Never done one of these before, might delete it later, but I really need a sanity check before this goes to far. Sorry if it's too long.

We've been together 2.5 years. I love her deeply and this feels like it could be ending. There's a lot of history here that is too much to get into but also feels important. The best way to summarize is that I've (m42) always been more committed longterm to the relationship than her (f34), but I also screwed up pretty badly a few months ago (not full-on cheating but she certainly might have a right to still be pissed). She has two boys, 3 and 7, and I have a daughter 13.

It's become a regular pattern that they stay at my place once in the middle of the week. I've spent a lot of time getting space set up for the boys and they love it here. Tonight was especially important for her because she has a busy day tomorrow at work (extremely stressful job) and a couple hours of work to do tonight to prepare. I planned a simple meal for the kids and a fancier meal for us after they go to bed.

While I made dinner for the kids she seemed a bit upset (very critical, maybe a little cranky). It wasn't horrible and certainly within the bounds of what we can handle together. I just figured she was hungry and stressed.

The real trouble started while the kids were eating. Her 7 year old started pushing limits the way a 7 year old does; he started holding his juice cup with just one finger from each hand, nearly dropping it twice. I politely asked him to hold the cup properly, which be refused. I told him if it did it again I'd have to take the juice away. He looked me square in the eye and did it again. Please bear in mind, I love this boy to pieces. As frustrated as the experience was I knew was just a normal childhood thing. I gently took the cup away and replaced it with water.

When he complained his mom looked up from what she was doing and started saying that I was overreacting. That he should be allowed to have the juice and I was going to "give him anxiety." I need to pause here and explain that it is an ongoing tension between us that this keeps happening, where I provide a reasonable consequence only to be countermanded by her. It's extremely upsetting to me and took me a while to figure out why: it's the difference between being a partner and a babysitter. As a babysitter, I just do what Mom says with no real authority of my own but as a partner I'm working to forge a long term parental relationship. This is a really soft spot for me because I already behave as a parent in so many ways to the boys (Cub scouts, doctor's appointments, school meetings, the whole 9 yards), I have a deep attachment to them but no right to them. In a second she could decide that I'll never see them again and there's nothing I could do. So when this happens and I get instantly demoted it's actually pretty painful and scary on my side. I've tried to explain this in the past and she just rolled her eyes and said I'm "being dramatic."

In this moment where I was again countermanded I could feel myself getting really angry so I just patted her on the shoulder and said "you seem to have this covered" and left to do the laundry.

After they had finished dinner I was still pretty upset, and tried to talk to her (kids seemed busy elsewhere in the house at that moment.). She started saying she hadn't seen the whole thing, but when I tried to tell her she interrupted me three times in a row. When I tried to tell her why I was upset she interrupted me again. I started to say that I wasn't going to watch the boys anymore until we talked this through, including tonight. She pointed out that she didn't have time and we couldn't do it in front of the kids anyway, and I relented. I said we could talk later and I'll watch the boys, but I needed her to understand the shitty situation I was being put in. Her response was to roll her eyes and say I was "just being dramatic." I'll admit it. I snapped. I hit some kind of breaking point. I told her that until she could acknowledge the way I was being treated I would not be taking care of the boys. Starting now.

We fought a little more, I cleaned up and got things ready for their bath while she got some work done. I didn't think she thought I was serious about not watching the boys until I told her that I'd make her dinner while she put the boys to bed. She got pretty mad. I told her all I need was one or two sentences to be back on duty, and she started talking about how long she'll be up tonight. I interrupted her and said she was "being dramatic" before walking away. Not my proudest moment. I apologized for waking away when I returned a few moments later.

Shit really hit the fan about 10 minutes later when her 3 year old walked out of his room with no pants on (important to note that he's special needs and there is a real chance of him pooping or peeing somewhere.) I laughed, called him "pooh-bear", and took the dog outside for a walk.

When I got back in she was putting pants back on him saying she was packing both boys up and going to her mother's so she can put them down for her. I told her that seemed unnecessary when all I needed was some kind of acknowledgement then I'm back on duty. She basically ignored me as she gathered everything up and left, I repeated a couple times that it wasn't necessary for her to leave. I can't remember exactly what I said so that probably means it was getting less nicely put in the end.

It's been about 5 hours and I haven't heard anything from her. The 7 year old seemed pretty sad when they left and I'm really worried that he'll think this was all because of the damn juice.

From my point of view my choice was to either let her leave or say it's ok to be treated that way and still expect to use me. I couldn't bring myself to say it was ok. It doesn't seem like I was asking for a lot, and it was something I really needed.

So... Am I the asshole?