0 What to do when your parent tells you your relationship won’t last

Awerpia asks:

I’m very disturbed and confused. I don’t know what my mother wants from me. Today she smiles and asks about my girlfriend and the next day she’s saying all sorts of things. Mother has only seen pictures of my girlfriend. And from her attitude she seems willing to accept her as my girlfriend but never as my wife. I love my girlfriend so much and I love my mum even more. The way I love both ladies is so deep that I don’t want to have to choose between them. I’m on my way to school. I’m finally moving to the next chapter of my life where I will now be at the clinical level in my studies. And just a day before I departed, after spending almost a year at home due to Covid, my mother just decided to tell me “you won’t marry that girl, I’m telling you” in a very authoritative manner in the middle of a conversation.  I really don’t know why my mother wants to put me in such a situation. One day she wakes up and says give this to your girlfriend, I can’t fit into it, and the next day she just tells me to find an excuse and break up with her. Shirelle I’m confused!!!  My girlfriend and I love each other so much. She is 3 years older and working. She keeps on turning men down because of what we share. Only for me to graduate from school and tell her I’m sorry my mother says go away.  My mother has really spoilt my mood and I don’t know how to even cope with studies. I wanted to say I’m so sad but that’s an understatement of how I actually feel.  dsafAnd what makes it worse are her reasons for disapproval—that girl is too short, you will give birth to dwarfs, she’s not from a rich family… her reasons just don’t make sense to me… maybe because I’m deep in love. What do I do Shirelle? I can’t think straight.  I can’t wake up and plan a wedding without my mother’s approval. Especially from my part of the world where we value the blessings of our parents and assume that without it our marriage will be doomed. I feel doomed already. I never knew I would face this. I feel like just getting lost from the surface of the earth.  And my mother is a type who is very good at stereotyping and playing blame games. If I continue against her weird wishes and I face any problems in future (like short kids), she will keep referencing me till she dies. I’m so frustrated. I don’t know what to tell my girlfriend and I’m not ready to let her go.  It’s like my mother just wants me to have sex with her and dump her in the end for someone she thinks is perfect for me. I’m sure her idea of perfect is a rich tall light skinned figure girl.  I’m confused. Can I even focus on my practice? I have always done what mummy says, right from what I eat to what I wear. But this is just too much for me to bear.

Hi Awerpia –

I’m going to give you two answers, based on different readings of what your mother said.

You see, I’m not totally sure you’re interpreting her correctly.

It sounds to me like she’s actually saying, as parents do so frequently, “You don’t know today what you’ll want later.  And while that girl is everything you love today, she’s not what you’ll want long-term.  She’s not the girl you’ll marry.” 

Now that might irritate you, and make you feel like she’s still treating you as a child who doesn’t know what he wants.  But it’s a far cry from ordering you what to do.

And what I find with parents who make predictions like that, with an “I know you better than you know yourself” attitude, that they’re right way more than one might guess – oh, let’s say 50% of the time!  Yes, they do know you well, and as people grow to be more like their parents over time, they know a lot about who you’ll become.  But that means they’re also wrong 50% of the time.  You’re your own person, and have your own opinions and values – based on the way they raised you of course, but still your own version based on your own experiences and personality.

So if I’m right, you have literally nothing to worry about.  Either she’s right or she’s wrong.  Go on with your life as if she’d never said anything and all will be fine.

But if I’m wrong… this does get tougher.  It sounds like you’re in an in-between culture, where you’re not looking at a fully arranged marriage, but you are depending on your parents’ blessings.  So I will need to ask you a question then: when would you marry this girl if your parents were okay with it?  Would you wait to finish your years of study, or would you want to join yourselves in the next year or so?

If you were planning on waiting, then I’ll go back to what I’ve said before, that with time I imagine your mother will move past her prejudices about your beloved’s height and other “faults,” and learn to like her and accept her.  She might always say “I was hoping you’d choose someone else,” but still be able to live with your choice.  I just think it will take more time, for her to realize all the qualities you love so about your girlfriend, and to see that you – her son, whom she probably cares more about than anyone else on the planet – really want this woman.  And between those two changes, she will almost certainly become more accepting.

But if your plan is to marry sooner, then I’m not sure what to suggest.  You’re going to be far too busy to spend a lot of time campaigning for this, and might even find it hard to give as much time to your family or relationship as you had before, much less more.  So perhaps that is one dream to put off a bit.

But otherwise, truly, I think you two can end up like Handsome and me.  So many people disliked me when I was a puppy – a very obnoxious, hyperactive, troublemaking puppy! – but learned to love me over time.  This can happen with her as well.  You see, people just began to see me through Handsome’s eyes.  His excitement about me, his love for me, his work to get me to behave better… all became part of their lives as well.

So my advice is to just buckle down and be a great student, and trust that the best will happen.  And by the way, I need to add… CONGRATULATIONS and THANK YOU for doing what you’re doing!  I’ll never like shots or having things sprayed up my nose, but this past year has made me SOOOOOOOO appreciate doctors of all sorts!  What a mind you must have!  I will be so excited to hear what wonderful miracles you achieve!!

And if I were your mother, I’d be so proud of you my chest would just burst open!!

All my very very best,

Shirelle

0 How to deal with parents not accepting your bisexuality

Vedanova asks: I’m bisexual. Yesterday I came out to father. I went to his office and I could feel my heart beating very fast. I was very nervous. He was watching a movie on TV so I waited some time and then we went to get some food. When we came back, I still wasn’t very confident, but I told him I had something that I had wanted to tell him for a long time. And then I told him I was attracted to boys. And the first words that came out of his mouth were, “We have to change that.” I didn’t speak the actual word bisexual because I didn’t want him to know that I know about sexuality. And then I started crying. He started explaining me that this is all because of hormones and that I must have excess of estrogen in my system. And as every homophobic parent ever told their child, “It’s just a phase” was told to me . He wanted to explain me that after a couple years there will be no estrogen left in my system, and I will be attracted to only girls. Now he’s the doctor and not me so I don’t know if that is true or not. And then he also wants me to be a real boy and do “masculine” things and stop doing “girly” things. Whenever I tell him I think some stereotype is wrong he always has the two same reasons – nature told humans to do this (I have never been able to understand this reason) and what people will say. Before coming out, I thought that I would be hugely relieved after coming out but now I instead wish I hadn’t come out. He also told me to never tell anybody but him that I am attracted to boys. He told me that gay boys don’t go through puberty like normal boys do. They don’t ever get facial hair and their voice never deepens which I know is not true. He also told me to not look up anything on the internet about this stuff. He said that he was also attracted to boys in middle school and high school and then wasn’t, which I think he said to make me believe that it’s just a phase thing. I don’t really think that he is homophobic because he did not say anything against gay people. And because I acted like I know nothing about sexuality he also tried to explain me what are the causes of same-sex attraction and he said that it can be CURED by giving anti-estrogen medicines to males and anti-testosterone medicines to females to a certain extent. How can someone be a doctor and say that?! There’s no way a pediatrician does not know about this stuff. One more thing I want to say to you is that I would love to have this letter published on the website if you can (I wouldn’t mind if you wouldn’t) because I feel like this is an issue that every LGBTQ+ person faces and I don’t care if my sister sees it because now I’m getting tired of hiding my true self from the world.

Hi Vedanova –

Every person is guaranteed a few things in life.   And one of them is to disappoint their parents or caregivers, maybe a little bit and maybe a lot.  

You are absolutely correct that your father knows that much of what he said to you isn’t true (I mean, we’ve all seen LOTS of gay men with beards!  Come ON!).  But it’s clear that he doesn’t want to believe you’re gay or bisexual, and that pain in him is real and shouldn’t be discounted by any of us.  Even if we strongly believe it’s misguided.

So I want to throw a crazy notion at you.  Maybe, on one count, he’s right.  Maybe your attraction to men will go away when you’re older.  I don’t know, and you don’t, and he doesn’t (and maybe he wasn’t lying completely about this “phase” of his life!).  Maybe you also won’t like your current favorite food, or your current favorite song.  I simply have no idea.

But here’s the deal about it – it doesn’t matter.

You like that food today, you like that song today, and you’re attracted to both men and women today.  What you’ll feel in ten years is pretty irrelevant.  For all we know, by that time you may have fallen madly in love and gotten married to someone you plan to be faithful to for the rest of your life.  Will it really matter whether you’re attracted to men or women or some body types or races or whatever then?  If you’re faithful, you’re faithful, and that’s all there will be to it.

I do have to say I’m a bit concerned about his idea of giving you medications to deal with this.  I don’t know enough to speak on the issue, but getting a drug to reduce any hormone in your system sounds questionable to me.  What side-effects would that have?  I don’t know.  But it sounds scary.  

As I so often say to teenagers about their sexuality, what matters to me is that you keep safe.  So if you’re finding yourself attracted to both men and women, but not getting sexually active with them, you’re of course totally fine.  Where I see a concern is if you start dating a boy and getting involved – then I imagine your father doing more than he is now.

Vedanova I don’t know your age, or how long you’re planning on staying at home.  If you’re nearing the time you’d move away, you might consider just holding off on pursuing any romantic relationships with boys till then.  And maybe, to avoid confusion and conflict, girls too.

But if we’re talking about years and years, that becomes a tougher issue.

But for now, again, I really want to emphasize that I’m impressed with you and proud of you for standing up for yourself.  While you’re not happy with the immediate results, I think you’ll be happy forever that you admitted who you are.

And that won’t be a phase!

Cheers,

Shirelle

0 What to do when you’re attached to someone with ambivalent feelings

Rebel Kid asks:

Lately I’ve been really upset. I met a girl online 7 months ago and we both like each other. 6 months ago she asked me out but broke up with me two days later because she thought we do not know each other enough and that she’s a terrible person and she might break my heart. I was really hurt cause I actually fell for her, but after a few days things became better.  We started talking and after a while we even told each other how we just want to touch each other and feel each other and how it’s getting hard to stay away. But suddenly she stopped texting me often. She said she likes my art but doesn’t like it when it’s dedicated to her. I thought she doesn’t love herself and maybe I could change that. I tried by not dedicating my art to her too often, and things were again fine. But since a month ago we haven’t been talking properly. I put in all my efforts because I love her, but I feel she doesn’t and she even admitted it. She said half of her heart wants to hold on but other half wants to let go, and she doesn’t understand why people stay – she says she can be alone for the rest of her life. I can’t stop thinking about her, I stop myself from texting her but sometimes I just do which leads to a dead conversation. I really don’t know what to say to her now that she clearly stated that she’s confused and she doesn’t know if she even wants to talk to me. She says it’s her and not me. I always understood, but now I feel like I was just time passing for her and now when she’s bored with me she doesn’t want to stay. It makes me feel terrible and I can’t even take out my anger cause I love her so much that I can’t even think of hurting her by my words. What should I do?

Hi Rebel Kid –

My friend, you are a victim of something called Ambivalence.  We dogs are pretty incapable of it – we have strong feelings about everything.  But humans, with your larger brains, often seem to experience it.  How did you feel about school last year?  Oh it was okay, some was great and some was boring and most was all right.  How do you feel about your parents’ car?  Oh it’s okay, it’s not a cool Corvette but it’s not a boring whatever either.  And, dear miss, what do you think of Rebel Kid?  Oh I love him but I don’t want to be with him and I’m not sure I even want to talk with him…

It’s got to just drive you nuts!

Now it’s totally natural for you to put a lot of effort into figuring out what’s going on with her, and why she acts this way. 

But here’s my bad news – it won’t matter.

Maybe she’s afraid of commitment because her parents had a horrible divorce and she doesn’t trust long-term relationships.  Maybe she’s afraid of her own feelings, especially about physical intimacy.  Maybe there’s something about you she doesn’t like or can’t accept, but she doesn’t want to tell you about it.

But finding out about any of these won’t make her want the relationship you want.  Or rather, it might over time, but I doubt you want to wait years for her.

So my advice, which is painful I know, is to let go.  To acknowledge that you two almost had a really great relationship, which shows that you are fully capable of having one with someone else, but that she is not.  At least not now.

Think of what it would be like (I know this sounds very rough) if you were in a wonderful romance with someone just right for you and she suddenly died.  That would be horrible, right?  Devastating.  You’d cry and grieve and miss her like anything.  And then… at some point, you’d move on.  You’d find someone else, and while they’d never be exactly the same as she’d been, your relationship could be just as good.

Well that’s what’s happened to you.  Because you and this girl had so much you liked about each other, you experienced being in a perfect relationship.  But that perfect part of her died, went away.  She wasn’t able to keep it there. 

So while the good news is that the actual person is still alive, you still need to grieve the relationship just as you would have if she weren’t.

Because – and here’s my main point – what matters isn’t the underlying reasons for the way she’s treating you… it’s that you deserve to be treated better.  Even she says so. 

So be a little selfish, and move on.  It doesn’t mean that you two can’t be friends, or even get together at a later time when she’s more capable.

But for right now, it sounds like she’s being very honest about her ambivalence – feeling more than one way about you at the same time.  And the most respectful thing you can do in return for her honesty is to accept what she says, and kindly, lovingly, step away.

Even if it hurts. 

Because the more it hurts, the more it shows how capable you are of love.  And that love should be given to someone who can happily receive it.

All my very best,

Shirelle

0 He’s a Tramp! … the hardest quality to attain

Over all the years I’ve run this website, I’ve talked about lots of movies – some good, some great, some maybe not so great.  But I’ve always insisted on one being my favorite.  My favorite love story, my favorite musical, my favorite everything.  And with the sexiest, most charming leading male ever.  Of course I’m talking about Lady and the Tramp.

This glorious animated feature is often considered one of Walt Disney’s better films (though not as historically important as his masterpieces from a decade or so earlier), but what matters to me is that it’s still the best movie about dogs ever.

Now don’t get me wrong.  There are lots of excellent movies that have dogs in them.  And a number of terrific movies about “a” dog.  But most of those are movies about humans, who have dogs in their world. 

But Lady and the Tramp is really about us.  How we live, what we value, and what we like to do.  Is it maybe a bit anthropomorphic (a long word that means animals do things that in real life only people do)?  Sure.  Like when the dogs can read!  But overall, it gets more right than wrong.

And biggest of all, it gets our single most important quality right. 

(Now I’m going to admit, what I say after this kind of requires you to have seen it.  So if you never have, you might want to catch it before you read on.  And if you do, he bigger screen you can see it on, the better – as it was made for the wide screens of the 1950s.)

If it’s been a while since you’ve caught it, the story surrounds a cocker spaniel puppy that a couple adopts and raises in their very nice home in a very nice neighborhood.  They name her Lady, which she most certainly is.  Her best friends are her neighbors Jock, a Scottie, and Trusty, an aging bloodhound.  Her life is bland and simple until the day a stray mutt, Tramp, shows up in her yard.  They like each other at once, but he insults her domestic life, and his rudeness repels her.

Soon after that, her humans have a baby, and start ignoring Lady a bit.  But when they go on a vacation, they leave the home and baby in the care of their dog-phobic Aunt Sarah.  Her cats try to destroy the house, and Lady stops them, but gets blamed for it and taken to a pet store to get muzzled, and runs away. 

Chased by some mean dogs, she’s rescued by Tramp, who takes her to a zoo to get her muzzle chewed off, and then shows her his fun carefree lifestyle, famously including eating spaghetti at an Italian restaurant, till they’re chased by a dog catcher, who nabs Lady.  Terrified in the pound, she meets other dogs, all who know and tell her about Tramp, and in particular about how many girlfriends he’s had.

Aunt Sarah frees her, but chains her to the doghouse in her yard.  Tramp shows up and tries to explain that he hadn’t abandoned her, but she wants nothing to do with him, until they spy a large rat entering the baby’s room.  Tramp gets into the house and barely wins a fight-to-the-death with the horrific vermin.  But when Aunt Sarah finds him, thinking he had attacked the baby, she calls the dog catcher to take him to the pound and put him down!

Lady tells Jock and Trusty what’s happened, and they run to catch the pound’s truck, while Lady’s humans, returning from their trip, discover the rat and realize Tramp’s heroism.  Jock and Trusty stop the truck in time, but Trusty is run over, leaving Jock in tears.

Then that Christmas, Lady’s owners bestow the now fully domesticated Tramp with a license, while their puppies play with their favorite neighbors, Jock and Trusty, who turns out to only have suffered a broken leg.

It’s good, isn’t it!  And I didn’t even get to the songs!

Looking at this movie today, there’s a lot to talk about.  Yeah, Tramp’s still my ideal fellow, but I can get a bit annoyed at how Lady’s always needing to be rescued by some male or another.  And the movie could even be called – in its own weird way – a little racist, with its evil Siamese cats singing in Chinese accents, its buffoonishly emotional Italian chefs, and its cliché’d images in the pound of Germans (the dachshund), Mexicans (a chihuahua), and even a Russian Wolfhound who quotes the works of Gorky (okay, I have to admit, that’s just hilarious!). 

However, in the end, the movie actually speaks against prejudice, as Aunt Sarah’s pro-cat-anti-dog viewpoint is proven SO wrong!  (And she even sends the family a package of dog treats for Christmas, showing that she learned her lesson.  Yes, in modern terms, Aunt Sarah gets Woke!)

But the reason I chose to write about this lovely treat of a movie is something else – something that’s never talked about in the film but is, I think, something we need to talk about a lot more in our world.  Integrity.

I got Handsome to look up a dictionary definition of Integrity.  He found two main ones: “the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles; moral uprightness” – and “the state of being whole and undivided.”  My definition would be sort of a mix between the two, where one acts on their values and has a core sincerity.

Handsome told me about a TV show a couple of years ago, where a society believes in stealing.  Not that they were dishonest exactly; they just believe it’s weak to earn things or get them through trade, and that “real men” take what they want instead.  Now I would want nothing to do with these murderous thieves, but they actually have Integrity – they openly state who and what they are, and accept the consequences for it.  At the other end of a moral spectrum, people who are willing to die for their faith rather than defend themselves absolutely have Integrity too.

Now Integrity isn’t even an issue with minerals or plants, or animals of smaller brains.  Rocks have pure Integrity, as do ponds and celery stalks and giant oaks and polar bears and cockroaches.  They can’t be anything other than they are.

It gets a little tougher when you talk about animals like horses or cats or, yes, dogs.  We can’t lie the way humans can (though humans are always accusing us of it – “I fed you two hours ago!  Don’t tell me I didn’t!”).  But since we are taught rules, we can choose to follow or break them.  For example, if a dog is told to stay off a couch, and only gets onto the couch when the people aren’t home, does that dog have Integrity or not?  On one hand, the dog is following a deeper rule (Don’t get on the couch when the humans are there), but on the other it’s living a lie (Act completely subservient and let them think I’m perfectly good, though I know I’m actually sneaking around behind their backs and doing what they don’t want)!

            But this gets way bigger when it comes to you humans.  You guys are so good at lying, betraying, hypocrisy, all that – so Integrity takes a lot of work when someone has as big a brain as you! 

            Think of those two definitions – moral uprightness and being whole – and imagine a woman in a marriage that has no spark who’s fallen in love with her coworker.  If she sticks with her marriage, she’s obeying definition one, but wouldn’t divorcing or having an affair be more in keeping with definition two?  She’d be fully herself, while breaking the most serious vow she ever made.

            What about the honest police officer who needs money to pay for his son’s medical operation, and finds some easy-to-steal money?  Is it more moral to save his son or obey the law?

            And what about when you did something years ago that you now regard as immoral, but to admit it would make other people’s lives worse today?

            Is Integrity even possible for a human?

            I’ll argue that it is. But it requires the ability to change, and openly own that change. Maybe that woman makes the choice to leave her marriage, or to change workspaces to avoid that coworker. She’s insisting on her Integrity, one way or another. Or maybe that officer does take the money, but spends the rest of his life working to pay it back. Again, the person has to change in some way, to allow for what’s different in their lives.

            And then, let’s go back to the movie (admitting, again, that the characters are pretty anthropomorphic), and look at the characters there. Those cats have basically NO Integrity (yes, they share their evil secrets with each other, but they are so phony to Aunt Sarah!).  While Jock shows great integrity (if you accept his hiding his bones from Lady and pretending there’s nothing there!).  And Trusty seems to live in a state of delusion about his tracking abilities, but he’s still a good caring guy.  And of course both of them show enormous Integrity in risking their lives to save Tramp, whom they initially didn’t like.

            Does Lady have Integrity?  Sure.  She sticks by her values as best she can.  When she runs away, it’s out of terror at the muzzle, not her cheating on her responsibilities – and she does say she needs to go back home after she’s free of it, to protect the baby. 

            But then we come to Tramp.  Does he?  Well, when he’s living free and easy, you could argue that, sure, he’s got full wholeness-Integrity in his love of a trampy life.  But once he meets Lady, he changes.  Suddenly he wants her for his girlfriend, which means he needs to cover up his past from her; letting her know about the other girls would mean he’d lose her!  So he’s stuck – and not fully being himself.

            But then, two events enable him to regain his Integrity.  First, Lady’s experience in the pound teaches her everything she needs to know about him (particularly courtesy of that great Peggy Lee song, “He’s a Tramp, but they love him / Breaks a new heart every day / He’s a Tramp, they adore him – and I only hope he’ll stay that way!”).  And then, while she’s rebuffing him for his past, that rat shows up, and he proves his worth for eternity.

            And the end of the movie shows it.  Suddenly his past is irrelevant.  He’s a husband, a father, and a heroic licensed pet.  Yes he has a past, and he owns it, but he has changed, and he owns that change too.  And as such, while all the adoring dogs in the pound might be unhappy with those changes, he has regained his Integrity.

            If there’s one thing we dogs can teach you humans, it’s this: Integrity is the best quality anyone can have.  We might cheat about the couch, or sneak food off the kitchen counter, but at our core we are honest.  We might live in love the way I do, or in fear as my friend Aria often does, but we are who we are.  It’s easy for us. 

            While for you, it’s a lifetime of work.  Especially as you grow and learn and change, which is just what you ought to do. 

            Because it really matters in the long run.  Someone might be disappointed that you’re not the person they want you to be, but fundamentally they’ll respect you.  Whereas, if you lack Integrity, they never can.  No matter how much they enjoy what you do for them.

            And more than that, having Integrity is what allows you to be loved!  Think of how easy it is to fully adore a dog or a cat or a baby, because we have that full Integrity.  But it’s harder to love an adult person that way, because they’re so much more likely to disappoint you by their lack of it.  But remember: people want to love each other, so they’re going to give you a break as much as they can.  Think of when you were a child and first realized your parent had a real flaw – they cheated at something or lied or just failed.  That was tough for you, but you still managed to trust and love them enough, because you wanted to.  Or maybe you had a boyfriend or girlfriend who just kept blowing it – breaking promises, flaking out, or being cruel to you.  Remember how you tried and tried to keep believing in them, so that you could feel loving and loved?  And how it felt when you realized you couldn’t anymore?  That they had so little Integrity you couldn’t find what to love?

            So yes, you’re not as perfect as us (and even we might not be as perfect as the characters in a movie, who never shed in the house or pee on a carpet!).  But Integrity will get you closer and closer to it.  And with that, you can be trusted, and respected.  And loved.

            Be a lady or a tramp, but be yourself.  And then, at the very worst, they’ll sing of you just what I’d sing of that hero if he were real…

“You can never tell when he’ll show up.
He gives you plenty of trouble.

I guess he’s just a no-count pup
But I wish that he were double!

0 What to do when they say they need to break up to concentrate on their career.

hey hey peg asks:

I have been in a relationship for last 6 months and I really really love this guy and its pretty serious.
It was going all good but just two days ago he told me that this is not gonna work out.  He would get distracted from his goals and it’s better that we break up.  He says that we should stop here and think about it after 3 years when he graduates! But I have got so attached to him that I just can’t let him go, and I am ready to do anything to work this out –but he is just not ready to listen to me, to trust that I would stand by him no matter what, and would never distract him or take him away from his goals.  What should I do to convince him that we shouldn’t end this? Because we still love each other. I don’t think I will ever have a bond stronger than that I had with him. If he is very firm on his decision, how would I let him go?

Hi hey hey peg –

I’m awfully sorry this happened.  I know what it’s like to pin all my hopes on someone and then have them just walk away (it happened a number of times to me in the dog pound).  It’s just awful.

And I also know what it’s like to love someone who’s all focused on their dreams and career and studies and doesn’t have time for you (Yes, I’m looking at Handsome as I write this!  He knows who I’m talking about!  Mr. No-Time-For-A-Walk!). 

So I’m able to give you my simple quick advice, and some follow-up.  Which is necessary, because my advice is to Let Him Go.

Now you’ll notice, I didn’t say to break up.  I said to let him go.  Why?  Because if you don’t, you’ll completely prove him right.  “See, hey hey peg, I knew that you’d just keep demanding my time and attention and keeping me from doing the work I need to do!”  Whereas if you step back and say “Okay,” suddenly he’ll have all the room he needs.

But you don’t need, then, to go anywhere!  Let him know that you’re around to talk with, that you’ll be glad to be his friend, just as he needs for now. 

I don’t know where you live, hey hey peg, but if your schools are on the same schedule as the ones where I am, he’s heading into final exams, and maybe has some huge papers and projects due too.  So he has every reason to want to put all his focus on them.  And that’s fine.  But they will end.

Now he may also have some other things in mind that he’s not telling you, too.  Maybe he’s getting a little bored in your relationship (that’s so common with this awful lockdown) and thinking he’d like, when he has time, to pursue someone else.  Okay, let him!  Is anyone else going to be as good to him as you’re being right now?  Will anyone else give him this space, and know and love him the way you do?  Maybe he has to go try with someone, but most likely you’ll keep looking better to him.

And there’s another benefit to letting him go.  Which is – what if he’s really moving on, what if he’s going to be happier outside of your relationship?  Well, if you can become “just friends” with him, it’s going to be a lot easier for you to find someone else too. 

And what if you find someone just as he realizes he was happier with you, and wants to make your relationship work again?

Oh well that would be sooooooo sad, wouldn’t it?  For him to have to compete, to try to win you back, to give you all the attention and love and crazy affection in the world to get you back from this other person?!!!

In other words, hey hey peg, I think there’s just one simple answer.  You don’t need to lie to him – you can tell him you really hope to get back together.  But give him that space he craves.  And let him enjoy it… and then… let him not!

All my best,

Shirelle

0 Is it possible to trust someone completely?

PERFECTION asks:

When you fully trust someone does that mean you don’t get jealous anymore? What does it mean to really fully trust someone?

Hi PERFECTION –

            That’s a really great question.  I think there are two answers – and both are… yes.

            Here’s what I’m thinking.  I trust Handsome with every molecule in me.  I know he can make mistakes (like accidentally stepping on my tail!), but I know he would never do anything to hurt me on purpose.  He always wants the best for me.  No question. 

            But because I value him so much, I can go a little crazy when he’s too friendly with another dog.  But I don’t get mad at him, I just get very rough with the pooch – making sure he or she knows “That Man Is Mine!”  I don’t want anyone trying to steal him away, or to get too much of his attention that I love so much.

            But that’s one kind of jealousy.  There’s the other kind that eats at one’s soul.  It has less to do with what anyone else is doing than about ourselves – when a person feels they’re not good enough, they’re terrified that their partner is going to see them that same way, and leave them for someone more attractive, richer, stronger, whatever. 

            So to get back to your question – if I trust someone fully, I might get jealous of someone else’s interest in them, but I also could have such a low opinion of myself that I get jealous out of the thought that they’ll start seeing me the same way I do.  It’s two different kinds of jealousy (and I can tell you, the first kind is a lot more pleasant to live with!).

            But when you ask what it means to fully trust someone, I’ll go back to what I said about Handsome and my tail.  Sure you might idealize someone and think they’re perfect and can never make mistakes – but you’ll be wrong.  But if you see them as they are, and know that they care fully about you, then yes that’s a legitimate way of fully trusting in them.  And it is a beautiful feeling indeed!

All my best,

Shirelle

0 The Aquarian Apocalypse …a fable for our times…

            Certain kinds of stories transcend place and time.  For example, did you know that almost every land on Earth has some version of Cinderella, long before they’d have heard them from each other? 

            One that seems to show up in every culture that existed around the ancient Mediterranean is of The Great Flood.  You know it – that humans were so awful that God (or the Gods) flooded the whole world out, but one man was so good that he was warned in advance from above, and built a great ship on which he saved one member of every species of animal, along with his family.

            Another sort of story we hear about is where God (or the Gods) test people, and punish or kill everyone who doesn’t give the right response.  The Jewish story of the Passover might be the best known of this (due to exciting movies of it like The Ten Commandments!).  In it, God sends a plague that kills the first-born of every family that doesn’t put a sign of devotion on their doors, but it ‘passes over’ the homes that do.  Pretty harsh, huh!

            Then there’s another sort of apocalyptic warning tale. It’s more modern, and showed up a lot in stories written after the invention of the atomic bomb.  In these, either mankind learns from disasters to master its newfound power and move forward, or it doesn’t and is ruined (by those disasters), or it’s warned in apocalyptic terms of just how dangerous this new power is.  In other words, the stories all have the same moral: “If we don’t learn how to stop fighting each other, we’re going the way of the dinosaurs!”

            I was thinking about these three kinds of stories recently, when it hit me that we may be living through a fourth one – one that isn’t being written or filmed; it’s literally happening to us. 

            You see, odd as it may seem, we’ve actually survived the other ones.  Whatever awfulness humans were doing before The Great Flood, it hasn’t been repeated, so you guys must have improved!  And while horrible acts have been perpetrated on people for their faith over the last 2500 years, the world seems to have survived the vengeance of their deities. 

            And maybe most amazing of all, the human race, for all its flaws, has gone 75 years without using atomic weapons on each other.  Pretty astounding when you think of it!

            So I guess the overall moral here is that, slowly but surely, humans do learn their lessons.  But there’s always room for growth, right?

            Well, what about our current coronavirus apocalypse?  Is there anything we can learn from it?  It hasn’t decimated the entire world, or picked favorites based on ethnicity or faith.  And it hasn’t created any devastating wars, yet.

            Is this something completely new?  Something promising to raise humanity to a higher level?

            Maybe.

            I argued in the last Pawprint about how sad and furious I was that people’s laziness and stupidity had allowed the virus to grow and spread for so long that it killed one of my favorite people.  And yes, I’m still very angry about that.

            But what if we look at it another way?  What if the whole human race is being taught a lesson, one you need more than ever?  What if it’s on purpose that this disease demands something all new from everyone?

            Not to care for yourselves, or your families, or even all of humanity.  But to care for “the other.”

            So here’s the story I’m suggesting.  A new fable:

            One morning, the Great Dog in the Sky looked down at the world She had created, and said, “Humans have evolved well.  They no longer do such unspeakable things that I need to eliminate them and start over, and they now treat other religions well enough that I don’t need to kill their children; and they’ve even shown some restraint in how they fight each other.  But while they’ve improved in some ways, they have gotten worse in one.  They are selfish than ever!”

            And of course, She was correct.  The growth in their intelligence and skills had made humans less dependent on their tribes, and more focused on themselves and those closest to them – to the degree of often not caring about anyone else.  They figured “somebody” would take care of anyone in pain, and smugly assumed that any poor or destitute person must deserve it.  They no longer were trying to eliminate everyone who was different from them, but they had not yet learned to truly love each other, in the way the world needed.

            So She sent down a new plague.  A plague unlike any before.  This plague hurt or killed some people, but infected far more, without showing any symptoms.  And once humans learned the basic facts about it, they realized something new – that the only way to beat the new plague would be to wear masks, keep distant, and keep clean.  Not to protect themselves, but to protect each other!

            At first, most humans didn’t grasp this concept.  “But if I’m feeling okay, then I can’t be sick, so there’s nothing wrong with my going about my life as usual,” they insisted.  But then bit by bit they learned.  They went to a fun party and came home, and unintentionally infected and killed their grandparents.  They took their daughter to a religious ceremony to teach them moral lessons, after which she gave her best friend lung damage for life.  They screamed for their favorite team at a sports event, resulting in local hospitals filling their beds with patients on breathing machines, while other people died waiting to get let in.

            And meanwhile, they also suffered the lack of everything they loved doing together.  Restaurants and concerts and plays and movies and sports events.  And even going to school.  All of these got stopped because of the danger caused by people who didn’t know they were contagious.

            And so, bit by bit, the people learned.  They started acting as if they were sick, even if they were almost certain they weren’t.  They politely gave room to those they were walking past.  They wore masks even though the nasty things were uncomfortable and made their faces break out.  They sanitized themselves before and after encountering everyone.

            And even those who got vaccinated, guaranteeing them that they’d not be hurt by the disease, kept masked and distant and clean, in case they might carry the disease and spread it to others.

            And as enough people learned to act in such an unselfish way, the Great Dog chose to reward them with a lovely treat: she started to take the virus away. 

And slowly, just as the flood and earlier plagues had receded, the world began to re-open.  Schools enabled youngsters to meet and play and grow together.  Theaters and restaurants took people in to give them joy and sustenance.  Gatherings increased, with embraces and jostling and mosh pits and fistfights – everything everyone had enjoyed before.

            But with a new understanding. 

            You see, humans had been telling each other that the key to happiness was to treat others the way you wanted to be treated, to love your neighbor as yourself, for millennia.  Now they learned the next level of that – that you have to actually take care of each other!  Just wishing the other well isn’t enough. 

            And the world was better forever after.

            Do you like this story?  I do!

See, If a dog howls in pain, other dogs will join in and howl along with them.  That’s our pack mindset.  If a dog smells fatal illness in another, they might try to kill them, instinctively acting on the harsher side of our pack rules.

            Where humans are heading is to another level.  To say “It doesn’t matter whether I sense it or not, I need to alter my behavior for my fellow human.  That’s the only way to have the world I want.”

            In other words, the key to each person’s selfish desires is to act unselfishly!  You want your job back?  You want movies and concerts back?  You want to start meeting cute attractive people in public again, so one of them might be all you desire?  Then take care of the person next to you!  Everyone needs to do just this!  That’s the only way it can happen!

            And that’s the lesson the whole world’s been getting taught for the past year.  The sooner more people learn it, the sooner everyone gets better off.  And the longer people insist on sticking to their old mindsets…  well, you know.

            Oh, but there are two aspects to my idea I’ve forgotten to include.  First, this has actually been predicted.  Not the stupid virus, but the place I like to think the world is moving.  Astrologers and some religions have spoken for years about the Aquarian Age – an era that will involve mutual understanding, after the past era, the Piscean Age, of conquest and domination.  Don’t look for one specific date; the idea is that we’re in a period of transition into it.  Depending on where you read, this transition might take decades or it might take centuries!  But every time people learn to think of others in their actions more, that’s a great step forward into it.

            And the second aspect?  Oh that’s the best part of the story.  When the Great Dog in the Sky saw that humanity had learned and grown, she threw a great party up there – a party for all who had perished in this recent plague.  And all of them felt pride about being part of this wonderful change, and sang and danced to all the songs they’d most loved in their times on Earth, and beamed down love on those still here below.  Which led to them deciding that the song they wanted to dance to the most, regardless of their musical tastes, was of course…

            So why not get up and dance with them!  I do!

Love,

Shirelle

0 How to choose where to live when you each want different things

Miss Pawco asks:

I wish to seek some relationship advice from you and to gain a third person perspective apart from his or mine or any biased friend. I am a career oriented woman working in a metropolitan city and very much in love with city life. My boyfriend is currently settled in his hometown (small hill station), operating a cafe. He has agreed on a middle ground situation where we would settle in a tier 3 city (1 hour drive from his town) so that I am able to continue my passion of working in the IT industry. This is evidently the only possible solution visible to us but sometimes he nags me for not being able to live a life like his in a small town and for having an inclination towards city life, and for prioritizing my career over him. He says I think superior of myself and can’t adjust to the situation he has to offer. I do want to be with him but not at the cost of giving up my dreams and identity. Please help.

Hi Miss Pawco –

So I should throw in a warning from the beginning.  I’ve never met you and doubt I ever will, but you should still consider me a “biased friend.”  I adore my pack members, and, even when I disagree with you, will always support you as best I can.

Though with this situation, I can’t really side with either you or your boyfriend on what’s right and what’s wrong.  It certainly does sound like he’s mistaken when he says that your love and ambition for your career means that you think you’re superior to him.  But otherwise, you’re both right – he’s found the lifestyle he likes, and you’ve found a career you love.  And you both want to be with each other.  So that’s difficult.  And no one’s fault.

I do worry that he has that old-fashioned mindset that says a woman should put her ambitions second to her man’s, and that therefore you ought to be willing to live wherever he does.  But even if he does, I’m not sure he realizes that’s influencing his thinking.  Certainly other couples would choose to live where one of them would make the most money.  While others would choose the place they think is best for raising children.  Any of these make sense, and none has to be the rule you two choose to follow.

But did you catch the trick I pulled just then.  I talked about how some couples choose one thing, and some another, and then mentioned what “you two choose.”

But right now, you two aren’t choosing.  He’s choosing one thing and you another.  And the two of you are trying to make it work.  He’s so far been willing to compromise with you on where to live, but clearly he’s not liking what he’s agreed to.  So something else has to happen.

Now maybe he’s really just geared to living in a small town, and nothing else is going to feel right to him, and he needs to just do that; and if so, you might feel you just can’t agree to do that with him, and you two need to split up with great respect and love for each other.  Or maybe this current compromise, while not ideal for either of you, is a price worth paying so that you two can stay together.  Or maybe there’s a better choice for the two of you to make.

My one insistence, though, is that you two agree that what you choose is acceptable, at least for a while.  In other words, if he agrees to that Tier 3 City, he needs to really try to make it work, and not complain about it to you.  Or if you move to his town, you agree to try your best to enjoy it.  And biggest of all, both of you need to promise each other to never again make personal judgments about each other part of this discussion!

When my human friend Handsome takes me for a walk, sometimes I want to go chase another dog, or stay and sniff a tree for a long time, while he wants to keep walking as he intended.  We disagree, and will struggle before agreeing to something (perhaps because he jerks my leash and insists!).  But I will never tell him “You just want to keep going because you’re a control freak and hate being away from your desk!”  And he’ll never tell me “You want to sniff this tree because you’re a dumb dog and can’t read a book!”  I mean, neither of us would ever do that!  We respect each other’s wishes and feelings too much!

So I’m all for you and your boyfriend to keep doing what you need to figure out what’s best for you two.  But please, insist that he stop accusing you of thinking you’re superior.  And make sure you don’t make a similar accusation of him.

As I keep saying, you’re both right, and you both deserve complete respect.  If you come from that place, all this difficulty will become much easier and more tolerable.  I promise.

Best of Luck with it!

Shirelle

0 Should one share a gift with others?

Maya asks:

Hey Shirelle 
Are relationship gifts meant to be shared? 
For instance say I am in a relationship.  My boyfriend buys me something for our Anniversary, then I permit my sister wear it, or maybe she takes it without asking me, and I am like, very okay with sharing it. Tell me Shirelle, what are your tips when it comes to buying and giving out gifts, like are they meant to be shared with others?  Because I believe the significant other won’t feel good about it.  What do you think?

Hi Maya –

I love sharing, and I love even more when things are shared with me, like whatever Handsome is eating!

But of course, people take gifts very seriously, especially when a lot of thought and emotion has gone into them.  And even thought the gift is arguably “given,” some gifts are actually requests.  The easiest example of this is a wedding ring – if I give you one, and you accept it, you’re giving me yourself in marriage.  And I’d sure be bothered to see you re-gifting it to someone else!!  (Don’t worry, I’m not actually proposing to you; I’m fully committed to Handsome.  But hey you could do worse – Handsome tells me I’m quite a catch!)

On the other hand, if I gave you, say, a book, and you let your sister borrow it, that probably wouldn’t bother me at all.  And even if I had given you a wedding ring, I’d probably be honored to see your friends try it on and see how beautiful it was, and tell you how lucky you were to have me, “Oh Maya, you got the best dog EVER as a spouse!”

Now with your question, this is a tough one.  I’m sure your boyfriend would be bothered if you actually gave his gift to your sister.  That would seem very insulting.  But to let her borrow it – maybe he’s fine with that, I don’t know. 

I think the best thing would be for you to ask him what he thinks is best.  But – and here’s my main advice here – ask it in a very specific way.  Tell him how beautiful it is, and how much it means to you.  And then say that it’s so beautiful that your sister really wants to borrow it and wear it to something special.  But, while you want to make your sister happy, it’s more important to you that he be okay with it. 

Do you see what I’m doing here?  Instead of letting her wear it and making him feel unimportant, you’d be telling him just how important it is to you, how special.  Because that’s what matters most.

I have a funny story that deals with this.  When Handsome was a teenager, he was dating a girl whose parents didn’t trust him with her, and especially her father didn’t like him much at all – just because Handsome was dating his daughter.  For her birthday, Handsome baked a cake for the first time, and it came out pretty awful – one side rose but the other didn’t, some was fluffy some was almost liquid.  He tried to fix it by adding extra icing on the one side, and it didn’t work.  But of course it still tasted okay – it just looked lousy.  He brought it to her, with many apologies, and took her out for the evening.  And when they got back to her house… they found that her parents had eaten half of it!  Was he upset that his gift had gone to someone other than his beloved?  No way – he was thrilled!  Their eating the cake made him feel more accepted by them than he ever had before! 

So there’s no single answer.  Try my words with your boyfriend, and I imagine all will become clearer.

And if you think of it, send me a photo of what he gave you!  I’d love to see it!

Thanks,

Shirelle

0 Should you worry if your different-sex partner kisses someone of their sex?

Outcast asks:
Lately my girlfriend told me she kissed her female friend. Her reason was that her friend was nice and she was curious to see how it felt kissing another girl.  It’s been two weeks since she told me . But I think I lost that trust towards her, though most friends tell me it’s not a bad thing. I’m confused on how I should feel or act about this.

Hi Outcast –

Okay, let’s get this out of the way for starters: I love to kiss EVERYBODY!  Men, women, boys, girls, all sorts of dogs, the sides of trees, hey I’ve even kissed a couple of cats in my day!  So how you humans avoid kissing all of each other is just beyond me.

But I know that the sort of kissing you’re talking about isn’t the same as me running up and taking a big slurp on the side of someone’s face.  Or if your girlfriend had kissed her grandmother.  This was more of a romantic kiss, a sexual kiss.  And she wanted to find out how it felt to do that with a girl, since she’d only tried it with boys before.

And you say you’re confused as to how you should feel or act.  And I’m going to emphasize one word of that: you’re confused as to how you SHOULD feel or act.

And my answer to that is… no.

That there is no such thing as “Should” in this case.

Now there are some people who will tell you “What she did is wrong, and so you should break up with her.”  But I’m not one of those.  What they did was inquisitive and harmless, to my mind.

But maybe you feel horrified and disgusted and mistrusting, “If she would kiss that girl, then what else might she do, the next time she gets curious?  Flirt with my dad?  Make out with my best friend?  Take her shirt off in church?!”  And if that’s the case, then you clearly need to talk with her, and find out where her boundaries lie.  What is “interesting” to her, and what’s “off limits.”

Or maybe you feel excited, “I hope she does it again so I can watch!  Or maybe she and her friend would both make out with me at the same time!”

Or maybe you don’t really care all that much.

Now you say you’re feeling a loss of trust.  But I think it’s really important to answer two big questions then.  First, what is it you’re not trusting – that she kissed anyone, that she was willing to try kissing someone of the same sex, that she was even curious about it?

And secondly, how did she feel about it?  Has she told you?  Did she love it?  Did she want to do more of it?  Or did she feel “It’s just the same as kissing a boy?”  Or maybe even “It was nothing, I didn’t feel anything at all?”

The fact is, Outcast, we live in a very particular time.  Because humans are getting more accepting of different sorts of sexualities that have been shunned for centuries, that also means people – especially young people – are trying more things out.  “Am I bisexual?”  “Am I actually a different gender, or gender-fluid?”  And these questions aren’t a bad thing at all.  Especially if they help people get happier, and help people accept others more than they have before.

Don’t get me wrong – if one’s religion or moral beliefs dictate that they shouldn’t even try such things, I’m not going to say they’re wrong.  But just as I don’t want to see one person hate another because that person eats foods they don’t believe are morally or religiously right, I also don’t want to see hatred of another for who they’re attracted to, or who they innately feel they are.

So what all this leads to is… talk with her.  Find out how she feels, and what she wants.  And then have an even bigger talk with yourself.  And see what you really, deep down, feel about what she says.

But I can say that I’m a lot more likely to judge someone for kicking a dog than for kissing anyone.

All my very best,

Shirelle