Reader Q A

Friendships are rarely perfect; they come in more flavors and textures than Ben & Jerry's ice cream. Sometimes, coming to terms with a less than perfe...

QUESTION Dear Irene, I have a friend that I felt was my best friend. She was in my wedding and we were pretty much attached at the hip. She called m...

QUESTION Dear Irene, Our best friend has been seeing this guy. She's really into him so she wanted us to spend some time together to get to know ...

QUESTION Dear Irene, After years of friendship, my relationship with a colleague was damaged while both of us were enduring major losses in our l...

QUESTION Dear Dr. Levine, My dearest best friend of 35 years died in March. She had Alzheimer's disease, so it had been several years since I was a...

QUESTION Dear Irene, I'm 45 years old and feel like a 7th grader due to a mutual friend situation. I have been good friends with two neighbors for o...

QUESTION Hi, I've had the same best friend for more than 20 years. We were so close that we even have matching tattoos. We don't live near each oth...

About three years ago, writer Rachel Bertsche moved from New York to Chicago with her husband-to-be, leaving behind her friends, her job and a city sh...

QUESTION Dear Irene, Last October I discovered that my only sister, who is two years older than me, has been stealing the money I send to take care ...

QUESTION Hi Irene, I wanted to ask you about travel friendships. I just returned home to the UK after a gap year in Australia. While abroad I made ...

QUESTION Dear Irene, I don't know if this is a strange question or if many other women have the same issue as me. I have a lot of friends that I'm ...

QUESTION Dear Irene, Over the course of my life I've had two or three best friends, relationships that ended for one reason or another. Although I ...

QUESTION Hi Irene, Throughout my life (I am now 25) I have had problems with friendships ending poorly, usually with friends betraying and/or aband...

QUESTION Dear Irene, I met my former BFF on the first day of college almost nine years ago. A year later, I went to a party she was throwing and m...

QUESTION Dear Irene, I have been friends with Amy since high school, and we are now mothers in our 30s. I have a 10-year-old and another baby on th...

QUESTION Dear Irene, My husband and I were very close friends with another couple who betrayed and hurt us deeply. They made twisted and false accus...

QUESTION Dear Irene, First of all, thank you for your blog and columns; I've gained much insight from you. I am a 42-year-old mother of two boys and...

QUESTION Dear Irene, A friend of mine spends a lot of money on gifts even when it's not a special occasion. She is not wealthy and her husband recen...

QUESTION Dear Irene: My friend sent me a message on Facebook (a personal message, not where it could be read by everyone). She said: Hey, your birth...

It always hurts to be dumped without having any say in the matter but it will be less painful and you will heal more quickly over time if you take control of what you can.

QUESTION Dear Irene, I am an only child and have a friend named Linda (who is also an only) whom I've known since first grade. She is due to give bi...

QUESTION Dear Dr. Levine, For the past six to eight months I've had two friendships deteriorate. Jillian had been my friend for about 15 years. We ...

A little more than a year ago I began a friendship with a female co-worker. We are both married and it never went beyond the friendship stage nor did either or us want it to.

Sometimes people believe they need to obtain closure from another person before they sever a friendship. This isn't true.