Saturday, November 15, 2008
12:00 AM
DEAR AMY: My wife and I are coming up on our 15th wedding anniversary and are at a major crossroads.
This summer my wife told me that she met someone in her chat rooms. She confessed to loving him and wanted to leave me and be with him.
It turns out that he was also married and lived very far away.
They have never met but have been in the same chat room for a year now. His wife found out and threatened to divorce him and take the kids. He ended it with my wife.
My wife was devastated. She got some medical help, said she would end it and said she would stay with our two children and me.
Two months later, I see the instant messages and text messages have started again.
I love my wife and will do anything to keep our marriage together.
I don't know whether to confront him or her or both.
I don't want to push her away, but I don't know how much longer I can be left out. -- Lonely Husband
DEAR LONELY: You should pull out the stops, confront your wife and the other man in question, and insist that this contact must stop. You are fighting for your family's future, so you should do everything possible to try to save it.
Your wife received professional help before, and she needs it now. You should be intimately involved in the process -- through marriage counseling and a consultation with a mental-health professional, if necessary.
Think of it this way -- if you do nothing, then nothing will change.
DEAR AMY: I am responding to letters from people wondering how to deal with difficult family members.
For the first decade of visits with my mother-in-law, my husband and I bitterly disagreed each time whether her behavior had become "bad enough" for us to pack up and go home.
We never once left the scene of the crime early, no matter how shocking the incidents became.
A few years ago, I decided to drive separately.
The freedom to quietly excuse myself immediately each time my mother-in-law went off the rails was a huge relief.
This year, my husband apologized for trying to force me to pretend along with him that nothing is wrong. He also began to excuse himself when his mother gets started.
It may be a coincidence, but recently I find her behavior much less offensive during our visits -- it's easier to get along.
Retreating from my husband's family drama was one of the very best decisions I've made for myself in all my 39 years. -- Carrie
DEAR CARRIE: I assure you, your enforcement of basic boundaries -- and your husband's very important assent and support -- has affected your mother-in-law's behavior.
One important quality of a fully integrated, emotionally healthy adult is the ability to modulate our behavior based on the circumstances and the people we're with.
Your mother-in-law is proving that she is able to read a situation and change her behavior enough to achieve her desired result, which presumably is your presence in her home and her life.
Your story shows that something as simple as providing yourself with an escape -- your own ride home -- started the process.
DEAR AMY: I have a similar problem to "Wondering Sister" in that when our mother died, letters our father wrote to our mother were left in a box that she meant to destroy. I hated to lose any history that might be of interest, so I read them.
The letters mostly were apologizing for being unfaithful and promising to change if she would only give him another chance.
These letters were written while he was out of the country. They came to terms with this and stayed married. Unfortunately, he continued to be unfaithful.
I don't know why she stayed with him. Maybe she thought we needed a father. It certainly wasn't for security, as he could never keep a job.
After our parents died, I realized my siblings didn't know about these affairs, and decided it was of no purpose for them to know.
If they think our father was great, I just smile and nod. It is better for them to remember him in a good light than the way I will always remember him.
Some things are better left unsaid. -- Not Wondering Sister
DEAR NOT WONDERING: You are correct. Some things -- many things -- are better left unsaid. But this is a judgment call that each family has to make based on its own calibration of what purpose could be served by disclosing secrets.
(Send questions via e-mail to askamy@tribune.com or by mail to Ask Amy, Chicago Tribune, TT500, 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60611.)
(C)2008 BY THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE DISTRIBUTED BY TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.
View all comments that have been posted about this article.