Reply to When successful men with demanding jobs (doctor, lawyer) divorce, what usually causes it?

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Reply to "When successful men with demanding jobs (doctor, lawyer) divorce, what usually causes it?"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][twitter][quote=Anonymous]Very few men initiate divorce. They are lazy and typically receive a lot of unpaid labor from a wife.  They will stay married unless it’s horrific. [/quote]

Yeah, when a guy files for divorce you know it had to be beyond insane.[/quote]

No. Usually it’s the because he has an AP lined up to move in [/quote]

Or because couples therapy uncovered that the marital problems were because he was controlling and borderline abusive, the wife isn’t going for it any more, and the husband wants to move on to someone “softer.”[/quote]

I think you're all right. Men don't leave if their needs are being met. A man with a demanding but high-paying job very often has a wife who will meet a lot of those needs, especially regarding family life -- it's what she signed up for, to a great degree. But if the bedroom goes quiet or she starts getting resentful, he might go looking for someone friendly and game (and if he's very successful and has some charisma, which these men often do, it will not be hard to find opportunities). If he finds someone he thinks could meet all the other needs AND where there's attraction and sex, he might be willing to divorce. Might. Depends on how appealing the AP is, and how sour things have gone with his wife. Most men won't, still, unless pushed.

More often I think there's a prolonged period of "working on it," often initiated by the wife who feels he is not present and doesn't prioritize her or the family. This can engender more resentment from him because working on it requires time and energy, and if his job is stressful and demanding, it can mean that he's spending what limited time off he has doing things like couples therapy (which can be absolutely brutal even when effective because you have to talk about all the uncomfortable stuff you usually avoid, and you have to sit there and listen to your spouse describe their unhappiness with you and your life while being instructed to be open to it and not get defensive or angry, which can be incredibly hard for someone with limited emotional maturity who is used to getting their way and never being questioned at work). I actually think this is the time that men are most likely to find, if not an AP, a potential one -- a friend or colleague who is kind and warm. It may not even be romantic or sexual, initially. But in the situations I've known where things have ended in this sort of relationship (with huge imbalances in earning and work prestige, often involving a SAHM), I think that's when it happened -- during the time where the wife thinks they are finally working on their marriage and figuring it out, but actually he's almost unconsciously figuring out his exit strategy because he simply does not have the interest or patience in fixing what is broken.

But never when the kids are young. Not for these sorts of marriages. It's later, when kids are teens or later. Sometimes there's a sense from him that she's freeloading at that point (as opposed to a SAHM or mommy-tracked spouse who is doing all the child rearing while you work 80 hour weeks, for which these men do tend to be quite grateful) because the kids are older and she has more free time and a very comfortable lifestyle and it's like "what is she complaining about?" Other times I think she's the one who gets restless when the kids are older. She might even have the affair. Or she starts working, starts a business, gets really into a hobby, because she's bored and he's always working, and they grow apart. Lots of ways this can happen.[/quote]

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