Making New Lives

[Zues126]

Fogg, i think the DBing books and theories are great books for declining marriages.

My point is that the majority of us on here were not merely in declining marriages. We were being deceived and abused. In marriages with addicts and cheaters.

Deceived and abused people are usually being gaslighted which makes it easy for us to think we can fix our marriages. We think its us! Most of us are already pro marriage. Most abused people dont recognize they are being abused. They are not the ones to call out abuse. They are frustrated, depressed, know something is wrong. But will stay and try to fix things. Thats why we all love newcomers. Its about staying and fixing things.

But there needs to be acknowledgement in her books. She is a health care professional. I would hope she is aware of the type of people posting here...people using her books to justify staying with addicts, cheaters, and even pedophiles.

When you put something out there, and build something based on helping vulnerable people there should also be a responsibility to go back and check. Make changes. Address misconceptions.

Now if you are in it for a quick buck. To exploit those people, thats a different story. Just 1 more con. But i hope thats not what this is.

MWD wrote the book the way she did for a reason. It wasn't to exploit people. It was, I think at least, that she understood that if she included exceptions about abuse and addiction that people would take those paragraphs and over-apply them to their situations to the point of voiding out the entire book.

The problem with the 'abuse and addiction and cheating' thing is that when a marriage is crap both partners are at their worst. They are so full of pain and resentment they are well beyond their ability to cope. In these circumstances people do things they normally wouldn't. How can you tell if it's temporary or chronic behavior? The only way is to get beyond the worst to see if things come around.

Many marriages have survived drug use or alcoholism, adultery, and hurtful behavior. The whole idea of DB is to end the dysfunctional dynamic and stop hurting each other, get better as an individual, and then see what develops. From a strong healthy place of detachment maybe the LBS prefers accepting some destructive behavior versus getting a divorce. Maybe the partner, finding themselves no longer in a retaliatory battle, changes in some positive ways. Besides, the LBS was going to spend time grieving and detaching and growing whether they do it in the M or out of it.

I do agree that our culture is moving away from this mentality and going to a more "They're the problem, here's proof, I deserve better" mindset. This is exactly why she wrote the book.