DEAR SOMEONE ELSE’S MOM: When I was in my junior year of college, my mother left my father and my two younger brothers, who were both still in high school. When it happened, I was told she left because she wanted to follow the teachings of the church she was a member of and which taught you can only find “salvation through good works and a life of self-sacrifice.” I thought it was a bunch of bull$%it then, and thought it was just some kind of local cult.

What I found out since is that my mother left so she could be with the pastor, who left his wife and children too, and went off with my mother so they could “found a new community.”

I know how devastated my father was at the time my mother left, and it hit my brothers and me hard too. With what I now know, I can’t even imagine how my father felt, not only being left as a single dad, but wondering if my mother ever really loved him or us at all.

I have talked a lot to my dad about this whole thing. We know where she is, but it has now been years since any of us have heard from my mother except for birthday and Christmas cards for my brothers and me. I think we’re all better off this way.

My youngest brother is getting married later this year, and he has told our dad he wants our mom to be at the wedding. My dad is trying to be neutral about the whole thing, but I cannot be. I’m a long way from forgiving my mother for her selfishness and her betrayal.

Don’t you think that with so many hard feelings it would be wrong to bring someone who obviously wanted nothing to do with her family back into it for what is supposed to be a happy event? --- DON’T WANT TO SEE HER

DEAR DON’T WANT TO SEE HER: It isn’t difficult to understand why you’ve been so deeply hurt by your mother’s actions, and it’s up to you to decide if you ever want to forgive her.

However, it’s your brother’s choice to invite her to his wedding, and for his and his intended’s sake, it’s up to you to do whatever you need to do to help make their day a good one to remember. If that means swallowing your feelings for a few hours or a couple of days, I think it would be a loving gift to give your brother. It might help if you can focus on the festive and fun parts of the event, spending time with family and friends who will also be there to support and wish well to the couple as they start their new life together.

DEAR SOMEONE ELSE’S MOM: My husband is a physician assistant at one of the three hospitals in our city. He works three 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. shifts a week, on a rotating basis. What that means is he will be on for three days and then off for four days. The four days off are really nice, but we barely see him for the three workdays, and often they roll onto the weekends and into the holidays. It wasn’t so bad when it was just me and him, but we now have a two-year-old son and I am pregnant with our daughter. We already know he will be working Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve, which means more time he won’t be around with us. At least this year, my parents said they feel comfortable enough to travel. So they will be here for Christmas and New Year’s, so we won’t be alone the whole time.

I am proud of my husband, and I know the past couple of years have been incredibly hard on him and everyone in healthcare. But what could be a gamechanger for us is that we found out that one of the other hospitals is offering PAs steady 8-hour weekday shifts, with them only having to work two holidays a year and one weekend every other month.

This sounds perfect to me, but it will be a little less money, which seems to be a potential dealbreaker to my husband. Even with the cut, he’ll still be making really good money, and we’ll be more than fine. I keep telling him that.

I think what is really happening is he is happy where he is, even though it means less time with us, which kind of hurts.

I keep telling him to at least look into the other hospital, but he keeps putting it off and coming up with reasons it wouldn’t work as well for us.

What do I have to do to get my husband to really start thinking of his family first? I feel like this is putting a real strain on our marriage and family life. --- SECOND FIDDLE

DEAR SECOND FIDDLE: It’s possible your husband believes making the best salary available to him best serves his family at this point. Also, it may be he likes having the four days off to be with you all and potentially do some of the other things he enjoys with that nice chunk of time. Additionally, some people actually enjoy doing overnight shifts for a variety of reasons, which don’t always make sense to everyone.

Perhaps one thing you could do, if you’re the family money manager, is to sit down with him and clearly demonstrate that a smaller income will not be any kind of a hardship on your budget.

Beyond that, it seems to me it’s time to try and make as clear as you’re able that you’re feeling a strain on both your relationship with your husband and your family life.

But even as you tell him your side of things, listen to what he has to say. There may be other motivations he’s feeling to keep things as they are.

One way or the other, you two need to communicate honestly, openly, and soon.

DEAR SOMEONE ELSE’S MOM: Right before we got married, I went through all my stuff and got rid of everything from my old boyfriends that I had kept from when we were together. I hadn’t kept much of anything, but I felt like it was the right thing to do as part of my commitment to my husband.

When we were unpacking the boxes at our new house, I found that my husband had kept some printed out emails and cards and photos of his old girlfriend, even though they were broken up long before he and I got together. He never talks about her or anything like that, but don’t you think it is strange that he would keep these things from her? I find it a little insulting to me and our relationship. --- WHY KEEP THE STUFF?

DEAR WHY KEEP THE STUFF?: I doubt there’s any reason to take your husband’s holding onto some mementos from his past personally or as some kind of statement of his reluctance to be fully committed to you and your marriage.

Often we keep things not only to remind ourselves of people from our earlier days, but to preserve a bit of those bygone times themselves and who we were when we were living through them.

In your husband’s case, it’s possible that it isn’t just an old flame he’s preserving the memory of, but other reminders of an era that she happened to have been a part of.

Some people also tend to be more sentimental than others. Since you were readily able to rid yourself of souvenirs of your past relationships, you seem to be among the less sentimental. Your husband shows signs of being the kind of person who enjoys holding onto pieces of his past. That doesn’t mean he isn’t more than ready, willing, and able to move forward.