Advice Needed To Deal With WW - Part 3

[BL42]

My W says the same things. I also get ,"I come from a divorced family. You don't. So you need to trust me that I know what's best for the kids." Really? The majority of her issues stem from her childhood and being neglected/passed around by her parents. Unfortunately our views towards marriage and divorce are different. I have always been pro marriage and anti divorce. She has claimed that because her parents have divorced multiple times, she doesn't want to do that. Before we got married, she mentioned many times that divorce would not be an option for her because she wanted something better than what her parents had and gave her. Yet here we are. Family background has a lot to do with it in my opinion. My parents have been married for 43 years. Her mom, dad, and grandma are all on their third marriages. With that being the example that was set for her, it's no wonder she views marriage as disposable (even though she said the opposite before we got married). It doesn't help that these are the people giving her marriage advice either. When time get tough, instead of encouraging her to work things out, they tell her that she needs to do whatever it takes to be happy...

My W was very much the same in that she said she would always rather work through our problems than divorce. I came from a much more stable upbringing like you. My father passed away when I was a teenager but other than that, there were almost no divorces or other family shakeups on my side of the family that I can think of. When I married my W, it was for life almost no matter what. It would have taken a lot from her to get me to ask for a D. She was always the same before...until the BD and her overnight personality change that is.

One difference with your sitch and mine is that her family have 100% rejected her decision and it has completely blown up in her face due to her recent behavior. They certainly aren't giving her that kind of encouragement or advice. That's a positive I think. Her new friends on the other hand...that's a different story.

Reading through an old thread and these bolded comments jumped out at me. My parents had their 40th wedding anniversary this year during my sitch whereas each of my W's parents have been married 3 times. While we were dating & engaged W & I had multiple conversations about how she didn't want to be like her mom and how marriage was forever with her, and that reassured me about moving forward with the relationship. However, after BD W told me she was done and didn't have any energy or desire to work on it at all or go to MC with me, and now her mom and step-sister (who has been married multiple times w/affairs and didn't want anything to do with at one point) are both her main confidants. A friend of my sister's who went through a similar situation told me my biggest mistake was marrying someone who had that family history because at a certain age the modeling/learned behavior just kicks in. I think about that from time to time and can't disagree.

Too bad this thread just died off...it would be interesting to know what came of Bewas.