The Woman Who Wouldn't Let Her Husband Leave

April 5, 2010— -- When Laura Munson's husband came home one summer day and told her, "I don't love you anymore. I'm not sure I ever did. I'm moving out," Munson remained calm. "I don't buy it," she simply said.

The author of the new memoir "This Isn't the Story You Think It Is" said she maintained emotional control because she knew it was not about her, their marriage or their family. It was about him.

"I believed in this man and I knew this man," Munson said on "Good Morning America" today. "We had been together for 20 years. And I really saw this as a crisis of his own self."

In her book, Munson writes that her husband's behavior was like "when teenagers scream, 'I hate you,' and slammed the door in their parents' face. Does that 'I hate you' have credibility?"

Instead of kicking him out, Munson, a writer from Whitefish, Mont., decided to give her husband space. Over the next four months, he came home late, if he came home at all, he gave her the silent treatment, and he ignored her birthday.

But she was patient, kept her anger to herself and gave him the room he needed to work through his issues on his own.

"It meant for him a lot of fishing, a lot of getting out in nature and a lot of working through his stuff in nature," Munson said.

The writer, who met her husband in college, said her job was to "get out of his way" so he could figure out his problems.

"We live in a very reactionary society, what about practicing a little bit of patience? I had my standards, I wasn't going to put up with his behavior forever," Munson said.

The two were honest with their children about their marital problems. Munson said she would not teach them "myths."

"We told them the truth, adults have hard times just like kids and it doesn't need to take you down," Munson said. "And I think, ultimately, the message that they are going to go into their adulthood with is that you can be powerful, even in crisis."