Polite Paradise

https://slate.com/human-interest/2019/02/husband-affair-with-former-student-advice.html

Dear Prudie at Slate. I'm most interested in the first letter. It's hard for me to even summarize without inflicting my own judgment! Basically, this woman's husband is a high school teacher, and since he recently had an affair with a former student (who's now 21), she's worried that keeping this job provides him with too much temptation. They're working through things with a lot of counseling, but I think she's wondering if she should make him quitting this job a requirement for their marriage moving forward.

Prudie had some good things to say--I was appalled that, after her husband cheated on her at least twice in their marriage, AND has unresolved problems with alcohol, her main focus was still on him and his job, and how to make these better for him. Like, not seeing the forest for the trees, really. Ditch this lying jerk and who gives a flip what job he has, as long as he pays child support? (The school administration is aware of the affair but doesn't seem concerned, as the person is no longer a student.) But, I was surprised that Prudie focused so much on the husband being a potential predator of minors, and advised the wife (along with divorce and all) to urge the school to look into how he might be grooming current students. I'm normally pretty sensitive to anyone who comes close to preying on minors (my mom worked in child welfare), but I guess I don't see an affair with a 21-year-old who was someone's student 6 years earlier as any worse than an affair (already terrible) with another adult. Still, maybe Prudie was trying to be shocking to tarnish the image the woman clung to of her husband, as a good man with a few flaws--uh, no, he lies and cheats repeatedly and has never been made to change as long as he says the right words. The guy certainly sounds selfish and self-centered, and by his behavior, not someone I'd want around impressionable young people, but he doesn't necessarily scream "predator grooming minors" to me.

That's a good point. The wife was making a lot of excuses for him, and probably wasn't the most reliable narrator of events. You wonder if maybe she had witnessed interactions herself with students that subconsciously worried her, so that it's not so "clear-cut" as she describes. And, she does shift the blame more onto the teenage girls, which could further blind her to anything her husband is actively doing. In fact there could be plenty of other stuff already going on, or things that happened between him and the 21-year-old when she was younger.

Red flags all around from a relationship point of view! But I wonder if she is correct, that the school won't take any further action since the affair was with another adult. Nowadays I think they would be erring on the side of caution, or at least doing something to further monitor him, when she implies no action will be taken. I wonder if her husband just told her he told his boss about the affair, but he really didn't. So if she wrote a letter to the school board, etc., it might all come as a surprise to them. But I'm curious what they would do--it'd be so easy for the husband to say, "Yeah, that's just my crazy soon-to-be-ex, making up lies and trying to get me in trouble at work." I hope she has some concrete proof, or that the other woman is willing and able to step forward also!

The whole thing is just so creepy and unhealthy. I felt like I needed to take a shower after reading it. The husband is slimy, the wife is in denial, and the whole thing is just a mess. And honestly, the way the wife was talking about the students was kind of creepy, too (the whole thing about high school girls being "on the cusp of womanhood" and at their "physical peak" was just...ew.). I think everybody involved there needs a lot of very professional help.