Out Of The Blue

I desperately need help ending a friendship I know I must end. For the past two years I have given advice to a friend with problems. My friend would call daily to ask for direction on handling situations she seemed unable to deal with. In my willingness to help, I gave her the best information I could, based on my experience.

Yesterday my friend phoned me, and during the conversation, mentioned she didn’t feel I was being honest with myself. She insinuated my husband was probably gay, and that he was either lying to me, lying to himself, or both. This came out of the blue, and I was flabbergasted. She also said she knew her remarks might end our friendship.

I asked her to explain. She said she just “knew” my husband was using me to blend in with society. I should add that she hardly knows my husband, and I have never asked for her advice about my life or my marriage. I defended myself by saying my husband is not a knuckle-dragging, truck-pulling kind of guy, but he is definitely not gay.

She said she was just being honest. I told her honesty is not always called for. You don’t tell someone if you think they are ugly! I am still quite shaken by having to defend my husband’s sexuality and my honesty. I certainly cannot remain friends with such a person. Please help me end this friendship with finesse.

Sonya

Sonya, for two years your friend has been the center of attention with her problems. You tried to help, and you tried to be her friend. Now she is ready to end the relationship if she can’t gain the upper hand.

Perhaps she is tired of playing the victim and wants to diminish what you have. Perhaps she wants to humiliate and hurt you. Perhaps she has other motives. It doesn’t matter. What she said attacks you and your husband.

This situation doesn’t call for finesse but firmness. What you need to do is more like firing a bad employee than talking with a friend. End contact with her. Don’t defend yourself or give credence to what she says.

Take her comments for what they are: valueless. Give them no more thought than you would the peel of an orange. Once thrown away, it is never thought of again.

Wayne & Tamara

Wayne & Tamara are also the authors of Cheating in a Nutshell, What Infidelity Does to the Victim, available from Amazon, Apple and most booksellers.

In My Shoes

Please help. Nothing we do is right. My husband and I have a 9-month-old son. We both have successful careers, are financially independent, and enjoy our new family life together. For some reason my in-laws are highly critical of everything we do.

When we visit them, they talk only about themselves. When they say something about us, it is usually negative. They comment on how much we eat and if we drink alcohol with dinner. They start disagreements just for the sake of disagreeing.

We have been patient because we want our son to spend time with his grandparents, but they make us nervous and this nervousness makes our son uncomfortable. He is often irritable and doesn’t like to be held by his grandmother.

This year in their Christmas letter they were extremely negative toward the birth of their grandson, emphasizing how his name did not seem appropriate. They didn’t mention my husband at all but put a big emphasis on my mother-in-law performing “baby duty” once a week, even though she told me she wanted to care for him once a week.

The letter described their daughter in extremely positive terms and included family photos, but no photos of us. We were hurt, especially my husband, who feels he has a life he is proud of and wants his parents to be proud of him for being accomplished and a father.

We told them what they wrote, and did not write, hurt our feelings. They said we were “ridiculous” and “overly sensitive.” When I changed my work schedule so my mother-in-law would not have to take care of my son, they complained they thought our son didn’t remember them.

My husband’s mother organized a lunch with my husband that she told him to keep secret from me. He didn’t, but let her believe he did. She told him she thought I was too stressed at work–I work part-time now–and said he should convince me to let her care for the baby. My husband said, correctly, the most stressful thing in our lives at the moment is our difficulties in our relationship with them.

Then just today I found out they sent my parents an email saying how concerned they are about our “attitude,” when all they want is a normal family relationship. So, now my parents think we should apologize and make amends.

We feel like we can’t do anything right. Is there a way to salvage this relationship and keep our small family safe from my in-laws’ attacks?

Drew

Drew, Adam Smith said, “Though our brother is upon the rack, as long as we ourselves are at our ease, our senses will never inform us of what he suffers.” But, Smith said, when we use our imagination to put ourselves in his place, his agonies are brought home to us and we understand his feelings.

But some people lack this capacity for empathy. Instead they use guilt and demands to get what they want. They admit no flaws in themselves. When those tactics don’t work, they amass an army against the ones they want to control.

You have physical proof in a letter and an email what these two are up to. Calling you “overly sensitive” is a non-responsive answer. Contacting your parents is pure blackmail. Even your baby has a handle on the situation.

When you spoil a child, what do you end up with? A spoiled adult. If you let your husband’s parents treat you badly, what will you end up with? In-laws who treat you badly. Most problems can be solved by applying the sound principles of dog training. Good behavior gets rewarded, bad behavior does not.

Get a copy of Susan Forward’s book “Emotional Blackmail.” Seeing your in-laws’ tactics in print will give you both courage and methods for handling people who, as Adam Smith said, lack the imagination to understand the feelings of others.

Wayne & Tamara

Wayne & Tamara are the authors of As the Child of an Alcoholic.

Head Games

I have a coworker I’ve been friendly with for several years. About three months ago she started being too busy to have lunch together. I asked her once whether anything was wrong and whether I offended her in some way. She assured me nothing was amiss and she considers me a friend at work.

But in the past month she stopped speaking to me unless absolutely necessary. No more sailing into my office, flopping onto a chair, and asking, How is life? No more talking about her work stuff and home stuff. No more good morning or good night, even when she is leaving the office next door to mine and always used to pop her head in.

Once she went so far as to look through me to say good morning to someone else. Another time she was in the conference room having arrived first for a meeting. I arrived second, and she kept her head down as if very busy until a third person arrived, then said hello to both of us.

There have been hundreds of instances of not seeming to hear me when I say a normal pleasant greeting to her in her office or in the hallway. I feel hurt and disturbed as I wonder if I’m being accused of something I didn’t do, or if I put my foot in my mouth in a way that never struck me as offensive.

I feel it would be useless to ask again if something is wrong. I think my real question is, how can I make myself tougher so a thing like this doesn’t occupy my mind and bring me close to tears a few times every day? Are there steps a person can take to grow a tougher skin?

Alexia

Alexia, Wayne once asked a 60-ish friend why he was always in such high spirits. This friend explained that as a young man he worried incessantly. He worried over tests, dates, and whether he would ever find a job. Then in his late teens he had an epiphany. Worry accomplishes nothing.

What you need is not so much a tougher skin as to stop worrying over things beyond your control. You asked if there was a problem and she denied it. You’ve done all you can. For some reason, the friendly woman with an office next door moved away and a person with whom you have little in common and no rapport moved in. That’s curious, but it’s not a reason for worry.

In the personal space between her ears something is going on. You are likely never to know what. Wayne once smiled at a friend on a street corner and was baffled when a woman he didn’t know and hadn’t noticed crossed the street to ask why he was laughing at her. Say what?

People do all manner of strange things. People tell tales, create hoopla, and use passive aggression. They also show extraordinary kindness and care. Good people torture themselves asking why, why, why. But the answer is often as simple as displaced emotion. This woman may be a little like the serial killer who wants to kill his mother but kills other women instead.

Not everything in life carries the same weight. Your family carries a certain weight, your partner a certain weight, your house a certain weight, and your neighbors a certain weight. Your job carries a certain weight. You are giving her too much weight. Your purpose at work is work.

Treat this woman with the normal corporate politeness used in the workplace. Treat her professionally, clinically, and distantly. When you walk into a room and she is there, ignore her, but with a third person present act normally.

It always helps to ask ourselves, what is my purpose in life? Then let your life proceed from your purpose and not from the oddities and quirks of others.

Tamara

Wayne & Tamara are the authors of Cheating in a Nutshell.