There’s a specific type of low-quality man who is wonderful to the world and exhausting to the people who actually live with him — and the cruelest part is that the world will never see what you see, and you will spend years carrying a truth nobody will ever believe

I’m going to write this article carefully, because I’m writing it for an audience that will include people currently in this situation, and I don’t want to be either glib or melodramatic about something that, in my experience, breaks people slowly and quietly.

I had a friend in London I’ll call M, who was married to a man everyone in their circle adored.

I want to describe this man, because the type is specific. He was charming. He was funny. He remembered names. He was the person...