Friends flaunting their affairs
Q: Two of my married girlfriends are having affairs. I’m married, with two children aged seven and five, and I work part time. I also drive the kids to various activities, like sports and their music or dance lessons. I do all the food shopping and laundry, so I have little time for myself, let alone for a romance or even a fling.
But these women who tell me their stories create time for cheating. One woman hires a babysitter to so she can “do errands,” but actually meets her lover in the afternoon at a hotel. Another woman lies to her husband, saying that she’s having a girls’ night out. She’s sleeping with a married man whose wife travels for work.
I used to like and respect both women, with whom I’ve been friends since high school. But their disrespect to their husbands and their
kids is disgusting me.
— Turned-off Friend
A: Both women have known you long enough to sense your personal standards. However, by listening to their stories, you give tacit acceptance of what they’re doing. It’s time to turn off their reporting and say you feel it’s their private business that you’d prefer not to know. The message that it’s bothering you will be clear.
But there’s more to long friendship than judgment. This is an opportunity for you to say to each one that you worry about her, and where an affair can lead. The longer cheating continues, the more whatever caused it gets ignored.
Despite feelings of escapism, fun or whatever each woman claims as reason for an affair, the future’s likely to expose her as a cheat, and lead to divorce and troubled reactions from her children. If you show you care, a friend might rethink her actions.
Q: I was 13, living in England with a vicious father and a mum who didn’t do anything about it. I had four siblings and I couldn’t stand the beatings. I ran away to sea with a friend who lived in similar circumstances. It was 1944, the war was still on.
We hitchhiked to Southampton and crawled through the barbed wire surrounding the docks. We hid in a crane. My buddy felt sick, so we got out of the crane and were promptly collared by a dockyard policeman.
We were interrogated in the local police station, fed and put to bed. The next day, a policeman escort us home. When my mother opened the door, the policeman told her she should stop my father’s brutal behaviour immediately.
Things settled down just a little. I left school at 14, got a job and joined the British navy at 15. One weekend I was at an afternoon party and, looking out a window, saw this gorgeous young lady. It was love at first sight. I was 17. We married three years later.
— Still Together
A: Thanks for this touching and inspiring story of a young person’s determination to defy circumstances and find a better life. It’s not an easy task. It’s an example of how determination, courage and optimism can help someone find lasting love.