Dear Abby has long been a place where ordinary people bring the messy, tender, complicated moments of family life, and two recent letters show just how wide that range can be. In the first, a worried mother and father from Indiana describe their 24-year-old daughter, Becca, and her 26-year-old boyfriend, Jason, who is the father of their 7-year-old granddaughter. The young couple recently bought a home together, which should be a happy milestone, but it has become a source of dread for the grandparents. Jason works only part time—if he works at all—and has no real interest in full-time employment. Even more troubling is the strong smell of marijuana that hits them almost every time they walk into the house to pick up their granddaughter. The grandparents have voiced their concerns more than once, but nothing changes. Their other children have noticed the same heavy odor, so it is not just an overreaction from two anxious parents. The thought of their granddaughter living in that environment is almost unbearable to them, and they do not know what to do next. They love their daughter, care about their granddaughter, and want to protect the child without destroying their relationship with Becca. It is a painful place to be: caught between love for an adult child and fear for a vulnerable grandchild, between the desire to speak up and the fear of pushing too hard.
The first letter is really about the helplessness that parents feel when their adult children make choices they cannot control. Becca is an adult. She owns a home and has a child, and her parents cannot simply forbid her from doing anything. But watching a 7-year-old grow up in a home where drugs are smoked openly is terrifying to them, especially because they know the danger is real. Marijuana may be legal in some states, but in Indiana it is still illegal, and that creates legal risks that go far beyond personal preference. More importantly, there is the health of a child to consider. Secondhand smoke, including marijuana smoke, is not good for young lungs, and no grandparent wants to think about their grandchild breathing that in. Abby’s advice is calm and practical: keep talking, be direct about what you see and smell, and make it clear that your concern is for the child’s health. She suggests that Becca and Jason could at least smoke outside the house, away from the little girl. And she warns that if the child ever tests positive for THC because of secondhand smoke, there could be serious legal consequences. That is not a threat; it is a fact, and it may be the wake-up call the young couple needs. The underlying message is that this is not about judging their lifestyle, but about protecting a child who cannot protect herself.
The second letter is a completely different kind of family puzzle, but it is just as familiar to anyone who has ever lived with another person. An 86-year-old husband has what his wife calls an indirect communication style. He will say something like, “I need to do some pruning on the climbing rose, but it’s too high for me to reach.” His wife, hearing this, does not know whether he is simply thinking out loud or quietly asking for help. So she asks a specific question: “Are you asking me to set up the ladder for you?” And he replies, “I can’t reach the top of the roses.” This back-and-forth drives her crazy. She is happy to help him, but she wants him to just say what he means. He, in turn, is frustrated that she does not instantly understand. It is a classic verbal dance, and the partners are stepping on each other’s toes. The wife is not angry; she is just exhausted by the endless guesses and the interrogation that seems to be the only way to get an answer. She wants to know what he needs without having to play twenty questions every time.
Abby’s response to the wife is gentle and insightful, because she understands that this communication style may be deeply cultural. In many parts of the world, especially in East and Southeast Asia and parts of Europe, direct requests can feel rude, aggressive, or demanding. People are taught to prioritize the comfort of others, to hint rather than ask, and to trust that a thoughtful listener will fill in the gaps. For this 86-year-old husband, those values may have been part of his upbringing for his entire life. It is not that he is trying to be difficult; it is that directness simply feels wrong to him. Abby wisely tells the wife not to try to force him to change, because that would likely make him feel harshly criticized. Instead, she suggests that the wife already knows the code: his offhand remarks are really requests. So she should do her best to help in whatever way makes sense to her, and if she guesses wrong sometimes, it is her husband’s responsibility to clarify. That is a freeing thought. It means the wife can stop treating every statement as a riddle to be solved perfectly and can just move forward with compassion, doing what she can and letting go of the pressure to read his mind every time.
Taken together, these two letters say a lot about the challenges of loving people who do not think, communicate, or live the way we wish they would. In the first case, the grandparents are dealing with a daughter whose choices put her child at risk. In the second, a wife is dealing with a husband whose way of asking for help feels maddeningly indirect. But at the heart of both is the same fundamental question: how do you care for someone without losing yourself in frustration? How do you speak the truth in love without destroying the relationship? For the grandparents, the answer may lie in having more serious conversations, not fewer—conversations that are calm, specific, and focused on the well-being of the child rather than on moral judgment. It may also mean setting clear boundaries, such as refusing to pick up the child from a home where it is hard to breathe the air, even if that creates conflict. Sometimes love means being willing to be the bad guy for the sake of a child. For the wife of the 86-year-old, the answer is more about acceptance and humor. She can learn to hear her husband’s indirect comments as his way of saying, “I need help,” and can respond with kindness rather than irritation. She can also gently teach him that she would love to hear a direct request now and then, not by criticizing him, but by making it safe for him to be clear.
What makes these letters so human is that neither situation has a perfect solution. There is no magic phrase that will make Becca and Jason suddenly change their lifestyle, and there is no magic phrase that will make the 86-year-old husband start asking for the ladder in a straightforward way. But there is room for tenderness in both. The grandparents can keep showing up, keep loving their daughter, keep being present in their granddaughter’s life, even as they speak difficult truths. They can also educate themselves about what to do if they ever suspect serious neglect or danger, and they can remember that their love is a powerful counterweight to a chaotic environment. The wife can keep being patient with her husband, recognizing that his indirectness is not a weapon but a habit, likely rooted in values he has carried his whole life. She can find ways to make their interactions lighter, perhaps by joking about her own guessing game or by offering help in a way that does not sound like an interrogation. She can also accept that some things will never be perfect, and that is okay. The true goal in both stories is not to win an argument or to prove who is right. It is to hold a family together with love, patience, and honesty, one conversation at a time, even when those conversations are uncomfortable.
Dear Abby’s advice has always been rooted in common sense and compassion, and these two answers are no exception. They remind us that every family has its own strange, frustrating, and beautiful ways of communicating. We all long to be understood, but understanding is hard work. It requires patience, imagination, and the willingness to see the person behind the annoying habit. The grandparents from Indiana need to remember that their daughter is still learning how to be an adult, and that their granddaughter needs them more than ever. The wife of the 86-year-old man needs to remember that her husband’s way of speaking is not meant to hurt her, and that the rose bush might really just need both of them, in their own ways, to get the job done. In the end, the best advice is not about changing other people; it is about changing how we respond to them. We can speak clearly, love fiercely, and let go of the need for perfection. We can forgive each other’s awkward words and strange habits. And we can keep showing up, again and again, because that is what love looks like in real life. Whether it is a smoky house, a climbing rose, or a husband who cannot quite say what he means, the answer is always the same: be patient, be honest, and above all, be kind. That is the lasting wisdom of Dear Abby, and it is a lesson worth carrying into every home, every family, and every relationship we treasure.
