So I'm thinking of filing for divorce from my wife of many years. A lot is going on and there are a lot of reasons to do this, which I will get into, but I also feel like I owe her something. Do I owe her a conversation of some kind? Do I owe her more years of my life trying to make it work? I feel tremendously guilty and I am deftly afraid of what happens if I file for divorce and our relationship becomes straight antagonism and hate. I don't hate her, but I don't really want her coming back to the home to live with me and the children.

At the moment, my wife is in rehab after having had some strokes. She is getting better and could be released in a few weeks, but what she was like before the strokes makes me not want to subject the children and myself to living with her again.

You see my wife was very self-destructive. She has numerous health issues - diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, obesity, prior strokes - but for years she has refused to take her medicine and has spent 90 to 99% of her time lying down sleeping on the living room couch. She doesn't bathe, barely participates in family life if at all, skips meals, avoids doctor's appointments, and even occasionally poops or pees on the floor and leaves it there.

Up until she was hospitalized a few weeks ago, the entire first floor of our home smelled of her body odor and urine. She was also very passive aggressive, frequently blaming other people for her condition and she had secret vices. After she went to the hospital, I found out that she had run up 25K in credit card bills on secret cards. A couple of years ago, she secretly ran up $14K in debt on my card from playing phone games (she blamed our 3 year old for this but that's impossible). We have two young children and they were miserable with mommy's lifestyle. They couldn't have play dates and they were surrounded by her junk and stench. She had turned the house into a hoarder's nest.

This situation has been worsening since COVID started in 2020 and she lost her parents. The first few years, she was on the couch like 90% of the time. Then it was like 99% of the time and showering and hygiene became less and less. For several years, we had a marriage counselor but she was no help because she kept saying that wife was free to do whatever she wants and would ask me "what are you going to do about it?" Wife had her own therapist but it didn't help her and she stopped seeing her.

Now that wife is in the nursing home rehab, things are so much better in the house. We've cleaned up. The kids are having playdates, which they couldn't before. They don't miss the way things used to be.

Now I'm faced with a dilemma. What do I do to keep things good for the children and for our family? Do I let my wife come back and potentially resume the same behaviors? I mean maybe I can get her to live in the bed rather than on the couch (not great, but better). She had strokes about 2 years ago and came back and resumed the lifestyle so there are few guarantees she would be better this time.

If I file for divorce while she is still in the nursing home, this makes me a terrible person, but it might also allow me to prevent her from coming back. On the other hand, she has a legal right to be at our house unless I can prove she's a danger to the kids so it's possible she comes back from the nursing home even though I've filed for divorce and we live at each other's throats indefinitely.

Or is there a better way to talk about this situation with my wife and do I owe her that? Can I say "listen, things are better with you in care. You're getting the care you need and I'd like to arrange for you to stay under long-term care." I doubt she would go for that and it's possible that she gets better enough in a month or two that she can't stay any longer in the nursing home.

Or do I say to her "what's your plan for making sure we don't go back to the way things were?" Then I let her come home and see how things turn out. The problem there is that she can talk a big game, but her history shows that she is not reliable and true to her word. The best we might get is some partial improvement, maybe the occasional shower.

I don't want her to hate me. I don't hate her. I don't want to take the angry phone calls and emails from her friends and family, calling me a traitor. I still love her, in a way. Right now, when I see her at the nursing home, I feel sorry for her. But I'm also deadly afraid that filing for divorce is my only chance to give the kids life without a bed-ridden, unsanitary person living in the house with them. And if I let her come home from rehab, I might be stuck with her for the rest of my life, even if the situation does not improve.

On the divorce side, no doubt I would be financially devastated if I filed. My one saving grace is that my mom has offered to give me some of her retirement money to buy out wife's half of the house if it comes to that. Still, with wife disabled and unable / unwilling to work (to be fair, she quit working right after we got married and never looked again), I'm sure I would be paying a hefty monthly fee to her for the rest of her life / my life. The only hope is if I get custody of the kids that I get to keep more to pay for them. But who knows if, even in her disabled state, wife would get some amount of custody.

But emotionally and morally, what do I owe her?