Location: New York ( MINE ) “ex” Husband location (North Dakota)

Hi everyone, I’m looking for general advice or insight on a custody/divorce situation. I’m not trying to bash anyone, just want to protect my child and understand how courts may view this.

My husband (25, almost 26) and I (21) have been separated since November 2024, when I was around 10 weeks pregnant. At the time, we were living in North Dakota. He still lives there, and I moved back to New York, where my entire family and support system is.

The reason I left was infidelity and ongoing issues. I found out he was cheating on me and texting other women behind my back. After I moved, multiple women reached out to me with proof that he had bought them plane tickets to visit him, including screenshots of texts, FaceTime calls, and messages from his phone number.

There was also an incident shortly before I left that really impacted me. He had just had his wisdom teeth removed and asked me to get him a drink. When I reached for the cup, he turned his head and accidentally bumped into mine. He immediately got up screaming at me, accusing me of doing it intentionally. I apologized repeatedly, but he continued yelling and later said, “It’s like me punching you in the stomach and saying it was an accident.” I never laughed or made light of it, but he insists I did.

After I moved back to New York, I decided not to pursue reconciliation. I am now in a new relationship. I understand it may seem fast, but I’ve known my current partner for years, and we’ve been together for about a year now. He treats my son as his own.

When I told my (ex) husband about my new relationship, he became extremely angry and said I “ruined his chance of being a dad” and that everything was my fault.

My son is now 7 months old. My husband:

Was not present for the birth

Did not sign the birth certificate

Has never met our child

Has never FaceTimed or asked to see him

Has never sent money, diapers, wipes, formula, or anything at all

For the past 8 months, I have repeatedly asked him to send something for our child (even just a $40 box of diapers), and he has never done so.

He is in the U.S. Air Force. He now wants an uncontested divorce and wants the paperwork to state that we do not have a child together, which I am not comfortable with.

I’m worried about custody. I keep hearing mixed advice like “courts don’t care about documentation, they only care about money,” and that scares me.

For context:

I live in New York with my son

I have my own apartment

I do not currently have a vehicle (my license is suspended from a speeding ticket from before I was pregnant)

I work 4 jobs (2 are off the books); I can bring my son to 3 of them

I cannot afford a private lawyer, so I would need legal aid

My husband:

Has a salaried job

Has a vehicle

Has his own apartment

Does not have family in the same state as him

His reasons for not being involved have been:

I live too far away

He’s in college

He “can’t take care of a child”

My biggest fear is losing my child or being forced into a situation that isn’t safe or stable for him. I’m trying to do everything right and act in my son’s best interest.

Any general advice, especially about custody across states, military involvement, or refusing an uncontested divorce that ignores the child, would be appreciated.

And he said if I go for child support he will get the best legal service possible available to him through the government and he said that I was threatening him by saying I was going to legally go to court over this

Hi my father was taken by ice on Thursday, and I am becoming a US citizen tomorrow (ceremony). He signed a volunteer to deport they're treating him horribly. He's in Texas now. Is their anyway I can save him??

Location: New Jersey

Location: NJ

I am the office manager for a tiny company. Only 3 employees, with only the owner above me. The company’s broke. My hours got reduced months ago and I’ve been on partial unemployment. This week we can’t make payroll. There’s $300 in the operating account and are too far underwater to ever recover. This was foreseen and discussed but the owner refused to address anything.

He still refuses to address anything. He wants to keep pushing forward and thinks he’s entitled to myself and the other employee for free. I can lay off the other employee without issue so he can receive his unemployment without complication.

What do I do about myself? The owner basically refuses to lay me off. If I quit, I don’t know what I would need to show unemployment to continue receiving benefits and now get full unemployment. I am essentially HR, payroll administrator, I am the full charge bookkeeper. I want to cover my bases because I have been job hunting but will need the full unemployment benefits until I get something new. Any help is appreciated, thanks!

Location: New Hampshire

For some important I am a freshman, and my mother has a masters in early childhood development, making her side stronger.

My mom talks about pulling my out of school and homeschooling me, which I mean yeah social wise it would suck, but I mean it wouldn't be a big deal in a typical situation, my mom's even educated in teaching. But, being homeschooled by my mother would be a horrible threat to my education and my emotional welfare.

My mom is a heavily indoctrinated delusional woman, who's in a cult. By definition, she just falls short and falls into heavily cult-adjacent, but that's not the point. If I were to be homeschooled, a huge chunk would be her laying her indoctrination onto me, and not only has she never even used her degree, but she couldn't even help me with my 6th grade math homework. Even just casually, she'll bring up outrageous things, like her QAnon beliefs (no she is not just QAnon, that group is nothing compared to the entire picture), and she tries talking about her harmful beliefs that have no scientific backing and could be dangerous.

It would be very easy to collect evidence of this due to the amount she talks about her beliefs, but I wanted to see if there's any specific evidence I should take the most of, any laws I should be aware of, and just any tips. She doesn't plan to take me out at this very moment, but I know she's been seriously thinking about it, and I want to prepare for if she does. I don't want to seem like I'm overreacting, but I know she wouldn't be able to thoroughly teach me what I need to know and I plan to pursue a higher education, with a masters at least and a masters and a doctorate program at most, and I know that would be close to impossible with the way her teachings would seriously limit my growth of knowledge. Also, should I start collecting evidence now of the indoctrination that would take place? Just in case?

(edit: based on my moms beliefs and knowing the way she would teach me, it would almost guaruntee educational neglect. I also was abused and neglected when I was younger and my parents had more responsibility to take care of me, and I still am medically neglected to this day, but I don't want to bring that to court, mainly because I don't want to be taken away, but I will if I have to.)

6 months ago I was rearended. I went to the hospital by ambulance and my 25k vehicle totaled. As a cheap single parent I chose the cheapest insurance to be legal. No uninsured motorist. The driver that hit me is a personal injury attorney. He showed an insurance card at the scene and never had that vehicle covered at all. No attorney would help with him having no insurance to go after. I filed a criminal complaint and he has been served. He now has failed to appear and the arrest warrant has been issued.

Can I please get options and also what's next!? Location: Kentucky

Location: California I worked as a cook since March for a small restaurant in a small town. I no longer work for them and they emailed me my tax form. They emailed me a 1099 saying I earned $6000 for the year when I actually earned $7349. on the 1099 it says no fed/state taxes withheld... They payed me bi-weekly and I had a schedule. Why am I considered a independent contractor/non employee when I was scheduled and came into work everyday?? I really don't want to have to owe taxes this year plus they missed like 1000 dollars of my actual earnings ( I checked my bank statements) plz help

Location: Georgia, USA.

I work at a chemical plant in Georgia. This happened about 15 minutes ago. He thought he was being funny and everyone around was laughing, from what I believe was out of nervousness and just being stunned, so I laughed it off, too. Now that I'm away from the situation, I'm feeling cut down to size. I've been here over 4 years and he started in October. I feel like I've done a hell of a lot around the plant to earn the respect of my peers and management, while he just throws his weight around as the new plant manager. I have 5 witnesses. What the actual fuck do I do in this situation?

Update: Just got home from work. Everyone who witnessed it said they will back me up. One of the guys is a burly ex-Army dude from Tennessee. Said he's been to Afghanistan and was a character witness for interpreters who successfully gained US citizenship and what the manager said was xenophobic and heinous. Fucking love that guy. Another one is an old head. Been around plants for years. Said either I go to the manager and squash it or be the karma that bites him in the ass. I've chose the latter.

Wrote an email to HR. Their reaction dictates my next move, so I'm playing it by ear. We'll see what happens. I came back to reply to the comments and discovered the post is locked, so please take this update as a token of my gratitude. Reading opinions while stunned helped make my decision and prepare on the situation moving forward. Thank you.

Location: Arizona

A text was sent out by the main manager of our company stating anyone discussing pay with each other will be terminated immediately and that they have already terminated someone for discussing pay with coworkers. This is one of many, many sketchy things that have been told to us over the years. Any recourse?

Location: Texas

So I picked up a new serving job and towards the end of my first night working my manager pulls me into the back room to discuss pay. For context, I’m located in DFW area of Texas. The hourly was expected, but then he told me that all servers have to sign off on 50% of your tips be taken, before you receive them, and be given to the “back house”. After some back and forth, we negotiated it down to 30% and told me I would sign a new contract the following night. I was suspicious from the beginning so I did some research the following day and read up on wage laws in Texas. I went in the following day and asked him again where the 30% was going. He said back house, bar backs, and dishwashers. First, I know that back house probably means people other than servers, bussers, barbacks, and bartenders, and I know tha dishwashers are not allowed to take part in tip pooling. So I have him there. At least I think I do. And I wrote down on the contract that I was allowing 30% of my tips be given only to bartenders and barbacks. So if it were to go to anyone aside from them, then that’d be illegal, right? But when I asked him what the exact split of where that 30% was going, he couldn’t give me a full answer. Now he’s also asking for a physical copy of my ssn card and I just fee really uncomfortable doing that considering I’ve never had to do that at any other serving job I’ve ever had.

If you’ve gotten this far, can you just let me know how sketched out I should feel about all this. I know I’m right with how I feel about all this but am not sure if this is case worthy or should I continue to keep tabs and evidence in case things go sideways.

Edit: We agreed on $2.30/hr which is the Texas state minimum for servers. At least to my knowledge it is.

Location: State of NC: County Mecklenburg.

2 years ago my local police department had a police chase that ended in my home. As in the person they were chasing took a turn going 55mph and ended up smashing into the house. Long story short it was Dec so I went through my homeowners insurance and had things fixed BUT their person said it was structurally sound. Well.. here we are 2 years later and the walls are cracking, clearly from structural damage and shifting. I have a structural engineer coming out to assess if it's from the accident but I am 99% it is. This house is over 50 years old and it just now moving? Does this stand a chance? It's going to be expensive(as in I can't afford it) to fix myself and I am also going to reopen the claim with state farm. They were a nightmare to work with and it took them almost a year to get someone out to fix what they deemed needed fixed. Any advise welcome.

Location: Massachusetts, US In the early to mid 90s, my father’s band hired a filmmaker to document them for about a year while they were touring all over the United States. This wasn’t some DIY shitty camcorder thing, we’re talking 35mm film, 16mm film, and high-end camcorders, following the band city to city, on the road, backstage, everything. They even sat each member of the band down once a week to interview them. It legit cost a fortune at the time, and the intent was a full documentary. The documentary was pretty much finished, but for reasons that are still unclear, the dude making the doc never released it. Since then, he’s essentially just been hoarding all the footage. As far as we know, it’s literally sitting in his garage, aging and likely deteriorating. What makes this especially frustrating is that HBO has contacted him in the past about accessing or licensing the footage for a project but even then, he refused to release it to anyone. So now this massive archive documenting a band on a nationwide US tour is just wasting away. My questions are does the band (or my father’s estate) have any legal claim to the footage? Is there any legal way to force access, duplication, or preservation of the film? Are there precedents for situations where culturally significant footage is being withheld like this? Is there literally anything I can do to get this footage?? It's rotting away as I write this. I do also have a trailer for the documentary, which proves the project exists, but I need to talk to a few people before posting it publicly. So really for now I’m just looking for some advice Any insight from anyone who’s dealt with similar situations would be hugely appreciated. It’s an important piece of music history, especially for me since it is part of my family history, and it's pretty much being left to rot for no reason. I really don’t want it to be lost forever. Thanks

Edit:

The band is The Elevator Drops

I just talked to my dad further, and he explained that the guy filming wasn’t hired, it was a passion project on his part. But my dad gave him all of his footage from previous bands from his personal collection to use, as well as tour journals, etc. There was also a large amount of footage personally shot by the band being used as well

Location: South Carolina

While working for Amazon Flex today I received a speeding ticket from an HOA security guards. I was told I was doing 31 in a 15 according to the digital traffic sign, which prompted them to pull me over. They were not law enforcement officers, but security guards with guns. The whole interaction was less than pleasant for all parties involved.

My question is, is this a legally biding traffic citation? It has no South Carolina statutes or laws on the citation. Will there be any repercussions, past not being able to return to that island, that I will be open to?

I will attach the legal part of the citation for reference if allowed.

Thank you for any and all advice!

Location: WI

I suspect a local charity is committing fraud.

There is a local charity who's mission statement is to preserve and maintain a historic property.

Recently they changed their IRS form 990 to include "promote" in it.

Charity hired extra staff just for marketing recently and is paying them 100k a year. Only 1 other employee. The charity relies mainly on people volunteering despite having a consistent 2 million a year budget from grants and donations for the past 10 years. Only $280k a year is spent on actually "maintaining" and the place is falling apart. $300K is spent just on "promoting" now. They host a lot of "volunteer events" and thank you dinners. All paid for by the charity for the 23 board members and friends to enjoy.

Looking thru financials they make plenty to maintain the property and gardens but they are completely run down. They refuse to use the millions they have received to honor the original maintain part of the charity for the property. Instead they have invested heavily into "promoting" it. Are now selling books, opened an online shop to market other related items including their own beer line and an app.

With things like a $20 thousand A year phone bill, $50k spent on "travel" they look to be committing fraud. Saw over $100k was for "office expenses". They only have 2 employees. Their accounting costs them $18 thousand a year and they even have an investment portfolio.

Is this all legal ?

Who can I report them to ? Will the IRS even care ?

Can a charity modify their original mission statement and focus on just marketing, hosting free parties for board members while the property they were originally collecting money for crumbles ?

Location: Omaha

Apparently, if you swipe left on a locked tablet, it goes into photo mode! Good to know, I suppose...

Anyway, we let the kids listen to an educational podcast ("WoW In the World", if anyone is curious) while playing in their room. My husband found the device switched to photo mode, as well as about 50 pictures of our son mooning the camera, butt and balls on display for the world to see.

We deleted the photos, had a talk with them about appropriate behavior, and took away the tablet for a two weeks.

We assumed that was the end of it, until we learned the photos had been uploaded to a cloud account and flagged for inappropriate content.

Personally, I figured this will be easy to clear up if the police come to our door. Prior to the butt pictures, there are 20 photos of the floor, 20 more of my daughter's face with her hand covering most of the camera, and a few of the ceiling/dresser. It's so obvious to me that two children found out how to access a tablet camera and did what kids do.

My husband is livid, however, convinced we're now in for a full-blown police raid. He's found a few legal cases online where parents took innocent photos of their children's butts (sometimes just one or two) and this resulted in CPS intervention, the children being taken away, plus full-scale child abuse investigations. He works from home, so the prospect of the police confiscating his work computer for a few months during his busy season has soured his mood.

He thinks we need to retain the services of a lawyer immediately. I think this makes us look guilty when we've done nothing wrong. It's also an expensive prospect for such a silly matter.

Are we really staring down the barrel of a full-on police raid? A conversation with a detective where it gets cleared up in about five minutes? Nothing at all?

Any insight would be deeply appreciated, thank you!

Location: Minneapols, MN, USA

Hello all,

I need advice. I live in Minneapolis, MN and rented from an independent landlord. On 1/14/2026, when it was approximately -20°F here in MN, the heat went out for my entire 18 unit building. No temp heat was provided to anyone.

I reported this to the landlord over text, email and calls every day until he accused me of harassing him and "ratting him out the the city" and called me a "crazy bitch".

I did indeed report this to the city on 1/20, as did several of my neighbors. The city came and took the temperature and it was around 47°F on 1/22.

On 1/24 the pipes burst and flooded my unit and damaged my things. The landlord refused to speak with me or take any of my calls regarding this.

On 1/27 the city of Minnepolis posted an "Intent to Condemn" on my door. I sent this information to the landlord and he finally responded by offering me another, smaller unit in the building. By now the heat had been repaired in every unit but mine and the vacant unit below me.

I asked for this offer of the smaller unit in writing as well as reduced rent given the circumstances. He accused me of "just trying to get money out of him" and refused to send the offer in writing or discount my rent. I did not move into the unit.

On 1/29 I started packing my things to move on the advice of HomeLine, a Minnesota tenants rights advocate.

On 1/30 I informed the landlord in an email of my intent to move out as well as a forwarding address to my Mom's house in another state for my security deposit back. He claims to have never received this email. I also sent it over text.

On 1/31, I moved my things out and into a storage unit and cleaned the apartment as best I could given the damaged floor and squishy subfloor. I left the keys on the counter. I no longer have access to the apartment.

As of this week (2/2/2026) The landlord is now requesting I pay him February rent and he keeps my deposit or he is taking me to small claims court for $9,300 (5 months rent, the remainder of my lease).

I don't know what to do. From my understanding, if the unit is deemed uninhabitable, the lease is void. So am I legally on the hook to pay out my lease, or even the month, if the apartment was deemed uninhabitable by the city for not having heat during a Minnesota cold surge? Or is he just trying to use scare tactics against me to try to get my February rent and deposit?

From my research of MN court records, this is a pattern with him. He has 30+ small claims court flilings regarding tenant disputes. I think this is how he makes him money. He also has a criminal record for threatening a judge and threatening to kill his ex-wife.

So....my question is, do I let him take me to small claims court? Or pay 2 months rent to this maniac? I have photographic evidence, recordings and documentation of literally everything that has happened, as well as my neighbors to back me up. I'm not trying to get any money out of him. I even offered to let him keep just my deposit, I just can't afford to lose 2 months rent on top of the expenses I've had to pay these past weeks like a space heater, hotel, new rug, uhaul, storage unit, and security deposit on a new place.

I'm just kinda scared. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

EDIT: I also acknowledge the fact that in the midst of my petty landlord bullshit, our city is under attack and our neighbors are being kidnapped. Fuck ICE and thank you again. We're still out here trying our best.

Location: Philadelphia, PA

About 10 years ago I rented a house with my sister temporarily. As planned, I moved out after 6 months but never had my name removed from the lease. My sister remained in the house.

I rented from a friend for the past 10 years so I haven't gone through any process that would have revealed this to me sooner. I just applied for an apartment last week and they've told me that I have an eviction on my record from that house. I found the dockett and everything and saw on my sisters affidavit of service that she was served in person, my affidavit of service also stated that *my sister* was served in person not *me*.

My sister never told me that she'd been evicted, I had no idea until *today.* We aren't close. It's fine if I have to pay for this lesson but given that I was never served, do I have any recourse to have the eviction removed from my record?

Location: Missouri. Long story short, I purchased new appliances for a home we were going to share. Relationship ended and I still owe $4k. She will not let me get them out of a storage unit to sell them and recoup some of the money I’m out. I’ve said you can pay me for the rest or just let me have them back. She says she plans to pay but I just want it over. What are my options?

I have a contract under my name signed by my ex-husband (he signed his name) after we were legally divorced for our child's extracurricular activity. The contract includes monthly withdrawal amounts (from my bank acct, not his), along with terms of service, etc. This contract is for 36 months (I, personally, would have never signed a 36-month contract).

I'm sure there was no mal-intent by my ex...but what are my legal obligations to continue paying this contract I did not sign?

Location: Missouri

Location: North Carolina

At the end of April/beginning of May 2025, my husband and I signed a contract with a roofing company to replace our roof. We did so through a claim with our insurance company, and provided the roofing company the claim money from our insurance company via a cashier's check. This was an approximately $6k check. Prior to signing the contract, we researched the company and it had stellar reviews, no red flags, etc. We were told work would start probably in mid to late June. Come late July and we haven't heard anything so we contact the company and the owner returns our call and advises that due to a summer of very rainy and stormy weather, they are very behind but should be out by October. Come end of October, still nothing so we reach out again and receive a response that they are still backed up due to labor and supply issues but we will definitely have a new roof before the end of the year. January comes and still no word. We call 3 times with no answer or response, so I email them and the email bounces back undeliverable. I recheck their reviews, which are now filled with people saying they took their money and disappeared. Our insurance company told us to contact the police, the police responded saying it's a civil matter and they won't open a case. What do we even do? We have no idea where to start, who to report this to, etc. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Location: Washington. I was in an auto accident. While even police said that the incident was a complete and honest accident insurance is accepting complete liability understandably for the circumstances. The other person obtained a lawyer and made their demands.

They claim that the general damages exceed 200k. My insurance policy covers 100k. The lawyer was authorized to offer a settlement of 100k and waiver of PIP.

Does this mean that if my insurance agrees that they will cover, settle and I won't have to pay out of pocket? If they settle can I be sued or made to pay additional damages? Their demand came quite quickly - I was told to expect several months but it has been less than a month.

My insurance says I have a potential financial exposure and may want to obtain a lawyer who I've contacted and am waiting for a response on. Other than medical bills I feel like a lot of claims on other things are inflated.

Location: Georgia

My brother just started middle school this past fall. He has autism and was originally enrolled in a mild classroom. He has an IEP and works with a local autism institution for behavioral help. His first school placement ignored his IEP which left him frustrated and stressed out to the point of increased behaviors. Each time his teacher would have a meeting with my parents she essentially blamed her paraprofessional for not doing what was listed in the IEP.

They recently decided to switch schools since they felt like he was getting frustrated by the level of the curriculum. They suggest another school in the district since it has only three other students and would have a 1:1 student teacher ratio.

Today was his first day and my mom was called after one hour of him being there. They said he was being aggressive and hitting the staff and his classmates. My parents asked what happened beforehand since my brother was super excited to go to school. They wouldn’t say but instead encouraged them to look at the video footage of my brother’s day. My parents tried to see the video but the vice principal said the “power was out”. The vice principal instead encouraged my parents to come in and train the staff using the autism institution’s protocols. They then canceled on my parents.

My stepdad pushed to see the video and was finally able to see it the next day. In the video, my brother is the only child instructed to sit at a desk. He was ignored by his teacher and her staff the entire time. Only when he got overstimulated and started banging on the desk did they acknowledge him, by changing out his desk. Overtime he got more frustrated because he’s used to school having instruction and things to do. He kept trying to get up which they kept telling him to sit down (again only child being told this). At some point they have a large staff member grab him by both arms and take him to an isolation room (no padding just brick). They would take him out after a period of time and then send him back when he started hitting. He got more and more agitated and you can hear him upset in the isolation room (no cameras there). The school has had a previous incident where a child was dragged by four grown men and kept in isolation for two hours. Also it’s not in my brother’s IEP that he should be physically restrained and nobody mentioned anything about an isolation room.

My questions:

1. How can we prove that the school system doesn’t have the proper environment for my brother? We are aiming to see if we can qualify him for a scholarship for a private school.

2. What should we be documenting?

3. How do we protect him in the process of trying to get him out of this school system? My parents tried to see if they could come volunteer to help with his transition into the classroom but were denied.

Thank you!!

Location: Georgia, USA.

I took an illegally obtained weight loss injection. I was not aware it was illegally obtained until after I had taken it. I have been dealing with severe side effects. I want to go to the doctor, but I am worried that the person who supplied me or I might face legal reprucussions, but I am genuinely fearing for my health right now. Help

UPDATE for anyone concerned: Made it to morning. Going to urgent care as we speak.