You’re only as stuck in union as you choose to be

Advertisement

Advertise with us

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: My ever-expanding wife of eight months says she’s sick of me and my drinking. I told her I’m tired of her and her overeating.

Read this article for free:


By clicking the button above, an account will be created and you will begin to receive some of our recommended newsletters. You may opt out of any newsletter by visiting your Email and Communication Preferences page or by clicking "unsubscribe" at the bottom of any email.

or

Already have an account? Log in here »

To continue reading, please subscribe:

Digital Subscription

One year of digital access for only $1.44 a week*

  • Enjoy unlimited reading on winnipegfreepress.com
  • Read the E-Edition, our digital replica newspaper
  • Access News Break, our award-winning app
  • Play interactive puzzles

*Billed as $5.77 plus GST every four weeks. After 52 weeks, price increases to the regular rate of $19.95 plus GST every four weeks. Offer available to new and qualified returning subscribers only. Cancel any time.

To continue reading, please subscribe:

Add Free Press access to your Brandon Sun subscription for only an additional

$1 for the first 4 weeks*

  • Enjoy unlimited reading on winnipegfreepress.com
  • Read the E-Edition, our digital replica newspaper
  • Access News Break, our award-winning app
  • Play interactive puzzles
Start now

*Your next Brandon Sun subscription payment will increase by $1.00 and you will be charged $17.95 plus GST for four weeks. After four weeks, your payment will increase to $24.95 plus GST every four weeks.

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 24/05/2025 (524 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: My ever-expanding wife of eight months says she’s sick of me and my drinking. I told her I’m tired of her and her overeating.

She’s been piling on weight and there’s not even a pregnancy as an excuse — she says kids are just too messy to consider.

I can’t even remember when we last had sex. We fight all the time now that we’re married and it feels like we’re stuck in the mud. She just keeps on saying, “You signed the wedding papers, too, so don’t complain to me.”

What can we do? All we do is go to work, come home and argue.

— Marriage Mistake? Exchange District

Dear Mistake: You two seem to be getting a twisted kind of enjoyment out of quarrelling about your marriage. Why waste your time doing this if it’s such a mistake?

With no kids, you two are only as stuck as you want to be. One or both of you can easily walk away from the strained marriage, get legal counsel and a divorce to free you up again.

The two of you are not good for each other’s self-esteem with all this bitterness, so maybe it’s time to cut your losses and cope with your respective issues on your own.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: I’m seriously in love with someone at work. Sometimes we stop talking in mid-sentence and just stare at each other. We really just want to kiss each other senseless.

She is a woman and so am I. The good thing is we’re both divorced now, having finally left our unhappy straight marriages. We are very, very close.

The trouble is, we hold high positions with our company and the owners of it are “down on gays,” as they sometimes say.

The only way we can see each other for any length of time is by doing work projects that involve private meetings. We also do a little travelling together for the company, which is hard to wrangle.

I’d like us to start seeing each other openly, but my mate says her ex-husband will use that to make a legal move to try to have their kids live with him full time. So now what?

— Ladies in Love, West St. Paul

Dear Ladies in Love: Hike off together to see some lawyers about the likelihood of your love losing primary custody of the children over her being with another woman.

You likely already know custody is not simply about the adults’ desires. It matters who the children want to live with and who would be around more for them to see to all their needs and show them proper love and attention.

Would you ever want to live with this woman and her children? Do you know them and like them? There is much to consider, so take it slowly, and do a lot of experimenting, especially where various experiences with her kids are concerned.

Please send your questions and comments to lovecoach@hotmail.com or Miss Lonelyhearts c/o the Winnipeg Free Press, 1355 Mountain Ave., Winnipeg, MB, R2X 3B6.

Maureen Scurfield

Maureen Scurfield
Advice columnist

Maureen Scurfield writes the Miss Lonelyhearts advice column.

Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.

Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.

Report Error Submit a Tip

More Stories

Fact Check

1 minute read Thursday, Nov. 30, 2023

Fact Check

Having problems with the form?Contact Us Directly |

Waiting for Cormier verdict the ‘calm before the storm’

Katie May 6 minute read Preview

Waiting for Cormier verdict the ‘calm before the storm’

Katie May 6 minute read Thursday, Feb. 22, 2018

As the jury room door closed behind the seven women and four men who are now deliberating on the evidence against Tina Fontaine’s accused killer, Thelma Favel rose from the chair she’s occupied for most of Raymond Cormier’s second-degree murder trial.

Almost every day over the past three weeks, Favel, the woman who raised 15-year-old Tina, has sat right up front, directly across from the jury box, listening, sobbing and soaking in disturbing details of the teen’s last days that have come to light over the course of Cormier’s second-degree murder trial.

On Wednesday afternoon, after Court of Queen’s Bench Chief Justice Glenn Joyal instructed the jury and sent them off to be sequestered until they decide whether 56-year-old Raymond Cormier is guilty of killing Tina, Favel got up and hugged Crown prosecutor Breta Passler. It was one of many moments, this one shielded from jurors, that have long since proven the emotional impact of the case and the lasting power of Tina’s legacy.

Tina’s death sparked a public outcry that renewed calls for a national inquiry into disproportionately high rates of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls across Canada, and the criminal trial for the man accused of killing her hasn’t happened in a vacuum.

Read
Thursday, Feb. 22, 2018

Shocking development

Kelly Taylor 6 minute read Preview

Shocking development

Kelly Taylor 6 minute read 2:00 AM CDT

HOCKLEY VALLEY, Ont. — It’s not too often you get into a new vehicle, look at the interior, and say to yourself, “Wow, this is different… in a good way.”

Automakers tend to stick pretty close to defined norms, and when they differ, it’s not always successful. I’m looking at you, Toyota Yaris and Nissan X-Trail.

So, stepping into the 2027 BMW iX3 was refreshing. A bright parallelogram of a main touchscreen is closer to the driver than most, aided in no small part by pushing the instrument cluster to a narrow band just under the windscreen.

The effect is to clean up the look of the dash but without moving to a centre-mount instrument panel like the Yaris and X-Trail. The most valuable information (speed, battery charge, range) is right in front of the driver, visible above the top rim of the steering wheel.

Read
2:00 AM CDT

You’re only as stuck in union as you choose to be

Maureen Scurfield 3 minute read Saturday, May. 24, 2025

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: My ever-expanding wife of eight months says she’s sick of me and my drinking. I told her I’m tired of her and her overeating.

She’s been piling on weight and there’s not even a pregnancy as an excuse — she says kids are just too messy to consider.

I can’t even remember when we last had sex. We fight all the time now that we’re married and it feels like we’re stuck in the mud. She just keeps on saying, “You signed the wedding papers, too, so don’t complain to me.”

What can we do? All we do is go to work, come home and argue.

Submit a news tip

1 minute read Monday, Mar. 16, 2026

Submit a news tip

Letters, Oct. 30

6 minute read 2:00 AM CDT

Embarrassed by turnout

I am ashamed by the poor turnout of voters in the recent municipal election in Winnipeg. Just 38 per cent of eligible voters is a disgrace to the thousands of men and women who gave their lives in past wars, where they were defending democracy and the right to vote.

My grandfather was an infantry soldier in the First World War, and my father-in-law flew in Avro Lancasters in the Second World War. For both I am grateful.

Maybe the 62 per cent that had a flimsy excuse for not voting will keep this mind for the next election. People died for our right to vote.