Me (41M) and my wife (41F) have been married for 13 years and two small children. Last year, we opened our marriage to ENM and it developed into more of a poly situation. That being said, both of us only see our other partners every few weeks, although me and mine text semi-daily.

When we first opened, me and my wife's relationship was exceptional; we feel deeply back in love and the sex was amazing. However, since the winter that dynamic has shifted, now dramatically. My wife has been seeing someone since last summer and has developed an anxious attachment to them, one which I would say is severe at times.

The issue is that she is increasingly bringing that anxiety home and has said some stuff which have me concerned about her other relationship. Also, as her other relationship has become more emotionally serious, she's increasingly shut down intimacy of any sort in our relationship claiming that I'm too anxious, needy, intense, that our kids and home life make it impossible to think of physical intimacy or that, most recently, she's experiencing trauma.

She acknowledges that she has a hard time re-integrating into our family life after dates. I should mention that there are often drugs or BDSM involved in her dates. In the past, this challenge to re-integrate came off as her being sort of dreamy or tired the day after her dates. However, now, she often comes home and is quite avoidant and sometimes angry, potentially for a couple days. This pushes me into an anxious state, which makes her more avoidant. Which makes me more anxious. I'm sure you can see the dance. I would say for the last few months, despite work on both of our parts, we are getting worse and not really coming out of it.

Throughout the Summer, we have had multiple discussions where she listed a number of wrongs I had committed going back 14 years and at one point insisted that she can't trust me and said she "has never felt nurtured or cared for in our relationship". During this time, intimacy, both sexual and eventually otherwise, has dwindled to almost nothing.

Since the end of August, things have escalated substantially. She experienced a betrayal in her other relationships where her boyfriend pushed too hard around a sexual issue. I did not know about this for a few days later, but the day after this happened, she suggested that I was only "in love with her" but did not "love her" and that her BF had taught her what real love was. She described to me how me, her family and friends were not there for her, but he was and now even he wasn't. This was hurtful, but also made me concerned for her. Both me and her parents have recently let her down, but I wouldn't suggest that I am not there for her. Her parents are there for her, in their own avoidant way.

Eventually I found out about the incident. The context was her going into a deep funk where she did not go to work for several days and where she eventually went out of town with a friend to sort things out. During this time, she was extremely avoidant and I was not permitted to touch her and she was sleeping in the fetal position. She came back and seem to be doing better. At this point, she continued to date her boyfriend.

Things seem to be improving, but intimacy, avoidance and anger are still an issue. This week, it seems to have reared its head again; I have not been permitted to kiss her and she's withdrawn again. She phoned me the other day to apologize for this, at one point crying, and explain that what happened triggered memories of a sexual assault she experienced 25 years ago. I tried to be understanding and supportive. I should note, that she continues to date her boyfriend.

At this point, I'm not sure what to do? Part of me wants to establish much stronger boundaries with her because the avoidance, lack of intimacy and anger issues are really challenging for me and not good at all for my wellbeing. On the other hand, I want to be there to support her and help her process what is happening and there are a number of red flags in her behaviour that have me concerned. I am also trying to balance my own anxiety and needs throughout this.