Some People Refuse to Show Up to a Party Empty-Handed. This Is the Way Around It.

Dear Prudence Prudie replies to readers’ comments and suggestions. Advice by Enter your email to receive alerts for this author. Sign in or create an account to better manage your email preferences. Unsubscribe from email alerts Are you sure you want to unsubscribe from email alerts for Jenée Desmond-Harris? Aug 28, 20266:00 AM Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by MaRussya/iStock/Getty Images Plus. Sign up for the Slatest to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily. Each week, Prudence asks readers for their thoughts on the letters she’s received. Her reply will be available every Friday. Hey Prudie, For Good Manners or Bad Manners?: I noticed in your letter you mentioned she brought something with tree nuts and a kid is allergic. Make sure that she knows not to include specific allergens if that’s a rule. That is a good reason to tell someone not to come back. Try this: Tell her what she can bring. Drinks are always a hit—have her bring a couple gallons of store-bought lemonade! Or something that you will need to replace (paper plates, or something). My mother is like this: Anytime we go to a family party, she wants to bring a baked good or a side dish. For some people, showing up empty-handed is simply not done. Just like you wouldn’t stroll out to the mailbox in the buff or something equally completely off-the-wall, some people cannot even fathom this behavior. Redirect her energy while you keep trying to retrain her to not bring something. Also, the “Carla is stubborn and insists on bringing something” is a pretty handy line to use (obviously not directed at her) if people start asking. —Rebecca Crecelius Yes, you’re absolutely right about the tree nut offense, and I should have mentioned that. And I agree. If someone is going to insist upon buying something, you may as well make it something useful to you. I have personally provided a relative, whom I will not name, with a list of “things we could use if you see them on sale at HomeGoods” and have had some success getting those instead of the things we definitely do not need no matter how cheap they are. Please keep questions short (<150 words), and don‘t submit the same question to multiple columns. We are unable to edit or remove questions after publication. Use pseudonyms to maintain anonymity. Your submission may be used in other Slate advice columns and may be edited for publication. Hey Prudie, Re Diarrhea for the Dogs: Think vertically. Cats can usually jump or climb in ways that dogs can’t. Put the food up high enough that the dogs can’t get to it, then add something the cats—but not the dogs—can use to get up there. A tallish cat tower would probably do the trick. —Kate This is brilliant. Or maybe it’s common sense for cat people? Either way, thank you. Hey Prudie, For Ghosted by a Friend: I think one possibility you missed is that some women are very jealous of the marriage milestone if they are still single, and I think it’s very possible that nothing more than that was going on with her. The timing of the ghosting (12 months would put it shortly after the engagement, and then she reached out two weeks after the wedding) supports that. The other possibility supported by this timing is that the letter writer was a terrible bridezilla and was so impossible to be around that she washed her hands of the bride while the wedding planning was still ongoing. Either way, the LW doesn’t mention a history of depression or catastrophes for the friend, thus making it likely that the wedding is more of a factor in their estrangement than you acknowledged. —Lulu I mean, I guess! It’s also possible that LW’s husband was the friend’s former boyfriend, whom she unapologetically stole out from under her, and she failed to mention that. Or, it could be that the LW used the friend’s identity to fraudulently obtain a credit card in her name and used that to pay for a wedding dress. But I try not to make up too many of my own facts when I respond to letters. While there definitely may be more to it than what we read (there always is), I don’t see any indication that the friend pulled back because she was jealous or because the LW was a “bridezilla.” You’re right that there was no mention of a history of “depression or catastrophes,” but there was no mention of these other narratives either. Hey Prudie, For Uncrossable Line: As a sole caregiver for my elderly parents, as someone who saw all those “loving relatives” not once show up to help, and as someone who sought support online and found that this almost always happens (one person in a family has the caregiver role and the rest avoid), I wonder how much the in-laws accusing the letter writer of cruelty is guilt and projection. One way to shut their stuff down may be to ask them, “What have you done for mother-in-law lately?” —Over Those With No Skin in the Game That’s a great point. They should worry about their own relationships with her and what they can add to her life instead of antagonizing the LW. Hey Prudie, You gave such great advice to Soon to Be Divorced. I hope she will embrace the idea of just letting the truth out. Sure, it would be great if everyone could just mind their own business. But they won’t. And the truth is NEVER as bad as what people will assume on their own. Real-life example: A school official resigns unexpectedly for “personal reasons,” and we can’t legally share any further details. Where did your mind go? A bunch of people probably think he’s a horrible criminal now, when the truth is he just didn’t get along with someone important on the board! This is pretty much the story behind every “scandal” I’ve been through in nearly 30 years of church and school ministry. And church ladies love to chatter. But I would also like to encourage this letter writer to remember that not everyone is just being a busybody. A lot of people really love you, and they just want to understand when big changes happen in your life. Shame grows in secrecy, and it can thrive there for a very long time. Like a blister from a bad pair of shoes. Just take the shoes off! The truth may hurt for a moment, but then you can actually start to heal. —Shameless “Just take the shoes off!” Yes! I will be writing that one down for future use. I couldn’t agree more. Classic Prudie My roommate is one of those scarily competent people. She does a lot of things well and doesn’t stress things that aren’t a priority. When her breath started to smell a few months ago, I told her nicely and in private. She was annoyed but then thanked me a few hours later and said she was glad to know. The problem is that she doesn’t really seem to have done much about it. Advice Dear Prudence