This week’s Dear Abby column takes on two family dilemmas: a decades-long struggle with a self-absorbed mother-in-law, and a sibling rift that deepened after tragic news arrived the wrong way.
A woman who signed her letter “Frustrated Daughter-in-Law” wrote that she has spent 30 years keeping distance from her husband’s mother in order to protect her own peace of mind. She described her mother-in-law as someone who cannot hold a normal conversation, instead redirecting every exchange back to herself, even around her own grandchildren.
“She won’t ask them any questions, isn’t interested in how they are or what they are up to, and doesn’t say anything loving or kind. Instead, she drones on about other people in her life who have nothing to do with us.”
The letter writer said she has tried for years to steer conversations back on track without success, and that she doesn’t push her children to spend much time with their grandmother because the visits leave them annoyed and disappointed — a stance that doesn’t sit well with her husband.
Dear Abby’s response was blunt: after three decades of this pattern, there is no quick fix. The columnist told her that if she and her husband haven’t been able to get through to his mother by now, they need to accept she isn’t going to change, and that the grandchildren will likely keep their distance regardless of how their father feels about it.
A Death Learned Through Social Media
The second letter came from a woman signing as “Young Executor,” who described an “OK” relationship with her sister marked by the ordinary sibling friction of childhood. That relationship took a serious hit when their father died and she learned the news from social media rather than a phone call from her sister.
She told Abby she confronted her sister about how hurt and angry she felt at the time, but has struggled to move past it. Now complicating matters: her mother is in poor health, and the letter writer has been named executor of her mother’s will and trustee of any assets going to her older sister — raising fears that old wounds could resurface during estate matters.
Dear Abby advised her to approach the executor role with humility rather than dwelling on the past, and to carry out her duties objectively and diligently. If the estate turns out to be substantial and her sister objects to its terms, the columnist recommended bringing in a probate lawyer to keep the process from becoming personal.
Dear Abby is written by Abigail Van Buren, the pen name used by Jeanne Phillips, who wrote the column for nearly four decades. It was founded in 1956 by her mother, Pauline Phillips.
