Wow! Your wife sounds really depressed over her career. It seems her self-worth is tied to her success. Since her career is floundering she may not feel good enough about her self. If you feel defeated then you feel you have nothing to offer another person. She probably made up the stuff about the affair b/c her truth is that if her career is a failure then so is she and that's pretty hard to own up to. At the very least, I think she needs counseling by herself and/or maybe even a life coach to help her set reasonable and achievable career goals. Once her life starts to pick up in this area then I'm sure she will relax enough to recognize that her feelings towards you really have nothing to do with the marriage.