'Quit Drinking or Divorce?' A Marriage Hell Husband Chose Divorce

A couple seven years into their marriage and raising four children together appeared on MBC's Oh Eun-young Report: Marriage Hell on the 7th, and the picture that emerged was one of almost complete domestic disconnection. The episode, which the show frames through the lens of certified child psychiatrist Oh Eun-young's analysis, laid out a household where a year of near-silence had become the default setting.

The wife described how the conflict had calcified over time. "When we talk, we fight. The moment one of us starts speaking, it turns into an argument," she said, adding that the couple never quarreled during their relationship before marriage, but that arguments had gradually cut off communication after the youngest child was born. The husband put it differently: if he did not initiate contact himself, ten days or two weeks could pass without a word between them.

The drinking ultimatum

The wife identified her husband's drinking as the central source of early conflict. He had been drinking up to six times a week, she said, between work dinners, company gatherings, and nights out with friends. At one point she gave him a direct choice: quit drinking or accept a divorce. His answer, he later explained, was not indifference but honesty, he said he did not trust himself to stop. The studio panel received that explanation with visible skepticism.

The husband disclosed that two years ago the accumulated stress produced a depression diagnosis. He had not recognized the symptoms as depression: chronic indigestion, frequent urination, disrupted sleep. When he finally saw a psychiatrist, the severity of the results surprised even the doctor, who reportedly said it was remarkable he had continued functioning at that level.

Spending and household friction

Beyond the communication breakdown, the episode catalogued a pattern of unilateral decisions that had eroded the wife's trust. The husband, who was preparing for a fitness photo shoot, structured his days around a strict five-to-six-meal diet schedule that the wife said made family outings difficult. He canceled a family gathering for his own mother's birthday because it conflicted with his diet plan. At a children's play cafe, he sat apart from the family to manage his meal timing while his wife handled the four children alone.

The spending figures drew a sharp reaction from the studio. The husband spent 3 million won on sneakers and another 3 million on a refrigerator dedicated to storing chicken breast, while telling his wife to cut costs on childcare. A 1 million won aquarium purchase added to the total. Meanwhile, the wife said her husband had borrowed 100 million won without consulting her.

A drunk-driving conviction also came to light. The husband had paid a fine of 9 million won, an incident the wife said he justified by pointing to side effects from his depression medication.

When the husband tried to redirect the financial discussion toward the cost of childcare, arguing that the wife's reliance on sitters accounted for at least 40 million won a year, the panel was not persuaded.

Oh Eun-young closed her analysis by telling the husband his depression appeared to have resolved, but that he struggled to recover when his relationship with his wife deteriorated. She described him as someone who takes significant emotional hits when the partnership is strained and is slow to bounce back. The observation stopped short of a verdict, which is characteristic of how the show operates, identifying the dynamic without prescribing the outcome.

Panelist Jimin noted the communication gap between the couple most plainly when discussing a scheduling dispute: the wife had posted a group chat notice about a six-week Saturday training program in Seoul that would require the husband to handle childcare alone. He said he was informed, not consulted. She assumed he had read it. Neither had followed up with an actual conversation.