Exactly! My wife has said she knows how much she messed up (not that I'm perfect...) and that things will never get that bad again. There are times where I almost want something major to happen so I can get confidence in her again as to how she will handle it. I was with her for seven years before all of this and we always worked together as a team and I never expected her to treat me the way she did. It was this awful feeling of "Who is this person? What happened to the person I married?" Meanwhile, this person kept saying they'd still be the same person after transitioning, they weren't going to change that much and I was thinking "But you already have..."

On the other hand, she is trying to help some trans people online come out to their spouses, stop hiding, encouraging them to get into therapy (alone and with their spouse) because she says she knows how much she messed up and she doesn't want them to make the same mistake because they may not be as "lucky". So in that aspect, I see her recognizing how much she lost and she's trying to help others.

It's also hard when my own mother tells me that if I do get hurt again, it's my own fault because I chose to trust her again, that I'm putting myself in that position. Because I wouldn't feel like that anyway? So now I feel like everyone is just waiting for her to hurt me again so they can say "I told you so."

But at the same time it's frustrating because it's not like she cheated on me, this isn't something typical most marriages face, and in the seven years we were together before all of this, this was the first major issue we had between us (I'm not including the issues with her parents not approving of her dating/marrying me, because that wasn't something just directly between us). Most couples encounter at least one major issue or argument before marriage is even considered, we didn't have that. So then I feel like, how dare they point their finger at me and blame me for trusting her again when we just went through something so extraordinary that most couples can't even imagine going through? And on top of it, it was also our first major issue we faced?