Dear Queenie,
My husband and I do not have a good marriage, but he wants us to have children. Some time ago I got pregnant and then had a miscarriage, and since then I have been taking contraceptives without him knowing it. He keeps saying he wants children and I keep telling him it’s not going to happen.
Queenie, should I explain to him why?—Worried wife
Dear Wife,
What you have been doing, letting him live with the hope of having a child(ren) is not fair to your husband. However, I can understand why you hesitate to tell him the truth.
As usual in a situation like this, I recommend professional counselling to help you decide what to do.
Dear Queenie,
We have an elderly neighbor who lives alone and comes by almost every day needing some sort of help around her house or a ride to go somewhere.
Queenie, how can we get her to not bother us so often?—Wanting some privacy
Dear Wanting,
Your neighbour seems lonely and probably cannot do the things she asks you to help her with. It is okay to sometimes tell her you are too busy and to ask her to chip in for gas when she needs a ride.
Meanwhile, are there other neighbours or friends of hers who can pitch in to help her?
Dear Queenie,
I’m in my 40s, divorced, with teenage children. I’ve been dating a man a little older than me, also divorced with teenage children. Sometimes we disagree and even argue about unimportant things and he gets over these arguments quickly, but I don’t and I am starting to wonder if I should keep seeing him.
Queenie, what do you advise?—Lonely divorcee
Dear Divorcee,
Spending time with someone who does not make you feel happy, just to avoid feeling lonely, is not a solution to your problem. If you are not happy spending time with this man, no, you should not keep seeing him.
Dear Queenie,
My wife cheated on me with her sister’s husband’s brother at her sister’s house, so I don’t let her visit her sister without me.
Queenie, I know her sister will keep on trying to break up our marriage. What can I do?—Fed-up husband
Dear Husband,
Your wife will have to tell her sister that she does not want to cheat on you, and it is up to your wife to stick to that ultimatum. Your wife has to make her sister understand the consequences of her behaviour. Meanwhile, your wife should not visit her sister without you.
Dear Queenie,
My husband and I have been friends with another couple, his best friend from when they were kids and the friend’s wife, for a long time, but for a while I have had the idea that my husband and the other wife were getting too fond of each other. He knows how I feel about them and sometimes he visits them without me.
I don’t want my husband to stop being friends with them, but I keep telling him I don’t want us to see them so often. I tried to talk to him about why I don’t want to see them so much, but he just laughed at me and said there wasn’t anything to talk about.
Queenie, am I being foolish about all this?—Worried wife
Dear Wife,
There probably is not anything wrong going on between your husband and his friend’s wife, but your husband is not giving much consideration to you and how you feel on the subject. Tell him you will stop complaining about it if he will show a little more respect for your feelings.
