Sinn Féin councillor Caroline Dwane Stanley has spoken about the controversy that has surrounded her husband Brian Stanley and insisted she would not be "driven from the party".
She was speaking after a Sinn Féin draft report into a complaint made against the former party TD came to the opinion that his conduct constituted "sexual harassment".
It stated that this amounted to gross misconduct and was a breach of party discipline and Sinn Féin's ethics charter.
Mr Stanley has strenuously denied any wrongdoing and consistently stated that the party's complaints procedure was seriously flawed and he described it as operating like a kangaroo court.
Last month, Mr Stanley resigned from Sinn Féin, saying in a statement he had done so as "in recent months a certain clique within the party have gone to extreme lengths to damage my reputation".
He ran in the General Election as an Independent candidate and was re-elected to the third seat in the Laois constituency earlier today.
Read more on the Laois constituency
"A tsunami came our way around five months ago and it's only been out in the public domain for the last six or seven weeks," Cllr Dwane Stanley said.
"Behind the scenes we were trying to deal with things as a family. We were hoping for a different outcome but sadly that wasn't meant to be," she said.
"I think any woman, particularly the first reaction you're going to do as a parent, as a wife, is to try and protect your family. For me, my husband, his children and granddaughter are my priority and everything else comes after that," she added.
Mr Stanley resigned from Sinn Féin five days after being presented with the draft findings and has insisted that the complaint was politically motivated.
Ms Dwane Stanley said she still has questions for Sinn Féin about their conduct and will not quit the party.
"I want questions answered and then I will make my decision. I'm going nowhere. I won't be driven out," she said.
"We don't have closure but I think we have turned a major corner today," she added.
