Readers, please send your letters. They can be emails, formal letters or handwritten notes. They are edited solely for grammar and spelling. Also, they are sometimes edited for length.
Dear Doctor Love,
I am turning fifteen this year. My father is getting married again and he expects me to be there. I have told him that I am old enough to make up my own mind and really don’t want to go. He said never mind, I have go to the ceremony at least. His fiancé is OK I guess but I think I would feel really uncomfortable if I have to be there,
What should I do?
/s/ Old Enough
Dear Old,
When your father tells you he wants you at his wedding he is trying to tell you something. It is his way of showing you that he is committed to you as his family. Some day you will be getting married and you will want him to be there. Honor him as your father and put aside your feelings.
Dear Doctor Love,
I am a forty year-old man and still single. I have had a lot of relationships but I can’t seem to find a woman that I want to settle down with for the rest of my life. On the other hand, I haven’t spent a lot of time looking for that “one” woman and have never been in love. I like the kind of work that I do and I have always liked the feeling of being unattached and single. I would hate to change things from the way they are. Sometimes I get anxious thinking about twenty years ahead in my life. I don’t like the idea of waking up one day to find myself alone and miserable.
For the last year I have been thinking that maybe I should start looking for a wife instead of just a girlfriend. Do you think that is the answer?
/s/ All By Myself
Dear All By Myself,
If you find a wife right now and settle down you will make yourself miserable. You will make some unsuspecting woman equally miserable. You would be doing neither of you a favor by leaping into a marriage when you are not ready for it. Before changing your life you would have to change yourself. Aside from the occasional feelings of anxiety about old age you appear to be quite satisfied with the way things are going. Why change, unless you meet someone who is extra special? That’s just asking for trouble. You have no idea about loneliness and misery until you wake up in bed with your wife of ten years and find that she is a complete stranger.
