Anger and "In the Middle"

I find myself in the same situation as Garnet at her blog.  A couple of weeks ago I offered to let my son's girlfriend sleep in our guest bedroom one particular evening.  She has been helping to drive him once or twice a week to work or his probation appointment.  I don't remember the particulars from that offer, but he declined at the time.  Last night, J called asking if she could spend the night (in the guest room), because she could pick him up at 1am and take him to his probation appointment today at 1:15pm, followed by work at 2:00pm.

My husband and I have been taking turns picking him up at 1am.  It was planned that J's Aunt was going to take him to work today.  I had forgotten about his probation appt.  My hours aren't flexible this week, because I'm in training.

I put J on hold when he called to run it by my husband.  He said "No, he didn't agree".  So, I tried to explain to J and he got upset.  I am "in the middle" again.  I tried to talk to my husband about it after I hung up from talking with J, but he gets upset if I start questioning him, trying to understand his reasons.  I stay calm.  Each time he gets upset, I interrupt him and ask if we could try to just talk and stay calm.  He makes statements such as "just do what you want", "I'm the bad guy, the "dick" again", "the bottom line is...".

At one point he walks over and standing three feet from my face, spews anger at me.  I don't react.

I wait for a few minutes and tell him I won't put up with that kind of anger being directed at me and that I believe he has an anger problem.  I ask him if he sees the anger.  He says "no".  In the past, he has admitted that he has an anger problem, but has done nothing to work on it.

Through the years, there have been a handful of times that his anger has turned physical with J.  A push, a slap on the chest, picking him up off of the floor to throw him on the couch, etc. and only once with me, jabbing his finger into my chest repeatedly.  I have looked at my part in it, as Garnet said in her post, and can see from his perspective that he feels like I continue questioning him until I get the response I want sometimes.  Like an attorney cross-examining.  I would like to set up my camcorder so that we could replay it and watch ourselves, each time we try to resolve an issue.

He came in the room a few minutes ago and said, "Sorry about last night".  Normally, I say, "O.K.".  This time I said "hmm".  As I write this out, it sounds like "abuse".  I tell myself that he has gotten better.  I had quit smoking again for 4 days until this outburst, and felt the need for one last night.

This makes me sad...I welcome your comments.