Dear Prudence is Slate’s advice column. Submit your questions here. (It’s anonymous!)

Dear Prudence,

My late mother did not leave him in her will, but always expressed her desire to “take care” of her grandchildren: my nephew “Ben” and my niece “Sally.” He died six years ago. I bought my brother and sister’s share of the house as I was tired of city life. My brother had an affair and married a “good Christian” woman. He completely alienated Sally from our family. She is bisexual and biracial. My new sister-in-law would prefer that Sally never existed. Unfortunately, I was going through my own problems and was not very present in Sally’s life during the divorce.

I have decided to downsize and the house is worth much more now than when I bought it. I wrote a check to Sally and Ben for $10,000 each and signed it “Love Grandma.” I didn’t tell my brother. I told my sister, since Ben is still a teenager. Sally responded by saying she was touched and that we should stay in touch. Well, later I visited my brother and his wife for their baby shower.

It was extortion. Apparently the cat slipped out of the bag and Sally told her dad about the check in a fight. They were visibly upset that I gave them a small gift, instead of a big check. I was staying with them and ended up leaving because of the fight.

My SIL started crying and said how hurt she was that I didn’t consider her kids or the new baby to be a “real” family. I told him to stop this nonsense: his children never even met my mother and I didn’t know they expected anything. This was a unique deal I wanted to make to honor my mother’s memory. Then my brother started telling me that I somehow tricked him into buying the house. I reminded him that I paid the market price and the matter was over. Now there is a big gap between me and my brother. We were never close, but I tried to maintain the connection. My sister told me that she and Ben are fighting over money. He wants to spend it now on a car while she wants him to save it for school. Basically, my goodwill gesture has blown up in my face. How do I fix things here?

-Fly

Dear Blow Up,

I am so sorry that your attempt to honor your mother’s final wishes turned out this way. But I encourage you to think about it like this: You probably did what she wanted you to do. I’m sure your mother didn’t think that helping her grandchildren financially would lead them to fight with their parents, and I’m sure you didn’t either, but that doesn’t mean it was wrong. Part of me wants to suggest that it might have been different if you had put the money in a trust or waited until the teenager was in his twenties, but I’m not sure it would have mattered. In any case, the question of spending versus saving is something they will have to figure out on their own.

Fixing things will be difficult and I have to ask: are you sure that’s what you want to do? You haven’t traditionally been very close to your brother and his wife, and while it may be awkward to not have a resolution, it might make a lot more sense for everyone to let everything be okay for a while.

Dear Prudence,

I’m a twenty-something bisexual guy. Five years ago I went out with Adam, who was one of my only friends in a new city. The relationship started in pretty difficult circumstances and I was far from a perfect match, but even when circumstances improved, the relationship and communication continued to get worse. Adam oscillated between “you are the love of my life, this is the most special and unique relationship, I will never find anyone like you again, never leave me” and “you are so cruel, you don’t care.” “Yo, how can you keep talking to (my ex and current friend) Betty? She’s conspiring to manipulate you and ruin our relationship.” (I’m still not sure how much he believed this himself, but it wasn’t true.) Anyway, he pretty much convinced me that I was crazy and couldn’t trust my own judgment or memory.

After months of this (during which I distanced myself from Betty in an attempt to appease him, but it was never enough), I felt absolutely exhausted, lost will and interest in the relationship, and ended it all. I tried to rebuild as friends, with limited success, as I still cared about him and hoped the pain would heal with time. Unfortunately, he continued to try to treat me like a romantic partner and complained that I didn’t prioritize him over my other friends and activities, cut Betty out of my life completely, and moved in with him.

A couple of years after the breakup, I started dating my wonderful girlfriend Cara. Adam immediately started texting her and trying to organize individual activities with her: he invited her to spend a week on vacation abroad without me (which luckily didn’t happen), brought her gifts, and warned her that my mother was washing me the brain. Former crazy Betty. He also repeatedly told us that our relationship was unfair, that he and I would have been better and deserved another chance. I told him he needed to give us space, but this ultimately caused him to act more erratically and threaten self-harm. One night he started screaming and banged on my front door and refused to leave for hours. He also refused professional help. I decided to cut contact with him (a little less than a year ago). It was absolutely the right decision. I was finally able to enjoy my life and my relationship without worrying about how his mood will change this week or what he will do next.

Cara and I just got engaged. Adam won’t be invited to our wedding. Unfortunately, this is a small town. Many of my friends who will be guests know or are even friends with Adam in some way, and I still see him at social events (where we are cordial). He has spoken badly about me to several of these mutual friends. He’s more or less stuck to the no-contact boundary, but things I’ve heard in our social circle suggest he’s still upset about the breakup. I don’t want to hide the wedding and make it a secret that no one can talk about, but I also suspect that the news will be an unpleasant shock for him and I’m worried that he might bring that out in inappropriate ways (note: I don’t think he will be violent towards others, I’m not worried about him physically hurting me or Cara). How can I handle this with compassion? Should I tell him the news or not?

—Still tormented by past relationships

Dear still haunted,

You are already handling it with compassion by ignoring it. It’s clear that Adam is obsessed with the idea of ​​you hurting him, and there’s nothing you or his friends can do to convince him otherwise. You don’t have to go up and tell him about the wedding, he knows about the wedding. You don’t have to break contact to save him, now he has to lean on someone else. If he spirals (and given his history, I can see why you think that would be likely), you can’t take that reaction as your responsibility.

The best thing you can do now is enjoy the run-up to your wedding and release any anxiety about the day. When it comes to Adam, there is nothing you can do to fix or prevent whatever his reaction is. Focus on yourself and your upcoming nuptials. Marriage is much more than the wedding day, but the wedding day belongs to you and your loved ones. Unless you’re afraid you’re in danger (in which case you’ll have to get the police involved), don’t hide it from anyone.

Dear Prudence,

I met my husband after his daughter, “Rose,” graduated high school and was away from home. Despite being married to Rose’s father for a dozen years, she has never warmed to me, although our relationship has been fairly civil. I retired after forty years working for the local school district, while my husband still enjoys running his own business. Rose and her husband moved about an hour away from us after living abroad for several years. They are waiting…and waiting for me to drop everything to be their free, unpaid source of childcare.

At first I thought they actually wanted a closer relationship. They visited us instead of waiting for us to visit them. There were offers to dine, go shopping, and go to the theater together. But it was all a ruse in an attempt to sweeten me. Since I’m retired and don’t “do anything” with my time, they want me to take care of the baby after Rose exhausts her maternity leave. I said I’d give the idea some thought. They were upset because I didn’t immediately understand the idea and I was very insistent about it. Rose claims that my reluctance hurts her. Honestly, this irritates me because I’ve made multiple attempts to get closer to Rose over the years and been rejected. No one is owed a relationship, but now that Rose wants something from me, she’s totally fine with it. Their own mother lives far away and they don’t have many local friends since they moved here. They both make a great living, so I doubt hiring a nanny would be impossible.

I wouldn’t be opposed to occasional overnight babysitting or being there in case of emergency, but Rose and her husband have made it clear that they want me to be there at least five days a week, if not more. I’d rather not open the door at all, but my husband thinks offering a little will go a long way. I volunteer, work in our garden and am actively involved in our church. I’m not willing to give that up. I’m also wary of future fights given how this is going. The baby hasn’t arrived yet! What should I do?

—Feeling the pressure

Darling to feel the pressure,

You only feel the pressure because your husband’s daughter dropped a stone of expectation in the center of your chest. Are you kidding me? It’s bad enough having someone decide how you’re going to spend your time without your input, but then inferring that you have nothing better to do than take care of kids full-time because you’re retired? Enormous.

If you are truly willing to provide some type of regular child care, or serve as a backup option in some way, I encourage you to create your own version of what that would look like and offer it to parents. If you’re not interested in that, let them know that you’re excited for them and the opportunity to develop a relationship with their child, but that you won’t be providing full-time childcare, or anything at all. It’s not something you owe anyone, especially when they have other options, and in those circumstances, it’s not the kind of thing you offer to do if you’re going to end up feeling taken advantage of. It seems that the seeds of that perspective have already been planted.

Catch up with this week’s Prudie.

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