Here’s my last best stab at this. I do have work to do today.

Married people have a unique set of implicit and explicit obligations to one another. All the choices either one makes has reciprocal repercussions on the relationship. (Think of it as two people in a canoe)
As life goes on, each partner changes, has stuff happen that makes them happy, sad, glad…and it always affects the other person. (The canoe gets tippy). When a mature husband (or wife) is unhappy, feels unappreciated, or is just bummed, it’s his (or her) obligation to talk to his spouse. It’s a marital obligation to lovingly listen and, if he/she’s unhappy with something he/she is doing or not doing, try to change his/her bahaviors. (This helps to reset the listing canoe) And this goes both ways, okay?
Life gets hectic…work, kids, paying the rent, balancing the checkbook, etc. Through it all, a married couple have to retain a unique sensitivity to each other’s needs and expectations, which isn’t at all easy, in order to have an enduring, satisfying relationship. (This canoe stuff isn’t easy)
While, as Dennis Prager says, none of us know who or when or why this relationship stopped being well managed, we all know by the results that this sensitivity fell apart.
Usually one partner (or maybe even both) gets to feeling really shortchanged. (Uh oh, the canoe is really whacked now)
At this point, there needs to be some sort of intervention, shake on the shoulder, stay up all night, super honest profound exchange of what I think of as saying “OUCH” really loud. (Honey, I’m about to fall into the water. Help!)
The big ouch may not have happened in this relationship. Or it may have happened and the reaction was a big shrug. At that point, the unhappy partner needs to push for counseling. At this point, (there’s still Marsh’s 50/50 responsibility going) it can be a real marriage saver.
However, when one or both spouses choose, perhaps unconsciously, to take the easy way out and confide and bond with someone else (of the opposite sex), the marriage goes downhill really fast. (I’m not saying anything, honey, but I’m not paddling anymore) One thing leads to another, and poof, it’s a full fledged affair. “It just happened!” Actually not, there were quite a few choices made, mostly poor. Counseling after this is a lot less successful, for obvious reasons. While two can “tango” (manage the canoe), three really makes a mess of it.
Canoe analogies aside for the moment, however it came down for the Sanfords, it is obvious that the governor brought the third party into the mix. He was 100% responsible for that. (think: Marsh, above). He may have “felt” driven to it, he may have been depressed about his job, the wife may have seemed too preoccupied for him to say Ouch. But it was nevertheless his obligation to make himself heard, get this cleared up or get a divorce BEFORE he started confiding in another woman. THAT’s a slippery, dangerous slope.
Marriage is a learned skill, just as is double canoeing. Most people don’t know this at the beginning. Many marriages fail not so much because people “fall out of love,” they are often just inept learners.
marybel on June 26th, 2009 at 9:12 am

marybel on June 26, 2009 at 9:20 AM

Jeff from WI,
I saw this on another site (Palmetto Scoop, I think) and thought you’d like it added to the mix. I’m not being facetious:

INTERESTING POST from the Post and Courier

Posted by AnaLaura on June 26, 2009

“See a picture of the home breaker, she had a habit, she has been sleeping around with a powerful (and mafia) man (alberto Fernandez) from the Argentinean government, I know, I live in the US but I was born in Argentina. Heck, many argentineans, including me, we speak 5 languages, but we do not sleep around and we do not break homes.”

“This woman also slept around with the local “Ted Turner” of Buenos Aires, Daniel Haddad hired her as an informal commentator even if she had no formal training. She broke his marriage too, he had 4 or 5 kids, and when their affair came to light she was sent by his news channel to cover AFGHANISTAN, maybe Haddad’s wife ask him to do that, to get rid of this whore.

“She is a jaded divorcee and a gold-digger, a climber. Sorry mr Sanford, she “loved” you as much as she loved other “strong” men, not afraid to get close to mafia, in Argentina…”

http://www.postandcourier.com/news/2009/jun/26/mystery_woman_vigorous_athletic87333/

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Video: Maria Belen Chapur
http://www.charlotteobserver.com/747/story/800761.html

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marybel on June 26, 2009 at 11:48 AM

He’ll get over his infatuation and realize what a complete jacka$$ he was.
He loved his wife once. He can love her again.
Marsh on June 26, 2009 at 12:11 PM

This is so very true, Marsh. My dad messed up big time with my mother. I am forever indebted to my now deceased parents that they salvaged their marriage. Indeed, had my mother not swallowed her pride and somehow summoned up some genuine forgiveness, my future, and that of my siblings, would have been sorely changed for the worse. They died with their old scars, I am sure, but managed to be quite devoted to one another.

I have experienced that old adage. There’s a lot of good in the worst of us and a lot of bad in the best of us.
Mrs. Sanford is in the same mold as my mother and I wish them both a rehabilated marriage and her children a solidified home.

marybel on June 26, 2009 at 12:56 PM