DEAR HARRIETTE: I am upset that my mom is making me move from Los Angeles to Arizona. I don’t want to leave LA, but my parents just finalized their divorce. I can't stay with my father because he is always going on business trips, and they both agree that me being alone all the time would not be in my best interest. They feel that it's best that I live with my mom, but my whole life is here, and starting at a new school going into my junior year of high school is going to be the worst.
Being away from my dad is going to be hard because he already doesn’t spend that much time with me due to his business travel. If I move with my mom, I feel like I’ll never get to see him. It seems like I’m irrelevant to him, and I wish I could talk to him about how I feel, but I'm not sure how to approach him. -- Hesitant to Move, Los Angeles
DEAR HESITANT TO MOVE: Now is the time to speak up. Request a face-to-face meeting with him. Let him know how much you wish you could spend more time with him and your concerns about becoming more distant if you move with your mother. One solution might be to ask him if he can commit to FaceTime with you every week -- starting now -- and a certain number of visits per year. You have to be the one with the plan, as it’s possible that the reason for the divorce is that he was never around.
(Harriette Cole is a lifestylist and founder of DREAMLEAPERS, an initiative to help people access and activate their dreams. You can send questions to askharriette@harriettecole.com or c/o Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)