I've felt awful for a week, after shouting at my son.

My (28M) Son is 18 months old, he is the light of my life and I look forward to spending time with him every single day. Every time I leave the house to go to work I make sure to give him a cuddle and to tell him that I love him...However, last Friday I was on my own as my wife had planned to stay at a friends. All week I had come home from work at around 1.00am, and was back out the house the next day for work at around 11.00am (my wake up call most of the time is my son, at around 7.30/8.00am) but for a few days he has had a bout of the runny nose, mixed with a lot of coughing and tummy aches. He normally has no trouble sleeping whatsoever, sleeping 8 hours solid most nights of the week. But this night he just would not sleep no matter what I tried; waking himself up by coughing mostly, he first woke up around 2.00am and everything I did to comfort him would work for 30 minutes until he woke himself up again, expecting me to go to him (which I did, every time).​At around 6.30am the tiredness overtook me, I was a walking zombie and my little man's crying had not subsided, so when I went in his room I took it upon myself to shout at him - "SHUT UP!".​The look on his face broke my heart. He went from a little upset to scared and crying. I never thought I'd make my son upset, or afraid of his own Dad, and I am completely ashamed. I immediately calmed down, and picked him up to come and sit on the couch with me (he fell asleep in my arms within about 10 minutes, and remained like that until 10am).I've been thinking about this non-stop all week, even when I'm at work and supposed to be focused on other things, the image of his face creeps into my mind. I even sobbed whilst driving home on a couple of occasions. My son on the other hand, hasn't changed his behaviour around me, and still screams with excitement when I get back home after being at work. via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/2PBOEDY