Tell Me About It ® By Carolyn Hax

Dear Carolyn:

Is it a bad sign for a "doing his best to be supportive" father, father-to-be and husband (to a wife struggling with depression-anxiety) to develop strong feelings with a female co-worker? The crush is (hopefully) one-sided, and things are mostly professional except for a conversational friendship of two people who have a lot in common as far as movies, music, etc.

Although it's great to be around her, I can't take the happiness mixed with overbearing guilt feelings that go along with it. I'm just hoping she will move on to another job soon, as her contract is almost up.

Washington

That will help. But until then, as long as she's leaving (and only if she's leaving), give yourself permission to talk movies with her without guilt.

If you were starving, you wouldn't call it a bad sign that you wanted a cheeseburger. What you feel is so common. Yet we're so quick to discredit emotional starvation -- in ourselves and especially in others -- that any attempt to alleviate it is dismissed as weakness. And that's only when it's not outright deplored.

I'm not suggesting you betray your depressed pregnant wife or do anything else, well, deplorable. Light-years from it -- you owe your family your best attention.

But you can't sustain your best attention to them without also receiving some, in any form; people can and do get depleted (to which your depressed wife might attest).

Obviously crushes on other women aren't your wisest source of pleasure. In fact, if she isn't leaving soon, talk movies with someone else.

Either way, see her as a needed hint: Build some gratification into your schedule. This time, though, make it as harmless as it is immediate (guy friends, league sports, pulp fiction, season tickets?) and you'll be a better family man for it, without churning up all the guilt.

Dear Carolyn:

I'm having trouble getting over my ex, and it's affecting all aspects of my life. Problem is, I'm a man in my mid-20s, and my guy pals don't understand any problem that can't be solved by drinking, sex, or just forgetting about it. I don't have a lot of close female friends, and I abhor shrinks. Whom should I seek out for guidance?

Need an Ear

A man in your mid-20s? Come on, you don't feel actual pain.

Nothing begs more to be revisited than a thoughtless generalization. Including, say, a blanket loathing of an entire segment of the population. Surely some doctor-haters show up bleeding in emergency rooms, and lawyer-haters in lineups. Surely at some point we've all had a friend in car sales (or could use one).

And surely a twentysomething male shrink-hater can get depressed. There's no shame in pulling up a couch, no more than there would be in taking your hemorrhage to the ER. If it helps, you probably don't need more than a little couch. A love seat. (Get it?) Even one visit. Surely not all of the thousands of people in the counseling field are too abhorrent to be given a one-session chance.

You have things to talk about, questions to ask, confusion to address, and you live at a time when there are people competent, trained and paid to listen, answer and sort. Chug some pride and go.

How does that make you feel?

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