Father has a legal obligation to support his child

Dear Annie: I’m a 40-year-old woman. Four years ago, I met “Tom” online in a game room and he swept me off my feet. I knew he was married but didn’t care. He lived 100 miles away and we would meet whenever we could.

The last time we were intimate, I got pregnant. I never planned on telling him about the baby, but when my daughter was born prematurely, I thought she might die. I felt guilty that her father would never know her, so I e-mailed Tom to say he was the father of a little girl. He was not happy about it.

I suggested he give up his parental rights so he could go on with his life, but he never answered me. I e-mailed again to ask about his medical history, and this time he became angry.

I know I got myself in this mess, but was I wrong to want this information? Doesn’t he have an obligation to give me that? After all, it took two of us to make a baby, and he is the one who is going to be missing out on his beautiful daughter’s life. How do I get him to cooperate? Messed Up in Illinois

Dear Messed Up: Tom has more than a moral obligation to give you family medical information. He is legally obligated to support his daughter financially. Don’t be so nice about this that you let Tom avoid responsibility for the life he helped create. Talk to a lawyer so you and your daughter are protected.

Dear Annie: I am the director of nursing for a short-term rehab and long-term care facility. Thanks to the DEA rules and regulations each month, I, along with a pharmacist and a couple of my unit managers, flush tens of thousands of anabolic steroids and narcotic medications (such as morphine, Valium, fentanyl patches and Dilaudid) down the drain. Why? Because the law says we can’t dispense them to the patient at the time of discharge or return them to the pharmacy for repackaging. Medicare pays for the majority of these medications. We send the patient home with written prescriptions instead.

With 12 other facilities within a 25-mile radius, you do the math. Even worse, what is this doing to our environment? Where do these drugs end up? The public should know about this horrible waste. R.N.

Dear R.N.: Recent studies have found traces of painkillers, estrogen, antidepressants, blood-pressure medicines and other pharmaceuticals in water samples from 30 states. The medications you cite are classified as controlled substances and cannot be legally donated or dispensed. However, the DEA recently issued updated guidelines and no longer recommends flushing them down the toilet, except where the labeling says to do so. Instead, it encourages bringing unwanted medications to community take-back collections.

Readers who want to get rid of other unused medications also should not flush them. They should be ground up or dissolved in a small amount of water or alcohol, and mixed with coffee grounds or kitty litter, then put in a small sealable plastic bag and hidden in the trash. Readers can also check with their pharmacy for drug recycling or community take-back programs where medications can be collected. Some unexpired medications can be donated to third-world countries or given to animal hospitals.

Dear Annie: I, too, have severe rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis, like “Frustrated in Elgin, Ore.,” whose husband is debilitated by these conditions. In order to have moderate movement, I was consuming an unusual amount of ibuprofen, especially when officiating basketball.

Several weeks ago, a friend recommended putting a couple of tablespoons of concentrated cherry juice in my water once a day. Since then, I have not taken even one ibuprofen, my joints and muscles move easily, and I feel wonderful. Omaha, Neb.

Dear Omaha: Thanks for the suggestion. As with any other home remedy, before trying this, check with your physician.

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