My BIL is a great, balanced guy and recommended he catch up with us separately so he can get both sides of the story openly and without prejudice.
Be careful about what you tell him, because everything you say WILL get back to her. You do not want to come off sounding desperate and needy. Just say things like "I'm as surprised about this as you are" and "I think we both need some time and space to think about this." Be very generic and non-committal. Do not agree to marriage counseling or anything of the sort because she will just go do it to say "see I told you so, I knew this wouldn't work." It sounds like he fancies himself a mediator, but believe me when I say he has no idea what he's dealing with. His sister is completely checked out and done and there is nothing he can do that won't just make things worse. Just tell him you would prefer he not intervene right now.
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I also notice she's not wearing her ring today.
Standard operating procedure for WAS's.
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During the conversation I stood my ground and said that I don't think I should be the one to move out if she needs space. I wouldn't stop her from finding space, but I think that I should stay, since she's the one wanting out.
She said that it was her parents living with us right now in our home, and that it would be awkward for just me to be there. I countered and said that I get along extremely well with her parents, and if anything they would give me less pressure than they would to their own daughter.
AHA! I think we know now why she moved her parents in there, it was part of her plan to force you out. If true, that's pretty sinister.
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Still unresolved at this point but I'm glad I at least expressed my view that it should be her to move out. We have another spare bedroom she could move into, but it's completely her choice if she decides move out.
Exactly. Stand your ground. Stay in the house. Stay in the MBR. It is up to HER if she wants to separate and move to another room or another place. That is her choice. You are not going to be inconvenienced by this anymore than you have to be.
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What rules should we agree to make it effective?
If she leaves the house then establish rules about her visiting. Since her parents are there I'm sure she'll want to see them, but make it clear there is no revolving door for her once she leaves. She can only visit after giving you X amount of notice, and she needs to knock on the door or ring, not let herself in, etc. I'm sure she would never expect you to just walk into her place, so she needs to have the same respect for you.
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She says she needs space to figure out what she wants in life, and whether or not she wants to work our M.
This is just "dangling the carrot"- giving you a little hope that she's still thinking about it. Rest assured, she is 100% DONE right now. She is NOT thinking about working on the M. She is only saying that to make you more compliant. IE- "well you need to move out of the house so I can have my space to decide whether to work on the M, in fact if you do move out I will probably want to work on it." It is absolute BS, don't believe it.
She may very well want to work on the M later, but not now. It's going to be many months or (more likely) a year or more before she gets to that point.
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If I'm trying to detach, is it bad for me to insist that we shouldn't be allowed to see other people during the separation?
As the others said you can't enforce that, and even if she promises not to she will anyway. Don't believe anything she says right now.
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I'm happy to give her space, in the hopes that it will help facilitate clearing her head, but I'm afraid if she has an A whilst we're apart I wouldn't be able to forgive her and ever reconcile the M.
It is very likely to happen sooner or later, and may already have happened. So decide if that really is a deal-killer for you. No one here will blame you either way, that's your choice to make.
