I'd have to guess that the reason so many MLCers make a grand gesture/speech showing their love only a short while before walking away, is that, as a result of depression, they feel dead inside. Desperately hoping to feel a sense of connection again, they make the gesture/declaration of love ... only to feel nothing. At this point, they assume it must be their spouse's fault. Intellectually, they want to get back those in-love feelings, but can't figure out how to go about it. So they end up making an emotional decision, unable to understand how their depression has perverted their emotions.
As Antonia says, they are lost, with no sense of where their internal moral/rational compass has gone.
