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New to this forum and I hope I’m in the right place. I attempted to post this on Reddit, but frankly I’m too “old school.” This may be very long as it’s covering a lot of backstory and content.

My wife and I have been married 35 years and have two adult children. Daughter (33) and Son (30). Wife and I are both in our early 60’s. I’m an attorney, wife has expertly managed our household, raised our children and is involved in multiple charities/non profits/volunteer programs etc. We’ve had rough patches over the years and there were a few points when divorce was discussed, but we worked through it and pressed onward.

However, something has come to light recently and I’m so shaken by it that I don’t fully trust myself to respond in the right way. I’ve made tiny adjustments to some irrelevant details to protect my family’s anonymity.

My daughter has 3 young children. About 6 years ago, after a divorce and custody battle, she and her older two children (3rd grandchild wasn’t born yet) came to live with us. At the time, my practice was expanding to another city and I was away from home most of the time. I assumed that my daughter moving in with the grandkids would be good for my wife as well. Our home is on the large side, with bedrooms for everyone, plus guests if desired.

Unfortunately, I was wrong and the situation between my wife and daughter grew hostile very quickly. My wife claimed that my daughter was unstable and trying to live a “party girl” lifestyle. My daughter didn’t deny this, but she begged me to believe that she was trying her best. She admitted to being depressed and unhappy and reassured me she was medicating her ADHD as required by her mom and trying her hardest to attend therapy when she could.

I admit that I should have tried harder to intervene here, but I assumed they would work through their differences. They did not and my wife threw her out. I ended up renting her a little apartment and she’s now working, remarried and thriving. Im very proud of her.

Last weekend, a conversation with an old family friend landed on the subject of my daughter. This person said “I’ve always wondered, how did you guys get her THIS stabilized? Was it just detoxing from the drugs or is she on medications for mood?”

This statement shocked me. My daughter has never done drugs. Nor does she have a mood disorder. But this old friend went on, talking about how hard it must have been to make the decision to send my daughter to a facility.

My wife has lied to friends before in a relatively harmless way. Exaggerating things or skewing a story a little to give herself a bigger role. But something about what this friend said made me wonder. So I started digging. I’ve never gone through my wife’s phone or computer, but I went through everything and what I found is horrifying.

She’s living a fantasy life online. Ironically, in another marriage help forum. Her main source of martyrdom in posts, private messages and emails is my daughter. When I looked at things from that time period, I saw that she was telling people my daughter was a drug addict with multiple arrests. She claims my daughter neglected her children and didn’t feed them during the day. She said she partied every night and snuck strange men into our home. She said my daughter violently attacked her, had bouts of mental insanity and attempted suicide.

She also had a plan to have my daughter committed to a mental facility. This plan included tricking my daughter into signing over parental rights to her children. She was going to use a document from my practice to do this and lied to my secretary for a copy.

I’m disgusted and ashamed. I feel terrible for my daughter who was trying so hard to please her mother. She needed support from both of us at that time and instead, she got an absent father and a mother hell bent on destroying her. I don’t understand why she would do this.

All of it is a lie. My daughter has no arrest record. There are security cameras in the home, no men were at our house. My grandchildren were always healthy, happy and adored their mother. My son was around often and he said that while his sister was struggling with depression, she mostly kept that to herself. She did get more angry and erratic toward the time that she moved out, but now I completely understand why. She wasn’t partying, she was cocktail waitressing. My wife wouldn’t watch the kids for her to work during the day OR go to therapy. I found this out through their emails back and forth. My wife went as far as taking the keys to my daughter’s car to keep her from going to therapy.

I had a very emotional conversation about this with my daughter. She was relieved that I knew and had more things to tell me. But she also reminded me that this was a long time ago, she’s been steadily healing from it through therapy and she doesn’t want me to blow up my life over it. She encouraged me to try and move past it.

I want to do that. But I’m just so sick about this. I deserve to know why my wife did this to our child. Our child deserves to know why.

What happens now? I haven’t confronted her. I have compiled the proof and organized it to correspond with a relevant timeline of events. There will be no gaslighting or excuses. But how do I present this? I have stipulations she will need to meet to continue our marriage. How do I give her those without attacking her or making angry ultimatums?

I thank you in advance if you’ve made it this far and can offer some support. I am reeling.




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I should add:

One reason I’m sure of for the hostility between wife and daughter was because my wife was vehemently opposed to my daughter’s divorce. She was also angry with me for both encouraging it and footing the bill. My daughter’s ex was abusive and controlling and I believe the trauma she incurred from the marriage was the source of her depression. She was diagnosed with PTSD shortly after she moved out on her own.

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Welcome to MB.

I don't really know where to start with this. It's one thing for your wife to be hostile to your daughter, but the lies about her, and the plan to have her committed to a mental health facility based on a forged document, put this above my pay grade.

When you say you have stipulations for her to continue in the marriage, what are they?


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Originally Posted by SugarCane
...the lies about her, and the plan to have her committed to a mental health facility based on a forged document, put this above my pay grade.
I should clarify what I mean:

There are marital problems, and I have an idea how to deal with some of these because I am an avid student of Dr Harley.

There are extreme martial problems, and we get a lot of those here, but I can usually make a start on them by dealing with the elements of the problem one at a time.

But then there's insanity, and that's what this looks like to me. MB doesn't deal with insanity. Medical doctors are equipped to deal with insanity.


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I appreciate your honesty.

My first stipulation would be that she agree to immediate therapy. That said, this may be too far gone.

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Would you agree that it sounds like mental illness?

If it were just that she was writing on a forum about things that had never happened, we could say...that this is a secret fantasy life. It's a form of creative writing - that creating scenarios for people to discuss is an unusual hobby, but as long as nobody is harmed, it's strange, but okay. There are people that write horror and dark fantasy stories, and some even make a healthy living from this. Writing such things is not a sign of a disturbed mind, per se. I don't choose to read such things, but I wouldn't dream of condemning people who read or write them. It takes all sorts, after all.

But focusing on her daughter like that...I can't imagine getting a creative release by writing such things about my own daughter.

Okay, having re-read, I can't work out whether she actually obtained the form that she said she wanted to forge. I can't work out whether she took any concrete steps to have her grandchildren removed from her daughter. If she took even the tiniest step towards hurting her innocent grandchildren like that, then she belongs in a padded cell. Who could have such wickedness in them to take even one step that would hurt their own grandchildren?

But if there is only evidence that the plan was written as part of her fantasy world, perhaps medical help isn't needed. However, keeping your daughter's care keys to stop her from going to therapy, being vehemently opposed to helping her own child when she said she needed to leave an abusive marriage...I've known parents to not get on with their own children, and vice versa. I've known families that have been estranged permanently, including branches of my own family. A complete breakdown of the relationship between parent and child is hard to understand, but breakdowns have their roots in something concrete, and they are not usually signs of mental illness.

With what you've described - the verifiable things your wife has done to her daughter, not the fantasy writing itself - I would not want either my daughter or me to be near such a dangerous person.


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I do agree that this sounds like mental illness.

With my daughter’s permission, I spoke with her therapist this morning and he brought up something I hadn’t considered. Confronting my wife may cause her to retaliate against my daughter or hurt herself. He’s working with years of information and felt strongly about how this should be handled so I’m going to trust his advice.

I also didn’t realize that my daughter thought I was “in” on her mother’s plans to have her committed. She assumed the plans were being made with my help, which is heartbreaking.

I agree that if it were just creative writing, I could understand that in some capacity. But it’s not just about the forum involvement and she did take steps to obtain documents that would allow her to gain custody of the grandchildren. My daughter has been more forgiving about this than I think she should be, frankly.

I’m committed to working with her and other professionals to move forward in a way that prioritizes everyone’s safety, first and foremost.

Last edited by AllNighter; 07/01/21 10:41 AM. Reason: Spelling
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Do you think you can get your wife to work with professionals?

How will you tell her she needs help without confronting her with what you found?


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I’m not sure she’ll be willing to work with anyone, no.

I will need to confront her, but it’ll take some planning. My daughter’s therapist is recommending we approach it similarly to a planned intervention for addiction and has referred me to a professional with experience in these kinds of situations.

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Originally Posted by AllNighter
I’m not sure she’ll be willing to work with anyone, no.

I will need to confront her, but it’ll take some planning. My daughter’s therapist is recommending we approach it similarly to a planned intervention for addiction and has referred me to a professional with experience in these kinds of situations.
What about also writing Dr. Harley?


FWW/BW (me)
WH
2nd M for both
Blended Family with 7 kids between us
Too much hurt and pain on both sides that my brain hurts just thinking about it all.



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Email your questions to Joyce Harley at mbradio@marriagebuilders.com. When your email question is chosen to be answered on the radio show, you will be notified by email directing you to listen to the broadcast. If you would like to consider being a caller, include your telephone number. You will be called by us to explain the procedure to you. Every caller will receive a complementary book by Dr. Harley that addresses their question.


FWW/BW (me)
WH
2nd M for both
Blended Family with 7 kids between us
Too much hurt and pain on both sides that my brain hurts just thinking about it all.



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I may do this, thank you. I spent a lot of time reading articles here last night and this morning. Originally, my plan to approach this was very similar to what Harley calls Plan B. However, I do think that has the potential to put my daughter in the hot seat.

The steps for dealing with abusive situations are probably more where I need to focus. I do consider this abuse and the therapist I spoke with this morning tasked me with doing some reading regarding a specific personality disorder that revolves around abusive behavior.

I don’t honestly know if I feel as though I can stay married to my wife. But I’m not going to rush into divorce either. Maybe Dr. Harley can provide some insight into navigating the marriage aspects of this.

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Well, best of luck with it all.


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Thank you, I appreciate your time.

Last edited by AllNighter; 07/01/21 03:26 PM. Reason: Typo
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Did you write to Dr Harley? I'd be very interested to read the advice he gives you if you wouldn't mind summarising it here.


BW
Married 1989
His PA 2003-2006
2 kids.

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