Our advice columnists have heard it all over the years — so today we’re diving into the archives of *Care and Feeding* to share classic parenting letters with our readers.

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**Dear Care and Feeding,**

I have a wonderful 3-year-old son I am co-parenting with my soon-to-be ex-husband. Our relationship ended badly, fraught with emotional and psychological abuse. He started cheating on me when I was six months pregnant, and we split up about two years later when I finally found the evidence.

He is now dating the woman he cheated with. She spends time with my son and spends the night in their home for several days at a time. They live across the street from me, but I haven’t seen the girlfriend since my ex and I split up. Even two years later, it still stings and makes me sick to think about them playing house with my son.

Now my ex is saying that she will be attending events, like soccer games, school events, and my son’s fourth birthday party, and I am just going to have to get used to it. The thought of this throws me into a downward spiral. I don’t think I should have to spend any time with this woman.

I don’t want my contentious relationship with my ex and his girlfriend to impact my son, but I am thinking about just hosting a second party for him, which the girlfriend will be explicitly not invited to. From what I’ve read, this type of thing is typically not healthy for the child.

And I don’t know what else I can do to avoid this woman if she is going to show up to events I will be attending. Do I just have to suck it up and spend time with this woman?

— Scorned

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**Dear Scorned,**

I’m sorry: You *do* have to suck it up.

This is the partner of your child’s father, and she needs an invite to anything child-related you would otherwise invite your ex to.

I would be furious. I would angrily text my friends. I would constantly evaluate her outfits and mild social missteps and hold them in my heart like precious treasures. But I would still expect to see her at the birthday parties. Because otherwise, eventually, your child will notice and begin to feel as though he has to “pick a side.” Don’t do that.

Be gracious and warm and appoint a friend you can say all the things you are feeling to. Right now you can say they’re “playing house.” That’s a bit dismissive and may not be adequately preparing you for the likelihood that they will marry.

You do not have to like her, but you have to be able to speak to her civilly. Don’t be the one who makes it awkward for your child. Kill them with kindness.

Now, depending on the extent of the abuse you suffered at his hands, you may very well not want your ex at these events. That’s fine, at which point you have no obligation to invite the girlfriend either.

Think about who really screwed you over, and try to do so dispassionately, if possible.

— Nicole Cliffe
From: *I Thought It Was a Haunted House for Kids* (October 28th, 2019)

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**Dear Care and Feeding,**

A year or so ago, my husband’s family gave us a fancy play tipi as a gift for my young children, which I expect cost them a significant amount of money. We’re concerned about cultural appropriation, and after discussing it as a couple we decided to simply put it into storage.

We do actively speak with our children about racism, and they are also too young to understand why we’d be uncomfortable with this gift.

My mother always taught me that when you give someone a gift, it’s then theirs to do with as they wish, and rude to inquire about further. However, my mother-in-law, who lives out of state, does not seem to share this value.

Over the past year she’s been inquiring repeatedly to my husband about why it’s not in any of the pictures we send. My husband used to deflect the question by saying we don’t have enough space to put it up, which may or may not have been the best approach.

However, we’ve moved, and now have space — and she’s now pushing hard about why we haven’t set it up yet.

My mother-in-law is someone who would likely be aghast at the insinuation that she’s racist, though I believe we all hold racist beliefs and must work to overcome them. I’ve heard her make generalizations that concern me, though nothing explicit. At those times I’ve explicitly encouraged her to think about the things she’s saying, which seems to have bewildered her a bit.

But I feel like this is a slightly different situation, where she’s given us what she perceives as a lovely gift. Can you think of a way to address this while keeping our relationship with her intact?

— Tricky Situation

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**Dear Tricky,**

You are, of course, absolutely within your rights to tell your mother that you’re not comfortable with the gift she gave your children. Ideally, you’d be comfortable enough with each other that this conversation could be simple and nonjudgmental on both sides.

“You know, I’ve done some reading,” you could say, “and we’re just not comfortable putting up a tipi in our house, because it erases meaning from a touchstone of a marginalized nonwhite culture.”

You could cite pieces by Native writers about how hurtful such cultural appropriation can be, even in such seemingly innocent realms as children’s toys.

In fact, you could have had that conversation a year ago, when your mother-in-law gave you the gift. I wish you had! That would have been a lot easier.

Now you’ve spent a year deflecting her requests for photos of her adorable grandchildren playing in the gift she sent — requests that are, in my opinion if not in your mother’s, totally reasonable. What grandma doesn’t want to see those photos?

Your husband, caught between a mother whose feelings are hurt and a wife who seems not to like his mother very much, lied about not having enough room for the tipi, and now you live somewhere bigger and the lie’s been exposed.

I’d encourage you to clearly and kindly tell your mother-in-law the truth about the tipi. One way to be kind is to talk her through the journey you surely made at some point, from thinking a toy like a tipi is harmless to realizing it’s a bad idea — as opposed to presenting this concept to her as something that every enlightened person already understands.

Unless your letter is omitting glaring examples of intolerance and misbehavior, your mother-in-law seems like a perfectly sweet, totally normal older person, who may not be as wonderful as your own mother but who doesn’t deserve the teeth-gritting treatment your letter suggests you’re giving her.

— Dan Kois
From: *My 10-Year-Old Son Only Wants Clothes That Are Too Small* (October 12th, 2020)

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**Classic Prudie**

I have always tried to be a kind person. However, I have lived my adult life in a way many people would disapprove of.

During the last 11 years I have been a mistress of five married men. One had a long string of previous affairs. One was a friend for whom I had much tenderness and who told me he would rather have had me. One was a three-year relationship that caused deep feelings and deep distress.

I do not regret these or the other adventures. I have not been the initiator of the affairs; the men have pursued me. Apart from one, I would not have wanted to live with these men.

I do not know any of the five wives, and I am discreet.
https://slate.com/advice/2025/11/parenting-advice-other-woman-co-parent.html?via=rss