Dear Richard,

I’ve been with my girlfriend for a few months now and it’s going really well, but I am getting more and more irritated by her insistence that no aspect of our life goes undocumented. Travel, meals out, drinks with friends: it’s all captured on her phone, after due consideration of which of its four camera lenses is right for the shot in question. Then there’s a nightly post-production session, at the end of which edited highlights are posted on social media.

I’ve asked that I don’t feature in too many of the posts, so sometimes she blanks out my face as if I’m some sort of criminal. But it’s not really that I mind, nor the pervasive sense that the version of our life that gets posted is a bit fake, so much as the sheer inconvenience of it all. Anything fun we do we have to do twice or in a stop-start way, and her editing sessions cut into time when I wish we could be more properly together.

Can I stem the tide of content and get back to just living our lives, or do I have to get used to it if I’m in it for the long haul?

– T

Dear T,

How absolutely awful. I’m surprised you’ve stuck with it for this long.

Your girlfriend’s behaviour reminds me of a story I was recently told by a friend. She’d been in the arrivals hall at Heathrow and got chatting to a father who was waiting to greet his 20-something daughter from her flight. He hadn’t seen her for months. Eventually she appeared out of the customs exit and he waved excitedly at her. “Darling! Over here!”

She saw him, nodded and held up one finger. Delving into her shoulder bag, she produced her iPhone, switched on the video, held it above and slightly behind her, filming herself slowly walking, crabwise, towards the long-awaited reunion. In other words, the moment wasn’t real to her unless she recorded it on a selfie.

Of course, those were blood ties. Yours aren’t. My advice? Unless your girlfriend agrees to join you in the real world and step away from the virtual one, I’d hit the delete button on the relationship. Find someone who’s happy to live with you in the here and now, not the obsessively edited past.

‘Our daughter wants us to get rid of our dog because her child is allergic to it’Dear Richard,

Our young granddaughter is allergic to our dog – it’s not life-threatening, but it was clearly a bit unpleasant for her on her first couple of visits. But she has some antihistamines and we’re pretty scrupulous about hoovering, so it’s manageable, and she has a loving relationship with the dog. So we thought, anyway.

Our daughter has let it be known that her 10-year-old daughter is now officially reluctant to visit because of the dog. She (our daughter) has even suggested we get a new and less allergenic one, to which we politely said it’s not like trading in a used car. The dog is getting on in years – ironically we got her to ease our melancholy at the emptiness of our nest – and if we’re still up to the task when the time comes, we’ll definitely take this issue into consideration when we get another one.

But all wishful thinking about the dog’s longevity aside, that’s likely to be too late for our daughter to enjoy a pet in childhood (animals are prohibited in her London flat). Our daughter, much as we love her, has a bit of a track record of making decisions based on her convenience and attributing them to other people’s vulnerabilities, so if our granddaughter is indeed reluctant to see us because of the dog, or for any reason, we’d rather hear it straight from the horse’s mouth. And if we have to make compromises with the dog to see her, then so be it (though it would be a hassle getting someone else to look after the dog). But we don’t want our daughter to feel undermined. What’s your take on this?

– G&W

Dear G&W,

Oh dear. You’re not going to like this. Neither, I fear, will some of my readers. But as the saying goes: you did ask!

Basically, I believe that people are more important than dogs. I say that as a dog-lover. I don’t happen to own one, but I am extremely fond of the creatures and completely understand how they can wind their way around the human heart. When my parents sold our rough collie, Prince, because he was fundamentally untrainable (I think he was mad, to be honest), I was inconsolable for a year.

But. Surely your granddaughter is more important to you than your dog? If it were me and it came down to a straight choice, I’d find a good home for my pet so I could spend time with my granddaughter. And take advice on what breeds (if any) might be less likely to provoke an allergic reaction. But I certainly wouldn’t quiz her directly about the matter. You seem to be virtually inviting her to call her mother a liar. Don’t go there.

Of course, it’s your decision. But I can only tell you what I’d do. And what I wouldn’t.