Life Advice
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Being Brazenly Loud for the Greater Good
It feels like there are people in America who wake up every morning, stretch like a cartoon villain, and immediately start working to make things worse. They clog up school board meetings, launch unhinged Facebook rants, and propose legislation that makes you check if it's satire. And you know what? They do it with confidence that would be ...Read more
Single File: Love Partnership
The days are gone when women made financial clout the top requisite for serious interest in a man. No longer economically second-class (if not financially whole, or at least with more earning potential -- and hope -- than before), women are asking something different from men. They are beginning to insist that their love object actively nurture ...Read more

The problem with asking, 'Where are the men of my caliber?'
I work with a lot of amazing, successful women. A lot. And I am constantly impressed by these women’s tenacity, drive and achievements. Most have made their financial wealth on their own and are very proud of that, as they should be. But with this success sometimes comes difficulty in finding a partner. Why is this?
As a recent example, I ...Read more

Ask Anna: Is sexting cheating? Navigating digital infidelity
Dear Anna,
I've been with my boyfriend for a little over a year and recently found that he has been sexting strangers (single women and couples) on an app the entire time we’ve been together. When I found out I felt hurt, not just from the sexting but also because he has refused to sext with me ever. And he rarely initiates sex with me, and ...Read more

Ask Anna: My coworker-turned-boyfriend won't let me break up with him
Dear Anna,
I've been dating a coworker (we're both in our early 30s) for two months, and for the past month, I've been trying to end things. Every time I attempt to break up, he argues until I'm exhausted and emotionally shut down, then convinces me to stay by promising he'll change or telling me I'm misinterpreting his behavior. Things have ...Read more
Single File: Reader Mail
DEAR SUSAN: Hopefully by now you've gotten some email in support of your position on the engagement ring issue. This widely and fervently held and programmed belief is just one more symptom of the stranglehold marketing has on our culture, overriding all. -- Mike
DEAR MIKE: You and I may be the only humanoids on planet Earth who see the ring ...Read more

The reason we can't move past the person we can't have
The story starts the same. You like someone. They like you. You continue liking this person. This person stops liking you (or never did?) and pulls back. You like this person more. This person, feeling smothered, continues to pull back. You continue to obsess more.
Why is this, though? Why should a person’s feelings actually grow the less and...Read more

'Choose each other every day': Boise LGBTQ+ couple contends with the Idaho Legislature
BOISE, Idaho — While visiting Flying M Coffee, one of their favorite downtown Boise haunts, Chelsea Gaona-Lincoln pretended to go to the gift shop before returning to her table with Van Beechler-Lincoln carrying a personalized flipbook that told the story of their love. On the table between them was a ship in a bottle that Van’s friend had ...Read more
Millennial Life: Before Answers, Before Action
It's never good when you get the doctor on the phone to update you on the results.
This could have been a slightly chirpy column about how this millennial went for her first mammogram. But now it's another essay about the in-between -- before answers, before action.
Thanks to the state of our medical world, I'm now waiting for an unspecified ...Read more

Ask Anna: Surviving a partner's obsessive FIRE journey
Dear Anna,
I'm at my wit's end with my partner’s extreme focus on achieving FIRE (financial independence, retire early). What started as a healthy interest in personal finance has turned into an all-consuming obsession. We're both 29 and have lived together the last year. My boyfriend has become fixated on retiring by 35, which means saving ...Read more
Single File: Father as Co-Nurturer
You and I live in interesting times, which, according to ancient Chinese wisdom, equates with being accursed. But womanly intuition prods me (ever so gently) to believe those wise men might well reconsider after learning the supersized changes in our species' parenting roles. Women are released from their household universe and finding ...Read more

'Resisting, just by existing and loving.' Market hosts free gay weddings
COLUMBIA, S.C. -- The weddings were initially supposed to cost $100 a pop. They ended up being free.
Y’all-Mart, a quarterly Columbia art fair advertised as a “flea market for Southern eclectic folks,” hosted eight free gay weddings Sunday as a fundraiser for the Harriet Hancock Center’s name change and gender marker fund.
Stoked by an...Read more

Ask a dating coach
As a dating coach, I get questions that run the gamut from first date to the early stages of a relationship. Let's look at a few of those recent questions today.
Question: I’m a head taller than him. I enjoy his company, but I’m worried I won’t get over the height difference. What do I do?
Answer: There’s really nothing I can say here....Read more
Millennial Life: The Erosion of Empathy
The other day, I had a conversation that stuck with me, not because it was unique, but because it was disturbingly common. I was speaking with a gentleman about safe use sites, places where individuals struggling with addiction can use substances under medical supervision, reducing overdoses and offering pathways to treatment. He was adamantly ...Read more

Ask Amy: Exiting with some well-worn wisdom
Dear Readers: Since announcing my departure from writing this syndicated column, I have heard from scores of people across various platforms, thanking me for more than two decades of offering advice and wishing me well in my “retirement.” I am very touched and grateful for this outpouring of support.
The thing is – I don’t think of ...Read more