Dear Abby: Is the one-year rule a real thing when it comes to dating?

DEAR ABBY I lost my wife of years four months ago after a prolonged illness Related Articles Dear Abby They say I ruined their mother s funeral video Dear Abby My wife says I have no right to be mad about the trash development Dear Abby My granddaughter kept saying I should let her talk so I stopped speaking to her Dear Abby They changed the dates of our big trip and didn t tell me about it Dear Abby My husband texted his ex and talked to a divorce lawyer Should I be concerned I retired at and became her primary caretaker The job of caretaker is endless and stressful and yet rewarding A female friend of plenty of years Dinah came to the memorial I grieved attended Grief Share and read articles about grief I experience grief every day and will for my whole life In recent times Dinah and I began spending time together including worship For clarification we have never been intimate and won t be until our wedding night if that ever happens The difficulty is how my late wife s family have reacted They are becoming more and more distant I don t feel I m doing anything wrong Others have noted You should wait for at least a year My financial planner and I spoke about not making any major financial decisions for a while but what is this one year thing READY IN TENNESSEE DEAR READY The one year thing is the same as the suggestion your financial planner offered The reasoning is that after losing a spouse the widower is often emotionally vulnerable Out of loneliness chosen have made hasty decisions in their romantic lives that they later regret While it isn t wrong that you are dating your former in-laws may be upset that you started so soon after your wife s death and regard it as disrespectful to her memory What they may not have taken into account is that your grieving started while you were taking care of your wife rather than after her death DEAR ABBY My brother has been married for years to Gayle who has alienated herself and their family from everyone including her own siblings his siblings and the rest of our family as well She limits when where and with whom my brother can spend time Gayle nearly invariably has a nasty comment or barb and picks someone to fight with at every family gathering Rather than deal with this my family and my other siblings families have distanced ourselves which is especially sad because my brother and Gayle have college-aged children with whom we enjoy spending time Abby something happened in recent months that makes me wonder if it s time for someone to intervene My brother has an increasing number of false memories about things that never happened in his life particularly ones in which he has supposedly been grievously wronged by me Please share specific advice MISSING MY BROTHER IN NEW ENGLAND Related Articles Asking Eric My son begged us not to bring up our grievance to his touchy in-laws Dear Abby They say I ruined their mother s funeral video Asking Eric Should I give up my girlfriend for a coworker I might not even like Harriette Cole Seeing my friend at her new job made me feel bad Miss Manners Can I put a sign in my bathroom for one particular guest DEAR MISSING The topic of false memories is not one about which I am knowledgeable enough to comment I do however know they happen sometimes as people age Your brother may be experiencing characteristics of dementia and should be examined physically and neurologically by his expert Discuss this with the rest of your siblings in the hope that if all of you suggest this to your brother s wife and adult children it may get through to her But don t count on it if she has worked during their entire marriage to isolate him from all of you Dear Abby is written by Abigail Van Buren also known as Jeanne Phillips and was founded by her mother Pauline Phillips Contact Dear Abby at www DearAbby com or P O Box Los Angeles CA