Oh yes, and make calmer weekends so they are an oasis or sanctuary from the world. Lawn companies will mow for around $40. Get it done a weekday.
Anything that can get done on a weekday, get it done. Don't save chore stuff up for the weekend.

Update?

Anonymous wrote:He needs his space. And you're worried about him being gone for a couple of hours. He's may be close to making some big life decisions. And you might not be in it.

What you do is: you let him save face. He returns. He returns to a gentle, calm environment. He is telling you with actions and told you with words: it's too much. Too much stress. You expect too much emotional support -- go find friends, others to help with your emotional needs. He can't do it. It's too much for him, he's not wired that way. Likely too, you have the kids scheduled way too much. Especially revealing when, in the middle of a marriage crisis, *your* concern is how to get the kids to their activities and how you will get your errands accomplished. He's rethinking the marriage and you don't get what's important.

This, I think. He isn't a person who talks about his feelings and emotions? He has them, though. He just doesn't want to, or doesn't know how to without breaking down, or doesn't want to feel week. But he's got stresses and problems he doesn't let on about. Maybe big ones. And maybe those are at a critical point. Work? Job? Health?

He can't cope with his and listen to you "share" or "vent" or prattle on at the plant store.
In an ideal world, of course he should be able to.
But this is where he is now.

so...did he show up?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He’s having an affair and is looking for a way to make you the bad spouse so he can justify his actions.

OP and I cannot imagine anyone having an affair with him. He is mine and I married him for many reasons, but I really don’t think he is the type to put the energy into an affair (he is low-energy in general) nor could he attract the attention of other women.

You say he made 6 months of “optional” works trips to Asia. A lot of me like your husband go to East and SE Asia for paid sex. It’s an addiction of sorts. Work trips are typically the cover.

Not everyone is going to Asia for sex. There are lots of people doing legit projects. They hate the travel but have to do it for promotion, money or to keep the job.

Every marriage isn't in trouble because of cheating.

OP, It doesn't matter who is right or who is wrong. You are both suffering and by extension so are the kids and your are all in this together.

All you can do at this point is stop pitying yourself and start seeing a therapist or start a journal or come vent here, start meditation or something to ground yourself.

As of now, life can't be the way you want it to be so you need to be who you have to be to make it work.

He seems like a emotionally distant insensitive jerk but good thing is that at least he is working, isn't cheating and supporting family the way he knows how. For all we know he has health, depression, sexual, career or financial problems which make him see your day to day issues as insignificant and frustrating.

Let's assume that's the case. Where are his family and friends? How he gets his stress out? Just be a gentle, pleasant, accepting presence for a while and see if results are any different. Don't complain, don't argue, don't demand, don't whine. May be try finding lost connection through sex.

If you can't change yourself or him and can't stay this way then just ask for divorce and deal with life.

Anonymous wrote:Change the locks. What a dick.

Agreed! Why all the comments about not saying anything emotional? I’m so tired of the misogyny

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He’s having an affair and is looking for a way to make you the bad spouse so he can justify his actions.

OP and I cannot imagine anyone having an affair with him. He is mine and I married him for many reasons, but I really don’t think he is the type to put the energy into an affair (he is low-energy in general) nor could he attract the attention of other women.

You say he made 6 months of “optional” works trips to Asia. A lot of me like your husband go to East and SE Asia for paid sex. It’s an addiction of sorts. Work trips are typically the cover.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He’s having an affair and is looking for a way to make you the bad spouse so he can justify his actions.

this was my first thought too (DP)

Me too, but leaving the phone and car is weird. Unless he had pre-arranged plans to walk over or get picked up

Clearly he simply left the house to get away from crazypants OP and just needed some air. He didn't need his phone or car, he just needed to get the hell away for a bit.

So she is 'crazy pants'? The silent treatment is abuse!

This word ... I do not think it means what you think it means ...

Actually, she does know what it means.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/invisible-bruises/202411/stonewalling-as-a-form-of-emotional-abuse

Anonymous wrote:Was this a weekend HE had planned? No. Likely You informed him HOW his weekend was going to go. Yard work. Yippee!! He probably thinks most of what you do, keeping the family's world spinning is unnecessary. And he might be right.

And who do you think should do yardwork in a family home? Some neighbor? A random guy from the street? For guys like you everything is "unnecessary". But for some reason you still expect your house to be clean, grass cut and dinner on the table. I wonder who has the magic wand.

NP here. OP your DH didn't behave in a mature way, and he needs to own that. But your posts (and the title itself) are also a bit overblown.

When we fought, my husband would jump in the car and take a drive. It made me furious and anxious. But it was his way of stopping something that was spiralling and trying to get some space to think. Your husband may have done something similar. I'm not defending the behavior, but as we've gotten older and as our kids are more independent as teenagers, I get it.

Maybe there's more going on, as some of the PPs said. But maybe not. Either way, hopefully your DH has returned and the two of you are able to talk like adults.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oof, I remember this. The silent treatment, the manufacturing of conflicts out of thin air when I asked him what was wrong, the feeling that I annoyed him by even existing, the entitlement to check out or stomp out knowing I would provide continuity for whatever needed to happen….finish cooking, pay the restaurant check, entertain the guests. It was horrible.

Yes he was sleeping around, but that was merely a symptom of deep, pathological selfishness, spiced up by a fun whiff of sociopathy. He was an empathy void. And boy did he hide that well before he locked me down.

You know those men who leave when the wife gets sick? Yeah. I wasn’t going to stick around and find out.

I’m sorry OP. I have been there and for me, it never got better. Maybe it will for you. But I’d take this event as the bellwether it is. With no discussion, and over a nonsense event (the plant thing? Really?), he bailed on you and your kids. Hell, he even endangered the dog by leaving the gate open.

I’m leery of men whose protective instincts of those more vulnerable don’t remain intact in moments like this. They often make bad life partners. I would insist on counseling, no two ways about it.

OP and that is what I needed to hear. Whatever is going on with DH and whatever emotions I dared to express (apparently dcum agrees with him and thinks I need to squish myself down into the tiniest lump possible and not say a word about anything ever) don’t change the fact that he sought to make himself more emotionally comfortable at the expense of one of his own kids having to miss a baseball game or a birthday party and the dog potentially running into a busy street.

Nobody said this OP. They responded to the fact that your DH got irritated and walked out of a room and your reaction, when he didn't come back into the room, was, in your own words: "after 10 minutes I started frantically walking through the house." No one wants to live with someone running around "frantic" because they walked out of a room. The fact that you don't understand that this is not the same thing as "not say a word about anything ever" reveals your profound immaturity. As does your ratcheting the situation up to where a child misses a birthday party or the dog is killed in the street, when your original post suggests nothing beyond a quiet afternoon at home.

He's probably close to done with your emotional immaturity. You better get a handle on your behavior or next time the car and phone will be gone as well.

dp Are you claiming that the husband is the mature one? Do mature people walk out and not discuss what was bothering them? I can't believe the majority of posters are taking his side!

Op I don't know what I would do but, I would seriously think about divorce if you can swing it. This is no way to live

Have you read OP's posts? The incredible amount of drama in them?

Yes, I'm betting the DH is the more mature one here.

Of course I have read it! I don't comment on things I haven't fully read. If DH had explained why they were upset without the silent treatment and without storming out of the home you might have an arugumet. But he didn't and I can't support that

Are you and OP related, cause you sound like a crazy pants too!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He’s having an affair and is looking for a way to make you the bad spouse so he can justify his actions.

this was my first thought too (DP)

Me too, but leaving the phone and car is weird. Unless he had pre-arranged plans to walk over or get picked up

Clearly he simply left the house to get away from crazypants OP and just needed some air. He didn't need his phone or car, he just needed to get the hell away for a bit.

So she is 'crazy pants'? The silent treatment is abuse!

Yea she’s very much a crazy pants. That’s a nice way of putting it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oof, I remember this. The silent treatment, the manufacturing of conflicts out of thin air when I asked him what was wrong, the feeling that I annoyed him by even existing, the entitlement to check out or stomp out knowing I would provide continuity for whatever needed to happen….finish cooking, pay the restaurant check, entertain the guests. It was horrible.

Yes he was sleeping around, but that was merely a symptom of deep, pathological selfishness, spiced up by a fun whiff of sociopathy. He was an empathy void. And boy did he hide that well before he locked me down.

You know those men who leave when the wife gets sick? Yeah. I wasn’t going to stick around and find out.

I’m sorry OP. I have been there and for me, it never got better. Maybe it will for you. But I’d take this event as the bellwether it is. With no discussion, and over a nonsense event (the plant thing? Really?), he bailed on you and your kids. Hell, he even endangered the dog by leaving the gate open.

I’m leery of men whose protective instincts of those more vulnerable don’t remain intact in moments like this. They often make bad life partners. I would insist on counseling, no two ways about it.

OP and that is what I needed to hear. Whatever is going on with DH and whatever emotions I dared to express (apparently dcum agrees with him and thinks I need to squish myself down into the tiniest lump possible and not say a word about anything ever) don’t change the fact that he sought to make himself more emotionally comfortable at the expense of one of his own kids having to miss a baseball game or a birthday party and the dog potentially running into a busy street.

Nobody said this OP. They responded to the fact that your DH got irritated and walked out of a room and your reaction, when he didn't come back into the room, was, in your own words: "after 10 minutes I started frantically walking through the house." No one wants to live with someone running around "frantic" because they walked out of a room. The fact that you don't understand that this is not the same thing as "not say a word about anything ever" reveals your profound immaturity. As does your ratcheting the situation up to where a child misses a birthday party or the dog is killed in the street, when your original post suggests nothing beyond a quiet afternoon at home.

He's probably close to done with your emotional immaturity. You better get a handle on your behavior or next time the car and phone will be gone as well.

dp Are you claiming that the husband is the mature one? Do mature people walk out and not discuss what was bothering them? I can't believe the majority of posters are taking his side!

Op I don't know what I would do but, I would seriously think about divorce if you can swing it. This is no way to live

Have you read OP's posts? The incredible amount of drama in them?

Yes, I'm betting the DH is the more mature one here.

Of course I have read it! I don't comment on things I haven't fully read. If DH had explained why they were upset without the silent treatment and without storming out of the home you might have an arugumet. But he didn't and I can't support that

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He’s having an affair and is looking for a way to make you the bad spouse so he can justify his actions.

this was my first thought too (DP)

Me too, but leaving the phone and car is weird. Unless he had pre-arranged plans to walk over or get picked up

Clearly he simply left the house to get away from crazypants OP and just needed some air. He didn't need his phone or car, he just needed to get the hell away for a bit.

So she is 'crazy pants'? The silent treatment is abuse!

This word ... I do not think it means what you think it means ...

What are you talking about? ? It is ABUSE and why don't you think I know what abuse is? I've experienced it with my mother!

https://psychcentral.com/health/the-silent-treatment