ArcaMax

Dear Annie: For the past 30 years, my wife and I have enjoyed a friendship with another couple who are childless. They had no family nearby, so they were fixtures at our table for all of the major holidays. We genuinely liked their company. We vacationed together on several occasions, and we came to treat them like family.

We hadn't heard from ...Read more

Dear Annie: I have worked for a long time at a large manufacturing company. I am a hard worker and believe in teamwork. Over the years, however, the company has let workers get away with everything: personal emails and texting, using their computers to watch TV shows, movies and hockey games, abusing overtime and sick days, taking photos of ...Read more

Dear Annie: At least once a week, my oldest daughter, "Alice," asks me to babysit her two kids. I have back problems and cannot get up and down all the time. She has never offered me a dime, even when she was married and had two incomes. I could use the money.

Alice recently went through a divorce. I babysat a lot during that time, but she ...Read more

Dear Annie: I am having a disagreement with my sister. She gets very upset when she is not invited to a party or other event. She believes she has the right to question the host's motives for creating the guest list.

My sister claims she is justified in doing this because it would avoid the hurt feelings of someone being left off of the guest ...Read more

ATTENTION CLASSIC ANNIE'S MAILBOX EDITORS: THE FOLLOWING COLUMN WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN 2014. THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION -- CREATORS.COM

Dear Annie: Six years ago, I gave up my job to take care of my mother, while my siblings went off and had fun. After Mom passed, I still had the house to clean and laundry to do. I never asked for a dime...Read more

Dear Annie: I am in my second marriage. My two adult children were pre-teens when I married "Lenny" 15 years ago.

The problem is, Lenny has a bad temper and little patience. He flies off the handle and gets upset easily. It makes life difficult. He doesn't frighten me, and I can easily tell him to stop when these episodes begin, but they upset ...Read more

Dear Annie: I have been married to my wife for 20 years, but only three were truly happy. My wife is older and had been married before. She came to the relationship with a 3-year-old child. We then had a daughter together.

Not long after we married, I learned that my wife is a clutter bug and refuses to do housework. She always has an excuse. ...Read more

Dear Annie: I have a son with serious anxiety problems. He gets it from his father. That entire side of the family has so much anxiety that they never take vacations because they can't deal with the stress of leaving home.

When my son was in his early teens, I tried to get him into counseling, but we live in a rural area, and there are few ...Read more

Dear Annie: I recently remarried and became a stepmom to my husband's three daughters. My concern is his oldest, "Kallie," who is 14.

A few months ago, her father picked her up for our weekend, and she was terribly sad. When he asked what was wrong, her younger sister piped up with, "Her girlfriend broke up with her." Kallie thought her dad ...Read more

Dear Annie: I'm the youngest of 10 siblings. Most of my brothers and sisters are much older, and I was raised primarily with "Sara and Tina," who often bullied and hit me. Consequently, my mother would not leave me alone with them, and my sisters grew to resent the closeness I had with Mom.

When we grew up, I was the one who took responsibility...Read more

Dear Annie: I've been close friends with "Jane" for years. Recently, Jane said she feels I do not listen or validate her problems but instead offer her unsolicited advice when all she wants to do is vent.

I apologized for not being a good listener. But, Annie, she complained to me that she is losing her job and her house and wants to leave her ...Read more

Dear Annie: My husband and I are in our mid-20s, have been married for five years and have two children. We are both full-time students with jobs. My job is full time and his is part time. However, our responsibilities at home are split so that I do 95.5 percent of everything, and he does what's left. My husband refuses to look for a full-time ...Read more

Dear Readers: Happy Mother's Day. Please phone your mother, grandmother, mother-in-law, stepmother or foster mother and wish them the best. And please don't forget those for whom this day, for whatever reason, is filled with sadness. Give them a call and say you are thinking of them.

Dear Annie: Every Mother's Day, I think of how often the ...Read more

Dear Annie: I have twin teenage granddaughters who visit me every year for a week. They also bring along a friend (just one, thank goodness). I love having them, but I end up spending a fortune entertaining them. I pay for every meal, including restaurants, and we eat out a lot. I love to take them places, but I'm on a fixed income and would ...Read more

Dear Annie: Six months ago, I became involved with a man 20 years my senior. It has become evident that his ex-wife is still very much in the picture.

They divorced 30 years ago, when he found out she was cheating. He gave her the house and half of his earnings until their children were grown. Yet he still phones her and asks whether she needs ...Read more

Dear Annie: I'm starting to wonder about my son-in-law, "Pete." He married my daughter some 40 years ago when he was fresh out of the Navy. I was concerned that they had no savings and he had no job training. But he was quiet and likable. Through the years, however, people I respect have called Pete "no good," "a bum," "lazy" and "a snake in the...Read more

Dear Annie: My husband and I have been married for 33 years. His parents disliked me from our first date. I have no idea why. I was only 16. We married two years later, and his parents didn't come to the wedding and stopped speaking to my husband for the next 23 years. They missed knowing our oldest son. When our second child was born, I wanted ...Read more

Dear Annie: When my birthday was coming up, I told my wife about a piece of technology I really wanted and asked her to buy it for me. It cost $300. She said it was too expensive and didn't get me anything except a card.

In the past three weeks, she has purchased three birthday gifts for friends, each costing roughly $100. She put in a ton of ...Read more

Dear Annie: My 32-year-old son is currently traveling overseas on business. He is staying at a hotel, but he visited my sister's house to see his aunt and his grandma, who live near his place of business. My niece and her husband also came by to see my son. My son spent a few hours napping in my niece's old bedroom and then left for the hotel.

...Read more

Dear Annie: What do you do with an old and dear friend who now says something negative at every opportunity? "Lorene" and I live in different states, but we used to be in touch daily by phone and on Facebook and have spent time together fairly often when she has visited her family here.

For years, we were as close as sisters. Then, last year, ...Read more