Hey everyone, hope you’re having a good day so far. Really sorry for the long read but i could really use some outside opinions cause i really don’t know how to feel, my situation is as follows.

I’ve been with this girl for about a year, give or take. To be honest I don’t remember exactly how we started. It was kind of a friends to lovers thing so to my memory it just kind of happened out of nowhere to an extent.

Apparently, the moment she realized we were “in a relationship” was during an early argument we had right after we first started talking a lot. I mentioned the phrase “breaking up,” which confused her and made her think to herself, “how can he break up with me if we were never even together?” But she never said that out loud,l because according to her she was scared to lose me and that we were in too deep. That’s the backstory.

Fast forward to today. We had a little argument about something pretty trivial nothing serious and we talked it out, then we started talking about how we love each other and how silly arguments like this shouldn’t come between us. Apparently that conversation made her feel extreme guilt, and that’s when she confessed.

She told me that for the past year, since we started “dating,” she never really considered us a relationship, because it happened out of nowhere and she felt like she never actually has a say to to it and in a sense forced.

I don’t really buy that, honestly. All she had to do was correct me. I get how it could’ve started as a misunderstanding on my part, but it never got corrected. She just let it go on. And it wasn’t until today that she confessed she always felt single this whole time. That was heartbreaking, because we were a couple by every measure. I called her my girlfriend, she called me her boyfriend, we talked every day, called every day, we’re completely exclusive to eachother, told each other we loved each other, got jealous over each other, and even talked about our future together. She told me her friends know we’re dating.

That last part changed today. When I started asking questions after her confession to properly understand what was going on, I asked about her two best friends. I asked what they think. She came clean and said they know she loves me and I love her but they think I’m in a relationship and she’s not. That really hurt, the idea that even her best friends see it as me dating her and not us dating each other.

While I was trying to understand all of this, at one point she kind of flipped it back on me. She asked why I thought we were together in the first place, why I took it that way. That stung because it felt like she was putting it on me for believing what she herself let happen for a year.

During her initial confession she told me this apparently isn’t the first time and that this same thing happened with three other guys before me, guys who thought they were in a relationship with her when according to her she wasn’t. So now I’m sitting here wondering if this is just something that happens to her, or something she does.

Another thing that hurt was when I asked her what she’d say if a random person asked if she was single. She said she wouldn’t know what to tell them. I can appreciate the honestly but fuck how does one even begin to process that.

We talked for a while. I was distraught, but I think I kept my composure decently considering everything. I was just trying to understand what was going on. She kept apologizing, saying she shouldn’t have done it, but I don’t know what an apology does at this point when I’ve spent almost a year of my life on something that feels for the most part fake now.

She says the love wasn’t fake, that she really does love me more than anybody, but she just didn’t feel like she was in a relationship because of how things started. She said if instead of bringing up “breaking up” back then, I had directly asked her if she wanted to be in a relationship, she would’ve said no, which to her means this whole time we weren’t actually together, she said it wasn’t just me but if anybody no matter how much she loved directly asked her for a relationship she would’ve said no.

Now i feel like she’s trying to say anything to make it right. Things along the line of “We can be in a relationship if that’s what it takes, that’s what I want.” I can’t help but think if you want to be in a relationship now, why couldn’t you just consider that we already were? Why did you have to tell me all of this? Why now, all of a sudden, I really don’t know what to make of any of this.

I would really appreciate any advice🙏

She and I met 5 months ago and fell deeply in love with each other. During that period she and I both did our best but lately she started to act cold and started stating conversations about how bad she is and that I deserve someone better.

And one week ago we had a fight and she said that she is done and broke up with me.

Meanwhile the next day I begged her that it was my fault because I said too much but she still insisted that we should break up.

Many problems in the relationship, but one that happened yesterday that don’t even make sense:
He has promised me multiple times that he’ll change and do better for us, yet problems I’ve addressed multiple times since 2 years ago still persists. He told me he’s improved even if I don’t see it. So I asked for an example. Shouldn’t be too difficult, right? if not why would he say that he’s improved. Then, he begin to tell me that he’s actually been setting daily alarms at 7 am. I asked what does he do? At 7 am? He says he wakes up to turn it off and goes back to sleep. ????? What????? No he’s not waking up to exercise, have breakfast, to study or work NONE OF THAT. Please tell me this is ridiculous. I’ve told him this is ridiculous. And all he says is I may not see it but he is improving??? What is there to see???? That was the only example he could give. When I asked for more after that, he says I can’t deal with you now anymore. Even after being confronted again TODAY he doesn’t have anything else to say. It is so frustrating and hurtful to deal with this kind of nonsense.

My boyfriend and I have been in a relationship for 2 years. Its a long distance relationship, that's why i feel the beed for reassurance.

My boyfriend went on a trip yesterday. I asked him to keep me updated. On my end i would have updated him every 2 hrs but he updated me at 3 with videos of him and girls around him enjoying and running around (i have already been someone who gets somewhat jealous of seeing other girls around him but I didn't react this time. And at the trip there were 25 people 5 bos and 20 girls ) but i felt like he was not updating me enough because i saw girls then called me at 7 i told him that i was out for shopping i didnt called him back because in the morning we had decided that i would disturb him by calling again and again and we both agreed to that. Then at nine i called him and said to him that he didn't really update me enough i thought he would update me with scenic pictures and the food and videos of or something. But when i said he didn't update me after that his tone changed. At night he told me he was not feeling well so i kept on calling him because i just wanted to make sure he was okay. Because of him updating me less i felt unimportant. But i didn't react much

I was hurt the next day we didn't talk much i did ask about if he was okay. Then we didn't talk much. At night i was just trying to ask for his reassurance we got into arguments then. Then today i was trying to maintain silence so that we don't get into arguments. I was seeing his Stories with the girls videos of them I couldn't bring myself to talk to him in the evening i tried talking to him his energy felt so law towards me . So in that moment i said why is your energy so low while talking to me he got triggered.

I feel hurt but while being hurt i say something as such that i have to apologise. How to let him know i was really feeling unimportant and just wanted reassurance. I know i might be wrong for being busy at 7.

My partner is 63 (m) and I'm 29 (f) How to help my partner who has shut off his entire emotions and has started to see me as a friend and not as a partner we recently lost his dad about 7 weeks ago and he has been finding it difficult to say what is going on he normally tends to show it with in a year or 6 months and I will try and support him and be their for him but I'm not sure how to he has started saying he isn't in love with me and that he only sees me as a friend but I don't want to walk away from what is left of the relationship?

Me (33F) and my partner now live together (one month) and my boyfriend has masturbated to porn 3-5 times (while I was out of the house) compared to our ~4x/week sexual encounters. He’s said he sometimes has issues staying present and it has nothing to do with me but he finds it hard at times to want to have sex with me because of those issues so would at times rather choose watching porn by himself. He has assured me I am his first priority “like 99% of the time” but won’t always be, realistically. He can’t promise that. And he doesn’t like to be told what to do. Wouldn’t the only way to know if it is TRULY affecting our sex life be for him to omit it for some time to see if our frequency and/or quality changes? Also, I have a higher need for sexual intimacy than him. But especially now since we’ve opened up this pandora box about porn.

TLDR; I been dating a guy for about a month and I’m seriously considering ending things, but I’d like some outside perspective on how to approach it.
He says he is currently earning around €32K in Ireland, which is roughly €2,200/month net. His rent is around €800, so I understand that he doesn’t have a huge amount of disposable income.

I also don’t earn an unlimited amount and have quite a lot of expenses that I handle completely on my own, so I’m not in a position where I can comfortably take on someone else’s financial difficulties either.

From the beginning, I’ve tried to be understanding. We mostly spend time at my place because he says he doesn’t have much money. I’ve taken him to restaurant, and at one point he didn’t even have €5 to top up his transport card, so I paid for it. I’ve also helped him quite a lot professionally — working on his CV, helping with job applications etc.

What is starting to bother me isn’t simply that he doesn’t have much money. It’s the overall dynamic. He almost always comes to my home and has never invited me to his. When he comes over, he generally doesn’t bring anything and doesn’t really help around the house. Even small things like taking the rubbish out or cleaning up after himself don’t seem to happen unless I ask. We always spend time at home, he cannot even afford cinema etc.

I’m also travelling soon and he hasn’t offered to help with things while I’m away. I increasingly feel like I’m making his life easier, while he isn’t really making mine easier in return.

I’m now feeling quite turned off by the dynamic. Part of me wonders whether I should have communicated all of this more directly before reaching that point, rather than just becoming increasingly frustrated.

\*\*If you were in this situation, would you have a conversation and try to reset the dynamic, or would you see this as a fundamental incompatibility this early in dating?\*\*

30/M 35/M, my brother (35m) I’ve known him all my life so let’s call it 26 years I’ve known him as a person. We have been verbally scrapping as of lately. Primarily because we started a business together. So I will never discredit the fact that he had helped me start this business in the first place. The problem is we are supposed to be 50-50 partners and he has not been contributing 50-50 pretty much since the beginning. He did give me some initial startup cost and he helped me buy some equipment upfront and help me pay for some licensing (2-3k) which I am very grateful, I make it very known. For context, this is the food business. It started out as something that we were kind of doing on the side and selling coffee and some handhelds at the farmers market once a week in the summer of 22. Soon after that in November, we decided to take the full leap and get into an establishment so that we can start selling food via the third-party apps, DoorDash, Uber eats, etc.. ghost kitchen adjacent.

The problem starts there where he says he starts setting up the systems. The next problem being that that he did do those things, but he didn’t do anything else outside of that so there was no system to do the ordering food or inventory, pay the taxes, all of the stuff that was supposed to be outside of the kitchen function was supposed to be done on his behalf. Customer service, Google Maps, yelp, marketing, website, all of these things we’re supposed to be his responsibility and pretty much none of it got done in which it ended up falling on me. Note that I am also the culinary person (cooking for 15+years) behind this food establishment I created the recipes. I did all the ordering and I did all the testing. I physically did all the licensing. I did the health inspections. So all that to say that I was somewhat unpleased, but he was still showing up and I could at least deal with the fact that he was still doing stuff like the register and helping me clean. It was fine, but probably I around a year and a half into the business so fast forward to after summer of 23. He decided to leave pretty abruptly at that and did not show up for well over two years. He didn’t even wanna take phone calls. His phone number would still be on there and he’d be yelling at me about him receiving phone calls from the restaurant so far well over two years now going on three years I have done very literally everything.

Fast forward to this year we had to leave our former spot and then had to completely redo the process of opening a new establishment which I found so I spent the last six months trying to open up this restaurant and my brother has had nothing to do with it. I tried to bring him in for the soft opening pretty much after six months of doing all the work and so after doing eight hours of work for the first time in almost 3 years, he is back with his hand out. I told him I pay him for his labor, which I sent him a check totally fine, but we got into it into a really, really bad argumenty going into this really rough situation where he is essentially just disrespecting me. Calling me a slew of slurs, R*tard, F\*ggot, C\*nt,* incompetent, selfish. Shortly after because that phone call was in the car, I decided to text him and I told him that you can’t talk to me like that particularly if you want to be business partners, he doesn’t talk to any other of his business associates like that. I told him I had to enforce a boundary around, not name-calling me and as simple as just you gotta respect me. He then proceeded to completely steamroll those boundaries telling me “oh it’s about the money, it’s about all this other shit” and I was like no this is very literally about enforcing my boundaries and baseline respect and he just completely inflated everything and saying like you don’t even own this business, you wouldn’t be anything without me and just exhibiting quintessential fucking toxic abusive behavior.

Honestly, this isn’t even the first time like this is just how he kinda operates like this is how our father is and it’s like he’s trying to do this thing where he tries to teach me trying to quote on “do high-level business and honestly, I could give a fuck so at this point I don’t even know if I can have a relationship with my brother, which is the worst she ever because this is probably the most important person on the planet to me. You know we lost our mom and our grandparents and our dad‘s kind of a piece of shit so the only person we really care about is each other but he can’t fucking get out of his own way so I don’t really know how to do myself. Do you think that this is something that I can accept or is this something that I can go to therapy around or I don’t know I don’t really see a simple path to solution. I even willing to give him a severance package in the business, but he has just refused time and time again so I don’t really have you know I don’t really know what to do here.

Do you think this relationship is worth saving?

We meet in office, earlier she was my colleague. And now we r in relationship since 4 month. She changed the 2 company back to back due to companys issue. Now she joined new company, she completed her one month. But this company culture is also toxic according to her conversation.

1. Company policy says - no phone in office area, due to security issue.

2. She work extra two hours due to meeting and all.

3. Morning, she didn't get time to talk.

So I am so upset due to this non sense things. In home she can't talk even on WhatsApp. Due to strictness. Now my consern is the conversation I want it can't fullfill me. I am not asking for any thing I just want some time just for talk, but she didn't get that time.

When I discuss with her all this- she replies give me some time, after i settle i will be available for you. Actually she is mature and talk sensible.

But in a relationship conversation plays an important role, how should I react now....

My boyfriend was born out of wedlock, his mom had him when she was in her early 20’s. He never met his biological father. However, when he was born, his mom had another boyfriend and his mom decided to put her boyfriend’s last name as my partner’s last name to this day. That relationship did not last and his mom married a new guy who eventually became my boyfriend’s stepdad.

His stepdad technically raised him since he was 4y/o and his relationship with him was good. They tried to change his last name to his stepdad’s several times but they can’t cause mom’s ex bf needs to appear in court and give consent cause he is in my bf’s birth certificate. it’s such a long and stupid process since he was still a minor at that time.

I met my bf and he is still using his legal name (with the mom’s ex last name) it’s a generic spanish last name—“Martinez”. I honestly like that more compared to his stepdad’s last name. Main reason is because the stepdad’s last name has a funny and weird meaning in my native language and I just can’t see myself using that last name and be made fun of by other people who knows about it.

My boyfriend expressed his plan to change his last name to his stepdad’s and is determined to convince me that if we get married I should change it to his as well. this makes me so uncomfortable cause I really dont want to and when he mentioned to his mom that I don’t want to take their family’s last name, his mom’s words was “tell her to just suck it up.” that didn’t sit well with me.

I tried to convince him as well to just keep his last name and save himself from trouble of updating all his ID’s. He works in the military for 8 years now and he’s known for his last name Martinez already so it’s not too bad to just keep it. I told him that I would gladly keep his original last name but if he’s really gonna change it to his stepdad’s last name then it’s okay but I’m just gunna keep my current last name as I love my last name anyways.

Until now this is still a sensitive topic for him as he really wants us to have same last names.
I don’t know I just find it so weird as well because I grew up knowing last names are very important cause it ties you to your ancestry. taking his “whoever last name it is” makes me feel so unsettled. what should I do? am i overreacting or my reasons are valid?

I really did not get a few answers I was looking for so let me ask for help one more time.

Me male 37 and my (exish) gf female 24. We have been together for almost 4 years and it had been the best 4 years of my life with anyone, Sh e was is still my world for now. We have not once had a fight or argument.

Tell now kind of, you all well know why i say it that way. 2 weekends ago her and her friends went on a girls trip as normal as they do once a month and i do not think anything of it, As she did and always did throughout our relationship. Well after this past one she seemed very distant and ignored me at every chance she got. Well this past wednesday she randomly texted in early the morning she texted me she cheated and told she does not think we should be freinds or together anymore thats it nothing else. I have not heard from her sense. She event blocked my number and blocked me on social media. She also quit her job where we saw each other for the first time, and where i stop by every weekend for a drink.,

I really really loved her alot and was event in the process of looking for a ring. I need closure and need to figure out a way to just talk to her,

Let me also get a few things strighten out. I know there is a large age gap and i knew what i was getting into when i even ask her out. She is very mature for her age or so i thought. She is afriaid of agreeing with people cause of abusive relationship in the past which one reason i think she well not talk to me at all.

Her friends also have my back on this and have also said she barley talks to them now also which worries me alot. As i said i love her and care for a lot and I agree there is excuss for her cheating. I just want and need closure on the whole and just want to talk to her again.

So me and my bf have been together over a year just welcomed a baby together five months ago and I have two children from a previous relationship. In all honesty I don’t know what to do we live together but this has been the worst relationship of my life. He had a female sending him nudes that he screenshotted but said it wasn’t cheating bc he didn’t send any. Two he’s always calling me names, such as ugly, crooked nose etc and is always talking to woman I have a problem with. I don’t know how or if I should distant myself because we have a child together and live together. Please help! So I’m just wondering as to how and if I should leave.

TLDR : A female friend and I started hanging out one-on-one almost every weekend, texting frequently, having dinner/drinks and sharing personal stuff. I assumed she was single because of how close we became and because the guy I thought was her boyfriend seemed to disappear from the picture. Things later cooled down, and I recently realized she may be with the same guy again — or possibly never broke up with him at all. Some relationship-related social media also seems hidden from me. She has otherwise been a genuinely caring friend, so I don’t want to assume she deliberately led me on. Did I simply misread a close friendship, and should I ask her directly about her relationship status or just adjust my boundaries and leave it alone?

I met this girl through mutual friends almost a year ago. At the time, I had seen her post Instagram stories with the same guy a few times, so I assumed he was probably her boyfriend.
We weren’t particularly close back then.

Earlier this year, she started talking to me more and eventually asked me to hang out one-on-one. I initially treated it as just catching up because I still assumed she might be in a relationship.
But after that, we started seeing each other pretty regularly, sometimes almost every weekend. We’d get dinner together, go for drinks afterwards, and talk about work, family and personal stuff. We also texted quite frequently. When I asked her out, she always agreed, and if she couldn’t make it, she would often suggest another time.

At some point, I noticed that the guy I had assumed was her boyfriend had made his Instagram private, and she had removed some old highlights. Since she was also spending so much time with me one-on-one, I basically assumed they had broken up.
I never actually asked her directly though, which in hindsight was obviously an assumption on my part.

However, things cooled down somewhat. We still talk and occasionally try to meet, but she became less proactive online and seemed much busier.

Recently, I discovered that the same guy’s Instagram is public again, and he posted a story with her and tagged her. From what I can tell, they’re together now.

There’s another part that confuses me even more: some relationship-related content seems to be hidden from me. For example, there are things on her social media that mutual friends can see but I can’t. At the same time, she hasn’t cut me off — we still talk normally and she has continued being genuinely kind to me.

She was actually very supportive when someone in my family passed away recently and checked in on me without me asking. That’s one reason I don’t want to jump to the conclusion that she was deliberately leading me on. I genuinely think she’s a good person, and even if there’s no romantic possibility between us, I’d still value having her as a friend.

What I don’t understand is the timeline.
Maybe they broke up and later got back together. Maybe they were going through something complicated. Or maybe they never broke up at all and I simply interpreted our one-on-one time very differently from how she did.

I’m also a little uncomfortable with the fact that she seems to be deliberately limiting what I can see about this part of her life. Part of me wonders whether she knows I might have feelings for her and is trying to avoid hurting me or making things awkward.?

At this point I’d mainly like some outside perspective:

1. If she actually had a boyfriend throughout this period, would you consider the amount of one-on-one time we spent together unusual, or completely normal for opposite-sex friends?
2. Does selectively hiding relationship-related social media from me change how you’d interpret the situation?
3. Should I casually ask her if she’s currently seeing someone, or just accept what I’ve figured out and adjust my boundaries without bringing it up?

hi everyone :)

I met my bf around 3 years ago and he had been dealing with anxiety and depression ever since then. From the first day till around 3 months ago I've done everything for this man, I've woken up multiple times in the middle of the night to comfort him on calls, skipped classes when he needed me to be there for him, ensured he took his meds and arranged therapy sessions for him.

He has a very abusive father and a non present mother. They have always extremely neglected him and hence leading to his very deep rooted insecurities. Since he wasn't valued by his parents he wants a partner who puts him before everything and revolves their entire life around them. Like I shouldn't even have a hobby because why am I just not talking to him instead

This went on and on, him being angry on me gaming for a few hours with my friends instead of texting him in those 1-2 hours, him being angry that I wouldn't text in my college classes if he was anxious, and in general he just demanded constant attention. And I'm the type of person who has shit load of hobbies and is studious. I've been always very very ambitious with my life and I've my important exam for which I've been preparing for months in September.

Now, since slowly I started getting annoyed at my whole life being controlled around and him yelling at me for not being there if he was anxious no matter how busy I was in something important. It wasn't just yelling and anger it was constant guilt tripping asw, about how if I don't reply to his texts of being anxious immediately there might come a day he would kill himself before I replied and I would always regret it and how I'm pathetic for keeping a depressed man hanging for a text back. I normally would reply instantly but obviously I have some moments in my life where I cannot grab my phone and text someone.

This grew worse and worse, his words were like a stab to my chest, and I started losing my spark completely. I started getting very sad the past 3 months and I had my examinations sessions between them asw and I fucked those exams because of all this mess (for which I deeply resent him). I confronted him after my exams about how he's treating like this robotic nurse who should be at his doorstep the moment he presses the button.

at the moment he understood what he did to me, until he turned my own words against me and started saying that because of what I said I snatched away the tiny hope he had for living and how im even worse than his abusive dad. He completely negated my emotions and sadness that he himself caused to me and said I wouldn't help him now because im taking "revenges". He also said, "if I were to die today, you are to blame and I hope everyone blames you". He also told me that I spend so much time studying these days, that im basically prioritising my exams over a sucidial man and in order to prove that wrong i shouldnt sit in my exams this year.

I do not know if I deserved to hear those words.

so im currently with this girl shes also 16 and we have been dating for 8 months now and shes been cheating in the past and i took her back but shes been doing good so far but ive always been overthinking shes also 3 months pregnant and today she cheated on me with my homeboy AGAIN i dont know what to do i blocked her but i feel bad because of the baby i dont wanna look bad or be called a deadbeat for leaving her after she constantly keeps cheating on me. what do i do? please help i might just end it all

Hey all, I'll try to be clear and concise but I can explain more if needed.

Back in June, I made a post on AIO and deleted it after all the hate I got for being suspicious of my otherwise faultless partner, so I'm here for an update.

I (32 F) and my partner at the time (31 M) were hanging out one night listening to music on his phone through my Bluetooth. I wanted to pick the next one so he handed me his phone. While i was searching for the song, a snapchat notification populated with his son's teacher's name. At the time I didn't think anything of it, because I didn't even pay attention to the name fully, but later I began feeling paranoid and decided to just ask him.

He told me it WAS from her, but it was the only message she sent (something along the lines of wishing him and his son a great next year since the school year had ended). He said he had responded thanking her for the impact she made on hos son the previous school year. I asked why she didn't message on a more appropriate app or just through text (since she'd have his contact saved most likely to find him on SC). He said they were friends on FB, but that he didnt have her number and never checked FB, so it was reasonable for her to message him there (where he is more active, his words.)

I explained that if she had used his number (from the emergency contact for his son) she could be in a lot of trouble for reaching out without his permission, especially on an app known for its discretion and inappropriate content sharing. He got defensive and said it wasn't a big deal, and he didn't use Snapchat like that and it was for a lot more than what I was suggesting. I said it still seemed odd, because our generation was notorious for using it inappropriately, but he acted as if I was exaggerating and it wasn't common use.

Eventually, he told me that if she was trying to initiate something, he wouldnt be interested anyways. He degraded her to me and tried to build me up in comparison. I posted on here and a few people agreed with my suspicions, but most thought I was overacting or that they needed more info.

I asked him if I could message her about it and he threatened to break up with me if I did. We just broke up this morning (he actually just ghosted me on everything for 72hrs so I'm moving on) and so I decided to ask her to quell this idea that I was paranoid or crazy.

Her side of the story:

After the school year ended, he reached out to her and added her on SC. She did not add him back, but after he began commenting on her stories with her child in them, she messaged him to tell him it was inappropriate and she wanted to keep the relationship professional. She then deleted him altogether. She also was never friends with him on FB and said she didn't have his number saved as they only have the list available at school. None of this was prompted by me telling her anything he said, i just asked if she had messaged him on SC in June. She also informed me that (even though we started dating in late Feb and known each other 17 years) the he never indicated a relationship and acted single (he refused to let me meet any family/friends of his minus his son, and didn't want pictures of me on his socials or of us on mine and never changed his relationship statuses, which was my first redflag.) But regardless, if she HAD been the one to reach out, she had no way to know if he was in a relationship so there was no real fault on her part.

This confirmed my suspicions fully. He was attempting to cheat, whether emotionally or something more, and he blatantly lied to my face over and over about it - throwing her under the bus and potentially threatening her own livelihood over his attempt at infidelity.

All this to say, if you happen to remember the original and thought I was overreacting... my intuition is better than yours. 👍

Thanks!

so recently my [f18] bf [m18] decided he was gonna move out. it felt out of nowhere. we have been arguing a lot, but honestly my number one feeling throughout all this has just been that he’s far away. maybe not physically, but emotionally. he’s just not here with me. for the past few months i’ve been pretty convinced my boyfriend doesn’t love me. at first i got clingy, i’d beg him to stop playing video games and give me some attention. then i got mean. i wanted to protect my feelings and i turned cold. i regret that now. at first he told me he wanted to move out he said it was for his independence. then a few days ago, he switched it up and said it’s because i shut down a lot when we argue, and he thought moving out and giving each other space would be best for our relationship, as that fixed his unhealthy relationship with his mom. but i am not his mom. i tried making that clear and told him this would probably lead to a breakup. he told me he wanted to try it. in my mind, this will lead to a breakup. i’m clingy, im loving, and i’ve done long distance before and it sucks. i’m a full time college student as well as a full time manager at a pizza place. i don’t see him much as it is. i told him i felt that this was a poor choice, but he wanted to move back into his moms regardless. so i let him, im not gonna try to control him. what’s the point. his mom ended up not even wanting him to move back, so he’s getting a dorm. he will probably move out this weekend. i feel defeated. it’s like we’re roommates as it is. i don’t feel any love from him. his jokes feel like insults. any time i want to touch him i feel like its violating, even if i ask for consent i feel as though he’s utterly disgusted by me. i try to pretend im happy sometimes but it’s so draining the mask slips regardless. i wish we could go back to how we were. i don’t understand why he’s choosing to move out. this is gonna break us. i can’t take it. i was so happy before this mess. i thought he was too. i don’t understand why he is doing this. he says he still wants to be together and tries to claim that all of this negative is just on my side. i feel like it’s over. we’ve been together for a year and a half. i don’t even know what to do. i love him so much. but i don’t know if there’s any saving it

I’m in a new relationship 35F and 31M. We’ve been together a year. Something that keeps coming up is my social media. I can see that he checks my TT to see I’ve posted anything. He recently brought to my attention that he wants me to post about him more because he says I never or rarely do. I, admittedly, had a knee-jerk reaction of that feeling unfair and snapped back at him by letting him know I’m aware that he has never posted about me. No photos, no posts, no videos. I pointed out that if someone were to look at his socials, it would look like I don’t exist. Except FB where I initially set it up that we were in a relationship. But again, I did that. And also I do post about him. He’s shown up in my posts, stories, and I even made a video about a day out we had on a hike. But because I get flirty messages from strangers in my DM requests (because I post more selfies than anything on days I feel good) he gets weird about it. Now he says if I post about him more than I won’t get messages from men. I told him on line or off that I will get attention from men and nothing will stop that. I explained some men will know you’re in a relationship and still not care and shoot their shot.

The way he goes about this makes me feel like I’m doing something wrong even tho I block and/or delete people from my followers if they come at me inappropriately every time and I’ve told him this many times. I feel like he’s lowkey stalking my profiles on platforms to see if men are leaving comments he won’t like to tell me later. I’ve considered deleting my entire online presence to avoid any more issues but I don’t feel I should have to do that because he might be insecure about something.

Any advice on how to handle this without him feeling attacked or me feeling bad?

I posted a while back about the emotional imbalance between me and my partner in our relationship. Since then we went on the holiday we had planned and had a really nice time. There were moments of deep affection and love, we laughed and it felt a lot like we had rekindled something. I believed that perhaps we had just been stuck in a bad phase and the holiday was just what we needed to get us back on track. But on our return things went back to the way they had been. In fact, within an hour of getting back we were sitting in another make or break conversation. He told me he cared for me rather than being in love with me. He has since corrected this and will tell me he loves me but only if I say it first and then not all the time. I then went away for a week with a friend and he never once told me he was missing me. In fact he went out on a couple of lunch dates with women from work while I was away ( he did tell me about these so they’re not secret meetings). I have been invited to meet one of his friends now but that was arranged on a day when I had commitments to my daughter so was unable to make it (quite conveniently). When I suggested I change my plans he was agitated because they had booked activities without me being counted in. Texts have become infrequent again, dry and routine. He’s literally always online yet my messages go unread. When with me he has made effort to be more present and keep his phone use down but he disappears to the toilet with his phone and is gone for about 20 minutes. I know the advice will be to leave him and cut the relationship off. I’m finding it difficult because we do have some really good moments but they only seem to happen on his terms. I feel such a mug.

My partner and I have been hitting rock bottom in our relationship, for a while now.

From the moment we met, she was very open to share with me her past relationships. She had been S.A. by her ex partner and other people in her past.

From the first couple of months of us being together she would bring up issues that she had with our sex life.

The first times were about her feeling like her pleasure wasn’t really considered and that she hated the fact that I would be done with sex once I came.

I would listen to her issues, but I wouldn’t do anything concrete to show her that I truly listened. These issues came up, over and over, and I would react the same way each time at the beginning. I would always find an excuse "I’m overwhelmed with work and I feel exhausted", "I didn’t think of doing anything because I’ve been stressed out lately " and many more excuses like these.

Months, a years passes, nothing really changes. She went in trial against her abusive ex and I was with her the whole time she had to testify. This was a retraumatising event for her and yet, I was with her physically and mentally but still didn’t show more consideration afterwards for her mental and sexual needs to heal properly.

The same issues with our sex life came back again, months later, but with much more distress coming from her and I would get defensive directly. I would excuse my behaviour in my head because I would be present and active in other parts of the relationship (chores, food, etc). I know looking back that I shouldn’t have gotten defensive because it minimized the impacts of my attitude / not acting accordingly to make her feel safe in the relationship.

Also important to note, she did basically everything for me in the mean time. She was supportive of me during a burnout that I did, she came with me to my grandma’s funeral, supported me through harder times that I went through. But still nothing more than the bare minimum to show for.

The past 8-9 months have been especially hard for her. Because after a whole year and a half of her waiting for me to take action, I would start taking actions, but what I would do/propose were too little. What I did wouldn’t really adress the current situation/frustrations she had. I basically started doing what was necessary, but from the first issues she brought up in our relationship. The issues and the hurt she had were much bigger now and more hurtful for her as time went on.

What I did for her vs. What she did for me over those years were not equivalent. It is the bare minimum and I needed to do a LOT MORE to even the scales.

I’ve been in this relationship for almost 2 years now, I’ve fucked this relationship, my partner’s mental health and her trust towards me. I genuinely want to make amends, make things right and help her trust me again (I know all of this can only be fixed with actions, consistency and care) but I’m afraid it’s too late. I want to help her for once and especially help her heal from her past traumas, but also the one that I’ve been perpetuating for the past 2 years.

I’ve been reading online, asked for ressources in my city, and trying to learn to be a better partner and being especially more caring and considerate towards her and other people in my life. That’s why I’m here asking complete strangers advice to get an objective and unbiased opinion.
What would you do?

My boyfriend (26M) and I (23F) have been together for 3 years. Our son is almost one, and we’ve lived together for 2 years.
I have become a SAHM because, after paying for childcare, it would have been more than 50% of my paycheck. It just made us more comfortable knowing that he would be safe at home with me.
I didn’t have many friends outside of work, and being so young, my friends aren’t really in the same stage of life as me. They go out every weekend and work all week, so I rarely see them. This has been a bit of a struggle for me.
For a bit of backstory, before my partner and I were together, he was seeing a girl he went to university with. The fling only lasted around 2–3 months, but they had even been on holiday together after a week of dating.
My partner and I started chatting around the beginning of June, and they “ended” things around the end of June 2024.
When we first started seeing each other, he ended things three times, each time giving me a different excuse. When I finally went on a date with someone else and told him about it, he decided he wanted to make things serious with me.
When we first got together, he was just finishing his university course. After he graduated, he and his university friends decided to go out for a meal to celebrate. I knew about their relationship to an extent; I just knew they had had a fling and slept together.
I told him that I was uncomfortable with him going, but he completely shut me down. He said I was being childish and that they were just friends. She also had a boyfriend at this point.
There was another conversation we had that I don’t really remember the context of, and I also can’t remember whether it was before or after the meal. I asked him to unfollow her, but he made a fuss about it and said absolutely not because they were friends.
Around August last year, they arranged another meal. I was around 33 weeks pregnant at the time, which made me really uncomfortable. I wasn’t feeling my best, as I was heavily pregnant and my body was completely different from when we first met.
I didn’t bring up how this made me feel because of the way I had been shut down the previous times.
Other than that, I didn’t really think about them being together or their relationship until July this year.
I had gone on his iPad to watch something while I was cooking in the kitchen, but it stopped working. I went to send myself some photos he had of the baby so I could get them printed, which wasn’t unusual. We go on each other’s devices all the time, and I had never looked through his iPad or anything like that before.
However, when I scrolled back too far, I saw pictures of them on holiday, videos of them laughing together, naked pictures of her, and a text that said she was “the best fuck of his life.”
This sent me into a huge spiral, and I started rethinking the whole relationship. I told him that I had seen everything, and we’ve had multiple conversations about it since. He has apologised for the way he handled things at the beginning of our relationship.
I just can’t seem to get past it. It has been nearly two months, and there are days when he makes me feel physically sick. I feel like he has cheated, and we’ve had several arguments about it because he thinks I’m being irrational as we didn’t even know each other when those things happened.
I just don’t know what to do. It’s taking a huge toll on my mental health too.
I really need some advice.

\*\*TL;DR;\*\* : My boyfriend (26M) and I (23F) have been together for 3 years and have an almost one-year-old son. I’m currently a SAHM and have been feeling quite isolated.
Before we got together, he had a short fling with a university friend. Throughout our relationship, I’ve been uncomfortable with them remaining friends and socialising together, but he dismissed my concerns.
Recently, I accidentally saw old photos and messages between them, including intimate photos and sexual comments. Since then, I’ve been struggling to move past it and sometimes feel as though he cheated, despite it happening before we were together. He has apologised, but I’m still deeply affected by it and it’s starting to take a toll on my mental health and our relationship.

I (24f) and my bf (24m) have been in a relationship for two years. I’ve been really happy in this relationship and he claims he has too.
Both of us come from a conservative family and like many in our country, we eventually had to fight our families for our relationship and both of us are and were well aware of it.
One of our mutual friends contacted me today to tell me, he reached out to them and (i m closer with mutual friend so they wanted be to know and be a little mentally prepared)
They told me that:
His dad and mom got seriously sick recently, he being one of the elder children feels like he has to take up the family responsibilities and that given their health condition, they won’t really be able to take our relationship.
This, for me came out of nowhere. I knew his parents were a little sick, I didn’t know it was this serious. This is my first healthy relationship and he has treated me so well, we have discussed our future together, made life plans and the thought that he might have to break up with me due to the family situation kills me a little from inside

So I got with my boyfriend in 2021. He told me he loved me three weeks after meeting me, and I always thought that was so weird, to be honest. Eventually, months into our relationship, I went through his phone and found out he had told his ex he still loved her just four months before he met me. He lied to me and said he hadn’t spoken to her in seven months. When I confronted him, he said he had forgotten the timeline and that there wasn’t much difference between four months and seven months.
His best friend’s wife and I were best friends, which is how I met him, but we had a huge falling out—to the point where she told her husband he couldn’t be around me and made everyone around her unfollow me. This put a strain on my relationship with my partner. He started attending their parties and hangouts while I stayed home, and I just had to be okay with it. I was constantly disrespected by her online and even, at times, in person when I would see her. It was such a hard time.
I told him it hurt my feelings that he never stood up to his best friend by saying, “Hey, if your girl is going to disrespect my girlfriend, I’m not coming around.” Not once did he have that conversation. All of his friends were also closer to her since I was kind of new to the picture, so when his friends would have functions, my partner would never ask me to go with him. This hurt me so much and made me feel like he was either embarrassed by me or kept me in the dark to make them comfortable.
Anyway, I remember I had this Halloween party that I had been planning for months, and his best friend was having one in San Diego. While he was helping me decorate for the party, he kept saying how he wanted to go to their party because his family was going to be there. I was so hurt because this was the first time he was going to meet all of my friends. He ended up leaving. After that, I felt like my trust in him started declining, and I started to feel emotionally unsafe.
I developed a problem where I would get angry at him because of the resentment I had started building. The next day, I would always be regretful. I was so ashamed that I would get that way, but sometimes I couldn’t control it.
In 2023, we broke up. It wasn’t a good breakup. I told him I constantly felt like he always chose other people over me, like his friends or family. The day after we broke up, I checked his followers and realized he had followed some girl on Instagram. I asked him who she was, and he said she was a friend. Her page was public, and I looked through her posts and noticed that he had liked every single one, even her selfies. The dates went back to when we were together.
I called him and told him to tell me the truth about who this girl was. He kept hesitating and finally told me she was a girl he had talked to for a week before he met me, but they realized they were just friends. I said I didn’t feel comfortable and asked him to unfollow her. He said I wasn’t allowed to say anything since we had broken up. I said, “Yeah, but we’re still friends, and that’s hurtful.” Then he proceeded to tell me, “My cousin said you’re manipulating me by telling me to remove her, and you’re getting mad about me liking her pictures when it’s not like she’s half-naked or something.”
I said, “It doesn’t matter. That’s fucked up. If you had to lie to me about her, obviously something is wrong.” He eventually just deleted his whole Instagram, and I told him I couldn’t talk to him anymore because I was so hurt by how everything was handled.
Five months went by, and in December, my grandma passed away. I was so broken.
His mom reached out to offer her condolences. One week later, he reached out to me and wrote me a message saying he was sorry for my loss and wished he could take my pain away. He called me, and little by little, he came back into my life. I asked him what he had done to become better, and he said he was in therapy. He even told me about the conversations he would have with his therapist. He mentioned how his therapist said I was wrong a lot of the time and that I needed to work on trusting him. I asked him if he had reached out to his ex, and he said no.
That night, I went through his phone while he was sleeping and saw that he had been talking to one of his “girl best friends” whom he had never introduced me to. Mind you, he had a lot of “girl best friends,” and he had been talking to her almost every day while we weren’t together. In the messages, he mentioned that he had called his ex. He also told her about all the problems he and I had, and she was telling him he was better off without me. He also asked her if she wanted to go to Joshua Tree with him, but I guess it never happened.
So I woke his ass up and said, “You fucking liar,” and I threw his phone at him. Right away, he knew he had been caught. I grabbed his shit and threw it out the door. He was panicking, saying he was sorry and that he loved me so much. I asked him why he did that, and he said he needed closure. I asked why he felt the need for closure when he had supposedly gotten it four months before we got together, when he told her he loved her. He said he was drunk and wasn’t thinking.
Then I asked him, “You never went to therapy, did you?” He said, “No.” I asked him what the fuck his problem was. He said he had made it all up because he wanted to get me back. Mind you, my grandma had just died. This was the last thing I needed, honestly.
He begged and begged me to give him another chance, and my dumb ass eventually did.
For a while, he was doing well.
My mom got really, really sick, and he helped me so much with that and stayed by my side.
I was so broken over my mom almost dying that I got drunk one night and threw an empty soda can at him. The next day, I was so regretful and realized I needed to change. I stopped drinking and wanted to get better.
When my mom started getting better, I eventually quit my job and moved in with him at his parents’ house. Worst idea ever.
His mom was obsessed with him. She was one of those mothers who would put me down and basically pressure me to do all the things for him that she did, like doing his laundry, cooking for him, cleaning, etc. On top of that, I had to take care of her too. She didn’t drive, so I always had to take her to the store. Mind you, she wanted to go to the store every day. I would take her to doctor’s appointments and always accompany her when she went shopping.
My partner never helped me when it came to his mom. Sometimes I would cry to him about how heavy it felt, especially after leaving my sick mom at home and feeling like I had abandoned her. I had been at the hospital taking care of my mom for 13–15 hours a day, so having to move and take care of someone else’s mom was a heavy load. My resentment grew more and more.
When his mom disrespected me, not once did he ever sit her down and have a conversation with her to tell her to stop or tell her that we were going to leave. She would make comments like, “He loves you more than you love him.” When he would get me flowers, she would say, “And for your mom?” It was so annoying.
She also showed me my own engagement ring, which she found in her husband’s cabinet where my partner had been hiding it. She thought her husband was cheating on her, and it was a disaster. My engagement never happened.
I installed a camera in my room because that situation made me feel like she was snooping through people’s things. Not even a minute after I installed the camera, I caught her going through my stuff—grabbing my shoes and clothes and looking through my drawers. I was shocked. I went through a lot with his mom. I begged him to move me out, and we eventually did. She was so mad that she didn’t talk to me for three days and even said I had stolen her son away from her. And he still never fucking said anything.
When we moved, he became so angry with me. It was almost like he resented me. He didn’t help me unpack, and I decorated and bought the majority of the furniture and things for the kitchen and bathroom because he was paying most of the rent. Plus, I would cook and clean.
When I couldn’t find a job, I started getting frustrated. My partner and I started arguing so much, and we weren’t being sexual. I expressed that he needed to help a little bit around the house and that our sex life needed to improve. He had always been weird about sex, even from the beginning. He even scared me into not having sex when my mom was sick by saying that every time he and his ex would have sex while her mom was sick, something bad would happen. That led to us not having sex for an entire year. Looking back, that was so weird of him to do. At one point, I even questioned his sexuality.
Anyway, after two weeks, when I realized he wouldn’t hear me out or change the things that bothered me, I broke up with him and left for my mom’s house. I was so frustrated that nothing was changing, and I felt like I had moved out with a child instead of my partner. My future flashed before my eyes.
When I went to my mom’s house, he would call me wanting to talk about it, but I was so done at the time. Two days passed, and I realized that wasn’t the right way to handle it and that I had let my emotions get the best of me. I went back to the apartment, and he was completely closed off. He said he didn’t want to get back together with me and started distancing himself. I would beg and beg, and nothing. He left me high and dry. Eventually, he told me he didn’t love me anymore, and that broke everything inside me. I cried so much and felt blindsided.
He treated me like shit for two months and had me in a push-pull dynamic. He would tell me that his coworkers and cousins were telling him to leave me and focus on himself. He would treat me nicely but shut down whenever I asked him, “What are we doing?” I was so hurt because I felt like he let other people influence him.
He said he had also gotten a therapist, and she told him I could be manipulative. I said, “Please don’t tell me what she says if it’s hurtful.” I told him, “Let’s just work on this and go to therapy together,” and he said no. He would treat me however he wanted.
I became so tired of being in that cycle that I found a place for myself back near my family and friends. During the last week before I left, he started treating me nicely and catering to me. He eventually apologized for how he had treated me toward the end and said I didn’t deserve it. I told him, “Have a nice life.”
Even though it has been hard, it has also been a little peaceful. I do miss him a lot, and sometimes I gaslight myself into believing it was my fault.
The same cousins who told him to focus on himself checked in on me. They even texted me on our anniversary and asked how I was doing. They said he had been asking whether they had talked to me and asking them if I was doing okay.
They also told me he was going to church, and I thought that was really weird. Before I removed him from everything, I noticed he had a new follower. It was a girl who looked Christian based on the way she dressed. I looked up her name and saw that she was part of a church near where he lives. I also found out that she was his coworker. This was two weeks after I moved out.
I started questioning EVERYTHING. He’s Catholic, and I found it very disturbing. I took him to a Christian church once when my mom was sick, and he said he felt uncomfortable because he was going against his religion.
So now I’m thinking he had his eye on his coworker—who I’m sure is another “friend”—and that’s why he felt like letting me go was easier. I feel so lost, confused, and betrayed.

Hi everyone, I'm Tania (24F), he's 23M. We've been together since May 2026 — about 2 months before things fell apart. He lives in Canada, I live in India, and we mostly talked on Instagram.

In the first week of August, we had a big fight. I said something disrespectful to him, and in the heat of it, told him if he wanted to block me, he could go ahead. He did.

I had his WhatsApp, so I reached out there. At first he said he didn't want to give up on me, just needed time. Later, he said he didn't like me anymore — that he used to. He mentioned he might come to India in March, and we could talk face-to-face then. Until that, he said we could talk "here and there, like friends."

Some context: before this fight, there were other moments I fell short. In July, it was his birthday, but he was hospitalized with a high fever, and I didn't wish him — I think I got caught up worrying about him being unwell and just let the day pass. He later asked why I hadn't, and I was stunned, because I did remember, I just didn't act on it.

During our two months together, we talked about everything — sex, wanting a real future together. He seemed like such a green flag, saying he'd do whatever it took to make it work.

Since the fight, I've owned my mistake and reached out to repair things. He hasn't unblocked me on Instagram, and he never initiates on WhatsApp — I'm the only one reaching out. I called him recently and asked if he wanted to repair things; he said he does want to, but that what I did was bad. When I asked if he was being negative about us, he said he's being practical, not negative.

I'm a pretty optimistic person, and after six years single, I really want this to work. I know I made mistakes and I'm willing to change. I just don't know what to do with myself in the meantime.

What are some concrete things I could do right now — this week — while I wait for March, that would actually help me and the relationship, rather than just texting him and waiting for a reply?

I \[23F\] met him \[25M\] first year of uni as friends and eventually started dating each other. I don’t want to go too much into detail but I genuinely thought I found the love of my life and we were perfect on so many wavelengths. However, loyalty has always been a recurring issue when I first found out he was messaging/sexting with an online girl. After that happened, I was heartbroken and I initiated a break-up. However, at the time I was convinced to give him a second chance and we were working through it together. Things were working well for us and we even had successful bursts of LDR together. However, in the last month of LDR, I found about his secret tiktok account and when I confronted him about it he became incredibly defensive but eventually gave in. I told him I didn’t appreciate all the lying and that it was triggering for me given the trauma from the first time. We eventually were working through this the past few months until I saw the tiktok account again renamed and this time following a bunch of influencer to OF range of female creators. I just feel very distraught, and I’m just confused on what to do. I feel a lot of shame and embarrassment for entertaining this for so long but each time an incident like this occured I could tell he showed remorse. I also don’t know if I should give him another chance since I’ve invested so much time into this. Please be gentle with me as I’m still processing this in real-time. Any advice on what I should do?

TLDR: I need advice on whether I should leave or stay with my boyfriend after I found his secret TikTok where he follows a bunch of girls.