Baggage Check: Not Maid for Each Other?

GOT ISSUES? Dr. Andrea Bonior will help you sort them out.

How do I get my boyfriend to help out more around our place? Everyone warned me that when we moved in together, I would feel like his mother. And it is happening! Before we moved in, I thought of him as neat and organized. Now I swear he doesn't lift a finger. What gives? — PO'd

Everyone warned you before co-habitating that you'd turn into his mother? And here the only risk I'd heard of was the Battle of the Thermostat!

Yes, it's difficult to choose your words carefully when your peripheral vision is clouded with days-old Thai takeout containers. But talk you must, before this pattern sets into an irreversible funk that makes caked-on beef kaprow look downright heavenly in comparison.

"I feel like I'm doing more to keep our place in shape than I should be," is a start. Don't accuse, but express your own discomfort. Then suggest some small but tangible steps toward a solution. You don't have to bust out a chore wheel, but try to agree on some joint ways to balance the burden. Be flexible, patient, clear and observant, since this is something of a test of how well you guys can manage conflict.

My husband's brother and his wife are in the middle of a nasty divorce, and details are coming out that make my brother-in-law look very bad. My husband has refused to talk about it and does not want to say a single negative word about his brother. If everything is true, then my BIL has stolen money from the kids' college funds and cheated on his wife multiple times. All I want is for my husband to say that his brother made some mistakes. ­— Sad Bystander in Va.

There are two distinct ways of looking at this. One is that you are understandably anxious to hear some confirmation from the man you love that he does not approve of pilfering money and infidelity. The other is that your husband's lifelong best friend is suddenly being accused of shocking indiscretions, and your husband is desperate to digest, understand and get through the stress of it all as he figures out the truth.

Right now, in the eye of the storm, the situation is so raw and in flux that your husband might deserve some time to collect himself and separate truth from fiction before he's obligated to start making pronouncements. (You acknowledge that your brother-in-law's crimes have yet to be proven true.) But you are understandably shaken, too, and seem to need some reassurance that your man won't stage a copycat performance.

So, be honest about what you need to hear, and don't ask for anything more. Acknowledge that neither of you can be sure what's really gone on, but there's a piece of you that's scared and just wants to be reassured that he loves you.

Talk back to Dr. Andrea by leaving a comment below. To ask a question for Baggage Check in the Express print edition, e-mail baggage@readexpress.com or submit an anonymous question here.

Art by Eric Reece for Express