Hello All,

My wife / partner of 6 years told me 5 days ago she wanted to end the marriage. She has made it clear that she is not interested in trying to "fix" the marriage.

I have read both Love busters and His needs her needs, as well as many of the sites additional resources and other people's stories; I had my first wife do the same thing 8 years ago - hence the feeling like an idiot.

My optimistic take is that she has fallen to a very low love bank point, mainly through my neglect, and lots of little love busters, and has decided to get away from the unhappiness.

I am fully aware of the "default" affair / snoop advice. I have access to her email accounts, and facebook, and have found no evidence. I am not so naive to think this is incontrovertible proof, but I am not interested in snooping any further. Reason being is that we live Australia and don't have the same religious conservatism that promotes social pressure to stay in marriages that the US does, and that I feel the plan A/B stuff relies on to a fair extent.

I also don't feel like I would be sufficiently motivated to dig in and restore the marriage were an affair involved.

I have started our process by asking for a chance to make changes with her, and when refused, to telling her I respect her right to leave if she wishes.

I have moved into a spare room, and have started making as many positive changes around the things that know are sore points.

- house hold support. making meals, cleaning, etc
- waking earlier - she has always been a very early riser, whereas I prefer to sleep until 8am - and have insisted people keep noise down
- kept all our interactions safe and pleasant

She is moving ahead with getting legal advice on house settlement, with a view to paying me out to leave, so I don't know how long before I will be expected to leave.

She knows I love her and would prefer to stay together. I also told her that while I will respect her decision I am going to make changes and try to look after my family still.

We each have a child from a previous relationship living with us.

Another complicating factor is that her previous husband tied her up, badly assaulted her, and killed himself when she tried to separate from him. I have tried to very sensitive to this as I know she would have been very worried about how I might react.

I have tried to re-assure her that I would never harm her or my step son; that I want her to be happy and feel safe.

I would love some advice regarding if, how, and when to introduce any MB information to her and any general advice on what approach to take.

Thanks for reading.

WE don't care one bit about "religious conservatism" here. We care about saving marriages. And the way we do this is to rule out an affair if there is any suspicion. The reason is not because we are religious nuts, as you seem to imply, but because everything we tell you to do will be a waste of time if there is an affair.

And further, we don't give a RIP if you want to leave your marriage if you discover an affair. We feel that is your sole decision. Some people decide to leave the marriage and that is their right. You will get no argument from us.

Good luck!

Is this a new marriage? I see you came here in 2008 with another marriage and were equally clueless about her affair. You wanted to do a mild mannered Plan A. What happened with that marriage?

Which is it? If she's your wife she is probably highly offended by this term. It wouldn't feature in a proposal would it?

Also the plans only work for legally married couples. If you've been snooping on a girlfriend you've probably broken the law. Ditto for exposure. And MB plans don't work without these steps.



Not hardly. You couldn't be more mistaken. Dr H advised me to divorce even though a lengthier Plan B would likely have patched up my marriage. His exact words were 'all marriages can be saved but not all should'.

This is not a marriage at all costs plan at all. Dr H says repeatedly that people who believe marriage is a commitment to stay together regardless of how you are treated are setting themselves up for abuse. Marriage is a commitment of care, not a commitment of endurance.

I am a non religious user of MB and it is entirely suitable for people of any and all beliefs. Dr H is a devout and proud Christian, but the plans are based on logic and his clinical psychology experience. He explains the methodology behind every bit of his advice.

The snooping is common sense and logic - surely you see that? How can you diagnose a problem without looking?



That is the right of any betrayed spouse. However you'll have a hard time making this decision without snooping for an affair...Are you going to guess?



Why on earth would she automatically assume violence from you? Violent men dont show the first signs of violence during separation, it shows up much earlier in the relationship. However it is common for women in affairs to fear and project violence onto innocent spouses.


Were the two of you single and divorced when you met?

I want to save my Marriage, I love my wife.

A Plan B would not fly here and based on what I know, and the risk of being caught trying to access her phone, I am not prepared to create the fallout of a plan B nor would it change the outcome - I am going to be out of here with no contact soon anyway.

I would lose any hope of contact with my stepson, and my daughters would be alienated to her.

Any other advice would be most appreciated

Are you married to her?

Indiegirl - you obviously didn't read my post, nor have you any understanding of a thing called PTSD, and the rate of homicide of women at the hands of men,

WE have been living together for 6 years, and we were married 3 months ago

Plan B isn't recommended for men anyway. Men are advised not to leave their homes as its classed as abandonment.

However if you're not married to her it's all moot.

I am well aware of domestic violence. I deal with the fall out every day at work.

I just don't think that you have given her reason to consider you violent - have you? Why would you all if a sudden become violent after six years? The suggestion is ludicrous.

Do you know what PTSD is?

Post traumatic stress disorder. My father suffers with it. Not sure of the relevance here.

If you had bothered to read my post properly, instead of barging in looking to create conflict, you have read that my wife as PTSD as a result of being viciously attacked with a knife by her previous husband and now suffers from PTSD.

If you suffer from PTSD and have also given her some reason to fear violence it would save time for you to just tell us.

Is how you are addressing Indie right now, how you address your wife when you don't like what she has says? Because getting rid of that attitude, which is surely a LB to her, would be step one for you in my book.

What are her complaints about the marriage? Why does she want to end it?

Can you tell us why she went through with a marriage only 3 months ago, only to want a divorce a mere 3 months later? Why didn't she split when you were living together? People who marry after living together consider that some kind of test has been passed. She must have felt she knew you well enough, and that you had passed her test, for her to have married you in April. What has happened since April to make her want to go through the legal and financial hassle of divorce?

You never said a word about PTSD in your original post though it would be a natural result of such an experience. However her triggers would be related to her ex (if he were still alive) or memories like specific sounds smells or places. I don't see what you're driving at - she wouldn't have any triggers relating to your relationship which make her fear you.

This is your original post. I see no mention of PTSD there; not one word.

In her letter to me she said "In her heart she knows she has given all tat she is able"

The love busting things that I have done would be

- neglecting to put our marriage first
- not always fulfilling my household support tasks
- being disrespectful and not making her feel heard sometimes when we had a disagreement about something
- my waking time being much later than hers
- not being as supportive of family commitments as I should have been