My son told me he didn't want to live at home anymore

Every night when I put my 4yrs old to bed, we talk a little. One of us will say "Today was a good day, don't you think ?" and go over what went right and what went wrong . When he asked last night I said "Yeah it was, right up until it was time to brush our teeth. There was a bit of fooling around there, don't you think?" . We've had issues with that lately. We argue a lot more than we used to. There's a lot of talking back, and I think it has played with our patience and tolerance a little.I work every other weekend, and when my partner has to work on those same weekends, our son goes to my parents lake house and spends the whole weekend there. Of course when he's there, he's a little prince. He's their only grandchild so they let him do pretty much what he wants. It doesn't bother much me because I know he's safe, he doesn't have behavioral problems, and these weekends are pretty much the only time they get to spend time together so I let them spoil him.Last night, after I mentioned the teeth brushing incident, my son got really quiet and told me he didn't want to see us anymore. He wanted to live at his grandparents. "When I have daycare during the week it's ok, I can see you, but on the weekends I want to be at the lake house".. what ? I asked him why he didn't want to see us anymore and only got "because". I told him I loved him and wanted him to stay home with us and he replied with "I love you too mama but I don't want to stay here anymore. I love you but I want to go." My heart broke. I told him that made me very sad and I wished he would tell me what made him want to leave home. What makes him so unhappy? I asked him "Is this because we argue a lot lately?" and he said "Yes.. I feel like I'm always fooling around and I always mess up and that makes us angry and we argue.. I never argue with grandma and grandpa.." He got teary eyed and said "I love you very much mama, but I don't want to live here anymore".I tried my best to remain calm and not let my emotions get the best of me. I explained to him that it is normal for parents and children to argue, I used to argue with grandma and grandpa all the time when I was a child. "..REALLY ?" Yeah, really. I didn't want to put any blame on him, he was already beating himself up. I did not want to tell him that if he wasn't acting out that much, we wouldn't be angry most of the time. I knew my partner and I had to take the blame for that one. So I pressed on the fact that, maybe daddy and I aren't as patient as we used to be. Maybe we should really work on calming ourselves, talk calmly to each other when something is bothering us instead of raising our tones, and being so prompt. He said that would be good, but we would have to work on it, all three of us. Not just me, not just daddy, him too. "We could look on your phone tomorrow for ideas how to calm ourselves down when we are fooling around and getting out of control. We could all look for it together!" I said that was an amazing idea. He asked to go downstairs tell daddy his idea and I agreed. I gestured to my partner to pretend to understand the point kiddo was trying to make, nd he played along. Kiddo was so proud of himself. Hugged us, told us he loves us, and went to bed.Once he was in his bed for the night, I sat down with my partner and explained to him the conversation we had. And at that point, he too realized we had been a little too prompt with kiddo. We are snapping at every little things, and that probably is the reason he is acting out so much lately. Which makes us even more impatient, which makes him act out even more..So starting today, we are working on being nicer to each other. I am proud of my boy for speaking up and telling me how he felt. It broke my heart, but if we want a happy and healthy family, we need to listen to each other, and respect each other's feelings.Edited for spelling via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/2PMdjmH