My cousin's wife .. something sinister going on

[itsgottoberibena]

Why do you think is going on here and how can I support him without becoming involved.
I'm very concerned for him and his two kids

They are together nearly thirty years.
He is my childhood friend / distant cousin.
They have two beautiful children 12/14.
They were happy until five years ago when his career rocketed to global CEO status of a an IT company.
She also worked in similar area,
Not at such a high level as they decided that she would work part time
Because of kids etc and it worked well.
They have the beautiful home and holidays and cars etc ... all the superficial stuff.

However in the last two years , she has started in the gym and making new male friends. Texting others beside him in bed .

Drinking hugely , blacking out, losing her belongings, not coming home, attending sex / swing parties and sexting other men.
Has lost interest in the kids.
All new friends , has fallen out with her family ,
She has also expressed feelings for an old boyfriend.
Mood swings off the charts.

She is 48 so I was thinking peri or meno .

My friend is gutted although he saw this go on , to a point , in his own parents marriage where they stayed together until the end

What is going on here ?
How can I support him. He is going to counselling .

Massive hormone surges pre-menopause can definitely cause weird behaviour including a raging libido and abnormal 'moods'. I can't find where I read a serious paper on this, but I've found one documenting that it can cause psychosis. If menopause can make you lose contact with reality, it can definitely have less dramatic effects!

Do you fancy him yourself, OP?

It does say critical gaps. Another interpretation is that at a certain age, men drive women mad.

I can't believe I went thru menopause and missed the swinger parties damn.

@momonpurpose 😂 I’m at the start of it so I can still have all the fun!
@GarlicGrace I’m waiting for the raging libido!

Menopause??? Oh honey, no. 😂

That's true, hormones notwithstanding.

They were trying to draw medical attention to 'critical gaps' in research but they seem to have overlooked one in their own analysis - hormonal effects, within the broader range of normal, are due more to balance/imbalance than net amounts. In some women, oestrogens drop well before androgens. A relative increase in testosterone does drive sexual desire. Wrt that paper, they ought to look at this as well imo.

Good luck! 🔥😂

Don’t think menopause can be blamed here. Career banished, mind numbed and unhappy with children, an excess of money to go off the rails. Probably won’t divorce husband as would lose lifestyle for her and/or kids, so trapped and this escalated the escapist behaviour.

Feel a bit bad for her. But worse for him. I would advise him to stick with the counselling and to extricate himself from the relationship if the behaviour doesn’t cease. Continue being the good friend you are, that is all you can do.

Seconded

Unless his wife has an underlying mental illness and is experiencing a manic phase I'd say there's not much you or he can do.
I think the best advice to give him is to help him understand and accept that no one can change another person's behaviour, just the way we react to it. Each time he says 'she's doing this/l think she should do that/that's not fair is it' etc do not get drawn into moral discussions just bring the conversation back to real life 'Yes cousin, you've been saying that for 6 months now and nothings changed. What's your plan?' Don't give suggestions...I mean 1 is obvious...but just keep repeating. What's your plan?
If it's that he's going to ignore it and think it's a phase she's going through then so be it but I'd suggest you are less friendly and more firm with your responses eg 'Oh OK. If you wanna accept it thats good coz at least you've made a decision. That in itself is good so at least we don't have to keep discussing it. BTW, how did your meeting go last week? Did you clinch the deal?

Just as your cousin can't change his wife's behaviour, neither can you change his. Decline to listen to him repeating himself.

I got quite like this during menopause
Reveling in male attention, lots of drinking and partying
I know it is not an excuse but it may still be a symptom for some

Regret it all now though and she may do too.

This ^^, he needs to leave her asap.

This. You have one biased side of a very complex situation - you therefore have zero understanding of what or why.

Nose out.

She is 48 so I was thinking peri or meno .

wtf. What a stupid comment.

Well you can't really do anything apart from listen to him. But I second a pp who asked how do you know she is texting other men whilst in bed with your friend.

I would also be wary of getting too involved. Be an ear, but keep a healthy distance.

Until you see it with your own eyes, and witness the awful behaviour he is confiding in you about, just keep an open mind and don't take everything he says as absolute gospel.

That’s what I was thinking…

@Sunnyjac you lucky women! Enjoy it for the rest of us who went without 😆

Charming of you to presume she is menopausal and in such respectful language too.

It's none of your business. Situations like this get right on my nerves.
So many of my friendships have been tested by female friends dissecting the lives and flaws of other women on the say so of their male relatives who want to break up with these women or have had the relationship end.

Why do men need to go around controlling the narrative and asking for judgement to be poured on their exes? and why do thick women walk straight into the role of muck spreader on behalf of these men?
"Sinister" 🙄
Live your own life, advise him to leave if it's that bad.

It sounds like she has been unhappy and felt unsupported or disconnected for a while. I would help him to identify when this started and whether she indicated she was unhappy. It may well be that the set up of him having a great career while she took a back seat to care for children worked for everyone else but slowly destroyed her sense of self. She sounds very unhappy but may still be happier in this situation then she was with the status quo. But if that is the case he needs to be prepared to take ownership of his part in it and accept it will never go back to that place.

Ahahahahaa I wondered how long it would take

Oh and very funny reading crap such as "you don't know what is going on in their marriage" and the like but when it's a woman saying it its almost accepted as gospel.

As for the posters questuining whether OP fancies her cousin I despair.

It sounds like an extreme mid life crises rather than meno.

They both sound unhappy. Might they benefit from couples counselling? I know you want to help but it might be counterproductive for your cousin to be in the habit of looking to you for emotional support. Perhaps you could say this to him gently?