By Alison Shea | News Editor
Dear Alison,
My boyfriend and his family are really religious and they don’t want us to date because I’m not. What should we do?
Dear Troubled,
In this situation, before you do anything else, assess your relationship with each other. Be sure to ask yourselves if all this worrying and distress is worth the trouble. Think to yourself: Do I really want to go to all this trouble to date someone I will probably only be with for a month? Or do you see yourself developing a lasting relationship with this person? After you assess your relationship’s potential, you must decide on a course of action. As I see it, you have two options. If you really want to make this relationship work, either you prove to his family that you are worthy of dating their son by whatever means you feel necessary, or you have your boyfriend sit down with his family and have him explain to them why he wants to date you and why this really matters to him without insulting their religious beliefs or parenting decisions. If I were you I would do a little bit of both. This way his parents know that you two are serious about your relationship. Hopefully everything works out for the both of you, but if not, remember that you’re in high school and everything seems much bigger than it really is. Chances are that you and your boyfriend won’t last beyond the 12th grade.
– Alison
Dear Alison,
My best friend is involved with the “wrong” crowd and he’s getting into drugs and alcohol. What should I say or do to help him?
Dear Concerned Friend,
It’s reassuring to know that people still realize the severity of drugs and alcohol. I’m sorry about your friend but I’m glad you’re seeking guidance. This is a tough situation because you don’t want to sound like a parent talking to their child about substance abuse and about how disappointed you are in them. Yet at the same time, you don’t want to lose your best friend to drugs and alcohol. You also don’t want him to get mad at you for bringing it up and then have him distance himself from you. But here’s my advice: tell him that you’ve noticed what’s been going on and you think it’s a bad idea but make sure you do this in a relaxed setting when you two are alone so that he doesn’t get defensive and/or angry with you. This way it won’t be another version of the awkward parent-child discussion and chances are, they won’t get mad at you if you bring up the topic casually and without a pretense of judgment. When I say casual though I don’t mean you should be laughing and joking around but instead you should focus on maintaining composure and attentiveness. Don’t zero in on them but don’t ignore them either; give them the space they need to be completely honest with you.
– Alison
Dear Alison,
I think my teacher hates me. Whenever I raise my hand to answer a question in class he/she skips right over me and calls on the person directly next to me, and whenever I don’t raise my hand he/she always calls on me and I end up making a fool of myself in front of the entire class. He/she also accused me of cheating on a quiz and then lying about it afterwards. I don’t understand why he/she hates me so much! What should I do? I want to drop.
Dear Paranoid,
Whatever you do, I encourage you not to drop! Don’t take the easy way out because you never know when you’ll encounter a situation when you don’t have that option. Although it is tempting, dropping, you must admit, is probably what a coward would do and if you do it then you are letting your teacher win. The teacher would likely think you hate them and then there would be a mutual feeling of animosity between the both of you, even though you were both mislead into feeling this way because of each other’s actions. Stay strong and don’t think too much into it!
-Alison
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