Phase3, I completely agree with cobra, but let me expand a little. You're completely mistaken if any of us here think that doing this or that will produce a predictable response in our partner. If there's one gospel we preach over and over again, it's that you can NEVER control someone else's behavior or ever make them do anything. All you can do is request and then take care of yourself.
We're trying to help heather find a solid center inside herself that she can act from and make decisions from regardless of how her H reacts. She will need that strong core whether or not she and her H stay together, whether or not this marriage works.
And your remark "she doesn't owe it to him to go to counseling"-- whoa! Counseling is not some punishment that you submit to as a penance. It's not like being sent to the principal's office where you will get your knuckles rapped. Holy moley, is that what people think in the other forums?
Counseling is consulting; it's coaching. It's you redecorated the living room yourself and now the ceiling is black, you can't see the tv from the sofa, the front door is blocked, and now you need expert advice to get you out of this because you can't figure it out on your own. It's using three different hair colors and going to Nick Arrojo to get it fixed. It's doing your own tattoo, and going to a pro to get redesigned.
In fact, your litany about how heather doesn't "owe" her H anything-- where in the heck does THAT come from? Heather is the one who is wanting to get her M back on track. It isn't about who owes whom; it's about what WORKS.
I agree that heather's H should sh!t or get off the pot. To keep her dangling for two years is insane... but if you read Stig and cobra, you'll get some insight into why he is prolonging this insanity.
The point is that to keep saying he should do this, he should do that-- well, is POINTLESS. All that does is make him wrong. Well, I already think he's wrong for continuing to punish her for the A that was or was not an A. Now what?
If you stick your key in the car and turn it and the engine does not start, do you just sit there and keep turning it and saying "it should start"?
