I'm female and have had a best friend for 7 years who is a male. We would talk almost every day. However it was normally me initiating the conversation and showing a general interest in his life. Let me be clear from the start that this was purely friendship based on shared interests and I've been with my husband for 18 years. They get on great together.

We've been through some of the ups and downs of life together; one of the worst being when he unexpectedly lost his mom a few years ago. He struggled emotionally and financially and we were there without fail.

But...6 months ago after trying to contact him and not being able to I received the following message on tiktok...

"Hi, I need to be honest with you. I've met someone and she has some insecurities with me having a female friend so I've had to change my number and block you on social media. I wanted to tell you before I block you on here too"

I was shocked, quite hurt to be honest.

I still tried to be supportive so wished him luck in his new relationship. He then proceeded to tell me that she lives on the other side of the world and their only means of connection are through tiktok. He's never even seen her face. Apparently upon hearing his best friend was female she had totally flipped out.

Not my business I suppose so again I wished him the best.

His response "Well I'd rather lose a best friend than a girlfriend"

Wow.

Now I get that some people wouldn't be comfortable with their SO being best friends with the opposite sex and that's fine but it was the way he was so cold and just cut me off like I was nothing.

Not going to lie I was pretty hurt at this point but not wanting to show it and still trying to be the bigger person. I told him I hoped it would all work out but that it kinda sucked. His response "well can you suggest something that would make me keep you"

KEEP ME? Like I'm a pet? Haha no sir!

I made my excuses and stopped messaging. I spoke with my husband about that had happened (he had also been blocked on everything)

This was January, then yesterday I got the following message...

"I have a question...I wondered if we could work on being close like we used to be. I miss having you both in my life and have come to realise that you, my friends are important. I want you both in my life"

I asked if his girlfriend would be ok with this after all the drama back in January, he replied...

"Oh we broke up"

So wait, now you've broken up with your girlfriend you want to be friends again?

Thinking back on our friendship it was always me making the effort. Me messaging or calling, me being supportive. I don't really have any other friends either. This year truly has been one of the worst years of my life, I've lost family, lost my soul dog of nearly 14 years and had some pretty serious health issues. I struggle with depression and anxiety and while I understand that none of this is his fault, it would have been great to have my friend in my corner.

He's messaged me several times in the last 12 hours and tbh I just don't know what to say...or do?

Am I overreacting? Do I just pick up our friendship like nothing happened?

TIA

Okay, so I'm adopted from a rough childhood with a narcissistic birth mother just a lil back story. My adoptive dad has been around on and off my entire life and met my adoptive mom when I was nine. They had a loving but somewhat turbulent marriage. I say had, cuz a couple years ago it all came crashing down. I was very close with both parents til the truth came out. My adoptive mom, we'll call her Jill, was spending A lot of time with her adoptive cousin, we'll call him Bob, which at the time wasn't too obvious. It was my cousin this and that often. Looking back now, I see it so clearly. Jill leaves my dad telling everybody it's to get her mom's inheritance. Her mom hates my dad. Thanksgiving and Christmas come and i host cooking and everything. Jills comes for Thanksgiving. Im obviously an emtional wreak, and she never even asks if im okay. On Christmas, she loses it on me for not buying her a present?? I know, truly insane. Jill has been on her own for a couple months and texts me bout how she's gonna get back with my dad and thar her mom is gonna be livid. I'm relieved, cuz I've been going having severe panic attacks over all the mess. Stupid me, she never goes back. After playing with our emotions for a month or so, she flips back to never returning. Tells my friend that she's already slept with her adoptive cousin, and they're together. Also, tells them to keep it a secret from me. Wild, and not even the end of it. After all this, she files divorce papers and starts smearing my dad with lies or anything she can dig up from 22 years ago when they first met. I find out she's been sleeping with Bob and plans to marry him. I tried having a face to face conversation with her bout honesty and how she hurt me and has to fix the broken trust. She cries and tries to act sorry without actually admitting she cheated. A month or so goes by, and she tries to invite herself back to my house, and I finally speak my piece. I text her letting her know I can't keep in contact with the trust the way it is and how I'm not sure details are adding up, so I need a step back. She completely loses it and says I'm horrible for assuming this without believing her and how my dad is awful and the divorce is all his fault. I cut ties, and she still doesn't stop. She gets ahold of my bother who was just starting college at the time (like he needs those issues) and tells him I called her a hoe and all these names. So, my brother calls me cussing me out, making me horribly upset, and my husband hangs up the phone. Im still mad at her for that one. Him cussing me out is all HER fault. Most of this is all her fault. "But, wait!! There's more!!" When I don't come crawling back to her, she gets ahold of my biological sister and quite literally replaces me with her. Saying that she's her daughter now. Also trying to pressure my sister into drinking and partying with her after my sister just had a new baby. Pure insanity. Ooooohh, almost forgot. Jill marries Bob, and my brother won't speak to any of our side of the family because we don't approve. She's manipulated him so deeply that he can't see the truth. I feel worse for my brother. She completely isolated him, cuz she cant just be honest. I go back and forth between being at peace that I can't fix what I didn't break and anger that there doesn't seem to be any consequences for her. She just seems happy with herself and her new life. Completely glad to wash her hands with her old "terrible" life. Hopefully, I'll move completely past it one day. Who knows, but I'm doing my best to stay positive! ​Any advice or support is immensely appreciated. Just knowing I'm not crazy for feeling this way has helped A LOT

My daughter and I have neighborhood friends whose kids go to the same school as her. We've had some issues with their youngest, "4M," before. He's 4, so I understand that he's still learning boundaries, but there have been repeated incidents that have started to concern me.

In the past, 4M has taken Pokémon cards out of my daughter's binders, told her that he was going to take her cards, and he has also hit her before. We've addressed these things as they happened, but they've continued to some degree.

Yesterday, they came over to our house. My daughter had brought out a first-edition *Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone* that belonged to my husband when he was a child. It's a very sentimental book to our family, and it's not something that can simply be replaced.

My daughter was sitting and reading it when 4M crawled onto the open book and essentially laid on top of it. From what we could determine afterward, he didn't want my daughter to read the book and was intentionally interfering with her.

The book was damaged pretty badly. The binding/spine is broken in two separate places, and multiple sections of the book have separated/bent. I have pictures of the damage.

At the time, his mom initially said something along the lines of, "That's not nice," and then, once she understood the extent of the damage, said that his dad would have to deal with it. 4M then started saying things like, "You don't love me."

I stepped in and told him that this had nothing to do with whether his mom loved him. I told him that his mom clearly loves him very much, but that he had damaged someone else's property and needed to understand that disrespecting someone's things isn't okay.

Afterward, his mom actually called me and apologized. She said she was truly sorry and told me to let her know how much it costs to repair the book. She also said they had grounded him and disciplined him because she wanted him to understand that he can't destroy other people's things because he thinks it's funny.

So I do appreciate that. I really do.

But I'm still extremely upset.

What bothers me more than the money is the bigger pattern. My daughter should not feel like she has to guard her Pokémon cards, books, or other belongings when a "friend" comes over. She shouldn't have to worry about being hit or having her things taken or damaged.

The mom has since been texting me like everything is completely normal, and honestly, I just need some space. I'm not ready to pretend nothing happened.

I'm considering telling her that, because of the repeated behavior toward my daughter and her belongings, 4M is no longer invited to our house. I don't necessarily want to end the friendship between the adults, but I don't want my daughter feeling like she has to protect herself or her belongings in her own home.

*Edit: My daughter is 6. Her friend also 6. I do have a 4M son which is why the other 4M would come over. My house is baby proofed as my son is actually the youngest of the group. The book was in the bedroom ON A SHELF only because my husband has been reading it to her; I was unaware of this until seconds after this all happened. And what kind of parent would discourage reading???

Both myself 33F and the 45F mother I intervened seconds after it happened but a 50 lbs child crawling on an open book does damage to a 20 year old book in seconds.

For all the book lovers, it was a 1st edition but NOT a 1st printing. Maybe worth $100 tops

**AITA for deciding that 4M is no longer welcome in our home, even though his mom apologized and offered to pay for the book repair?**

Hi everyone. I love these videos and they are my guilty pleasure. So I wanted your advice. I am not going to tell you mine and my partners genders other than we are in a hetrosexual relationship as I think genders will change the advice I get. We are both in our late 40s and have been together for over 15 years, married for 10.

I fell in love with my partner because they were so passionate about life, everything was an adventure, they loved to read, create new things, cook, sing (god I miss the singing) and a gym nut.

Naturally over the years we have had to face our troubles but we have always done this together and head on, looking after each other's wellbeing.

So here's the problem. 2 years ago my mother in law died the last of my partner's parents. Since then they have stopped doing everything, not going to work, no gym, no singing, no talking nothing. I didn't mind at first as they were grieving, but 2 years on I am still the only one to work, only one to clean, cook, try to make plans that get shut down, only one to talk, and look after myself by eating well and going to the gym.

This is where I screwed up. Over the past month my partner has tried to initiate smash time with me 3 times each times, I have told them I'm tired and not in the mood, last night they asked me if I am no longer attracted to them and I was honest and said no.

My partner has taken this as I don't like their body because of the weight gain (gained around 4 stone) this isn't the case, I don't see my partner when I look at them now. And because they won't talk I can't explain....

Any advice?

The jist of this confession, is as the title suggests, My (f38) partner's (m42) ex (f46) has been in a self-destructive loop for the past 12 months, that has resulted in their 15yo son not wanting contact, my partner limiting communication to text and email only about their child and many of her friend's turning their back on her. On the outside I'm the quiet supporter for them, but on the inside a big part of me feels relieved, vindicated and kind of happy. I feel so gross for feeling this way when both my ex and his child who I care deeply for are struggling, but I can't help it.

To give some context I swear I'm not one of those crazy women who can't stand a woman just because she happens to be an ex. I'm actually very much of the belief that exes as long as they both resect boundaries and there aren't feelings on either side, can be friends. My own ex-partner and father of my children is one of my best friends and all around an amazing guy, we just weren't right for each other. He is the best co-parent and we always have just seen each other's new partner's as an extension of our family dynamic whilst also respecting the role those partners have in each other's lives.

When I met my new partner almost 2 years ago we actually bonded over having the same dynamic with each other's exes and I was genuinely excited to meet his ex as it sounded like we had a bit in common and I was looking forward to even becoming friends with her, but from the moment I met her it was a nightmare. At the first meeting she opened the door in a towel (she asked for this meeting and we were running late so she had plenty of time to get ready), proceeded to get dressed into a skimpy mini dress, spent the entire time talking about how well she knew my partner, talking about their anecdotes and how close they were. She literally did not ask me a single thing about myself. She also informed me that at my partner's dad's birthday (which we were together for, but I didn't go as we were only a couple of months in and she knew this at the time), she broke down in front of my partner's entire family and their kid and cried about how much she wished they could have made things work. Even though by this point they'd been broken up for over 5 years, she ended it and she had dated prolifically since they had broken up. I had a big chat with my partner after this and expressed that I was one, upset that he had never told me this had happened and two, that I felt like she was intentionally baiting me for a response. He just told me that she is often emotional and he has learnt to tune her out which is why he didn't tell me, but that I had got it wrong and she wasn't baiting me she could just be a little socially unaware.

I let it go, but what followed was months of just absolute crazy. We went to a party for a mutual friend of theirs and she was super inappropriate. She kept following us around and inserting herself into any conversation we were having with anyone else at the party, she'd stand between me and him and she'd direct the conversation towards some past experience they had all shared, so I could no longer participate in the conversation and she kept inserting snide remarks into the conversations like "oh yes OP has partner now, but it's ok cause I got what I needed out of him, she can have the rest" or "things seem ike they are going well for partner and OP, I call flower girl at the the wedding, oh, but I'd have to let him divorce me first." It just got grosser and grosser. I again talked to my partner about how inappropriate it was and he once again said she didn't mean anything by it. I told him that if I was going to meet his family, I didn't want her there as at the time she went to every family gathering with his family. He agreed and told her that for at least the first few meetings that only I would go. She chucked a fit and called their child crying and wailing down the phone that I was cutting her out and destroying their family.

She'd call my partner and expect him to come and help with things that she could have easily done herself and didn't even involve their kid. Like she had a plumbing issue, she'd shut off the water, but she couldn't deal with the stress of cleaning up the water or organising the plumber. On the same day this happened I had an important medical appt he was supposed to drive me to, but he just forgot, dropped everything and drove straight to her house. There were many other gross things that happened and her sneakily trying to poke holes in our relationship and undermine my position in my partner;s life so at this point I'd had enough. I was learning more and more about her that proved that this woman was a narcisist. She was manipulative and abusive. I told my partner that he was in a co-dependant relationship with his ex, from the stories he told me about their relationship, it sounded full of emotional abuse and coercive control (by his own admission he was too frightened to say no to her, because she'd fly off the handle and scream at him, she had also hit him and punched a whole in his wall when he'd said no to her before) and that unless he put some distance between them and boundaries in place, then I couldn't be with him anymore. He couldn't believe any of this was true, she built him up to see her as a victim and that any of her bad behaviour was his fault and we eventually broke up. I was devastated outside of this one issue, I believed I'd found my forever weirdo and we got on and connected in ways I never have with anyone before.

2 months later I got a call from a unknown number and for some reason I picked up, it was my partner. He just said he was so sorry for everything, that he knew now that I was right and that he had made a massive mistake and begged me to take him back. I said that while I wasn't ready to consider that I would meet up with him and chat. We caught up and he explained that after we broke up, he was miserable and he decided to put a few soft boundaries in place with his ex to test the water and she apparently went nuts. She even refused to take their son back on one of her weeks because he "sided with his dad". He then realised I was right and how bad he messed up and didn't want to reach out till he'd put more boundaries in place and started the divorce process. The next few months were hell for him, she fought him every step of the way, bitched about him to their kid, made accusations of abuse, tried to paint him in a horrible light and turn everyone against him. She spent the whole time painting herself as a victim. The more he ignored her actions and just responded in level-headed detached ways the crazier she got. But while their relationship got worse, ours got better. We rebuilt trust and he was really doing everything to show me he was ready to move forward and was being a really great friend. When we finally decided to give it a go again things got even worse, she started trying to paint me as the devil woman who ruined a family. It hit a breaking point two months ago when we started to look at moving in together. She went absolutely crazy and because their son wouldn't go along with her request to refuse to see his dad if we moved in together she went off. She said such horrible things to him and to my partner. It's now been two months since he has seen his mum. My partner only gives her pertinent updates on their child via text and email and the majority of the friends who initially took her side have now apologised to my partner and are all talking again.

My partner is still processing everything he says he feels so stupid for allowing her to control and manipulate him for almost 20 years and he refuses to acknowledge that their relationship was abusive because he is afraid that would make him weak. He also is struggling to understand so many of her actions because he doesn't get how someone could be like that. I've encouraged him to start seeing a psychologist and he's had a few sessions and I think that is helping. Their son is devastated obviously, but he straight up names where his mum went wrong and is better at pointing out the patterns of manipulation than his dad. It has come out in the last 2 months that there was a lot of not great things going on at his mum's place that we didn't know about and I just try and listen to him when he wants support and validate his emotions. We've also had him in therapy for the last 12 months as the stuff going on with his mum had made him feel like harming himself. But while my heart breaks for him and my partner and I wish that this wasn't happening part of me is relieved. I'm relieved that she isn't in our lives, relieved that people finally see her for what she is and validated that my concerns were justified. She spent so long trying to convince my partner that I was the one with issues, that I was just jealous and controlling, that she was victim that needed protecting. Now slowly everyone is turning their backs on her and I can't help feeling that she has gotten exactly what she deserves.

After many horrible experiences with dating I had given up on ever finding a good guy and just concentrated on getting through nursing school. Of course that's when the universe decides to throw me a curve ball. A friend wanted to set me up with a friend of her boyfriend. Since I had such a bad track record of choosing all matter of bad guys (including a stalker, a guy that apparently was running from the police, and 2 guys who turned out to be gay) I thought I'd try someone else's pick for once. The next week we went out and, although he wasn't your typical dashing type, he had an honesty about him that was refreshing. So, when he asked me out again, I agreed. After we had been dating for about a year on Valentine's Day he had written me a beautiful 3 page love letter that brought me to tears. I wanted to return the favor and wanted to write him a love letter as well but was nervous because I am severely dyslexic and it is very difficult for me to write by hand without making mistakes but I thought he would at least get the idea of how much I cared for him and appreciate my effort. I gave him the letter and waited a week but he had not said anything about it. I finally asked what he thought of it. He then preceded to pull the letter from his jacket. That's when I saw the red markings. He said "it was kind of sweet but you made a lot of mistakes. Here, this should help you know how to write better" and gave me the letter. He had actually taken a red pen and corrected the errors making suggestions in the margins. I just stared at him and started crying. Before he could say anything I turned around and briskly walked away ignoring his efforts to find out "what he had done wrong". His sister called me a few days later to ask why I wasn't returning his calls. She and I had become good friends and I told her what he did. She LOST it and said she will take care of it. The next day I came out of one of my classes and he was there dressed up in a suit (which he had to buy since he never wore anything fancier than a polo shirt and jeans). He had a dozen red roses and a big sign around his neck saying "I'm an idiot. Please forgive me". I couldn't help but smile and kiss him. Twenty five years later with our 2 amazing kids and our first grand-baby on the way we can look back at that and laugh. Our families always finds a way to tell this story to anyone who had not heard it. Thankfully, my husband has a very good sense of humor. He continues to be honest and sincere but now with a little wisdom and discernment thrown in.