But trust me, it can be better than this.
Dear Graham,
I am madly in love with my new boyfriend but find it difficult to handle the fact that he is in constant contact with his ex. They split up a year ago, after five years together, but still seem to be in touch on an almost daily basis. He often pulls out of things with me because his ex makes demands on him.
When her car wouldn’t start outside her flat, he was the person she called (he turned up within the hour with jump leads). Another time he went around to her flat in the middle of the night because a pigeon had got trapped in her bathroom.
I understand they’re still close – but find it difficult that she makes such inroads on our time together. In all other respects we get on brilliantly, but every time we start getting really close his mobile starts ringing, or a text comes through from her. I’m not a jealous, possessive person, but I’m getting more and more upset by the situation. Any advice?
Freya L, Middlesex
Dear Freya,
You may not be a possessive person, but you’re an idiot to put up with this treatment. Somebody, preferably your boyfriend, needs to explain to his ex that they are not together any more.
It’s nice to stay friendly with people we were once very close to, but I don’t think that includes fixing flat car batteries and freeing trapped pigeons. You don’t have to be mean about it, but he needs to start putting you and your relationship first.
When we move house, we don’t feel compelled to keep going back to mow the lawn. The grass that once needed us finds a way to cope.
Obviously, his ex enjoys the power she still has over your boyfriend and he must enjoy the feeling of being needed. Five years together is a long time and all sorts of co-dependent behaviour can develop. Time now to stop it.
If your boyfriend doesn’t understand why the texts and calls annoy you, then I’m afraid you should probably move on because obviously he isn’t going to.
Dear Graham,
My American wife died 12 years ago, leaving me to bring up our daughter, who was just seven at the time.
She is now 19 and studying in the US and I have heard through friends that she is romantically involved with a man of 50.
He is a twice-divorced writer and no doubt cuts a very glamorous figure for a girl still in her teens. I’m told he also drinks heavily. In short, the man is every father’s worst nightmare.
I despair at the thought of my beautiful daughter creeping out for assignations with her elderly lover, cutting herself off from all those nice Ivy League boys. But what really torments me is the breakdown of trust between us. Whenever we exchange news on Skype she denies everything.
What can I do to win back her trust and regain that closeness we’ve always had?
Jeffrey B, Oxfordshire
Dear Jeffrey,
You poor man. Everyone talks about the rites of passage of a young person entering adulthood but I’m afraid parents have their own rites of passage, which must be worst of all for the fathers of girls.
I often think of Catherine Zeta-Jones’s father walking her down the aisle to give her away to a man older than himself. Surely that rocks the natural order of things, yet no one can deny that they seem happy and she has a brood of beautiful children she clearly adores.
This relationship obviously isn’t what you’d wish for her, but your primary concern is the breakdown of communication. You know her better than anyone so you’ll know if she’s not telling you because she fears your displeasure, or is she playing a game where she wants you to freak out? Either way, I’m afraid it’s all about waiting. Forcing her into the open will only provoke unwelcome reactions. Visiting her in America might help bring things to a head and you may feel less concerned if you see them together.
Whatever happens, I expect the closeness that’s missing may return when her heart gets broken. Heavy-drinking divorced writers tend to quickly tire of 19-year-old students and, when he does, she’ll need her father. Look out for signs that it’s over so she doesn’t have to suffer in silence.
It’s clear you’ve done a great job of being a father so far but, as your daughter becomes an adult, that job changes. Sticking plasters and night lights were the easy part. Now you have to let go.
Dear Graham,
My wife and I have two wonderful sons. We divide our time between a country house in Hampshire and a flat near Sloane Square. I earn the money and my wife runs our two homes and looks after the boys. A rather old-fashioned marriage, you might say.
I would like us to have more children but my wife is adamant that she doesn’t want any more. She says that having survived years of nappies and night-time feeds she wants her life back, although she has no plans to go to work. She also argues that as she’s provided me with an ‘heir and a spare’ there is no reason for us to keep going.
I’m one of five and have always wanted a big family. I long for a daughter.
Rupert C, London SW1
Dear Rupert,
Real world to Rupert! Come in, Rupert! I’m no expert but apparently having children is really easy if all you do is have a fun time providing sperm and then show up to watch the resulting kiddies ride their ponies on a Saturday afternoon. Your wife, on the other hand, probably finds having children extremely taxing, especially when it sounds as if the only support she receives from her husband is financial.
My advice is to enjoy your boys and your lovely life instead of spoiling these precious years by yearning for phantom family members.
You are so lucky in so many ways. Look around at the lives other people are living – the couples that can’t conceive, the people who can’t afford to provide for their family.
Hug your boys, sir, and kiss your wife. Who knows, if you start really appreciating what you’ve got and treasuring your trio, an unexpected stork may come flying by.
Dear Graham,
My wife, who I love dearly, is privately wealthy. We have two children under five and she stopped working when our first child was born. We live a pretty normal middle-class life – nothing showy – and, as far as I know, she never dips into her money, although she has set up trust funds for the children. I’m from a principled, left-wing (and not moneyed) background. I’ve always sworn that I’d be the provider and I’ve done exactly that throughout our married life. But I was made redundant six months ago. Since then I’ve been paying the bills with my savings but the money is running out fast.
Finding a job in the current climate isn’t easy. I would love not to go back into salaried work and do what I’ve always dreamed of – start my own business. But I would need to ask my wife to step in financially until I got things off the ground.
I feel wracked with guilt about going back on my promise to myself. And I’m not sure how my wife would react. We have a rather conservative marriage and I think she expects the man to be the breadwinner at all times.
Gavin H, Liverpool
Dear Gavin,
I don’t care how conservative any marriage is because the ‘for richer or poorer’ bit seems very specific. The two of you are a family unit now and it seems crazy to be using up all your savings while somehow your wife’s money is untouchable.
Presumably she has noticed that you aren’t going to work any more, so where does she think the money to pay bills is coming from? It’s very nice that your children have trust funds but they won’t do them much good if they end up homeless.
It sounds as if the two of you have lived a rather charmed life so far and this is the first challenge your marriage has faced. Remember all the vows you both made and talk to her.
This is the woman you love.
This is the woman who is the mother of your children. Do you really think she is going to throw away your life together over money? Have you married Alexis Carrington from Dynasty or a pantomime villain? What you’re going through isn’t easy, but the great thing is that you don’t have to do it alone.
Dear Graham,
My (recover
ing alcoholic) brother, who’s lonely and vulnerable, has taken up with a woman he met at an AA meeting, a chain-smoking mother of three, all of whose children have been taken away by social services.
I suspect that this awful woman joined his local group with the sole aim of hooking a rich man. The meetings she goes to are held in a smart London neighbourhood, miles from her home in Hackney.
Apparently, she has just announced that she is about to be evicted from her flat. And my brother, being soft-hearted, has agreed to let her stay with him ‘temporarily’. I fear that, once she gets through his front door, he’ll never get rid of her. My husband tells me not to get involved, but I worry that she might make my brother’s life hell. I don’t think for a minute that he’s in love with her, or that she could make him happy.
He is 36. She claims to be in her mid-thirties but looks 10 years older.
What – if anything – can I do about it?
Karen D, London
Dear Karen,
You, I presume, are not an alcoholic or a member of AA, and so will never be able to understand the bond between two people battling the same illness. All you can do is be there to catch your brother should he fall once more.
Slight alarm bells ring for me because I’m fairly sure AA doesn’t encourage relationships forming within the group. Perhaps you should talk to a support group for the friends and families of alcoholics who could give you more information and advice. Rushing to judge this woman does seem very harsh.
Obviously, she has made huge mistakes in the past, but she is trying to change and move on with her life and that should be applauded. I’m sure on paper your brother, as a recovering alcoholic, doesn’t exactly look like a catch.
Whether the relationship will flourish once their problems are behind them, who can tell, but everyone deserves a second chance.
As for looking older than she says, well, she’s an alcoholic. Work it out.
Dear Graham,
Do I have the rudest daughter-in-law in Britain? On our last visit to our son’s house in Northamptonshire, we arrived with presents and bottles of wine only to find our daughter-in-law had arranged to go to a poetry reading on the one evening we were there. Our son was stuck late at work and, after the children had been put to bed by the nanny, my husband and I dined alone on a Chinese takeaway.
Perhaps I am a little difficult. Perhaps my standards are too high and out of sync with that of her rather more casual generation but it upsets me hugely that my daughter-in-law doesn’t at least observe the basic formalities and pretend to like me.
She makes no effort at all and I always go home feeling hurt, upset and more than a little furious.
Any advice on how to build bridges?
Margaret B, Ipswich
Dear Margaret,
As night follows day and obscurity follows winning Britain’s Got Talent, so a mother is destined to hate her daughter-in-law. Don’t fight it, but rather relish the primeval inevitability of it all. She has stolen your baby and she is not good enough.
Now, consider for a moment how much this woman loathes you. After learning that your son was working late, she preferred to go to a poetry reading rather than be alone with you. A poetry reading? Gordon Brown hates Tony Blair less.
What both of you should realise is that your son is the prime cause of all these problems. If your standards are so high, then why not apply them to your baby? You are visiting for one night and he gets ‘stuck’ at work? No. He chose work over you.
He isn’t some gullible fool who your daughter-in-law has ensnared. He is the adult you brought up and he has fallen in love with this woman and chosen to start a new life with her. If visiting them just upsets you, then stop. Clearly, your son and his wife won’t care.
It’s your expectations that are making you unhappy and probably alienating your daughter-in-law. Relax. This young couple are living their life their way. I sense you disapprove of the nanny, but you raised your boy yourself and look how he’s treating you.
We all make our own beds to lie in – don’t turn yours into a bed of nails.
Dear Graham,
I am newly engaged but daunted about those occasions when I meet my future in-laws.
My future spouse’s father has recently made a fortune, which he has ‘invested’ in his cellar. Every weekend spent under his roof is a bacchanalian debauch. Lunch usually involves three bottles of Puligny-Montrachet, while dinner is preceded by martinis of knee-buckling strength. The bloody Marys served at breakfast on Sunday go some way to alleviating the inevitable hangover, but by Sunday lunch I’m ready to fall into the soup.
I’m a banker and need to maintain a clear head and manual dexterity when answering my BlackBerry 24/7. I don’t want to lose blokish credibility by not keeping up (or suddenly developing an allergy). Any advice?
PS They don’t have pot plants into which one can tip the odd glass.
Will Y, London
Dear Will,
I will answer your letter but I have to admit your problem seems very slight. Most men would settle for a room temperature can of Heineken, but you get delicious expensive wine.
I understand that you don’t want a muddled head, but how often do you visit your in-laws? Even if it’s once a month that’s a mere 12 weekends a year. If that still seems more than you can cope with, then blame your busy work schedule – arrive late and leave early. Agree with your fiancée on an excuse for leaving early and then your blokish credentials won’t be in doubt.
I hate to think of all that wine going unloved. Couldn’t you learn to embrace the occasional lost weekend? I know I would always choose the grape over the BlackBerry.
Dear Graham,
I’ve just got back from a disastrous summer holiday with my husband and children in Brittany. My husband was moody and sulky and spent the entire time buried in one-day-old British newspapers, fiddling with his BlackBerry and ignoring us. He often refused to join us for lunch and went to the local café on his own.
We’ve been together for a long time and it seems like we’ve been in a rut for as long as I can remember. Do we even love each other like we used to? I just don’t know. We have sex rarely and when we talk it’s almost always about the children.
I don’t think he’s having an affair, but I sometimes wonder if perhaps he’s a bit depressed. His working life has been pretty insecure over the past few years. Perhaps that’s affected his confidence/joie de vivre. Or maybe he’s got bored with me – and with his responsibilities – and longs to be free of us? It’s difficult to know what to do. I want to make my marriage work, not least for the sake of our children. I just don’t know where to start, or how to get through to him.
Joanna S, Bristol
Dear Joanna,
Clearly something is wrong and you’ve done a great job of listing all the things that could be the problem, but ultimately the only person who can tell you what’s going on in your husband’s head is your husband, so ask him.
I understand that it won’t be easy because he may tell you something that you don’t want to hear, but that has to be better than drifting along in the dull chilly fog of your marriage. It can’t be nice for children to see their father skulking off to cafés by himself when a holiday should be an opportunity to spend more time with them.
I always think in situations like this you should imagine the worst possible outcome – he wants to leave you, he has a brain tumour, he’s murdered someone – and then talk yourself through how you would cope. No matter how awful the scenario, you can deal with it and survive.
Take strength from that and tackle your husband head on. He may just be in a general midlife malaise. Perhaps this isn’t the life he imagined himself living. Marriages are bound to go through peaks and troughs and you’ve both got to decide if you want to wait for the next peak or if there’s ever going to be another one.
You can’t love each other in the way that you did because relationships have to change and grow in order to survive, but h
opefully you will find a new way to love each other.
Of course, it may all be explained by your choice of holiday destination. Brittany? Just because there’s a ferry doesn’t mean you have to go there.
Dear Graham,
My boyfriend works insanely long hours. His job in advertising is pretty stressful and he refuses to go out on ‘school nights’ unless it’s with colleagues or work contacts. When we’re together, he either talks about work, or watches rubbish on TV, directing his frustrations at the box as if he’s addressing a real person.
Is his job making him go a bit bonkers? Even on holiday he takes his BlackBerry to the beach. Most alarming of all, he wears Boden swimming trunks, just like David Cameron. How can I persuade him to get a life?
Maggie R, Bristol
Dear Maggie,
Your boyfriend works all the time and when you do see him he’s really boring? His style icon is David Cameron and he talks to the television? You are going out with him because…? Surely being single is preferable to spending time with this work-obsessed yawn?
I’m particularly upset because I had just managed to clear my mind of that hideous image of David Cameron emerging from the waves like a giant wet veal sausage, and now it’s back. Can we really trust a man to lead the country when he can’t even grasp that waxing your chest is only sexy if you have a sexy body? If you don’t, you just look like a giant baby.
Why not call your boyfriend’s secretary and leave him a message. It’s over. And so is Boden swimwear.
Move on, Maggie!
Dear Graham,
I’m a 40-something twice-divorced woman. My friends tell me I’m intelligent, lively, fun loving and not unattractive.
Ask Graham Page 24