[BigV]

I think this brand new standard for the validity of plans "defend it or it's meaningless" is absurd. We have a well established standard for the validity of a plan, "did you achieve your goal?". So, I suppose the standard one uses matters. You said the goal was "marriage, staying faithful to one person", and that he did achieve that--no one was challenging that. But the responses were divided.

I think the "plan" was misidentified. I think (going out on a limb here, to say the least. the wife/women should speak for herself(s)) the reason the women were mad is because the wife wasn't kept informed about this new development. The initial contact was communicated, but not the subsequent ones. When she found out, she was mad. Why not tell her about the subsequent contacts? Certainly the husband gave his reason, "he was uncomfortable so just ignored that and the subsequent text." Your post about the story doesn't say what her response to his answer was. Maybe she accepted his answer and all was well. Maybe she was still mad. If she's still mad, it can't rationally be because he broke/failed the "plan" of marriage fidelity. As you point out he did nothing incompatible with that plan. But he did change how he communicated to his wife, and that change could be problematic.

Why might she be mad after learning about the subsequent messages that the husband didn't share with her? Was he intending to tell her, but she beat him to it? Was he intending to act on the messages but she beat him to it? That kind of unknowing can be very uncomfortable, exacerbating insecurities.

I think she was mad because he stopped keeping her informed about continuing and escalating communication with the former coworker.

monster, you said the story stuck with you, what was your opinion of the situation?