A good friend of mine was emailing back and forth with a man, through very sexually explicit messages.

By mistake, she sent her reply to him to everyone in her address book, which also contained several people from her workplace (including her boss!).

She's normally very private and dignified. She's horrified about this and feels like she can't face the people in her workplace. How should she deal with this?

Concerned

Too late for anything but a brief, self-deprecating, good-humourous comment, the kind anyone can relate to with such a mistake. Something like, "The one time I try to be sexy, I end up making a public mess of it!"

She should cut off further conversation with that one-liner and hold her head up high. If anyone starts coming onto her heavily because of this email, she can cut him or her off with, "Hey, I was joking with an old friend, and you're not my old friend, so forget it."

Lesson learned for all: Don't send till you check where your finger clicks.

I recently retired; my wife and I are settling into our new life, fortunate to have over $4 million invested plus other retirement benefits. We've not boasted about it, but people in the family know we're well off.

We accumulated our money by studying hard to get useful degrees, working hard at our jobs, and living below our means for our entire married life. We now want to enjoy what we've earned and leave the remainder to our children.

We do NOT want to give a cousin start-up funds for a harebrained project, pay off others' mortgages, or be back-up if our under-employed niece, 40, lacking medical insurance, gets a serious illness.

What can we tell relatives who drop overly broad hints about their financial woes?

Annoyed

Ignore them, until it doesn't work anymore. Then inject a dead-end to the conversation. Example: "It's a shame he/she hasn't put in the effort we did to secure the future. But there's still time ...."

Be prepared that some relatives will find you hard-hearted, and may even bad-mouth you. But you've earned the right to do as you please with your own hard-earned savings.

I'm 21, and with a great guy for the past 11 months. However, I've always had feelings for one of my best guy friends and am unsure of whom to pick.

My roommates don't think I should be with either guy and want me to be single, but one is unhappily single and the other is in an unhealthy relationship.

I love my roommates and our household, but we all have addictive personalities - all battling an embarrassing marijuana addiction for years and have tried to quit many times. Also, all gaining weight from smoking weed, then eating junk food.

We each got a gym membership, but don't go as often as we should. I feel stuck in a rut and would like to make some positive changes, but it's harder when not everyone is up for making that decision.

Confused

Forget choosing between guys and focus on the addiction and getting fit plus healthy. You're WAY too influenced by your roomies, and that's interfering with all your choices. You may even have to consider moving out, if staying there keeps dragging you down.

Once you assert some independent thinking and feel better about yourself, you'll know whether your current guy is right for you or has just been okay for you while you're this weed-addicted, insecure, group-clinging person.

FEEDBACK Regarding the teenager who stated she's a pathological liar (October 29):

Reader - "Lying leads to lack of trust, which is probably an important factor in her inability to maintain relationships.

"Excessive lying is a common symptom of several disorders. She may not be a pathological liar, per se, since pathological liars lie for no particular reason, whereas she lies to get attention and sympathy, which would be more consistent with borderline personality disorder. People with BPD are at elevated risk of depression and anxiety.

"There's also a strong association between BPD and insecure attachment style, which is consistent with her fear of abandonment."

Many readers are kind and caring enough to try and determine the underlying conditions/disorders that cause the feelings people write to me about. I periodically include feedbacks such as this in case it sparks a health check, or recognition by anyone out there who's dealing with similar symptoms.