What if a poly goes REALLY south?

I'm not sure what there is to gain in you talking to her. She's not a reasonable person, so what fruitful outcome could there be?

Called it.

I say that not to be cruel but only to say that I STILL think this same thing when it comes to your hubby's next talk with her, or the talk with all three of you, or any of it really. Neither you nor he have to engage with this any further and I truly don't see any positive outcome whatsoever from doing do. Opening yourself up to more emotional manipulation and lies (cuz that's what it is when a person says one thing to one person and something different to another, as in her conversation with you and then her texts to your husband that contradicted the impression she'd given you of where she's at) won't clarify anything or help anything that I can see. :/

Some other thoughts. I am normally very against the idea of the veto power, i.e. one partner unilaterally calling off one of their partner's other relationships. What you did when you ended the vee could be seen as that. However, and this is a subtle but crucial difference, what you did was state your extremely reasonable and sane boundary -- if you stay involved with this crazy woman who is trying to destroy our relationship I will be forced to leave -- and so I applaud your action there. Hell, even if you had straight up veto'ed her I'd still be in favor of it in this instance, because I think an exception can be made when you are legitimately trying to protect your partner's sanity and emotional health against an abuser.

Same goes with the "permission" thing now, which an earlier poster brought up. You're not saying "I'm in control of your actions and you may not do this" you're saying "If you do this I won't be able to stay", setting boundaries for your own health. It's not control, it's self-preservation and sanity.

Ask him what he hopes to gain from this next conversation. Then look together at her past patterns and see if there's any reasonable expectation that such an outcome will occur. Ask if it's worth the danger of getting sucked further in. Ask what would be lost in just letting her go and cutting off contact. Ask if there's any chance that would actually help her more than continuing to enable and encourage what she's doing right now.

It can be hard to believe that the most loving thing to do for someone could be to step away. The ego wants to believe that our presence could only possibly help, not hurt, because we are so great. But it's just not true in all situations.
 
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I freely admit that this has triggered stuff from experiences with some friends. It's going to be harsher than my normal attempts at tact and understanding.

A dear friend was in a warped unhappy relationship for many long wasted years (my opinion) because in part she kept seeing his beautiful soul and being of light-ness and not his fucked up actions. He had 'potential'.

Years ago, I fell madly in love with a brilliant, charming, funny woman who could not tell the truth to save her life. She persuaded me of all sorts of untruths. I dodged a bullet because she decided she wanted to be friends with me and not date. Still when the lies were revealed, it was deeply damaging to me.

So I say to you, as you consider her potentially beautiful soul filled with light, SO THE FUCK WHAT. Let her go work on her soul. You and White Knight need to run fast the other way.

Beautiful souls do NOT act as she has - manipulating you and your husband against each other, beautifully Idoing her part to erode the trust between you two (yes y'all contributed to that too but let's look at original causes here).

You can't fix her, White Knight can't fix her. By maintaining ANY contact, you invite further drama, crazy, and manipulation into your life. You two cannot handle her - she will spin both of you around until black is white, up is down, and your marriage will explode from the inside with the toxicity.

You two are clearly nice, caring folks. For your sanity and your relationship, RUN. Save yourselves and let her work on her beautiful soul on her own.
 
ForestFloor, I think you and hubby should
RUN AND DON'T LOOK BACK!

She is toxic and a manipulator.

I don't think you even owe her an explanation nor anything else. She's a grown-up, so let her take responsibility for her life and her own mental health.
 
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Okay, so you can both see the manipulation when it's through text/email, right? Instead of making the important discussions face to face, why not do it through technology? Normally that isn't recommended, because you miss the tone, body language, and all that, but in this situation you would be able to let her know the issue without being entirely sucked in by her "beautiful soul" appearance (I say appearance because she is NOT a beautiful soul if she treats people this way).

This way she would get the information necessary - that if she wasn't such a manipulative person (I struggled to say person, and I'm not one for name calling) you both would love to have her in your lives, but due to her past behaviors you can't trust that she has in any way, shape, or form changed so you need to step away to work on your primary relationship.

To me, it seems like you really want to help push her towards making some changes. By sticking around and just forgiving her or ignoring it every time she makes a mistake and treats either of you poorly, you are NOT doing that. Tell her exactly why, and then cut her off. Don't give her a chance to argue, don't let her manipulate/guilt you into softening, just do it.
 
"I started to feel like the anger I had toward her was really misplaced fear and that it ALL stemmed from trust issues with my spouse." I think this is still a valid lesson to of learned from her. She might be someone to run from, but hopefully you can take this away from the situation for next time.

Do you have a link for the "abuse" info he has? I wouldn't mind seeing that. It sounds useful. :)
 
All terrible things must come to an end......... thanks all for your advice and info. The hubs and I had a talk last night and he agreed to cut off contact with the Cowgirl. Both he and she agreed they wouldn't be okay with "just friends" and especially with a more distant friendship (which is all I could personally deal with without freaking out-- I've been having minor panic attacks over this whole thing lately).

The only problem left is my stomach-wrenching sense of guilt. I feel like I needed to make this call for my health, my marriage, and recovering from some major damages from this whole experience, but I can't help but feel that it wasn't MY call to make.

Hubs agrees that my view is mostly logical, though from his perspective her behavior has been a lot better than it was before and she deserves a chance to be in his life for another try. But he knows that the cycle of abuse is hard to break and it is a risk-- and that his main priority is us and me being happy.

So... I guess it's "over"? But he's sad. He loves her. He promises me he'll get over it, but this IS hard for him. And not only do I feel guilty for shoving her out of his life IF she is truly "getting better" but I hate that I've hurt the one I love/prevented him from continuing a connection with someone he cares about. I guess (this may be petty) I want HIM to feel like this was a good decision... but I can't change feelings, just dynamics.

I'm sticking with my boundary, but it still sucks. :(
 
Stop feeling guilty RIGHT NOW!

Guilt is a useless emotion. You have no reason to indulge in it. You deserve to protect yourself, your marriage, and everything you hold dear, so stop giving into that feeling that you've done something terrible. It just ain't so.

Both your husband and this chick are adults, and they could have chosen to continue no matter what you said or felt, so stop thinking you did it. He chose to set it aside. Even if his choice was influenced by what you felt about it, you did not give an ultimatum. You told him what you were and were not comfortable with, and the fears you had, which is a very healthy way to do it. He took that into consideration as well as his own feelings on the matter. You expressed to him what you needed to, for things to feel right between you. There is nothing wrong with that.

Guilt is an indulgence that keeps us stuck in feeling bad about ourselves, and it only causes us to make bad choices later on down the road. You can choose to drop it and move on. You have every reason to feel good about yourself and your relationship with your husband. I'd say that is what you should cultivate as you move on. Feel the pain and grieve the loss, but don't let guilt get in the way of moving forward and growing.
 
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*Hugs* Forest.

It is so painful when one has to hurt a loved one, especially when it's for their - and our - 'own good'. It's good to acknowledge that pain, that all choices aren't possible or even safe. It may help your husband to explicitly know that you understand he is indeed giving up something significant. You and he will have to live with this pain for a while. I agree that you have nothing to feel guilty about.
But that the relationship required sacrifice from your husband is difficult and real adult stuff. Loss is hard. It's ok for him to mourn what could have been and it's ok for you to feel bad you required him to endure such a loss. You and he did what you had to to maintain your marriage.
 
I can't help but feel that it wasn't MY call to make.
...
from his perspective her behavior has been a lot better than it was before and she deserves a chance to be in his life for another try

Two thoughts. First, what you can personally handle is always your call. If we don't get a say over that, then what DO we get a say over? You couldn't handle staying with him while he was also with someone who'd behaved in such problematic, unstable ways, so you let him know that. He then made a choice to prioritize his relationship with you over his relationship with her. It's not like you didn't try, and in the end he made his own choice. You didn't do anything wrong here.

Second, no one "deserves" a shot at anyone, no matter how well they're acting. The only thing we deserve from each other in the end is respect and maybe a little kindness, and I'm sure he didn't break things off with her in an unnecessarily cruel manner.

It's gonna be ok.
 
I don't think this could have turned out better. Meeting with her gave you some insight into the lulling manipulations he has been dealing with. Not to mention while you were trying to see if you could still have some common ground with her, he was examining his history with her and it woke him up. Go Team Work Go!
 
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