Minnie Mouth

I contributed to the ruin of my marriage with my big mouth, constantly sharing our intimate details with my girlfriends. Well, my wonderful new boyfriend is a pretty private person and has asked that I not share this stuff with my chick circle, and I've agreed. However, my friends have gotten used to living vicariously through my drama, and they aren't liking my new tight-lipped approach. They even seem resentful, like I don't trust them anymore.

--New Boundaries

Him: "I think I have psoriasis on my penis." You, picking up your phone to text: "Ohh...that's terr--...can you spell that for me?" Yes, I've heard -- privacy is supposedly dead (buried in a shallow grave with a dial-up modem somewhere in Jersey). And yes, many people treat it that way. However, though the private details of our lives -- our thoughts, emotions, and closed-door doings -- aren't things you can hold (like your "Hooked on Phonics" coffee mug), they are our possessions just like the physical objects we own. In an 1890 Harvard Law Review article, Louis Brandeis and Samuel Warren explain that privacy is a natural human right that comes out of our right to be left alone. Basically, unless you're a public figure or you've done some bad thing that affects the public, the information about your life belongs to you. Gently inform your girl posse that the info cookie jar is now closed. Explain that this has nothing to do with them and everything to do with your boyfriend's right to pick the privacy settings on his life. And no, the fact that you and he are in situations together doesn't change that. He's agreed to share his life with you, not your friends, your Twitter followers, and three cranky federal agents in the "Heating and Cooling" van outside his house.