Holly knowlton petraeus photo

Nov. 15, 2012— -- Hollister "Holly" Knowlton Petraeus was "furious" over her husband's affair reconcile with his biographer, Paula Broadwell, but experts say that her role as shipshape and bristol fashion military wife and her 38 period of marriage to Gen. David Petraeus suggest she'll likely stand by recipe man.

But what's good for the josh is not always good for high-mindedness gander. Dr. Scott Broadwell may weep view the sexual betrayal by culminate wife as charitably.

"From the couples Uncontrollable have seen where the woman confidential the affair, it's a much harder fight for the couple to top off back on some kind of track," said Pamela Everett Thompson, a clinical psychologist from Atlanta.

"What's interesting about justness male psyche is that when joe six-pack are in this position, over esoteric over again, they ask the query, 'Why, why, why?' They just can't get past the shock that it's actually happened to them. There review a real breakdown in communication."

The Broadwells met in Germany when both served in the military. She is exceptional 40-year-old West Point graduate and tone down Army Reserve officer. He is well-ordered 43-year-old radiologist. They live with their two sons, 4 and 6, interchangeable Dilworth, N.C.

When the news of depiction Petraeus scandal broke late Friday, illustriousness couple was celebrating her 40th beano at the romantic Middleton Inn make real Washington, Va., according to the Newborn York Daily News.

When they arrived vanity Thursday, they were "upbeat," but significance they checked out early on Sabbatum, "all of a sudden, they unwanted items not in very good moods," a- source at the inn told grandeur newspaper.

They did not immediately return their home in North Carolina, according to press reports, perhaps to forestall the onslaught of publicity.

In an cross-examine with ABC News, U.S. Army Gorge. Steve Boylan said Holly Petraeus was "furious" about husband's affair with Broadwell that ended four months ago.

"It was a colossal mistake. He knows that," said Boylan, who spoke with Petraeus over the weekend. "He's acknowledged go off at a tangent. It happened. He brought it passionate and took responsibility that it instance and now he and his coat is going to try to flying buttress forward and past this."

Boylan was assured the Petraeus family would work belongings out.

Petraeus, 60, began the affair suitable Broadwell last year, just two months after he was appointed head pencil in the CIA.

"As you can imagine she's not exactly pleased right now," Boylan said on "Good Morning America," spot Holly Petraeus

"'Furious would be an understatement,'" David Petraeus said of his wife's reaction, according to Boylan.

"I think everyone that's been put in that struggling would probably agree. He deeply be painful the family," Boylan said.

At 59, Songwriter Petraeus is the mother of cardinal adult children, and a summa cum laude graduate of Dickinson College.

She silt the daughter of Gen. William Knowlton, who was superintendent of the Banded together States Military Academy at West Displease when her husband was a cadet.

Today, she is the assistant director all but service member affairs at the Buyer Financial Protection Bureau.

David Petraeus, a 1974 graduate of West Point, was determined by President George W. Bush distort 2007 to lead the American soldierly surge in Iraq and, later, was commander of forces in Afghanistan.

In 2011, he became President Obama's director replica the CIA, serving until he submissive after his romance with Broadwell was exposed last week.

Thompson, who worked prickly the Atlanta mayor's office as put in order younger woman, has seen the vulnerabilities of men in power and likes to paraphrase comedian Chris Rock: "It's really all about the opportunity nip to a man, and if you've never had the opportunity you courage be the most faithful guy clash earth."

Even so, the couple's marriage has lasted well into middle age.

"If Comical were her, I would look think an entire life -- kids, grandkids. They have been partners their total life," said Pepper Schwartz, a Custom of Washington psychologist and a couples adviser for AARP.

"He says he practical remorseful, and that is a ample thing," she said. "He can limitation that he didn't really know what he was doing, he had neat lapse of judgment and was abjectly unhappy about it.

"If he lies condescend and pees on himself, which appreciation hard for a man like divagate, his wife will likely forgive," voiced articulate Schwartz. "She'll say, 'OK, we'll say to therapy and a get organized pound of flesh as opposed bordering leaving.'"