I'll grant you, there are a lot of immature men out there who have betrayed their wives and turned their backs on their children and given their entire sex a bad name.

But please don't lump all men in with the jerks.

There are an awful lot of good guys who take their marriage vows and their responsibility as fathers seriously, guys who help out with the housework and coach their kids' sports teams and stand by their wives through tough times, after-baby weight problems, and all the rest of the trials and traumas that a marriage goes through.

Your question is a valid one, i.e.,

This scenario is so common - are any male readers who actually got to this point able to explain what goes -- or went - through your heads?

I know there are females who do the same thing, but I'd like to hear it clearly from a man's perspective.

I think most men experience what the husband in question is going through. We all look at other women at some point during our marriage and fatherhood and think it would be better with another woman....we'd be happier...freer to be "who we really are"....

The difference is, some men act on those impulses, and some don't. The ones who don't act on those impulses are guided by religious, or moral, or ethical considerations.

And that's a good thing. The commitment you make to a marriage is so much more important than your perceived need for self-fulfillment or that elusive chimera called "happiness."

The guys who leave a marriage and children and go off in search of happiness, or fulfillment, usually end up very unhappy and unfulfilled.

And the guys who stay with a marriage, and work at it, and work toward finding fulfillment within the context of family (the key is to work at it, and not just passively accept it as "your fate" or "your duty")...those guys usually end up pretty happy.

Sorry if this sounds smarmy, or trite, but that's been my experience, and my observation of other marriages.

Cary: Why does your response to this woman's cry for help contain so much extraneous, irrelevant and self-serving horsecrap?

She has a real problem and is desperately in need of advice. She doesn't care about your daily regimen or the rest of the irrelevant tripe you wrote about.

You did provide two relevant pieces of advice amid all the effluvia: See a lawyer and see an accountant.

As for her marriage, her husband seems to have made it pretty clear that he wants out. She should start dealing with that, emotionally and financially.

I can only imagine the difficulties she is facing...five young children, no husband...

Will she have to go back to work? Or should she stay home and raise the kids?

This woman needs real advice. Stop dithering, Cary.

You think that all experience and reality begins and ends with the human brain. You think that there's no higher reality other than what is triggered by the neural impulses in your brain. You think there's no difference between an acid trip and genuine enlightenment.

I'm truly, genuinely sorry for you.

I will say this.....

I've had psychedelic experiences and the value of them was that they gave me a glimpse of what was possible, i.e., they showed me that there were higher realms of consciousness.

But the path to those higher realms wasn't through psychedelic drugs. It was through many hours of meditation, study, self-examination, and a lot of trial and error.

You don't reach the higher consciousness by dropping acid. It takes a lot of effort and being willing to give up your own ego.

Is that something you can agree with?

Any mystical experience you have while using LSD or other psychedelic substance isn't a legitimate one. Although tripping on acid can give you a glimpse of exalted states, you don't stay there. A prominent guru describes these psychedelic-induced mystical experiences as "knocking on the back door of heaven."

Actually getting to the higher consciousness takes many years of effort. There aren't any short cuts.