Don’t marry the man who is sharing bed with his young daughter

Dear Amy: My fiance and I are in our late 50s. His late wife (the mother of his 10-year-old daughter) died suddenly and unexpectedly — six years ago.

His wife was younger than he, and he has not dated anyone since her death. That is, until me.

Before his wife died, she shared a bed with their daughter. He slept alone.

After his wife’s death, he began sharing a bed with his daughter. Nothing inappropriate goes on, but the girl cannot — or will not — sleep alone.

This means that he and I can only be intimate when she is not home.

We’ve talked about this issue as an impediment to getting married. For many reasons, I refuse to sleep in the bed with him and his daughter, as he’s asked me to do. I don’t see this as being a solution to what I see as a huge problem.

Do you have any suggestions or advice?

I’ve been alone for seven years, and I thought I’d found The One after years of dating many others.

— AN OLDER LONELY HEART

Dear Lonely: Do not enter this family system as an official member until your guy and his daughter feel secure enough to sleep separately. Realistically, even if your fiance wanted to change, this could take many months.

Given that the daughter has slept with a parent her entire life, and also that she suffered an extremely traumatic and sudden loss at a tender age, she will not be able to change her sleeping habits on her own.

At her age, co-sleeping retards her growth in a number of ways. For instance, at an age where many children enjoy sleepovers with friends, I assume that she is too insecure at night to do this.

Another mark of his poor judgment is that he is deluding himself if he thinks an adolescent girl would welcome another woman to quite literally take her mother’s place in the family bedroom.

This girl needs professional therapeutic and bereavement counseling regarding her traumatic loss. The focus should be not only to change this sleeping arrangement, but — most importantly — to help her to heal and grow. Your guy does not seem at all ready to form a new family with you. He needs professional help and parenting counseling, too.

Dear Amy: I am a middleaged, attractive woman. I took my car to get serviced yesterday. It was my first time at this dealership. As the representative began helping me, he introduced himself. I’ll call him “Freddy.”

Immediately another customer, a man around my age who is obviously a regular client there, leaned in and said, “The women call him, ‘Lover Freddy.’”

I smiled politely and continued with my business but I am sick of having to deal with professional situations being turned into sexual ones.

Is there any reply I can keep in my back pocket for the next time a man makes an inappropriate comment like that?

— STICK TO BUSINESS

Dear Stick to Business: In this specific situation, when the man said, “The women call him ‘Lover Freddy,’” you might have responded: “I wonder what they call YOU.”

Keeping a snappy reply in your back pocket might be less effective than deciding ahead of time to try to respond to this sort of thing in the moment, expressing a genuine reaction along the lines of, “Huh? What the heck?”

Saying nothing in reply telegraphs that — whatever the joke might be, you don’t get it (or don’t want to get it). As would this response: “I can’t figure out why you just said that to me.”

Dear Amy: We hosted a wonderful anniversary party recently for ourselves (our 50th!) and were thrilled to have friends and family attend. The invitation read “No Gifts,” but as sometimes happens, the directive was overlooked. Along with lovely cards, we also received a boatload of zucchini along with the explanation: “We thought you’d love to have something from our garden!”

First of all, it was awkward greeting old friends with a hug and a greeting, and then lumbering off with an armful of zucchini and a smile, especially when we’re thinking, “What the heck are we going to do with this?”

Plus, our two refrigerators were stuffed to the gills with pop, beer, fresh fruit, veggies and other munchies for the pre- and post-party festivities. After the party, though we looked forward to spending even more time with our out-of-town guests, we were busy cramming all the zucchini into our refrigerators — along with leftovers from the dinner.

So, I’d like to notify people that as party plans unfold this year, they should make a mental note to leave their zucchini at home. Unburden your bounty with the neighbors. Or donate to a nearby food pantry. Or sponsor a friendly baseball game using your larger zucchinis as bats.

Whatever you do, don’t show up at party time with your zucchini. We’re thrilled to see you. We just don’t need your squash. — AWASH IN SQUASH Dear Awash: At my hometown church during this time of year, the collection plate isn’t the only thing being passed around, as people offload the excess bounty from their gardens to fellow worshippers: Tomatoes, corn, and the omnipresent zucchini!

I agree that zucchini is a strange gift to present as an anniversary present, but this time of year for vegetable gardeners, the rule is to either give squash or be squashed. Your local food pantry might have been happy to welcome this fresh produce.