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How about take sex off the table for both of you? It seems to be the boiling point in this relationship.

How about she works on why she is so damn passive aggressive by finding her voice, creating healthy boundaries and learning to communicate.

And you, Doc, work on why you allowed that passive aggressive dynamic (maybe you didn't actually give a shit if she was upset unless it was in the bedroom?) and how you can improve honest, EQUAL communication between the two of you versus rules and punishment.

The pressure and expectations surrounding sex is killing this marriage.

I suggested no sex, but both my WW and the MC disagreed. They liked the idea of my WW being the one to initiate sex, so I said I'd give it a try. That's in place for this week and then we'll examine how we both feel about it.

Setting boundaries has seemingly been her priority for the last five months. She's struggling with it.

And I agree, setting rules is not good. I cornered myself. I needed to step back and reset, and that's what I'm doing.

I had a mother that was like this as well, the more we learn about Mrs DrS the more I see my mom, and that may be why I keep reading. My mother verbally, physically, and mentally abused me my entire life, until I drew a firm boundary and keep her at arms length. It sucks, because she has dementia now that is rapidly worsening. But she won't admit she is having memory issues, and because I'm not involved now, my sister has become the badguy. But she didn't live w/ a life time of not being as smart as, as quiet as, as thin as, as strong as, her. She is the Golden child.

It's a very unhealthy dynamic, and like you my dad, played the passive role, and allowed it, he dealt with it mainly by drinking. So when I call them out on it now they neither remember any specific incident, but even at almost 52 the scars are still there.
Do NOT allow this to happen to your kids. Call her out everytime she pulls this shit with them, and she will, and you won't recognize it initially because you have tolerated it for so long, but when you see your kids shut down, or cry for unknown reasons, explore it, identify it and at least protect them from it.

Interestingly, my WW's grandmother (mother's mother) died with Alzheimers and her mom seemingly has the early stages of dementia. I worry about my WW in old age.

I will be very protective of the kids. Truthfully, if I felt my WW was stubborn about her behavior, I'd leave now soley for that reason, but she hates being passive aggressive--she hates that's how her mind works and how she behaves. She wants to change it. She has been focused on setting healthy boundaries as a first step, but it hasn't been that successful thus far.

Now you're triggering my ghosts. My ex did that. It's such a relief to no longer be married to someone that is always looking for the bad in others. Does your WW have any long term close friends? Or does she tend to rotate through new ones?

Nah, she has no longterm friends anymore. She travelled all over the place in high school, so those friends are scattered around the world, and she has lost touch with virtually all of her college friends for various reasons--geography being one of them. I will say she's now starting to develop what appears to be some healthy relationships with local moms--many of whom she's meeting through our children. Logically, these relationships should do well, but we'll see.

Doc - I also think you need to recognize something that you currently don’t see and aren’t experiencing.

We agree that your WWs treatment of you sexually pre A was abusive. We agree that her badmouthing of you pre and during A was abusive. We agree that her A was abusive. Finally, we agree that your WW continues to abuse you with respect to your sexual relationship.

However, this is where I think we diverge. For 99.9 percent of BHs, continued abuse wrt sex by their WW 5 months post A, or anytime during R, would be a dealbreaker. However, you’re not like 99.9 percent of BHs because your sexual kink allowed you to move past the fact that your wife had "an intense, highly deceptive affair."

Now, for a moment, try to put yourself in your own shoes minus your kink. Then imagine, and put into this construct, your WWs behavior wrt the BJ last week snd her other post A sexual belittling, anger, and resentment towards you. Like the 99.9% of BHs, I think this would be a dealbreaker for you.

Think about it. Doc doesn’t have, nor ever had, his sexual kink. His wife treats him like crap in the bedroom pre A, continues to do so during her A, badmouths you all the while, then cheats on you. And now, as you try to R, she continues to treat you like crap in the bedroom.

I don’t think that Doc without his kink, nor 99.9 percent of BHs, would stand for this. So to me, your kink is an enabling function for you to continue to tolerate abuse. I think that deserves some thought.

Dude, your post is incredibly perceptive and it is something I've given a lot of thought. Again, I don't write much about my kink here because it tends to lead to unproductive conversations. But I agree with you: without my kink, I *likely* would have considered my WW's A, and/or her behavior post-A, a dealbreaker.

The question of course is what to do with that. I feel like I'm very conscious of the idea that I can end this situation at anytime, but I can't necessarily get back here. So regardless of my reasons for tolerating the situation, I should remain in it until I think it's futile.

Doc. What I recommend you do with it is channel it. HO and others have detailed the typical stages you should be going through, anger being one of them.

Many BHs didn’t get results getting through to their WWs that this stuff is serious, and they mean business, until they reached the anger stage.

You haven’t channeled anger towards your WW. You accepted in bemusement her latest BJ abuse. We discussed recently that your personality is getting in the way. Until you express outright anger your WW understands that you’ll continue to over analyze and over litigate things to death.

BJ type incident occurs, you blow your top, kick her out of the bedroom, pack an overnight bag for a hotel, then actually go to that hotel for a couple of days maintaining zero contact. Try that!

To add, you yourself have said numerous times that your WW displays the maturity of a child in many instances. Children don’t understand a ten page research paper on why they shouldn’t run across the street into oncoming traffic. They sure as hell listen when they get screamed at for doing so, crap their pants in fear, and thus will think twice about doing it again. You know - you’re a parent.

I suggested no sex, but both my WW and the MC disagreed. They liked the idea of my WW being the one to initiate sex, so I said I'd give it a try. That's in place for this week and then we'll examine how we both feel about it.

She knows how important it is to you. Whether you ask or initiate she may still feel obligated. She's desperately trying to save her marriage. I don't see how she can feel comfortable about NOT initiating knowing the lack of sex might be a deal breaker for you. It is still sex under duress. But, see how the week goes.

Setting boundaries has seemingly been her priority for the last five months. She's struggling with it.

As she would. Especially now with her life and marriage hanging in the balance. At the scariest time in her life she's supposed to speak honestly about her wants and needs? That is so foreign to her it's like asking her to speak Japanese whenever she wants a foot rub.

Her badmouthing people doesn't surprise me either. Because she does not, in the moment, express what she needs or thinks. So she comes home and unloads it on whomever will listen.

FWIW, I have struggled with people pleasing and boundaries my entire life. It is terrifying, to someone like me, to speak my mind to those I love. Worse, the longer you are this way, the more you lose line of sight on what you actually want and feel. So in moments where a boundary is needed or a direct conversation is required, all we feel is an uncomfortable anxiety. Later, when the urgent scary moment is over, our anger shows up. It's mostly at ourselves, but unraveling that ball of dysfunction is like climbing Everest. So we lash out at others.

I am not making excuses for her. I guess I'm echoing what HO has outlined several times. This is her. This is her dysfunction. She betrays herself in a moment and then lashes out after because that's all she knows how to do. You either allow her time to grow and re-learn things or you walk.

I should stop there but I can't help myself. I'm reading about her abuse. Over and over. And this idea that if there were gender reversals here, we'd be writing different things. Maybe. But I don't think so.

You've said before she is a loving, compassionate person

You've said she is a great mother

You've said she showed more loving actions than you did in the marriage (love notes, actual care and concern, etc)

You've said that you got your sexual needs met online with her permission

You've said that you are an exacting person and offered as an example, the day you corrected her on a table setting

You've said that (in discussing that example) you were not interested in how others see it (rigid, sorry)

You've said you enjoy confrontation

You've said she does not

You've said you are not easily moved off your position of rightness

Exactly where in there is she supposed to feel like she has equal agency in this marriage? That she is free not only to express her wants and desires but do so without debate or criticism from her spouse?

Abuse? Or a scared woman who cannot, ever, out talk her spouse and who has no ability whatsoever to hold her boundary regardless of the outcome.

[This message edited by TheEnd at 11:36 PM, Friday, August 26th]

By all definitions, I was a BS that stayed entirely too long in a wreckonciliation - almost 13 years from discovery to divorce. I’ve read SO many responses throughout the years that basically said "just leave already!" Perhaps that’s why this thread drives me nuts. I know this territory intimately. I know what helped me, what hurt me…and I really know the territory of trying to make and enforce boundaries - particularly before I was emotionally in a place to back them up. For me personally, I experienced a LOT of internal conflict between where I was emotionally and where I felt like I SHOULD be. The one thing I can see with resounding conviction from the whole experience is that it’s a process - you get there (wherever "there" is) when you are ready.

My first marriage was physically abusive - like, extremely. My second marriage was emotionally abusive - like, extremely. I’ve been manipulated by a master - and as a result, I’m fairly skilled now at recognizing even nuances of manipulation. Someone pointed out earlier in your thread that manipulation frequently occurs in virtually all of our relationships. I think that to be true. So given that, I do think your point about intent is relevant; since I so readily recognize manipulation now I’ve had to work toward also placing value on intent to find balance in all my relationships. It’s one reason that blanket assumptions drive me crazy.

Without picking on any poster, I do find the broad classification of abuse somewhat presumptive. I also find it to be highly emotional charged - because if we tolerate abuse then somehow we seem to become complicit in it; it becomes partially our fault. And that’s just a responsibility I’m not willing to assume. Explore why I was tolerant or even unaware? Yes. But I didn’t cause it no matter how many times I endured it.

Physical abuse is very different than emotional abuse in that it’s much more measurable. The contradiction is also much more obvious when it comes to the abusive relationship vs other relationships in the abuser’s sphere. But there’s another component that’s even more significant - emotional abuse is largely effective/detrimental only to the degree to which I’m invested. As I use to tell my students, just because someone calls you a chicken doesn’t mean you’re going to start clucking and laying eggs. It’s only affects you to the degree that you value what the other person says/does. Not the same with a black eye or busted lip. I’m not minimizing one type of abuse over the other. Many have said they’d rather be hit than endure some of the emotional abuse they did; personally, I agree with them. The emotional abuse was horrific - but that changed for me when I began to see that his behavior had really nothing to do with me outside of the fact that I was just the most emotionally connected to him. Both in that he was more apt to be triggered (feel vulnerable) and need to resort to his learned coping skills in this relationship - as well as I was going to be more hurt by it because of my own emotional connection. We acted as both "cause and effect" in our own little dysfunctional dance.

Did I really say that it took almost 13 years to figure that out? Yes - and no. Because the only thing that matters to me now is what I did and accomplished within my own growth during those 13 years. (Obviously, I had a lot of shit to unpack…and I found his behavior to be an excellent catalyst and road map toward my own growth.) By the time he actually physically left, I was both ready and somewhat indifferent (other than now having to figure out all those nasty little post divorce logistics). Stay, go…you do you, Boo. (Can you see why HE left? I had changed and was no longer a fit for his dysfunction. I wasn’t checked out…I was simply matching his level of intimacy.)

This is why detachment is so very important. You haven’t been equally invested - and an affair has a way of bringing that into the spotlight. In the early stages - and what I do wish I could have done sooner to protect myself (but the process is the process) - I was trying to bring him up to my level of emotional investment when we both probably would have been better served if I could have just divested to his level. I even think I intuitively knew this because I struggled a long time with the idea of having a RA. But because I couldn’t let go of the outcome, because I was afraid if I truly emotionally pulled back there would be no one bailing the water, I doubled down and tried harder - and that looked and felt like a clusterfuck. Hopeful, all in, some days - other days kicking him out and looking up attorneys. (Imho, THIS is the rollercoaster.). I was a fucking mess. And ironically, me being a mess was a great diversion from him being a mess.

Regardless of the outcome of your marriage, this thing has happened to you and it will require its own course of healing. What AND the degree to which you heal is what your intent and focus will direct. There was nothing - not even a remorseful spouse and a stronger marriage - that could make this experience truly beneficial to me unless I became a stronger and more self-aware person as a result. My world had been shattered…and it was no longer a safe place for me in any way if another person’s thoughts or choices had that capability; in that, I would forever be hanging by someone else’s thread. That is what I set out to change. I ended up with a much stronger and more secure relationship with myself - and now my external relationships reflect that. The improvement in the external relationships happens organically, as a by-product not the goal itself.
In my case, yes…my marriage ended - but I also view that as having "passed the test" (genuinely learned what it was to teach me and it’s purpose had been served). I lost the marriage but I gained a deep relationship with myself. I’d make that trade any day, every day. No regrets or wasted time here.

This is the point I have been trying to make to you since my first post. And I do think you are coming to it. I’m just trying to encourage you to keep your eyes on the REAL prize.

There is far to much talk of him bending to his wife's will. I know its not the intention but if followed it will be the outcome.

There is absolutely a gender based bias here. No one and I mean no one would be suggesting that a woman bends to the will of an abusive man, in no fashion or manner, yet its being done. Why she is abusive is irrelevant, how she perceives his boundaries is irrelevant, they are his boundaries, they are his conditions for staying in a marriage that she destroyed. I believe we are losing sight of that.

Sure if done correctly, there will come a point that Dr will need to compromise, he isn't there yet.

I just read TheEnd’s post and could not agree with it more. I also agree strongly with pretty much all of HO’s posts. It’s not about whether your wife’s behavior is truly abusive or whether you should tolerate it. It’s about understanding your wife from a different/deeper perspective. It may be right - or your wife may simply be a mean sociopath. It took me time to decipher that when I shared a bed with my XH so there’s no way for any of us to know when it comes to your situation.

I think the larger point remains: it’s not about you. No matter what her intention is.

I think the larger answer also remains: Detach emotionally and focus on what you personally can gain from this experience - independent of the outcome of your marriage.

Everything else is just logistics.

There is absolutely a gender based bias here.

Respectfully, this is an assumption - and presenting it as now a gender issue is emotionally charged - and imho, an unfair (and irrelevant to the larger point) tactic. I see and feel the same thing when assigning intentionality to the abuse (as well as making future predictions). We simply cannot KNOW that…and DrS himself seems unsure.

I totally believe that every poster is wanting to help. I also understand that our own personal experiences color our perceptions. In that, I assign no malice to ANY advice or perspective. But I do think it’s helpful to stay within the lines…and I just don’t see how the hanging on intentional abuse - or now, gender bias for those of us that aren’t seeing it that way - is moving toward that.

The fact that it's being questioned is biased. I've read many threads here where women claimed abuse and I'm yet to see a response that asked her to see things from his perspective.

There are no assumptions in that statement. Not being in agreement doesn't change facts to assumptions. Dr hasn't been waffling on the nature of his wife's abuse (others have), and has several times questioned why he has accepted it for so long.

I will move on, respectfully. I'm sorry if I've offended anyone.

So..those who do see it as intentional, and do see a gender bias..arent staying within the lines set forth by those who don't see it,so we shouldn't point it out.

Ok.

Doc, I wish you well. But I'm going to step away from this thread for a few weeks. I won't be able to stay within the lines.

[This message edited by HellFire at 2:22 AM, Saturday, August 27th]

Your threads are a master class in Codependency. Your WW is addicted to selfish ego kibbles and you are addicted to her.

Detach

180

Focus on you

Stop having sex with her

In house separation

Full separation

Divorce

Whatever you want to call it or however you want to do it.

Anyone helping you focus, analyze, understand, and ruminate on your WW--who should be doing that entirely for herself since she is a fully grown adult--is enabling your addiction to her and your avoidance of your own issues.

This gets better when you learn to take care of yourself and STOP taking care of her. She is a person, not your project. Get. Out. Of. The. Way.

The fact that it's being questioned is biased. I've read many threads here where women claimed abuse and I'm yet to see a response that asked her to see things from his perspective.

That's it, the thing that struck me too. Don't get me wrong, I do see it occasionally where a WH will behave abysmally and a treatise on the fog or shame spiral will be written out as a way to help the BW understand her WH. It does happen, but generally it's harsher when it's about a man mistreating a woman.

It doesn't matter whether abuse is intentionally done to hurt me or if it's done without consideration or empathy for me because that person doesn't respect me enough. End result is that I'm still being abused. People don't abuse those whom they respect. I'm not sure that I even believe that unintentional abuse is a thing.

Doc can recognize her passive aggressive stuff as abuse and still stay with her if he chooses to. He and everyone else can psychoanalyze her and maybe that will help him. I don't know. We all have different things that we can live with and I'm sure that I'm less tolerant than most so that skews my perspective.

Hey Doc. Been a while again. You’re getting lots of good and varied advice.

I’ll keep it simple as It’s late.

I won’t comment on the abuse, as it’s been discussed deeply, but I do want to mention again what it means to me that it occurs. The most disturbing part of it to me is that it still means that she is completely inward focused. It’s still all about her and her own feelings and how this all affects her.

I struggle mightily to find indications that empathy and remorse exist at all. Just when I think they might show up, she has another outburst that she care about herself above all.

That’s truly disturbing after 6 months. With due respect to HO, with whom I agree it’s still early in the aftermath for her to be getting it all right, but I’ve not seen a WS be successful with such blatant disregard of what her BS feels and is going through.

That’s what I would try to get her to focus on if I were an advisor of hers.

In the most recent event, what she should have been focusing on is how she was making the person she supposedly cares about feel good. That is supposed to be important to her. It should be important to any spouse whether they have been unfaithful or not.

Sure she has the right to say no. But she chose not to. She could have said no any point along the way. She chose not to. And yes it’s awful that she actually said something to make you feel bad about the experience.

But what’s even worse, she couldn’t bring herself to feel anything toward how she was making you feel. She just didn’t seem to care at all. And I find that is what has been lacking all through this process. Caring about what you feel.

It doesn’t come near at all to caring about what she feels about herself. And to me, that’s something she needs to be focusing on in IC. Or, she should just be honest with you and tell you she can’t bring herself to care about your pleasure or your pain. And let you off the hook from trying so hard. Let you move on.

I do things all the time for my wife, sexual and not, that are more enjoyable for her than me and it makes me happy that I can make her feel good that way. And she returns the favor to me. I just don’t feel that from what you convey about your wife.

I feel she’s going thru the motions, and not very well at that. I really wish she would find her empathy and remorse and hold on to it consistently. It’s still my opinion that a WS needs to find a way to really care about their BS as much as they have and do care about themselves. Perhaps even more.

Just my opinion. Take it for what you think it’s worth.

[This message edited by Stevesn at 4:42 AM, Saturday, August 27th]

It’s not my intention to control responses or perspective. I’m just sharing mine. It really is that simple.

With the intentionality piece, his wife is set up for failure by default. If she’s enthusiastic with sex, (which according to Dr is approximately 10 out of 11 times), she’s just manipulating him. If she’s not enthusiastic, then she doesn’t care about him. I totally get where he’s wanting it to be, that it’s not just the sex that’s the issue, but she can’t get there if all roads lead to failure. When you add in her component of people pleasing, she’s totally fucked. DrS has even indicated this when he basically says she can’t get out of her own way. HO has also described this (as I understand her). It’s not that it’s acceptable; it’s that the deck is currently stacked against her (Dr’s wife) - and I think she very much feels that. It’s one reason I’ve suggested taking sex off the table. It seems to be the most significant stumbling block right now - for BOTH of them.

But there’s another reason that I point it out, as well as the gender biased aspect. It’s based both on what I’ve observed in his threads as well as - surprise - my own experience.

There seems to be a pattern where Dr posts things are going well and he receives a whole chorus of caution, assumptions (she’s just manipulating you), and pushing for what he’s going to do if something doesn’t go well. He draws lines in the sand because it triggers his need to self-protect. Then something doesn’t go well, he shares, and then there’s the whole chorus of action he needs to take - lest he teaches his wife that he will tolerate this kind of behavior and by that, then he also somehow is complicit in it. He’s heavily reminded of his prior "boundary" so he makes an emotional decision that he’s not emotionally resolved to support (because it was never an authentic boundary). Some time passes, initial emotion calms, and he’s re-evaluating. But when he corrects his path - based on his own internal resolve - then he gets the "I knew you wouldn’t follow through" responses so he must then reestablish the next "boundary" to self-protect. Speaking personally, this feels like shaming to me - and I’m just not ok with that. I’ve experienced this cycle - though I don’t think any of it was malicious. It just wasn’t helpful.

Dr S is a big boy here and I think he has more than demonstrated his ability to take it as well as his appreciation for it. That’s not my judgement to make or my battle to fight. But I’ve been here long enough to know that conversations that focus on gender never go well and are very rarely productive or resolvable. They’re just too emotionally charged and they often diverge into fruitless rabbit trails that end up getting the whole thread locked. That’s the logical reason for my response above. My personal reasons are different but not worth fueling the fires that will come.

You haven’t channeled anger towards your WW. You accepted in bemusement her latest BJ abuse. We discussed recently that your personality is getting in the way. Until you express outright anger your WW understands that you’ll continue to over analyze and over litigate things to death.

BJ type incident occurs, you blow your top, kick her out of the bedroom, pack an overnight bag for a hotel, then actually go to that hotel for a couple of days maintaining zero contact. Try that!

Careful now!

This is an open, public forum. IMHO, we should be mindful of our messaging. It's possible to do the 180, or to send a strong message by walking out of the room (or out of the marriage). There is no need to root someone on in anger. Anger can be dealt with in more appropriate, grown-up ways than "blowing your top".

In the words of the great Dr Martin Luther King, Jr, "Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that." BTW, he was a man!

Love, Marie

[This message edited by ohmy_marie at 2:54 PM, Saturday, August 27th]

** Posting as a member **

There is far to much talk of him bending to his wife's will. I know its not the intention but if followed it will be the outcome.

There is absolutely a gender based bias here. No one and I mean no one would be suggesting that a woman bends to the will of an abusive man, in no fashion or manner, yet its being done.

I think you need to read truthesetmefree's post again, and OIN's and TheEnd's.

None of them touch on bending drs to his W's will. None of them exhibit gender bias in their posts. They talk about Drs finding out what he genuinely, authentically wants and going for it. They - and I and a few others - write about Drs giving up his attempts to control outcomes, figuring out what his own authentic will is, and figuring out how to use his strength to get as much of what he wants that he can.

DrS writes again and again about what his W does without taking responsibility for his actions in setting up and staying in the relationship he has.

He wants to change his W, when all he can change is himself. To get out of this relationship and enter R or D, DrS needs to go through a process of figuring out what he wants, how to get it, etc., and he has to recognize and be open to - on a gut, not intellectual, level - that he may not be able to get it with his W. IOW, he pretty much needs to go through the process that truthsetmefree describes.

If his W does get out of her co-dependence and he doesn't, the relationship will probably end anyway.

[This message edited by SI Staff at 4:42 PM, Saturday, August 27th]

Lots of new posts, so I probably won't respond to them all--but I'll do my best to work through the ones the really relevant ones.

She knows how important it is to you. Whether you ask or initiate she may still feel obligated. She's desperately trying to save her marriage. I don't see how she can feel comfortable about NOT initiating knowing the lack of sex might be a deal breaker for you. It is still sex under duress. But, see how the week goes.

Exactly my point in MC--and also my point a few days ago in my exchange with HO. The last couple of days have gone very well though--she's been positive and we've had a few fun sexual encounters that she has initiated.

As she would. Especially now with her life and marriage hanging in the balance. At the scariest time in her life she's supposed to speak honestly about her wants and needs? That is so foreign to her it's like asking her to speak Japanese whenever she wants a foot rub.

Her badmouthing people doesn't surprise me either. Because she does not, in the moment, express what she needs or thinks. So she comes home and unloads it on whomever will listen.

FWIW, I have struggled with people pleasing and boundaries my entire life. It is terrifying, to someone like me, to speak my mind to those I love. Worse, the longer you are this way, the more you lose line of sight on what you actually want and feel. So in moments where a boundary is needed or a direct conversation is required, all we feel is an uncomfortable anxiety. Later, when the urgent scary moment is over, our anger shows up. It's mostly at ourselves, but unraveling that ball of dysfunction is like climbing Everest. So we lash out at others.

I am not making excuses for her. I guess I'm echoing what HO has outlined several times. This is her. This is her dysfunction. She betrays herself in a moment and then lashes out after because that's all she knows how to do. You either allow her time to grow and re-learn things or you walk.

You're spot on--and I now understand why her getting control of her boundaries is so important.

I should stop there but I can't help myself. I'm reading about her abuse. Over and over. And this idea that if there were gender reversals here, we'd be writing different things. Maybe. But I don't think so.

You've said before she is a loving, compassionate person

You've said she is a great mother

You've said she showed more loving actions than you did in the marriage (love notes, actual care and concern, etc)

You've said that you got your sexual needs met online with her permission

You've said that you are an exacting person and offered as an example, the day you corrected her on a table setting

You've said that (in discussing that example) you were not interested in how others see it (rigid, sorry)

You've said you enjoy confrontation

You've said she does not

You've said you are not easily moved off your position of rightness

Exactly where in there is she supposed to feel like she has equal agency in this marriage? That she is free not only to express her wants and desires but do so without debate or criticism from her spouse?

Abuse? Or a scared woman who cannot, ever, out talk her spouse and who has no ability whatsoever to hold her boundary regardless of the outcome.

I feel like a lot of narratives keep getting written in multiple directions. I don't think either my WW nor I need to be "bad;" and we're certainly not perfect--I can be critical, but that doesn't mean I'm not loving and compassionate as well.

Here's my bottomline rebuttal to you though: we can debate whose behavior was worse between my WW and I prior to the affair--I think there were resentments on both sides. We can take sides and volley arguments back and forth on who was good or bad.

But then my WW had an affair. She destroyed the marriage. So whatever scared victim you'd like to paint rings hollow to me.