DR. WALLACE: I did something that I am terribly ashamed of and I don't know how to rid myself of the guilt feeling.

Our family had a reunion last week at a local park. A lot of people showed up, some coming from neighboring states. During the festivities, I found a wallet on the field after the family played softball. When I opened it I found $46 and a bunch of credit cards. I took the money and tossed the wallet and everything in it into a nearby pond. I never even looked at the identification to see whose wallet it was. I guess I was hoping it wasn't a family member.

Two hours after I tossed the wallet into the water, my uncle announced that he had lost his wallet that contained money, driver's license, credit cards and other important papers and pictures and asked everybody to help him find it. We all spent an hour looking for the wallet but, of course, it wasn't found.

I have never felt worse in my entire life because, when my uncle realized that he was not going to find his wallet he almost cried.

The next day I told my boyfriend what had happened and I showed him where I tossed the wallet. He volunteered to wade in and try to find it and my prayers were answered. He found it.

I returned the money to the wallet and mailed it to my uncle, who lives in Alabama, and said in a note that the wallet was found and was sent intact. I didn't sign it.

I feel relieved, but I still have guilt. Would it do any good for me to admit to my family that I found the wallet and threw it into the lake after taking the money and then had my boyfriend find it? Please answer soon! — Nameless, Houston, Tex.

NAMELESS: The best way to get rid of your lingering guilt is to look at this episode as a once-in-a-lifetime learning experience. You used extremely poor judgment but instead of simply getting away with it you were forced to see firsthand the consequences of your action: the distress of your uncle over his lost, and perhaps irreplaceable, valuables.

I can understand why you put on a charade after "looking" along with the rest of your relatives when the wallet was reported missing. The humiliation of public exposure as a thief would have been overwhelming. But I am happy you didn't continue the charade afterward, and that you had someone to confide in who was able to help you out. Your boyfriend is the unsung hero of this fiasco.

Instead of continuing to feel guilty, be thankful - not merely that the wallet was found, but that you learned what morality is all about. When you take what isn't yours, you can wound another person deeply. Most thieves see only their own trivial gain, not their victim's devastating loss.

You saw the truth and your uncle has his wallet back. (I hope his photos and papers weren't hopelessly waterlogged.) That's enough for now. You don't have to confess a wrong that's been righted, but you are obligated to learn from this experience. A prayer to the Almighty asking for forgiveness will put your mind at ease.

Dr. Robert Wallace welcomes questions from readers. Although he is unable to reply to all of them individually, he will answer as many as possible in this column. Email him at rwallace@thegreatestgift.com. To find out more about Dr. Robert Wallace and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.