As New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer apologized for his involvement in a prostitution ring, and then resigned from office, his wife – Silda Wall Spitzer – stood by his side near the podium.

The led many women to ask: Why?

Blogger Amy Ephron, on www.huffingtonpost.com, shared her fantasy: “I just want one of them – Hillary, Silda – to stand on the steps of the White House, the governor’s mansion, and stamp their foot and say, ‘And another thing, I’m keeping the house.”‘

One of the most poignant voices defending Silda Spitzer was Matos McGreevey, who stood next to her husband, New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey, in 2004 as he told the world he was gay, claimed an affair with a male aide and resigned. She’s among the most prominent women to stand by their men in recent years, along with Clinton during the Monica Lewinsky scandal, and Suzanne Craig, the wife of Idaho Sen. Larry Craig, who was accused of soliciting sex in an airport bathroom.

“We all do it for personal reasons,” said Matos McGreevey, now going through a contentious divorce with the former governor. “I did it because he was my husband. I had always supported him. I loved him. I had a daughter … I wanted her to know I was there for her father.”

One therapist who deals with couples in crisis, Gail Saltz of New York City, says most wronged women do want to at least try to work things out.

“Your lives are intertwined, emotionally, financially and physically,” said Gail Saltz, who practices in New York City. “You share children. Just because someone has hurt and betrayed you deeply doesn’t mean you stop loving them. It’s very complicated for any woman who finds her husband has betrayed her.”

And the fact that the alleged betrayal was with a prostitute is complicated as well, Saltz says: On one hand, “this isn’t a woman that he fell in love with. On the other, many women would find the prostitution part particularly humiliating.”