Dear Abby Dilemmas: Boundaries, Marriage Strain, And Ghosts Of Old Love

A bar that feels unsafe, a marriage that feels smaller by the year, and a love that speaks only in dreams—today we wade into the gray areas where real life actually happens. We read three striking Dear Abby letters and respond with straight talk on boundaries, autonomy, and the tender mess of grief that lingers after lights out. No fluff, no easy answers, just a clear look at what people can do when the polite path stops working.

First, we unpack a friend group that keeps choosing a restaurant tied to a listener’s past trauma—a “jolly bar guy” who once broke into her home. We talk about the difference between preference and protection, why “get over it” is not empathy, and how to choose venues and friends that don’t trivialize PTSD. The takeaways are simple and strong: boundaries are valid, opting out is healthy, and social circles reveal their values through their choices.

Then we step into a marriage where one partner has scorched the social earth. Is he depressed, overmedicated, or just done with small talk? Instead of waiting for an epiphany, we make the case for parallel lives: encourage medical care and therapy if he’s willing, and build your own community regardless. A loving partnership can include separate calendars, new hobbies, and dinners with people who refill your energy.

Finally, we sit with the rawness of a husband who sleep-talks to a late ex. Dreams aren’t decisions, but they can hurt to hear. We share practical tools—sleep environment tweaks, gentle wake-ups, honest daytime check-ins—and the bigger reminder that grief and new love can coexist without canceling each other out.

We close on a lighter note with a classic TV debate—Seinfeld, Cheers, MASH, Wings—and invite your pick. If this kind of candid, caring breakdown resonates, follow the show, share it with a friend who needs a boundary boost, and drop a review telling us your all-time sitcom champ.

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Thanks for listening! 

Liberty Line each week on Sunday, look for topics on my X file @americanistblog and submit your 1-3 audio opinions to anamericanistblog@gmail.com and you'll be featured on the podcast. 

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Chapters

• 0:00 Friday Opener And Setup
• 0:54 Why Dear Abby Today
• 1:34 Letter 1: Friends Favor The House Intruder
• 3:39 Response: Boundaries And Rethinking Friends
• 4:17 Letter 2: Husband As Social Terrorist
• 5:26 Response: Independence Vs Fixing A Curmudgeon
• 6:33 Letter 3: Husband Says Ex’s Name In Sleep
• 8:19 Response: Grief, Dreams, And Perspective
• 9:24 Question Of The Day: Best Sitcom
• 10:19 Personal Picks And Sign Off

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:15

Ooh, hello, good morning. It is Friday. We made it through the week. This week went by zippity quick, didn't it? Oh, I think it did. Alright, we need to move on to uh the topics today, and they're all Dear Abby's because I really couldn't find anything on the New York Post. I know I say this all the time, but the stories out there are getting grosser and grosser, and I can't talk about them. They're just yucky. Therefore, we're gonna talk about Dear Abby. We have three of them. Which one should I start with? Um let's start with this crazy one. Of course, they're all ridiculous and crazy. Dear Abby, my friends want me to hang out with the man that broke into my house. This is a story that needs more vetting. Dear Abby, I have a group of wonderful women friends. Now, when I first started reading the reading this, I thought, well, what what do you mean? Why are we going through all of this when you I want to get to the man who broke into your house and your friends want you to hang out with them? I thought, why are we going through this? Okay. I have a group of wonderful women friends I have known for decades. We get together monthly for dinner and drinks at a local restaurant. The local, the location is generally left up to whoever has a birthday that month and usually varies among three choices. Occasionally I bow out if they choose a restaurant that caters to a local creep. This man, Bob, and Bob is in quotation, so obviously that's not his real name, has never been charged with an offense. Well, did you file charges? But I was one of his victims 20 years ago. Twenty years ago. Weeks after my first husband's death, Bob broke into my home and stole items from my husband's office. I was there at the time and he came into my bedroom while I was dressing. I screamed at him and he responded that I hadn't heard him knocking at the door and he wanted to make sure I was alright. This gives us no backstory at all. So obviously this man and this her husband obviously kind of I guess knew each other, but it doesn't say that yet. I have no ties to Bob, but my friends do. All of them are aware of his actions and reputation. If you have no ties to him, why would he break into your home and steal stuff from your husband? He obviously knew you. Alright, I have no ties to Bob, but my friends do. All of them are aware of his actions and reputation, so so is the owner of his nightly hangout. But Bob is a jolly bar guy and buys drinks. So everyone except me is okay with it. I get PTSD at the thought of attending one of our dinners when this particular establishment is chosen, so I usually skip those nights. A few of the women in my friends group have told me I need to just get over it, but I can't. Any advice on how to handle this? Well, I guess just keep doing what you're doing. Don't go. And I mean I want to know why he wasn't ch he wasn't charged with anything. Did you call the police? Did you pursue it? I want to know the background, but obviously she's not gonna tell us. Dear Abby says, Dear victim, I'm sorry for that what happened that day, although Bob didn't touch you. The terror was real. Yeah, I guess it would be. I do have a couple of suggestions regarding how to handle this. The first is to continue refusing to attend birthday celebrations, is what I said. Also, I think twice about how wonderful a woman friend is who would choose that restaurant for her party. Good point, Abby. Good point. You might want to ditch those friends. Okay, we need to move on to the next one. Let's see, do I want this one or do I want this one? Oh, let's go with let's go with this more serious one. Dear Abby, my husband has become a social terrorist. Can our marriage survive? Dear Abby, while the saying goes, no man is an island, I beg to differ as I am married to one. My husband has little to no patience with anyone, family included. I kind of like this guy already. He has always been negative. Oh well, I don't like that. And as he grows older, it has grown ten times worse. Over the past 15 years, my husband has alienated most of our friends to the point where he no longer has any contact with them. He literally walks away from them in public. He probably doesn't have any patience for their silliness. Well, I know a lot of people are super narcissistic today. I feel you have to put up with some of today's BS. I'm not super social myself, but his rudeness has gotten out of hand. Our social life is nil. It may be a case of depression. He's on multiple oh, he's on a multitude of medications. Why? It's wearing me down and I'm afraid I'm sinking down with him. Is there any situ go is there any solution? Just go make your own social life. Leave his negative asset home. He probably would like it better. That's your answer. Go go create your own social activities. I mean, you know, still be his wife and take care of him and everything, but you can still have time for yourself and go socialize. Alright, let's see what Dear Abby says. Dear going, because your husband has mental health issues. Now she didn't say mental health issues. This could be discussed with a doctor, a different medication, and talk therapy might help him if he would consent to it. Please consider consulting someone for yourself to help you decide if you want to spend the rest of your life being isolated. No, Abby, this is the wrong, wrong advice. Wrong, wrong. Just let him be. He's probably just a regular person, curmudgeon old man that doesn't want to put up with anybody. That's fine. There's nothing wrong with that. Alright. Moving on to the next one. Dear Abby, my husband calls out for his old girlfriend when he sleeps. Now, this one, this one is bizarre. I started reading this and I thought this one has to be talked about. Some of the statements that this dear Abby person writes, you want to go, what? Wait, back up. What happened? Tell me more about that. So here we go. I'll read it without interruption, I hope. It's short. Dear Abby, my husband of four and a half years had an old girlfriend he was on and off with for 15 years. She passed away while he was in prison. We got married three months after he was released. The thing is, when he sleeps, almost every night he says her name and how much he loves her. He says because he's doing it in his sleep, he doesn't know he's doing it. It seems to upset him that I'm upset. He doesn't want to hurt me. What can I do to deal with it or get him to stop doing it? I want to know why he was in prison. And how did you meet him in prison? If he's been in prison for 15 years and he had a girlfriend well, I mean he said he had a girlfriend for 15 years. I don't know how long he was in prison. But she passed away while he was in prison. But he was but they were boyfriend and girlfriend for 15 years. Why couldn't he commit? Why couldn't he get Okay, I have lots of questions. Let's see what dear Abby has to say. Your husband was on and off with his late girlfriend much longer than he had been married to you. Old habits die hard. If he wakes you when he if he wakes you when this happens, don't hesitate to gently wake him up. No, don't wake his ass up. Let him sleep. Let the man sleep. I would not wake him up. So what? It's in his sleep. Who cares? He can't help it if it what he's dreaming about. Who who cares? Just he's with you when you're when he's awake, that's what matters. If he asks why you did it, explain that he was talking in his sleep. Do not be specific about what. Well there you go. Then try to remember that she is history and you get right and you you are right next to him. Yeah, right next to an exfelon or a felon. Oh, I don't know. What do y'all think about those stories? Uh, we need to guess go to the question of the day. Let's see. What is it gonna be today? Okay, what do you what are your opinions on the best sitcom from back in the day, the 80s or 90s, probably the 90s, 80s or 90s. What uh because there's so many different ones. Let's do I don't know, your favorite sitcom. How about that? My favorite sitcom is gonna be Seinfeld. I love Seinfeld. Although the gent and I have been on a wings kick for like a year now. We've been watching old reruns of wings. Fraser's, I guess, pretty good. I'd like to start watching Fraser again. We started watching Cheers, but then the the streaming service we were watching and all kept messing it up and pausing and everything, so we had to ditch that. Cheers was good. I love Cheers. I mean Cheers was great. Uh but Seinfeld, I think, was the best. I'm definitely a Seinfeld person for sure. You either love it or you hate it, and I love it. I know I haven't picked a favorite one yet. Yeah, Seinfeld's my favorite sitcom. Um, but as a kid, I loved watching the Brady Bunch. Um, what else? I think that's it. That's it. Oh, wait. No, okay. Mash was good. MASH was really good, wasn't it? Uh yeah, I guess that's it. Seinfeld, what's your favorite sitcom? All right, gotta go. Thanks for listening. Have a great weekend.