I’ve worked hard at managing my temper—I can’t help it, I can always find something to be mad about, even when my family is behaving perfectly—and I’ve become really good at not snapping at my husband and kids. The kids are great, but my husband doesn’t seem to give me credit for how much better I’ve gotten, and he hasn’t gotten any nicer himself. He still treats me all defensively, as if I’m Godzillette, and it’s starting to get me mad. My goal is to get some credit for the progress I’ve made and achieve more marital peace.

If you want credit, here you go; One million space bucks worth of reward for your good deeds and strong effort. Now go in marital peace.

While you deserve marital credit from your husband, too, making it a goal to get what’s fair from anyone, especially a spouse, is usually a bad idea.

The search for justice, marital or otherwise, leads to your telling your spouse why it would be fair for him to be more appreciative, and then he explains to you how he’s been very, very appreciative and you haven’t been appreciative of his efforts, and you’ll wish you never started.

Then perhaps you two go to a marriage counselor who tries to make you both feel appreciated, which feels much better . . . during the treatment session and for a short time thereafter.

Once things go back to normal, which they inevitably do, you’re both more disappointed and resentful because, after you’ve invested all this time and money in treatment, you both still feel unappreciated, and now you’ve blown all your entertainment money on therapy and you’re stuck in the house together even more.

So, as much as you might wish and deserve for him to appreciate your new temper-control muscles, (and as much as it would serve his interests as well), it’s dangerous to make it your goal. Your goal is to accept the fact that, for some reason that has little to do with you, he doesn’t notice your efforts and/or is too negative to be appreciative. And they say opposites attract.

Come to think of it, you probably have some reason to believe that that’s the way he is. It’s not a matter of his loving you more or less; it may be depression, or being overwhelmed by other things, or he’s color blind and you’re explaining red.

You’re aware of your temper, and kudos for that. Your husband, however, is not aware of his negativity, and trying to get him to see the light will do the opposite. You do the work, he doesn’t, but that doesn’t mean you’re doomed.

Assuming he’s still a good partner, ask yourself how to make the best of things. Your main job is to give yourself credit and lower your expectations for his judgment and appreciation.

Keep up the good fight, which is the fight to keep your temper from getting the best of you. Give up the bad fight, which is the one for a deserved pat on the back.

STATEMENT:
Here’s a statement to counteract the inner protest to the life fairness referee. “I’m proud of how well I’ve been managing my temper, and I’m even prouder since I realized that I’ve been tolerating my husband’s infuriating inability to understand what gets me mad and give me credit for dealing with it constructively 99% of the time. We’d both be a lot happier if he wasn’t so dense; but he is, and I deal with it amazingly well.”

I’m really not a good friend, because I don’t like to call people regularly or bring them food when they’re sick, and I think it’s because I’ve never been able to grieve my father’s death. He was a warm, kind person who drove me crazy by wanting to know why I was unhappy and telling me what I should do, and I couldn’t stop fighting with him and then he died before we could make up. Now, I’ve got some good people in my life whom I’ve known for years, but I don’t have the kind of closeness with them my dad could create with a stranger. My goal, if I could do it, would be to get over my father’s death and become a better friend.

It’s hard to have a father who lives up to your values better than you do, but it’s a mistake to try to fit into his shoes when they’re just the wrong size.

Yes, it’s possible that grief has blocked your ability to be a better friend and that psychotherapy could release your potential. If you’ve had a good try at psychotherapy before, however, a connection between grief and your friendship deficit is less likely. Aside from the fact grief and friendship share a few letters, the connection isn’t immediately clear.

The bad news then is that, unlike your father, you’re a more guarded person, which likely won’t change. The good news is that you haven’t failed to live up to your father; you’re simply a different person, and not necessarily a worse one.

Being a little warmth-deprived does not need to stop you from being a good guy and a good friend. You just have to work harder, which is hard to do if you blame yourself for poor friendship performance, which makes you more isolated and less energetic, which makes you withdrawn, which makes you more self-critical, and around it goes. Self-blame and shame are probably your biggest obstacles to being a better friend.

Once you give up believing that your basic approach to friendship can, and should, change, and accept the fact that you’re not like your father, then you’re free to examine the obstacles to your being as good a friend as you can be, given your own style and personality.

The problem may be one of distraction, disorganization, or not being able to keep track of non-crisis priorities. If you examine what interferes with your friendship-homework, you’ll probably find some ways to be a better friend. Even if you aren’t just like you’re dad, your efforts honor his legacy.

STATEMENT:
Meanwhile, you need a statement to fight the paralysis of self-blame. “My loneliness is not a result of, or punishment for, my inability to live up to my father’s friendship achievements; it’s just a fact of life that happens sometimes for someone with my personality. I honor his values by trying to be the best friend I can be with the personality I’ve got, and I talk to him, in my mind, with respect and gratitude and without reason for guilt.”

I don’t know what I did to drive my husband away. I guess I’m a pushy type of person—I’ve got an executive job—and he’s an easygoing carpenter who spends every spare moment rehabbing old houses, and he gradually got sick of my nagging him to spend more time with me on the weekends, until one day he just moved out. Now, when I reach him on his phone, he tells me he loves me, and agrees to meet with me to talk things over and work things out, but then he doesn’t show up. I wish I hadn’t given him such a hard time, but now I want to know how to get him to come to couples therapy and put our marriage back together.

Some girls prefer being married to someone who’s never around but pays the bills. Those girls and your husband have something in common, whether you like it or not.

Before figuring out how to save your marriage, ask yourself what you want your marriage for (and don’t say love—you should know better).

You’re an executive, so be as specific about the amount of availability you would write into the partnership as you would for a job description: hours per week, time of day, degree of alertness, freedom from inebriation, etc.

Keep sitting on that save-your-marriage urge long enough to ask yourself, regardless of how much you nagged him and/or how much he loves you, what the likelihood is of his doing the amount of necessary face time with a non-shack-rehabbing marital partner.

The way you describe him, not fuckin’ likely; he’s not into hanging out with a girl who’s not into holding a hammer (unless maybe she’s handing over a credit card).

If that’s true, you’re in luck and out-of-luck. Out of luck because there was never much chance he’d meet your marital requirements, and the chances aren’t going to improve, no matter how sweetly you try to entice him into marital therapy and how persuasive the therapist is.

You’re in luck, however, because your nagging isn’t at fault, and you have nothing to blame yourself for, so we’re not going to talk about how your nagging drove him away or how a therapist can glue him back on.

Now that we’ve killed off false hope, think about ways to make the best of things. Ask yourself how to avoid making the same mistake twice, given the fact that you probably knew his habits from the beginning and then talked yourself into believing he’d change.

If you still think guys change, slap yourself. People don’t change, but that doesn’t mean you change your approach towards relationships. Be an executive at work and in your personal life, and be glad your husband quit.

STATEMENT:
Here’s a statement to point you forward. “I hate losing this marriage, but my goal is to find a good partner, not create one from someone who doesn’t have the right material. Partners aren’t made, they’re found. My job is to use my experience with this marriage to choose better next time.”

When we were in training, I used to depend on my wife completely—she was a year ahead, and I couldn’t stand it when she was on call and would leave me alone overnight. I wasn’t jealous, I just needed her. But then we got married, and I graduated and started my own specialty training, and suddenly—it was like a switch clicked—I stopped needing her and didn’t really want to be around her. Now it’s 4 years later and we’ve got a couple kids and the trapped feelings just keeps getting stronger. It’s tough, because she’s a very nice person, she doesn’t do anything wrong, and she wants to make our marriage work, and I feel totally guilty, because I just don’t want to be with her. How can I get our old chemistry back?

Some people believe the measure of a good partnership is an equally balanced feeling of need for one another—wanting her as much as she wants you—and you’re the living, breathing example of why that’s not so.

You didn’t want your neediness to blind you into thinking your then-girlfriend had strong feelings about you, if she didn’t. Congratulations, she did and does really love you. Unfortunately, what you were blind to was the depth of your own feelings.

The trouble is, needy feelings come and go depending on your confidence, mood, loneliness, horniness, whatever. Neediness makes you blind, which is why satisfying your needy feelings shouldn’t be in the partnership job description.

Instead, consider your actual needs as you would if you were looking for a partner in your practice. You need someone you like to spend time with and can rely on, whether you’re needy or not.

So here’s the standard procedure: the more you’re crazy about someone, the more you should take it slow. Clean out a basement together, travel long distances and sleep in crummy motels together, foster a diabetic cat together, whatever, just put your relationship to the test to see if it’s a shared partnership or a personal fix.

Meanwhile, the old chemistry can’t be retrieved and wasn’t the real thing, in any case, so give up that goal and stop wallowing in guilt. You might not need her anymore, but your kids do, so you’ve got to figure out how to make the best of it.

STATEMENT:
Here’s a statement to address her and your own conscience. “I would do anything to make this partnership work but I made a mistake in thinking my need for you was the same as good, solid attraction and acceptance. Now that I’m feeling less needy, I can’t find the necessary chemistry and I can’t help not loving you. You haven’t changed. It’s no one’s fault. Meanwhile, we have a good family, and I need to keep it strong while managing the bad chemistry that makes it impossible for me to give you what you deserve.”

When my mother starting dating my soon-to-be-step-father, I was upset. It’s not just that my father had only died six months earlier, but that this guy was clearly a user and a nowhere near good enough for her. I’m in college, so at least I didn’t have to live under the same roof as this jerk, but I’ve already gone out of my way to avoid him and it’s really annoyed my mom that I haven’t tried to get along with him. Plus it means I’ve spent last time with her, and we used to be really close. When she told me they were going to get married, I freaked out, and now she’s says that if that’s how I feel then I’m not invited to the wedding. I think what my mom and I need is a face-off to get everything on the table and sort out this mess. My goal is to get my mom back.

You’ve got every reason to worry about your mother’s taste in men and its impact on your relationship; after all, her choice has the potential to cause you (and possibly her) great pain, at a time when you’re grieving your father’s death.

Unfortunately, however, all you can do is worry, and after that, you’re fucked. There’s nothing you can do to make things better and lots to make things worse.

Sometimes people feel that grieving entitles them to special consideration, but those people are delusional.

Loss triggers the worst in everyone bereaved, which becomes a chain reaction. Death is hard, but so is life, and you don’t get to cut in entitlement line.

If you go with your feelings—and you’re entitled to them—you’ll make things much worse. You want a face-off because you want to believe you could get through to your mother in a one-to-one conversation. Confrontation is supposed to be “empowering,” which is usually code for, “a giant waste of time.”

You’ll tell her she’s being stupid and insensitive to your feelings, and she’ll tell you you’re an immature brat, and you’ll both repeat yourselves several times at higher volume until the talk is over and no subsequent talks will be scheduled until her third wedding anniversary (or, as you see it, her messy divorce).

Remember, Hamlet had it even worse. True, he had even more reason to be angry (his stepfather had murdered his father and was eager to get him out of the way, the play he wrote for his mother failed to get his point across and got bad reviews, etc).

Being a character in a play, however, he naturally had lots and lots of feelings, all of which he communicated, and his family situation definitely deteriorated as a result. You see, there’s lots you can learn from Shakespeare, namely, ye shall shut up.

Your broader goal isn’t to vent your spleen and get mama back (which won’t happen), but to minimize the damage to yourself and avoid drawing your mother and fiancé together in an alliance based on her fight with you.

Instead, keep your feelings to yourself. Lie low, finish your studies, eat cake at the wedding. Choose peace with your mother over your worries and righteous indignation, because no matter how much you hate her choices, choosing to suck it up is probably what your father would want.

STATEMENT:
Here’s a statement to keep you on course. “I’ve lost the family that I thought was my rock. I don’t know when I’m going to stop hurting. What mattered most to my dad is that I finish my studies and try to support Mom and if that’s impossible, try to stay out of fights. I can’t salvage or rescue my family or stop the pain but if I can keep on course, with all the sadness, loneliness, and irritation I feel, I’ll have accomplished something amazing.”

I was a real fuck-up when I was in high school; I cut a lot of class, got high a lot, got my girlfriend pregnant…she ended the pregnancy, but it was a huge mess. My oldest and only son is now 13, but he’s already becoming a chip off the old block. We’ve always gotten along so well, and I thought we were still getting along, but then I found pot in his room and my wife said she found a condom wrapper in the trash. We live in my wife’s small hometown, so nobody knows about my history, but now my son is going to have to walk around with that reputation, nevermind that he might ruin his future or end up with child support. My goal is to get my son to snap out of it and not fuck up his future.

It’s great that you and your son are good buddies, and that you understand him well, so don’t wreck things by trying to over-control his choices.

Yes, of course you’d like to save him the pain you went through, and you’re terrified of what might happen if he lacks the luck that kept you out of serious trouble. If you act on your feelings, however, you’ll turn your buddy into an enemy, and probably a nightmare.

Look at the bright side; he’s still at home, and you have lots of opportunity to give him good advice and back it up with incentives that are extra strong because he’s relatively dependent. (It’s much harder after he has a car and job).

You understand his problems, having had them yourself, so if you can just keep your emotions safely under wraps, you can be the good coach you never had yourself—you’re in his own live-in “scared straight,” without the scaring him part.

So, in order to be useful to him, start by creating a boundary between what you think will help your son and what your feelings want you to express that would not be helpful.

It’s helpful to discourage marijuana use with whatever monitoring and enforcement system you like, but it’s not helpful to tell him he’s bad, ungrateful or defiant (even if he is), or to present your efforts as punishment, or to generally give him a bad guy to rebel against.

It’s helpful to discourage unsafe sex and unsafe relationships, the latter being those that are overly close and therefore likely to blow up with lots of rage, misery, and distraction. It’s not helpful to tell him he’s got to follow your rules or else.

As an overall rule, it’s helpful to share your own vulnerability to the needs and desires that are pulling at him and state your reasons, based on experience, for not giving in to them.

It’s not helpful to portray yourself as morally superior or as a frightened protector of his image in town. He doesn’t need a visit from the ghost of ruined reputations future. Sure, you’re more his dad than his friend, but being his dad doesn’t make you his judge. Be reasonable, and he might just follow your lead.

STATEMENT:
Give yourself a pep-talk before trying it out on him. “I shouldn’t be surprised that my son has my own impulsivity and eagerness to try everything, and those are good qualities if he can learn how to manage them. It will be no easier for me to control his behavior than it was for my parents with me. Judging from that experience, I’ll get nowhere showing him anger or fear. So I’ll choose my battles carefully and explain my limits in terms of their long-term benefit and try to look calm and friendly, regardless of how I really feel, and hope for the best.”

I’m an older woman with two advanced degrees in creative writing (one from Iowa, la di da). My career, on the other hand, hasn’t risen beyond doing commercial writing, be it technical or ad copy. I get published in small journals here and there, but after my first novel got a handful of rejections, my agent dropped me, and I haven’t been able to finish another novel in order to get a new agent and sell the first. My limited number of published pieces has also made it hard to get a teaching job, even though I got degree number 2 specifically to enter academia. So now I’m stuck working in advertising, and while it’s a good steady job that pays well, it still kills me a bit inside. Nevermind that I’ve absolutely struggled with depression my whole life, and while I take a handful of medications to control it, it’s just an added level of difficulty. Nonetheless, with my illness under control but my dream still very much out of control, my goal is to make this job work so I can settle and maybe even be happy.

You could say writing is a stupid career choice, given the unlikelihood of making money, and that academia isn’t much better, given the current job market. It’s as stupid as counting on a career in the NBA because you’re good at basketball.

The truth is, a large part of being a writer isn’t a matter of choice; it’s who you are, and trying to find a life that fits. It’s not so much a bad choice as a bum calling, with inspiration necessary but never promising to come when called.

The good news is that you’ve got a day job that involves writing, you’re making a living, you’re gathering experience that may inspire your next novel, and you can always find some teaching opportunities that will spiff up your credentials. For your parents, it’s very good news.

I know, my congratulations do nothing but cause your inner-writer chagrin. That voice says you’ve failed to fulfill your creative purpose, find your voice and message, connect with an audience, or put together something that moves people.

The good news, again, is that there’s nothing I or anyone can say to quiet that voice, because it will never let you be entirely happy. Short of getting a lobotomy, that voice will be your most constant companion, and if you succeed in writing a book that sells, his demands become more relentless.

So invent a good, kind speech for your inner narrator to tell yourself. You don’t control the result, so your job is to respect the effort. Consider the many writers and immortal characters, from Chekhov to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, who remind us that we don’t fight against hardship to win, we fight to fight, regardless of the result.

If you’ve learned to carry on despite depression, you can keep on going even if your job isn’t ideal. Your story isn’t dramatic, but that’s precisely what makes it heroic.

STATEMENT:
Let your narrative voice frame the meaning of your efforts. “I wish I could do more writing and teaching, and someday I may, but in the meantime I have good reason to be proud of the compromise I struck between the need to make a living and the wish to do what I love, because it’s hard, it’s the best I can do, and it’s for a good cause.”

I was a promising graduate student in English, doing well, respected, enjoying talks about books and ideas, when something happened and I just faded out of the real world. Nothing traumatic happened to me. I didn’t get dumped or mugged. I just stopped getting my work done and the extensions grew longer and longer on my projects and papers until finally I had to leave without getting my PhD. Whenever I try to go back and finish off my old projects, I just stare at the computer. I’m sort of depressed and medications have helped me feel a little better, but I’m still not good at getting things done. Now I’m teaching high school English and the kids like me and I like teaching, when I’m prepared, which isn’t always. I never know when I’ll get paralyzed and not prepare a lesson plan or fail to grade papers. My goal is not to be the total fuck-up I’ve become.

Some people regard procrastination as a kind of laziness resulting from a secret loathing for work, or a rebellion against bosses, or a rage against life in general.

Those same people, however, are the ones who see mental illness as an emotional failure. They’re not all Scientologists, but they are all wrong.

The evidence is growing that procrastination arises from disordered neurology, the equivalent of “chemical imbalance” except sadder and scarier, because what’s happening is brain damage. You’re probably not firing on all cylinders, literally, since brain images shows cells missing from critical locations.

It happens to lots of people who’ve had depression, even when the depressed feeling gets better. It’s true, theoretically, you could grow new brain cells, but in practice, the damage often doesn’t improve.

I blame your neurons, not to let you off the hook, but to show you that, while you’ve got more ambition than most, you’re running on less horsepower. Which means your diagnosis is, you’re fucked. The good news, as always, is that there’s no point in blaming yourself, and there’s much you can do once you accept that you’re fucked and stop feeling ashamed.

No blame, but there’s no escaping the hook, and it hurts more because you have high ambitions, which causes more depression, and so on. You might not be able to meet deadlines, but you can still cook up brilliant thoughts, and there are worse ways to have a busted brain.

I know, it’s hard to feel proud when the teacher is farther behind on his homework than the kids, but that’s the way your equipment works, so do your best with it.

STATEMENT:
“I still care about English literature and teaching, but I have trouble doing what’s necessary for reasons I can’t help. So my goal is to try to provide good teaching by using a number of tricks, including asking my friends to help me stay on task and stick to a work schedule. I don’t know if I can teach a good course, but I’ll try, and I respect myself more for trying to get half-decent work out of a busted brain than great work from one that’s super-gifted.”

My husband always saw himself as the righteous protector of our daughter and, after our divorce, he got into the habit of dragging me into court to force me to pay for some super-costly treatment or schooling that was always no more than a little bit better than what was available for free, but he’d look like a hero to our daughter and the court and the social worker, and I’d look like a miserly shit, and I’d complain bitterly, which just got everyone more on his side, and I was screwed. My daughter bought the bullshit, which meant she and her father shared a tight bond based on hating me, the Scrooge. But I thought the court assaults would stop when she turned 18, until yesterday, when I learned he’s suing me, once again, this time to pay for our daughter’s college tuition, even though she never asked me, she’s over 18, and, with her history of alcohol abuse (and no attempt to get sober), paying for her to go to college without going to rehab first is a waste of money. I think they’re both just scraping the barrel for reasons to drag me into court and I’m getting flashbacks about being raped by the judge. I don’t have any illusion about all of us getting along, but I think it’s fair to want this craziness to stop.

Like it or not, it’s your ex’s legal right to haul you into court at his whim, force you to hire a lawyer, and make you look like a creep. As a reward, you get to give him a good chunk of your savings to pay for something you don’t believe in, to someone who’s out to ruin your life.

Say what you will about justice, but most of the time, it isn’t very fair.

There’s no way you can avoid feeling helpless and outraged, and there’s no shower long or hot enough to make the violated feeling walk away. If, however, your goal is to stop this from happening again by repeatedly venting your outrage, you’ll actually make it worse.

You’ve described the process well; when you’re angry, you look like a monster, not a victim. Your ex has got the knack for pushing your buttons down so well, you shouldn’t be surprised that he treats you like an ATM.

Instead of fighting back again and again then, accept the fact that he’s got you nailed, and shut up. (If you don’t like being told that, remember, I’m not the one who told you to marry him.)

Don’t mistake a Jerry Springer shouting match as the best way to stand up to someone. Remember, no matter how cleansing the venting is on Springer, nobody walked away from that show without looking like an asshole. If you can get yourself to shut up and keep your rage to yourself, you can start to work on a more effective defense. You’ve collected lots of good facts and they can speak for themselves…if you don’t drown them out with your feelings.

Put the facts together, forget your ex-husband’s allegations, and respond to the issues like a caring parent. Then sit back, shut up and be patient. Initially, people will believe him because he believes himself, but if the facts don’t check out, they’ll come around to your point of view.

Don’t pursue your daughter or the Tag Team of Educational Virtue will punish you with her silence. Make it clear that you care by taking your parental responsibilities seriously and articulating that it would be better for her to cultivate her own relationship with you. Beyond that, however, you can only respect her choice, and hope those facts, not blustery emotions, lead her to the light.

The legal process isn’t very fair, but as we often point out on this site, not much is, so it’s better to keep your mouth shut. If you don’t want to remain tied up in the courts forever, stay quiet until your ex has enough rope to hang himself.

STATEMENT:
Put your response in writing and edit out your rage. For example: “You and I both want our daughter to get a good education and I am more than willing to help financially if it looks like she is ready. I wish I knew how she’s been doing for the past 6 months, but I can’t say because she hasn’t kept in touch. Before that, as you know, she had several drug-related legal problems and hasn’t finished a course. As much as I share your desire to help, I don’t have any reason, as yet, to believe that she could make use of college. Asking the court to mandate me to pay her tuition does her a disservice and wastes a large portion of my remaining resources in legal fees. I would advise her to get sober first, get some work habits going, take a course or two, and then she’d have a better chance of success. Talking to me herself would also give her an opportunity to let me know what she’s accomplished and benefit from my input.”

I don’t think she beats him up, but my son can’t seem to stand up to his crazy wife, no matter what she does. She gets furious with him over nothing and then anything goes. She’s thrown away his model airplane collection, screamed at him in front of friends, and locked him out of the house. The grandkids are always nervous. She always has to have the last word and insists that he apologize for things he hasn’t done. I wish he could stand up for himself and let her know that she’s got to stop. She wouldn’t act like this if he were stronger. All he does is keep quiet, look sad, and try to make her happy, which allows her to act like a jerk. My goal is to protect him or teach him how to stand up for himself.

If standing up to someone means out-intimidating them, it’s seldom a good goal, particularly when you’re up against someone who seems to believe they’re as infallible as the Pope.

Go toe to toe with her holiness and you’ll get a slugfest that not only scares the kids, but draws police like flies. It’s tempting to believe that toughness will carry the day and straighten out the bad guys, but that’s only in the movies. Everyone wants it to happen, which is why you can sell tickets, because nobody ever sees it off the screen.

On the other hand, you don’t want your son to feel responsible for the anger and unhappiness of his crazy wife. It’s nice that he’s caring and nurturing, but this is the evil flip side of being overly-sensitive.

If you push him to confront her, he’ll feel more responsible for her feelings and you’ll quickly see his backside (as I’m sure you’ve already discovered); you’re actually making him more responsible for her feelings by suggesting that he could get her to act better if he was firmer.

He thinks he’s upset her, you think he hasn’t upset her enough, and you’re both making him responsible for her. The Pope/wife remains without fault. Holy shitstorm.

A better goal is to help your son develop a better boundary, and this doesn’t require confrontation or hostility. By a boundary, I mean not allowing an excessive feeling of responsibility for his wife’s unhappiness to get in the way of his doing what he thinks is right.

He wouldn’t fight back, he just wouldn’t take such a hard hit every time she attacks. Then eventually, please Jesus, he’d also ask for a divorce.

STATEMENT:
Show him how he can reject blame without attacking her. “I think we’ve got a good thing going and that it would be better if you could manage your anger. I want you to be happy but you’re right, after all is said and done, I don’t necessarily agree with you about what you feel I’ve done wrong. If you yell or try to punish me, it makes things worse. I am who I am. So my idea about how to make the best of things is to back away from confrontation. I’ll always listen to new suggestions but I won’t stay in the room with yelling or physical intimidation.”

I recently had to relocate my family for work, so we were forced to move from a fairly large east coast city to a small town nowhere near water (unless you count the great lakes). My wife and I are Jewish, and we’re raising our kids in the religion, but that was much easier where we used to live than where we are now, where our 12-year-old son, who was always a bit of an outsider, is now facing a lot of teasing at school for all the ways he’s different, which includes his religion. It’s been especially bad for him lately, given that the town is very Christian, with prayers before high school football games and lots of school-centered Christmas activities, and he’s even further on the outside of what the other kids are doing. As you may or may not know, Channukah isn’t Christmas—it’s a minor holiday—and we don’t try to pretend otherwise by giving smaller gifts and not playing it up so much. My son is younger than his age, though, and he likes to tell everyone he’s not interested in Christmas and then they pick on him and he accuses them of anti-Semitism and it’s a mess. My goal is that he should be proud of being a Jew while getting along better with people at school.

It’s painful to watch your kid get picked on and called a dork, particularly when he is a dork and does dorky things that you know are going to make his troubles worse.

If you tell him to shut up and keep his opinions to himself, you may be destroying the paltry remains of his self-esteem. If you try to get his tormentors to stop, you may stir up additional trouble.

You could argue that it’s your job, and society’s, to give him a positive school experience that supports differences in religion and personal style. I would argue that’s bullshit. It’s not in your power and idealistic expectations will often make things worse.

Your goal is to work with what you’ve got and help him do the same. You can’t protect him from the pain of being different, whether that pain’s from being a Jew or a dork (or a bit from column A and a bit from column B), but you can urge him to accept himself, take pride in being different, and learn to manage the hurt.

Celebrate the importance of being who you are vs. being happy and accepted. You’re not saying “it’s better to be feared than loved,” but, in a larger quote salad, you are saying it’s better to be yourself than to be loved, and what’s love got to do, got to do with it?

Celebrate the value of being an unpopular misfit, a kid whom no one understands or respects, who grows up to have a unique point of view and something special to offer the world. Visit a convention of psychiatrists or physicists and point out the many, many former dweebs who are quite happy with their adult personalities and have found partners who feel the same way. View an interview with James (DNA) Watson (and his wife).

Cite Jewish history, because it’s all about trying to be a good person despite always losing, and never having winning ways. View the film “Crimes and Misdemeanors.” And eat some latkes.

STATEMENT:
Prepare a mission statement to guide your “living with prejudice” curriculum for your son. “In our family, we value what makes us different, even when it draws trouble. We have no choice about many of the things that make us who we are, including being Jewish, and about there being no way to avoid all the painful attacks of those who are bothered by who we are. But being a good person is more important than being accepted and allows us to build a wall of protection between our pride in who we are and pain caused by the scorn of others.”

I was raised as a Unitarian and consider myself a cultural Protestant who believes in Christian ethics but not in God, ritual, or mumbo jumbo. The girlfriend I want to marry—and we get along very well in most ways—is a Catholic who loves the parish community and going to mass (like midnight mass, just around the corner). I don’t know how she can tolerate that shit, or trust a priest, given the recent sex scandals and the way the Pope tries to manipulate our elected officials, but she does. She doesn’t try to convert me, and I’m not going to force her to quit the church, but she says I’m making an issue of our religious differences that could threaten our relationship. My goal is to get her to see that I’m not going to threaten her religious beliefs.

You can’t make someone who knows you and sees you as religiously intolerant change her opinion. If you wore a Klan bed-sheet to your first date and could show her the next day that you’re actually a sweet, sensitive guy working undercover for the FBI, you might change her mind.

She knows you, however, and is telling you that she thinks you’re intolerant, so give up, accept the fact that she sees you the way she sees you, and think of what you can do.

She sees you as intolerant and hasn’t dumped you yet, which is a positive thing. Don’t make it worse by telling her she’s got you all wrong.

Ask yourself whether you can tolerate her seeing you in a negative way. If you can’t take the criticism, she’s not your girl, or won’t be for long.

Then ask her whether there’s any way she can accept what she sees as your intolerance. If she can’t and requires you to change your inner beliefs, she’s not your girl or, if she is, it will be hell (in the true Catholic sense).

She may tell you that she can accept your intolerance if you could just shut the fuck up about your views of Catholics and the Pope. If she can and you can, then you have a possible deal.

I know, it will kill you to bottle up your true feelings, but un-bottling those feelings is killing your relationship. This is what they mean, after all, by marriage being work.

STATEMENT:
If negotiations are still on, describe your intention to manage what she sees as your intolerance. “I love you and respect your commitment to your religion and its way of life. In the ways that matter most, we share similar values. Given our differences in religious affiliations, we cannot expect to worship together. But I want you to be comfortable with your involvement in your religion.”

My daughter is turning into a petty criminal. She’s getting kicked out of school again, she won’t stop messing around with drinking and drugs, she has unprotected sex, and her boyfriend is probably the guy who broke into our house and stole our TV, though she refuses to believe it. My husband and I have tried so many times to get her to see what she’s doing wrong and steer her in a better direction—we’re our own private “scared straight” program at this point—but every time we confront her about where she’s headed, she says she feels terrible, that she’s sorry, that she never wants it to happen again…and then she gets wasted and everything repeats itself. If only we could get her to understand the harm she’s doing, maybe we could get through to her and turn her around. Meanwhile, it’s killing us. We try to forgive her, but it’s hard. My goal is to forgive her and get her to see what she’s doing to herself and everyone who loves her.

There’s no point in getting your daughter to see what she’s doing wrong if she can’t really stop herself from doing it, and she really, really can’t. You can’t scare straightness into a boomerang.

Regret and remorse will make her feel bad, and you might think that will stop her from fucking up next time. Well, au contraire, my dear unHarvard-educated sap. It’s not fair, but that’s the way it works. You should know that since you’re the one missing a TV.

According to Christmas movies and sentimental parts of the Bible, repentance leads to redemption, but I say, goddammit, that’s just wishful bullshit.

Repentance leads your daughter to hating herself more for the shit she does when she loses control, and self-hate makes it that much easier to lose control again. Your goal isn’t to get her to repent. It’s to get her to accept that she’s fucked and should nevertheless try for better self-control.

Fuck forgiveness, too, while you’re at it. You wouldn’t forgive a snake for doing its thing with your foot and its fangs, because it does what it does, and your daughter’s lack of self-control is probably the same kind of thing. If you weren’t around, she’d still be having the same problems. She’s just steal someone else’s TV.

No one knows why some kids have so little self-control over anger and neediness, or sometimes we know but knowing does no good. Acceptance means you aren’t entitled to judge or forgive; just to make the best of things.

Making the best of things means trying all the standard tricks for keeping a kid of any age away from over-stimulation and temptation. Keep her busy, move her away from the bad kids if you can, and find good activities you can schedule regularly. Above all, stay calm and positive, and don’t show how scared and upset you are about her fuck-ups.

Don’t expect treatment to change her. Sometimes a 24 hour control-your-every-activity residential school will break bad habits and build new ones, but it’s expensive and often doesn’t work.

As for the oft-derided “Good Will Hunting” one-on-one psychotherapy, it’s less expensive and similarly unlikely to lead to a basic transformation. More realistically, therapy can do the same thing as you’re doing: positive coaching towards better behavior. As for achieving that better behavior by getting her to take responsibility, own her actions, and feel bad…you’d have better luck with a snake charmer.

STATEMENT:
Compose a statement of purpose that will keep you positive. “I think you want to be a good kid and that you regret at least some of the things that happen when you mess up. But it’s hard for you not to mess up because your brain pushes you so hard to act before you think, that’s just the way you are. So we’ll keep on trying to keep you away from risky situations and slow you down, so you have more time to think about what you really want to do. There are some troubles we can’t protect you from. You may get HIV or go to jail. But nothing will change our determination to help you get the control that you need, sooner or later.”

My sister and I have had issues over the years, but we’ve always managed to stay cordial despite our differences, at least until she got married. Just after she got married five or so years ago, she did something to my parents that really pissed me off—she was basically stealing from them, as far as I can tell—and while, in the past, she and I would have eventually gotten over it, her husband got into the crossfire (I chewed both of them out, not just her), and now he won’t let me anywhere near my sister to even try to move past this. I still think what she did was awful, and I still think her husband is an asshole, but she’s my sister, and she’s family, and I need her in my life. My goal is to figure out how and whether I should make amends to my brother-in-law, even though I’m not really sorry, so I can put my family back together.

You’re right to start thinking about what’s best for your family relationships and forget about who’s a conniving criminal, because you’re never going to stamp out family crime or protect its willing victims. You’re not God, or even Judge Judy.

On the other hand, you may benefit in the long run by avoiding unnecessary conflict, retaining your family membership card, and participating in events that allow you to make the best of the family you have, crooks, liars et al.

If forgiveness is important to you, you’re fucked, because whatever you forgive your sister for, she’s likely to do again, which will destroy your faith and make you nasty. Fuck forgiveness. Again.

If she’s a criminal, she is, so your goal is to accept her the way she is and decide what you want to do with her and the family relationships that you will always unavoidably share.

Figure out if the fight with her is worth it, and if it’s not, and you decide that peace will give you a better chance of enjoying family events, then mend fences, declare the war over, and let all hostilities from this point on be for her and her husband to sustain, or not.

You can’t stop her and her husband from continuing to hate you or freeze you out, but by refusing to hate them back, you just may lull them into giving it up, shutting up, and making nice.

STATEMENT:
Prepare a statement that stays positive, doesn’t lie, and lays out the advantages of peace. It may sound like an apology, but it’s not. An apology would be dishonest. “I know we’ve had our differences, but there were tensions in the past that no longer seem important, at least not to me. I believe you and your husband are an important part of my family and I think we’ll all be happier if we can share some friendly time together. I think it’s better to put the past behind us and remember that we share lots of good childhood memories, a love for our parents, and responsibility for their welfare as they grow older. I think we’ll all gain from resuming a positive relationship.”

My father, a Holocaust survivor, is dying of cancer. I’m his only child, and while my mother is doing the best she can, I feel overwhelmed with responsibility and grief. I don’t know how to stop feeling so helpless, not just because I love him and can’t save him, but because he overcame so much to make life possible for me, and now all I can do is watch him die. My goal is to figure out what I can do for him since he’s done so much for me.

Don’t fall for the common misconception that you fulfill your duty to your parents by taking care of them and keeping them safe when they’re old. As a genuine geezer, Dr. Lastname can tell you with authority: you can’t, and it’s not your duty anyway.

No, I’m not telling you to push your dad out on an ice flow or forget about him, not for a moment. I am telling you to think about two things: what your goal will be for your kids when you get old and need their help, and how little you can do for anyone when they’re suffering from old age.

If you’ve made sacrifices for your kids, it’s for the future of your family, and you want your kids to do the same for their kids. The last thing you want is to deplete their resources, disrupt the stability of their marriages, or take them away from your grandkids.

My guess is that your father didn’t have a child after surviving the Holocaust simply because he wanted care during old age or revenge on the enemies of the Jews. If he’s like most survivors, his main goal was to do what he started out doing before the earthquake happened, which was to give love to the next generation, pass on good moral values, and not let unavoidable sorrow or anger interfere.

Perhaps the intensity of your sorrow is part of your inheritance as the only child of a survivor. Your goal is not to make it go away by holding on to him, but to bear it, as your parents did, while living a full life.

So your goal isn’t to devote yourself to your father’s care; it’s to help him if there’s something you can do that will make a substantial difference and meanwhile continue with your normal life priorities.

No, it’s not a process that will make you feel good; tearing yourself away from his care, even though you know you can’t do more, never feels good and you’ll be tempted to keep on doing more and more and more.

If you let your loving, protective feelings take over, however, you’ll wear yourself out, do him no good, and damage the life your father wants you to build for yourself and others. Your father survived impossible hardship; honor him by surviving his illness with your sanity and priorities intact.

STATEMENT:
Prepare a statement to protect yourself from irrational guilt and responsibility. “In my family, we are committed to caring for one another, but we are also committed to carrying on with life and we know there is only so much we can do when faced with life’s worst problems, like aging, death, and loss. I will do anything for my father that will really help. And I will try to bear the pain of losing him without faltering in my other responsibilities, as he did with his losses throughout his life.”

I know it’s a cliché, but I am a gay man with a cat I love more than anything in the world. The problem is that she’s 15, she’s having serious problems with arthritis (and general old age), and the vet has made it clear that there are ways to prolong her life but not without some suffering on her part. The last thing I want is for my girl to suffer, but when I think about living without her, it’s like my heart stops. My goal is to make a responsible decision even though just thinking about making the decision tears me up inside.

Responsible decisions about unhappy dilemmas will almost always make you feel worse, because the only choice you have is between less-pain-now-and-feeling-like-a-shit-later and gagging-on-the-bitten-shit-bullet-now-but-knowing-you’ve-done-the-right-thing-later. Be a shit, or eat shit. Viva life.

So if your goal is to feel happy about your beloved cat’s death, forget it. On the other hand, if your goal is to do right by your old friend, then prepare to suck it up and bear your sorrow proudly.

It’s dangerous to want to feel less pain, because in order to do that, you’ll need to stop being a sensitive gay guy. You’ll need to get tough, brag about your sports injuries, and trade in your cat for an iguana.

Furthermore, you’ll need sign up for my cut-rate lobotomy service. Don’t worry, I promise to keep my charges down until I’ve completed 5 and gained the experience necessary to put myself in the upper ranks of brain surgeons. It’s all in the wrist.

If you insist on being gay and staying true to yourself, however, you must accept your pain. In all fairness, you wouldn’t want to get over the loss of a close friend in 2 weeks. Feeling pain is part of honoring her importance. There’s no shame in that, or the cliche.

STATEMENT:
So give yourself a pep talk to remember that pain can have positive meaning if you make it so. “I’ve been lucky to share my life with a wonderful cat, who gave me the kind of conditional non-acceptance that only a cat can provide. She saw me through tough times and taught me that the only thing of real importance was seeing to her needs. I’ll do right by her and cherish her memory.”

You said before that everybody hates the holidays, and I think most people hate seeing their families. Well, I hate the holidays, but it’s because I don’t have a family; my parents still drink too much, one brother is in jail and the other I don’t trust around my kids, and so every time the holidays roll around I get depressed that I don’t have anyone because the people I should be happy to see are the ones who made me the crazy mess I am today (honestly—I’m bipolar, but on medication). I’m sick of basically being guaranteed to hate myself and life all winter just because of what my family did. My goal is to find a way to feel better no matter what time of year it is.

There’s a simple answer to why it’s a bad idea to expect to get over the sorrow of a bad, abusive family; because usually, it simply can’t be done.

Focusing on your pain and waiting for it to go away will spoil your holidays even more than they’re already spoiled. Talk about a turd in the cranberry sauce.

Maybe you think it’s a holiday right and tradition to vent/celebrate your sad feelings with a shrink. Well, this shrink says forget it. I’m not interested, and neither should you be.

Sure, venting might give you a moment of relief, like a good emotional barf. On the other hand, you’ve shared your feelings before, you know where they come from, it hasn’t made them go away. If anything, they’ve probably made you feel even sadder and more pre-occupied than usual, which has made you the life of every holiday party you attend.

Please, don’t tell me that expressing your pain in psychotherapy will give you eventual relief and freedom. I can’t prove that it won’t, per se, but A, I did go to Harvard, and B, most people who seek my advice have cried themselves a river with more than one shrink, and their tears are still going strong.

So either they haven’t yet found the right shrink, or shrinks often don’t have the antidote to childhood sorrow. Take your pick.

Once you realize that getting rid of your pain is a dumb goal, then you’re free to focus on something much more constructive: how to have a meaningful holiday anyway. Aside from feeling happy, your holiday goal is to forge meaningful relationships and celebrate the values of that holiday, and pain doesn’t have to stop you, even if you can’t stop it.

My guess is that you have some long-term friends with whom you like to share holidays and that there is real hope that, over the years, you and your friends will come to share the kind of love and support for one another that families do.

Perhaps, in time, this love will ease your pain, or maybe it won’t, but either way, that part is beyond your control. Your urge to vent, however, isn’t. Keep it in check, try to ignore the negative, and pass the gravy boat.

STATEMENT:
Compose a statement that will help you shut up about your pain and focus on your determination to create the kind of holiday celebration and relationships that you missed as a kid. “I treasure the kind of friends who can get together regularly over many years and provide the commitment and support of caring family, particularly since I missed having that kind of love first time around. So I’ll do my best to find and build such friendships. And if I do, despite the sorrow I carry in my heart, I’ll have greater respect for my efforts and take pride in the meaning of what I’m trying to achieve.”

I’m a pretty generous person, so I’m never shocked when I find out someone’s taken advantage of me, even though it’s always painful, especially when I have to cut ties with them and move on. Without getting into too much detail, that’s exactly what happened with my brother 11 years ago, and I haven’t spoken to him since. It’s been painful, especially painful during the holiday season when I know he’s out there but we can’t all have Thanksgiving together like we used to, and like we should. My goal is to forget about his absence and get through Thanksgiving without having to suffer.

One thing I’ve observed about generous people, especially my fellow clinicians who like to make other people feel better (and including clergy, who are almost all closet therapists); we get really, really pissed after we’ve done a whole lot of giving and get nothing back.

There may be such a thing as selfless giving, but most of us like that giving feeling and have a dark side that gets triggered when we feel used. Giving, if nothing else, feels good; it’s the Christian drug of choice. It’s a good thing, of course, when it actually does some good and/or doesn’t lead to gift misuse or giver depletion.

Man alive though, do we givers get mad when what we get back is shit, even when the fecal return delivery was entirely predictable and so clearly isn’t personal.

What you need to do then, O jilted giver, is ask yourself carefully whether you’ve written off your brother because he’s an asshole who would ruin your holiday celebration by barfing all over the turkey/Christmas tree, or because you’re very, very angry.

Your goal isn’t to express anger—that would be a violation of the fuckin’ holiday spirit—but to do what you think is right and best for you and your family in the long run.

What’s right for families in the long run, I believe, is to hang together if it’s not absolutely toxic. Add up the pluses and minuses yourself without giving too high a score to the dramatic thrill of reconciliation.

Being kind to family, even bad family, is good for your self-esteem (as long as you keep a safe distance from the snakes). Showing kids how you accept faults and make the best of strengths is a good lesson in doing what’s meaningful, rather than what makes you happy. Looking out for one another helps everyone survive hard times.

Add whatever you want to the list as long as it’s not about feelings, just what’s meaningful or helpful in the long run. Then you can either reconsider your brother’s standing, or have a solid list of reassuring reasons why he should not be around.

STATEMENT:
Write a statement that will help you ignore your anger as you consider which course is more meaningful and consistent with your values. “I have good reason to be angry at my brother and it’s always reasonable to protect myself from abuse. But I won’t let anger make my decision for me as I decide whether it’s best to reach out and re-establish contact. It doesn’t matter whether this requires me to eat shit along with my turkey if the long-term result is better for my family.”

I have been basically bedridden now for almost a decade with constant pain and fatigue, and I’m not even 50. I have been diagnosed with many auto-immune diseases, as well as central nervous system disorders that have led to constant pain, and am on a diet of many medications for pain, neurological disorders, and sleep. I find myself asking why bother? I have lost so many years of my life; my “thrill” in life is getting through a grocery trip. My body is weakened and aged, I cannot please my husband, my now grown children see a mother who is weak and sad. Before this, I was an active, involved, strong woman looking forward to a wonderful active life with my husband, and ready to see my children become healthy adults with families of their own. Now I see a life of pain that no medication has been able to stop, the constant craving of sleep, and utter depression.

If your goal was to be have a wonderful active life with your husband and watch your grandchildren grow, you were screwed before you began.

We all wish for a life like that, but the reason I’m open for business is that none of us can make such a life happen, even with a perfect start and wonderful marriage, not in this world. So if you make a goal of wishes like these, you’ll feel like a total loser when uncontrollable things happen, like incurable illness and pain.

A better goal is to find a partner who is sufficiently strong, caring, and devoted to kids so that he will shoulder the load when you can’t and stick around when you’re not much fun to be with. Lucky for you, you’ve succeeded.

Your goal with your kids is to show them how to be good, caring, productive people in spite of all the unfair shit that life will throw at them, and that’s what you’re succeeding at now.

Your husband and kids may be sad and hurting for your pain, and you’re hurting for theirs. Happiness and pain relief, however, were never what was most important about your goals, so never say that you’ve lost “so many” years of your life.

For all those years, you’ve coped with illness while raising a family. If you put aside the negative thoughts that pain and depression have put in your head, I’m sure your family still considers the day better if you’re around than if you’re not, so that’s many years of living with pain, and sharing life with your family.

I’m old enough to have many dead friends, some of whom died painfully. Some reached the point where pain was too much and it was a relief to go, but one secret that doctors know, and people who care for dying patients, is that dying people often show us how to live. They discover their priorities and share their courage.

It’s painful to work with them but also enriching, and so it has been with my friends. I think of them often when I need to remember what’s more important than pain.

STATEMENT:
Help out your family by writing a statement. “I know it gets depressing when I seem to get weaker and hurt more, no matter how much good love and care you give me. But I want you to know that my time with you is precious and that I’m proud of how strong you’ve been and what a good job you’re doing. It’s normal to get discouraged, overwhelmed, and angry. It’s also normal to give up and bicker and get away from this burden. But we haven’t done that in this family. In this family, we hang together and try to help one another and I’m proud of you.”

My husband and I were having problems for a long time (we both acknowledged this), but then, as things were coming to a head, he suffered a severe stroke. From that point, the status of our marriage seemed unimportant; he was my husband and he needed my help. For over a year, I stayed with him through physical therapy, rehab, just several grueling months of watching him learn how to speak and walk again. He’s still not 100%, but he’s no longer dependent on me or anyone else…which is why I want to talk to him again about getting a divorce. I’m not sure whether I’m just worried about being perceived as a monster (I know, who cares what other people think), but whether I really am being a monster, even though we were talking about divorcing before his stroke ever happened. I know he’s in an impaired state now, but just because he has to suffer a burden for the rest of his life, doesn’t mean I have to suffer our marriage. My goal is to go back to the things the way they were before the stroke, and go forward from there.

To my mind, living up to your marriage vows is important. That said, living up to your vows isn’t just a matter of keeping your promises, because there’s too much you don’t control about what happens to a partnership after it’s formed.

Your wish for your marriage is that you support one another through thick and thin, but reality may make mutual support impossible and turn the marriage into a severe burden for one or both of you. This happens frequently if your partner has an addiction or a problem with other out-of-control behavior. It also happens when it turns out that you just can’t get along.

Despite your best intentions, your marriage goal is not to support one another unconditionally, but to do your best to create a good partnership and manage it constructively if it’s not.

In deciding whether or not to stay with your husband, accept that, of all the factors involved with your next move, your feelings are not what’s most important. Someone may be a pain in the ass to live with, but you and your kids, if you have them, may be better off with the marriage as is, regardless.

Yes, you may be able to provide better care than he could get elsewhere, but, if you really can’t get along together, being trapped in a close relationship by his disability will be hell for both of you. Accept the reality of your bad chemistry before considering alternatives.

It’s unlikely that your decision will make anyone feel good because that’s not possible. Your goal is not to make a decision that feels good, but to assess the good and bad that will come about from staying together versus splitting up, and arrive at a decision that makes the best of things.

Don’t focus on what other people would think, or what you would feel, or what could have been. Focus on what makes the most sense for the future.

STATEMENT:
Write a statement that will help you make your assessment without being overly influenced by anger or guilt. “I’ve done a good job of caring for my partner and I think he’s strong enough to be OK if I decide to leave. Now it’s my job to add up the value of staying versus going. I’ll assume, at this point, that the bad chemistry between us can’t be helped and is nothing but a fact that I must include, without blame, in my decision. I can’t expect my decision to make anyone happy in the short run. But if I’ve tried hard to make our relationship work and to find a good way of dealing with the fact that it doesn’t, I’ll make a good decision.”