Dear Queenie,
My husband and I have a cat that very obviously cares more about me than him. I’m the one who feeds her and brushes her fur and takes her to the vet. She comes when I call her and sits on my lap and sleeps on my side of the bed. She lets my husband pet her (sometimes) and she runs and hides from strangers.
Queenie, he gets mad when I say she’s my cat. What do you say?—Love my cat
Dear Love my cat,
It is obvious what your cat “says”, but unless you are the only one paying for her food and veterinary bills and the place where she lives, she belongs to your husband too. Try to be more tactful.
Dear Queenie,
One of the girls I know is always afraid of how people will judge her if she does something, doesn’t play sports and is always on her phone, but she always wants someone to be with her.
Queenie, what can I do for her?—Fed-up friend
Dear Friend,
You can talk to her about all this if you think she will listen and it will do any good. Otherwise, you will just have to ignore what you can and spend as little time with her as you can manage.
Dear Queenie,
How do I break up a friendship with someone I just don’t have anything in common with anymore? I’m married and have a child and I just got a job that keeps me too busy to do anything but go to work and then go home and take care of my child.
Queenie, how do I tell them I care about their friendship but it has to end?—Overwhelmed
Dear Overwhelmed,
Tell them in a caring way how much you value their friendship, but for the time being, between your job and your family, you just do not have time for them. But do not cut them off entirely. It may very well happen that eventually, as you settle into your job and your child grows older, you will be able to find more time for your friend.
Dear Queenie,
My sister is divorced, has two children, doesn’t have a job, has been in drug rehab and keeps getting in trouble. She says she is trying to do better, but nothing ever changes.
I have tried to help her but she lies and gets in trouble again.
Queenie, what more can I do?—Fed-up sister
Dear Sister,
There is not much you can do for your sister until she actually starts trying to do better.
Spend whatever time you can with her children – take them out, help them with their homework, cook a meal for them, things like that. It will give them some stability and you will be a good role model for them, which their mother is not.
Dear Queenie,
My daughter is a good worker and she has a job to support herself, but her boyfriend has never worked at anything, not while he was in school or since he graduated from college.
They have been living with his parents and now they are planning to get married and they want me to pay for the wedding. I’m sure they love each other, but I think she shouldn’t marry this guy until he has had a job for a good while and has proved that he can take care of her and any children they might have.
Queenie, what do you think?—Worried father
Dear Father,
I think you have every reason to be worried. Tell them they will have to pay for the wedding themselves. It should give them a good introduction to financial reality, assuming – no, hoping – that her boyfriend’s parents do not step in financially.
Later on, if the marriage lasts and they start thinking about buying a home, you can give them the money you might have spent on their wedding to help with the down payment.
