Their concerns too late to matter

Dear Carolyn: Over the past year I was diagnosed and hospitalized for a serious and life-threatening illness, I have been struggling mightily since then with severe depression, survived a drug overdose, am in the process of getting divorced from my husband of many years, lost a cherished pet to illness, and have had to sell my house. In the process, I found out that my social network was seriously lacking in the true-friendship department. Of the “close” friends I told about my illness, not a single one remained in contact with me throughout my ordeal, and some were downright rude and insensitive. All of them know not only about the hospitalization but also my pending divorce. I am in the process of moving and trying to start fresh. I have no intention of sending these people my new contact details.

Now some of them have begun to contact me – nearly a year after the fact – asking me how I’m doing and saying they’re “concerned.” One of the worst offenders left a message on my voice mail at work today saying she’s sorry she hasn’t been in contact (since September), but that a lot has been going on and that she was procrastinating (!). She informed me she’d e-mail me “soon.”

My instinct is simply not to respond. I don’t even feel I can trust them enough to tell them how painful it was to realize I had no one there to help me. Do I have any obligation to formally cut things off with them? – Looking for More Than Fair-Weather Friends

After years and years of advising people to talk (and talk), it’s refreshing to say: No. You have no obligation to respond, at least not to a voice mail so thoughtless and noncommittal. If any of these friends proves to be remorseful and, maybe even more important, persistent, you might find it rewarding to respond; at worst you’ll get the satisfaction of being heard, and at best you’ll relaunch a good friendship. But short of that, please do give yourself the small satisfaction of washing your hands of them all.

Dear Carolyn: I am currently struggling with the if-we-get-married-I-come-first issue. I don’t mean to say at the exclusion of his family, but right now I am very firmly not first, and it makes me hesitant to commit. How do we get past this? – Detroit

“We” don’t get past this, you do, by getting past the idea that waiting around for people to change (be it silently, articulately, needily or foot-stompingly) is the way to initiate change. Marrying them doesn’t work, either.”

Ultimatums are another change-motivator you want to avoid. If threats are the only way to get the attention you want, you’re not really getting the attention you want.

The internal ultimatum, on the other hand, is not only effective, it’s essential. Unless you’re willing to leave – unless you can say to yourself, “or else,” and mean it – you will never have the power to improve your circumstances.

So. State aloud what you (reasonably) need from someone to be happy; allow that person (reasonable) time to start providing it; and if your needs continue not to be met, then accept they never will be. Then decide if you’ll stay or go.