V, you're an honorary New Yorker for your sense of humor and telling it like it is! I have no doubt about the truth behind a man's reasons for doing these things as you suggest. Perhaps the context around my comments is framed a certain way because my husband is Middle Eastern and Arsh's husband is South Asian. In both societies men don't have free, open, and easy access to any woman they want such as they do here in the West. So they often immigrate as very innocent men and become 'corrupted' in our free societies. Divorce is so easy here and so normal compared to where they're from. So I think they're doing as you suggest but with a guiltier conscience than someone who was born in the West. At some point I think they get burned one too many times by their behavior. They have to face people from their own culture who they respect - their families, elders, colleagues, etc.. and they feel ashamed. I think eventually they start to see their home and family as a nicer place again. It's hard to tell if I'm projecting or basing this on reality since my own marriage is unresolved. I'm not suggesting that Arsh and her husband will get back together and have a happy perfect life again, just that he may try to come back. Coming back, as I learned well, doesn't mean the marriage can be fixed, just that the husband realizes what he had wasn't so bad after all.
I do have questions about how you use the word "abuser." If someone suddenly starts acting-out-of-character demonstrating abusive behavior but they'd never been like that before, does that mean they've always been an abuser, are an abuser now, and will always be an abuser according to your definition? After going through five counselors and psychologists no one has ever diagnosed my husband as an abuser even after hearing more details than what I've shared on this forum. I can think of many terms that fit well for my husband - wayward, immature, broken, cheater, player, indifferent, etc.. but I thought abuse refers to a specific set of behavior that includes intent to control and cause physical and emotional harm. My mother was guilty of this but my husband has been a very benign and gentle person until January when he suddenly lashed out and became a monster but even that manifestation has slowly died down. So I hesitate to call myself an abuse victim or my husband an abuser but perhaps all of the clinicians I've seen missed it. I'll let Arsh speak for herself and her husband but I do wonder if the cyclical abuse cycle is what we're dealing with or if it's a different phenomenon. It sounds like you use abuse as a general term so perhaps all the wayward and walkaway spouses here on this forum are abusers in some form but when the counselors and clinicians we see in real life don't make that diagnosis then it's hard to know which term to use!
