● DEAR ABBY: Two weeks before my wedding, my mother announced that she was leaving my father. Now, two months after my wedding, their divorce papers have been filed.
I am 23 years old and should be able to handle the news, but I cannot. I have been devastated by the end of a marriage that I thought was a good one until only a few months ago.
My mother is now behaving like a college student. She parties all night, dates several guys at once and calls to tell me about it.
All my father does is complain about being lonely and broke, and a single father to my teenage brother.
My own marriage is suffering because of this, and it doesn't seem fair. What can I do? — Not-so-happy Newlywed
DEAR NOT-SO-HAPPY: Please accept my sympathy for the demise of your parents' marriage. If you were in the dark about the fact that they had been having problems until just before your wedding, it is understandable that you are in shock and grieving. You must also be wondering if what you thought was real was only a mirage.
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For the sake of your emotional well-being and to protect your own marriage, I hope you will take this advice: Inform your mother that you cannot/will not be her confidante. Period. Then let your father know that although you feel sympathy for him, you cannot be his trouble dump either, because it's affecting your marriage. Explain that if he needs a place to "vent," he should do it with a professional counselor.
You may need counseling yourself to get your own head straight, so please do it now rather than later. Your problem isn't that your parents' marriage didn't make it to the finish line. It's that they hid their problems so well, you no longer know what a healthy marriage looks like.
● DEAR ABBY: Please explain the saying, "No good deed goes unpunished."
I have heard it many times, but can't imagine where it comes from. — Curious in Georgia
DEAR CURIOUS: It probably originated from bitter experience. It is usually uttered when someone has tried to do something for someone else, and instead of being grateful for it, the recipient finds fault or resents it.