Hi rcguy
I don't think that it's abusive and controlling at all -- it's drastic, but, as wildcat says, your wife has clearly demonstrated that she has no self-control or sense of responsibility and someone in a family has to exercise a certain amount of both of those.
If you've talked with her already about limits, budget, etc, and come to an agreement that she has since disregarded, then taking away the credit cards is an unpleasant but necessary consequence. If you haven't had that talk yet, I think that it's important to at least give her a chance to show that she can be responsible if she knows that she has to. Short leash, though, since your finances have already taken such a beating, and check in weekly on how she's faring.
I hear you about the fear of conflict, though. You can read in other posts that I was in an abusive relationship as well. Just the thought of upsetting him would send my anxiety sky-rocketing.
I don't suppose that I'm the best adviser here, since I ended up leaving rather than mending the marriage. I tried to be assertive and stand up for myself, and if the issue was something I had complete control over, I could be calmly assertive and adamant and weather the storm. But the rest of the time... he could be utterly ruthless, and I had no idea how to deal with that. As an example, I'd signed up for a 2 day course for my work -- really important to me. I'd still be able to drop the girls off and pick them up from daycare, but he'd have to be the "on-call" parent for the first time. He wasn't happy with this, but I stood firm and said that the odds of something happening were low, and so he agreed. As it happened, our 2 year old had an asthma attack the afternoon of the first day. The daycare called me, and I called him. He was ticked, but I stood firm and reiterated how important the course was for my work. So he went. When I got home a few hours later, her lips and fingernails were blue from lack of oxygen -- he said that he couldn't figure out how to use the ventilator and how was he supposed to know what symptoms to watch out for? The next 2 days I spent in the hospital with my baby in an oxygen tent. Saying that he was deliberate in his inactivity sounds ridiculous -- he said that it all just showed how incompetent he was at parenting. Very remorseful.
Marriage is always a balance of needs, but where does it cross the line? Passive isn't necessarily a bad thing, but your needs have been trampled, your dreams ignored. Are you so passive that you don't state your needs, desires, hopes and dreams? If you've told her and she deliberately disregards them, well, you've got some decisions to make. If you've never told her, perhaps she truly doesn't know how deeply unhappy you are. You'd think that she'd pick up on some of your needs over the years, or ask you, but some people just don't think that way.
Good to hear that your bank was helpful about another mortgage (even if it would have been better not to have needed the second mortgage).
take care