I’ve been lurking here a long time and have enjoyed a lot of the posts and gained a lot of insight from the comments.

Tonight at dinner, my (35M) wife (34F) finally had some quiet time to talk. We have 3 kids (6M), (4F), and (2F) and are expecting number 4 very soon. The kids ate already and wife and I were eating after I got home from work a bit late. I took on a coaching position this spring to fill the need and have been staying later after school.

We were talking and there were some dirty dishes on the table. We had finished eating and I was finally able to have some rare uninterrupted time to talk to wife about my day.

EDIT: we were having a nice conversation about the house we looked at today, the kids, her day, etc. finally got to talk about my day at the end.

While I was talking, she asked me to get up and put away dirty dishes.

I felt that this was extremely rude and that she wasn’t listening to me and was instead thinking about dirty dishes.

I took the dishes and assumed we were done talking. Started walking past her and going upstairs to start bath time.

Cue the screaming. I remember that last time she was pregnant she got angry very quickly in a few situations, but they were never directed at me.

EDIT: she was able to repeat back what I said, but I was still angry since she had the appearance of not listening wholeheartedly.

She screamed at me to sit down like I was a child and berated me in front of our two youngest.

I kept calm and tried to talk to her to explain, but she wasn’t having it and kept yelling at me. Wouldn’t let me get a word in.

Finally, I started to feel the anger rise. I have had issues with anger in the past and have done things I’m not proud of when super angry. Been working on it. So I said I was going to go upstairs to start bath time.

Then she yelled that I always just run away and can’t face problems. I reiterated to her that I was trying to keep calm. More screaming and next I was screaming at her too.

She kept saying it was over a simple ask, to take the dirty dishes away.

My point of view is that she wasn’t giving me her full attention. Then she screamed at me and talked down to me like I was a child. Granted I can be childish and playful at times.

More screaming then she stormed off saying she won’t ever ask me to do anything again.

I started to calm down, thinking she is pregnant and has hormones that are usually not present. So I started talking calmly again. I even went to help her unload the dishwasher.

More screaming to leave her alone and to leave. Lots of screaming and crying.

So I took my wallet and keys and went out the door. She tried to push me back a few times. I said she wasn’t the boss of me. I went out the door and she screamed out that I was the worst.

I’m sitting in my truck by the garage. Haven’t actually gone anywhere, just wanted to cool down and be calm. Also didn’t want to show the kids she can boss me around. I usually do whatever she asks, but she is usually not screaming or berating me.

Am I the asshole for not continuing the conversation in the first place. Should I have just taken the dishes away and acted like it was nothing? Was I wrong to think she was being super rude to me and walking off? Then later walking out of the house?

Idk what to do next. I told her I’d come back when she could talk to me calmly.

But part of me knows she is not herself and is exhausted too. Do I just swallow what little pride I have and go back inside and take whatever she throws at me? Figuratively of course. Nothing physical has ever happened in this marriage even when I had worse anger issues. Worst I’ve ever done was throw and break stuff. Never at anyone though, just child-like temper tantrums which I am trying to work towards maturing out of.

EDIT: fk it. After writing all that and rereading it, I’m probably TAH. I’m going to go inside to help with bath and bedtime. I expect she will still be very angry and have some not great things to say to me. Hopefully she has calmed down a bit. I’m going to try to stay calm and be level headed, see if I can step up and be a real adult like I have to be at school.