Posts Tagged: Ask Polly
Turning The Screw
11

Ask Polly: Jesus, My Struggling Writer Friends Never Shut Up!

| May 15th, 2013

Appearing here Wednesdays, Turning The Screw provides existential crisis counseling for the faint of heart. "Because you're still fucking up in the same ways you were before, only now you're too arrogant to notice."

Dear Polly,

How many times is too many to listen to a friend discuss their problems? I have several friends (mostly unemployed writers) who talk about the same thing over and over: namely, that they're not successful and don't know people who will help them, and yet don't do anything to change it. I literally have listened for over 30 minutes at least four times this week to the same friend who kept repeating him/herself [...]

Turning The Screw
12

Ask Polly: Only Black Men Like Me, But I Don't Like Black Men

| April 24th, 2013

Appearing here Wednesdays, Turning The Screw provides existential crisis counseling for the faint of heart. "Because every time a door closes, a few more close."

Dear Polly,

I have a big problem. Actually a multitude of big problems that have coalesced into a giant problem. I am 31, and I cannot figure out what to do with respect to my romantic life. All my friends from college/grad school are married or partnered and I feel really unwanted. I'm attractive and outgoing, which has given me the opportunity to make many, many, MANY mistakes with respect to men. In my early 20s, I dumped every single guy who seemed truly [...]

Turning The Screw
12

Ask Polly: I'm In Love But My Best Friend Is Slipping Away!

| March 6th, 2013

Appearing here Wednesdays, Turning The Screw provides existential crisis counseling for the faint of heart. "There's nothing out there but cold space."

Dear Polly,

I'm a straight 20-year-old woman. I was in love with my best friend, Ben, for three-and-a-half years, since the end of my senior year of high school. Ben is gay, so that was problematic, but even when it was at its worst, I was self-aware enough about the whole thing to understand that it wasn't healthy for me, and it wasn't sustainable.

Anyway, about 6 weeks ago, I started dating someone. I'm really excited about Noah, to put it lightly. He's my first [...]

Turning The Screw
21

Ask Polly: Is He Crazy, Or Am I?

| October 24th, 2012

Appearing here Wednesdays, Turning The Screw provides existential crisis counseling for the faint of heart. "Chicken tenders for that empty place where your soul should go!"

Dear Polly,

First of all, you must excuse my English, I'm actually French. Plus, I don't have autocorrect for English on this thing so I'm kind of forced to go with the flow. Anyway!

I know you already kind of wrote about that stuff but I'm still wondering if you'll help motivating me: I'm completely—and I mean it, completely—stuck on a guy.

We met each other in high school, kind of fell in love, kind of nothing happened because we [...]

Turning The Screw
13

Ask Polly: My Best Friend Likes A Guy That I Really Want To Get With

| May 8th, 2013

Appearing here Wednesdays, Turning The Screw provides existential crisis counseling for the faint of heart. "Because laughter is only the best medicine if you can't afford the other ones."

Dear Polly,

I am recently hot for a man who is also hot for me. But my very closest friend has been hot for him for a year. He told her after one make out session that he just wants to be friends with her, but she has been hoping for more anyway. She has worried about me meeting him because of potential hot times between me and him. I am not some raging slut. I assume she sensed that [...]

Turning The Screw
15

Ask Polly: The Eventual Death of The Universe Is Making Me Anxious

| April 18th, 2013

Usually appearing here Wednesdays, Turning The Screw provides existential crisis counseling for the faint of heart. "Because time is running out!"

Dear Polly,

I am, by all accounts, a relatively happy, well-off, 21-year-old woman. I exercise regularly, eat well, have good friends, a great boyfriend, and I'm about to graduate from a shmancy private college in NYC debt-free (thanks, Mom and Dad!). Here's the thing: lately, while I'm lying alone in bed, trying to go to sleep, I can't stop thinking about death. I'm pretty sure it started when I took an astrophysics class last semester, and read an article about the "eventual heat death of the universe" where [...]

Turning The Screw
18

Ask Polly: Should I Divorce My Perfectly Good Husband?

| February 13th, 2013

Appearing here Wednesdays, Turning The Screw provides existential crisis counseling for the faint of heart. "Because bitterness becomes you!"

Dear Polly,

As Neil Gaiman astutely pointed out, you often don't realize you have a migraine until it's way too late. I have now been with my husband for more than half of my life, and a couple of years ago I realized that I don't actually love him. Or even really like him very much.

Our relationship has never been easy, but for years I had blamed it on Things That Could Be Fixed—lingering distrust from long-ago infidelities, the typical working family's imbalance of housework, a mismatch in [...]

Turning The Screw
40

Ask Polly: My Best Friend Is In Love With My Sister!

| May 1st, 2013

Appearing here Wednesdays, Turning The Screw provides existential crisis counseling for the faint of heart. "Don’t make me come over there!"

Dear Polly,

Recently one of my best friends since childhood started dating my sister (whom I am also super close with). They seem pretty serious about each other and I want to be okay with it, but I'm having a really hard time with it. The main issue is I just have this primal response of UGHGHG NOOOOOOO which doesn't feel totally logical when it happens, but here's what I think it's about:

1. I talk to both of them constantly, all the time, about everything. Particularly dating, [...]

Turning The Screw
30

Ask Polly: I Am 40. Will I Be Alone Forever?

| April 10th, 2013

Appearing here Wednesdays, Turning The Screw provides existential crisis counseling for the faint of heart. "Because the heart is a lonely hoarder."

Polly,

There seems to be an abundance of advice-seekers who are 25 and terrified of being alone or 31 and think they're elderly. What I don't see is anyone over 40 who doesn't have their shit together. Is it that they are too busy being surrounded by loved ones to read blogs? Or are they too downtrodden to bother?

There is a perception that young people are bundles of misguided anxiety and that time will sort everything out. And yet everything in my experience contradicts that. (It [...]

Turning The Screw
12

Ask Polly: Will I Be Alone Forever?

| January 9th, 2013

Appearing here Wednesdays, Turning The Screw provides existential crisis counseling for the faint of heart. "Sometimes when we touch, the honesty's too much."

Dear Polly,

This may be one of those "What’s my problem? IS this is a problem?" problems.

I’m 28 and I’ve been single for six years. Very single. As in, years going by where I didn’t have much sex and little to no romance at all. I would tell you about my last relationship but it’s not that interesting and to be honest I don’t think about it much. My parents fought a lot when I was little and drama ensued for many years, but we [...]