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Dear Didi

Husband’s attitude worries wife

By Jyothi Rao

Dear Jyothi:
Please advise me. My husband and his friend have been business partners for 30 years. We are all in our sixties. All of a sudden, my husband is trying to undercut him. I don’t understand why he is doing this. We are all friends with his wife and children. I asked my husband what happened, but he says that he wants to go it alone. I almost think that he is jealous of his partner, but I don’t know why. First of all, I don’t think that he is healthy enough to handle the business on his own. He has high cholesterol and 50 percentblockage in his arteries, and a bad diabetic. I am really scared.
— Worried wife

Dear Friend:
First and foremost, I think that your husband needs to be working with his physician about his health. Is he in denial about his health and age? He might be facing his mid-life crisis later in life. Is this reaction a result of his medications? Please get together for a joint consult with you, your doctor and your husband. This certainly is not a time in his life to be trying to handle the pressures of a business and improving his health. Does your husband have time to exercise? You and your doctor should approach your husband that he needs a vacation. He has a business partner whom he has worked with for over 30 years. This is the time that they should be sharing the pressures of the business responsibilities and to be able to take time off. Urge him to look at this partnership as an important management tool for improving his health and his life. Not many businesses can share these responsibilities jointly with the same understanding that these two partners have. After all, they have an equal knowledge about their business. Now to bring in someone new to help might not work that easily because they won’t have the same understanding of the goals that these two partners have.
You can help by cooking low calorie foods. Try using brown rice instead of white rice.
Try to get your husband and yourself on a daily exercise routine. Do plan a vacation and other outside activities. It won’t be easy to get your husband to change, but I hope that he will realize that it is for the better. Let me know how this works.
Good luck and take care.
—Jyothi

Dear Jyothi:
I am a young professional. My friends are planning a destination wedding. I am planning to go with my boyfriend. We are not committed to one another yet. He doesn’t know these friends. My parents are horrified that I would consider traveling this way.
They say it is inappropriate. I did tell them that we would take separate rooms.
What do you think?
— Not a twosome.

Dear Friend:
Times have changed, but your parents are worried about you and your reputation. The fact that you and your boyfriend are planning to have separate rooms should alleviate the image that your parents are worried about. If any of your girlfriends are going, perhaps you could share your room with them. Remember that your parents are worried about you and love you. They are just trying to protect you.
— Jyothi

jyothirao214@yahoo.com