LadyQ

My brother and I are both in our thirties. Two years ago, he told me that he'd been cheating on his wife and said that he'd fallen in love with the other woman. A few months later, I got a message from his wife's best friend saying that he'd also propositioned her. Clearly my brother wasn't madly in love with the one woman and he was being a creep.

I sent him a text asking wtf was going on and he never replied. He hasn't spoken to me since. My calls, emails, texts all go ignored.

Our mom has drinking problems and I've needed to put a lot of space between us. She tried getting my attention by telling my partner that my brother has brain cancer. My partner called my brother and he said that he was waiting for a diagnosis and that he would call if he was sick. He never called.

We both talk with my dad and he's been trying to respect my brother's privacy but he finally told me at Christmas that yes, my brother was diagnosed with stage four brain cancer in the summer.

My brother has refused all treatment and is self medicating with marijuana and a kept diet. He's still well enough to work and has even expanded his business. He's left his wife and is dating the other woman.

Both me and my dad are skeptical. My brother has a history of lying when he wants to distract people. When we were younger, he lied about being molested by a family friend to hide a drug addiction. Then he lied about being gay when he wanted to break up with a GF. Is he lying again?

My mom has very severe boundary issues. If someone isn't paying attention to her or treating her the way she expects they should, she stalks them. She finds whatever dirt she can on them and then she uses that to try and ruin their lives.

Growing up, whenever a new family came to our church, she would obsessively try to befriend them. If they upset her in any way, she would "investigate" them. She would call people in their old church and community until she found someone who would share some tiny bit of gossip and she would use that to hurt them. Then she would act completely devastated when they got angry at her.

When I got married, she was upset because I wasn't always there whenever she wanted attention. She has made the last seven years hell.

I have blocked her from all forms of social media. I have blocked her number. She does not know where I live or work.

So yesterday my spouse picked me up from work. Apparently my mom has started calling people in my life to say that my little brother is wasting away from brain cancer. We aren't supposed to contact him because he doesn't want anyone to know (we aren't supposed to contact him to see if this is true is more like it). We did call him and he's fine. He gets migraines. They're genetic.

I'm upset because I don't want her to ruin my life. I'm worried that she's going to start calling my in laws, my step kid's mom, and anyone else she can think of.

How can I make her stop?

I have two step kids; a nine year old girl and eleven year old boy. I love them so much and I've been in their lives for the past seven years. They live about eight hours away with their mom and stepdad and we get them for a few weeks each year.

Lately they've been driving me absolutely nuts. They're the most disrespectful kids I've ever met. We don't have a lot of money and whenever we try to plan and take them somewhere fun, we explain how much they can each spend and where we're going. We wind up having to leave early because they both insist that we need to buy them bigger things and they both flip out and start crying and saying mean things to us when we have to say no. (They're used to getting whatever they want because their grandparents spoil them like crazy when they're with their mom).

They do not say thank you. They burp and fart on purpose and then laugh about it or blame the other and have a huge fight. They ignore us until we get angry, they argue with us, and they talk back. Just getting them to take a bath or brush their teeth turns into a half hour of "I wish I'd never come here" and sobbing.

When we're around our friends with them though, they just act super sad and our friends always want to buy them ice cream or give them something to cheer them up. I always wind up feeling like such a mean person because my kid is crying because I've said no and someone else jumps in and says yes.

Anyhow.

Now they want to live with us. Am I awful for dreading that?

I'm in my mid thirties, happily married, and life is good for the most part. But I grew up in an extremely abusive home. Some of the abuse was physical (spankings that left huge welts and bruises) and most of it was emotional. I would up with an eating disorder and pathetically low self esteem.

It's taken years and literally my moving a few provinces away from everyone to get some perspective and now I'm in a great place. My family doesn't think they did anything that bad and they think that I'm being a drama queen but a lot of our friends and relatives all agree that I was treated badly. I do want to move on and not be weighed down by this constant anger I'm feeling now. I know I need to face it and release it but how does one do that please?

I've got an amazing memory and I tend to recall things easily and clearly. Most of the time this is pretty cool but I have a horrible memory from when I was little.

I remember being three or four and my mom fed me and my little brother aspirin and told us that it was candy. I don't remember anything dramatic happening later but she did have really bad depression.

I confronted her about this once a few years ago and she said that she was depressed, that she'd wanted to die, and that she wasn't going to leave us without a mother.

Sometimes I think that there's no way that really happened but why did she react that way? She drinks a lot so she doesn't remember any of that now but it really bothers me.

I have no idea how to deal with this.

I'm in my mid thirties, happily married, and doing well as is my brother. We live in two different cities and our mom is in a third city. A few years ago she told us both a lot of lies about each other that resulted in us having such a bad fight that he and his wife didn't come to my wedding and we didn't speak for nearly four years. We've just started talking again and we've been realizing that she's been lying her *** of to us about each other for years.

These are just some of the lies that she's told:

1. My husband and I laughed when my brother lost his job.

2. My brother told her that my job was in trouble because my husband and I worked together.

3. My brother secretly crashed our wedding.

4. Our dad cheated on her.

5. Our dad hit her.

She also led me to believe that my entire family is awful and that I'm not very well liked. I was just at a family reunion where I saw my aunts, uncles, and cousins for the first time in years and they were all thrilled to see me and my husband. None of them think very highly of my mom either.

She also tried to break up my relationship with my husband numerous times and she's been telling me that my brother and his wife are on the verge of splitting up too (they're very happy).

This woman also had a year long affair with a friend of mine who happens to be her best friend's son while she was still with my dad. Then she ended that to have another affair with another guy.

I still love her. How do I handle her?

DH and I both work for a company that isn't very good and we're both looking for new jobs. He just went on an interview last Thursday and it turns out that an old boss of mine was the one doing the interview. DH got the job and the old boss wanted to know whether I'd be interested too. He asked for my resume within an hour and I had an interview set up immediately.

I interviewed with two other bosses on Friday and I thought I did really well. I spoke with their recruiter and he said that one of the interviewers and the old boss both really like me and that the third person wasn't entirely sure that I'd be a team player.

DH got the job yesterday and the person who wasn't sure about me wants to talk to old boss before making a decision. But old boss is on vacation and they need to fill the remaining positions.

Old boss knows that I'm a HUGE team player and he used to leave me in charge all the time at our old workplace when he was away. I was told that I'd have an answer yesterday and then today and now I'm apparently waiting until tomorrow.

I don't want to be in my current workplace without my husband because we work with a family and they're going to be FURIOUS when he quits and life is going to suck for me.

What do you think? Am I stressing over nothing? Do you have any advice?

Ugh. I'm married and in my thirties. I've had this lifelong friend who I grew up with. He's three years older than I am and we have been friends my entire life. His mom is my mom's best friend. The two of us considered dating when we were younger but I was moving for university so we decided not to.

I found out last year that my mom had spent the last year of her marriage to my dad having an affair with this guy. And then she left my dad to be with her best friend's ex ( Yup. She's been sleeping with the son and now she's with the ex. Gross.)

I want my mom to be happy but I'm so awkward. This guy and I haven't seen each other in years but our moms are still close and we are going to run into each other. I kind of just want to joke about it because that's how I handle awkward stuff. What would,you do?

I used to work in business sales for a pretty large company. I was friends with someone who was really shady and I knew not to trust her with too much. A year ago I was offered a way better position with the competition and I took it.

My "friend" just got promoted at my old company and now we are both selling to the same target market and are in direct competition with each other. I only ever hear from her when she wants something and I've accepted that we have a pretty hollow friendship so I don't have much to do with her anymore. She's been trying to call me a lot over the past week and I finally called her back.

Wow. She wants us to trade client information. She wants me to send her a list of my company's clients who I think would be willing to move to her company and she will send me a list of hers in turn.

Now this is wrong on a lot of levels:

First off, this completely violates customer privacy policies for both companies. Neither of us have any business sending client info to another company.

Secondly, this is essentially stealing. The clients she wants to send me are from another sales rep's territory and if I were to close those clients as mine then the rep whole territory it is would have a lot of losses. If I were to send her client info from my company then we would lose out on revenue and residuals.

I don't work for her company anymore but I do still like and respect a lot of people there. Should I report her to their fraud department?

I recently left my job at a telecom company to work elsewhere. While at my former job, we were all encouraged to use a certain procedure to get sales for a few years. I followed every single rule to the letter and was an excellent employee.

In January I was called into a room with my manager and asked to sign a document that stated that I would face disciplinary action if I spoke to any other employees about what was to happen.

Then after I signed it (I know I shouldn't have but I didn't think I had any other choice) I was told that our VP did not like how we had processed some of our sales and that some of us - myself included - were going to have our commissions from six months ago taken from our pay. Not one of my sales had ever been returned, complained over or had a single fault. I had followed every procedure to the letter and I had kept clear records of everything. I wasn't given a chance to defend myself or to question anything.

It apparently happened to a lot of us but we were all afraid to talk to each other about it much so we all just kind of hinted at it.

I was offered a much better job with a competitor a few weeks later and so I left. And apparently the old place hadn't taken enough money from me so they want two hundred dollars from me. Do I have to pay? Policy was that commission was only taken if sales were returned in under six months. Nothing was returned and the company is still getting money from them. What can I do?

I work for a federally regulated company in Canada and I was not able to use all of my vacation time last year and I'm wondering whether this gets paid out or is just gone for good.

I'm pretty angry right now. My husband and I have been close friends with another couple for a few years. They were both in our wedding and I've been asked to be their baby's Godmother. They're like family to us. Or were.

Two and a half years ago my husband and I were in his car with our guy friend and we were rear ended by another driver. We were hit hard enough to cause damage but it was considered a low velocity impact crash. My husband and I were both a little sore and his car was scratched. Our passenger was sitting in the back and was at a funny angle. Apparently he was hurt badly.

Neither my husband nor I missed any work save for a few hours for follow up doctors appointments. All three of us work in the same office and job and our job is not physically taxing. Our friend insisted that the two ounce headset that we have to wear for a part of each day was too much to handle and so he was off work for months.

On a completely "unrelated" note, his girlfriend was pregnant with their first child and he did not return to work until well after the baby was born and well past when he was expected to return. On the day of the accident we were all going out after work to talk about how he wasn't happy in our office and how he wanted to leave. When he came back it was on a very limited basis and he's since transferred to another department where he's required to be on his feet all day.

My husband was found to be not at fault and the other driver was deemed one hundred percent liable. And yet we got a notification a few months back that said that our friend was suing my husband as well. We are insured but the guy hasn't got a leg to stand on. My husband was not at fault. When we confronted our friend about this he swore that he had no idea that his lawyer was naming my husband in the suit as well and he promised that he would have my husband's name removed from it. He apologized profusely and said that he was just sick over it because he would never sue us as the accident was not my husband's fault.

Well we got another letter the other day that said that it's done. He did name us and we are being sued. My husband called him and he said that he would have it fixed and said again that he was not coming after us at all. And then he stopped replying to texts and calls.

My husband got a hold of him this morning and was told that he's going to try to see if he can get any money out of this.

So I'm wondering whether anyone else has had to go through this with ICBC (insurance company in BC) and how you guys would handle a friend suing you? It feels like he's just slapped a dollar amount on our friendship. He told my husband that he's got to look out for his family and that he's going to go after whatever money he can get.

I'm their child's godmother and these people were our best friends. We're devastated over this. And we're also worried that if they were to trip at our place or have anythign happen then they woudl try and sue us again. Is this normal in a friendship?

My boss wants me to get one. I was out sick for a week in January, again in February and yet again in March. We work in an office with about a hundred or so people and when one person gets sick it spreads like wildfire. I usually don't get that sick but having the flu three times in three months was bad!

I've heard that people get really sick from the shot itself and I'm a bit worried that I would wind up really sick from it. I've never had a flu shot before so I have no idea how I will react to it. We're coming up on year end and I'm out of vacation/sick days so I can't afford to be sick and off work again.

What do you guys think? The shot doesn't cost me anything so that's not a worry.

My husband and I live on BC and we've just found out that our apartment building is still full of asbestos. The building was built in 1971 and has to be re-piped now and we came home to find that the laundry room has been closed and part of the basement os sealed off for asbestos removal. Shouldn't this been done years ago? And are we in any danger? What about people who buy units in the building and renovate them without following proper asbestos removal procedures? How screwed are we? We aren't planning on living here forever and we only rent our unit. The landlord wants to sell it to us. What does asbestos removal cost?

I don't want to get anyone mad but I am wondering about this. Young girls have unprotected sex with young guys and then they flip out on these guys when they a) get pregnant and b) have to deal with immature baby daddies. Do girls think that they can make guys into the perfect boyfriend and husband just by getting pregnant?

Don't get me wrong - I'm not saying that guys shouldn't be held responsible too. I'm just annoyed because I know a few girls who have lied about being on birth control, have gotten pregnant and then have complained constantly about how their guys are not good fathers or boyfriends. Why do girls do this?

My husband has bipolar disorder (type two) and each year around this time he falls apart. The rest of the year you wouldn't even know that he's got anything and his medication works. But this is the fourth summer now where he's become very moody, emotional, irritable, and is having trouble concentrating. He usually starts acting this way with the first heat wave and within a few weeks he's off work. I'm not worried much about that part - his workplace is great and he performs very well through the rest of the year. But he's always out for August and he starts to improve as the weather cools down.

Our doctor keeps giving him more medication and she says that it'll take about a month to take full effect. She attributes his feeling better to the medicine working.

I'm worried because he's on a lot of medication and it increases year over year. I'm sure that he's got reverse SAD and am wondering if anyone knows much about how the two affect each other.

I work for a big company that has retail stores all over the country. I worked with a guy (I'll call him Leroy) a few years back and helped to train him when he was first hired. He worked at a different location and was eventually put in charge of one of the smaller stores while I was offered a spot in our corporate offices.

Performance wise, we're both excellent employees and he wound up moving into my office too.

So here's my issue. This guy sits in the next desk and never turns his cell phone off. Ever. And he leaves it when he goes to the bathroom, lunch room, meetings etc and the rest of us have to listen to it ring constantly. It bothers all of us but our boss isn't getting after him because she thinks it's all work calls. It's not. We all have office lines that clients call us on. The calls that come in to his cell phone are his kids. They call over everything right down to whose turn it is to play on the iPad and they talk loudly enough that I can hear them clearly. This is very distracting.

Now that school is out for the summer, he's started bringing them to the office. They are really nice kids but it's weird to go into the break room and see two kids watching the TV in there. This has happened a few times and it's starting to really bother us.

Our boss is pretty relaxed as long as we're ahead of schedules but this guy takes way too many liberties. We're all supposed to be in the office for around 9:00 each morning and he usually comes in for close to 11:00. He is late for meetings so we have to recap everythign that he's missed. He assumes that he does not have to take part in conference calls and takes client calls instead while we're all trying to listen to our MANDATORY call.

Since I sit right beside him, I hear how he's doing things and I've got a very strong suspicion that he's breaching company policies with a lot of his work. He did this in the retail sector and never got caught and I'm so sure that he does it here but I've got no proof.

Anyhiw this is bothering me becasue he disrupts me and everyone else frequently and does not care. Our boss has started talking to him about things and he does not care.

I'm hopeful that he's goign to wind up fired one of these days but I would love some coping tips in the meantime.

Really,curious about why people choose one over the other.