TLDR; Wife is somewhat depressed. Probably due to necessary changes in the marriage brought on by MRP. How to apply appropriate comfort without faggoting it up and losing frame?

The first 80% of this wall of text is just background. Sorry for the length, but I think background is important. The last part is where I have my question.

If you have followed my posts/comments you will know that a lot of the friction in my marriage is due to a disagreement over whether to have a fifth child. This probably all started around April of last year in 2016. So, it has been going on for quite a while. During the vast majority of this disagreement, she was dealing with a beta bitch faggot from up until about early March this year 2017 when I discovered MRP and swallowed the pill. In other words, the first 11-12 months of the disagreement she was dealing with a blue pill faggot and the last probably 4-5 months she has been dealing with someone red pill aware.

Before MRP, I would never really rock the boat and didn’t want to hurt her feelings. I was a “nice guy” throughout this whole ordeal starting in April 2016, but I also have a track record of being a faggot throughout our entire marriage in how I would handle other disagreements. I was never firm enough about not wanting child number 5 for about 11-12 months pre-MRP and sort of always left a glimmer of hope with her that she continued to exploit and just compounded the problem. I handled the situation poorly and it eventually led to a nearly dead bedroom (about twice a month and only during her most horny time of the month). She began to resent me and stopped saying “I love you”. I can’t say that I handled it any better and gave her the silent treatment and every other covert and wrong way of communicating that is counterproductive. Which is what finally brought me here. Ever since discovering MRP, things have been getting better. I read through the sidebar, but soon realized that my progress was dependent upon crossing this biggest hurdle that was causing so much resentment. I finally sat her down and finally shut the door on the idea with a very direct heart to heart talk. As expected, she did not take it very well. There were lots of tears and emotions etc. However, after about a week or two things started to improve.

Overall, the last 3-4 months have been night and day better than before. Sex has increased by quite a bit and she has started to become more and more adventurous as I have been leading this direction slowly. I know there is still a lot of improvement here. The biggest problem is that this issue, or possibly even the aftershocks of it, still remain.

Things got really good for a while. If she ever reverts back it has been caused/triggered by PMS. Last PMS was particularly bad and she started kind of bringing up the topic again. I will say, that her tone and approach has changed though the last few months. Before it was putting pressure on me to agree. Now, it is just more of her being depressed and trying to cope with the reality of being done bearing children. She has admittedly stated that she has not completely given up on the idea and is just putting it off for now. I have reiterated that I am done. These conversations have occurred peacefully and I feel like I have maintained frame throughout. I also feel like I have provided sufficient comfort at least in these previous episodes where it has cropped up.

About a week ago, she was particularly troubled. I have felt for quite some time that she needs to talk to someone else about it and have another place to vent. She has always kept our marriage behind closed doors which part of me actually respects, but she also needs another outlet. She has a close friend that she trusts and her mother that she also trusts. She doesn’t want to bring problems to her friend because that friend suffered a legitimate nervous breakdown about 5 years ago and she doesn’t want to burden her with her problems. So, she chose her mom. Typically, I would advise against having her vent to the in-laws. However, after MRP, I like them, but I can really care less what they think of me. She talks to her mom for an hour or two alone and then comes home pretty quite. The next evening she opens up and tells me that her mom pretty much told her that she needs to let this whole thing go. She cried pretty hard and I felt like this might be a turning point to where we could finally put this in the rear view mirror.

This last week she has been pretty fragile. Part of this could be because she is sick. She is taking an antifungal medication to treat thrush. However, I am pretty certain that 90% of her issues are from her just being flat out depressed. Which honestly, I can’t say that I am surprised or that this is unexpected as she is pretty crushed.

Friday she seemed to be in good spirits. She texted me on the way home asking if we could go to Taco Bell. She had been at her brother’s house most of the day swimming and out in the sun. She had been mentioning that the medicine she was taking was screwing with her taste buds. I joked back that was the reason she wanted to go to Taco Bell because she couldn't taste anything trying to tease and be a little flirty. She replies and say “hey, Taco Bell sounds good right now.” I reply with “said the girl with no taste buds”. Overall, this interaction went well and she responded well to it and flirted back. To the point where I thought I could leverage some of this into some action later.

We get to Taco Bell and things are going well. I see the kids are tired from swimming, but it was Friday night and I was hoping to just have fun with my kids when we got back home. My wife has tendency to do this and I have really allowed it to go on for too long. When she gets tired or frustrated she starts taking it out on the kids. Usually, in the form of her having a crazy short fuse that ends up sending the kids to bed early. She and the oldest daughter, who is 12, get into an argument about eating the remaining beans on her plate in order to have one of those nasty apple empanadas that we bought for the treat. The 12 year old wanted the treat, but we do have a rule that you need to finish your dinner to have a treat. I am totally okay with this rule. The 12 year old, yes, is tired from swimming and starts to plead for an exception. Wife is tired and eventually escalates into “everyone is going to bed when we get home!”. It was about 6:15PM at the time.

Granted, I had never told her that I wanted to do some things with the kids that night, but I don’t want to work my ass off all day only to have them go to bed the moment I see them. Plus, the 12 year old doesn’t need to be disciplined like a toddler. I don’t want to make a scene and tell her as we get in the car that I want to talk to her when we get home. We get home, I tell the kids to go upstairs and get their pajamas on, so that they aren’t down there. I tell her that, I agree the kids are tired, but I was planning on playing with the kids that evening and that she shouldn’t unilaterally decide to send them to bed. She seems pretty shocked (I don’t usually say anything like this to her and pre-MRP I would have never done this because I would think I could get pussy later that night if I didn't rock the boat too much based on those texts), she looks as if she is about to cry, and then says that she is just tired. About 5 seconds later says, “fine, but I need to get out for a while”. She leaves. The kids come down and we play for about 30 minutes where we all hide around the house playing “sardines”. They usually love this game. Honestly, they are legitimately tired and by the time we finish up and get ready for bed it is closer to their regular bed times. Apparently, my wife just went to a Home Depot parking lot near our house and just sat there (probably crying) before coming home an hour later.

The rest of the weekend, she spent most of her time sulking or in bed. She has been a little sick and has been taking some medicine, but this is just depression in my opinion with "sick" as a crutch. When I was able to distract her she would seem normal, but otherwise was just kind of in this fog all weekend. It could be part depression from the reality of not having a fifth and also depression that I am rewriting some of the rules and pushing back.

I know she needs comfort here. My question is how do I provide comfort without encouraging the sulky behavior? Usually, I see questions about alpha-ing up, but I do think she needs legitimate comfort. However, I am reluctant to do this and enter into her frame. I am wanting her to figure out that she is control of her emotions and I am not responsible for fixing them (which is a departure from my pre-MRP behavior). I feel I have done a good job of this. I have given her numerous hugs and if I say anything to her it is more along the lines of “everything is going to be alright” with a big hug.

So, I don’t think this is necessarily Rambo, but is maybe a lack of appropriate comfort. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to comfort her without coming across as if I need her to feel good for me to be happy type of thing? I just don’t want to take a step back in our progress or make her feel like everything is still in her frame. My thoughts are just to give her some space. Be friendly, fun, and nice and just let her work through this herself. Is that the right approach?