behind closed doors, when your spouse is free to respond without having to edit himself because the kids/public are around.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I totally disagree with the idea that kids need to see you fight and disagree that the benefit from it.

It's BS made up by aults without any self control and who are totally self absorbed.

My parents believed in that crap and I got nothing from it but feeling tensed and stressed. Feelings I can't shake even today and I believe has led me to be conflict adverse.

OP here. If your parents had terrible fights in front of you that was definitely inappropriate. But my own parents had disagreements in front of us and while of course I would have preferred that they always got along great, I think it was good for us to see them work through things in a mature way.

If you keep bringing the same thing up (or acting like a critical b**** toward your husband all the time) you're not modeling this, somtime to drop this idea and find a new way to fight.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not sure op, who is right or wrong. But my sympathies to you and huge props for carrying on and keeping it together over lunch with the kids. It seems like it always falls to the mom to keep the kids held together when the dads get to stalk off and "compose themselves."

I don't think it's wrong to step away when you feel yourself losing control. But my beef with the husband is that he just left, and left her out with the kids to keep it together and feed them and get them home by herself. He should have taken a few minutes to compose himself and then joined the family and helped with lunch. If they had been at home and the kids were napping, then it's another story, but I would have been livid if I was left to carry out the family lunch adventure with two little ones while DH got to blow off steam on his own.

Yes to all of this. You want to go back to the house, fine, take one of the kids w you...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree with the three prior posters and also think it's unfair to extrapolate that he'd walk away from the family because he walked away from a fight. Not the same at all.

+1 Was it the right thing to do in the situation? That's almost beside the point. He's human, he hit his limit. I can understand that you wished he'd handled it differently, and I can understand being disappointed. But to equate it with walking away from your family, etc.? OP, you need to dial it way, way down. You are absolutely overreacting. You came home and he was there, he was calm, he put the kids down for a nap. He didn't use the excuse to stay out all night and leave you with the kids.

Your reaction is about you, not him. Maybe it will help you to examine why you reacted so strongly and dramatically.

[Anonymous]

" I was expecting that we would snap at each other for a few minutes and then calm down..."

Translation: "I was expecting that I could say whatever I wanted and he would be forced to temper his reaction because we were out with the kids."

[Anonymous]

My first reaction is that he did the right thing.

My second reaction is that OP seems like one of those people who loves to argue. It's really tiring to be around that type of person.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with the three prior posters and also think it's unfair to extrapolate that he'd walk away from the family because he walked away from a fight. Not the same at all.

+1 Was it the right thing to do in the situation? That's almost beside the point. He's human, he hit his limit. I can understand that you wished he'd handled it differently, and I can understand being disappointed. But to equate it with walking away from your family, etc.? OP, you need to dial it way, way down. You are absolutely overreacting. You came home and he was there, he was calm, he put the kids down for a nap. He didn't use the excuse to stay out all night and leave you with the kids.

Your reaction is about you, not him. Maybe it will help you to examine why you reacted so strongly and dramatically.

+1 to all of this. It's got to be tough living with you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with the three prior posters and also think it's unfair to extrapolate that he'd walk away from the family because he walked away from a fight. Not the same at all.

+1 Was it the right thing to do in the situation? That's almost beside the point. He's human, he hit his limit. I can understand that you wished he'd handled it differently, and I can understand being disappointed. But to equate it with walking away from your family, etc.? OP, you need to dial it way, way down. You are absolutely overreacting. You came home and he was there, he was calm, he put the kids down for a nap. He didn't use the excuse to stay out all night and leave you with the kids.

Your reaction is about you, not him. Maybe it will help you to examine why you reacted so strongly and dramatically.

Just to add, I'm not saying your frustration that he left isn't valid - but where you took it in your mind - to a place of catastrophic thinking about your DH, and his character and his attitude to your family, was an overreaction.

[Anonymous]

Yikes.

1) he did the right thing walking away and composing himself and not fighting in front of the kids and public.
2) if you were so upset about having to take care of the kids you ALSO could have walked away and not taken them out, Or drop one off with DH, taken the other out. Mix and match.
3) I can understand thinking / wanting him to come back. But he said he was leaving, it was right around the corner, and he wasn't using the silent treatment, he was composing himself and acting like an adult.

Yes, you are in the wrong. Take responsibility for your own actions and decisions.

[Anonymous]

Also, OP, it was only after somebody else pointed out that he left you with the kids and it might be unfair blah blah blah did you pick up that chorus. I don't think that is your actual complaint here. You wanted his attention, and when he refused to give it to you you became a petulant child.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DH, the kids (3 and 5) and I were walking to a nearby restaurant for lunch this weekend when we got into a fight. It was a dumb recurrent fight and we both got very frustrated with each other very fast. I was expecting that we would snap at each other for a few minutes and then calm down, in large part b/c the kids were there and because everything had been fine otherwise. I think it's important to show kids that couples can have disagreements/fight but remain civil to each other and get past it.

But my DH said he felt like it would be better for him to go home or else he would say something that he would regret. So he just walked away. I was totally shocked and for about 20 minutes I was looking up the street expecting he would come back. I went ahead and had lunch with the kids at the restaurant we had been planning to go to, feeling totally bowled over but trying to act normal.

When we got home he put the kids down for a nap. Then we had a huge fight while they were sleeping in which I told him that his walking away had made me see him differently--as someone who would, literally, walk away from our family if he was mad at me. I felt it showed he was willing to put his anger at me above the kids.

He said he felt he had made the right decision by leaving because he thought "it was going in a bad direction" and we would have ended up having a serious fight in front of the kids, and that I was being melodramatic in my reaction.

We worked through the original fight (didn't resolve it but agreed to both try to work on the issues). But I am still feeling very unsettled by the walking away part. I believe him that he thought he was making the mature decision, but I think that is completely wrong and not how you should conduct yourself if you are a member of a family. I felt he was basically blaming me for his decision, too, by talking about the fight in the passive voice and acting like would have had no choice but to say something terrible to me if he had stayed, as opposed to regulating his own behavior.

So what do you think, DCUM? Was I overreacting or was this a really big deal? (Ducking.)

Men process things differently and walking away to reevaluate the situation is what most men do. Read about it. Men are solvers and like to solve problems and come to conclusions. You're overreacting and it's obvious you don't understand male behavior. Walking away to come up with a different strategy and to approach the issue a different way is what men do.

Get over yourself