[Maceman]

Women are very adept at long term planning, secrecy and manipulation. Have you ever noticed that it is usually the man who immediately moves out of the family home even though it is the woman who usually initiates the eventual family breakup? The women know they have the power of the law and the courts behind them. Even if they don't know how powerful the State's backing can be, the first lawyer they see will gleefully explain it to them. Women hold all the cards in this type of situation. They know that eventually they will gain control of the children and will have access to whatever family assets and/or income they will need to maintain their customary lifestyle.

Everything you say here is true. But it doesn't disprove my point, which is simply that one has to be a brain-dead moron to not realize that one's marriage is heading towards the breaking point befoer it happens.

There are always plenty of warning signs that a relationship is in trouble, and the fact that man could be taken by surprise when the woman kicks him out is prima facie evidence that he was a distant, detached, uncommunicative and emotionally unavailable husband in the first place.

I'm not saying that women aren't ever at fault in the break-up of a marriage, or that good guys don't get dumped unfairly. And I'm not suggesting that every marriage can be saved in any case. But women need communication and presence above all else in a relationship, and if a guy is so out of touch with his wife that he is surprised when she woman wants out, then he likely deserves to be dumped.

[nygoose]

There are warning signs during the deterioration of a marriage. Perhaps men ignore those signs intentionally, are beyond the point of caring, or feel that there is nothing that can be done. Whatever the reasons, it is always sad and hurtful to all concerned.

[Taxula]

I would have to most heartily disagree. My brother's experience was just like this. He never saw it coming. Mainly because he thought she should be placed upon a pedestal so he worked two jobs totaling 80 hours a week. He is not a wealthy man, but she was only too happy not to have to lift a finger. He lavished her with expensive gifts, a vintage Mustang she had to have because she loved the purple paint (it really was a beauty) a big fat diamond ring, and trips (mostly local because he worked so much) and the way she gave back to the relationship was to screw every friend he had.

How did he find out? She got pregnant, apparently on the very bed they shared, by another guy, attempted to abort it, and they called my brother at work when complications arose. He met Steve (the presumed dad) when he arrived. Lovely isn't it? Regina told him that she was leaving him when he went in to see her.

My brother is nobody's dummy. He was simply blindly in love with her. He would have forgiven that slut, raised the child as his own, and still put her upon a pedestal (if slightly tarnished) had she wished. I give thanks everyday that she did not. But no, up until that moment she acted the part of the doting wife. Everyone was shocked when it came out what she had been up to. Her sister is the one who clued us in partly because she felt so bad over my brothers devastation- financially as well as emotionally.