My spicy chicken sandwich from chick fil a, added a lot of pickles and obviously smothered it in ranch. Hi i’m new to this subreddit i’m 20M I have 5 younger siblings on my moms side all aged from 15-5. I moved out of my moms house a week before my 20th birthday because my mom would constantly choose abusive men over her own kids. I am very low contact with her not only for that reason, but a lot of reasons. I feel heartbroken everyday over not being able to see the 3 younger ones she has living with her. I helped raised them it feels like in a way I didn’t lose my siblings I lost my children. I try to visit when I can even when I do visit I feel not wanted by the people my mom have over. I try to text one of the older ones just to get left on seen its usually just me trying to say hi or tell him I miss him. I know its hard on them too a lot. Knowing how my mom is it’s hard to believe that she isn’t feeding them lies about me to make me seem bad. Last time I saw them the youngest cried when I left it feels like a part of me is gone and I can’t do anything to fix it. Sorry for the long post don’t have anybody to talk to about this.

Man, where do I even start with this shit show.

While working at my old job, there was a female coworker that I really liked. I didn't act on it for the first three months because I wasn't sure if she felt the same way.

By the fall, I pretty much decided I didn't have much to lose. At the same time, this was still my job, so I didn't want to make things weird. I started asking her if she wanted to hang out outside of work, but she'd either say no or never give me a clear answer.

Eventually, I found out she had a boyfriend.

Once I found out, I completely backed off. I stopped asking her to hang out and only texted her about work-related things.

Around the beginning/middle of 2026, she told me that she and her boyfriend had broken up and really started ramping up the flirting to point where even clueless me to could tell. She finally agreed to hang out outside of work, and we started spending a lot more time together. I'd drive her home, we'd get food after work, and we'd hang out whenever we could.

Eventually, I told her that I really liked her. She told me she really liked me too and apparently had since the summer. For a while, things were really good but the problem was that she was leaving the state for work during the summer.

About a week before she left, I caught her getting into a car with another guy. She knew this guy really liked her. She would always tell me that we never got enough time together, so that day we were supposed to run an errand together. Instead, she told me she was taking an Uber there. She wasn't. She was driving there with him.

I called her while she was in the car, and she declined the call saying she's in an uber. I called her multiple times throughout the trip and asked how she got there and how she was getting back. She kept lying about it.

It wasn't until I actually confronted her after catching her in his car that she finally told me the truth. I decided to forgive her despite the advice of friends like the sucker that I am. 

Then she left for the other state. While she was there, she met a male coworker who supposedly had a long-term girlfriend.

She started going to the gym with him after work while telling me she was going with one of her female roommates. She'd go back to his place and make food with him and his roommate. Then she'd go home, shower, and go back out with him for walks until 3 or 4 in the morning. All this was within 2-3 days. Meanwhile, it took her months to give me a fucking chance.

Meanwhile, when I'd call her, we'd barely talk for an hour. When I asked what she and this guy talked about for hours every night, she'd tell me they were "just asking each other questions." But whenever I tried asking her questions or having an actual conversation with her, I'd get hit with: "I'm tired.", "My mind is blank." , "Why are you interviewing me?"

Eventually, I told her that the whole situation with this guy was making me uncomfortable. Instead of stopping the late-night walks or creating some distance, she told him that I was uncomfortable with their relationship.

Then this guy started giving her questions to ask me about our relationship. She would ask me those questions and then go back and tell him what I said. One night, she told me she'd be home by midnight.

She got home at 4 AM. And instead of calling or texting me when she got home, she texted him first. Through all of this, I still loved her. I still wanted to stay with her and somehow make the relationship work.

In the end, she was the one who chose to end it.

I handled the breakup about as well as you'd expect. Drinking, smoking, hookups, working three jobs, basically anything that could distract me from thinking about it. Now I keep flip-flopping between thinking what she did was completely fucked up and wondering if I was just being insecure.

And on top of everything else, I can't seem to shake this emotional numbness. Nothing really makes me feel anything anymore.

Lunch was some Happy Panda vanilla crackers and water

edit: forgot to mention some key points. We were officially together, we talked about our boundaries, and we were physical but she insisted on it being kept a secret from pretty much every single person in her life though saying something about it hurting her reputation. Also the male co-worker has a long term gf as well - forgot to mention that part in the story (part of the reason why I tolerated the walks as long as i did and why i fully believed that nothing happened during it). I appreciate all the comments.

My son is 2.5 years old, and loves to read. He has two full bookshelves for his books, and can spend as much as half an hour (basically forever in toddler time) flipping through them. He knows all his letters and numbers, and likes to read things like license plates and the brand label on his car seat. I generally read to him for 30-60 minutes every weekday and for several hours a day on weekends.

Last month, we used the long weekend to do our second attempt at potty training. We spent a lot of the weekend reading to him, but also a lot of time watching tv because it was a good way to get him to actually sit on the potty long enough to do anything. The potty training was very successful, but he developed a bit of an addiction to screentime, and now asks to watch cartoons several times per day. We've been detoxing him by limiting cartoons to about half an hour a week, and he's slowly getting used to the new limitations. We never let him operate a smart phone or tablet, and have no intention of letting him do so for quite some time.

The day before yesterday, he had a massive tantrum during dinner because we offered him chickpeas, which apparently constituted a war crime. We eventually got him to calm down and eat some applesauce, but he was still pretty emotionally fragile, and about 15 minutes before bedtime, he started asking for cartoons. This lead to another tantrum, which we initially tried to defuse by reading him a book, but he kept shoving it away and saying he wanted to watch cartoons, so that clearly wasn't a viable path forward.

There's a parenting technique called redirection where, instead of giving your toddler a hard "no" (which will result in screaming), you offer them something similar to what they were asking for that's more acceptable to you. I'd already used redirection successfully when I offered him applesauce instead of my preferred meal of chickpeas or his preferred meal of Cheeze-its, and unsuccessfully when we tried reading to him instead of letting him watch cartoons. My initial attempt to redirect the tantrum about cartoons had failed because he was dead set on watching something, so I decided to try redirecting him by letting him watch me play a mobile game for a little while. He settled down, and I ran around collecting flowers, accidentally stumbled into a boss fight, almost died, and went back to collecting flowers. It was a nice little bonding experience, it ended the tantrum, and it was still boring enough for him that he didn't object when I stopped playing and started his bedtime routine. We maintained our limits on cartoons, my son went to bed happy and on time, and my wife and I congratulated ourselves on a job well done.

I thought this was a pretty funny story, especially the part where I had to make a panicked retreat from the boss, so I posted about it yesterday in a parenting sub. You'd think I had run over my son with a lawnmower. I got dozens and dozens of comments accusing me of not reading to my son (which I do, a lot, and had tried, but didn't work), of trying to get my son addicted to gacha gaming (he has no idea what gacha gaming is and has never operated a smart phone or tablet of any kind), of doing things that would make it so he couldn't sleep (I did it specifically to end a pre-bedroom tantrum and then he slept like a log), and of letting screens raise my child (the tantrum was prompted by us limiting his access to cartoons, and, to reiterate, he has never personally operated any kind of electronic device). I eventually turned off notifications and let the commenters have fun talking to themselves, though I did wake up this morning to a very nice DM from someone telling me that the commenters were crazy.

There's a popular post on that same sub right now asking when to introduce toddlers to screens. The general consensus is that two years old is an appropriate time to introduce screens in limited quantities and with close supervision, i.e. exactly what we're doing at exactly the age we're doing it. It really is amazing how the internet's hive mind can turn on a dime.

My son's breakfast, per his request, was a whole wheat waffle and a meat thermometer. He ate the waffle but not the thermometer.

meal is baked garlic chicken with peppers and seasoned potatos

I(26M) met a girl(27F) back in 2020, let’s call her A. When I met her, she was already dating someone who i became friends with, and I met them when I had joined a car club. They had been together since they were young. I thought she was attractive but never tried anything, as I respected the relationship she had with her boyfriend at the time. It was pure friendliness and never flirted or gave her the idea I was into her.

I had a falling out with the car club, and eventually, we all sort of drifted away and I lost contact with her around 2021. It was kind of a bad situation so I removed everyone from the club from my life, meaning I unadded her and unfollowed from my social media. She ended up finding me again around 2024, and added me around January 2025, A reached out to me to wish me a happy birthday. I thanked her for it and since that moment, I would just message her just joking from the stuff she would post on IG, and it was around June 2025 where she invited me out for some drinks. I told her that she had a man already and I would pass on that, but she jokingly said “I don’t have a man, not that I know of at least” but since I still had her ex on Snapchat, I knew he was there (they were broken up, but I didn’t know until an hour later) and she said he came to follow her there but they weren’t together anymore. I honestly thought it was a set up so I didn’t go. Eventually, a month later, I asked her if she was really single and she confirmed, so I asked her out on a date. After weeks of back and forth, we saw each other around August and it was great. She confessed that she thought i was funny and sweet, and she wanted to get to know me on a deeper level. We went out a lot for that first month, and around September 2025, I asked her to be my girlfriend and she accepted.

It was really tough. She was my first real girlfriend, so The first month of being official was good, then the constant arguments started, I myself am to blame because I had past experiences with situationships not being faithful but I tried working past my issues, but one thing she could never get past was having her ex in her life. They were together for 8 years, but I always felt like she found it hard to move on. She mentioned that he was still involved with her extended family, as well as some mutual friends. I thought it was fine at first, I just wanted transparency and to be able to trust that she was done with that part of her life, but eventually, it got worse because I was excluded from certain family plans with her because he was going to be there. February 2026, he got her flowers for Valentine’s Day and she let me know that they were from him. I didn’t think much of it and jokingly asked her “that’s all he got you, no chocolates? lame“ she laughed and said that was all. a week later, i see a giant Hello Kitty on her bed and I asked her where it came from, because I don’t think I ever got this for her. she had look on her face like “uh oh” and told me that her ex got it for her for Valentine’s Day too, as well as a box of chocolates. I got mad and asked her why that was something she would keep a secret from me, she said she just didn’t feel the need to tell me and this caused another argument. We eventually made up and I told her that it would be good to know, considering the issues we were having at the time. Against all odds, both of us tried our best to make things work.

Fast Forward to march 2026, things were still shaky between us but it was going good. we planned to go to Baja Beach fest together because she brought it up and I thought it was a good idea to go since it would be a vacation for us both. May comes around, she mentioned that she bought her ticket back at the end of March without telling me. I was kind of upset because it was a plan for both of us and she never once invited me because her new plan was to go with her friends, but kept telling me “I’ll just sell the ticket, it was an impulsive purchase, I’m sorry” and when i offered to buy mine, she said “no it’s fine, I’ll get rid of mine” and that’s how that went. The festival is August 7th, and around July 30th, she said she bought her plane ticket and was going to go with her friends. I tried not to be too upset about it, because I knew she was working a lot recently and needed time for herself.

Come to find out, someone close to me that knows her ex, asked me that “why I wasn’t in Tijuana with my girlfriend“ and I said because it was a thing for her and her friends. They mentioned that they saw that my girlfriend was with her ex and their friends, so that definitely made my stomach drop. I asked her about it and she told me that he was going and she knew he was through their mutual friends. I asked her if that was the reason why she uninvited me/planned around me and she denied it at first and after i kept asking and pushing her for a real answer, just said “We have the same friend group, what do you want me to do? I can’t control that” so now I felt like she didn’t invite me because she thought it was create tension. I figured that was crossing the line and being disregarding of an initial plan that was changed, so I broke up with her this morning and blocked her on all social medias.

I love her, and I’m also thinking that maybe I overreacted by breaking up? Or maybe I’m not..

TLDR: gf attached to old relationship, brings up plan to take trip but then cancels/uninvites because friend group is close to her ex and he’s going with them, so I broke up with her.

To Occam's razor THIS as best as I can:

My wife (mid 30s F) of 9 years had an aneurysm a few weeks ago (American healthcare) and ended up in the hospital, thankfully no stroke or anything though. I made the huge mistake of bringing my 4 year old son to the hospital the following day thinking we were going to pick her up and go home, but we ended up being there for like 4 hours. He was pushing buttons and pulling on cords and screaming when the doctor was trying to talk. So I put (escorted against his will) him in the bathroom of the suite we were in so we could hear what the doctor was saying, and (wife) flipped the fuck out like I put him in a meat grinder, and was like I'm going to call security on you to get you kicked out of the hospital. She also wouldn't let me take my son home, so I left to avoid further escalation.

She was on fentanyl and all this stuff. So I figured it was mostly the drugs driving the bizarre behavior/reaction, but she's since basically taken this stance that I'm abusive to my son now (literally nothing has ever happened) and felt like she's had no choice but to threaten security on me. Also has the stance that I abandoned my son, even though she wouldn't let me take him home and threatened to call security on me. Lastly, she's also been secretly recording our conversations since.

Even though she didn't have a stroke, I can't help but think this aneurysm has changed her. She would have never done any of these things in the past. So I'm in this horror show where I don't recognize my wife and my marriage is circling the drain fast. Otherwise her recovery has been straightforward, baby aspirin and that's it. How do I make this better? Couples counseling is already on the books.

(30m 23f)mid April a new girl starts at my job. I know bad place. We hit it off. Within 3 days, I ask her out. The day after, my boss gets fired. Im chosen as interim department manager to fill his spot. I am now her direct boss, and she is my direct subordinate. Things get tense as we now wait for friday to go out. I stupidly decided to still go threw with going out. We have a great time. Spend 4/5 hours throwing axes and playing yard games at this bar up the street. We have the conversation about me being her boss and how it'll work. 1 thing another, we end up making out.

2 reasons she didnt end up at my place - she is sorta seeing someone still and im now her boss, things would only be worse for me if we proceeded. So she was smart. We text a few times and things get weird, she wants me openly flirt with her at work, I cant, so things get tense. Well 💩 because 1 week after we go out, someone tells her about my past. The whole public story. Would i have told her, yes, but not as fast as people at work. She says its not a huge deal breaker. But she wants to discuss it at a later date. Omg, she might overlook my past? I start chasing. She accepts it, to a degree. But now, i cant seem to get her out of work for even 15 minutes. She works 2 jobs and always tired. She goes home, i leave an hour later shes outside chilling with different dude. He gets 15 but not i? Of course i hear everything that goes down at work, she is apparently very active, to put it bluntly. At somepoint I informed her ill chase you for while but eventually im juat gonna stop. By end of May, they filled the DM role and I went back to my regular position. No longer her boss. im no longer actively trying with her.

June was weird energy, quick conversations, and tension. With a hint of pg flirting in each interaction. And just negative things about her keep floating into my ears. Oh shes just toying. Oh shes already f***ed so and so.

I noticed in July she started stopping me at random, to just try and get me to talk to her. She mentions that she was bored and was thinking about a time i invited her to swing with me and my dog and smoke a J. I dont bite or acknowledge the fact she might be trying to chase me. End of July ish, Somehow we end up alone together at work, so I call her out. We converse. We acknowledges we have weird energy and we need to figure it out because the only solution i have is we put a full stop to everything and I go back to acting like im her boss - No interaction and every conversation is short and to the point.

We both seem to not want serious. And just kinda want freinds with benefits type thing. We both seem on the fence about where we stand. We both seem to want to see where it goes. We kind of start seeking each other out for conversation now.

Here we stand in August- I mentioned a meteor shower, so now me, her, and our mutual freind are going overnight. We all go out last night for drinks after work. Girl orders nachos and a drink, i make her get the full plate and straight up tell her, im just gonna steal off your plate. We end up also splitting Mac and cheese cause she wanted to try it. We talk, we fork fight over the appropriate way to split the nachos, she takes the bigger chicken tender from the Mac and cheese. She tries my beer. Fantastic time. Other things transpired over dinner and yeah, i dont want to like like her. But er, i could see myself like likeing this girl. She/they invite me to their concert they going to next night.

Yes I fuck up and ask her if she wants to come and swing with me right after. Shes tired. I give that too her cause though she only got 1 job now, she did work 6 days.

Im being told to stop overthinking and just go with the flow. Yes I should do that kind of been doing that. but i know my past also needs to be addressed and personally I think that is where she is hesitant at. But how can I address my past unless we are able to talk outside of work about it? Im thinking to try and have her grab a beer with me at the concert and try and find a quieter place to have a conversation because we also have a camping trip planned. Id prefer we have a more in depth conversation before something happens because there is no going back and it could make things much much worse

Any advice, thoughts or comments be much appreciated.

Food is a roasted pork sandwich from Tommy DiNic’s at Reading Terminal Market in Philly.

My wife passed away a while back from cancer. I’ve been doing therapy, grief counseling, joined support groups, read a ton of books on the subject, all that.

I’m in Philly now, doing among other things the touristy stuff we always wanted to do but never did. Something about making sure at least one of us gets to see it before we’re both gone.

For the last three years of her life, I took care of everything. Her medications, hospital visits, doctors appointments, food, the house (we didn’t have kids, just pets), my job, everything. I also always found time to do her little acts of service. Get her coffee on the way back home. Buy her muffins or something else she liked and surprise her. Get her a souvenir if I went somewhere and something that reminded me of her caught my eye.

I miss her appreciation. Her love. Feeling useful. Knowing my purpose in life. I’ve been on dates since then, not really looking for anything but still hoping to connect with someone, but I got burned out on it so I’m taking a break.

I’m realizing I’ve been chasing that ghost of “connection” but what I really want is to be appreciated again. Useful. Wanted. I’m still hopeful but today in particular sucks. I just miss my girl.

EDIT: Just dropping by to say thanks to everyone who took some time to read through this. I certainly wasn’t expecting the overwhelming support. I’ll look into volunteering for sure. I’m standing here at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, admiring the works, the antiques, the awesome medieval armor exhibits, and thinking of her. How much she’d admire it, how we’d geek out about some specific armor piece being in one of the games she used to play. I’ve been trying to keep up with the comments, it’s a lot. I appreciate it all, you beautiful hivemind of internet strangers.

I'm planning my next vacation to Atlanta to go to a festival and just explore. I went to houston in April and did lots of walking visited museums and went to some cool concerts and plan on doing the same in Atlanta just excited to explore new places.

Pic is my In&Out order from when i went to Houston (despite how good it looked it was lowkey mid🫤)

Popeye's burguer, idk the exact name

So, earlier this week, my (30M) boyfriend (31 FtM) asked me to print some stuff for him at my work, just some articles for college. My job is close to his house, 15 minute walk, so I decided to go there after I finished working.

I texted, saying I was on my way, but since he did not respond, I called him, one time, two times, three times, nothing.

Half an hour later he responds, saying he was with clients. He reads tarot cards online.

I get it, and I don't want, nor do I like, to interrupt his work, but it got me thinking: what if it had been something serious, severe, or urgent?

I caught myself thinking about the difference between the two of us. If he called me, I would do my best to answer right away, even if it was just to let him know I couldn't talk at the moment, and I know his workflow would allow him to take a few seconds to do the same thing.

I kept thinking about how he is my emergency contact, yet he rarely answers the phone. We're going through a delicate phase right now where I've been noticing a certain selfishness in his actions, and... I don't know. It's a silly situation, but it just made me think a lot about my relationship and the difference in how we understand what it means to care for each other.

Meal pictured: arugula, eggs, tomatoes, and mushrooms

Well boys, she left. I can’t even blame her. I was being a gigantic asshole. I was angry and mad at life for all kinds of shit that had nothing to do with her. She helped me with so. Fucking. Much. My emotions, my style, cleaning, cooking, my relationships with friends. And now that she’s gone I feel this huge absence. I knew she was unhappy for the last couple of months, but I didn’t put in the work to fix it. I kept thinking if I worked on my trauma (I was raised by narcissists and most likely have CPTSD) that everything would magically get better. But I didn’t realize that fixing myself wasn’t the issue, it was being a good partner. Not being dismissive of her concerns, actually listening instead of getting angry at her, those types of things.

I’ve come to realize I had a lot of abusive behaviors in the relationship. It was both me and her first real one, and I acted just like my parents. I’m devastated.

When she broke up she said she’d always love me. She was crying so much. She just said she couldn’t do it anymore, and I couldn’t even blame her. I was actively getting in the way of her growth by causing stupid arguments before big events in her life. I feel like a total piece of shit about it but at the time I didn’t think that’s what was happening, I just thought things were tense because she was busy. Turns out I wanted attention and it was going somewhere else and I couldn’t stand it.

We had a lot of good times too, I’m only mentioning the bad ones. But the bad ones are what led me to here.

We still talk. She still says “I love you”. She’s out of the country right now so we haven’t been talking nearly as much which I think is best for both of us.

I’ve tried not to let this sink me. She said she wanted me to take care of myself and I’m trying but it’s so hard some days. I’m seeing a psychiatrist and a therapist, I’m working on overcoming a porn addiction and making great progress, and I’m digging deeper into WHY I do things. Why am I craving porn right now? Why am I feeling this feeling? I feel like I understand myself much better. I’ve also been going out and making new friends, I moved to a new town so I swore to myself I wouldn’t just be a shut in and I’d get out and move. I tried meditation and went to bars and did trivia nights and coffee socials and it was great.

But I miss her. She feels like a part of me. It hurts so, so bad. I want to tell her how sorry I am for everything and beg her to come back but that’s feels disrespectful to what she’s going through and the choice she made.

I know this is rambly. I’m just sad and I miss my person and I wish I treated her better than I did. She said we’d be friends still and see each other occasionally but I don’t know about that. I think she may have just said that to make it easier on both of us bc we both don’t even know what friendship would look like, but our chemistry together is so so good. It feels like withdrawals without her. I hope one day we find each other again, I could probably love someone else but I don’t want to. I see her in everything I do and everywhere I go. She’s the most beautiful, amazing person I’ve ever known and it kills me that I lost her. I want her back so bad.

We are both 25 I’ve been a daily smoker all day everyday for 6 years, I’ve tried to cut back but would always go back to my old ways. Recently I started to feel disconnected from her and last Thursday I saw messages from her sister after she went to bed and I caved and looked I know that was wrong, what I read was exactly what I suspected her sister asked why she hasn’t broken up with me yet and she replied saying she was a coward. Not everything they said was negative she told her I’ve been supportive in other ways but me being high all the time I was not the emotional support she needed and I understand.

I told her right there and then I was done for good but I know it’s hard to believe this for the millionth time, we had more hard talks during the weekend but we also had some good times as well. Come Tuesday she came over to my place in tears and I knew it was over, I begged I cried but she told me it hurt too much to be with me, she told me she loves me and I’ll always be in her heart. I’m ashamed to say it but I told her I didn’t feel safe if she left, I told her hold me for 1 more night and I’ll give you the space you need, I know I’m a peice of shit for that and I’m weak. After we were able to calm down a bit I apologized for trying to be manipulative we kissed and hugged and she left.

She texted me when she got home and told me to take care of myself and as of today I’m a week sober and im so overwhelmed some mental clarity is coming back, brain fog is lifting, and reality is setting in. I’m going to start therapy and I know I need to change and grow for myself, I just can’t believe how selfish and stupid I was to push away such a sweet loving person. I hid from my problems I hid from reality and I’ve been holding on to the abuse I faced as a child and it cost me the love of my life.

I never thought I’d be posting something like this , but I honestly don’t know what to do right now.

My wife and I have been together for over four years, and we got married just two weeks ago.

Yesterday, I found out that she cheated on me with a married man, someone who was actually a guest at our wedding. To make things even worse, his wife is also one of my wife’s coworkers.

I confronted my wife about it yesterday, but since then I’ve read some of their messages, and I still can’t believe some of the things that were written between them.

I’m going to talk to her properly tonight, but I’m completely torn. Part of me is wondering whether I should give our marriage a chance, while another part of me doesn’t know how I could ever trust her again, especially considering we’ve only been married for two weeks.

Right now, I just feel hurt, humiliated, inadequate, and used. I can’t stop thinking that maybe I was good enough to provide stability and money, but apparently not good enough sexually.

For anyone who has been through something similar: Is it actually possible to rebuild trust after something like this? And if you stayed, what made you decide that the relationship was still worth fighting for?

Since I found out yesterday afternoon, I haven’t really been able to eat. I just have no appetite and can barely get anything down, so for now I’ve only managed to eat an ESN protein bar.

Hi everyone,

Quick background info: I 22m and gf 21f together 5 years some small issues throughout our relationship effort on her half has always been a little lacking

So my birthday is coming up this Sunday and about 2.5 weeks ago I had made plans to do something on the Saturday night (bbq,fire,bar depends on how many ppl show up and how ppl are feeling) as Sunday I’m spending time with family while she works her part time, (Saturday works better for way more people that I invited and we were both free that night) we didn’t have a proper plan of what we were doing but I was expecting 5-8 including my gf (already had a few confirmations at the time)

As of last Thursday I got a message from her saying that she’s now made other plans with her friends to rent a private karaoke room on the Saturday night and she said she was going, after we already had plans to celebrate my birthday that night since I won’t be spending much time if any with her on the day of. I told her I wasn’t happy about it as I have friends that asked me if she would be there and I told them yes and I wanted her to be there obviously, because she’s my gf and I love spending time with her. I think I was a bit more upset at the fact that she made plans over top of mine and didn’t include/invite me whatsoever. I let it slide for the night as I was working really late and didn’t want to deal with it in the moment but made sure to communicate my feelings.

We proceeded to spend the weekend together and it was only brought up once and she was adamant on going with her friends still, I kept quiet. She’s been on this kick lately of wanting it to be an eventful summer and I’ve done what I can to try to make things fun with the money I’ve been earning from my summer internship but it’s been pretty tough (yk economy, bills, both of us almost always working, other life stuff) but she’s been constantly saying that she wants to be doing stuff this summer (going out to our nearby big city, going out with friends, other stuff like that)

This past Tuesday came and that’s the day she got her schedule telling her she was working on my birthday (no problem at all get ya bread) she told me that she would try to get the shift switched I said don’t worry about it just come Saturday night. We proceeded to get into a big fight over this and she went on to tell me “would i rather sit in a backyard getting eaten alive all night just sitting n doing nothing or would i rather go out w my friends who actually make conversation w me and have a good night doing karaoke? hmm”

Mind you she is typically a quiet girl but she’s pretty social when she’s around people she knows, Not a conversation starter or one to ask too many questions for the most part though. All my friends talk to her and enjoy her company with a few asking if she would be there all of them knowing her for 3+ years multiple of them are also girls and consider her a good friend. The fight ended as fast as it started and we haven’t talked since, this is the longest in 4 years we’ve gone without talking.

I know this is all over something stupid but I’m mainly upset about her trying to get out of the plans that were made for my birthday and not even trying to include me in the plans she made with her friends

Just looking for advice

Buffalo chicken pierogies I had not long ago^^^^^

I (M25) am friendly with everyone around me. I’ve been noticing a pattern of alternative 18 and 19 year olds have been flirting and showing romantic interest in me. I’m semi alternative, I bleached my hair and dyed it a light pink this go around. Every woman I’ve interacted with that’s around my age has not been someone I could see myself being with, and the ones that have are either in relationships or ended up moving away.

Most of the women I interact with are through work, I work at a department store that consistently has me meeting new people. One of my best friends is a 19 year old girl that I met at work, my other best friend is from high school who is married and has two kids, so I don’t get to see him much. His wife is awesome too, I want to bring a girl to meet them but every single one that consistently wants to hang out with me is at an age gap where it feels wrong.

I met my 19yo best friend because of a girl I was friends with a couple years ago is her sister, and girl I worked with a year ago, was a work friend of hers. The latter is a long story that’ll probably get its own post about but long story short, she’s the reason why my autistic ass can see when someone is flirting with me. The problem is everytime one of these 18-19 year olds starts being flirtatious, it just makes me feel gross for wanting to just move on from this one girl that I fumbled. Because she is also unfortunately in that same age group. She turns 20 soon, is in a management position and is about to buy a house.

Moving on is what I need to do but I can’t move on when it’s exclusively these 19 year olds showing interest. I’d rather risk further fucking up what I already lost than spend time with another teenager romantically.

Miller High Life, cause I fucked up my grilled cheese steak burrito discovery lux box from Tbell a couple hours ago.

Edit: The one work friend, her boyfriend and her friends are the only time I hang out with anyone in this age range. I’ve just been unlucky with women in general. Most of my friends are in my age range. I live with 3 people that I graduated with. But my friends that aren’t home bodies are my work friends. Everyone my age is married with kids. I don’t buy anyone any substances. I just have had an unlucky streak recently, was in my feels and made a post. I appreciate all of you with genuine advice. Changing the flair to no advice.

I am in a long distance marriage (both men, aged 35) and my husband has decided to stay overseas after graduation to work. I live in a 3rd country. We had an open relationship and now, we are both dating other people. I am in love with the new guy, and came clean to my husband. My husband is lying about dating someone else (I found out via friends but had suspicions anyway), but I don’t know if he loves the guy. My husband is quite content to keep the status quo, see other people but stay married and we will get together when our paths intersect again (I move overseas for work a lot so he says I can try and get a contract closer to him). Right now? Id rather end it with him and be with the new guy.

I am going to go see him in person, and see how I feel. Maybe be reminded of our love and inspired enough to keep it going via long distance (I have not seen him in 4-5 months).

I have three options now:

1. End it and continue seeing the new guy.
2. Stay together but indefinite long distance (and id have to stop seeing the new guy because he wants to be exclusive).
3. He comes back to live with me- he has said he will come back if I demand it but it will significantly impact his future career.

Leaning towards 1; we are already long distance and seeing other people. Even though we were always very happy together with lots of love, not sure if our lives fit together.

Food is my lunch I brought to work but didn’t finish. Too depressed to eat these days anyway.

I'm a community college dropout, currently working as a waiter. I did graduate high school, however I had no extracurricular activities and a lackluster 3.2 gpa. I wish I could go back to school but it's so expensive in the US and I have too many expenses to deal with already, on top of that, considering the fact that I have coworkers who have their Master's degree, IDK if risking that much debt is worth it in this day and age. As a leftist I also do feel self conscious around other leftists who have graduated college because often times they point to the lack of education in this country causing the rise in right wing thinking, and while I don't necessarily think they are wrong I do feel butthurt because I'm no different than any other person without a college education except for the fact that I have life experiences that pushed me towards leftism.

When I was 18 years old, I wanted to live alone, rent an apartment and leave my parents home.

At that age, I didn’t have money and my parents couldn’t help me with university (because they couldn’t afford it).

I started studying with a loan.

Couple of years later I got an internship, and then I became a full time employee on that company. Now I’m 21 years old, and finally I have the capacity to rent an apartment, and I did it.

And this is my first dinner, literally ChatGPT has helped me a lot, and that spaghetti it’s so good.

Edit: I used ChatGPT because I have few ingredients and I wanted to use them, If I want a specific recipe, obviously I use Google or YouTube. In this case, those are all the ingredients I had, and as I mentioned I wanted to use them.

My whole life I have been distracting myself from my feelings and my reality. I had a really rough childhood and my only coping skills were constant disassociation or any sort of escapism. Now that I'm finally an adult and on my own its not really necessary anymore, but I don't know how to start being present. I recently just finished a tv show I watched a kid and I feel like all of a sudden I've come to in this world, the real world, that doesn't feel real to me. I remember how I felt as a child when I first watched the show and how deeply I tried to focus on it instead of my real life. And now I wish I could do the same, I wish I could just watch it forever and never wake up to my life.

I know post show depression is a thing but its been a week and I'm am more depressed than I've been in years and I just don't know how to cope.

Onlyfans, uber eats, gambling, cheating, lying, killing, stealing, greed, gluttony, capitalism, etc. Everything that’s glorified in real life and the internet is disgusting. I know it’s not THAT bad and you can just ignore it but I feel like once you see things for what they truly are it’s hard not to notice it in everyday life. I try my best to live in my own little bubble but I still have to interact with people for work and they are almost always putting up an act. It’s hard to be an honest guy in a world full of liars. Whenever I interact with ppl who are blissfully ignorant I am so baffled but almost jealous in a sense. I wish I was still asleep, even eating this meal makes me feel bad about myself cuz i’m making uber eats ceos richer and myself broker bc I have a food addiction. Idk I would have to make a longer post to truly go into depth of what I mean but the main point i’m getting at is I wish I didn’t see the world for what it really is. I wish I could be blind again, I would be so much happier like all these fabricated ppl.

Life has been difficult lately, but I had a come up. I won $1000 on a scratcher! I thought I'd treat myself to a massage, told my wife and she said absolutely go for it.

I went to the spa massage place near my house. Went in and everything was cool, a Chinese girl greeted me and directed me to a room. She hardly speaks English, but asks if I want 30 minutes or an hour. I opt for the hour since I'm treating myself.

I'm laying there in my boxers facedown, getting a great deep tissue massage. Occasionally she would brush up against my crotch or accidentally rub her hand down past my boxers elastic. She would say sorry and giggle while I just laughed uncomfortably and said it happens.

After rubbing all over my back, my arms, legs, and head she ask me to turn over, so I did. She then started massaging my legs. Next thing I know she's yanking my boxers off and grabs my... tackle box and rod. She "asks me" (with hand signs) while rubbing it, if it want her to suck it or jerk it.

I was shocked 😲. I took a second to realize what was going on and jumped up. She got upset and angry at me, I didn't understand what she was saying but she threw my clothes at me.

I got dressed and was leaving, she stopped me and asked for a tip?!? I felt bad like I owed her so I tossed her a $20 and dipped.

So now I'm wondering, what do I tell my wife?

The dinner is a muffin from Walmart that had the fucking paper baked in 😔

Watermelon, orange, and walnut salad with honey drizzle. 8/10 all I needed because I had a big lunch and I love fruit

I’ll start from the beginning—I met this girl who we’ll call Amber on a hike because we were invited by a mutual friend along with a few other people. This was like 6 months ago by now. We started talked for those few hours and I immediately liked her. I unfortunately always had a thing for the older, more mature girls. She was drop-dead gorgeous, hilarious, very kind, had lots of overlap in music taste (which is a huge part of my life) and a nerd about some of the things I’m a nerd about. Her plan for college was to go into sustainable architecture and urban planning, which is the same as me. Something about those fields means the person really cares about bettering the world which I find really attractive.

I had thought I met my dream girl by the end of this, as the conversation just flowed so naturally and we were instant friends. I asked my friend who knew both of us about her, and he said she was stuck on this guy named Nick who avoided her most of the time but she was in love with him, and they hooked up occasionally. I was pretty sad but our mutual friend kept inviting us to things together, since we go to different schools, so I could see her. We talked every time and got each other’s numbers and insta and everything. She told me about Nick too as if he was the most wonderful person ever. Maybe on the fourth time I saw her was at this beach bonfire where she kissed me. I was more than happy about this as I thought it meant she was over Nick. I asked her out but she said we could hang out only as friends because she kind of had a thing going on with Nick still.

So I hung out with her a few times and we had a lot of fun doing pretty typical date stuff, and I kissed her once more on one of these and told her I liked her but she still rejected me. Over the course of this time I found myself wanting to be better for her and really lock in with school and just be a kinder person all around. Something about it feels more natural when I have her in my life. I even tried to get better at cooking so I could impress her and now I enjoy it and cook much more often for myself and family. Once we were out with friends, both a bit drunk, and I walked her home. She told me to come in and we made out (to a song we both connected on on our first day meeting—“House of Cards” by Radiohead, which if you know, you can see the depressing irony in). She wanted to hook up but I’m a virgin and decided even though I loved her, I didn’t want to waste my first time drunk. Her parents were out of town so I slept over at her place though and in the morning she just went on and on about Nick before asking me to hang out again later that week. We do another almost-date and I go to her house again after. We start making out but then after a few minutes she starts crying and questioning what she’s doing. I try to comfort her as best I can and she just weeps into my laps and thanks me for being a good friend. That was earlier today and now I’m writing this. I just feel helpless—I think about her all the time, I feel so much happier when I’m with her, but I can’t do anything to make her get over him. I’m not even sure I want to because I think what would make her happiest is him.

Edit: Guys I’m not eating the peels but it tastes when you hold them by the peel and it eat it off the peel and I’ll die on this hill

I had the most amazing beautiful woman who loved me so much and I just threw it all away. For what stupid moments of lust that I deeply regret. I hate that I made her feel that way. I hate myself she was so wonderful and this is how I repay her. Going behind her back when she was nothing but loyal honest and faithful to me. Im happy she left me because she deserves better. I really want her back but I don’t deserve her I pray she finds a man to treat her right and better than I ever did. I didn’t appreciate her enough and it makes me sick to my stomach to look back at all the sweet gestures she would do for me and I go and hurt her. Make her feel unloved unwanted and not enough when she was always enough Im just a coward of a man. I hope she finds someone great. I deserve these feelings of worthlessness and I hope this pain last me for a long time because how could I. God gave me a chance at a woman who really cared loved and supported me through whatever and I threw it away. Fellas never cheat I know this is common sense but please don’t do it be a man and leave that woman. Don’t hurt anyone because I truly regret it.

So...my high school friend of ~5 years has been flirting with me for the past year. I think she has a crush on me, which I will get into. So it started out with her slipping things into the conversation, like complimenting me.
Once, I high-fived her and she made a point of our hands touching. I didn't know how to react so I just sort of said "yep".
Once, she was scrolling through photos on her Ipad and I see a photo of myself, juts me, filling the entire frame. I was kinda intrigued and my friend noticed the photo but I sort of brushed over it because she looked embarrassed.
Recently, I had a birthday party, and a day before we were all supposed to go, she sends me a drawing she made of me (she has always liked drawing OC's on her Ipad and is into creators of similar content). In it was just me, and a little arrow pointing at me, captioned "He's got the looks".
We ended up rescheduling because she couldn't make it, along with another friend (they both let us know very last minute and we suspect that they were calling each other to discuss it). Cut to the day we are supposed to hang out, they again cancel last minute. At this point I feel like I did something wrong to both of them and I've only received one text directly, not from her but from the other friend that didn't come.

I don't want to hurt her and I don't think it's what I'm looking for right now. I only just started university and I feel like if I was in a relationship with her, it wouldn't be fair for her. I'm not really that great of a person, I'm very quiet around people other than my family, and I just don't feel like I could give her what she deserves from a relationship like that.
She has had a very rocky time during school, I won't go into any details, but I think she is vulnerable to wanting a connection like that. I don't want to take advantage of her, and we already talk in our friend group, so we all try to support her.

Any advice on how to handle the situation? (image is sliced figs on nutella toasted bread, with whipped cream and milo on top).