Is it always another woman?

It usually is another woman though isn't it?

I'd feel sorry for your sil too, if you're close and good friends, maybe reach out and say your happy to meet up and do play dates etc if that's what you'd normally do, there's no reason for the kids to miss out if you're all close.

Normally there is can’t say I’ve seen a divorce where there isn’t though normally the story is been miserable for years yada yada.

Depsite the loved up photos, future planning sometimes even planned babies and new mortgages yet they claim sadness for years…. Hmmm

A new gf always appears within months who he tends to of been working with as a new hire / transfer for the last year

.....puts glass of wine back down.....

As a PP said generally men like a quiet, facilitated life too much to leave unless someone else is offering them the same perks (sex, housework, food, pretending to be interested in his stories) elsewhere. As they get older, men tend to become very set on their ways and dislike change so they rarely do it unless there’s an immediate temptation.

A lot of women get bored of men and often bristle at the lack of fairness in their marriage, being taken for granted and the sense that their needs are always secondary. This is why women leave. Menopause in particular is a common catalyst for this. Women usually leave men to be alone rather than burden themselves with a different flavour of dependance from a different man. Who would want to escape this just to go through it all again with a different man?

I honestly think a majority of women would check out if so many of them weren’t financially dependent. Marriage is generally a much better deal for men than it is for women.

When my DBIL left his wife after 20 years together, he did his best to maintain the fiction that there was no one else - and his immediate family chose to believe that . We didn’t - and duly the person his wife named as the most likely person to be the other woman ( and who had coincidentally left her husband 6 weeks before ) was duly unveiled as his new girlfriend a year later . One of the reasons we didn’t believe him was that he was really very rich indeed and had been planning it for ages - but actually came and plonked himself with us two hours drive from his 3 kids when he could easily have rented somewhere or just stayed at a hotel . As a friend observed that was exactly what he did as a smokescreen to pretend there wasn’t another women. Wishing your SIL all the strength she will need for the coming months . I am still close to my former SIL some 28 years later !!

Mostly although a friend finished her marriage after realizing she couldn't cope with him drinking a bottle of whisky a day. She and he are still single and no interest in anyone else two years later. Also got two friends who ended the marriage after a few years of being beaten. One walked away no issues, the other lucky to get away alive. But you right mostly it's due to someone else.

It always has been in my experience, yes. I will bet money another woman appears on the scene soon in this case too.

Because many times if the third party didn't come along the split wouldn't happen. The couple would plod along together, not exactly ecstatic, but a functional partnership, who might even warm up to one another again once whatever tedium/life stress that had them thinking the grass was greener had passed. Also when a person leaves with no one else to go to, there's hope, no one cheated, so less to forgive, it might just be a phase etc. I get completely why it matters.

It's almost certain that there's another woman waiting in the background
It's such a common thing for men and women alike to have a backup sadly
The age old I'm not happy/don't love you anymore

Yes, out of the ones I have known it always is, including my friends dad who is in his 70's and they had been together over 45 years and for months my friend was saying he just wasn't happy etc, maybe it was mental health related, then after a few months along comes this woman who he is now living with, he did the usual, I've been unhappy for years etc, same script. He had been with her/talking to her before he left her Mum.

She now knows it was another woman but wouldn't believe it at the time cos her dad 'wasn't like that'

I've always known it to be another woman, or their head has been turned and they want to pursue things more easily.

Women I know on the other hand have left for many reasons and none of them another man although I'm sure it happens.

I hear men only leave when the next woman is lined up.

If it is another women is lined up, I wouldn’t be making DB or her welcome any time soon.

Sadly I agree with others, my experience is that women end marriages to be alone and men end them to be with someone else.

Not always but usually I would say.
My ex cheated on me, I found out and he begged me for another chance. Said he would go to marriage counselling, anything I wanted. I said no and all of a sudden I was the bad guy. Everyone turned on me! Because I wouldn’t give him another chance.
We divorced and he married the OW 😆 yeah in my own experience there’s usually a third party involved.

It usually is

They then suddenly remember than they have been miserable for years 🙄

Time will tell. Take care of your nephews and your sister-in-law.

Agree with this. I can’t even write what my ex did, his family not only stood by him but cut me off too. I’ve no other family in this country so it’s really awful. And DC misses out too

Definitely not always another woman (or man). Of the four couples I know who have split over the past 4 years, only 1 of the 8 people involved is now in a relationship, and I believe that relationship began after the end of the relationship.
I hate how MN always warn of an affair being responsible for the marriage breakdown, and seem invariably correct. That is not my lived experience.

See I actually see this the other way around. I think a lot of the time the compatibility and respect goes out of a marriage years before a split gets triggered. People stay for the children or for the money and because there’s no obvious catalyst to do anything else.

The OW or OM is the catalyst and quite often it’s not really about them it’s about what they represent, ie freedom or youth of not having to do things you are committed to.

It’s reprehensible obviously but I think sometimes instead of blaming the affair partners the couple needs to be far more honest about why they didn’t admit to themselves earlier on that the marriage was over and separate with dignity without bringing other people in.

Most people don’t have the balls to leave a marriage until a carrot is dangled in front of them.

Friends of mine dh left as hadn’t been happy for years. His wife was a slob which is fine in itself if you pick up after yourself, she never did. He couldn’t take cleaning up after her all the time, every weekend all day. He lasted 10 years but said he hadn’t been happy for a long time. I helped her clean once right after the divorce and it was bad. Really bad. A few weeks later it was back to the original condition and I never helped her again so I can see why he left!!

Does it matter? And if so, why? I don't get it. The point is he no longer wants to be married. Perhaps it took another woman to make him realise that, perhaps it was the way his wife stacked the dishwasher - the result is the same. I don't get the obsession people have over third parties - the marriage is between two people and one wants out. Sad for everyone, devastating if the decision is not yours, but it seems to be a denial that the problem is between the couple.

Playing devil’s advocate … Are you sure that SIL is telling the truth and he isn’t using the generic “not happy” excuse because he doesn’t want to tell you about SIL doing something wrong because you’re all close to her ?

If it’s an affair then the new partner will appear in due course.

Avoid taking sides or getting into their drama triangle. You don't need to know details.
They might be back together in the near future.

This.

I know plenty of men who have been unhappy in their marriages for a long time. But they put up and shut up until there is another woman for them to shack up with.

Who else will give them sex and wash their clothes?

Not always. Sometimes it's massive debt, gambling or drugs. But nearly always.

No matter what, give your SIL plenty of support. When it happened to me, I never heard from my ex SIL and BIL again.