Ask Amy: Husband snoops on wife’s private writing
When young parents are raising children on their own, the grandparents often feel compelled to help with expenses out of concern for the grandchildren. This is laudable, but grandparents who do this must be extremely careful not to do too much, thereby impeding the progress into maturity that all young parents need to make.
What you can do is to encourage the mother to be extremely careful with these financial bailouts. The young mom might be using her spending to try to self-medicate her sadness away; unfortunately, this will make things worse for her.
Dear Amy: I appreciate the question in your column from “Concerned Sister” about discussing end of life wishes with loved ones.
I am a doctor in the DC area.
Two resources that might be helpful are “Five Wishes”, a guided booklet that helps people talk about what they want at the end of their life. This is available in English and Spanish and can be obtained for free from most primary care doctors' offices.
The second is The Conversation Project. Available at https://theconversationproject.org, it has many helpful tips and can help direct the discussion and try to overcome what is usually a fear of death.
– Laura Quint, MD
Dear Laura: Thank you. The Conversation Project was founded by journalist Ellen Goodman, after her own mother’s death. It serves as an excellent guide to having these tough conversations. Thank you for the recommendations.
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(You can email Amy Dickinson at askamy@amydickinson.com or send a letter to Ask Amy, P.O. Box 194, Freeville, NY 13068. You can also follow her on Twitter @askingamy or Facebook.)
©2022 Amy Dickinson. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
