Dear Bel,
This horrendous time we are all going through is difficult for me, as well as everyone else.
However, I have a specific problem. I’m 70, married to my husband for over 30 years. Also, I have a son of 44 from my first marriage. His father, my first husband, died some ten years ago.
My son has had a major mental health problem since his father and I separated when he was ten years old. He is an only much-loved child, sensitive by nature, who became addicted to drugs in his mid-teens.
He was extremely bright and, until drugs became a major factor, did very well at school.
This was at a time when drug issues were not as well known to parents as they are now. I knew nothing in the early 1990s and found out gradually.
His father and I both remarried, but I still tried to include my son in everything, while his father distanced himself with his new partner. My son never got over this.
He’s been out of control for many years, his addiction horrendous. Fast forward 20 or so years, my son is in a rented flat on his own.
Four years ago he had major health problems — kidney failure, deep vein thrombosis, compartment syndrome — that could have led to death and he was hospitalised for four weeks. He now has osteoporosis, no balance, and falls easily.
He and I are still extremely close, I visit daily, do his shopping, cook and clean, collect medication.
His depression is overwhelming. The problem I have is that my husband thinks everything I do is wrong. He’s not seen his stepson for six or seven years and does not believe how unwell my boy is.
I have (until now) been following my usual routine of visits. We are told to stay at home and self-isolate, but my heart tells me I cannot leave him.
My husband is furious with me, we argue like never before, he wants me to stay at home and says my son can look after himself.
I want my son to come and stay with us, but this is absolutely out of the question for my husband.
I’m afraid to even mention it again. But how can I leave him on his own? He has become agoraphobic and completely reliant on me.
Mental health services in our city are hopeless to non-existent.
I worry constantly and don’t know what to do.
SALLY
This week Bel advises a reader whose son, 44, from her first marriage is suffering from depression. She says he is completely reliant on her, but it’s causing problems between her and her husband
At a time when so many people are suffering and when a woman your age is additionally vulnerable, it feels unnecessarily cruel that you find yourself caught between the competing demands of two men — and not for the first time, I’m sure.
This is the moment when you need your husband to give you maximum support, and I’m sorry he is failing to do that.
On the other hand, looking at the situation from his point of view, he has had to watch your son inflict untold misery on you for years. He married you, taking on another man’s son — a young man with many problems.
During all these years, especially in the 1990s when you were discovering the extent of your son’s addiction, he must have seen you desperately unhappy and almost driven into the ground.
I expect there were many days he wished your son would disappear and never be heard of again. It might be a pretty normal response to the miserable situation.
In your longer letter, you tell me your son rented his flat with a lovely girlfriend, and you were hopeful for the future. But that’s over and now he is in the pitiable physical condition you describe.
To strangers, your son would appear to be a husk of a man but the originator of all his own problems.
You feel that the break up of your first marriage and the withdrawal of the father he adored caused permanent damage. You may well be right.
You are a brave, loving mother, even if perhaps (and how do I know?) you have done too much for your son over the years.
His present is grim — and in your situation I know I would want/need to go on caring for my sad, hopeless adult child. But at the same time I totally understand your husband’s refusal to have him come to live with you. Surely he has a say in this matter?
At this time in his life, the presence of your son under your shared roof would almost certainly do damage to his wellbeing and (as a result) your marriage.
If you are the only person who can make essential visits to your sick son, then surely by any judgment you must continue to do so.
If you deliver food just once (maybe twice) a week, taking all the necessary precautions, washing hands, and so on, I cannot imagine anybody could say that’s wrong. Of course, your husband is worrying about the threat to your health, so reassure him quietly.
No cooking or cleaning, please, just the delivery and check up, maintaining distance.
You see, as much as you love your adult child, you must also refuse to sacrifice the happiness of your husband.
My husband’s ditched his best mate
Dear Bel,
This problem is eating away at my marriage.
For 33 years, my husband and I had a couple as close friends — we went on many great holidays and outings together. The other husband (let’s call him Fred) most likely has a form of adult ADHD — always needing to be the centre of attention, in charge, liking silly pranks.
We learned to ignore it, as he has such a wonderful character. He and my husband entertained us with their jokes and shared many hobbies. My husband saw him as the brother he never had.
Fred has poor health and we were always there for him. But about six years ago the men had a tiff over who was going to drive on their regular Saturday outing. Fred insisted it was him but my husband didn’t agree…the argument then escalated.
Although we still saw Fred and his wife, the relationship between the men got worse. My husband went to their house (I insisted) and mentioned various things Fred had done that had upset him. Fred wouldn’t agree he’d done anything wrong, although his wife could see it and was apologetic. She and I wanted to continue the friendship, although we both guessed the men didn’t.
I still find it so difficult to deal with the thought of losing our friends. It would also mean being cut off from a few others in our circle. My husband makes jibes about Fred, which annoys me and we row. I want him to let the grudge drop.
The friendship matters because of things we’ve been through over the years. My husband and I had many great family difficulties and they were a great support.
Now I feel angry with him (although I know it’s not all his fault) and feel I don’t want to be with him if he can’t be kinder about Fred, whom we know has mental health issues that he’d deny. What can I do?
ELSA
What a terrible waste. Some readers will remember childhood tiffs clearly, reliving the pain if we were the unfortunate excluded or bullied one (as I was at 11), then witnessing similar things happening in our children’s lives.
The silliest quarrels can have a huge, upsetting fallout with emotional results that can last a lifetime. But adults behaving like children? Close mates falling out over whose turn it is to take the wheel? It seems incredible.
More from Bel Mooney for the Daily Mail…
But it happened and the real victims of the rift are you and the other wife. So even though I understand why you are so upset about losing the couple as friends, I have to ask why you can’t continue to see her?
Why should the unforgiving arrogance of two men destroy the affection between two infinitely more sensible women? Our lives should not be defined by coupledom.
You and she could agree not to discuss the stupid husbands and their issues and meet up regularly, once this lockdown is ended.
What is most worrying here is that you feel so strongly about your husband’s unwillingness to let it go that you are considering a marriage breakdown. You believe he should have been the bigger person — and his failure to be that person you could admire has caused you to judge him harshly. Disappointment and (what often follows) contempt are two dangerous things that threaten a marriage.
Did the absurd tiff in fact bring to the fore long-buried resentment? Could your husband have grown tired of Fred’s constant need to take centre stage? Might he have felt that as a couple you were too dependent on others?
People often change as they grow older; sometimes to develop as human beings we need to leave certain people behind. These are things worth thinking about and discussing — although I fear your husband sounds an unlikely candidate for introspection.
But don’t throw away your 33 years, as he has done with his friendship. Next time he says something nasty about Fred, reply quietly, ‘Oh, but you had such a good time together when you…’ Or, ‘I’ll never forget how we all laughed when…’
Counter each nasty negative with a serene positive. And in the meantime, stay friends with Fred’s wife and make it a merry challenge to those ridiculous — and sad — men.
And finally: Let’s stick together… with music
The other day I was watching a terrific BBC programme about the great Dolly Parton (how I love that woman!) and was touched to notice that as she sang her classic number I Will Always Love You, the camera caught the audience singing along, word perfect.
Young and old, male and female, faces smiling as they sang, eyes often bright with unshed tears. Maybe they thought about a loved one, past, present — or sadly dead. A lost love, maybe. A first love never forgotten.
Everybody sings together because these are universal feelings. Certain songs have a miraculous power to unite people in a swell of powerful emotion. Vera Lynn’s We’ll Meet Again is another. So is You’ll Never Walk Alone. And Bob Marley’s One Love. You’ll have other suggestions, I’m sure.
The point about all these songs is that they’re all positive statements of belief. There’s no ‘maybe’ ‘or ‘I wish’. No moans of ‘Why me?’ They express uplifting convictions that love will always be there and we will meet our loved ones again and we will never be alone.
Even if the skies are dark and stormy and people have to part for a while and love cannot carry on as it did … despite such painful, frightening truths, difficulties will be overcome. ‘Let’s get together and feel all right.’
In the past few weeks, we’ve seen many songs shared online — from choirs and opera companies uniting at a distance, to neighbours on their doorsteps singing Happy Birthday to a man on his 100th birthday, to the Rolling Stones, each in his own home, performing You Can’t Always Get What You Want.
It reminds me of a line in the 1995 movie Empire Records: ‘Music is the glue of the world.’ And so it is.
That’s why the BBC’s One World: Together At Home worked so well, the combination of song and personal stories often making me weepy. We may be very different, but music will make us one heart.