Just bend over and lube up.

Welcome to Family Court.

Uhh, dude, stick a fork in that relationship, it's done.

I have a buddy who's wife cheated on him with (at least) five guys while he was selfishly defending this nation in the Persian Gulf. She even kidnapped their two children and took them to another state. She doesn't have a real job and lives with relatives. She got full custody and takes half his check in child support.

Hurray for feminism!

Remember that article about why Western guys like Asians girls?

THAT'S WHY!

Dumbasses.

Obviously, your wife is trying to break up with you using a passive-aggressive behavior. He wants to make your life miserable in order for you to initiate the breakup (or, if this is not possible, to play the trite "he made me left him" role, that is, "I left but it was only because he forced me to leave, because our relationship was dysfunctional, he was not fulfilling me emotionally or any other BS").

I had a similar problem with a girlfriend of mine. She wanted out but she wanted me to leave her. But I resisted all her mistreatment for months (I loved her) until she had to initiate the breakup. She was so infuriated about having to initiate the breakup! Haha. Of course, my experience was way better than yours because we were not married and we didn't have kids. You have to be very careful.

About a year and a half ago, she began telling me I wasn't acting myself.

Translation: she had stopped loving you. She had given up on your relationship. Maybe it was because of your problems. Maybe she had known other person. Maybe she was already cheating, maybe not. We will never know. But she didn't want to stay in this marriage anymore and and wanted you out so she started throwing you sh*t.

After a few months, I realized that my behavior was a problem and instantly changed.

Ha.Ha. This was good. You left her without excuses. She must have been infuriated. She had the perfect excuse: "he was workoholic, he drinked too much so I didn't have any other choice but to leave"

You got your act together. This was good for you but bad for her. She lost the rationalization she was going to use with other people to explain her breakup with you.

I'm better, but she still resents me. He has since said horrible, hateful things to me.

Of course, because it was never about your problems, whatever they were. It was about her wanting out from your marriage and trying to make you responsible for this break-up so she could avoid any responsibility of her actions and appear as "the victim".

When I later confronted her, she denied it and attacked me viciously on a host of subjects going back 15 years. She will not admit her affairs.

Well, as you see, this is a person who is good at denying not only any responsibility but even the evidence. She won't admit cheating and she won't admit being the cause of your breakup.

Look. This marriage is over. There is no solution when a woman wants to leave. These are decisions that women meditate very well. You are in a very dangerous position now. If she initiates the divorce, you can lose your assets but, more importantly, you can lose your daughter. It is unfair, but it is the truth.

You have to act very carefully. Print the emails, get a good lawyer and initiate the divorce on grounds of infidelity. You have no guarantee because American divorce courts often reward women's infidelity. But this is your only chance of keeping your daughter and not ending up paying half of your salary to your cheating wife and seeing your daughter every other weekend

I wish you the best. My prayers will be with you. But please act quickly and carefully.

Misogynists just love a good excuse to bash women, suggest that the courts are biased against them, and troll doom and gloom.

You asked what was best for your daughter - you two staying together - 10000% - that is what is best. She's at a fragile age, she needs both of you home, so she can talk to both of you when whatever the latest teenage crisis, whatever the latest question, whatever the latest thing is that her friends are doing that she's not sure if she wants to do, etc. She doesn't get that when you split, those causal 'accidental' conversations as you are driving somewhere, when she asks a loaded question at home - they don't happen when you're working with visitation and telephone calls.

20 years of marriage should be a priority - and salvageable. Your wife may need some time. If you've been treating her badly, in whatever way, it takes time and experience to see if she can restore her trust in you. Give her that time. But do discuss the emails you found - and do recognize that you looking was yet another breach of trust. Find out if they were affairs (you don't say how explicit the letters were - is there a chance you are reading more into them than is there? Print them hand them to the therapist for a neutral evaluation). Then you can decide how you want to handle it.

If there were affairs - it's a huge breach of trust - but marriages can and do survive them. She'll have to face up to them, apologize and mean it, and restore your faith in her - just as you have to work to restore her faith in you. It'll be little steps over a long time. Every time she opens up to you and doesn't get slammed for it - that's a step forward. Every time she does get slammed - that's 50 steps backward. Every time you can trust her - that's a step forward. Every time you cannot - that's some 1000 steps backwards (when we speak of affairs).

Good luck - but if all else fails - try to find a way to live peacefully together until your daughter is of age. These next few years are CRITICAL for her. Not a good time for a divorce.