Having been the wife of an elder, I know how much stress is put upon these men to sometimes go against their conscience. It really is a "good old boys club" and you must adjust your thinking to theirs to fit in. To step aside takes great humility because the gossip starts in full force and you are immediately treated as a lesser person.
This is exactly it in a nutshell. Once you stop "adjusting your thinking and going against your own conscience" that is when the pestering starts like in my case.
"How are you?" "We missed you at the last meeting" PO: "Do you think we could meet and talk with you for a few minutes?" "We noticed..you seem stressed out lately"
I have made a concession recently to start to go more regularly to the meetings again w/ the wife but I am done playing games with the other elders and she understands this. She knows my stepping aside/deletion isn't far away. Maybe when she sees how I am treated afterwards she'll finally see how unloving and unchristlike these people really are and leave with me.