"Summers with Jim have been a dream; I feel free, funny, and in love with everything. But when school starts, I throw myself into teaching and our relationship takes a 180-degree turn. I do love him and want it to work between us for a long time, but why do I stop loving him every Fall?"

I have to admit I smiled when I read your letter. Doing laundry can often bring out the best or the worst in most of us depending on our elemental personality. Earth people usually enjoy doing laundry because it allows them to focus on improving something about their home (clean clothes are a definite improvement!). Wood personalities usually find it a chore that has to be done to get on to something else (“the only way out is through”). Fire and Water people usually end up doing laundry only when they run out of clean clothes because they’ve either been busy with friends (Fires) or lost in a book or creative project (Waters). And Metal people usually do laundry regularly on a specific day and time and take special care in how that laundry is done. That’s because Metal people believe there is a right way to do everything. And I think this is the root of your laundry woes, but it is definitely fixable!

For years, this blog has used the Five Elements model from Chinese medicine to discuss the five basic elemental personalities. We've covered issues like strengths and weaknesses of each, as well as understanding how they relate to each other. At times, we’ve even dipped into how they relate to themselves. One issue we've never covered is what happens to an elemental personality when some form of mental illness is present. Recent events suggest this might be a good time to cover this topic, especially as it relates to the primary Wood personality.

“I am writing about my father; we’ll call him Greg. He’s is a great father, just not very warm and fuzzy. He’s been in business, specifically marketing, for most of his career, and changed jobs two years ago to head up a national marketing and sales force. He’s had three administrative assistants during those two years. The third quit last week and now he’s complaining that he can’t find good help. Is there anything I can say to him that will help him find and keep a good administrative assistant?”

“I’m having a difficult time with one of my best friends. Gail and I have been very close for several years now, ever since we met working at our community garden. She is usually a caring and thoughtful person and we have a lot in common, especially our love of gardening and our children. My husband and I welcomed our first grandchild a year ago. While Gail was initially enthused about Robby, for the past six months she’s seemed really uninterested. It’s gotten to where I can’t be myself around her and it’s ruining our friendship. What can I do?”

Dear Vicki: My mother has always been a strong and loving woman. She is a nurse who managed (and still does) a multi-physician office while my two brothers and I were growing up, but she still had time to bake cookies and help with science projects. When her father died and living alone was too hard on Grammy, Mom moved her in with us. The problem now is that I recently received an amazing offer to teach at a nursing college out of state.