Ask Virginia Ironside
I’m having family guilt
Q I have an elderly mother, approaching 100, who is increasingly immobile and housebound, although fiercely independent and still living in her own house. My sister, my only sibling, lives a few streets away and is able to visit her on a daily basis to make sure she is OK and to do chores for her. I, on the other hand, live over two hours’ drive away, have a family, and am only able to visit on occasional weekends. I feel terribly guilty, not because of failing to do enough for my mum (although that is a factor), but because my sister takes so much of the burden of visiting and looking after her. This guilt continues to grow with time – can you suggest a solution? Elizabeth, by email A Guilt is entirely useless unless it prompts you to kinder action. Clearly you can’t visit your mother more often. But you could ask your sister if there’s any other way you could contribute to making your mother’s life jollier rather than hiking over to see her. More phone calls from you and the grandchildren? Teaching her Skype so the contact is even greater? Perhaps your sister would like money for petrol for trips out? Or a generous present of theatre tickets or foodie treats? Perhaps your mother would appreciate letters or flowers? Is there any way she could be moved to come to stay with you for a few days every few months?
My ex-friend is a pain
Q I’ve got an ex-friend who drives me mad. We used to work together perfectly happily, doing PR in the same business. Now both
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retired, and moving in the same social circles, we bump into each other often. I’m afraid I now find her so intensely irritating that I can barely bring myself to talk to her. She is always friendly but, as I suddenly realised when we retired, is extremely boring, beneath a layer of bonhomie. She always approaches me at parties. I find the irritation overwhelming and, within seconds, make a flimsy excuse to race away from her. I’ve heard she’s upset with me, quite understandably. I realise I’m behaving badly but I am completely allergic to her. What should I do next time I see her at a party? Name and address supplied A You can either continue and bear the consequences – we can’t like everyone or, in her case, be liked by everyone. Or, when you spot her, you can go up to her before she catches sight of you, give her a warm smile and a big hug, say how lovely it is to see her – and how amazing she’s looking – and add that your life is completely frantic these days. And then disappear into the crowd.
The news is so depressing
Q I have become increasingly anxious about the state of the world. Every time I check the news, it seems there’s another disaster – if it’s not a flood, it’s a grisly murder or young people freezing in makeshift refugee camps. A recent story about children locked in a cellar has been the final straw and I can’t stop thinking about them. This sort of thing never, I’m sure, happened when I was younger. Or, if it did, it happened far less often. I wonder if I’m supersensitive – but a lot of my friends seem cast down, too. Marion, by email A When we were younger, far fewer dramas were reported. Now, with rolling news, and film footage, we’re tormented by graphic reports of every storm, every awful murder, every shivering, starving old widow, tortured animal and indescribable acts of cruelty in the entire world. If I were you, I’d buy only one newspaper a day – the print version – and forbid yourself from checking news online. That won’t stop the horrors, but it’ll cut it down by at least half. And comfort yourself that, when you were younger, it’s quite likely that even worse atrocities were happening daily – you just never read about them.
Why is my husband crying?
Q My husband is obsessed by First World War cemeteries. Every spring, I am dragged round these places while my husband weeps, often quite openly. But if I get tears in my eyes about an old lady run over in the road, he remains dry-eyed and obviously thinks I’m being rather sentimental. Do you know why this is? Name and address supplied A I asked a man similar to your husband what it was that made him weep at cemeteries and he said it was guilt. He said he felt he should have died like those young soldiers, and he felt guilt and sadness about being alive. Many men feel envy for those who died in heroic acts – not to mention guilt that they, too, haven’t had the chance to be heroes.