Category Archives for "Family"

0 Should one stay in a relationship with someone of a different religion

roshini asks: My boyfriend is a male chauvinist; he never understands my feelings and perspectives. I don’t like breaking relationships and so I thought to adjust with him, but later on I couldn’t, and we had lots of fights. He has trust issues with me. He is afraid to marry me since we are from different religions. Now I need to decide what to do – to be in this kind of relationship or to leave him!

Hi roshini –

Have you ever heard of John Gray?  He wrote a famous book called Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus, and a number of sequels to it.  At one point, he wrote about the question of whether couples should share interests, or have an “opposites attract” dynamic.

His answer was that it doesn’t matter.  That it can be delightful when both of you like horror movies or football, and it can be fun when you disagree about lots of things.  But, he argued, what matters is that the partners share Values.  Core moral values.  Especially if they’re thinking of having and raising children.

So she loves reading sappy romantic novels while he plays violent first-person-shooter video games?  That can be okay, if they agree about those big issues – like religion in their lives, or whether it’s okay to commit crimes.  Or the roles of men and women.

That last one is a big one.  Because you can disagree about politics and just avoid discussing how you vote, but your beliefs about a woman’s place is in a home will show up every hour!

So you can probably see where I’m going with this.  I have no idea how old you are.  If you’re thirteen and want to have someone to go to the school dance with, then all I care about is Continue reading

0 Is death the answer to the painfulness of life?

PERFECTION asks: Shirelle, is death the answer to all problems and sadness in life? I’ve always wanted to shut myself off to the world. I’m in pain for far too long and I think that’ll be the only way to maybe at least get over the pain.

Hi PERFECTION:

Quick answer to your question:  No.

Absolutely not, no way, impossible, forget it.

Now, now that I’ve said that, let me make one exception.  If you had a terminal disease, and were in constant awful pain, and only had a short time to live, it’s possible that I could agree that the best thing would be for you, in a way agreeable to your loved ones (and of course, only if in accordance with your religious/moral beliefs), to end your life sooner.  After all, that’s what you guys do with dogs, cats, horses, and so on, and that’s an act of love and kindness.

But if you’re young and healthy, the fact is that anything you did to end your life would cause more pain than you’ve ever experienced.  To more people than you even realize.

You see, when a person feels good about life, they feel some of the connection to everyone that we dogs feel all the time.  You open a door for a person you see needing it, you smile at little children because they make you smile, you see a car in a big hurry and let them cut in front of you.

But when a person feels depressed, empty, hopeless, or sad, they tend to feel completely disconnected.  Like no one sees them, no one cares about them, and they don’t care about anyone else.

The fact, PERFECTION, is that you are more connected to more people than you can begin to realize.

What would it do to you to find out that your neighbor killed himself?  Would you wonder if you could have done something to prevent it?  Even wonder if you were responsible in some way?

And what if that were your uncle?  Or your parent?  Or your brother or sister?

Or your own child?

I don’t know a lot about your life, PERFECTION (only that you ask great questions!), but I’m betting you have a Continue reading

0 What to do when your husband doesn’t want to spend time with you

Tasmyne asks: I just recently got married to someone I’ve been dating for 10 years. We were living together. I also just had a baby who is 4 months old. My husband has this thing that every weekend he is out with his buddies. I am still on maternity leave and am home all day. I have a nanny who also helps me. I hardly see my husband during the week, and when I do he is constantly tired (as he owns his own business) or he is on the phone conducting business. If he is not doing that, then he is at the gym and when he is done gyming he tends to go chill with his friends. My problem is that he sees his buddies every day during the week, and then on the weekend he is with them. He doesn’t seem to realize that he never spends time with his family. So I thought I would suggest a date night. Since my daughter is a little older now. I suggested we have date night once every 4 months at least just so we can have some time together. The response I got from him was “Who are we going to leave the kids with (we also have a 7 yr old son),” because he can’t leave the kids with his mom all the time. My issue is that it will be once every 4 months and I was also going to ask my mom. Or if I really needed a baby sitter I would pay my nanny overtime to stay the night as she only works days. As I write to you now it’s 2 am and he is still out with his friends. Tomorrow morning he will be too tired to eat breakfast with us. He will probably wake up after lunch and be gone again. I have no idea what to do. I feel so alone and fat and unattractive because all I see is a husband who doesn’t want to spend time with me or his kids. A few weeks ago he stayed out all night. I woke up at 7 am and he still was not home. After telling me he will be home at 2 pm. I tried calling him but his phone was off. I tracked his car to a hotel parking lot. I could not leave my kids to go searching for him as it was my nanny’s day off. I asked his brother to go check it out for me. This was the day he was supposed to take the kids on a safari. He apparently got so drunk he passed out and one of his friends who is the boss of the security guards at this hotel drive his car there so it would be safe. And his other friend was supposed to drive him home, but instead his friend drove him to his place where he passed out on the couch. He only contacted me at 10 am that day. I was so angry I took myself and my kids to my mom’s place. I still can’t get past that day as I seriously think he cheated on me, as the whole story doesn’t add up. I don’t know what to do.

Hi Tasmyne –

I get a lot of letters, as you know, and very often they have mistakes in them.  Misspellings, typos, or even flat-out wrong words.  That’s fine; I just clean them up to make them more readable before I post them.

So when you said that you offered to have a date night with your new husband once ever four months, I thought, “Oh she was just emotional when she wrote this.  She means every four weeks.  I’ll suggest she make it every one or two.”

But it wasn’t a mistake; you actually said Four Months, more than once.  And he said no?!  Three dates a year with his wife?

Something is VERY wrong!

My human friend Handsome can’t stand it if he goes four NIGHTS in a row without spending one with me, and I’m a dog!

Now I don’t know exactly what’s wrong.  You think he might be cheating; I’ll admit, my imagination went there too.  His friends say he’s drinking to horrible excess – that would be pretty awful even if that’s all that’s wrong.

If you and he were only dating, I’d say this is something to look at very strongly, and work on making it better.  If you had been married for twenty years, I’d recommend couples therapy to find what’s wrong underneath all this.

But you two are newlyweds?!  This is simply awful.

I do have one thought.  Some men get very Continue reading

0 What does it mean to “never beg to be loved?”

PERFECTION asks: What does it mean to “never beg to be loved?”

Hi PERFECTION –

My friend, your asking me this question is like asking me what it means to fly, or to walk on two legs.  It’s something I know exists, but it sure doesn’t apply to me!

The best illustration I can give of this concept is cats, and cat-people.  (Note – I’m going to write this SOOOOO non-judgmentally!  And that’s SOOOOOO hard for me!  So please, give me some applause for my Gandhi-level tolerance here!).

There are people who like cats more than dogs.  And they’re perfectly sane, and have the right to do so (DO YOU SEE HOW HARD I’M STRUGGLING HERE?!).   And one reason, maybe the biggest reason, for that is that they really don’t like the way dogs are always coming up to them, wanting to lick them and play with them and love and be loved by them.  They find this behavior annoying and insincere.  They far prefer the company of kitties, who will come to them out of need (for food or shelter) or out of a temporary wish for affection and attention – and then go mind their own business, often in a way those people find cute and meaningful.

Now you know very well, I’m no cat, and my human friend Handsome is quite the opposite of those people.  He loves  the attention I give him, loves that I want his attention, and it simply melts his heart when I come to him begging for love.

The fact is though, when it comes to humans interacting with other humans, the issues are subtler.  A person who is generally drawn to more effusive people is still going to want some space, and get tired of being asked “Honey, do you still love me?”  And the person who likes cooler, more self-contained people, is still going to need reminders that their partner wants and needs their love.

So while I can imagine someone meant very well when they told you to “Never beg to be loved,” I’d change that to “Always Continue reading

0 What to do when an abuser breaks up with you

Kavita asks: I got married one and half years back. My husband is very good person by heart, but when he gets angry he’ll act like a demon. Once, for no good reason, we fought, and he beat me up and left home and blocked me from everywhere. Then one day out of frustration I cheated on him (meaning I kissed a guy and he also kissed me) and now my husband found out about this and is asking for a divorce. I don’t know what I should do?

Hi Kavita –

I don’t know enough about the earlier part of your marriage to say anything super-intelligent, but it sure sounds to me like this relationship has run its course.

First, I am not  a fan of men who beat women up.  I love a good fun friendly fight as much as anyone, but this is more like getting kicked by a person with metal-toed boots.  Then, he’s blocking you from knowing anything about him, but suddenly able to find out what you’re doing, and saying he wants a divorce because you kissed a guy?

It sounds to me like he’s looking for excuses.  Maybe he’s been running around, or even has a girlfriend (or wife!) now, and doesn’t want to look like ‘the bad guy’ in the divorce proceedings.

My biggest question to you is why you’d want to stay with him, after he treats you this way.  I know you two have this year and a half together behind you, but I’m thinking maybe it’s time to let this go.

If he sounded interested at all, I’d be recommending you to go to Continue reading

0 How to get your oldest child to behave better.

Ashima17 asks: I am the mother of two kids – a nine-year-old son and a one-year-old daughter. I am worried about my elder one; his behaviour is very rude to me. Maybe because I always scold him for studies in front of people He said, “My mother does not love me anymore, every time she hits me, she used wrong words to me.” I agreed that I am doing all this, because he doesn’t want to sit for studies. He always misbehaves, he never listens me. I am worried what to do how to handle him and get him mannered and disciplined.

Hi Ashima17 –

There’s a lot going on here, and I probably don’t know a lot of it, but I can tell you the bit I see.  And really it comes down to two things.

First of all, although there’s a really large age difference between your children, your son is still pretty much guaranteed to have been very affected by the birth of his sister. I get bothered when I see my human friend Handsome pet other dogs, but you went way beyond that. I know you don’t see it this way, but a child will see getting a new sibling as the greatest insult ever.  He was your only one, the center of your universe.  Then suddenly, he’s told “I’m going to cut the attention and focus you get in half.”  Actually probably he’s getting a lot less than that, just because of the amount of care a baby requires.  And there’s no way for him not to be angry and jealous, even if he also loves and enjoys the new baby.

But even if you hadn’t had that little girl, he’d be very likely to go through a phase like this sometime.  The tough question is how you deal with it.

I’m a big fan of a discipline method called “Catch them being good.”  What this means is that, instead of punishing your child for the wrong things he does, you reward him for the good things, even the ones that seem small.  So if he gets a good grade on a test, take him out for ice cream.  And if he does something nice for his baby sister, give him an extra half-hour of TV or computer time.   Now I don’t mean you have to do this every time – it’s actually better if it’s a bit random.

What you’re doing with this is changing the nature of his environment.  Instead of life being a mine-field of ways to do wrong and get punished, each day is filled with opportunities to feel successful and loved.

In a way, Handsome did this with me when I was a puppy.  I was a wildly  obnoxious little girl, always biting him and chewing on his things.  But a trainer taught him how best to deal with me: he filled his house with doggy toys, enough so that there’d always be one in reach. Then if I bit him or some other thing I wasn’t supposed to, he’d instantly say “No!” and get me away from it, and then suddenly jam a toy into my mouth, and start petting and complimenting me, “Oh look what a smart little girl you are!”  Sure enough, before too long, when I wanted to bite someone, I’d instead grab a toy; all was good and successful.

So if you can do that with him, my guess is his behavior would change fairly soon.  Now of course, just as Handsome had to say “No!” to me, you’ll still need to correct your son when he does mean or mistaken things.  What we want is for you to, more often than those, find ways to tell him how good he’s being.

It’s not easy, and it’s not overnight, but my honest guess is that doing that will solve more problems, sooner, than any other method with this.

GOOD LUCK!  And thanks for writing!

Shirelle

0 Is it good to leave your child with your parents permanently

unlucky-luck asks: My daughter is three years old and has a very close bond with my mum. I’m moving away soon, and my mum has asked me if my daughter can move in with her as she is heartbroken that she is moving away. My daughter sobs if we meet up with my mum and then leave to go home, as she wants to always stay with my mum as well. Visiting us or us visiting her won’t be an option, as neither of us drive and money is tight. I’m not gonna lie, my daughter and I don’t have a close relationship, which I think was due to me having post-natal depression. I also have a 9-month old son who I have a close bond with. I don’t really wanna “give my child up,” but I’m wondering if it’s in her best interest if she lives with my mum.

Hi unlucky-luck –

This is a really difficult question for me, because there are so many different aspects to it.

First of all, there’s the very real and awful issue of postpartum depression.  It’s much more common than most people realize, and can leave a new mother anything from a little blue, to distant and unfeeling, to feeling a desire to hurt her child or more, to being actually psychotic and needing to be hospitalized (I’ve known cases of each of these).  Lots of women are embarrassed to admit they’ve had it, so I really respect your bravery for opening up about it here.

Second, your daughter seems to enjoy your mother more than time with you, and it sounds like your mother is great with her.

Third, you have more of a bond with her little brother than with her.

But fourth, you very understandably don’t want to “give your child up.”

And I’ll add a fifth, that your daughter will struggle, as she grows, with understanding why her mother “gave her up” if you do leave her with your mother.  Even though she shows more affection to her grandmother now, she’s very young, and as she gets older she’ll start asking a lot of questions.

And of course, the easy answer to all this would be to split time with her, but you say that’s not possible due to distance and finances.

So I hate to do this, but I’m going to say… Continue reading

0 How to help teens whose parent won’t let them date

ChilliPepper asks: My son (17) has fallen in love with a beautiful young lady (also 17). She seems to be going through depression because of circumstances at home. Now her mom has forbidden her from seeing my son. This is breaking her heart as well as my son’s heart. My son is the only reliable solid in her life at the moment. She wants to run away from home and has even considered suicide. I don’t know what to say to my son to comfort him or what to do to help her.

Hi ChilliPepper –

What a terrifying situation! For all of you!

I’ll be honest with you – I don’t think there’s a perfect answer to this. I imagine you and your son would get into trouble for helping her run away, and her suicidal feelings make it dangerous for her to stay home.

But I do know what I can recommend. And I’ll warn you, it’s very very hard.

I’d suggest you Continue reading

0 How to handle parents unable to accept romance between races AND What to do when someone treats you differently after drinking

Marina asks: I am going through something. It’s so stupid but I don’t know what to do. For about a year me and this guy had something going on. We never made a move because he is black and I’m white and my parents would freak out. We kind of moved on and he has a girlfriend now. We still talk a lot, because we just have this connection. Always making awkward eye contact. Two weeks ago we were both drunk and we kissed. I realized I didn’t care what my parents thought and that I wanted to be with him. Long story short, he said we could be together but just keep it quiet until he sorts things out with his girl. Last night I drunk dialed him and asked him like what now? Like it’s been two weeks? He just said “we can talk tomorrow”. But I haven’t heard a word. I feel hurt and yeah I don’t know what to do?

Hi Marina –

Well there are two stories here, two very different stories!

The first one, about you and a man of a different race getting attracted to each other, but holding off because of your families, is of course as old as storytelling.  Romeo and Juliet, West Side Story, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner… these stories of love beyond boundaries will live as long as people insist on believing in their differences.  (For what it’s worth, I don’t know my parents, but I am a mutt, so I certainly have nothing against interracial romance!)

In this day, parents getting upset about racial differences feels a bit silly.  Handsome loves to tell about a cousin of his in Kansas, as pink-white and Germanic-looking as any woman has ever been, who had a child with a man of full-African background.  Her grandmother was very upset, fearing that no one would accept the child socially.  But all this was happening during an election in which the child of a white woman from Kansas and a black man from Africa was being elected as the President of their country!!!  (Needless to say, that little girl has grown up just fine, and even been a magazine cover-model!)

So if things were to work out between you and this guy, my advice would be to treat your parents with loving patience, but slowly pull them into the 21st Century, and accept that these differences just don’t meant what they once did.

But then there’s the second story:  What the Heck!  I hate to say it, but it sounds like this guy’s one of those humans who’s a different person when he’s drinking.  There’s a great old movie called City Lights about a poor tramp who befriends a millionaire with a drinking problem; whenever the millionaire is drunk, he sees the tramp as his best friend and welcomes him into his home, but once he’s sober, he forgets he knows him and kicks him to the street – and this repeats over and over.

Now I might be wrong; maybe there’s something else happening with this guy.  But if I’m right, and anything does move forward with you two, I have some very strong advice: either get him to stop drinking, or never again believe what he says when he’s intoxicated.  Some people are extra-friendly when they’ve had a few; some people are mean; this fellow sounds like he’s not dangerous, but just untrustworthy.

Or to put it a different way, we all know it’s bad to let your friends drive a car when they’ve been drinking, right?  Well, let’s say this guy shouldn’t drive a relationship in that condition either!

I’d love to hear where this goes.  But for now, my only advice is to sit back and see what happens.  You’ve done everything right so far.  It’s now all up to him.

Thanks again!

Shirelle

0 Should a young woman stay with an older widower?

sapearl asks: I am 24 years old, in a relationship with a 42-year-old widower (which I am not so comfortable with). I love him but he does not trust my love for him, he fears my family won’t welcome him and I might leave him one day. We have stopped taking to each other for a few days now over a minor issue. Recently my family member has been pressuring me about marriage, so I mentioned my boyfriend to them but they didn’t welcome the ideal since he is a widower. They prefer I meet another guy and get married. I am confused what do I do. I already know my boyfriend’s family, we plan to marry in two years time, and my leaving him would break his heart. Should I get another guy? I can’t even discuss the situation with my boyfriend because we are having some problems.

Hi sapearl –

My friend, you’re finding yourself in the sort of complex relationship issue we dogs never face.  We like someone or we don’t.  We might question whether to trust them or not, but our brains just aren’t big enough to have all these competing feelings and opinions.  And as much as we envy your abilities to think and compose and buy groceries, this is one area where I don’t envy you guys at all!

So it strikes me that the key here is to break down the issues one by one.

First, you are “not so comfortable” about dating someone eighteen years older than you, who’s had a previous marriage that ended when his wife died.

Second, he doesn’t trust that you love him.

Third, some minor issue has made you two not speak to each other for a few days.

And fourth, your family is pressuring you to look for another man, not liking that this one’s a widower.

That’s a LOT!

So I want to ask you first, just how you Continue reading