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Dear Prudence,
My retired father lives with me in our garage apartment. We live off a bend in a river where there is a park nearby, so we built up a shaded lookout so my father could continue his bird watching and sketching. He was an avid amateur artist in his youth and has become so good that he was featured at our local cultural council. He was so proud of his work until some nosy woman made it her business to track down some of the families he featured in his pictures.
These were perfectly innocent and public pieces, like a dad and son fishing or a mom watching her kids on the swings. Several families were flattered and even wanted the pictures, while a few bad apples acted disgusted and dared to suggest my father was a pervert of some kind. We got a lot of community support, but the other negativity has weighed my father and his enthusiasm down. He rarely goes out to look or pick up his art anymore. He just watches TV. This is so frustrating, and I am furious. We were talking about my father holding workshops here, and I was thinking of putting up additional picnic areas so we could have more people over.
He was very depressed when he moved in with me after my mom died, and his health got worse. I had the space, time, and funds while my brother and his family were struggling (my brother’s stepdaughter got pregnant at 16 and is currently pregnant again and sitting in jail). I don’t know what to do here. My husband thinks we just need to give my father time and space, but the unfairness of it all makes me want to spit nails. What do I do here? I feel that if I push or don’t, I will just make things worse.
—Art Lover
Dear Art Lover,
This is so unfortunate. But there’s hope. I think the fact that your father is totally emotionally derailed by the negative reactions to his art may be related to the depression he had when he arrived at your home. While the painting provided a temporary distraction, maybe his underlying tendency to see himself and his life in a really negative light and to sink into despair was still there, lying dormant, and was simply activated by his critics.
Is there any way you could put the art aside for the moment to get him some mental health support? That would be the best use of your time, because it’s impossible to protect him from life’s insults and unfair moments. In the coming years, he may face additional health issues, family tensions (and even fights), and lose friends and loved ones. So, prioritize finding a provider who can talk to him or even possibly prescribe medication. Once that is handled, start leaving art supplies around, and hopefully, he’ll feel up to using his talents again.
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Dear Prudence,
My husband and I have been letting his mother, “Kathy,” watch our 10-month-old son, “Damon,” while we have been trying to find a caregiver for him since his previous one had to move to another city to care for an ill family member. Things were going very well, and I thought that maybe this arrangement could work for us on a long-term basis until I discovered something terrible: Kathy has been using Damon to aid her in shoplifting.
I came home from work early one day just as Kathy was getting Damon settled back in his playpen from a trip to the grocery store. When I picked him up to hug him, I felt an object in his diaper. I checked to see what it was and found three costume jewelry necklaces wrapped in a tissue. I put my son down and went to the kitchen, where Kathy was putting the groceries away, and confronted her. Not only did she not attempt to deny what she did, but she even rationalized it by saying the store wouldn’t miss it since they are a big corporation!
I am at a loss as to what to do here. My husband and I don’t yet have child care for Damon, but the last thing I want is for my MIL to continue to use him as her accomplice with her five-finger discounts. Help!
—Loaded Diaper
Dear Loaded Diaper,
I’m more alarmed by Kathy putting strange objects in your son’s diaper, which seems uncomfortable at best and dangerous at worst, than I am about her exposing him to a life of crime. But the shoplifting part is concerning, too. The fact that she’s totally unashamed about it suggests that she may be a little detached from reality, or at least has really poor judgment in ways that make her a questionable caregiver. Plus, what would happen to Damon if she ever got caught and arrested?
I do know how expensive and emotionally charged child care can be and how great it would feel to know that your son was with a loving family member, but it’s time to delete your fantasy about your mother-in-law being your long-term babysitter. Continue the search you started. In fact, expedite it! I’m sure some great people could use a job beginning next week. Dismiss Kathy with a nonconfrontational, “You’ve done so much for us, but we’ve finally found a professional nanny. Now all your time with Damon can be fun, and you can have breaks whenever you need them.” You don’t have to mention right now that it will be supervised fun, or that you’re going to be looking very suspiciously at any piece of jewelry you receive as a gift from her.
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Dear Prudence,
My wife and I are both women. She recently lucked into a great remote job, while I got transferred to an office on the other side of the metropolitan area. Traffic is horrid and can cost me four hours on a bad day. We don’t have kids and only one cat. We were both reasonably neat until now and divided chores equally. But my wife has turned into the worst kind of slob. I will get home, and she is still in her pajamas, her hair a mess, her teeth unbrushed, and the place in disarray.
I am not even talking about vacuuming or deep cleaning, but our bed being unmade, the clean clothes not being put up, and her dirty dishes everywhere. It is like being married to the worst kind of teenage boy. It turns me into the worst kind of nag because it adds more stress to my already stressful day. I do the majority of the cooking and grocery runs, and my wife can’t be bothered to add, “We ran out of milk” to the grocery list on the fridge.
My wife gets defensive and says I am devaluing her work and treating her like a sitcom stay-at-home wife. I say that she can take 15 minutes out of her busy day for self-care, making the bed, and putting things away. The worst was when I went away for a three-day trip. When I got home, my wife was still in the same clothes from when I left. Including her underwear because laundry hadn’t been done, and she had no clean ones. She smelled rank, and kissing her made me want to gag. This was on a weekend.
We ended up having a huge fight where I questioned her mental health because this kind of neglect wasn’t healthy or normal. She refuses to admit anything is wrong and continues to act like a teenager being chided for not doing her chores. I am at my limit and really thinking a trial separation might be the only way, or at least a move closer to my work.
—Make the Bed Please
Dear Make the Bed Please,
It’s too bad that you had to get to the point of having a huge fight before you brought up that something is (obviously) amiss with your wife’s mental health. It’s also unfortunate that you seemingly presented it as an attack rather than an expression of concern. Either way, you now know that she’s not willing to get any help with what I think most would agree sounds like a pretty deep depression. You can’t keep living like this. A trial separation is a good idea.
Classic Prudie
I’m a woman in my late-20s. I grew up in a rural/blue-collar place, but I was good at school and bad at practical skills. I got a good scholarship, did a combined program, and now have a master’s degree and a decent job in the city. I was in a long-term relationship for the past four years that ended a year ago. I’m mostly attracted to the same type of guys I grew up with, and that dating pool definitely exists here. But when they meet me, things get weird…
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