I like that she didn't fall into sympathy because of the whole, "he grow up emotionally damaged" thing. She shut that down immediately. He needs to figure himself out. They need to stop making it the wife's (or whoever the fl is in these kinds of stories) responsibility to heal some dude's emotional damage. That's his responsibility. He needs to heal himself. She has her own issues with her mother, yet she turned out to be a very caring person. At the end of the day, it's about choices. I feel really bad for the former Empress, being forced to adopt the child of your husband's affair. The Emperor is cruel for that.