Pet-sitting for businessman gives girlfriend wrong idea

Q: I’m a woman who provides in-home pet-care services to a businessman who’s frequently travelling.

For his longer trips, I often stay overnight to make sure the pet doesn’t feel abandoned. There’s a spare room that I use.

Over the 18 months that I’ve have been pet-sitting there, I brought a few items into the home: two ceramic pet dishes to help prevent acne from developing on the pet’s chin, a pair of slippers to wear (at the owner’s request), a tea mug and a small cushion.

Over this past Christmas, the owner’s long-distance girlfriend visited him. According to him, the girlfriend, believing something personal was going on between us, took my pet-care items and threw them away.

He didn’t stop her.

What can I do to respond in a professional manner, to address the loss of my work items and the wrongful dispersion cast on me as a paid service-provider to this businessman?

Let Down by Employer

A: Even if this man provides you with a steady income, he threw you under the bus.

At the very least, he should have reimbursed you for the tossed items. Worse, he left you with a questionable reputation from his girlfriend’s view.

As a professional wanting to clear your reputation from whatever she may say about you, I suggest you write her a polite letter expressing what her unjustified reaction means to you as a woman doing an honest job to earn a living.

Send a second letter that describes these circumstances without naming the client or his girlfriend, to professional associations you belong to, also veterinarians and pet shops that may send clients to you, and to the businessman who should pay you for new items.

Don’t renew a commitment to look after his pets.

Instead, make a concerted outreach to new potential clients, after your letter circulates among your contacts.

One warning: Before you send either letter, have a thoughtful friend look it over so this issue doesn’t turn into something more problematic.

Reader’s Commentary: Regarding whether a friendship between a married man and a woman associate through work, is “emotional cheating” (Jan. 20):

I went through a similar situation, but it had to do with a friend’s wife.

She and I had dated for about three months before my friend met her.

When we broke up, they got together and eventually married.

When my wife and I were dating, there were many occasions when the four of us would be together and there was no problem.

After we were married, it came out that me and this woman had a relationship and my wife went ballistic.

She refused to see them and would have a fit if I had a beer with my friend, even without his wife.

This went on for years and didn’t end until our marriage did.

One day, while having drinks with my ex’s sister and her husband, her sister said she believed it was because my wife was unfaithful all during our marriage, which I did not know.

I’m only saying this to give some insight into this issue.

FEEDBACK: Regarding the grieving widow (Jan. 19):

Reader: I also lost my husband recently to an unknown illness. Please accept my thanks for the help to motivate me to get some counselling and work through my grief.

If I could say one thing to anyone else who’s grieving a lost loved one, it’d be that life has to end, but your memories will never die.

Ellie’s tip of the day

In personal-service work, walk away from clients who disrespect you.

Ellie Tesher is an advice columnist for the Star and based in Toronto. Send your relationship questions via email: ellie@thestar.ca.

OTTAWA — As the Trudeau government is forced to explain delays rolling out COVID-19 vaccines, some of the world’s economic and health leaders are warning of catastrophic financial consequences if poorer countries are shortchanged on vaccinations.

At a video meeting convened by the Paris-based Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Secretary-general Angel Gurria said rich countries would see their economies shrink by trillions of dollars if they don’t do more to help poor countries receive vaccines.

“It’s a smart thing to do. It is ethically and morally right. But it is also economically right,” said Gurria.

“The global economy stands to lose as much as $9.2 trillion, which is close to half the size of the U.S. economy, just to put it in context … as much as half of which would fall on advanced economies, so they would lose around $5 trillion.”

On Tuesday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Canada remains committed to helping poor countries cope with COVID-19, while working hard to vaccinate Canadians as quickly as possible because of the emergence of the new variants.

“We continue to work with partners around the world,” he said at a news conference outside his Ottawa residence. “We understand the pressure that every government is feeling to vaccine as many of their citizens as quickly as possible.”