The way I look at it is a bit different than what is canon here.
MLC is not listed in the psychological diagnostic manual to my understanding and is not accepted as a professional diagnosis.
I talked to my own therapist about it and concerns that I had of me following a similar path of dancing with the fairies. She assured me that since I was asking that question that there was little risk. Self-awareness she seemed to indicate was key. It is talked about here that the "MLC" person needs to deal with their issues. I know that my ex certainly was very avoidant of any sort of introspection especially if it was not positive.
There's some talk here and a lot of talk on other sites about narcissism, cluster-B disorders, bi-polar and a lot of other labels. I think if we take off our rose-coloured glasses and think of our spouses we can certainly see that they had some strong selfish characteristics.
Being able to do selfish things even though they hurt others is a key factor. I do know that my own son has many personality traits like his mother and like you both, I worry about him following a similar path in years to come.
Now - with that being said, if you dig around some of the older threads, there does indeed seem to be some commonality of early abuse / loss, depression and unresolved issues. I would argue - completely without authority - that there are lots of people who have those problems and don't go off with the fairies. Given the astoundingly large percentage of people who are seen here to go into a "MLC" and there are so few "returns" and of those many of them go dancing off again, I do have my doubts about the process as it is laid out here. But again - non-professional and only anecdotal information.
I think that for me, the best that I can do is to model good behaviour for my son. He is well aware of the impact that infidelity has had on me. He has a generally kindly soul. But - so did his mother I thought and she had a horror of infidelity and disgust with her cheating father and sister. Until she started cheating too. He perhaps has also seen the cost of her infidelity - which his mother never saw since her parents and siblings stayed together despite the cheating.
Not sure if that helped - just my thoughts.
On BD H52, W50 T27, M26 S21, D23 BD-9-Mar-16 D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18 I am a storyteller. The story may do you no good. But a story is never for the listener. It is always for the one who tells
