Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. Have a question for Care and Feeding? Submit it here.

Dear Care and Feeding,

A few weeks ago, my wife “Stella” and I left our 3-year-old son “Alex” with my parents for a few days while we went out of town on business. We have left him with my mom and dad on prior occasions and everything went fine. This time, however, my dad did something that enraged my wife. When we came to pick Alex up, the first thing we saw was that his previously shoulder-length hair was gone: He had a buzz cut.

Stella demanded to know why they’d cut his hair without our permission. My dad told her that they had been at the park when some kids asked Alex if he was a boy or a girl, and it upset him. He said that afterward, he asked Alex if he would like to have his hair cut so people wouldn’t mistake him for a girl anymore, and that Alex said yes. So they went to the barber shop my dad uses and had it cut. My wife lambasted him and my mother, loaded Alex into the car, and made us leave immediately.

Nearly a month later, Stella is still outraged over Alex’s new look and is now saying she wants to cut my parents out of our lives for “traumatizing” our son. I’ve talked to Alex about his hair and he doesn’t seem “traumatized” in the least. He says he’s happy that his hair no longer gets in his face and that he doesn’t have to sit still to have it combed out all the time. He truly is fine with it. And it’s not as if my dad decided on his own to have our son’s hair cut without giving him a choice. He asked if he wanted to get it cut, and then he went along with what the kid wanted. I’ve tried to explain this to my wife, but she has no interest in hearing it. Alex has a great relationship with my parents and I’m not willing to blow that up over something so stupid. How can this be resolved when my wife is being so unreasonable?

—Hairy Situation

Dear Hairy,

If you want your parents to remain in your child’s—and your—life, I’d start by knocking off the explaining/defending of your father’s actions. He was wrong. Getting a 3-year-old’s long hair cut off while his parents are away is an act of hostility, even if the child agrees to it when his beloved grandfather suggests it. And yes, even if the 3-year-old says he’s happy now with his buzzcut. The problem is not the hair; it’s the decision-making by a grandparent that undercuts a decision made by a parent. I don’t blame your wife for being furious, and I am 99 percent sure your father knew exactly what he was doing. Your defending him is making matters worse.

If you’d recognized the real reason Stella is so angry and stood up for her instead of minimizing her feelings, I would imagine that, a month later, things would not have escalated to this point. While I don’t believe cutting off contact with Alex’s grandparents is a punishment that fits the hair-cutting crime, I’m not surprised that Stella has reached this conclusion. Your insistence that it was no big deal, your inability or refusal to see this from her point of view, even your enlisting of your child to prove your point—that this is all something “so stupid”—is, I’d wager to say, what angers her more than the inciting incident. Tell your dad he was out of line. Tell Stella you know he was out of line. Apologize profusely to her for being such a jerk about it. And then be patient. This too shall pass.

Dear Care and Feeding,

I’m a 34-year-old man who lost my job during the pandemic. My parents offered me the chance to move back in with them and I accepted. I have been living with them ever since, as rent in our city is high and housing is scarce; I am now working again as well as doing postgraduate studies. I’m very grateful to them for allowing me to live with them, and deeply appreciate their generosity. However, if I work long hours, they make comments about how unhealthy it is for me to be working so much. If I set out for a whole weekend day—say, to the gym and then to meet a friend for dinner and a movie—they act shocked. I have an overseas trip coming up at the end of the year, and they refuse to acknowledge it or talk about it when I bring it up. It seems pretty clear they don’t want me to leave home, not even for a day, which I can empathize with—to a degree.

They have a nice home and I enjoy spending time with them in it, but I’m a young person with an active work/social life and it doesn’t make sense for me to spend all my time at home with them. If I dig deep into my emotions around this, I feel hurt that they don’t seem to want me to have a fun, active, adventurous life. Obviously, I am not going to hold myself back on their (or anyone else’s) account, but is there a way for me to better manage their feelings here? They’ve been good parents to me, and they are good people, but their possessiveness makes me uncomfortable.

—A Good Son?

Dear Son,

Have you and your parents ever talked about what was expected of you in return for their housing you for all these years (with no end in sight, it seems)? What do you give them in return for their generosity? The pleasure of your company, yes—I get it—and they may well have felt at the start that this was more than sufficient compensation, especially during the worst of the pandemic. It’s possible they were thrilled to have you move back in with them; I imagine that for years before that, you were going about your own life as adults do, and perhaps not seeing them as much as they would have liked.

But it’s now been at least four—maybe coming up on five?—years since you moved in with them, and they’re not getting as much of that compensation as they used to. I can only assume that this is what you mean when you say that you can empathize with their feelings “to a degree,” but you seem to want to have it both ways: to continue to be housed by them, enjoying their nice home and their company when you choose to, but to have no responsibility to them. It’s not “managing their feelings” you should be concerned with; it’s making a decision. I believe you have two choices: Move out, even if that means living in a smaller place than you’d like—or with roommates (who will not expect you to devote yourself to them)—and spending a good chunk of your earnings on rent like so many people do, or, if you can’t bear that thought, sitting down with your parent-landlords and having a frank, open conversation about the situation you’ve all put yourselves in. Let them speak freely about what they wish from you (and be prepared for the consequences of that, which may include your realizing that this living arrangement is not sustainable), and tell them what you wish from them beyond free room and board. You’re not that young a person—your characterization of yourself to the contrary—and if you do mean to continue this arrangement indefinitely, the three of you need to work out the ground rules together. A countless number of vexing problems within relationships could be solved by honest communication. Give it a try.

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Dear Care and Feeding,

I don’t know whether I’m asking for advice or just solidarity. My 2-year-old is just … kind of a butthead. Nothing seems to make him happy lately. I’ve heard about terrible twos but wow is this frustrating. Here is a real conversation we’ve had:

Me: Morning!
Him: No! No Mommy! Want Daddy!
Me: OK, let’s go see Daddy.
Him: NO GO SEE DADDY.

Recently, some friends of ours were in from out of town and wanted to treat us to the local science museum. It was a special day at the museum (there’d be puppies!). But everything was no, all day long. No touch tunnel! No animals! No lights! No play! No puppies! (Who doesn’t like puppies?) Is this normal? Will he ever become fun to be around again? If so, when? I’m not sure I can take it anymore.

—Terrible Two

Dear Terrible,

He was fun before. He’ll be fun again. (And then he won’t be fun, and then he will, and so on and so forth.) Kids go through stages—they’re supposed to. Some of them are rough on their parents.

The so-called terrible twos represent an essential developmental stage. Your former baby is figuring out that he he’s his own person, not an extension of you. He can say no! It’s a revelation! He’s going to say no, experimentally, to everything, just to try out this new power (the little power he has). He’s going to say no for no good reason; he’s going to say no when he wants to say yes. He doesn’t know this, of course.

He is at least as confused and frustrated by this as you are. He’s changing. Change is hard (for small children and their parents). Just hang on, stay as calm as you can, be as matter-of-fact as you can, shower him with love (even if he doesn’t seem all that lovable to you right now), and try hard to keep in mind that as maddening as this is, there is a method to that madness: It will get him to the other side. I can’t promise precisely when, only that it’ll happen. Eventually, he’ll shed his baby self for good and emerge as a little person in his own right, with his own ideas, opinions, and preferences. That’s fun. And it’s just around the corner.

—Michelle

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I am not a parent, but this advice column was recommended to me by a friend who’s a mom. I’m 34 years old and found out I was pregnant a few days ago. I absolutely do NOT want to have kids, ever. I’ve been using birth control pills, but I know they’re not always 100 percent. When I saw the test, my husband and I both immediately knew I needed to schedule an abortion (luckily, I live in a state where reproductive healthcare is very easy to access). I have the procedure scheduled in a week. Here’s the problem: My mother has a pattern of violating boundaries.