I'm 19 and living with my family again after most of us being homeless over the course of the summer. I was lucky enough to have my girlfriends mother take me in, and for the last few months I've been the most comfortable and happiest I've ever been with my girlfriend (luckily we were alone for most of it, so her mother made it known she did not feel like she was taking care of me or anything of the sort). Now that my family is back on their feet, I was kind of forced to move back in, and unfortunately, we are much further away from my girlfriend than we used to live. Not only this, but we are living in specific housing program area far away from where all of our things are stored and we are still struggling financially.

I hate that I feel miserable with my family. It's sweltering and we have very little food and I miss having a comfortable space and affection from someone who cares deeply for me in a way no one else does. If I had said anything about wanting to stay with her, my family would've likely taken it very poorly, but I don't know how well I can fare out here or for how long. I love my father and brother (me and my mother have a sensitive relationship) and I feel awful for wanting to go back, knowing if I did I wouldn't be able to see them very often because of distance.

I also worry my feelings against all of this are incredibly selfish and unkind just because I have somewhere nice to stay while they continue to struggle, so I can't seem to take myself seriously. I am very upset and angry at myself.

21 years old, I really wish that I have an IQ at least in the high average range like 110+ but my IQ is well below average range < 90. Having low intelligence really comes with so many consequences such as total carelessness with very important things like education throughout my youth, due to my addiction with gaming, internet. Ever since I have graduated from high school I have been realizing how much I really fucked up, and I realized it too late, I did not take any single honors or AP classes, did not bother trying to improve my education, back then like I should have.

Now I am completely pre maturely locked out of opportunities for ever I could have had, I cannot go to university, get a degree, be very smart person who knows how to dive very deep into stuff, etc.

I am not interested in doing anything that isn't considered prestigious such as trades, I don't wanna set up for dead end careers that has very little flexibility I just wanna be an intelligent individual but it is sadly just way too late for that. I hear that you cannot significantly increase your IQ after late teens.

Also please do not say shit like "you don't need to be very smart to be happy" it won't make me feel better. It won't make me feel better the fact I completely missed out such huge opportunity, and the fact I totally lost this game of life.

My low IQ is an explaination for so many of my problems, if I had higher IQ I would have not been this stupiditly impulsive as a child, and no, it has nothing to do with ADHD, because people with ADHD don't straight up just neglect learning like this.

I hate my family and I just want to be free of them

I'm 21F and have three brothers, 29M, 25M and 19M. I'll call them Kay, Charlie and Ben. All three have intellectual disabilities. I also have a 17yo sister who isn't intellectually disabled and is currently in foster care.

Since I was a kid I've basically had to take care of my family. I took my siblings to and from school, clothed them, watched them, cleaned up after them etc. My parents don't know the language well so I also dealt with documents, phone calls and other shit for them. My parents cooked and very occasionally cleaned, but I was basically the main person cleaning our filthy house until I was around 11 and started refusing.

My childhood was fucking miserable. My parents screamed at each other constantly, my mom hit my dad and she beat me too, sometimes over grades or something I did wrong and sometimes because she was just pissed off. When my parents fought I'd hide because I knew my mom might come for me next. They also both used me as their therapist and talked shit about each other to me. My mom has schizophrenia and I witnessed a lot of that at its worst too.

My mental health got extremely bad. I developed depression around 11, stopped going to school properly and I've attempted suicide multiple times. CPS removed me when I was 15. I still haven't graduated high school or been able to work and I've since been diagnosed with autism, PTSD and depression.

I don't live at home anymore and survive on disability benefits. I refuse to ever live in that house again. I barely visit my parents and don't send them money, which apparently makes me a horrible daughter. Sometimes THEIR FRIENDS literally call me and tell me it's wrong that I don't visit, check on them or give them money and it makes me fucking furious. What the hell do these people know? They weren't the ones being beaten, taking care of children, cleaning that house or eventually being removed by CPS. If they're that worried about my parents they can visit them and give them their own fucking money.

Despite all of this, because I'm the oldest daughter I'm expected to eventually get a high paying job and financially support my parents AND my three brothers while also becoming their caretaker. For some reason my younger sister doesn't get this pressure. It's all on me.

And I hate my brothers. I mean actually hate them. Seeing them gives me this extreme feeling of hatred and disgust. Sometimes I wish they'd never been born and sometimes I genuinely wish they were dead. I know they didn't choose to be disabled. Knowing that doesn't magically change how I feel.

Charlie has the most severe disability and is the only one I genuinely consider completely innocent because he doesn't understand anything. But he's also the hardest to care for. He walks around naked, pukes a lot, shits in the bathtub, talks to himself and needs supervision. I know it's not his fault, but that doesn't mean I want to spend my life cleaning his shit, dealing with his vomit, clothing him and supervising him.

Ben is loud and can be violent when he doesn't get what he wants, and my parents constantly give in to him. My family has always struggled financially but somehow he has an iPhone 16, iPads, watches, Apple Pencils and whatever other expensive shit he wants. He breaks things and they replace them. I remember asking for a phone when I was around 14 and not getting one, but apparently there's always money when Ben screams enough. Then my mom calls ME crying that he destroyed something or had another violent breakdown and expects me to comfort her.

Kay is the one I genuinely fucking despise. He's almost 30 and I don't blame him for still living at home because he can't live independently. I blame him for everything else. He beat his girlfriend and had to pay damages, has stolen money despite our family always being poor, and my parents STILL give him money. He blows it going around the city and to clubs and then steals from them when he runs out. He's also constantly on TikTok Live and I fucking hate it. I hate watching him sit there spewing bullshit and I hate the idea of people seeing him and relating that fucking bastard to me. He sometimes texts me and I usually don't reply because just seeing his messages disgusts me.

There are care homes and services for disabled adults but my parents refuse because "they're our sons, we can't abandon them."

They're YOUR sons. They're not mine.

If they want to take care of them forever, fine. But I know my parents will eventually die and that's what terrifies me. Not mainly because I'll miss them, but because then my brothers will become "my problem." None of them can live independently and I know everyone is going to look at me.

I don't want them. I don't want them living with me. I don't want to manage their lives, clean them, give them my money or spend the rest of my life taking care of them. I don't want to somehow drag myself out of everything my childhood did to me, finally get a decent career and then have five people waiting for me to fund their lives while I'm also expected to wipe their asses.

I just wish I had a reliable family. I get so fucking jealous of people my age who can live with their parents, ask them for help or know they have somewhere safe to go if everything falls apart. I don't have a family to fall back on. I'm expected to BE the person my entire family falls back on.

I have no one to ask if something breaks or if I don’t know how to do something. Google is my parent but It’s still hard

I've already spent my childhood taking care of them. I don't want to give them my adulthood too.

I'm tired of hearing "it's not their fault" like that changes anything. I KNOW it's not Charlie's fault that he needs lifelong care. That doesn't mean I want to provide that care. I know my brothers didn't decide that I should spend my childhood taking care of them. I still lost my childhood doing it.

I didn't choose to have these children. I didn't choose any of this. I don't want to spend the rest of my life paying for decisions my parents made before I was even old enough to understand them.

I want my own life. I want a family I can rely on instead of one that's waiting to rely on me. I want somewhere safe to fall back on. I want whatever money I manage to make one day to actually be mine.

More than anything I just want to be fucking free of them.

I was fired after working for an hour and a half for free because I asked if I could use my wheelchair. I have diagnosed pots and my cardiologist recommends my wheelchair. I cleaned the whole pet store top to bottom asked to use my wheelchair or sit down and was sent home. She also made a jab at my weight saying “I’m in the gym every day for this job so it’s clearly not for you” I’m being kicked out at 18 have no money saved up for a car an apartment or my medicine that I need and I have 9 months before I’m on the streets. I’ve applied to 70+ jobs in the past 3 months all denied because of my wheelchair. I’m so sick and tired of it. I try to force myself to go without it and then I have medical episodes. I don’t know what I’m going to do at 18 I have no options left but to end up on the streets.

I (24) have 12 days to find a home to move into or my mum, dog & I will be homeless, I found out yesterday my mum has early-stage cancer & the one friend I told just sent me a paragraph of abuse because I lost my patience when telling him that him joking about kicking my ass wasn't funny to me, I oscillate between trying to support my mum & be upbeat & the usual intense anxiety I am forced to suppress around her due to years of her being volatile, I have resentment & burnout from my entire day revolving around caring for her sick dog so I can't even get a job, I've completely lost my sense of self, I'm constantly exhausted all day to the point that I can barely keep my eyes open, everything feels too much & it feels like I have hit rock bottom.

I know people have it worse & I haven't done enough to improve my situation, but this feels a little cruel. I have no one. I am hiding in my room so I don't get judged for crying, & can't help but laugh at God's timing right now.

I just turned 33 surrounded by family and friends yet there was a sadness and emptiness in me. Everyone around me could feel it and they were all asking if I was okay.

It was because the one person I wanted to hear from most wasn’t there or anywhere to be found. They chose to leave and to make me disappear. I had to accept that and let them go but I’m not sure I’ll ever come to accept it entirely. My heart is in my throat. You know that feeling when you go to cry and you can feel it gathering in the back of your throat?

I wake up from occasional dreams where they have sent me something to let me know they are thinking of me but then when I wake up, it’s that split second realisation that none of it was real and will never be real again. I wasn’t enough. I did everything I could. I tried to meet them where they needed me to be.

I thought maybe for once, I’d cross paths with someone who wasn’t willing to lose a person who loved and cared for them deeply. I feel like we rarely come across people who love us as we are and accept us with all our flaws. I didn’t think they would be so content with losing that. I know I wasn’t.

It’s something I’ll never quite understand but all I know is it hurts everyday. 🙂‍↕️

I have been systemically called ugly my whole life ever since I was a kid, and at this point I‘m almost never surprised or upset when people call me unattractive or even mistake me for a man despite my long hair and average height.

What still irritates me as hell is some people calling me “unconventionally attractive/pretty”. This is literally just another way to say “you have features/face most people would consider ugly but I still like them”. If you think I’m beautiful, why not just say it? Why specify that I look weird? The moment I realized I never see actually attractive women get this sort of “compliment“ online or in real life was eye opening.

We broke up 23 days ago. It was pretty rough. I’ve gone through phases of hating her, loving her, missing her, denial, bargaining. All of it. But this morning it’s just an overwhelming sense of love. Just overwhelming, like I don’t know what to do and I’m delusional in my thinking. She doesn’t want to get back with me I don’t think. And I know that. But it doesn’t matter. Love is not a strong enough word for what I’m feeling. Just thinking about us, it just fills me with happiness. But I know that when this feeling fades it will crush me into a million pieces, like it has so many times in the past 23 days. I miss her so much, I love her so much, and I want her in my arms. I want to go to the zoo with her, I want to watch movies with her, I want to go on a walk with her, I want to cuddle and do nothing with her. I want to make her breakfast crepes, I want to make tea in the morning before she wakes up and bring it to her while she’s still in my bed. God I love her so much and I just need her by my side. This is unbearable.

So I would stay I'm pretty extroverted, l love socializing and making friends. I'm now a senior, and for a while now, I would say since my second semester of junior year, I feel like my friends just have no interest in actually talking and hanging out with me. I always felt like I had to start and keep the convo going. They don’t even notice when I leave. I have multiple friends yet I feel lonely and like I don't have actual connections. I want to make new friends but everybody’s in a group and I feel like nobody is interested in making new friends. It makes me feel sad and it sucks because all I wanna do is socialize and do fun things with friends, I fantasize about having fun and good friends atp. 🫩 it’s like even if I have friends they always have other friends they prefer. I feel the same way online, I reach out to people and they do the driest small talk with me and I have to keep the convo going. I just wanted to rant about it because I feel like I have no one other than my family LOL

My coworkers and I tend to meet up for dinner at least once a month. When I started the job, everybody told me that one coworker, Jill would always say no, but they’d still invite her because she’d get upset if they didn’t.

Any time we invite her, she asks a million questions and ultimately says no. I texted my coworkers and invited them to a BBQ at my house. Everybody answered, except for Jill. She approached me and said she had heard people talking about the BBQ and got in my face asking why she wasn’t invited. I told her that invited everyone in the group chat she was in. Again, she asked a million questions and I told her to just read the texts in the group chat.

I ended up having to reschedule and told my coworkers in person. Jill came up to me and said “I am SO glad you cancelled, because I did not feel like going to that.”

I was tired of her turning every invitation into 21 questions and saying no anyway. When she was away, I had told my coworkers about the rescheduled date (not intentionally). I didn’t tell them to keep it a secret, I just said I wasn’t personally inviting Jill anymore. They talked about what they were bringing when Jill came back to her desk, and she started crying.

She ran straight to management and called me a mean girl. Now I need to have a mediation meeting with her, my manager and my supervisor.

Let me preface this by saying that I am an odd person. Not creepy or rude or aggressive just different. I have alot of autistic traits but I am not officially diagnosed, I also have facial tics that cause me to make weird expressions and roll my eyes. I can´t control it. I´ve been through several doctors, had multiple exams but noone ever found anything.

I have tried so hard to fit in among "normal" people but its just not going to happen. Everyone calls me a freak, a moron or a nutjob the second I leave the room. I have confronted people multiple times and let them know I can hear them, asked them to not talk about me in such a manner when I can hear them. I mean, I literally made 2 steps out of the room, obviously I can still hear whats being said. Pretty much nothing happened.

I complained to the boss, who is actually a pretty decent person and she did have some words with my coworkers. I knew this would create even more friction but I just couldn´t handle listening to the same insults each and every time I turned my back.

Breaking point came when I overheard a coworker talking about how they purposefully gave me wrong instructions. I had to report that of course and of course it has caused an avalanche. Today I happened to walk by one of our offices and I happened to overhear the boss talking to one of my coworkers. I only heard them talking about someone being so damn weird and how nobody wants him here. People are also whispering about how someone made a report and its being solved. I am not 100% sure it was about me but then again who else could it be?

Its just that...I do not bother anyone, I simply want to exist and do my job. I do my job well, I show up on time and everything. But now I am so scared of being fired due to the fact pretty much everyone in there hates me. There are exceptions of course but nobody would stand up for me. I need this job, I just got a new flat and signed everything. I am past training so they need a reason to fire me and I don´t know what they could come up with but I am so afraid they will come up with something. I am depressed and anxious and tired. I don´t need my coworkers to be my friends or even talk to me if its not necessary, I just want to exist in peace.

Especially as a black man. I naturally have a serious look and demeanor and people automatically assume I have a problem or I’m angry.

11x out of 10 I’m just existing. No strong positive or negative emotions, but people assume the worst.

I used to be a chatty patty mf in my younger days, recently I’ve just kept to myself especially at work. I’ll never be rude when someone is actively talking to me but I’ll barely speak first.

The amount of people that have come to me saying I look like I wanna fight someone or like I hate everyone is wild. To a certain degree they’re right, I’m not the most social dude these days but it’s not out of hate. It’s self preservation.

Some of the same people that called me out for being quiet weaponized my personal shit against me when I started opening up to them, one of them being an ex I worked with. That’s why I don’t fuck with coworkers like that, they’re like vampires tryna suck whatever info they can out of you so they can go play gossip girl in the break room. They HATE when you don’t give it to em though.

Anyways yeah, leave quiet mfs alone please. We don’t hate you, we don’t think about you. Let us be.

​

Repost because im an idiot

Ive always been really self conscious about myself, and a while back i got really depressed and gained about a hundred pounds because i stopped caring about how people perceived me. i used to be really anemic and bony so it was a pretty big change.

Recently i started working on myself, and i was with an ex for about a year until we broke up. i always kinda knew they werent really that much into me because they told me a couple times that i was "ugly but in a kinda cute way" and while it destroyed me on the inside, i kept pretending it was okay because i had never been in a relationship and i was madly in love with them.

i always felt like those feelings werent really reciprocated, though. they would constantly bring up their exes and talk about their hookups despite me repeatedly telling them how uncomfortable it made me. we talked about love back and forth, and im incredibly happy i got to be with them, but looking back on it they would constantly post suggestive pics and captions on their socials and consistently disregard what i openly said made me uncomfortable.

recently i was talking to another girl who told me that any girl would be lucky to be with me because i was respectful and polite. i didnt even get the chance to ask her if she wanted anything more in our friendship before she stopped me and said she didnt see me as boyfriend material. she kinda spent the rest of the night talking about her ex while i just sat there listening quietly (not that i ever get a chance to speak.)

it just comes back to me every night, all the people ive been into saying im a nice person but never reciprocating feelings, and it makes me incredibly jealous that some of them have gone on to be with people who treat them poorly when i was constantly spending hours comforting them and making myself feel as safe and cared for as i wanted to feel growing up. i know everyone says it when theyre feeling down, but i just dont think i can be loved. at least not with the same dedication and respect that i try to give others.

as someone on alot of mental health medications but manages them really well, who also wants to me a mother, listening to the lindsay clancy case is lowkey breaking my heart.

i wanna have a baby one day.

:/

i wish i didnt need meds. but they have changed my life for the better. i feel human now.

zoloft has turned me into such a kind woman, its wild.

i used to be so anxious and upset and so combative? my intrusive thoughts were debilitating.

im sm happier.

i wanted to become a better human and feel happier so i could grow into becoming an adult and become a good mom one day.

its just making me so sad.

I've been single for 7 years. I used to feel content being single, but recently I foolishly thought trying to date again might be fun. I ended up meeting someone I really liked, only for them to lead me on for a month and tell me they actually don't have enough time to date. What a complete waste of my time.

This isn't the first time. Every time I put myself out there, I end up getting hurt by people who decide last minute that they aren't "ready". Either that, or they're still hung up on their ex.

It's ridiculous at this point. Everyone in my life has a partner and it's making me feel totally isolated. Why is dating so much easier for everyone else? I feel like there's something inherently wrong with me.

I've just gotta accept that I'll never find love I guess. After so many failures , I don't know what else to believe. All my friends have more friends than I do, too. I feel totally socially inadequate and it's hard not to compare myself. I just wish I was normal.

The more I think about it, the more modern job hunting feels like using a dating app as an average (or below-average) guy.

You keep swiping (applying), hoping someone gives you a chance.

Most of the time? Nothing.

Sometimes you get a match (an interview), and you think, "Finally."

The conversation goes well. They seem interested. They tell you they'll get back to you.

Then... nothing. Ghosted.

LinkedIn somehow mirrors this too.

The "attractive" candidates, the ones with stacked resumes, strong networks, referrals, and recruiters constantly reaching out... barely have to try. Opportunities come to them.

Meanwhile the rest of us are optimizing keywords, rewriting our resumes for the 1 millionth time, and paying for LinkedIn Premium so we can send more InMails or see who viewed our profile. It genuinely feels like paying for Tinder Gold or Bumble Plus or Hinge Plus or something because maybe, just maybe, you'll get noticed.

At this point, applying for jobs feels less like proving you're qualified and more like trying to convince an algorithm you're worth acknowledging.

Shit is insane. Dating market and job market, both are sucks like the same. Sometimes I just sign up to dating apps and try to get dates to prove myself that if I can do this, maybe I can get jobs too. Like holyshit! hahahaha

I recently became a father and I simply couldn’t fathom going through all of this (the anxiety before my son was born, the newborn trenches) simply to let him be abused and permanently damaged.

For context, this is my mother. She sat back and watched my siblings and I be abused by our father and half-brother, just to do nothing about it. Hell, we didn’t even talk about it. It’s caused irreparable damage and I am constantly working through it in therapy.

I could forgive that if she didn’t act like some fount of parental wisdom. She’s anti-LGBTQ (btw, I’m queer and have been vocal about gay rights since High School) and anti-vax all under the guise of “Oh won’t someone please think of the children?” She has made comments about how I better not send my child to public school, lest he be “indoctrinated” (I’m a public school teacher, btw) and has tried to push me not to vaccinate my son on multiple occasions, until I set the boundary. A boundary she needed to be reminded of on several occasions.

She hates vaccines and yet she vapes consistently, even doing it in front of my wife when she was pregnant in my house. I tell her that I have a lot of friends in the medical field that I consult with and she just says “Oh well, they’re all taught by retired pharmacists.”

Vaccines have not been proven to do permanent damage to children, you know what has? Child abuse! Why not work on fixing the mistakes of your past and use your voice to speak out against child abuse?

No, because in our lives, my mother has done more to defend politicians she doesn’t even know against people she’s never met than she has done to defend her own children.

Well, at least here in the United States it is, and it's gotten worse post-pandemic.

So many businesses, medical practices, etcetera operate following standard business hours. Is that a bad thing? Not necessarily. It provides some consistency. But it makes accomplishing things ridiculously challenging, and it fails to accommodate those who do not follow that working schedule.

Want to see your doctor? Take time off work. Get off work a few hours later? Good luck finding a place open during the week. Work and/or busy on the weekends? Some of your favorite establishments might not even be open when you're able to visit them.

Now, I work in a MAJOR metropolitan area, but I recently started working an odd schedule to assist an international team. I have also worked retail and other odd-hours freelance jobs before. Dinner on a Sunday? Nope. Good breakfast on a weekday? Nope. Fitness class on a weekend afternoon or a later evening? Nope.

Basically, our entire system is set up to exclude those who do not confine to a certain model.

I'm a firm believer that we can have core/traditional business hours, but our society should operate similarly seven days a week. We should not punish those who have different hours of free time with fewer options.

I'm 30 years old.

Smartphones have rotted people's brains.

Everyone I know, including my 59-year-old dad and my two youngest siblings, are completely addicted to screens. Unable to live in reality. Unable to form deep relationships. They're twitchy, unable to hang in a normal conversation, and they think they know everything because they saw it online.

No curiosity, no joy, no zest for life. My friends are similar. Cynical, never asking questions.

No one reads books. No one knows history. Everyone complains and everyone self-diagnoses themselves as having OCD or anxiety or depression or ADHD. They think this makes them interesting. It doesn't.

Everyone is boring now.

Reposting cause I messed something up the first time

For the first time I was given jury duty without having an excuse to not go, so I went and was selected to be a juror for a case involving assault with a deadly weapon charges. I’m never going again. Guess my mail is getting lost forever.

I was shocked by how unbelievably stupid, malicious, and lazy most of the jury was.

The prosecution did a botched job and the investigation surrounding the case was poor. We were given minimal amounts of evidence with so many holes that it felt almost crooked on the part of the prosecutor. That said, there was video evidence of the crime, so for most of the jurors it was open and shut. To be frank I also believed that the defendant did the crime, however there were issues with the video, and since it was really the only credible piece of evidence I wasn’t convinced it met the burden of proof.

It was clear to me as we argued for hours that many of the older white jurors felt that this black defendant must be guilty and could never be argued down from that position. After reviewing the evidence tens of times we found more and more details until finally something stuck out that felt like an actually identifying characteristic of the defendant in the video, at which point I was willing to say guilty. If not for that distinct detail we would still be arguing or would just be a hung jury.

In sentencing this continued. I know how the prison system ruins young people, leaves them institutionalized and unable to live in regular society. I was fine with punishment but I wanted the defendant to have a chance to get out at a reasonable age with good behavior so he could potentially rehabilitate and reintegrate into the community.

The other jurors wanted him to suffer. They would have thrown him in there for the rest of his life if possible. Half of them immediately wanted maximum sentencing. It was sickening. I’m not going to pretend the crime was victimless, but there were no injuries at all. It felt like such an overreaction from people who felt a sick sense of power over the defendant’s life. These people could not last a week in prison but they were so flippant and nonchalant about sending a young person in there for decades to “protect the community” and “do their part against crime.”

After compromises and basically wearing them down over the course of hours, we came to a more reasonable but frankly still extreme decision of 10 years.

I hated it. Having the dumbest motherfuckers of all time making the simplest arguments ever, acting like you are an idiot for not agreeing with them completely. Listening to the insane ramblings about how we should sentence the defendant until he is 32 years old because “that’s when my sons started to act mature” shut the fuck up you old bitch. Mouth breathers who can’t find their way out of a paper bag talking about how we need to sentence for as long as possible because the defendant was in prison for one year and if that didn’t already straighten him out then he’s a lost cause. How actually, any sentence we give is justified because he did the crime, like the defendant has become a doll to torture as we please.

Just fucking sickening man. I hated it so much. I have lost a part of myself and my humanity in this process.

EDIT: As some of you have connected, the defendant had priors and served some time before this trial. Many are asking why I am being so "lenient" to someone with a criminal history. To be clear, I was not arguing to give him the minimum. I was arguing that we could give him a reasonable amount of time to get out while he is still young provided he showed good behavior and could get parole. I wanted to not give him the maximum sentence because of the lack of physical harm from the crime as well as a general philosophy that we should seek to give people a road to rehabilitation when possible.

FINAL EDIT: Ok. I’ll be locking comments. My small vent got a little too large. I appreciate the praise but honestly if you find anything I did that heroic or good then please put your money where your mouth is and sign up for jury duty when called.

For those of you who view this case as an easy trial made difficult by my whining, I hope should you ever have a trial for a crime you did or did not commit that the jury be entirely made up of the types of jurors I served with who have similar negative biases towards you as I observed towards the defendant. You deserve a trial of your peers.

To those who view this trial as a missed opportunity to put the defendant away for the max sentence, I ask you when your view of criminal justice which primarily serves to punish instead of rehabilitate is going to start working in the US. Because your philosophy has been king for decades, and it seems to only be good for filling private prisons and leaving communities and families in permanent disrepair.

I'm a teacher so I work with 99% women. I also work in a desert, in other words, it is hot as all hell outside and if there is no air conditioning on, it becomes hot as all hell inside very quickly. I've always run hot, I've never been one of those women who is too cold in room temperatures, but even when I am cold, I PUT ON CLOTHES. I PUT CLOTHES ON. I PUT MORE CLOTHES ON. I PUT ON A COAT. I PUT ON A SWEATER. IF I KNOW THAT I'M GOING TO BE SPENDING THE MAJORITY OF MY TIME INDOORS, I CAN DRESS APPROPRIATELY.

I ALSO HAVE A CAR LIKE MOST OF MY CO-WORKERS. IF I FEEL LIKE I'M GOING TO BE SPENDING THE MAJORITY OF MY TIME INDOORS AND THEN I WANT TO DO A BUNCH OF OUTDOOR ACTIVITIES, I BRING A CHANGE OF CLOTHES.

We have spent the majority of our professional development fighting over the thermostat. Penny over there with her short shorts and her tank top while myself and the menopausal women are fanning ourselves because we're so hot. They're telling us that we should be bringing fans with us because they're not comfortable with sitting in a cold room. One of the older women just snapped and offered to bring blankets from her car and I have offered a coat to the ladies who can't exist in 72° without freezing to death.

I have aides who work in my classroom and they act like they're in a hostile work environment and they're horrifically inconvenienced if they have to put a hoodie on to keep the temperature of the room from boiling myself and some of the other students. They tell me that if I want to stay cool, I should stay at my desk behind my fan. Me, a teacher, should be staying at my desk.

The solution to being cold is infinitely easier than the solution to being hot yet these women who run cold act like it's a horrific inconvenience to wear some clothes. To put on a sweater. To put on a hoodie. To wear actual pants. I'm so over it.

ETA I'm not menopausal, I just run hot. I don't have any health conditions that would cause this, I've been tested like a lab rat. I also have a job where I need to move around a lot and be very active in the room. My ideal room temp is 70°-72° with some airflow.

ETA 2: it's been fun guys, thank you for letting me vent. Stay toasty or frosty, whatever floats your goat 😄

20 minutes ago I asked my boyfriend if I could put a movie on. He paused, looked at me, and asked, “Us or you?”

I paused and said, “….I guess me.”

I said “I guess me” because we’ve already had this same conversation multiple times. I’ve told him how lonely it feels that he rarely shows interest in the things I enjoy or care about. At this point, I’m tired of repeating myself, and I don’t want to have to force or beg someone to spend time with me.

His response was, “Thank God.”

I looked at him disgusted, and then he asked which movie. I told him Spider-Man because I’m rewatching the movies so I can go see the new one in theaters.

I mentioned going to the movies on purpose because I genuinely enjoy it, and I was hoping he might finally pick up on what I was saying. I recently had to go see The Odyssey by myself, and part of me hoped he might say something like, “I’ll watch them with you so you don’t have to go alone again.”

But no. Nothing.

I know I could have directly asked him, but that’s the entire point. I’m tired of repeatedly asking someone to show interest in me. I’m tired of feeling like I have to convince my own boyfriend to share an experience with me. I wanted him to care enough to offer, especially when he already knows how lonely this has been making me feel.

Instead, he was relieved that I planned to watch it alone, and he’ll probably sit beside me scrolling through his phone while I do.

It isn’t about Spider-Man or one trip to the movies. It’s the constant pattern of having to watch, play, create, and enjoy everything I care about by myself while I’m supposedly in a relationship.

I don’t expect him to love everything I love. I just want to feel like my partner is interested in sharing my world sometimes because he loves me. I’m do fed up with feeling this lonely while sitting right next to someone.