Married for 10 years, two kids. Youngest 6 months.

Yesterday, I left in the evening a little before the kids went to bed. Went to visit my brother, grab a couple beers. It was very much implied I might not come home for the night (her words, later on). This isn't abnormal, though the frequency of it is new. Last weekend, I spent two nights in a row at my buddy's place, while coming home in between and leaving in the evening. I'm doing this consciously, removing myself from her presence more and more. I work at home, she's currently on baby leave, so home as well. It sucks.

Back to yesterday. I left my brothers place, drove by town and caught some friends, went to their place for the night. Night rolls over midnight, today in the morning around 5AM I drop her a line telling I'm at a friend's place. I sent it at this time because I was fairly certain she'd NOT be asleep. Small baby, and all that. I think this was the initial mistake to begin with. She sends me a message reminding me she's got something to do before noon, I'd not forgotten about this, so I don't respond. I just set my alarm so that I can make it back in time. I wake up to my alarm, she's messaged me that she's got help, I can come back whenever. I go back to sleep, sleep a few hours, eventually making it home around 5PM.

Clearly she is now a little frosty, but I ignore that, going on business as usual. At some point she comes to the study and tells me that ”I really don't wan't to be angry right now, but I am.” I give her a blank stare, and continue on my thing. A few seconds later, she's still standing there waiting for a response, so I bite, and ask her ”Why?”, to which she responds ”The fact that you need to ask makes me even more angry.”. I go silent, continue my stuff.

After the kids have gone to bed, I'm watching the match and she's next to me. A few minutes earlier, I'd spooned her on the couch, things seemed.. less frosty. She sits up and it goes like this:

Her: You know, if you'd just stayed the night at your brothers place, that would've been understandable. Instead I get a message at 5AM telling me you're at your friend's place. (Mutual friend, who is in a steady relationship himself. Highly unlikely that we'd entertain strippers. Maybe.)

Me: …..

Her: What if I just decided to tell you I'm going to A's place, and then later on would send you a message saying I'm at B's place?

Me: I guess you'd do that then.

Her: That's the thing, I would NEVER do such a thing. (teardrop)

I try to halfheartedly grab her for some hugging, thinking she want's some comforting. She won't move, so I let it be, no hugs given. I'm just silent now, I don't really have any non-aggravating answer to give her. And I'm fairly certain it'd just feed the cycle and lead into a messy argument. I don't know for certain, I can't even recall the last time we've had a fight, if ever.

She went to bed soon after. We exchanged some information concerning schedules for tomorrow, but no ”good nights” or any of that stuff.

I don't see myself as doing anything wrong, I wen't out and did my thing. There were no plans that required my presence during the day, after she figured her thing out. Which I was ready to come to, should need be. She takes care of the kids in the morning, so I can assuredly say this day was quite ordinary in that regard. I'm disappointed I had nothing witty to disarm her shit with, apparently AM isn't my forte. I believe this is dread working, but I'm not a 100% on this. I've lifted for years, though for the past couple months I've only started to get into sculpting my body. Cutting at the moment, I think I'm around 10-12% BF. Clearly visible abs, defined shoulders. So, lifting, being more out of her presence, some wardrobe changes. All this combined. Mind you, this didn't start until a couple months ago. First the cutting, then gradually the time I'm away from home. Wardrobe somewhere in there. Now, I say I believe this is dread working, but I'm writing to ask:

Am I just being a huge fucking dildo, and too damn blind to see it? Or is this ze dread?

EDIT: I am.