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 have been married for two years and I am getting unhappier all of the time. Me and my husband are always fighting and arguing over stupid things. We have been saving up money to buy a golf cart. We almost have enough but now there is something else. The golf carts come in white and have small tires. He wants to get it painted a special color and have different wheels and tires put on it. This will be expensive and we will probably have to wait another six months before we can afford a golf cart. I really do not mind this so bad and I do not mind so much about the tires. What we cannot agree on is what color it is going to be. I want blue and he wants red.
This is the kind of stupid thing we argue about. We sometimes carry the arguments on for days until we are both so vexed we can’t speak to each other. What can I do?
/s/ Tired Of It
Dear Tired,
Start with yourself. How important is a golf cart color to you? You seem to think that it is important enough to be arguing about and creating serious friction in your marriage. That’s important. Will it still be important in a year? How about two years? Probably not. Maybe not so important. Ten years? You will have long forgotten about the color of that golf cart although the sting of the argument may linger.
All of the things that are so important to us today are less important every day that we get away from them. Eventually they fade into memory. The bitterness of fighting does not fade so easily.
As for right now, why not compromise with him? Let him go ahead and get his wheels and put off the paint job for later. You will get your golf cart sooner and chances are he will never get around to getting it painted.
Dear Doctor Love,
After my husband goes out with his single friends I always find the numbers of strange women on his phone. He always says he is sorry and these women mean nothing to him but I don’t trust him anymore. What should I do?
/s/ Suspicious
Dear Suspicious,
The problem lies with the single guys he goes out with. He is not strong enough to come out and say, “I’m married. I don’t want this.” Help him get stronger by deleting any numbers that you find.
