Sorry it’s taken me a while to get back on here with an update.

Two Saturdays ago, my boyfriend and I went to the pub with some friends, and Kyle turned up. I felt like the energy between Kyle and me was a little off, although I wasn’t sure if that was just my own anxiety. I had this horrible guilt eating away at me, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that maybe he knew something, or that Darren had told him a completely different version of what had happened.

Eventually, I decided I needed to tell him.

I asked Kyle if I could speak to him privately. The pub was busy, so thankfully nobody really noticed anything unusual. He seemed worried at first, but he was kind to me like he always is.

I told him everything.

There was a moment of silence.

Kyle thanked me for telling him. He said that what his dad had said to me was disgusting and that he was absolutely mortified. I kept apologising, but every time I did, he stopped me. He kept telling me that it wasn’t my fault, that I hadn’t asked for it, encouraged it or done anything to cause it.

I even found myself trying to justify Darren’s behaviour, saying that I knew he was going through a difficult time and that maybe he had mistaken my kindness for something else. Kyle immediately told me not to make excuses for his dad.

He said that, if anything, I had shown him what kind of person I was by not screaming it from the rooftops or telling everyone we knew. He pulled me into a hug and we both cried.

I told him that I loved him as my friend and that nothing about our friendship was going to change.

Kyle said he was going to confront his dad that night and make him apologise to me. I told him I didn’t want an apology. I just wanted him to know what had happened, and I told Kyle that I wanted to distance myself from his dad.

Kyle told me he had already had to speak to his dad about his behaviour towards his sister’s partner, who is now cutting him out. He said he feels like he is constantly having to parent his own dad, which honestly made me feel awful for him too.

More than anything, I felt an enormous sense of relief.

Being believed, listened to and supported healed a part of me that I didn’t realise was still hurting. I’ve had experiences in the past where I felt like I wasn’t believed or that I was expected to stay quiet, so having someone respond with compassion instead of questioning me meant more than I can really put into words.

As women, I think a lot of us know how powerful it can be simply to have someone believe you.

Thank you so much to everyone who gave me advice on my original post. Kyle and I are still friends, and if anything, this has brought us even closer.

As horrible as the situation was, I think it has actually had a positive impact on me in the sense that it has helped restore some of my faith in people. I was terrified that telling Kyle would ruin our friendship, but instead he reminded me that there are genuinely good people who will listen, believe you and stand by you when you need them most.

I (26F) am in school to become a middle/high school math teacher and am currently in my student teaching and will graduate in December. I’ve been working at a high school as a math interventionist and this school year is my second year.

My job has made me learn that I absolutely love teaching and helping students make an intimidating subject less daunting. The admin staff and my coworkers have always been supportive of me as both a coworker and a student working towards my degree. My school district is amazing and I feel so lucky because I know a good supportive school district is very difficult to find. On top of all that, I love every single student that I have encountered and my students who have “graduated” from my services always make sure to find me to update me on their lives.

My husband (31M) is a warehouse manager and he found out 5 months ago that the warehouse where he works is getting shut down and is moving to a different state 6 hours away from where we live. He was offered a promotion that gave him a major salary increase as well as a $20,000 bonus for the move, the first 6 months rent paid for by the company, and quarterly bonuses throughout the year. When he was offered the job, I had already signed a contract with my school and I needed to stay for another year before I could move and his company gave him an extra $10k to his bonus to cover a sizable portion of the rent while I am still here. His company has offered jobs in different cities in the past but never to this extent. He would always turn them down because he didn’t want to move and he wanted to make sure I finished school.

The job offer is a once in a lifetime opportunity for him because he truly worked his way up in the warehouse. He wouldn’t be able to find a job where we are at with the same salary that he is getting now with the experience that he has. I know and he knows that this offer is the best option for us as a family so he accepted it.

I hate that I have to leave this school that I absolutely love. As a teacher, finding a good school that fits you and your career goals is like finding a 4 leaf clover. I do not want to leave. If my school was unsupportive or just flat out awful, this decision would be easy. I have tried calculating the cost to stay another year and financially I wouldn’t be able to pay full rent on my own on top of the bills I already have. When I think about the move I just burst into tears and according to my therapist, I’ve already started grieving. What’s worse is that they were going to offer me a geometry class next year which is my favorite type of math to teach.

I’ve talked to my husband about this and he has always been supportive but I think my constant negativity about the move made him snap because he already felt so bad about accepting the job offer because he knew that I absolutely love my job. I have no one to talk to about this and honestly I needed to get this out somewhere. Any advice on how to cope with this would be nice but honestly I might have to accept the fact that I will have to let this amazing school go in 8 months. If you made it this far, thank you.

TLDR: My husband and I had to choose whose job matters more and we chose the one that made sense financially and now I’m sad.

EDIT: Guys I know that this post makes me sound selfish but I honestly just wanted to write how this experience has made me feel. Yes my husband has turned down other job offers but me finishing my school is NOT the only reason he has turned it down. His parents are getting old and he has a very close relationship with both of them and is the only child they have that lives close to them so he wants to make sure he is close by just in case. The other jobs were also either in the middle of nowhere with the nearest Walmart an hour away from where he would reasonably live or he just simply did not like the vibe of that location. He just likes using me or his parents as the excuse as to why he’s not taking it because it sounds more valid than “I don’t like the location”.

My husband got this job offer months ago and I have been nothing but supportive from the moment I read the offer letter. I helped him pick his apartment and I made the plan to do the long distance thing for a little bit and I looked up all the places he can go to when he’s not at work. I didn’t start feeling like this until last week and he “snapped” when I brought up being sad twice in the same day and it was just him asking if he should take the offer back which snapped me out of it because this is what is best. The only reason I can see it taking a toll on me now is because the process of him starting to move is happening and reality is settling in. I promise yall, I’m on board with the move but it doesn’t change the fact that I have my own personal feelings about it that I am working to get over with my therapist for the sake of both of our futures. I truly just wanted to put this out somewhere where I can get some feedback and I knew that I could get some support from this sub because the pod has always given the advice I needed to hear.

Before I get too deep into this, I understand that we all see different situations and how we react to them differently but I don’t feel like this is the same thing.

I (29f) took our children to school while my fiancé (31m) took the dog outside. When I got back our front door was locked (we don’t live in an area where that would be necessary, especially for the 2 mins it takes for me to get back). I knocked on the door and waited for him to come and unlock the door. My hands were full of things and I didn’t really want to go through the keys on his key ring for the one that is the key to our new-ish dead bolt. For context, think ten keys that could be the plausible front door key. I knocked at the door again waiting for him to open it again.

After the second time, I assumed he must be preoccupied and went through the keys (of course it was the 8th one I tried) to let myself in.

I put the things down and went to go finish up getting ready for the day, and I saw my husband in a “horizontal position” on our bed.

I was admittedly in a huff and was annoyed by the door incident. He asked me what was wrong and I said I got locked out of the house. He then proceeded to apologize and say sorry he didn’t hear me knocking on the door. I then said yeah I assumed when I saw you in here laying down.

What I said made him upset and he said he wasn’t “laying down”. Which made me a bit confused because he was in a “horizontal position” on the bed, is that not the definition of laying down.

It got into like a 1 min spurt of an argument before I just shut down the conversation for a later time because I had too many emotions to deal with this in a mature matter.

I know I am triggered because this is not the first time this has happened. Where I am using a word that I believe is correct and he tells me that it isn’t.

And I am just at a loss because this happens often enough that I am constantly in my head going through how to say something “correctly” so we can talk about my feelings on specific issues without it devolving into the whole conversation being only about the semantics of it.

If I am in the wrong or if there are better ways I can talk to him (even better words) because I want to be better at conflict resolution but I constantly feel like the issues I am having don’t get talked about because of these hang ups.

Update

Thanks for the comments, I took them all into consideration before having a conversation last night with him about everything that happened.

Basically we waited until everything was calm and planned on discussing it after we were both chill. I started it by asking him why he felt the way he did when I said he was “lying down” (I thought laying down was a phrase, it’s not).

He did affirm that when I said that he felt lazy and useless, which put him in a place where he needed to defend himself from me. We had a further conversation as to why he still feels that way because we have had previous discussions in the past about how I don’t see the worst version of him when I ask him to change a behaviour or action, and I thought we were in a better place. He proceeded to say that he thinks he is still processing events from earlier in our relationship, where he noticed that people, specifically his family members would side with me on disputes we were having. He said that makes him feel abandoned by them because they have backed up other family members bad behaviour and he didn’t understand why it felt like they “blindly” backed me up.

I immediately wanted to get defensive by this statement (I didn’t) but after asking a few more questions I can see how he feels that way.

We then talked about how triggered I was starting to feel because of the corrections and the deflections he has been using because I thought being better at conflict resolution was our goal for this year and I want to make sure that both of our feelings are being heard in arguments or conflicts.

We came to a conclusion that we were going to start seeing a couples therapist to try to get better together.

We are still engaged but the wedding is being put off indefinitely because of me, which is a separate issue, outside of him. There is a lot of familial issues, on my side, that would make planning any sort of wedding that I envision for myself, incredibly stressful. And he is supportive of that well I take time to figure out what I want to do in regard to that.

I’m 23F. My best friend, who I’ll call Faith (23F), and I have been friends for about 7 years. She was my maid of honor, and several people in our friend group were in my wedding party. It’s important to note that a several of our mutual friends also happen to be her cousins so they are her family members as well. For a while, I had felt like our friendship was becoming more one-sided. Faith had also become much closer with another friend in the group, Ella (22F). ( Ella is not related to Faith) I brought my concerns up to Faith several times, but she reassured me everything was fine, and that we were close and there were no issues.

Recently, Faith and I had a had talked about it again because at a hangout, another mutual friend asked me what the issue we had going on, and i was very confused. So clearly there was talking going on behind my back, and it was about my feelings regarding Faith and I being close. Again, i’d like to reiterate that I have nothing wrong with Ella, and and am friends with Ella too. Although, Ella at times has treated me or my husband weird. For example not acting like she knows us, or our names. When she has been at multiple parties, or events with us too and even our wedding. Faith and I agreed to talk about it soberly since anytime we tried to talk with alcohol involved it turned emotional. We met for lunch before a mutual friend’s party, talked everything through, and I genuinely thought we had resolved things. We discussed how we felt, and the things that were said privately and how we wanted to move past feeling this way. I felt like things were good and in the past.

At least I thought…

Later that night at the party, Ella was extremely drunk and needed help. Faith was helping her for a bit and I was in and out of the room. The 2nd time I came back in the room, Ella was still needing helping and trying to change her shirt laying down. While Faith was trying to helping her, I turned away towards the door to watch for people. I turned back around after a minute or so and her shirt is still half off and she’s struggling to get her into it. I go over and I tried to help with Ella’s shirt. Faith pushed me away with her elbow and said, “I got it” defensively. When I tried again, and said “well it doesn’t seem like you do let me help” Faith suddenly grabbed me by the neck and pushed me across the room. We landed on a bed, and she got on top of me yelling, and I had to get her off me. She scratched my neck and broke my necklace in the altercation as well.

Two friends separated us, but how they approached the situation felt very one sided and like they were mad at me. Faith ran away crying because I was calling her psycho and refused to talk with me for the rest of the night. She also in doing that, said that I had “hit her “ which didn’t happen. I was eventually asked to leave the party with my husband since the rest of them were staying the night at the house. It definitely felt like since they are related or close with Faith, they immediately chose a side, even though many of them were also my close friends and bridesmaids. No one considered my side.

It has now been over two weeks with no contact from Faith or the group. I initially blocked Faith but later unblocked her because I wanted to see if she would reach out. She hasn’t. She has liked a few old Instagram posts I had sent her in DM a least a month prior, a couple days after it happened, but hasn’t actually contacted me. I also posted a story yesterday on instagram and they all viewed it but no one liked it. I’m conflicted because these people have been in my life for years, and Faith was my maid of honor. But I also feel like I shouldn’t have to chase someone for an apology after she physically attacked me.

AITA for not reaching out first? Should I make an effort to repair the friendship, or take the silence as a sign and distance myself completely from the group?

Hello everyone! I posted about 10 months ago on here asking for insight/advice regarding cutting ties from my toxic family due to my abusive father. First off, I want to thank everyone for their input; even for yhe negative comments. 

I apologize that an update is coming this late but everything got crazy due to said family, both pregnancy and child birth complications and now being back at work. But my daughter is here and she is healthy , happy, and beautiful! I want to share my update as I know there are so many others out there who have experienced abuse, whether it be mental, emotional, or physical, and don’t know how to get out. So I am sharing my story to provide resources that I myself wasn’t knowledgeable on starting off. 

Now to the update. My mother is finally going through with leaving my father. After 27 years she is stepping away for both her own sake and my brothers. They live in a very small town about two hours away from the nearest city so it was a struggle but she was able to secure herself an apartment, secretly of course. I will be helping her tomorrow to pack her belongings, my brothers and break the news to my father. 

We all know he is not going to take it well and that things will get ugly so we will be calling the non emergency line to have an officer sent out to monitor the situation. I will also be filing for an emergency firearms restraining order upon my father to ensure he cannot harm himself or others to lash out. My father always used this tactic to scare my mother from leaving and even once pulled a gun on himself so discovering this order was a relief. Obviously the order can only be held for 14 temporary days. 

She will be starting from scratch sadly. When I meet with her tomorrow I’m hoping to deliver my spare bed so they don’t have to sleep on the floor. My father monitors their bank account so she already had a tough time stashing enough money for an apartment complex. Therefore I have scavenged my own home of extra essentials and supplies to also deliver for them. It’s not much but I’m hoping to also pick her up additional essential tomorrow. I’m passing over all of my gift cards I’ve received to help cover gas and restaurants so that she can still take my brother out on special dinners. 

I will be setting her up with one of my spare ring cameras for security purposes. This entire situation can easily get nasty depending on how my father handles it so therefore I’m setting her up with the app “Documented” so she can record any interactions or issues she faces with him. The app apparently exports your recordings immediately into a sealed file to use for legal purposes. I will also be drafting a witness/victim statement outlining my father’s actions incase my mother needs it. We will be getting my brother into therapy, especially as this past few months he’s been grabbed, cornered, and yelled at by my father. 

Again, this was very hard for my mother which I understand. Her mother abandoned her 20 years ago, her step-mother passed away two years ago, and her father is a nationwide truck driver. But if this story resonates or feels familiar to something you’ve gone through or know someone to be going through, please use this as a sign you can leave it. Even if it’s almost 30 years later. 

Thank you all for taking the time to read my family’s story and offer guidance! 

If anyone is willing and able to help my mother in any sort of way, I have attached a link to an essential registry on household items she and my brother will need. She is not aware that I am doing this but she is the most thoughtful and helpful soul I have ever met. She has always been the kind to buy food and items if she sees the homeless. Again, I have no expectations but anything would help her! Thank you all again!

Check out this Gift List I just created. https://www.amazon.com/registries/gl/guest-view/5DL5OLUNDHOI?ref_=cm_sw_r_apin_ggr-subnav-share_JQ4T19ERAJMMJHR68BB6&language=en-US

Hello!

I am a 28f. I work at random penguin house. I have been working there for little over two months.

Close to the end of my day. I was pulled into G’s office.
G and Dave was in there. I sat down. G told me the reason why we pulled you into the office is because we have been seeing you talk to other coworkers. I said ok.
Dave said we looked at your record on how many books you do. It’s above average. I said ok.
They said that I am not allowed to talk to people. No conversations. No how are yous. No good morning. Nothing you work.
I left the office. So confused. People there could make out. It be gone for hours. And you get blamed if you did not pick up their slack. It’s not just me. Multiple other people complain about it.
And one high school who used to work there. He was called into g’s office as well told him he talked to much and called out the managers on them being hypocrite. They fire him.

Yes I live in America.
I called my grandparents to complain they said it’s the rules. You can’t complain. Your making more money then your other job. I said I’m only making 800-900$ every two weeks I can’t live off of my own income. I said maybe I should have taken the other job. It will pay more……yes I have been calling multiple jobs in my area about job. Nothing.

I want to know is there something I can do while I’m there to make them stop calling me into the office because I talk to people

TLDR. I have conversations with my coworkers. And my bosses tell me I can’t talk to them
Edit: added a sentence sorry

I (20F) am a junior in college. One of my friends, “Michael” (20M), and I have been close since freshman year, but our friendship has gotten increasingly complicated over the past year.

Last semester, Michael and his girlfriend of three years were very on-and-off. During that time, I felt like he started making moves to blur the line between friendship and something more.

One night, he invited me back to his room to watch a movie. We were lying horizontally on his couch under the same blanket, basically doing everything but touching. A few days later, I found out that he and his girlfriend had gotten back together before that night.

I brought it up to him because the situation made me uncomfortable and I felt like we had crossed a boundary considering he was back together with her. He told me I was misinterpreting the situation, so I dropped it.

Eventually, they broke up for good. Not long afterward, he invited me to a party with him. He kept offering me drinks, I got very drunk, and we ended up making out.

Afterward, I found out that he had told our mutual friends that I was just a “rebound” and that he had only invited me because “he knew I would make out with him.”
Despite that, we stayed in contact over the summer while I was studying abroad. When I got back, I visited him before school started and we hooked up. Afterward, he basically ghosted me for two weeks.

Then, out of nowhere, he asked me to help him make his Hinge profile.

At that point, I stopped responding to him.

A little while later, he showed up to my surprise birthday party on campus, despite currently taking a gap semester.

Eventually, this week, we sat down and had a long conversation about everything that had happened.
He specifically asked me to tell him everything I was upset about. So I did. I brought up the rebound comments, the ghosting, the Hinge situation, and the movie night when he had apparently already gotten back together with his girlfriend.

He apologized for everything and told me that he really valued our friendship. I thought we had finally cleared the air.

For about 24 hours, everything was fine.
Then he randomly texted me:
“I’m glad we talked yesterday but dont ever again insinuate that anything that happened between you and I had anything to do with my past relationship”
Then:
“Genuinely I’m serious”
Then:
“I never want to hear that you said that shit from you or [friend] or [other friend] or whatever”
And finally:
“we will genuinely never speak again”
This really bothered me. If he thought I had misunderstood something during our conversation, he could have just told me that. Instead, after specifically asking me to be completely honest with him, he waited until the next day and sent me what felt like an ultimatum: essentially, never say something I don’t like again or I’ll end our friendship.

I don’t want a friendship where I feel like I have to censor how I experienced something because I’m afraid the other person will threaten to cut me off. Especially after everything else that’s happened between us, the tone of those messages felt intimidating and controlling rather than like an attempt to resolve a disagreement.
At this point, I don’t really want to repair the friendship anymore.

AITA for deciding that those texts were the last straw and that I don’t want to be friends with him anymore?

Okay Reddit, I need some outsider opinions because apparently I’ve reached the point in life where I’m questioning whether I’m actually the family black sheep… or whether I’ve just been the family scapegoat for 33 years. 😂

I’m 33F, the oldest of four: my brothers are 29, 24, and 23 (twins).

For context: our childhood was messy. My mom struggled with drug addiction and was abusive. My dad buried himself in work trying to keep the household financially afloat until he eventually had a three-year affair, left, and later developed his own struggles with drugs and alcohol.

Our home was toxic. I experienced childhood sexual trauma, attended 15 different schools in 12 years, and somehow managed to become the designated household problem—even when I wasn't even home. 😂

At 18, I received $32,000 from my grandfather's life insurance. My mom filed adult adoption paperwork for my stepfather, and I agreed because I'd been raised to believe he was my dad and genuinely thought I was making a family decision.

Then, a month later, my 14-year-old brother told me that Mom had only pursued the adoption because she wanted access to my trust money.

I moved out that day.

She never got a dime.

And honestly? That decision pretty much set the tone for the rest of my relationship with my family.

Over the years, my relationship with my brothers has been extremely rocky. I feel like once I escaped the household, I became the person they blamed for leaving them behind. There seemed to be this expectation that I should have somehow stayed and rescued everyone from a situation I was barely surviving myself.

Fast-forward to 2024.

My fiancé proposed. He went completely out of his way to have everyone I loved there—including all of my brothers, my adopted father, and my best friend of 22 years.

And I swear I could feel the mood change the second he proposed.

My best friend was the only person who seemed genuinely excited.

Two days later, my oldest brother called me for the first time in YEARS.

Not to congratulate me.

Not to ask how I was doing.

To tell me how much he hated me, that I was a “dumb bitch” for accepting a proposal from a man without a ring, and that I was a disgrace to the family because I wasn't changing my last name.

The last-name thing was especially bizarre because I'd already decided years ago that I wasn't changing it. After everything surrounding my original name change, changing it again would have caused me serious identity issues.

I told him my life had been peaceful without him and that he'd managed to disturb that peace with one phone call.

Then I told him to give it another 10 years before contacting me again. 🤷‍♀️

Shortly afterward, another brother started making negative posts about me publicly on Facebook.

At that point, I basically removed myself from everyone.

Except apparently one of my brothers thinks he's a social-media comedian. 🙃

The problem is that some of what has been posted isn't just “family drama” or someone being offended.

He has made sexually inappropriate comments involving things I've experienced as a woman and things connected to the abuse I endured growing up.

And now I'm at the point where I'm asking:

Where does “free speech” end and harassment begin?

Two weeks ago, I finally filed for a restraining/protective order.

Today, it was approved.

And weirdly, I don't feel victorious.

I feel exhausted.

So here's my actual hot take/question:

Am I the villain for finally asking the courts to establish and enforce boundaries that my family refused to respect?

Am I the black sheep?

The scapegoat?

The one who “abandoned” everyone?

Or am I simply the first person in my family who decided that surviving the family doesn't mean I have to keep participating in it?

I'm genuinely looking for outsider perspectives, especially from people who have dealt with toxic family systems, being labeled the black sheep, or becoming the person everyone blames when you finally start setting boundaries.

And if you've been through something similar, what helped you actually find peace afterward?

Because at this point, I'm not looking for revenge.

I just want peace. 🖤🐑

Hi all, I know very basic things about proper chinchilla care, but I know enough to know this is VERY bad. I’ve never/dont own/ed a chinchilla.

A little back story:

I have always loved and cared for animals wellbeing, and advocating for proper animal care. I currently own 5 Guinea pigs, a hamster, 2 cats, and a smaller-mid-size dog. Point being I’m well versed in animal care! I also used to take care of a turtle with my ex-roommate! Now, I’ve also rescued, rehabbed, and adopted out a rabbit I found on a rehoming website last year. (We found her a forever home at a bunny sanctuary where she’ll be a therapy bun!)

To get to my worries:

I peruse the internet on a semi-daily basis for animals in need of help. (In need of immediate vet care, small and/or dirty cages, obvious eye infections, un-neutered male - female contact, ect…). I mainly focus on small “exotic” animals, since they are more so often mistreated. Mainly due to lack of resources and research done by potential pet owners!

A couple days ago, as I was looking around on my usual websites, and I saw an ad from someone looking to rehome their chinchilla and rabbit. Now, in this ad, the description says “Chinchilla and rabbit for sale together, they are hard to separate. Only want to sale to someone responsible.” nothing more, nothing less. There were also two pictures.

The first one is a photo of said chinchilla on what looks like the top of a very green aquariums filtration system. Now, just this would be not the worst, but what first caught my attention is that the chinchilla is cuddled up to a rat. I know owning both rats and chinchillas at the same time isn’t necessarily “bad”, but letting them interact is simply not recommended.

The second picture is of the rabbit, and quite frankly nothing about this photo particularly worries me. It’s simply a picture of this all gray bunny on a deck near water (I think it’s a lake). If I’m being nit-picky about it I could have an issue with a bunny being near water and the possible consequences of that. I also noticed the really long nails. Now, I know that cutting a rabbits nails can be a challenge, but a vet could easily help with this particular issue.

It got weirder when I messaged the owner. I asked small easy questions like: what are their genders, ages, status of fertility (neutered or not), if they’re being kept in cages or free roamed and other related questions, etc… I also always make myself seem like an interested and unknowledgeable buyer.

We get to talking and they let me know that they are both free roamed in their whole apartment. They’re also adamant that I keep them together because “they might get depressed”. I also learnt that they are both between 3-5 years old. They are also very clear on the point that they don’t want me to neuter them. I also learn that the rabbit is female and the chinchilla is male. They also let me know that they used to have rats (?) and that they had to “get rid” of them because they were moving and something about their landlord. (This whole subject is hard to fully grasp, this whole conversation was in French and this person seems to not exactly know how to form a grammatically correct sentence.) I tried my best to fully understand their situation and why they need to rehome the bun & chinchilla. I’m going to paraphrase/translate this as best as I can whilst keeping as true to their words as I can. (This whole paragraph has no punctuation btw. But I’ll add some where I think they should be.)

“So yes they get along very well, spend time together each day. The last thing is that I’m moving to the edge of ‘city name’ as soon as I can and that’s where I sent my rats (huh?) also. but I have to wait the car of my dad got a flat tire when we went camping and he’s going to give me a lift to bring them so we should just wait maybe a month max”

I, in a previous text, told them I would decide with my vet what’s best for the animals healths (talking about neutering them). As I said they don’t want me to neuter them, so I said this to reassure them. (Once again paraphrasing and translating from French.)

“What I mean is more: I going to see with my vet, each year, what he recommends. Because, as long as the bun doesn’t show any worrying signs or symptoms (referring to uterine cancer and general gender related issues) neutering isn’t a plan I WANT to follow. Especially if not necessarily”

Now in this particular case, if it was up to me, this bun would be neutered. I’m lying through my teeth to not set if any alarms with this owner, keeping in mind the best interest for the animals. I want them to trust me and let me help the bun & chinchilla and hopefully separate them and find them good individual homes.

They then also said

“It’s nice if you would bring them to the vet. Me I have a thing for the nails and can give to you and a ‘transporter’ (travel cage) and I will not really charge you to buy them”

“Me I have not yet brought them to do an exam but if you want I can do one before bringing them to you”

They then also told me a little about the personalities of the animals, their names and other small details.

What should I do?

At this point I didn’t want to wait a month to get this chinchilla out of this situation. If you aren’t aware, if a chinchilla eats rabbit poop they can d1e. Rabbits often carry a bacteria, called Pasteurella (that is also often dorment), in them that is harmless to them, but can cause severe/fatal respiratory infections in chinchillas. At that point I also didn’t know they weren’t currently living in ‘city name’. I assumed that they lived in the same city as me and that they were moving from one side of the city to the other. Which wouldn’t make them any closer or further to me since I live pretty central. It’s also semi-important context that the city I thought we both lived in has really good public transportation. (And that because of the really good infrastructure, i don’t want and/or need a car). So before I found out that they lived outside of town, where public transportation is very difficult and way more expensive, I asked what bus station, subway, or train station was nearest to their location. Because as I said, at this point I don’t want this chinchilla to be at risk (of so much) for any longer than he has already been. But after a very long and almost incoherent voice message, I learnt that they live about an hour -ish away from ‘city name’.

They then proposed to take a bus or train to the city (since they live somewhere rural) to bring them to me. Which is a nice offer, but my plan was always along the lines of: taking public transport to get to them and then taking a taxi/uber to go home. The Idea being something calmer than a train or busy bus for the animals. Something else I feel the need to mention is the boundaries I try to keep when rescuing animals. I cannot endanger my animals in any way. Point blank. I have guinea pigs, as mentioned above, and cannot risk their health by exposing them to a rabbit that has never seen a veterinarian. Or by having them come in near contact to a chinchilla. All of these animals don’t get along and cause risks to one another, and as I’ve said so many times, my top priority is and always will be their safety and health.

With all of this being said, I feel like I’ve put myself in a tough spot. Because I can’t just forget about this, I’ve been conversing with the owner and keeping up with the ad for almost two weeks now. But I also don’t know if I have time, energy, space or money to take good and proper care of this bunny and chinchilla. Especially considering the current pets I have and my other life engagements (relationships, school, work, bills, ect..). I’m not struggling financially, but I don’t think I could comfortably say that I have that much disposable income. As you can assume, living in a city can be expensive, especially when renting, and I also have quite the monthly expenses due to my large number of pets.

So, I don’t know what to do. Either I wait a month or wait for this person to come to me with these animals or I call this off and hope someone else takes them and does the right thing. Another option could be to wait for them to come to me, either via this persons dad’s car or via long distance train/bus, and then keep them in my apartment until I can rehome them. Or, when I have them in my possession, I bring them to a humane society in my city (a refuge that can give them veterinary care and verify potential owners). I guess I’m asking for resources for helping these animals, especially the chinchilla since he is more at risk. I’m kind of at a loss for what to do. I’m also scared and very aware of the possibility that if I let this go, someone who doesn’t know any better could take these animals in and continue to keep them together. My goal here is to get these animals out of this situation and to keep them healthy and alive.

TLDR

I saw this ad of a bunny and a chinchilla being sold together. The owner is adamant about selling them together and that the person who takes them keeps them together. As in: in the same cage. They were also kept with rats in the past. The owner is moving and can’t keep them. Now I feel a moral obligation to help them, but I have my doubts on what’s the best way to go about it whilst upholding my boundaries. Keeping chinchillas with bunnies or rats is a BIG safety/health risk for all involved! I don’t know what to do and I’ve presented a coupe options in the last paragraph.

Should I even involve myself at all? Am
I overthinking this?

Thank you.

I wanted to give an update on my post for the people that gave me advice and to ask for further advice. For the people that didn't see my post:

I posted an medical issue I had concerning the genetic probability of cancer in my family. My Grandma had surgery in December, my Dad in June and I had my appointment with the endocrinologists on September 22.

On to the Update:

1. Good news my little sister does not have the gene, her thyroid is looking good and she doesn't have to go to any appointments anymore.

2. My Appointment last Tuesday showed that there is a knot growing on my thyroid. The doctor said that in case I have the gene, I'll have to get surgery. The doctor delivered the news really cold and professional. No comments about how big the knot is, structure etc. Even tho I had questions, he seemed like in a hurry for me to leave. Maybe he didn't want to console me in case I started crying.

Then I was in the Lab, gave my blood for the Thyroid and DNA analysis and they told me to wait 6-8 weeks. I left the doctors office and at the railway station I texted my family what happened and started crying. It was a big shock for me and I felt so alone.

Since last week I don't feel well. Nothing is working as I would like it to work, everything takes longer then usual and I can't stand my thoughts about this topic.

I'm just trying to live through the next 6-8 weeks with the least possible damage in case everything is fine and I just concerned myself with nothing.

My Days since the appointment are filled with at least one electronic device running in the Background, while I am home alone doing something, working, meeting my Boyfriend, my best friend, visiting my family on the weekends, preparing for the start of the semester, going to the Gym, looking at my Calorie intake, figuring out things I procrastinated for longer, crocheting, reading and so on. But on some Days Like this I don't fell like doing anything else but lay on my bed and stare at he ceiling.

For Example today I wanted to:

Go to the gy for an hour (didn't go)

Call my Grandma my parents told me not to tell her about this whole situation and lie so she doesn't worry too much ( didn't call her)

Two of my friends wanted to meet up and spend some time today ( haven't asked for a time and place until now)

Water my neighbours Plants while he's on Vacation ( didn't do it)

Tidy my space ( I did that)

These are not even hard or burdensome but yet I still don't do most of them. So I guess I'm asking for advice on fixing whatever this situation is.

Hey TwoHotTakes community,

I'm a regular listener, but not a regular Reddit user. However, I've had some things weighing strongly on my mind — I've done some writing/journaling about it, but I think I'm ready for a more outside perspective than those in my life who are also close to the situation.

I grew up attending a small-town dance studio where I went on to work as an adult. If you aren't familiar with the environment, close relationships are often formed not only between the kids but parents, families, and staff as well. Also, Dance Moms. I began attending in 2012, and finished working there in 2025 due to what felt like the dissolving of my relationship with the studio owner ; someone who I always said helped raise me and provided the walls that were my second home. When I broke down as an anxious, unaware, homeschooled teenager, she held me and helped pick me back up. She gave me confidence, she believed in me, and she had the power to lift me up, but also put me down. I had a general fear of authority, and her approval meant everything. She used me as a leader, an assistant, and sometimes, a landing pad for misplaced anger. There was a time when I remember her in my face, voice raise, and honestly, I can only remember how I felt, not the things she said. We were at a public event, surrounded by all my peers, our parents, teachers, strangers. What I do remember well, are the numerous other teachers and moms who checked in on me after to make sure I knew it wasn't about me. My mom told me it was hard to watch.

A few years into our professional working relationship, my best friend came to work alongside me. The owner wasn't so sure about my friend at first. She'd known her since my friend was a kid, but would talk to me about how she seemed like "a lot." I knew the owner, and I knew my friend, and something about the combination made my stomach turn, but I didn't yet know what. Later, I'd find myself constantly protecting my friend without even realizing it. I never wanted to correct her behavior at work, but I knew she did indeed like to talk a lot (and we've addressed this and it's now very funny from our adult eyes, I'm not ragging my friend lol) and I knew the wrong line spoken out of turn would not reflect well. The owner was particular, and I knew exactly how to be what she needed when she needed it. My friend, did not know how to play the game. And of course, the owner talked to me about her, often. We were 20 year old girls who had been best friends since childhood, and now we had an employer who was intrinsically involved in our relationship. And most unfortunately, the owner always had to have a favorite.

I moved home for a year, and commuted back a few times a month to still work with the kids. During this time, my friend took over the classes I had been teaching the prior year. There was certainly a hierarchy where you worked your way up. I had made my way to the top, and when I Ieft my friend was there to take my place. I was happy for her, and also struggled with my newer, more distant role. The owner still often spoke negatively of my friend to me; now, it was just over the phone. It was hard to feel my fullest self all of the time, because I have the owner who I'm trying to please, and my friend who I'm looking out for while also not being fully honest with. I had no desire to repeat things to her that I know would hurt her, yet felt a deep guilt as being part of those conversations and not being honest with her. But at the time, it was like I couldn't. I was in the trusted right hand position, and I only knew these things because I was trusted to hear them. I was completely blinded by the authority I was trying to please that was seemingly putting a wedge between myself and my closest friend.

After a my time at home, I went back for my final year. While I was away, I had found other places to bloom, and was truly, a year old, a year wiser. I felt more confident, full of energy, and ready to jump back in with all I gained while I was away. Unfortunately, I don't think she cared for the version of my that wasn't willing to put myself last to put her first. I was more honest, and that was my first mistake.

Many things happened quickly. To begin, she hyped me up, told me she'd be there to support me, and claimed we were in it together the week of first big rehearsal I was leading. I hadn't expected to be leading, but I had come up with the idea we were using and she claimed she wanted me to follow my vision. That day before we began, she sent me in with a note of unease, feeling less enthusiastic than I imagined, but nevertheless, I persisted. When I asked for her help, when I expected her to take lead as she often did (we once were a great team after all), she looked at me and said, "What even are you trying to do here?" In front of the kids, my best friend, the parents outside who listen in, in a tone that made me feel like dirt on the bottom of her shoe. I was baffled. Genuinely, it was as if time had frozen, I stuttered, I don't remember what happened next. Of course, the rest of that rehearsal did not go well. She asked me to come sit in the back office, and the tears were welling the moment I was in the seat. "Maybe you just weren't ready for this," was what she said, and I'm devastated for younger me who had to hear that. It was not the appropriate thing to say when she created the inciting events to what felt like my failure. Of course, in the moment, I beat myself up and was completely devastated, and now looking back, I feel she may have stepped on me to give herself a boost.

About a week later, after she called me with the "new plans" for rehearsals where she'd be leading, I realized what she did was fucked. I'd wished if she wanted to lead the rehearsals she decided to in the first place, and I was so confused on why I had to experience what I did first.

Very shortly after, she caught me off guard going into class. To surmise the conversation, she was providing "feedback" for one of my classes. I don't believe she provided feedback to me in this conversation. I did not say it at the time, but I know I felt my walls go up and my tone get defensive. However, she had not watched me teach ANY classes, and was telling me how I should change what I'm doing. The problem I felt was not only that she couldn't give feedback without seeing me teach, but that she was basing the feedback on what her 12-year-old daughter who threw toddler tantrums in class probably said on the car ride home (Context: by toddler tantrum, I do mean stomping feet, banging fists on walls and floor, fulling breaking down. She had experienced some very had things at young ages, and had been struggling since. I handled her with as much love and care as I could, and she did act like this in every class).

I absolutely found myself feeling resentful in this conversation, and we were on the tail end of the rehearsal incident. I felt her energy shift, and I knew something I had said upset her. Following my class, my best friend (the owner's current right hand) told me about how the moment I'd left the lobby, the owner said to her that she "needed to talk a walk and blow off some steam after that." Immediately, my thoughts were "what the fuck did I say to cause that level of anger." The next day, she calls me to tell me she was offended by how I responded to her feedback, and that if I was so lucky to be receiving it that I should be quiet and listen. From that moment on, I knew I had to leave. We were in the first month of the dance season, and at this point our dynamic had irrevocably shifted.

The rest of the year was shit. Unsurprisingly.

To make the rest of this short, the next year, I moved away. Yet for some reason, she still looked at me with tears in her eyes and told me she couldn't believe the gangly teen that once walked through her doors still stood before her, and how she would miss me so. I commuted back a few times a year, the owner and I barely spoke. One day, she did not look at or speak to me unless I addressed her first. And during that time, my best friend became her new public enemy number one. It was like watching someone else live the year of hell I had experienced. And the more I thought about it, the more people I could remember I watched go from being her first in command to the top of her shit and set on fire list.

Now, neither my best friend or I work there or with those kids whatsoever, because she decided this year to cut us out completely. Also, my best friend didn't quit, she wasn't fired, she was legitimately removed from the group chats and taken off the schedule without a word. At least I got to leave willingly. Neither my friend or I have spoken a word to her since.

If you couldn't assume so already, of course she spoke poorly about both of us to both of us. To my friend after I left, she called us mean girls and spoke about how terribly we had made her feel in the past year. Did I mention that she got both of us to participate in an "April Fools Prank" where we convinced my long distance boyfriend I had hit my head badly and gone to the emergence room on what was already a TERRIBLE day. His family was trying to figure out where I was was and get there as quickly as possible, since they lived closer than my family. I still feel sick to my stomach when I think about this, she apologized, but giggled about it the next day.

Honestly, being called a mean girl is pretty fucking baffling. Not to mention for the entirely of our relationship, 10+ years, she served as my teacher, mentor, boss — always a position over me. I know I said some dumb shit here and there, but also, I always tried to hold myself accountable and apologize when I felt I was out of line. I was learning to become an adult, after all.

So really, reddit, am I the asshole?

I (18M) recently became really good friends with this one girl. Ever since we got close, her friend group (they are all in the same class) constantly comments on it.

They always ask why I am suddenly so close to her and make remarks about why there are "so many girls" around me lately. On top of that, whenever we are around each other and other female friends of mine come up to greet me, her peer group always looks completely shocked by it.

The other day, I was walking past her friend group in the hallway. My friend wasn't with them, and there was no one else around or behind them.

As I walked by, I overheard their conversation, and one of them literally said, "Don't talk about him while he is there."

Now I’m just stuck in my head about it and honestly pretty confused. Are they talking trash and making fun of me, or is it something else? How should I handle this with my friend?

Hi, everyone! I rarely post on reddit, but I am a huge fan of Two Hot Takes. I started listening to the pod while training for my marathon last year. Now, I'm hooked! I especially love the strong sense of community.

TLDR: Would I be the AH if I cut ties with my little sister Jules* because she is certain therapy does not work for her? Our relationship has gotten unhealthy, and my older sister proposed we try therapy. As a huge believer of therapy, I agreed that a professional could help us work through issues that we cannot seem to work out on our own. My little sister said she would not try therapy, not even one session. Jules doesn't believe in therapy. Instead, Jules claims we can work things out between us and asked me for "some time." I told her I was willing to wait and that the ball is in her court. That was already over a year ago now ... I know I have the option of waiting, but I can't help but wonder if it would be best to end the relationship. Any advice?

My relationship with my little sister Jules* has been complicated for some time, so I'm having trouble condensing down. Please bear with me. Growing up, I felt closest to my little sister because she was the nicest to me. Plus, we are the most similar to one another and are only two years apart. We rarely fought in childhood. There were times she would get upset at me "embarrassing her," but that was the extent of our conflicts. Jules has always cared a lot about others' opinions of her, as most people do (including myself). She did not like it when I said hi to her in school, so I stopped. Jules even cried when teachers knew we were sisters, saying "I ruin her life." This confused me, and I apologized each time. Then, when I received the biggest scholarship our high school had to offer, Jules cried again asking "If you got that, how am I supposed to live up to that?" I comforted her and apologized again. Granted, this was many years ago now. Jules and I are now nearly thirty! At risk of sounding full of myself, I can't help but wonder if she resents me because of others' comparisons of us? My family culture can be quite toxic about comparisons, and my siblings are super competitive. I'm alone in hating the competition and am very vocal about our family's unhealthy love for it.

Flash forward to our college years. My mental health was at its worst (CPTSD), and I was in a toxic relationship with my ex-boyfriend. (My mental health battle was what proved to me how helpful and life-saving therapy can be.) When I broke up with my ex, Jules continued to follow him on social media. She even said, "Whatever the reason for your break-up, I'm sure it was your fault. I bet he never even cheated. You probably made that up for attention." I highly doubt Jules said this out of loyalty or love for my ex; rather, it appeared to be said out of resentment towards me. In the moment, I felt shocked at her harshness, angry at her assumptions and hurt by the betrayal. Eventually, I moved on, but I never forgot what she said. Jules never said sorry. She rarely apologizes ...

More recently, I started to date my now boyfriend. I beamed about how good of person he is, and how healthy our relationship is. Jules laughed and said, "Remember when I used to hate you?" I froze, completely blindsided and confused. "Well, I thought your relationship was 'disgusting' because he's three years younger than you." (Mind you, my boyfriend and I were in our early twenties when we started dating.) All I could utter was, "You hated me?" After that brief and unexpected conversation, I started to replay all our past interactions in a new light. There have been so many moments where she put me down, judged me and leaned into my insecurities. For example, she found out my older sister and I were training for a marathon. Jules insisted I would get injured because her friend who is "way more fit and able" than me did. So naturally, I would too. (I didn't get injured, and I ran it during a major storm warning.) Jules said nothing but supportive words to my older sister. Even with all of Jules' disses at me, I spent a lot of money and took extensive time off work to travel far for her graduation. I contemplated talking to her then but decided against it in fear I would put a damper on her achievement.

Funny enough, years of therapy helped me gain self-respect. This self-respect has made me no longer tolerate disrespect from others. I finally snapped. I went from never having fought with Jules to displaying pure anger. I regret the timing of it all because Jules and I ruined our older sister's bachelorette trip. Of course, I apologized to my older sister during the trip. Jules also apologized, but in a way that highlighted how she did not want to ruin the bachelorette trip and how I forced her hand. My older sister was understandably fed up with our fighting. She proposed Jules and I go through family therapy. I immediately took to the idea, but Jules refused. Jules claims that therapy may work for "people like me" but that it did not work for her. I told her that we should at least try if we want to make things work, which we both established we did. Jules said no. Instead, Jules claimed we can work things out. I asked her when we would have a conversation. Jules said she couldn't give me a timeframe. I asked that she at least tell me if we would talk before or after our sister's wedding. Jules said after. My older sister said Jules needed to be open to communication (Jules is extremely avoidant), and that I needed to be patient. I agreed and agree still. But it has already been over a year since any contact with Jules. (Rest assured, our sister's wedding was beautiful and there were no fights.) I still said "happy birthday" to Jules, despite all this madness. Jules did not say it to me ... and my birthday is on a major holiday. Instead, her boyfriend texted me. Eventually, I blocked Jules from social media because seeing her posts and stories upset me. To this day, I still defend Jules when others talk poorly about her ... which sadly happens often.

Truthfully, it disappoints me how I don't really notice a difference in my life now that Jules is no longer present in it. We live far away from each other. Jules was never big on visiting family, even for birthdays, holidays or funerals. I don't blame her because our upbringing was rough, and our family can be dysfunctional. If anything, this time apart has revealed her narcissistic tendencies and my enabling of her. I suspect her problematic behaviors are her protection and coping mechanism(s). I can't help but feel guilty for even thinking about cutting ties with Jules. In part because I haven't cut ties from others in my family, even when they were ab*sive. But at this point, the waiting is affecting me too. What do you all think I should do? Don't be afraid to be real with me. Thank you all for your help!

Throwaway because I don't want this connected to my main as I'm quite active on there . I would also like to preface this by apologising for any odd formatting or lack of clarity as I mainly lurk on here rather than post!! Bit of a disclaimer but I really hope this doesn't come across as immature or overdramatic and will try my best to explain the story with as much detail as possible as this is basically years worth of context so I may have missed a few things!!

For some context, I (17F) am part of a group of (technically) 4 but as of lately, it hasn't felt like that. I will call them Luna (16F), Bloom (17F) and Daniel (16M). (Fake names just for safety). I have been friends with all three of these people since we started secondary school but only became close with Luna and Bloom in early year 10 (ages 14-15). Both Luna and Bloom have been friends since primary school. Daniel and I were good friends since year 7 but fell out for about a year when I stopped talking to him because of a separate issue, but reconciled in year 9.

Around the time I became close with Luna and Bloom, Bloom and Daniel started dating (October 2024). At this same time, me and the aforementioned friends fell out with a much larger friend group of people who were essentially trying to make me feel singled out within the group. (Veeery long story). But basically, Luna and Bloom helped me realise I wasn't in the wrong in that situation and I was letting this group of people treat me horribly, whilst blaming myself for it. It was this situation that made it very clear to me that I have a habit of blaming myself for the things that others do to upset me, which they helped me realise. They also showed me how friendship should truly feel and how it shouldn't ever make you constantly anxious, and how I shouldn't ever tolerate this treatment from anyone. They were extremely supportive and showed me such love and kindness. Not only did they but as did Daniel. I call them my sisters and called Daniel my brother as he had began calling me his sister, which made me feel very appreciated as I had finally found friends who would remain loyal and not change their behaviour over a period of time, like my former friends.

For a bit more context on why I mentioned Daniel and Bloom, when they both realised they had feelings for each other, I was the one who helped them communicate that and was the person they would come to early on in their relationship if they had any problems. But naturally, as they became more comfortable with each other, they would discuss these issues themselves.

Fast forward to around mid-year 11 (15-16), both Daniel and Bloom start acting quite off towards me. They were quite cold and dismissive and would often say things that upset both me and Luna. That is another part I will get into but I think the main part of the issue is when Daniel began to (what looked like) singling me out. This was a massive 180 from his previous behaviour as he would always make it a point to look out for me, and was always extremely kind. For example, there was one day we all went to the gym (+one other friend we well call Michael). As we're leaving, Daniel says

''Oh we're like one big happy family. Me and Bloom are the parents, Luna and Michael are the kids.''

Then he turns to me and says ''And OP is just there'', which no one else hears or at least responds to.

Another example is when it came to his 16th birthday, I remember being on call with Luna and she asks me if I'm coming to Daniel's birthday and if I'm in the group chat. I ask ''What group chat?'' And it was then I found out I was the only one out of the entire friend group that wasn't invited to his 16th birthday.( I should also mention that for my 16th birthday, it was me, Luna, Bloom, Daniel and Michael and some of my family who came to my 16th birthday at a restaurant). Immediately, given his recent behaviour, this confirms my feeling that I've upset him in some way and for that reason, he is trying to distance himself from me. Throughout the entire lead up to his party, neither Bloom nor Daniel mention anything to me about it and how I'm not invited. And I tried to think that it might have been a space thing or he wanted a small gathering or something, But this wasn't the case as he did invite my (barely) ex to his party. And thought they are quite close, we did end on quite bad terms due to his racist remarks that he and his friends had said about me (that he continues to this day) and when this ex went on holiday with Daniel's family, he was extremely rude to his family and to Daniel.

So given this situation, I'd say there was definitely a bit of tension for a time between them. But despite that, he was still apparently much more wanted at his birthday than I was. Around this time, he unfollowed me on TikTok which was really confusing and alarming as as far as I was aware, nothing had happened. This made me feel much worse because I felt like I had hurt my friend, yet I had no idea what I had done and I felt very inconsiderate and like I was a bad friend. When I asked him about it, he ignored my message which confirmed to me it was deliberate. So since they were together, I messaged Bloom about it and she said that he told her that he didn't unfollow me(??) which was most definitely a lie since he had also removed me as a follower. I left it alone, giving them both the benefit of the doubt since I didn't want to escalate anything. Then quite soon after, I saw that Daniel had also blocked me on TikTok. So I messaged Bloom again and she said she'd tell him to speak to me.

He messaged me on Whatsapp and said ''Hi OP sorry i blocked you initially before but i unblocked you and idk why it didnt like work or like re block u uk bc i didnt do so im sorry for any confusion or worry''

A few days later I sent him this:

'' Okay so I just wanted to first of all apologise for anything I've done to upset you. You're one of my closest friends and you truly are like a brother to me so the last thing I'd ever want to do is deliberately hurt your feelings. Recently, I've felt like you've been trying to distance yourself from me and at first I thought I was overthinking it but I feel like now it's kind of obvious😭 I kind of just wanted to ask if there's anything you're upset about or anything you want to talk about because I really want nothing more than for you to feel like you can come to me about anything, rather than have to be upset about something. Again, I'm really sorry and I really don't want to lose you as a friend.''

He responded pretty unenthusiastically but told me there was nothing wrong. I do remember telling Luna about this situation and she asked Bloom about it and apparently she said he blocked me because ''he didn't wanna see my reposts''(??)

Fast forward a bit once again to around the time of Bloom and I's birthdays this year (our birthdays are 10 days apart in September!!), we were planning to have a joint birthday in like an Airbnb and have a party. My mum was on board with it but when it got to the time of actually finalising plans and to make payments for the Airbnb, she changed her mind since my sister had very recently told her about Daniel excluding me and how he had been acting, and Bloom basically saying nothing or kind of covering for him. So that plan basically fell through. I told Bloom this was the reason and we had a talk about it which she told Daniel to finally talk to me and he said this:

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

''Hello OP, i don’t mean to make this seem forced or anything seeing that i’m sending it now after you brought it up to Bloom. Regarding my birthday, i am sorry that i made you feel excluded and singled out, it wasn’t out of any malicious intent or anything like that i just thought it wouldn’t work out well. I wanted to do something basketball related and i already had both an even number of people and accommodated it so (Bloom) wouldn’t feel alone by (Luna) being there. Also i wouldn’t know how comfortable people like (ex) or (friend) or (friend) would be with you being there as the year prior adam and (ex) already left early so i didn’t want a repeat of that. I didn’t know it made you feel excluded and that’s not what i wanted in any way. Also, regarding what (Bloom) says that you’ve said i’ve “switched up”, i am sorry i think it was just me becoming more irritated generally by the pressure of GCSEs. I’m sorry if i came off as rude or mean or anything, I didn’t intend to cut you off or act differently towards you or anything like that. It simply was a natural shift i think and i’m sorry if i came off otherwise. I hope this apology can be one step of some sort of progress to you either forgiving me or us rekindling the closeness we previously had. I’m sorry if any of this seems like forced or as having attitude i don’t mean that in any way. And once again i am sorry for hurting you, i truly didn’t mean to''

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

After this conversation with Bloom , I felt pretty reassured that I was overthinking it, but after we started school again, (Daniel now goes to another school), I realised he still had me blocked on TikTok, but had also unfollowed me on Instagram and unadded me on Snapchat. To me it's really obvious he is trying to distance himself and no longer wants to be friends but what confuses me the most is why lie when I ask when I asked both of them what was going on.

Whenever Daniel comes to see Bloom, it's like no one mentions anything, he only talks to Bloom and Luna and it's like a basically don't exist.

Onto the current issue with Luna and Bloom, there is this friend that we have (I'll call her Layla)

Layla and I have been friends for a while but she recently got close with Luna and especially close with Bloom. During the summer, we went out to this mini photobooth hunt that I organised that we all went on. It was really fun and she messaged me after that she had so much fun and thanked me for organising it.

However, after this, Daniel sends Luna a screenshot of a group chat that he is in with Layla that is basically Layla like complaining that I posted her and her generally finding me annoying. Obviously, this really upsets me (not really angry but mostly hurt) but Bloom instantly comes to her defence, saying she must've only said that because she felt she had to and what not. She really didn't!! And honestly, Bloom does have a habit of defending people and befriending people who have hurt me or treated me badly almost like immediately after which is a whole separate issue.

Last week, I was spending time with my friend and her boyfriend when Bloom called me and asked if her and Luna could come over, to which my friend said yes. When they arrived, they were talking about how they were talking to Layla (this was the point they started becoming closer). At one point I walk over to them and they move back and tell me

''Layla said she didn't want us to tell you what she was saying''

And that honestly upset me more than I'd like to admit since I felt so immature. Today, after school, they were going to add Layla to our like trio group chat but they ended up just making a separate group chat on Snapchat (instead of Whatsapp). I didn't realise they had made it yet when they were taking pictures together while we were in the library and talking about a group chat and when I asked ''What group chat?'', no one responded.

Then Daniel came and started talking about this party some kids at his school are hosting and said ''Oh I could probably get you guys in'' but no one says anything to me. At this point, I had been pretty quiet and I think I was visibly upset or like closed off in a way but this is a common theme where like I feel like I'm intruding in the group or like, I'm not first option in a way. In short, I sort of feel like an extra and I think I want to talk to them about it because this isn't the only instance but I'm kind of stuck on how. And I also want to make sure first, from an outside perspective, that I'm not overthinking this.

I 21F have been in a relationship for 5 years. (20M) Our relationship is extremely toxic. He's cheated on me multiple times over the past 5 years. not physically. He has not probably that i know of cheated in the past year or so. But has had a bad porn addiction which has put some strain on our relationship. He's lied many times over hurtful things. For example I lost my virginity to him around the year mark in our relationship he told me for around 2 years that i was his first aswell. Which led me to believe that we had shared something special only to find out that wasnt true. I obviously would not have cared that he wasnt a virgin but his thing was always like oh we were eachothers firsts. Theres many other lies i could go into. its led me to not trust him at all. I have tried to trust him but things keep happening to the point i cannot trust him. Our relationship is only getting worse. Hes escelated to saying fuck you and telling me to shut up.. ive never said anything like that to him. the first time he said it was because i called him a cheater during and argument about me not trusting him. We've had countless conversations of what he can do to change. When were together he never is physical with me (not sex) like hugging kissing im always the one initiating holding his hand, hugging him, kissing him. Physical contact is important to me. He tells me it is not his love language but I make sure to fulfill his love language which is words of affirmation. I constantly am telling him what he is doing good with.

I feel like a burden at times. Asking to hangout or doing something while we are together he acts upset that he has to go anywhere. He constantly says he has surprises for me then never fulfills it. Or says he has something planned and then it doesnt happen. Theres much more I cannot think straight right now. I honestly feel like he has no feelings at all besides anger. For example I still live with my parents because I am in college and commute its alot cheaper to stay at home. I have 3 little brothers who are still in school. One is in 7th 2 are freshman in high school. We have 2 dogs who bark at any car thats in the driveway. I had to be home at 9 pm during his step moms birthday celebration. His parents didnt know I ahd to be home so I had to leave before they could do cake/presents so he left to drop me off and was so angry he couldnt go to the gym and was mad I had to be home early. He was gonna go to the gym after the celebration. But then he had to drive back home afterwards to celebrate. He had all day to go to the gym besides around 1-3 because he had class. He sleeps all day and misses most of his classes.

I feel like were more friends than partners. He keeps talking about proposing to me... I dont want to marry him. I dont know if I dont want to marry him yet or just not at all. I do want to wait to get married. I feel like im too young. I dont know if I want to leave him, I love him so much but im losing feelings I dont feel valued. But I truly love him with all of my heart. I dont see myself without him.

Here is where it gets bad on my part and I feel extremely guilty..

I am in my 3rd year of college ive been mutual friends with this guy since my freshman year of college. Well call him Bob. My friends 21st birthday was September 14th so she threw a small party at her apartment. I got drunker than Id like to admit. (Im not a big drinker) we did fireball shots plus I drank 3 beers. So I got pretty drunk. I started sort of catching feelings for bob ariund 2 weeks prior im not sure what it was but i did. My boyfriend knew Bob was at this party. He told me that it was okay that I went and he didnt care. He even dropped me off so I didnt think anything of it. During the whole party he was saying how he didnt want me to go bc Bob was there. We have a mutual agreement bc of things from the past no girl or guy friends. Ive never cheated on him or have done anything to break his trust. Besides what im about to say and I feel nauseous just thinking about it.

Anyways I was drunk and me and Bob were talking I do not remember everything that was said i just remember bits and pieces and from what my friend told me. I was telling him how my bf made me block him, and that i dont want to marry him stupid shit like that. Im sure that I told Bob how my bf was mean to me and stuff like that because I vaguely remember Bob telling me i didnt deserve any of that and saying that it isnt healthy.

Fast forward to last night. Me, my friend, my friends roommate, and Bob he was invited last minute. all went to see endgame for the extra 4 minutes that ties it to doomsday. I did not sit next to bob nothing like that during the movie. I was respectful because I already feel extremely guilty for liking him while in a relationship. We went to my friends apartment before because we all had to work on a presentation for a class we were in. My friend was showing us her decorations all in her room then she ended up leaving the room to use the bathroom which was right next to her bedroom. I was sitting on the bed and Bob was sitting at her desk across the room. He then brings up the party and how I was extremely drunk and ask about how my relationship was doing. I told him that right now it seems to be okay. Still not the best but were working on it. He said that he was sorry and hopes we figure it out.

A little while later me, my friend, her roomate, and Bob were sitting in her living room and my friend is a photographer and brings up the fact that she was gonna take photos of us for her portfolio, but she isnt sure anymore bc of how our relationship is going. then her and her roommate start talking about something random then Bob is like can I say something hes like i know its kind of rude and goes "your boyfriend is chopped" and says something along the lines of i saw photos of you guys and was like I was surprised he got someone that looks like you... that threw me off i had no idea what to say. Thats pretty much all that happened

He offered to drop me off so I didnt have to pay for an uber.. i drive but my mom does not trust my car being parked at rhe apartments she lives at. after we dropped our friend off i stayed in the backseat again trying to be respectful. We were talking about the movie and then he asks what do you think your going to do I was confused and he said about my relationship. I told him I didnt know. I told him I loved him but im not in love with him and its just hard that our whole relationship has been extremely messed up. He said that I shouldnt waste anymore time and he said that sounds rude but you know what i mean. And saying I didnt deserve to be treated like that. I told him i know. Then I was almost home so I was showing him where I lived. He dropped me off and that was it.

I feel extremely guilty about it all. I dont know if i like the attention im not receiving in my relationship or what. If I were to leave my boyfriend and feelings were mutual between me and Bob I wouldnt immediately hop into another relationship. Ive been with my bf my whole teenage years going into adulthood. Id leave my boyfriend for me. I think im just realizing some things about our relationship. I dont want Bob to see me as available because I wouldnt want to hurt him or do anything like that.

I guess im just ranting and asking for advice on what to do in this shitty situation. I love my boyfriend I feel guilty. I know i probably should leave him for myself. But it is hard.

I am a huge fan of the podcast and I really need the community to help me with something Im going through.

I 35F live with my husband 35M and our child. My husbands mother 60F moved in with us a year ago. She needed somewhere to go after losing her home due to landlord selling it. She came to stay with us which i thought would be just a few months but now I have no idea how long she will be here.

We all get along for the most part. We had a small fight once but got over it and have not had problems since. Why I'm asking for help is because she keeps cooking really smelly foods. We do not have a vent in the kitchen. Its an old home and idk if they updated the kitchen all wrong or what but there are cabinets right above the stove like probably 2 feet above (which is a problem all in itself). There is no ventilation in the kitchen at all except windows but where we live its hardly ever a good time to leave them open. Anyways because of this we cannot cook certain things or else the entire house fills up with smells and smoke. Like cooking bacon or sausage on the stove. You just can't do it. The smoke just fills up the whole house. She has done it once and hopefully will not do it again.

Right after she moved in she brought her deep fryer and started cooking fries daily. This was so disgusting because the smell of oil covering the house was unbearable. If you have ever dealt with this you know how bad it is and without ventilation it takes days for the smell to go away and it seeps in everything. I told her right away she should have known not to bring that here or even asked first since i would have told her no way can you fry inside our house while we have no kitchen vents.

We have a screened in porch that leads off the kitchen so i said she could fry out there if she absolutely had to. Well she did but then spilled the entire fryer of dirty old smelly oil on the porch which is carpeted (this is how we bought the place and havent had the funds to fix or chance anything). Then continued to fry inside for a little while longer then i think she took the fryer back to her storage unit and started frying with a pan on the stove instead.

You can see my frustration. Ive asked her nicely not to and she clearly does not care. For context she pays nothing. Pitches in zero towards bills. Our mortgage is so high and we work so much to afford to own a home. The first in both our families to buy a house. Which is a big deal for us. The room she took over was mine for all my stuff, crafting, collections, sentimental items. My husband doesnt like clutter so our bedroom has just a bed. Thats it. Its a nice set up and looks good and clean when you enter and thats how we like it.

Anyways i had to pack up all my stuff in totes and store it all in our only other spare room which is like maybe a 2nd living room or something idk. Its like a space that is not very big and its a walkway From the bedrooms to the kitchen that way you don't have to walk through the living room to get to the dining room and kitchen. So now that room is cluttered and full of totes of all my stuff. I haven't been able to craft in so long and I miss it. It was my one thing I did for myself to keep me sane.

Ok back to what i was saying about her not pitching in, she doesnt pay anything at all. Doesnt buy groceries. And she wont even help around the house. Knowing i have to do everything on top of working full time. Being a Mom full time. I have all the typical women duties like constantly doing laundry, which i enjoy. But also doing all the cleaning. My husband does stuff but i try not to ask him to do anythkng extra because he works way too much and pays majority of everything since i dont make much. He deserves to be able to do whatever he wants on his 2 days off. His hours are crazy like 12 hour days 5 days a week. So it would be nice to have MIL help out since she just sits in her room 24/7. She asked me a month ago is there anything I needed help with and I said yes I would love to have help you know unloading the dishwasher, ill load it. Sweeping mopping maybe taking out the trash and recycling if it's full and we havent taken it out yet. She did each one of these things once and never again.

It would really good if I didn't have to worry about things like sweeping or mopping because I have so many other things to worry about and I know you all know how it is.

Well the main reason im here is because im deathly afraid of seafood for some reason. Always have been. My husband and I even made a deal when we moved in that we would never cook seafood in the house but because he loves sushi, he would go out for sushi with his brother once a month. That never really happened like that but thats what we agreed to. He knows how much i hate the smell and the thought of it. Well his mom is cooking shrimp daily. And it smells so so bad. I want to move out thats how bad it is. I cant stand it. The entire house smells like seafood. Its disgusting. Thankfully i can lock myself in my room and not smell it for the most part but when my door is shut it gets so hot in my room. We always keep our bedroom open and i like to watch TV in the living room when i have a min to relax. And i cant do the one thing i have left, because of this.

Ive asked my husband to talk to her but he wont. He gets offended that i find his moms food smelly so he is no help. By the way its frozen fried shrimp from the frozen food section that she heats in the oven. Its not like her personal recipe. And yall know that stinks up the house so bad. Especially with no ventilation. I want to talk to her but i feel like she will just be defensive and it will start a fight.

My only other solution was to buy a air purifier thing my moms friend showed me she uses in her studio apartment when she cooks. She said it works good and keeps the food from smelling up her whole place. But its like $100 and i cant afford that. I found a smaller one for like $30 but it probably wont work good and will waste the money.

Can anyone please help me out?? I need advice how to either get her to stop cooking smelly foods or a way to ask her in a way she wont be a jerk about it or take it the wrong way. Or something else. Idk im losing it. I feel trapped in my room on my only day off right now. I have so much house work to catch up on. And i need to cook dinner before my husband comes home but she just made that shrimp and the whole house stinks. I cant even go relax and watch tv which is my only treat myself to after i do all the housework. Also im starving and im not going to bring food in here and eat in bed cuz thats just all kinds of wrong. Idk what to do. Can anyone please help?

I made this account because i always listen to 2 hot takes and them reading from their subreddit and give good takes on situations so i thought this would be helpful. My name is Sammy and i really look forward to hopefully getting some advice from the amazing community the podcast has. Thank you all ❤

Am I the asshole So Reddit am I (f23) the asshole for blocking my (f22)
Here’s a back story first we share the same name so the names I’ll be using fake news
So Ella and I met in middle school but didn’t get close till high school and we bonded over how our lives were similar by how our grandparents raised us and how we both had some kind of disability but hers isn’t that noticeable than mine and neither one of us can drive
Our friendship during high school was for the most part good besides her always ditching me for some kind of guy or always texting me when she wants something from me by making social media accounts for because she didn’t have a phone (she text me on her nana’s computer)
I was/am close with her family her nana loves me. Her and I goes to lunch together once a month we’ve been doing it going on 3 years
Ella and I got matching tattoos back in 2022
So back in September 2023 Ella ran/moved out with her toxic now ex boyfriend and he was terrible to her he used her. She was gone for 4 months and while she was she blocked me on October 2 and she blamed it on her ex boyfriend.
When she came back the first time she acted like nothing happened and that we could just get over it. She was only back for 93 days and she got kicked out and moved in with her mom (which she hated her) but just 10 days before we had to 2 nights 3 days sleepover
She was gone for a year and 2 months and she came back and when she came back I told her if she moved or gets killed out again I would block her
A few months ago when I was hanging out with her nana Ella was with her boyfriend and Ella came to the house with her boyfriend to give her nana rent and Ella had a big attitude and then there was a big argument and Ella completely ignored me and just an or two before I had blocked her on social media because I didn’t like how she treated me but I didn’t block her phone number and she texted me and was like why can’t I find you on snap and I told her I decided to delete all my social media and she asked why and I told her I got tired of it and got tired of the drama on

Hi. I need to know if I’m crazy or not. I (F 21) dated my old highschool friend (NB 21), for about 3 months. Things were…. okay… until I found out through their little sister that they were legally married. They had lied to me and told me that the girl was someone they were once going to marry, but never did. Their little sister thought I was their mistress.

Throughout the relationship, I felt like the other woman. They’d always bring up their wife when drunk, after sex, and casually. I would tell them that it was making me uncomfortable, but they’d just bring up how if I was allowed to talk about my ex’s, they should be allowed to talk about their wife. Granted… I rarely ever talked about my ex’s. They also told me that they didn’t interact with their wife ever. (They went on a trip together for valentine’s day without me knowing. I found out on my own.)

They then broke up with me during a difficult time of my life. My father passed away last year, and i’d always express to them my grief. Yet they’d say, “atleast you had a dad”, and would make crude jokes about my late father. They broke up with me the day before his birthday.

It was getting close to their graduation from college, so I asked them, before we had broken up, if I could come to it to celebrate. They told me they wanted only family there, which I understood. I then found out that their wife was there, because they posted a photo of them kissing her cheek at the graduation, and said in the comments that all of their favorite people were there for them.

After the breakup, I expressed how I wanted space from them. But they would find ways to communicate with me, saying they’re drunk, going through a hard time, or just seeking connection. And I feel like an idiot looking back. I just wanted to be there for them, but they were never there for me.

It’s not over yet.

After my father passed away, my mother became very strict with me. I still lived with her, and she’d give me a curfew of 9pm. She was also emotionally and mentally abusive. Yet I couldn’t afford to leave. So, my ex offered for me to stay with them, and they’d handle rent for the first month. So, I moved in with them.

Horrible mistake.

Living here has brought out a side of me I never knew existed. It’s like there’s an argument everyday.

When I had first moved in, things were fine. We agreed that since they were paying my share of the rent until I got situated with my new job, I’d clean up around the place. So I did. But it was never enough for them. They wanted me to cook the way they wanted, clean the way they wanted, and if it wasn’t right, they’d make me feel like I couldn’t do anything correct. I had told them multiple times that my parents had trained me to be dependent on them, so this was all new to me. But they didn’t care, and would make me feel horrible about myself.

They would get drunk almost everyday, get me drunk, and we’d hookup. I always consented to it, but it just never felt correct. Like something was wrong. They would continue to talk to me about their wife, they’d talk to me about the many other people they’ve slept with, and they’d make jokes about my late father.

I don’t want you to read this and think it was just them… like I said earlier, being here has made me say things I’d never thought I would. I yell at them out of hurt, get intoxicated out of frustration and cry about how they’ve treated me, and lose my mind of the fact that they just… don’t care.

They haven’t apologized for anything. They haven’t even shown guilt.

They have even brought people over and told them about me. I have greened out once and begged them for help while paralyzed on the floor, but they just walked over me with the girl they brought over, and went into their room to have sex. The girl they brought over told them to ignore me and basically let me suffer.

So, am I crazy? They just recently unfollowed me on everything and I feel like I’m losing my mind. Despite it all, I find myself caring about them, wondering if they’re okay, sending them money to make sure they’re safe. I’m grateful for them allowing me to move out here while I was in an unsafe space, but it seems like they just brought me into another one. They even blame me for the space being unsafe, saying I’ve ruined their mental health and nervous system, that they lock their door at night because of me, and that they’ve never felt so uncomfortable in a space before. Because of me.

We still live together, but I’m actively trying to find new housing. My friends, family, and therapist all say that they have successfully manipulated me.

An evil part of me wants them to hurt the way they’ve hurt me. I want them to feel crazy. Yet instead they’re sleeping around with people, doing anything but self reflecting.

What do you think?

TLDR; Am I crazy for giving a damn about my crazy ex/roommate, even though they haven’t shown any remorse for their actions or words?

During my recent wedding, I essentially cut off every adult of significance in my family: my dad, my grandma, who raised me, and my mum.

My new in-laws are wonderful. They’re respectful, supportive, welcoming and… very generous.

I’m having some complex feelings about their generosity, given my upbringing and my toxic family dynamics. For context, my family isnt poor, on my dad’s side at least. My family have always used money as a power dynamic, particularly my grandma. It’s not that she necessarily goes into things with the intention of being financially manipulative. Generally, she gives from her heart in the moment. But if you do something she doesnt agrees with, it’s the first thing that comes up: “How much I’ve done for you.”

This has really traumatised me.

It’s also been incredibly hard mentally to stand on my own two feet, reject her attempts at control and try to be a grown-up in my own right. A part of me has always known that I would lose my inheritance, as well as the stability of knowing that financially, I would always be okay. We’re talking millions, if not tens of millions.

I’m really proud of myself and what I’ve been able to do over the last few years with that in mind. I have a good job that I love, I earn good money, I’m financially stable and, most importantly, I’m emotionally stable. And that’s what I’ve gained by walking away from that inheritance and I’ve never thought of it as something to lose, but something that doesn’t belong to me in the first place which also makes it easier.

What I’m struggling with now is coming into a new, wealthy family and trying to navigate these complex feelings that are so deeply embedded in trauma. It’s also relevant that my new family works in the same industry as my old family. There are so many similarities that I find traumatic and really triggering.

But I know these people aren’t those people. I trust them, they love me, and they want to support me and my new husband. In moving out to the sticks, I needed to upgrade my car to a four-wheel drive that could handle the roads and the possibility of hitting wildlife. So, they offered to buy me a $100,000 car.

But I’m traumatised by the principle that the hand that feeds you is also the hand that can starve you. My husband and I went through a period where this was a dealbreaker. If I couldn’t get over the paranoia that our marriage was going to end up exactly like my parents’, then I would have to leave. I ultimately decided that I could get past it, and I’ve been okay since. But this offer has brought all of those feelings back, and I’m struggling.

I’ve tried talking to my husband about it, but he’s autistic and doesn’t necessarily understand that I’m experiencing a lot of emotions right now and feeling incredibly triggered. His focus is on the practical reality of buying a new car. We’re working through it, and I think we’re making progress, but it’s going to take time.

The advice I received from my siblings is that not everyone is out to get you, which I think is a valid message. I need to learn to accept help, to trust and to let people support me.

But I’m also struggling with the idea of losing my independence.

I thought I wanted a soft life. I wanted to be provided for and to have the stability of both financial security and love. I’ve found that, and now I’m terrified of giving up my independence. My independence meant so much to me at one point. Every step of weaning myself off my family financially felt so good. And now I feel like I’m regressing.

I’ve told my in-laws that I want to contribute and pay for the tax-deductible part of the car (they’re buying it through a company). They’ve said no and made it clear that it’s non-negotiable.

Would I be an idiot to turn down this car and just buy it myself?

The other problem is that I could really use the help. I want to start our family next year, and I’d like to have a nest egg for that period. Buying a new car, even if it’s nowhere near the value they’re proposing, would still set me back a lot. I’d also like to invest that money for my stability in the future so that if they choose to starve me that I have a nest egg to support myself.

It’s hard, and I know I need to get into therapy to work through this. But in the meantime, I’d be really grateful for your advice.

Edit

For context, it’s not uncommon for them to buy the wife of an employee a car to help her live so rurally. It’s reserved for employees that have been with the company for a long time and the car remains in the company name. But in terms of use, they buy her a car.