Thanks to all of you for your input. I need that kind of help.
Given what you've all said, I will have to think carefully about whether to not what I'm doing is 'enabling' behavior.
Maybe a little background will make my confusion about this more clear. (cat03, I know that you've asked for more info.)
Right now, I'm as worried about my wife as I am about our marriage. She barely eats, has lost about 30 lbs, and works herself into the ground. She vehemently mistrusts psychological counselors of any stripe, partly, I believe, because she's had some poor or ineffective ones in her childhood, and partly because she is incredibly willful. I know that I can't control her, but I can suggest she get help and take care of herself. I'm afraid if I back away, I will lose that opportunity and she will get worse.
She has no family relationships. She has a few friends, but it seems that they are more caught up in their own problems than anything else. She will rarely tell them much anything, and I think they will continue to respect the distance she's established. They won't convince her to look after her well-being.
I don't know what this OP tells her. She describes him as being incredibly understanding, insightful, and (here's the very interesting point) like a beneficient father-figure. Apparently he addresses those things that she has felt to be lacking not only in our marriage, but in her life in general. Much of what she's described about her childhood paints a bleak and often brutal picture. Perhaps this OP helps to soothe that.
She describes things to me much in this way. Insofar as it is supposedly a 'friendship' (even given the fact that she's told me he has been giving her advice about lawyers, offering to pay her expenses, etc.), anything I do that is in any way critical of this AH (my own acronym ) comes off as being unsupportive of her.
I am just sick today, much worse than I've been for a long time. It is not simply the imagination of anything going on between them. I would not be surprised if that indeed took place or will take place. The emotional attachment she has to this OP causes me enough pain that an extra dollop or so would just shine it up a bit more.
I'm physically nauseated with worry about her. Whenever I see her in pain I feel like I will collapse.
I suppose that there is as much bad mixed in with all my good intentions as good, but I don't know how to sort it out.
Sorry, I'm out of time right now. I also feel pretty lousy and want to take a break.
) comes off as being unsupportive of her.
