DEAR ABBY: My mom passed away a year and a few months ago. My parents were married for 38 years.
Dad started a whirlwind romance with a lady about nine months after Mom's death. Their relationship lasted three months, and they were supposed to get married. She blindsided him by breaking the engagement a month before the wedding. The breakup was because she still has feelings for an ex-husband and had nothing to do with my dad.
He keeps talking to her "as a friend," but he is miserable because he's in love with her. Ever since the breakup, she gets nasty and criticizes him about small things. She is not even a good friend.
I want my father to be happy and find someone who will love him. But he continues to call and text this woman, even though it makes him sink deeper into depression every day. He keeps thinking she'll take him back, but I don't see it happening. How can I convince Daddy to cut off all contact with her? -- WHAT'S BEST FOR DAD IN GEORGIA
DEAR WHAT'S BEST: I'm not sure you are the person to do that. It might be better to enlist the aid of a male relative or close friend -- someone who knows what has been going on. Your father might be more receptive to that message if he hears it from a contemporary. If not, he may have to learn his lesson the hard way.