You're listening to Life Kit from NPR.

Hey, it's Mariel.

I'm going to start by saying life is messy.

Relationships are messy.

And try as we might, we are not always going to live in perfect harmony with the people in our lives.

And there's been culturally,

I think, a knee-jerk reaction that says, if they do something and you don't like it, cut them off.

You don't need them. Lose their number. When someone is hurting you maliciously, intentionally,

yeah, that's probably the right decision. But these situations so often exist

in shades of gray. Casey Davis is a licensed professional therapist, and she gave me some examples.

It could be someone going, okay, I'm married to someone who I don't feel like is emotionally

available to me. And I feel like we've been having the same

conversation for 10 years. And they continue to, you know, not show up for me in ways that I think

are really vital to this relationship and to my health. It could be someone that says, I have

a strained relationship with my father. but he has recently gotten some health problems

and needs someone to take care of him. And, you know, am I obligated to do that? Should I do that?

Casey is the author of a book called Who Deserves Your Love? And in it, she gives a list of questions

that she as a clinician will ask clients when someone they care

about is behaving in a way that's bothering them. And so I think that that's what this book is really

about, is helping you, not necessarily giving you the answers, but giving you the right questions.

Because when you ask yourself the right questions, you can start to parse out what bothers

you about their behavior, whether change is possible, and what some solutions might look like.

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