Last August, I wrote a blog entitled Enough Of This Stand By Your Man Thing. I wrote it as I watched Larry Craig's wife stand next to her husband as he tried to explain away his bizarre bathroom behavior. And I wrote it as a tribute to all of the women before and after who will feel like they have to do the same.

A couple of days ago I started to receive comments to the article based on the latest trot out of the humiliated wife - this time, New York Governor Spitzer.

I was transfixed by his wife. She looked shell-shocked, like a zombie. The Harvard law school educated, top tier law firm lawyer, who gave it all up to raise three children and support her husband's political career and this is how it ends. With a husband who thought so little of his wife, his three teenage daughters, that he would risk losing it all for a few nights with prostitutes. The how much he spent for them, how high class they were, is all noise.

The second time I saw her, as her husband resigned, she looked defeated. Her face was crumpled. A million questions must have been going through her head the last 24 hours, chief among them, "How could he?". And there had probably been few answers.

She must have been consumed with trying to make sense of this for her teenage daughters. Trying to persuade them, as she tried to persuade herself, that he loves them, that he didn't mean to hurt them. But in the back of her mind, when she allowed herself to go there, she realized the bottom line was that something within him was more powerful than the loyalty and respect he owed to his wife and daughters.

I so hoped that the moment the news was out, her great friends flocked to her side. That they held her until she had grieved enough to speak, that they told her over and over and over that she didn't have to go stand next to him if she didn't want to. And mostly, no thanks to Dr. Laura, they told her vehemently that none of this was her fault.

My heart breaks for her (and for the daughters). This is definitely a time for great supportive women friends. Let's hope she had lots of them and that they will stay with her for the long term because this will be a long-term recovery for all concerned.

She strikes me as one of those stand by your man women who will rise again!

Gillian Parrillo
SacWomen