Sars,

I have a problem and no one to talk to about it. Everyone I know is too concerned with their own lives at the moment to give a crap about what I’m going through. So, of course, I’m writing to you.

I have this friend (I’ll call her “Anne”) who is really pissing me off, and I have no idea what to do about it. Anne has been my best friend for four years and is completely ignoring me. She got a boyfriend about five months ago and ever since then has been completely distant. I know this sounds like a really classic and simple problem, but I don’t know what to do about it. She knows how much this hurts me because I have told her point-blank that it does. She also knows that the fact that she is ignoring me because of a GUY is basically the most painful thing she could do to me. This is because two years ago my newly divorced mother found a guy and basically forgot about me. (I was 15 at the time.) Within a month, this guy and his 16-year-old son were living in my house and after another month they were married. My older sister moved in with my dad because the guy was a psycho bastard who controlled everything my mother did and wouldn’t let her go anywhere without him. Meanwhile, I was stuck at my house with psycho stepdad because I do not get along with me father at all. Also, my mother couldn’t see this because she was in “love” and thought he was great. She completely ignored me and how I felt the entire time. She filed for divorce a few months after they were married, but continued seeing him and lying to me about it. She got a restraining order against him because he was stalking her (and I’m pretty sure me as well), but continued to see him anyways.

So I have trust and abandonment issues. My sister and I were close for a while, but every time she gets a new boyfriend, she ignores me as well. I’m beginning to think I’m doing something to cause this.

Anyway, back to the problem with Anne. She has been working a lot and has been very busy, yet she still calls and sees her boyfriend. I haven’t seen her in about a month (she lives four HOUSES away from me), and she hasn’t called me in a week. She swore she would call me this week and we would do something. I know I should probably just forget about her because she isn’t being a good friend, but I don’t have many other good friends. I’m not a big people person and prefer to have a few good friends rather than many regular friends. So, what should I do? Do I give her a second chance or just forget about her?

Hurting

Dear Hurting,

You’ve given her several second chances; she’s not taking them.Forget about her.I mean, don’t make a big drama out of it.Just…let it go.

I know you have issues, and for good reason; you should think about counseling so that you can find constructive ways to deal with those issues and not turn them around on yourself.But in the interim, a reminder: We can’t control how other people behave.We can only control how we react to the behavior.As far as Anne goes, you can’t make her snap out of her boyfriend trance and hang out with you…but you can decide not to count on her.You can decide not to beat yourself up for her apathy; you can decide that it’s not you, it’s her.

It hurts when friends pull this shit, but it’s also a sign that it’s time for you to make new friends — more mature friends who can balance the demands of friends and boyfriends a bit better.Accept that and move on.

Dear Sars,

First, a little background: I’m 24, female, one (younger) sister, great parents.They have been married for 27 years and, by all appearances, are still mad for each other.Both my mom and dad are good-looking and fit and appear younger than their actual ages.They look (and act) like a perfect couple and they seem to love spending time together.I had always hoped I’d have a marriage like theirs.As I’ve grown older, I have come to truly enjoy their company and I feel as though I can talk to them about almost anything.

Friday, they left for a short vacation (not unusual in the least).My sister, who still lives at home, was taking care of their dog.She called me yesterday, said she had tickets to a concert, and begged me to watch the dog.Since I had nothing urgent to do, I agreed.While at the house, I decided to check my email.My parents have a computer, but only my dad uses it on a regular basis; however, he lets me use it whenever I want, as it’s much faster than mine.

Email checked, I went to the History tab (which I don’t normally use) to find a website I’d looked up the last time I was there.I found a long list of porn sites (kind of disgusting, but not what’s bothering me).In addition to the porn, there were several listings for “Married But Lonely” chat forums and a “discreet” dating site for married people.My dad had actually placed an ad on one of these…it began something like “Fortysomething business executive seeks married woman for discreet fun,” and there were messages from him stating that he was looking for women in the city where we live.

I’m sickened.I’ve always wondered somewhere in the back of my mind if my dad had ever cheated on my mom (his job requires frequent travel, so he would’ve had the opportunity, and I’ve seen the way women look at him), but I tried not to think about it.Now I’ve been smacked in the face with it.I really don’t know what to do.I doubt that my mother has even an inkling of what he’s been up to — she can be incredibly naive at times.

Now what?I have always thought that my dad was an honest person.I love both my parents more than I can say, but I am horribly confused.I don’t know if I should even say anything to my sister, much less either of my parents.I know, I know…parents are people, and people are fallible.I know that, but I feel like I’ve lost all faith in my dad, and I don’t know what to do about my mom.Something like this would totally wreck her.

Perhaps it sounds like I was snooping, but I really wasn’t looking for anything.It just didn’t occur to me.I’m horrified by what I found, and I wish I’d never seen it.I don’t know how I drove back to my place last night…I was so distracted I don’t even remember the trip.

Anything you can tell me will be welcome.I’m at a complete loss right now.

Shattered in Chicago

Dear Shattered,

I don’t know what to tell you.I’ve never faced a situation like this; I can’t imagine I’d ever have to.My parents have a great marriage, too, not to mention that my dad is so deeply square — and I mean that in the best possible way — as to make the concept of his having an affair utterly impossible for me to grasp.

So I’ll just think out loud here for a bit about what I would do if I’d discovered something like that on my dad’s laptop.Okay, first I’d have to lie down for awhile.Then I’d have to get extremely drunk in order to calm the heebs.Then I’d call my dad up and ask him to lunch, and at lunch, I’d say, “Look, Dad…you know how you guys went out of town and Mr. Stupidhead was taking care of the dog?Well, he went to a concert one night, so I came by to walk the dog and checked my email, and afterwards I clicked on the History tab of your browser.”Pause.”Anything you want to tell me about?”If he didn’t say anything, I’d tell him what I’d found.

From there, it would kind of depend on how he reacted.Knowing my father, he’d inform me gruffly that it’s not my business, and then I’d have to say, “Well, Dad, I know, and I don’t want to tell you how to live, but the thing is, I can’t un-find those links.This is a pretty big secret I have to keep now and I know you didn’t want me to find out, but I have, and now we’ve got to deal with that.”I’d probably bitch him out for not clearing his cache and accuse him of secretly wanting Ma to find out.And then I’d tell him, “Listen.I don’t want to rat you out.I never wanted to know this.I won’t tell Ma or Mr. Stupidhead, but if you get busted, I won’t lie for you, and if you’re smart, you’ll knock that shit off RIGHT NOW so that I’m not put in that position.I resent having to keep this kind of thing to myself, and I’d appreciate it if you’d just…stop, so that there’s nothing to ‘keep’ anymore.”

Then I’d tell him that I love him and I always will, but he’d better smarten up, because what he’s doing is wrong and we both know it.

I don’t know how your father would take that.I don’t know if you’d rather just out him to your mother and sister.I don’t know if perhaps your parents have an “arrangement” that you aren’t aware of.I don’t know if what I’d do is the best idea for you; I would give my own father the high sign that I’m onto him and he’d better watch himself, but that’s me.

It’s a horrible, thankless situation.Good luck with it.

Hello Sarah,

I don’t know if you can help me, but so far my regular primal screaming sessions aren’t doing the trick, so here goes…

Everyone I know is pregnant all at once!This is all very exciting, as you can imagine, but as I am not sporting the baby bulge myself, my interest in all things baby is a bit limited.Unfortunately, my friends can’t seem to talk of anything else.I’ve tried steering the subject towards politics, television, the guy with the pink mohawk on my bus, but pregnancy seems to have instilled in my friends a remarkable ability to turn any topic back to baby. “If my child ever tries the mohawk routine, I’ll…”I love hearing about potential names and going shopping for baby clothes, but extended discussion on nursing, the pros and cons of the pacifier, and what’s in the diaper are putting a strain on some of my friendships.

Any advice on what to expect when your friends are expecting?Dare I hope this will fade once the kids are on the scene?

Babied Down and Out in L.A.

Dear Babied,

A kid changes your life, forever, in huge ways.The short answer?You can expect…this, pretty much.And…no.

Generally speaking, the best thing I can say about any given child is that it’s not getting on my nerves.So, you know, I hear you.But that’s your friends’ lives now — midnight feedings and Mommy & Me classes and whatnot — and you’ll have to accept that.Kids alter priorities and schedules and just about everything else, and it’s not uncommon for friendships to fade when one friend starts a family and the other doesn’t.It doesn’t always happen that way, of course, but — okay, my own parents socialize with a fairly wide range of people of all ages and upbringings and so on.I can think of exactly one (straight) couple in that range that doesn’t have children of their own.I would hardly characterize my parents as Seinfeld-ian “ya gotta see the BAY-BEE” types, either; they went out, they had parties, they kept up with their friends after we came along, but my hometown is basically a place to which people move specifically to raise children because of the schools and blah blah blah, and that’s how it goes.

Don’t feel bad if you have to take yourself out of the pregnancy feedback loop a little bit; breast pumping isn’t in and of itself a boring subject, but if you’ve got nothing to add to the discussion, it can get pretty tiresome.Leave your expecting friends to their own devices more often, and think about expanding your social circle to include friends who don’t have kids.

[12/13/01]

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