Dear Ann Landers: I’ve been reading your column for years, but I never dreamed that one day I would write to you. I am hoping you will print my letter so my husband will see it. I know he reads your column every day, and I am not getting my point across.
“Pat” seems to be drinking more beer than ever, and I am trying not to nag him about it, but it’s getting harder and harder to keep my mouth shut. He can’t seem to do anything unless he has a beer in his hand. After work, when he reads the mail, he will have four beers before I can get dinner on the table. Even if dinner is ready when he walks through the door, he’ll open a beer. After dinner, he drinks a beer and watches TV or reads a magazine. He sometimes takes one with him to the bathroom and drinks it before or after his shower.
I’ve told him he is becoming an alcoholic, but he keeps saying, “I’m not drinking booze. It’s only beer.” I love him very much and hate to see him do this to himself. Pat is 55 years old and a health nut — always watching his weight and his cholesterol, but he is totally blind to what he is doing to himself by drinking so much beer.
We have a hard time communicating, so I have been going for counseling ever since his midlife crisis began. My counselor told me my husband is definitely an alcoholic. What now?
A Loving Wife in Palatine
Dear Loving Wife: No woman has ever nagged, cajoled or threatened a man into sobriety. The notion that “it’s only beer” and therefore he is not an alcoholic is nonsense. Some alcoholics drink nothing but beer.
I assume the health nut gets an annual physical. You might phone his doctor and clue him in. Won’t hurt, might help. Meanwhile, make a promise to yourself that you will never mention his drinking again. P.S. Has your counselor suggested that you attend Al-Anon meetings? If not, he or she should have. Look in your telephone book.
Dear Ann Landers: After reading the letter from “John,” the 32-year-old male virgin in San Diego, I have to say that I am even more of a virgin than he is. John is 32 and has had a couple dozen dates. I’m 39 with a similar total. (I am not gay.)
Some of John’s dates led to relationships that lasted a few months, while my longest relationship was four dates in a three-week period. John said he wanted to have sex with a woman he was dating and suggested it, while I have never felt that way about anyone and have never gotten so far as suggesting even a goodnight kiss.
John said he wants a serious, long-term relationship and is not interested in meaningless one-night stands. I don’t want either of those. What I am interested in is a nice, platonic friendship — someone for occasional companionship, interesting discussions, dinner, movies, museums and so on, with no romantic or sexual involvement.
Am I an oddball or what? Please be frank.
Howard Beach, N.Y.
Dear Howard Beach: I see no need to get into labels, but surely you must recognize the fact that you are “different.” A 39-year-old male who has never been interested in a woman and has no desire to be anything but a dinner companion is definitely not your average all-American guy.
With a little bit of luck, you may run into a nice woman who does not care about sex and wants only to have dinner, visit museums and go to movies. She’s out there somewhere. I hope you find her.
Gem of the Day: Have you noticed that it is impossible to stay mad very long at a person who makes you laugh?
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Do you have questions about sex, but no one to talk to? Ann Landers’ booklet, “Sex and the Teenager,” is frank and to the point. Send a self-addressed, long, business-size envelope and a check or money order for $3.75 (this includes postage and handling) to: Teens, c/o Ann Landers, P.O. Box 11562, Chicago, Ill. 60611-0562. (In Canada, send $4.55.)
