Dear Bel,

Thirty-odd years ago I found myself alone, having had a divorce and a major bereavement. I was living next door to a woman who was also newly divorced and trying to come to terms with trauma in her life. We became close friends and over the next eight dark years we supported each other with humour, shared pleasures and our developing sense of spirituality.

T was a very attractive woman with a rare quality about her which made it a privilege to know her. She loved “treats” and had plenty of boyfriends, usually wealthy, who pampered her a good deal. These relationships always started well, but once the boyfriends became aware of her need they would abandon her and go on to settle down with someone else.

When I remarried about 20 years ago we saw less of each other. Now T still lives alone and has sunk into depression – a condition to which she was always prone, but which could in the past be relieved by a “treat” of some sort. She begs me to come and see her, and I do, although visits are an ordeal. No suggestion that I make to alleviate her loneliness or lack of purpose is acceptable; nothing is possible. She says that she is in too much physical pain to go anywhere, and that since she has had every test or scan there is, and nothing can be found, her doctor supplies her with more and more medication. She will not change her doctor because this one puts no limits on the amount she can have. She admits that she sleeps most of the time, cannot remember anything, cannot watch TV or read because her concentration span is so limited, and doesn’t even remember whether she has eaten or not. When I am with her there are occasionally sparks of the old T, but mostly I come away depressed, defeated and guilty. Guilty because my marriage is wonderfully happy and because I do not wish to be dragged back into this sludgy pool of misery.

She says that as she is now 70 she has no wish “to go on like this”. I could probably help her if I was willing to see her more often, but deep down I don’t want to. I feel that like all those boyfriends I too have abandoned her – for my happy life with my husband. She has family across the other side of the world who know very little about her condition. I would like to know how to help her and how to deal with my own feelings of disloyalty and guilt.

Anne

With no longing to be better than we are, would we be truly human? I often look at the shelves of self-help books offering “Ten Things You Must Do to Succeed in Love and Life” and reflect that, although there is often good advice there, the basic premise is wrong – deceiving by offering formulae when real life is much messier. Wanting to be good people, we know our flaws. Maybe we have to accept that we will fall short of our longings, and the key to a “successful” (what does that really mean?) life is to find ways to live with that reality and turn it to good. It involves bowing to the struggle yet not giving up because of failure. I always used to tell my teenage children to expect this or that bad thing to happen because then it wouldn’t surprise you when it emerged from the dark to bite. Expect the worst, and then you can embrace joy without being lulled. Expect to be less of a good person than you dreamed of being, to release yourself from false ideals and engage with the reality of the normally good (meaning fallible yet striving) person you are.

You need to sort out your own guilt to be capable of doing what you can to improve T’s condition. It’s clear to me that you have been a good friend to her. For many people the marriage and moving away would have meant an end to the friendship, no matter what closeness had existed before. This isn’t always reprehensible; the truth is that we do grow as much from the leaving behind of people as much as from the making of new friends. You simply cannot “keep” all those you have ever known, even though you might have shared good times, confided secrets, even wept together. Like our loves, our friendships are vulnerable, as much a prey to time as our skin. That you have kept in touch with T and still visit her says much about you. You remember how wonderful she was, and what you shared.

Do you think yourself a bad person because you hate visiting her? There isn’t a person reading this who will not sympathise – those who dread the atmosphere in their elderly parents’ house, or know with what self-absorbed whingeing their oldest friend will greet them, or bite their tongues when the ailing sister or brother comes out with the same carping that tormented them as children. “Walk away!” comes the cry from those less afflicted by obligations of piety. That’s fine for them, but the rest of us feel that we must do what feels right, even if we do it in bad faith – not wanting to. Without such private systems of obligation the world would surely fall apart, for we would turn our backs on those less blessed, not wanting our happiness to be tainted by their sorrow.

So, knowing it is a part of your nature to go on making these difficult visits, you need first to stop feeling guilty about not wanting to. You could even see it as the “price” you pay for your great fortune in meeting your husband. T was your support at your lowest ebb; now you have him to support you in your efforts to help her. You were lucky; she wasn’t – but I think you should regard your happy marriage as the means that enables you to go on being kind to T, rather than that which could stop you. Love can make us selfish; it can also put us permanently in tune with the oscillations of the human spirit – including those cries for help.

I use the phrase “being kind to” because there is now none of that mutuality which makes a friendship a real, growing delight. No – you are displaying charity and mercy for the sake of the past, and need to work out how you can go on doing so, without beating yourself up as you are doing now. I hope I’ve encouraged you to cease feeling guilty; now you need to tackle those feelings of defeat. You are the kind of person who likes to feel that she can make a difference, so it must be very frustrating to have any attempts at help met with a wall of negativity. T is lonely, depressed and (evidently) addicted to medication. Only a saint or a fool could avoid feeling defeated in the face of such problems.

It could be argued that for a person in her situation to be knocked out by medication does no harm, blunting the pain of living; moreover, that she would be within her “rights” to seek death by swallowing a pile of pills. However, my instinct is to dismiss such counsels of despair. Does she live at a distance from you? This will obviously affect your visits. I am wondering if you have ever demanded that a home visit by the doctor is arranged at a time when you are present, so that you can talk to him and see if there is an alternative to all the drugs.

Perhaps you could make this a “condition” of your next visit. What network of practical help is available to her? I somehow doubt that she is Church of England, but does she live in a parish where the vicar and/or others might be helpful? I’m sure you have thought of such things, but you could still make this your “project”. Can you locate people near her who might talk to her: a counsellor, a Buddhist, a priest, even a “hedge witch”?

I say that because when you were close friends your spirituality was important to you both, and so I wonder what has happened to this in her case, and whether it might offer the possibility of a door into the light. At 70 she could have another 20 years of life ahead of her: a curse or a blessing depending on the condition of her soul. You say you still see flashes of “the old T”; therefore you know that she still exists within that suffering body. You won’t turn your back, but could help yourself by trying to find one or two others who will hold out a hand. The miracle is: they exist around every corner.

DO YOU NEED ADVICE?

Do you need advice about your relationships? E-mail your problems to: bel.mooney@thetimes.co.uk or write to her at: times2, 1 Pennington Street, London E98 1TT. Details such as your age are helpful. Please include your real name, but we will use your chosen pseudonym if you wish. Bel Mooney reads all letters but cannot enter into personal correspondence

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