Danny M. Lavery, aka Dear Prudence, is online weekly to chat live with readers. An edited transcript of the chat is below. (Sign up below to get Dear Prudence delivered to your inbox each week. Read Prudie’s Slate columns here. Send questions to Prudence at prudence@slate.com.)
Danny Lavery: Hi, everyone! Let’s chat.
Q. A sweet old-fashioned notion: Is there a way to say “I love you” for the first time without putting pressure on your partner to reciprocate? I would be perfectly happy with a Han Solo response; love means different things to different people, feelings grow at different rates, yada, yada. I just want to express what’s going on with me in a way that celebrates it, instead of causing anxiety. We’ve been dating for a year, if that helps.
A: This is such a helpful reminder of the rich and varied tapestry that is the human existence, because if I had been dating someone for a year and they had not yet said “I love you,” I would move to an island in the middle of the sea and fling up a wall of nettles and poison to keep the world out. So: Tell them you love them! Just say it, right now, go ahead, I’ll wait. There are worse things than telling someone you’ve been with for an entire calendar year that you are in love with them. Hopefully, and presumably, your partner will be very happy to hear this! (Feel free to append “I know feelings grow at different rates and don’t want you to feel pressure to reciprocate, but loving you has brought me tremendous joy and I wanted you to know it,” if you feel the need to equivocate.) Good luck, and write back to tell us what happens!
Q. Life in Brussels: I’m a 30-year-old who moved to Brussels a week ago for a great job. It is by nature a temporary move, and I plan to be back in the States within a few years. My parents were extremely anxious before the move, so you can imagine what they are feeling now, after the horrible events last week! My living situation is obviously causing them severe stress, and that is understandable. However, I have no plans of giving up my job and moving home. Among other reasons, I don’t want to let terrorists dictate how I live.
I am afraid that fears about my safely are taking over my father’s life. I try to send reassuring emails, but more and more I am getting distraught responses back with threats to fly to Brussels and physically move me back, or to take on the terrorist threat single-handedly. I would hope these fears would abate over time, but I hate being the source of such stress! Do you have any thoughts on the situation?
A: Life is dangerous everywhere. Surely your parents are aware, on some level, that you face a greater danger from gun violence and reckless drivers at home than you do from a terrorist attack abroad. I understand irrational fears—try talking to me on a plane sometime—but your parents need to deal with their anxieties in a healthier way than pledging to kidnap their 30-year-old daughter. Reassurance and helpful statistics don’t seem to have made a dent in their panic levels, so try gentle non-engagement. You’re capable of looking after yourself, and you’re not taking an unreasonable risk by working in Brussels. If they send you panicked missives about repatriating you to the States, or taking on global terrorism single-handedly, ignore it. Tell them about the scenery, or what’s going on at work. Ask about your grandmother’s health or your brother’s latest marathon time. You cannot reduce your parents’ stress by constricting the movements of your own life. The most you can do is refuse to indulge their paranoid fantasies.
Q. Sex ed: I grew up in an extremely religious, conservative family. The only sex ed I received was “Don’t do it,” “If you even kiss a boy you’ll get pregnant,” and “Contraception is a sin.” As a result, my interactions with the opposite sex consisted mostly of feelings of extreme guilt and shame when I did anything remotely sexual (even kissing). These feelings lasted well into my mid-20s. Fortunately, I’m now in a healthy relationship. The problem is that I have two much younger sisters, one who is about to turn 16. I don’t want her to end up with the same neuroses and shame about sex that I had. I want to talk to her honestly about how sexual feelings are normal and tell her that she can come to me if she needs advice or protection. I’m about 50 percent sure she’d report the conversation to my parents. Since coming out as an atheist and moving in with my boyfriend my relationship with them has been on thin ice. My parents would be livid if they found out I’d had this conversation and might end contact with me altogether. I’m also not sure if it’s my place to tell her these things when I know our parents are morally opposed. I’m not sure what to do here and whether I should wait until she’s 18. Thoughts?
A: If the odds are 50/50 that your sister would rat you out for telling her the basics of sex ed, I think you should wait. If keeping in regular contact with your family is important to you, don’t risk a total estrangement over a conversation you’re not sure she’d welcome. She already knows that you’re an atheist and that you live with your boyfriend (presumably without being struck down from heaven), so she must know that you would be a sympathetic resource if she wanted to talk about sex and contraception. Tell her that you’re always there to listen if she ever has questions and that any conversation she has with you will remain strictly confidential, but don’t get more specific than that. You don’t know how much of your parents’ beliefs she’s internalized, and you don’t want to scare her off.
Q. Should I contact my ex?: I just got over a (mercifully short) fight with mono, and from the timing it’s possible I either got it from or gave it to my ex. She broke up with me a month ago and neither of us has reached out to the other since. It wasn’t an ugly split by any means: It just caught me by surprise when she said she was unsure of the relationship and thought it better to end things sooner rather than later. Should I warn her about the mono, or maintain radio silence?
A: Radio silence. There is always an almost-plausible reason to get in touch with someone who’s dumped you, but “I recently had mono” isn’t one of them. Keep your dignity and your recent medical history to yourself.
Q. Playing doctor: I’ve been seeing a lovely man for a little over nine months. As such, he’s seen me unclothed and he’s seen a bump I have on my back. I’ve had the bump for years; best I can tell is it’s a benign cyst, since it doesn’t change color or size. My boyfriend wants me to get it looked at and possibly removed, and I’m willing (my sister had a similar cosmetic surgery in high school for which my parents paid) but unable since I’m a temp/freelance worker living in a different state than my family without insurance. How would you advise I prevent resentment about his (rare) comments and/or do you know of a cheap insurance plan? For the record, he has family members who refused care only to have expensive and deadly conditions to show up, and I’m related to many nonsurgical doctors, so our ideas about medical urgency in relation to finances are rather divergent.
A: I have no idea, but I imagine there are more than a few readers with suggestions. If you have any advice about this situation, let’s hear it!
Q. Re: Sex ed: Your sisters deserve healthy sex education, and it seems like you’re the only one in the family willing/able to give them that. IMHO, it’s worth the risk. Sixteen is way too old to first get this message.
A: A vote for boldness!
Q. Co-worker stealing money, I’m conflicted: I work for a small theater company. My boss recently discovered that my co-worker, over the past couple of years, has put more than $2,000 of personal charges on her company credit card. He’s furious, and wants to fire her and give her 12 months to pay it back, or else he will press charges. While I agree with the decision to let her go, I feel that asking for her to pay the money back is excessively punitive, considering she’s 25, completely broke, and lives with her parents, who are equally broke. My boss said if it were him, he’d be mortified and want to pay everything back because it’s the “right thing to do.” But he comes from a wealthy family, has never had to struggle for money, and doesn’t seem to care (or realize) that paying back this money will likely upend her whole life. For example, he suggested, “She might have to take out a loan,” seemingly unaware that there’s probably no way she could get a loan. Who’s right?
A: “Who’s right” is less important in this situation than “who’s actually got the authority to make a decision.” You could be as right as it is possible to be, and it still wouldn’t be your money or your decision to make. But let’s say for the sake of argument your boss would be willing to forgo repayment if you could convince him of the rightness of your position. It’s a shame that your former co-worker is in a difficult financial situation, but that doesn’t make that $2,000 she stole go away. You can have sympathy for her struggles while also acknowledging she committed a crime and needs to make it right. If you’re a small company, my guess is that $2,000 has been sorely missed. You should contact the company’s insurance carrier to see if it covers employee theft; this could help him cover expenses during the repayment period. But I don’t think total debt forgiveness is the right choice to make here. Your boss is already doing her a favor by not pressing charges. If she finds the idea of repayment within 12 months excessive, let her bring it up with him; it’s not your job to get her off the hook.
Q. Re: Playing doctor: I advise you get it checked out; when I was 22 and insurance-less, I got a brain tumor—so I’m gun-shy about your situation. Use this tool to find a relatively inexpensive place; these are nonprofit clinics that charge on a sliding scale and can at least provide you with expert advice: http://findahealthcenter.hrsa.gov/. Sadly, there is no really cheap option—but trust me: The alternative is worse.
A: One (sobering) vote for getting it checked out! Thanks for the link.
Q. An abrupt cut in hours at work is leaving me reeling: I work part time at a small organization, and my hours were steadily increasing over the course of the past year. My boss told me that my hours were going to change as they went over the new budget, and she kept on saying she really wanted my hours to go up as I was doing more and more for the organization. However, at the next departmental meeting, she began by saying that we needed to schedule the following meeting at a time I would be there, as my hours were decreasing (very significantly—by more than half). This was the first I had heard that my hours were decreasing, and I was shocked that she delivered the news this way, with no additional explanation to me. I am now looking for a new job, but I have been feeling very discouraged about my worth as an employee. I don’t know what I can do to improve this situation besides hold on and hope I can keep up with my duties (which haven’t changed) until I get a better job. Do you have any advice on how to deal with this? This is my first “real” job in the field I want to have a career in, and I had hope it was going somewhere.
A: Keep looking for a new job. New, part-time employees are always the first to experience budget cuts, and there’s no reason to take it personally, even though it feels like a blow. This happens and isn’t necessarily a reflection on your value as an employee or your future in the field. Keep doing your job to the best of your ability, and keep searching for something full time elsewhere.
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