Am I an exit strategy?

Last night, Kyra demonstrated once again why I am so fond of her and value her so highly as a commenter, by responding at length to my post "Discovery" from last week. (It sounds like I am being sarcastic, but I really mean it. I love to get comments that make me think, regardless whether I agree with them.) In her response, she made three related points:

1. It is totally incredible when D claims that her husband's discovery of our affair was "out of her control," and in fact it would never have happened without reckless behavior on D's part.


2. D appears to be moving me into position to be the next "Mr. D," by manipulating both my own plans and my external circumstances.


3. D is really, really pretentious.

Of these points, I think the first and the third are fairly easily dealt with. The middle one is more serious and requires more thought.
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Whether the discovery was really outside of D's control is to some extent a matter of perspective. Certainly her failure to do basic things like password-protect the Word-files in which she composed some of her letters to me would count as recklessness if you or I did it. But I actually believe D when she tells me she has no idea how to do such a thing, and didn't know it was possible. A more serious question is why she didn't simply delete the files from her computer after she had succeeded in copying them into her e-mail, but I think she simply doesn't think carefully about data security. I mean, she knows enough to delete all text messages from her phone; but the rest of it is an area that she has long simply put out of her head. Her husband has always handled all of the family's IT needs, and D more or less assumes he can do anything if he sets his mind to it. So I think she is at any rate speaking sincerely when she says that so far as she knows,

To this it is fair to reply, "How nice that she's sincere. I'm sure that's going to be a great big whopping consolation to you when her husband suddenly morphs into a psycho stalker of the kind we see from time to time in the infidelity blog world." Or, more generally, "It is possible that she is sincere as far as that goes, but it is also immaterial because her technological cluelessness (if not carelessness) nonetheless puts you at risk." At a theoretical level, this is certainly fair. We have all known people for whom discovery worked out really, really badly. But in this case I think there are a couple of extra details that make the overall picture less threatening.

In the first place, Mr. D really is the salt of the earth. Unless he has changed dramatically since I last knew him, he is one of the last people I would imagine becoming a psycho stalker. Yes, anybody is capable of anything if sufficiently provoked. But I think D is not far off the mark in estimating that her husband's reaction, whatever it is, will not be violent or destructive.

In the second place, how much can he really do? He can divorce D, but she wants a divorce anyway. He can tell their children and friends, but that has more consequences for D than it does for me. (And what she really fears, I think, besides looking into his eyes and seeing the hurt look back at her, is having him tell their kids.) But he won't hunt me down to try to kill me -- not only because he's not that kind of guy, not only because his health isn't good enough, but because we live so far away from them. He is unlikely to try any dirty tricks at a cyber-level. But he could tell Wife. I think that is really about the only weapon he has that he could deploy against me, and how bad would it be? It's not like Wife will have any room for self-righteous indignation. Indeed, she has already told me several times that "of course" it is "fine with her" if I want to go out and find somebody else to fuck, seeing that we're not fucking each other. I think she would feel a little different about the reality -- and I think she would feel a lot different knowing that it was D, of all people! -- but I don't think it would make a big difference in our day-to-day lives. We already move through the day interacting as little as we can possibly get away with, as if we were both in little plastic bubbles that kept us incommunicadi. Would she move to divorce me? Maybe, although by that time I might have beat her to the punch. Would she tell all our friends about what a shit I am? Hell, she does that now, even if she has to make up the list of horrible things I have done. What's the difference? About the only credible threat Wife could make that would really upset me would be to tell our boys. And there, honestly, I think I can fairly safely blackmail her (if you want to use harsh names for it) by reminding her that there are a whole lot more really discreditable things I could tell them about her than she could ever tell them about me. So maybe we can both just back away from that ledge.
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As for being pretentious, I guess I'd agree in a qualified way but add that it doesn't bother me all that much. For one thing, I get that a lot too. (smile) Also, I am willing to call her on it. Usually it gets particularly thick when there is some emotional issue that is bugging her, but that she is afraid to bring up in so many words. But my reaction when she starts hiding behind too many abstractions is just to look at her blankly and say, "I have no idea what you are talking about. I thought we were talking about us; how did Plato and Anselm get into the discussion?" It makes her nervous when I say this -- she introduced Plato and Anselm, after all, because the original topic (whatever it was) made her nervous -- but she'll take a deep breath, speak very slowly, and try to spell out what is wrong. So I have a method for handling it, and that's good enough for me.
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But the question whether D is deliberately manipulating me into becoming the next Mr. D is a more serious one, and it deserves to be taken a little more slowly. In the first place, it is completely true that I have changed more in the last twelve months than Wife has, and that these changes have a lot to do with my affair with D. It has even occurred to me that my decisions right now may be suspect, because at some level I may be thinking with my dick. (I discuss this possibility at considerable length here.) The reality is probably a little more complex -- or at any rate, that's the conclusion I came to a month ago -- but that there is a correlation of some kind is undeniable. And honestly, this realization has made me slower and more circumspect about proceeding with the divorce. I find that I am always stopping, reconsidering, dithering, delaying. What about the impact on the boys? For that matter, which impact is the most important: the impact of divorce on young adolescents, or the impact of staying together when we have no respect for each other and virtually no communication? I don't know the answers to any of these questions and I worry about them. And yes, the possibility that my judgement may have been warped by seven dates' worth of ecstatic orgasms with D has certainly crossed my mind.

It is also true that D has expressed considerable insecurity about her place with me, over the months: I've talked about it here and here, for example. And the more insecure she gets, the more demanding she can get about questions like when we are going to see each other again (such as here and here). Alternatively, when she is in a good mood and feeling expansive, she'll make remarks about the future as if we were going to be together for a good long part of it. But if I make any noises which call this picture into question, she gets flustered and insecure. Once several months ago she was exploring some new career opportunities, but all of them happened to be in the same part of the country where she is now; none of them were anywhere near me. She apologized for this, and asked haltingly if I could forgive her for looking into them, because they really were good career opportunities, and her interest in them didn't mean that she didn't love me. I almost chuckled, and said by all means she should look into them; after all, I hardly thought that our relationship was at a point where geographical proximity to me should be her single most important criterion in choosing a job. At this she got very quiet, which I always know is a danger sign. Only instead of backpedalling and apologizing, I made a point of explaining -- as kindly as I knew how -- that if [this was before I had graduated to when] I ever left Wife, I was not thinking as far ahead as remarriage and in fact I could not see that far ahead. So she would have to act on the assumption that I would not remarry. If that changed later, then it did ... but don't make plans on it. It took her a day or so to assimilate this, but in the end she did.

It is true, in the third place, that D can get very emotional when she starts feeling insecure. This means that she can get very intense on the subject of our long-term future together, because she has so much invested in me that the thought of losing me is very upsetting to her. And you all know how attracted I am to intense, type-A women. (See here, for example.) Something kicks in when D gets like that, some urge to look after her. And yes, it does attract me. I am now more aware of it than I used to be, in large part because of advice and suggestions that I have gotten from readers. So I am a little more cautious than before. But yes, this is a factor.

It is also true, finally, that I know D is capable of being very devious and deceptive. She says she is not proud of it, but there it is. It is certainly something she is very good at. The first couple of times she was able to get away from work for one of our dates, I asked her what she had told them as a reason. But after the first couple, I stopped asking because in a sense I didn't want to know. Her stories were always very good: solid, believable, consistent with her travel plans, ... and totally bogus. And she always carried them off exquisitely. So as I say, after a while I decided I didn't want to know any more what explanations she was giving. I completely understand why she needed to make up stories -- most employers wouldn't give her time off if she said, "I want to go spend three nights in a hotel in another state while my boyfriend fucks my brains out." But somewhere in the back of my head, a voice was repeating softly, "If she lies to them, then one day she will start lying to you." And so I have tried not to put myself in a position where that would be a really bad thing.

So where does all this leave me? Am I being manipulated? I guess in order to answer that, my first question has to be where exactly is the dividing line between persuasion and manipulation? There is no doubt in my mind that D would like to persuade me to be her exit strategy; but persuasion, if it is above board, doesn't have to be a bad thing. More troubling is the question, What if D were to act in a plainly manipulative fashion but then I really and truly did change my mind (for good) as a result? I'm thinking of Much Ado About Nothing, in which the friends of Benedick and Beatrice plainly manipulate them into falling in love, and yet in the end they are happily married. It's possible that by shifting my position on divorce, I am coming round to the right position after all; and in that case, what does it matter how I got there?

Hmmm. Time to stop thinking so hard. Maybe I need to make this simpler. I have in the short run told D that there is no way I am going to remarry any time soon after a divorce. It is well known that people make bad decisions after stressful events; so for this reason, I have categorically refused to make any decisions about remarriage for at least a year and day after a divorce goes through. D says she fully understand that I'll need time to "heal" because my marriage has been so painful. I have also read that the impact of divorce on children goes sharply up when they have to start dealing with new romantic interests in the lives of their parents; but I haven't mentioned that part yet.

On the other hand I have left open the possibility of seeing her during that time. Of course I'll want to see her anyway. I don't know how the boys would react, so maybe I should wait for a break from school and then send them to spend the week with their grandparents.

What else? I'm not really sure. I know it is an issue. It is certainly one have been trying to keep an eye on. At the same time, I am trying to avoid outright paranoia. It can be a difficult balance to maintain. I am trying to be as transparent with her as I can bring myself to be ... meaning that I only leave stuff out if it seems gratuitously unkind to bring it up. I even think she is trying to be transparent too; but I remind myself that transparency is not the easiest of tasks, and that she is very good at being opaque. In short, I am trying as hard as possible to keep my eyes open. It seems the best middle ground.

Meanwhile, I am grateful for the concern ....