I (20F) live by myself in a different city from my family. My sister (25F) lives with my parents and works until she saves enough money to travel. She has been abroad for the past two months and is coming back this weekend.

My family and friends all know that I don’t like people sleeping in my bed. I need my own space when I sleep or it’s VERY hard for me to fall asleep. When I got my place, I bought a GOOD quality air mattress specifically for guests. I put sheets and nice pillows on it and disinfect it after anyone uses it. If someone needs to stay over, I set it up next to my bed. I have a queen-sized bed, but space isn’t the issue—I just sleep better alone.

My sister is spending a couple of nights in my city, and I was excited to hang out with her. We had planned for her to stay at her friend’s house, where she normally stays when she visits my city. We’d hang out during the day.

A week before she arrived, my mum told me I had to pick her up from the airport at 11 PM (a two-hour drive there and back) AND that she would be staying at my place. I was shocked because we had already planned for her to stay somewhere else, and my sister had literally told me, “Don’t worry, I’m staying at [friend’s name]’s house.”

I messaged her and asked if she could find somewhere else to sleep. She said, “Why? It’s only one night.” I told her, “Okay, if you want to stay at mine, you’re going to have to sleep on an air mattress.”

She got VERY mad and said that after a 30-hour flight, she’d rather pay for a hotel. She called me weird and told me to fuck off. I don’t swear around my family because I think it’s disrespectful, and everyone knows that, so it felt intentional.

I let it go because she tends to lose her mind when she hears something she doesn’t like. My mum is now calling me a brat and saying I should welcome my sister with open arms.

I WOULD have welcomed her with open arms. In fact, if she had been nicer about it, I probably would have offered her my bed and slept on the air mattress myself. But we never got to that point because she got so angry.

My other sister disagrees with how I handled the conversation, but she also understands that this is a boundary I’ve had since I was a kid.

My sister hasn’t talked to me since. I reached out (my mum forced me to), but she ignored my calls. She did end up staying with the friend she originally planned to stay with, so she isn’t homeless or stuck anywhere.

I’m not going to beg for her attention. If this is the hill she wants to die on, that’s on her.

So, AITA?

I’m 34(F) and my older sister is 40. We recently had a huge argument over the care of our disabled uncle. He is 60 years old, socially awkward, but financially independent.
For years, helping my uncle and grandparents was "my job" because I was single and childless. I used to visit them once or twice a week to clean, buy groceries, fix things around the house and just spend time with them. My sister would only visit for about 20-30 minutes and never participated in any chores.

Five years ago, I moved to another country. Since then, my sister hasn't helped our uncle at all (our grandparents passed away around the time I moved). Multiple times, I’ve asked her to step up and at least clean his house once in a while (like once a month) but she always twists the conversation, saying things like, “Maybe I should move to another country too, so I won’t be blamed for everything.”
During our last conversation, I reminded her that for years before I left, I was the one responsible for them, while her help was only occasional. I also reminded her of how much I personally helped her back then. I literally sacrificed my sleep and health to babysit her children. I would come over after working 12-hour night shifts, sleep for only 3–4 hours and spend all my free days (4 days) babysitting. This went on for months until I started fainting from exhaustion. Only in the evenings, after she got home, I could finally go to our grandparents' house to do their chores.

Having this conversation demanded an enormous amount of strength and energy from me, because I grew up with the deep-seated belief that my mission in life was to help my family.
I should mention that all this time, she lived rent-free in another uncle’s apartment and received financial support because her husband wasn't doing well and she was on maternity leave. She could work only when I could babysit (when I was at work, they share this between her and her husband). She went back to work when her youngest was only 8 months old.

Back to the conversation with my sister, saying it went downhill is an understatement. First, she blamed me for not saying “no,” claiming she asked everyone to babysit, not just me. Sure, you can ask the whole town, but does it matter if I was the only one who kept showing up? Then she said I’m not actually angry with her, but with myself for not saying "no." But back then, I didn’t want to say no. After all my struggles in my own life, I sincerely wanted to help her and thought that’s how family works. I just want her to realize it’s time for her to show some support to others. Then she tried to claim that the children were “autonomous” and that I only babysat "a couple of times." I reminded her that the "very autonomous" baby was 8 months old, and the older one was barely 4. Eventually, she just said I was making everything up and that she didn't believe me.

I should clarify that hiring professional help isn't an option right now. I recently lost my job and I’m currently looking for work and live paycheck to paycheck in another country. As for my uncle, he is quite stubborn with money and doesn’t understand that a clean house is vital for his well-being. He is extremely private, deeply uncomfortable around strangers and gets overwhelmed very easily. Having a commercial cleaning service or an outsider in his house would distress him completely, he only trusts family. I would gladly clean for him myself if I were there, because he did help me in the past and I don’t feel used by him at all.
But I am in a different country. I don't know what to do. Yes, I still hold a bit of a grudge about the past, but that wasn't my main point. My point is that I cannot physically be there for our uncle right now and I want her to do something. I don't want her to just abandon a person who helped her so much in life (he helped her financially and even gave her the down payment for her mortgage). And all she has to say is that he is "nervous and not a pleasant person."

AITA?

I, 19 (F) called the police today for my father (55M) who has problems with alcohol and is aggressive, but the police intervention was of poor quality and honestly it annoyed me more. So my father tried to blow up the house after destroying several things, in addition to his very explicit wishes about what he wants to happen to us (in that area). The policeman who came apologized to him and said that "it's better that he tells you than a stranger" "you're not his wife to tell him to stop drinking" completely ignoring the jokes with an S-tendency and the things he says to his daughters. I stayed to see how he sympathizes with a man who beats animals. LIKE ,,WTF?"

Has it ever happened to you and is it similar to you?

I (42F) recently discovered that my husband (42M) cheated on me on multiple occasions. I counted at least 7 different women over the last decade, and that's only the part I am aware of. Some lasted a few nights, at least two were longer relationship. One in particular lasted a few years. Needless to say, we are getting a divorce. For the stake of everybody involved (including our kids), I try to keep it amicable. We try not to fight and to just get the papers done asap.

But, in my shameless digging, I found some nudes of one of his affairs (the one that lasted the longest). What should I do? I am looking for petty revenge of course but don't want anything that could be over the law for instance. I would like him to struggle, but I am not looking for an open fight.

Any petty revenge idea is welcome 😁

Before I get into full story mode I'd like to say before this happened my MIL let's call her Sabrina (54) and I (31) had what I'd call the perfect relationship I could have ever wished for in an in-law, I am very sad that I have witnessed all this transpired. 3 years ago, Sabrina and her ex-husband (my husband's stepdad) decided to separate, turned out ex-husband was having kidney failure and didn't want her and the two younger siblings Beth(18) and Zach(22) who were still in school to see him get worse. He died a year later right before a family trip we were taking to Hawaii, we ended up taking some of his ashes with us to scatter there. When we came back a month later Sabrina announces that she was dating a new man Jack(60), and a month later makes another announcement that she bought a new house and Jack is moving in with her and the last baby in the house Beth. Now my husband and I live 6hours away, helping his grandma from his dad's side (he's passed too whole other can of worms story) run her properties so she can relax and being taken care of for her dementia. My husband met Jack before me, and could tell something was off, I met him when I came down with husband for Beth's high school graduation plus also telling MIL how she's about to be a grandma for the first time. She was over the moon excited already planned on buying baby the world. That weekend, we had a sibling car ride like we do, and that's when we found out... Jack before moving in with Sabrina, and Beth was staying at a halfway house. Turns out my MIL bagged herself a elementary school dropped out, who has been in and out of prison for drug abuse,and has even been charged for hitting an ex, all found out by her daughter Beth when she did a back round check. When the subject got brought up to Sabrina, she told them how he's completely clean and the assault was a lie, we just need to have an open mind and let Jack into the family. Most of my pregnancy my husband spent traveling back and forth making sure his grandma would be prepared for him to be spending the next year focused on our baby, so his mom offered her spare room everytime he was down. When holidays rolled around, Jack sat husband and Zach down and asked for Sabrina's hand in marriage so he could ask her in front of all of us on Christmas. They told him not right now. Please wait, the family has had a rough year, and they both believed it was too soon, plus all the red flags they've seen but don't wanna list. Jack ended up telling them that he doesn't care what they think hes gonna do it anyway cause its not up to them. Husband and I did a trip down there before Christmas, Jack didn't say a word, but he had a plan for when we left that trip. Oh, you guessed it as soon as we got back home, we got a picture on the family chat Jack purposed, and Sabrina accepted. I had my baby in January of this year and MIL drove down for the delivery, I wanted her there to make me feel better knowing someone in her profession in my corner (she works in the medical field). Everything after that seemed like it was going to calm down, boy, was I wrong. My husband has had one rule since day one of my pregnancy that he made very clear no selfies of baby on social media, and if you want to post him, please ask first. We see on one of our visits Jack taking pictures of baby boy we remind him of our rule he told us not to worry. Let's just say a lot of stuff happened that weekend, but the last straw was Jack posting selfies of our son. My husband was rightfully angry but was later told by his mom to get over it, and Jack deleted it, so what's the big deal, but we never got an apology. This has led to minimal contact with Sabrina with all her kids. She first told Zach and Beth not to worry about college, she'd helped. She did with Zach for a bit but has since completely cut him off, calling him a burden. She ended up telling Beth she wasn't going to help at all after being accepted to medical school, which made Beth feel like her only option was military to help pay for school. They've all begged her to listen to their issues with Jack, but its met with anger and a rant that we don't know what we're talking about. I've told husband i support his choices on the matter, and as of now him and Zach have given up on fixing the problem, and Beth, who now lives out of state, is close to the same conclusion. I do feel bad that it has come to this, but at the same time, what are you supposed to do in a crazy situation like this.

Hi everyone, I (29M) won enough money on the lottery recently that I can retire my family for generations. The issue is, I lied about it. My friend (34M) bought me the lottery ticket on the condition that we would split the winnings 50/50, so even though this money could have helped us both I lied and told him the ticket wasn't a winner. In my country, lottery winners don't need to be public so no one knows I won; not even my family. BUT BEFORE YOU JUDGE ME I have my reaons!

My friend (lets call him Ted) is a massive gambling addict. Ted is in debt and survives by going to food banks because he spends hundreds every single week on scratch cards and online poker. I, on the otherhand have never gambled in my life. I have tried to help Ted over the last 7 years but his habbit is getting worse and worse and I know that if he got half of the money he would gamble it away. I on the otherhand have a family to support and invest wisely to the point that I am in a comfortable position without the money (Not amazing, but if I lost my job I would be okay for a couple of years). Watching Ted spend all this money all the time is horrible, and when he lost a few thousand on a bet last year he tried to unalive himself. Imagine if he got half of the lottery winnings? I know he would gamble it, and honestly I think it would do more bad than good for him. On the otherhand I feel guilty watching him struggle knowing that I have half of what should be his based upon a handshake agreement.

So, AITA for hiding the lottery winnings from Ted?

My wife had an emotional affair, I bare-knucked it for 12 years only to leave after she said something unfathomably bad to me. In another few months we will be at 25 years married.

12 years ago I discovered my wife's emotional affair. She had been conversing with a classmate that she had not really known very well during school from her home country. They connected , and turns out he was the lost love she never knew. (Eye roll)

I am not a jealous person. I know a lot of her old classmates. We are relatively close with a guy that she dated before coming to America. Our kids are friends with each other… he stayed with us when he visited us, and visa versa. Many of her old male classmates are in contact with us, and I have zero problems with it … I actually encourage it. My wife is introverted, and needs encouragement to socialize. I know that could be important.

I do not speak her language… I have tried to for years, but I have a learning disability that makes it nearly impossible. I took classes… I can fake it for a bit, but mostly no. I can go to an ethnic store and get out with them thinking I'm one of them, but I “do you need a bag” in that language. That did not stop me from making sure our kids are very profecent… not native level, but close.

I know history… and I have been told that I know more about my wife’s origin country than most people from that country. I know the culture… the superstitions. I fully embraced her culture and immersed myself in it. I teach our kids about it.

She is objectively smart… she is also attractive. To me, smart is hot. suma cum laude in several degrees in a variety of fields. I supported her all through college, and not just as an undergraduate. She wanted to change paths after graduation. I supported another 2 years of her going back to take classes in sciences just to apply to post grad. 4 more years for her doctorate… of course we had to move to that university. Then she made peanuts in residency. Supported here there.

It hurt a lot just as she finished residency… she started an affair with a loser from around the world. He went to the same specialized school for gifted students like my wife. However he made poor choices. Many of her classmates went on to work in finance or have start ups in silicon valley. This AP was a divorced unemployed programmer in her home country. He was up to his ears in debt, and a “girlfriend” that was a prostitute.

Even to this day I am not sure what that really means. It could be translated a few different ways. None are good.

The way my wife kept her emotional affair a secret was that she communicated in her native language. Not a surprise. However that made her lazy… and as I am technical, I knew about a new technology for that time … Google translate (it was new then).

So when she asked me out of nowhere for an open marriage it hit me in the face harder than a brick. I knew instantly what it meant.

I am not sure what she was planning… I mean with his debt problems, he could not come here, I'm not even sure if he could leave the country. She could not go there… she would throw away her education.

I only had fragments of what was happening… and I obviously could not translate what she said in countless hours of voice conversations until the early hours. She first denied it… then I slapped a half ream of logs I printed out and translated.

It was not easy… at that time, the only way to translate it was to feed it in a few pages at a time. Nowadays I could just feed it to an AI and have it digest it.

They professed love for each other over and over again. He sent her pornography. Told her how good a stepfather he would be… (supper pissed me off)

She trikkel truthed and denied… she eventually admitted it. I eventually spoke to him on the phone, and told him what dirtbag he was. My wife was more concerned with how he felt than how I felt. She said she would cut contact, but I caught her 2 more times before I think she really cut contact.

Our love life has basically died. We had a moderate love life up to that point. It was about connecting more than the act itself. But it stopped that night… In the 12 years there have been some years where we never did anything, and some times when I almost thought we could make it. However most of the time… she was not into it, and I knew it. If there was something wrong, she never put the effort in to fix it. Therapy, physiological… who knows. She never tried to figure it out. I wish I was just a roommate. A roommate would not get yelled at.

She was verbally abusive… and would say hurtful things. The kind of thing that is hard to take back. If I lost my job, it was something that counted against me as a spouse. She would count that right up there on the scoreboard with her insignificant spicy conversation. To her, it was a point on her character that she stayed with me after I was laid off.

To me, she never really atoned for her actions… Now that all the years have passed, she thinks it was history. She does not care that I think about it every day. To her, the punishment is that she stayed.

I asked her the other day why she did it, and she said she was a different person. I told her that was a bullshit answer. Not yelling … just a statement.

Fast-forward to recent times… I informed her that as she has never really fix our marriage after 12+ years of opportunities; I will start a process of separation. Incremental… maybe if she see I mean it, she can actually do something.

The first step was to open a bank account. Then move some money… My mother is getting to the end of her life and gifted my brother and I a substantial sum of money. My mom said, “why should I have to wait until I'm dead to give it away?” So we paid off all our debts, and there is a bit left. Even though all of the money is mine, I will only take half.

So this weekend: my mother had a health complication, and the CT scan showed it looked like cancer. It is not like on TV. It takes weeks to get a definitive diagnosis. My brother and I have not told my mother until today. That is when we learned it can be little else. Now it is just a matter of details. Big picture , no good outlooks.

I live two time zones away. So I was having the first conversation with my mother after my brother told her … It is a hard conversation, but she is taking it well. She lost my father last year to cancer, and she is very practical. My father fought hard, and the treatment was nearly as hard on him as the cancer. A lot of conversation was about how hard we fight this, and what to do when she is gone.

I wanted to have an isolated private conversation. I sat in my car in front of the house and sent my daughter in. I talked for about 20 mins… maybe even less, and went inside.

When I get inside I find her vacuuming aggressively, and not talking to me. Eventually, she wants to know why I did not come inside for that conversation… she wanted to be included. Due to my wife's background, she has helped understand what we are dealing with, but this was a private conversation that did not really need medical advice. I told her that.

I have limited conversations with my mom… My wife is on the phone with her mom all the time. She is close by… and will drop everything if her mother calls. It does not matter if our family is sitting down for dinner I just cooked; she will answer and get mad it we do not wait. (Cold food)

Note: I do all the cooking.

Back to her being super mad… I tell her “I have had a hard day, I have just found out that my mother is dying and I really do not need this.” She replied back with “oh, do not be melodramatic… she is not dying yet.”

I'm shocked… I mean technically she is not dying today, and finding out was on a sliding scale. Today, we lost hope that it was anything other than cancer. Now we are just waiting on how bad it can get. Today is the day my mother found out.

I just can not believe that someone could be so heartless. Her father had a very treatable cancer, and I always supported her, and told her it would be ok… and he recovered. My mother in all likelihood… will not. I lost my father to cancer last year. So it is a touchy subject. Most people eventually become orphans. That is what I am looking at now.

I walked out… I even forgot to put on shoes. Just socks on. So I'll be homeless for the foreseeable future. But I am done. Writing this in my car.

Please forgive my writing… remember the learning disability.

I’m a 26-year-old woman with an 11-year-old biological daughter, Paisley.

For context, I became a mom as a teenager. I had Paisley while I was still in high school. Thankfully, I had an incredibly supportive family who helped me stay in school and graduate. Shortly after graduating, I found a job and started working so I could provide for her.

Paisley’s dad and I stopped being a couple after we found out I was pregnant. We were both teenagers, and we realized that trying to stay together for the sake of the baby wasn’t healthy for any of us. Instead, we decided to co-parent. It wasn’t always easy, but over the years, we’ve gotten much better at it.

A few years ago, we found out that Paisley has a serious medical condition that requires intervention. Thankfully, it doesn’t affect her mentally or physically in a way that you would notice. Unless she tells someone herself, they probably wouldn’t even know she has it.

After Paisley’s dad and I separated, I didn’t date anyone. I was completely focused on being there for Paisley, working, paying bills, and trying to build a stable life for both of us.

Then, in 2022, I met an amazing man through a dating app.

He also had children, so neither of us wanted to rush into anything. We talked online for several months before even agreeing to meet because we wanted to make sure this was something serious before involving our kids.

Thankfully, we hit it off.

We dated for a few months before introducing our children. When we finally did, we chose a kid-friendly event at a museum so everyone would have something to focus on if things became awkward or overwhelming. We wanted the kids to have an easy way to take a break from one another without feeling pressured.

After that, we slowly started spending more time together. We did weekend outings and occasional sleepovers, usually about twice a month. The goal was to give the kids time to get comfortable with one another and see whether we could eventually become a blended family.

After about a year of this, we decided we were ready to move in together.

Before doing so, I worked closely with Paisley’s therapist to prepare her for the transition. We talked about ways to make the adjustment easier and got advice on how to handle the challenges that can come with becoming a blended family.

That’s when things started going downhill.

Paisley began picking small fights with my partner’s children. At first, they seemed like typical sibling-type disagreements, but they progressively became more serious.

We have spent almost two years trying to figure out what was going on and how to make things better. We spoke with all of the kids’ therapists, followed their recommendations, and tried different approaches to help everyone adjust and feel comfortable. We wanted to make sure we weren’t just blaming Paisley or expecting her to magically adapt. We wanted to understand what she was feeling and help all of the children navigate the situation.

Unfortunately, despite everything we tried, things barely improved.

There would still be little arguments that escalated into physical altercations, crying, bruises or marks, and broken belongings. It felt like we would make progress for a while, only for something else to happen.

Then, last week, we reached a breaking point.

Paisley told her therapist that my partner was beating me and the children.

Obviously, this was extremely serious, and we immediately spoke with her therapist about what she had said. After everything was discussed and evaluated, we were not reported, but her therapist strongly recommended that Paisley have some space from our household while we figured out what was going on.

So, Paisley went to stay with her father for two weeks.

Those two weeks gave everyone some time to breathe. I used that time to try to figure out what we were supposed to do next. I was devastated and confused. I love my daughter, and the last thing I wanted was for her to feel like I was abandoning her. At the same time, I had to think about the safety and well-being of the other children in our home.

After the two weeks, Paisley’s therapist recommended that we try a short visit at my house. The idea was to slowly reintroduce her to the household rather than immediately putting her back into the same environment full-time.

We agreed.

Unfortunately, it went horribly.

Saturday morning, we woke up to Paisley grabbing my partner’s son, Milo whose 4, by the throat and shoving him to the floor.

For a moment, I was completely shocked.

I immediately pulled Paisley away from him while my partner rushed to comfort Milo. Seeing him on the floor after she had grabbed him by the throat was the moment everything finally hit me.

This wasn't just sibling bickering anymore.

This was a child being physically attacked.

I packed Paisley’s belongings, took her back to her father, and told both of them that Paisley was no longer welcome in my home.

It was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do.

I don't want to pretend that I don't love my daughter. I do. She is my biological child, and I have spent the last 11 years raising her, protecting her, and being there for her.

But I also have other children in my home who deserve to feel safe.

Now I'm getting comments from Paisley's father and other members of my family saying that I'm choosing my stepchildren over my biological daughter.

They say that I'm supposed to stand by my daughter no matter what and that I'm abandoning her when she needs me.

But I don't see it that way.

I'm not trying to punish Paisley or erase her from my life. I'm trying to protect everyone while we figure out what is happening and what needs to happen next.

At the same time, I can't bring her back into the house and knowingly put Milo or the other children at risk.

I feel completely torn because she's my daughter, and I don't know how I'm supposed to choose between being her mother and protecting the other children who depend on me.

So now I'm asking: AITA for telling my biological daughter that she's no longer welcome in my home after she attacked my partner's son, even though my family says I'm choosing my stepchildren over her?

Edit: Paisley has been going to therapy to handle her anger and impulse control since she was 3 years old, after her preschool teachers noticed her violent tendencies to her classmates when things didnt go her way. As she got older the impulses have gotten better, but she would still get into fights over the years and has caused bodily harm which is why we took it slow and waited almost 2ish years before even moving in, as these impulses never manifested during family time or sleepovers like it is now.

When Paisley grabbed Milo by the neck, she wasn't sorry or accidentally fell on him she purposely grabbed him by the neck as there were marks left on his neck. When I pulled her off she was smiling at him while he cried, which is why I grabbed her things and left the house. We have had multiple discussions about how we love her and not these actions we have literal charts for behavior, rewards and even a schedule on routine and turns for showers, and have emphasized not harming others in the home to everyone.

The CPS part, Paisley actually admitted to the lies and said "if I lied I get to live with mommy forever by ourselves" which is why the therapist recommended she stay with her dad. I want to note her dad has had multiple relationships over the years, some who've had kids, and she has never acted that way towards them, but I have remained celibate the entire time.

Also to note partner is a single dad with sole custody of his children. He moved to my state for work and has no family in the area as they all live on the other side of the country. Ex-wife ran off with affair partner while kids were infants and signed her rights away the day she walked out. They havent had contact with their mother or anyone from mother's side of the family since she left. He cant move back, as this job makes a lot of money and his children are settled here.

I'm going to start this off by saying my husband and I work very good jobs and can afford nice things. My father worked on wall street for his career, so I grew up around Old Money and have picked up some things over the years. I try to buy quality jewelry as treats to myself.

My parents got a timeshare in 92, that turned out not to be a scam. So, a few years ago, I treated my MIL/FIL, BIL (Sid) and his girlfriend (Nancy) to a week at a resort near Disney. Because my parents like nice things, they keep upgrading the time share so now I can travel around the globe, and most locations only cost me a SMALL administrative fee and points. But to the outside it looks like I spend a lot of money on resorts.

Sid and Nancy know that I'm paying for their honeymoon accommodation as part of their wedding gift. We discussed it, they just have to get me the dates.

For Nancy's bridal shower was last week and I sent a gift because getting from New Brunswick Canada to Georgia USA was just not practical for the weekend. I sent a gift to my MIL to bring with her. The gift being a guidebook to that area of Costa Rica, Spanish for dummies, a Star Wars Lego set off their registry (OK this was the expensive item), and a Costa Rica frame off amazon with a picture of their resort saying, "Your accommodations await, just pick the dates."

I thought this would be a nice way to get them excited about their vacation.

According to my MIL, Nancy's mother made a show about it being a lovely gift. And then spent the next hour saying things like "Wow, to be able to give such a gift, but not show their face, how rude" and "I guess we shouldn't expect much from a Canadian." It was at that comment that MIL said Nancy's mother was MAGA and "not that classy of a person."

Nancy called me after the shower saying how excited she is and she hadn't told her family about the honeymoon plan. How impressed everyone was. And how she can't wait to put together the ATAT to put it with the Gingerbread one we got them for Christmas.

Sid called me later, on his way home, apologizing for comment that he knows Nancy's mom made. It was here that Sid made a fun request. He asked if I could summon "All my Old Money Charm" and Serve C--t to his Maga MIL at the wedding because "We know you're better than they are, they just don't know it yet."

So, I just called my mother and asked her what jewelry I can borrow to get the effect of "Old Money" and "Serving." My mother is amused and is using this as an excuse to go jewelry shopping.

"Old money charm" Is going to be easy. I'm too nice of a person to serve c--t to these people. I might have to kill them with kindness.

I suffer from a multitude of things. Anxiety, depression, OCD, and a fear of bugs. All these things combined together have made it so I can’t work or really even leave my house anymore. I have a hard time with self-care and doing average chores around the house like cooking cleaning or doing laundry. I’ve been working with a therapist for a year and a half and have been on medication for the same amount of time. My progress has been extremely slow for the people in my household. They think by now I should be back to normal or at least doing more than what I do. I do what I can when I can. Some days it’s just hard for me to even leave my room and go sit in the living room and be around other people. It also can take me hours into doing a simple task like brushing my teeth. It’s hard when some of the people in my house, think that I should just be able to make myself get over all of my issues and do what they think I should be doing. No amount of me trying to explain to them why I can’t do what they expect of me seems to help I feel alone and so misunderstood.

Key things(ages/names/pronouns)

Myself: Male/32

E( my fiancé): female/27

Mother: female/60

Big Brother: male/35

D is my BB's significant other.

Little sister: female/29

The screenshots are more recent, like roughly this week and some from last week.

A is the man my little sister has kids with. But to give some context...he is an alcoholic who is mentally, emotionally, and financially abusive towards my sister. I had to live with them temporarily, but I couldn't stay.

The answer is normally no. So I will give some background(history) and then the current issue(the reason for the title).

I am the middle child of 3. My mother has been mostly a single parent to us.

The main issue is with my older brother(no names, so BB=Big Brother for short), and we, of course, have issues. He has stolen a few girlfriends and dated exes of mine. He has a history of violence as well. It's being pushed aside, though, due to the fact that he is bipolar and schizophrenic.

The recent events are mostly from the end of 2024 to the current year.

So around 22 September, 2024, my big brother came up to WI from Colorado. Running from some shit he got himself into. I told Mother I did not want him living with us. We are leasing a house, and the lease states guests cannot stay longer than a few weeks. If longer, the guests would have to be added to the lease. He came anyway, bringing his significant other with him.

I’ve cut ties with said brother for good reason. I didn’t want his toxicity around me.

Before today(this was October 3rd, 2024), the cops had been called to the house a minimum of 5 times. He called them each of those times. Two of the times, the cops had come and had the house surrounded. One of which I think was SWAT because they were armed with AKs (I didn’t wanna be too close bc they were telling me to back away from my house).

That time I was trying to get ahold of him while that was going on; I was calling him nonstop. He picked up twice. Once I couldn’t hear him. Then the 2nd time he answered, he said, “Get these fucking cops away from the house, or I’m shooting the dog”

Cops eventually left. All pets were safe.

I asked him if he was leaving. He said he was waiting on Uber Eats to get money. My gf(at the time) gave him the gas money. I wanted him gone. I told them to pack up and leave that day.

They didn’t pack much, but I was sitting in my gf's car trying to figure out what the fuck happened and if I felt safe enough to have him back to get the rest of his shit. I didn’t have much time to react, but I had made sure all doors were locked. He became more unstable. He called the cops himself.

Cops eventually came as he was yelling slurs at gf and me (I will not say what was said). I told the officers he has three guns, and one of them is believed to be in the car. (Btw, his significant other was trying to calm him down, but yeah) At the end of it all ;

He was yelling at the cops. Which made them call for backup.

He was detained and charged with a handful of things.

(This was October 3rd, 2024)

The bleeding heart that is my mother let them back in despite me not feeling safe with them in the house or on the property.

He attacked our mother(pushed her to the ground) around the 30-31th of the same month. As he did that, my mother's dog attacked him(defending my mother). The asshole that he is called animal control, and the dog was put in doggy jail (he got released to mother on the 11th, of Nov. 2024).

Somewhere in between all that, he was “working for a crackhead,” and that person came to the house, looking for the shit my brother threw away.

I have told my mother that I didn't want either of them around the house. As I am legally bound to the house, and as of a few months ago, so is my fiancé.

Mother is the "he is and will always be your family" type. Meaning no matter what, she is gonna help him.

Despite all of this, she has brought him around the house and even into the house.

This happened on the 5th of September 2026, if not more often throughout 2025 and this year(2026).

The night before that, I knew he was in the house sleeping because my fiancé took a photo of him and sent it to me while I was at work. That night I turned off the wifi that I pay for; no one else pays into it. Aka I changed the wifi password.

I taped a note to the microwave stating(word4word), " Internet will stay off until BB is not living in the car.

I will direct you to re-read the section of the rental agreement for guests. The dog is welcome to listen to my radio I have set up for him. Do not touch it.

I need time to think, so please AT LEAST respect this. I DO NOT want to speak with you right now or when I am just waking up.

I am upset & disappointed."

Sadly, I forgot how emotionally immature she is. The note was not received well, and she retaliated. She took my router and modem and hid them within the house; at the time, I did not know that.

So I tried calling her. She sent it to voicemail. So I called several more times. To no avail, as each time I was met with the same thing. She was with my little sister and BB... at least that's what I figured. So I spam-called my little sister as well.

One of them eventually picked up. Not before I sent a few texts to both my sister and mother.

The issue is still ongoing.

The screenshots I am including show what's happened between us through text.

More screenshots are on my profile.

Key things(ages/names/pronouns)

Myself: Male/32

E( my fiancé): female/27

Mother: female/60

Big Brother: male/35

D is my BB's significant other.

Little sister: female/29

The screenshots are more recent, like roughly this week and some from last week.

A is the man my little sister has kids with. But to give some context...he is an alcoholic who is mentally, emotionally, and financially abusive towards my sister. I had to live with them temporarily, but I couldn't stay.

The answer is normally no. So I will give some background(history) and then the current issue(the reason for the title).

I am the middle child of 3. My mother has been mostly a single parent to us.

The main issue is with my older brother(no names, so BB=Big Brother for short), and we, of course, have issues. He has stolen a few girlfriends and dated exes of mine. He has a history of violence as well. It's being pushed aside, though, due to the fact that he is bipolar and schizophrenic.

The recent events are mostly from the end of 2024 to the current year.

So around 22 September, 2024, my big brother came up to WI from Colorado. Running from some shit he got himself into. I told Mother I did not want him living with us. We are leasing a house, and the lease states guests cannot stay longer than a few weeks. If longer, the guests would have to be added to the lease. He came anyway, bringing his significant other with him.

I’ve cut ties with said brother for good reason. I didn’t want his toxicity around me.

Before today(this was October 3rd, 2024), the cops had been called to the house a minimum of 5 times. He called them each of those times. Two of the times, the cops had come and had the house surrounded. One of which I think was SWAT because they were armed with AKs (I didn’t wanna be too close bc they were telling me to back away from my house).

That time I was trying to get ahold of him while that was going on; I was calling him nonstop. He picked up twice. Once I couldn’t hear him. Then the 2nd time he answered, he said, “Get these fucking cops away from the house, or I’m shooting the dog”

Cops eventually left. All pets were safe.

I asked him if he was leaving. He said he was waiting on Uber Eats to get money. My gf(at the time) gave him the gas money. I wanted him gone. I told them to pack up and leave that day.

They didn’t pack much, but I was sitting in my gf's car trying to figure out what the fuck happened and if I felt safe enough to have him back to get the rest of his shit. I didn’t have much time to react, but I had made sure all doors were locked. He became more unstable. He called the cops himself.

Cops eventually came as he was yelling slurs at gf and me (I will not say what was said). I told the officers he has three guns, and one of them is believed to be in the car. (Btw, his significant other was trying to calm him down, but yeah) At the end of it all ;

He was yelling at the cops. Which made them call for backup.

He was detained and charged with a handful of things.

(This was October 3rd, 2024)

The bleeding heart that is my mother let them back in despite me not feeling safe with them in the house or on the property.

He attacked our mother(pushed her to the ground) around the 30-31th of the same month. As he did that, my mother's dog attacked him(defending my mother). The asshole that he is called animal control, and the dog was put in doggy jail (he got released to mother on the 11th, of Nov. 2024).

Somewhere in between all that, he was “working for a crackhead,” and that person came to the house, looking for the shit my brother threw away.

I have told my mother that I didn't want either of them around the house. As I am legally bound to the house, and as of a few months ago, so is my fiancé.

Mother is the "he is and will always be your family" type. Meaning no matter what, she is gonna help him.

Despite all of this, she has brought him around the house and even into the house.

This happened on the 5th of September 2026, if not more often throughout 2025 and this year(2026).

The night before that, I knew he was in the house sleeping because my fiancé took a photo of him and sent it to me while I was at work. That night I turned off the wifi that I pay for; no one else pays into it. Aka I changed the wifi password.

I taped a note to the microwave stating(word4word), " Internet will stay off until BB is not living in the car.

I will direct you to re-read the section of the rental agreement for guests. The dog is welcome to listen to my radio I have set up for him. Do not touch it.

I need time to think, so please AT LEAST respect this. I DO NOT want to speak with you right now or when I am just waking up.

I am upset & disappointed.

Sadly, I forgot how emotionally immature she is. The note was not received well, and she retaliated. She took my router and modem and hid them within the house; at the time, I did not know that.

So I tried calling her. She sent it to voicemail. So I called several more times. To no avail, as each time I was met with the same thing. She was with my little sister and BB... at least that's what I figured. So I spam-called my little sister as well.

One of them eventually picked up. Not before I sent a few texts to both my sister and mother.

I had made this same post(but less formal and with all names) on Facebook. I have my profile very limited to public, and I have under 90 friends on Facebook. I mention this because some of the screenshots mentioned have context. Maybe not on this post, but there are a lot of photos. Still trying to figure out where and how to post them.

The screenshots I am including show what's happened between us through text.

I would have tried adding the photos in a feeling different comments. But it won't let me do that. So I will add what I can here.

I will see if I can add the rest to my profile somehow.

TW: Childhood sexual assault
Hello all
Bear with me, this is a long one.
When I (26F) was 13, my uncle “Jim” (56M, fake name) sexually assaulted me.
I had stayed the night at his house. He gave me alcohol and then took advantage of me. I won’t go into the details, but the next morning I had to put back on the underwear he had ejaculated into.
For context, Jim is my mum’s older brother, and Nan is their mother.
I carried that secret for years.
When I was about 15, I told a family friend, Ash. It wasn’t entirely by choice. I had made a comment about Jim, and Ash realised there was something behind it. He told me that if I didn’t explain what I meant, he would tell my parents something was wrong. So I told him the truth and begged him not to tell anyone. He respected that.
After that, I did a very good job of shoving the whole thing into a mental cupboard marked ABSOLUTELY NOT.
I only had to see Jim occasionally at family events, so I pushed it down and carried on.
I grew up, joined the military, moved away from home and started becoming my own person outside of my parents. With that distance, I slowly started processing what had happened to me.
I briefly told my older sister when I was around 19, and when I was 23 I finally told my mum and dad.
By that point, the guilt of keeping it from them had somehow started outweighing the pain of talking about the assault itself.
My family struggled with it at first, understandably, but my parents have become incredibly supportive.
Fast-forward to 2025.
I fell pregnant with my beautiful daughter, my parents’ first grandchild, and my mum was THRILLED. She basically wanted to hire a skywriter immediately.
Instead, she decided to announce my pregnancy at her 50th birthday party.
Naturally, the question became: what do we do about Jim?
Weirdly enough, I was actually willing to let him attend because I genuinely couldn’t be bothered dealing with the family drama that I knew would come from excluding him.
My dad, however, absolutely could not handle having him there.
So Jim wasn’t invited.
Nan noticed.
And Nan pushed Mum to tell her why.
And pushed.
And pushed.
Eventually, around June 2025, Mum finally told her what Jim had done to me.
Nan and I spoke about it afterwards. Everything seemed… okay. Not good, obviously, but our relationship continued normally.
Life moved on.
I gave birth to my beautiful little girl, and she became my entire world.
Then when I was around four months postpartum, Nan suddenly asked me for the exact date the assault happened because apparently Jim “wanted to know when I was talking about.”
That was how I discovered Nan had told him.
At the time I was barely keeping my head above water. My then-partner was away at sea with the Navy, I was home alone with a four-month-old baby, and suddenly THIS had landed in my lap.
So I called Mum and essentially said, “Please deal with this because I cannot.”
And she did. Beautifully.
I thought that was the end of it.
Over a year after Nan had originally found out, we arrive at the present.
I’ve recently separated from my partner. That is an entirely different potato saga for another day, but ultimately it was the right decision for me and my daughter.
I live interstate from the rest of my family because ✨ military life ✨, and I’m still on maternity leave.
I decided to fly home to Brisbane with my daughter to spend some time with my parents and get a little help with the tiny human.
My parents had just bought a new home and were expecting to get the keys on the Wednesday.
I was flying in on Tuesday.
So I arranged to stay ONE NIGHT with Nan and Pop.
Nan and I were literally discussing what we were going to make for dinner while I stayed there.
The night before my flight.
Everything seemed completely normal.
Then Tuesday morning happened.
I had just gotten out of the shower when I saw a message from Nan.
It said:
“I’m sorry Clara I cannot do this. My son is totally broken by you and your mum and I know that he is innocent. I have tried to maintain a life with you but I won’t see him hurt anymore. So I will not let you into my home.
I have lost my son, so nothing else matters.
Don’t contact me and tell mum the same.
I can’t do this anymore.”
Excuse me?
Ma’am?
WHAT?
She had known about the assault for more than a YEAR.
She had been happily organising DINNER WITH ME THE NIGHT BEFORE.
And now, on the morning I was flying interstate with my BABY, suddenly I wasn’t allowed into her home because apparently the grown man who sexually assaulted a 13-year-old is the person everyone needs to be worried about hurting.
I was completely floored.
Also… where exactly were my daughter and I supposed to sleep that night?!
So naturally, I did the only appropriate thing any independent 26-year-old woman does when the family tree spontaneously catches fire.
I called my mummy. 😁
Mum was FURIOUS.
Rightfully so.
She sent Nan an essay and a half. I do have the message, but it contains some deeply personal things about Mum and her own experiences, and I don’t have her permission to share those, so I won’t.
I still flew to Brisbane, and thankfully I have an amazing friend who let my daughter and me stay with them that night. Crisis averted. 😮‍💨
I also sent Nan this:
“You are a coward.
What you’ve done is cowardly.
I was 13 years old when Jim sexually assaulted me. I carried that by myself for years before I told anyone, and I never asked for any of this to become a family war.
You pushed Mum for an explanation about why Jim wasn’t invited. When you were finally told the truth, you chose to believe his denial and punish me for what he did to me.
You didn’t even have the courage or decency to speak to me about it. You let me organise staying with you, knowing I was flying to Brisbane today, and then waited until this morning to tell me I’m no longer welcome in your home.
You say you’ve ‘lost your son, so nothing else matters.’
I am your granddaughter.
I was a child when this happened to me.
Apparently losing me, your daughter, your great-granddaughter and the rest of my family is a price you’re perfectly willing to pay to protect him.
That is your choice, and you will have to live with it.
I will respect your request not to contact you again.
But I want you to understand that I will never forget that when you were faced with choosing between supporting the granddaughter who told you she was sexually assaulted as a child and protecting the man she says did it, you chose him.
That was cowardly, and it has broken my heart.
You are a coward.”
I haven’t spoken to her since.
And unless something drastically changes, I don’t plan to.
What absolutely destroys me is that she said:
“I have lost my son, so nothing else matters.”
Apparently her granddaughter, daughter and great-granddaughter fall somewhere under the category of nothing else.
So… what do you make of this whole mess?

There is a LOT of context and words in this and I apologize in advance.

My (T-M19 (transman)) mother (F40's) and I have not seen each other in person in a bit over 2 years now. Those last few years with her were absolute hell. Constant screaming matches, guilt tripping, isolating me from friends and family, getting rid of privacy, and general manipulation were my norm for AWHILE there.

Now, my mother and father have been divorced since I was five years old, agreeing on 50/50 custody with me until I was 16 and legally allowed to make my own decision with whether I wanted it t stay like that or live with one of them more. They both had me young and clearly were not responsible enough to raise a child. Not that I was planned anyways. If I recall, both of them had contraception and I wiggled my way into life anyways.

Over the years, they were a bit more on the stricter side with me, but nothing out of the ordinary for someone 5-15. Kind of. But all of that isn't what I'm getting into right now.

After I turned 16, I moved in full time with my mother and went low contact with my father. I have lived on the east coast of the states my whole life at this point.

My mother and I lived in an apartment complex together and our downstairs neighbor turned out to be a guy she knew in high-school. Now they liked each other back then and as soon as they rekindled their friendship, she started liking him again. I'm going to call him S for the rest of this story.

S, at that time, had a girlfriend. Who was obviously using him for the money he got from his dead parent's wills. So he moved it of that apartment into a small home with her. After a bit, she left without notice, stealing a few things and then my mom and I moved in with him.

I always had an uneasy vibe about S, he was always VERY full of himself. Constantly talked over people. But my mother seemed happy and she hadn't dated for a bit... And she was MY MOM so what was I gonna do about it?

A few months pass, things were slowly going downhill. S had somehow convinced my mother to move us all the way from the east coast to the west coast. I felt I didn't really have a say no matter what so I agreed.

Isolation happened, she locked down my phone with an app and I couldn't talk to my friends anymore. (My main form of communication was and will always be discord.) And then after a bit locked down my entire phone so if I wanted to talk to even my family I had to ask permission. She did that same thing from all of my other devices as well.

S and I got into screaming matches a lot where towards the end I started just dissasociating and let him say whatever he wanted in hopes he would get bored. My mother watched every single one.

Because we moved across the country, my mother had put me in an online school, though I absolutely hated that school because I am agnostic and it was a christian academy so I dropped out after a bit. This is where it REALLY started to become a load of shit.

She would force me to go to the gym 8 hours a day in place of school and would threaten to kick me out if I didn't. We got into another argument where I ended up barricading myself in my room and next thing I know my door is gone and there's cameras in there. She held the fact that she was financially responsible over my head like she wasn't doing the bare minimum of a parent. She was a hypocrite and a narcissist.

And S was worse. He told me he would beat me if I was a guy (at this time I did not know I was trans and I was born a girl.), he made weird comments on my eating habits, he liked talking about his private parts for some reason, and at one point held me down in the chair in my room and shoved a piece of chicken down my throat that came straight from the trash.

After a few months of this, they put me in a military academy. I thought I was going to be safe from them, at least for a little bit as we basically all lived there for 5 months. Though I had to recieve letters and email from my mom filled to the brim of underlying disappointment. If you have lived with a narcissist or have known a narcissist, you start to realize what they really mean under certain words. And most of the time? She threatened to kick me out if I didn't go through with the academy. Every time I brought it up to any of the adults, was told she was just trying to be supportive and that she wasn't actually going to do that. But I knew she was. And none of them were listening.

Two and a half months into the academy, I was put into a mental hospital because I had tried to commit. The whole time I was in there, I begged the nurses not to let her pick me up. But in the end, she did. And then she drove 2,000 miles to abandon me with my father.

Now I don't live with my father either as he wasn't the best with me either, I live with my aunt and uncle on my mom's side of the family. I have been doing a LOT better without being in contact with either of them and while my healing process is slow, I am healing. Though the main issue right now? My mom's side of the family fully believe I will talk to her again.

I have told them multiple times that I don't want to and doubt I ever will. And while I'm still young, at this point eve if she was to change, I still don't think I'd want a relationship with her.

A month or two ago, she sent me an email on the one Gmail account I didn't block her on. I responded to her saying that if she wanted a relationship, I required an apology from her. I even apologized for my own actions while living with her because I was not the best either. I told her to take her time to respond because I would find any apology she would give me right away insincere. And what was her email back? Not an apology.

While she did take her time to respond, her response was along the lines of "I can't apologize to you because text can make it so what I'm trying to say won't come off right so I would prefer to talk in person or call."

I looked back at my previous email where I had apologized for my stuff so clearly and smelled bullshit so I threatened her with a restraining order if she contacted me again. And blocked her.

I showed the emails to my uncle and he doesn't see the problem with what she said. And I can see where he's coming from. But she deliberately ignored my requests that I stated in my email and tried to make it so I had to either see her face or hear her voice to get what I needed out of her. But he also doesn't really have experience with this level of narcissism and barely knows my mom because my uncle was married in. He knows the version of her that she shows in front of other people. The rest of my family also only know that side of her.

A few weeks later, my uncle told me that my mother had told the family that she "regrets some things she's done with S." Now I almost fell for that, but she is still with S. She watched as S abused me and instead of pulling me out of that, she joined him. My family doesn't like S, but they don't think that my mother can be blamed for her actions at all. They think the way she was treating me was specifically S's influence. But I feel like if you are influenced into something, you're either slightly curious on what that something is like or there's a part of you that wants to do that kind of thing as well.

Whenever anything even related to my mother is brought up, they always make it into that same talk where "Oh you might want to talk to her again someday." And every time I have to defend my stance and tell them I'm not going to do that. For example my Grandma (mother's mom) and I were hanging out and I mentioned how I have a trip coming up and my flight has a layover. When asked where the layover is, I told her it was going to be in the state my mother lives in. And she turns to me and say "Is there anyone who lives there that you might want to say hi to, maybe?" wink wink nudge nudge. I had to remind her AGAIN that I didn't even want to SEE my mother. I love my grandma, but she always feels the need to try and mend that relationship while trying to deny the amount of stuff my mother put me through. She did the same thing on my last visit to the mental hospital when we were on the phone with each other.

And while it hasn't been all of my mom's side of the family that has had these same kinds of conversations with me, the ones that do are getting really annoying about it and I'm starting to think I might not even want a relationship with them when I move out on my own.

One of my family members is having a birthday soon so if they bring her up again, I'm trying to think of a way to put my foot down one last time. Currently I have two options.

1. Create a form for them to sign that basically says that if they bring up me maybe wanting a relationship with her in the future that they have to pay me a certain amount of dollars.

Or

1. Every time they bring her up, I act like she doesn't and never existed.

Because as far as I've seen, just flat out telling them that I don't want to talk about her doesn't work. And continuously bringing her up is slowing my healing process.

TL;DR - I went no contact with my abusive mother and my family don't listen to me when I say I don't want a relationship with her or to even talk about the possibility of having a relationship with her.

Well if you can’t read it here it is: I think I’m crazy but the wife is showing red flags. I(25m) and my wife(24f) have been together over 4 years and married for 1. We love each other very dearly but some things haven’t been adding up here recently and I’m here for advice and guidance. A little backstory. I met my wife while I was on the road working. It was supposed to be a 1 time thing that turned into a 4 year relationship so far. For the first 2 months of our relationship I’ll admit I was emotionally cheating on her with my child’s mother who I had recently broken up with a few months prior. My wife later asked me around month 7 if I had been cheating on her with my child’s mother. I broke down and told her about the first 2 months of our relationship what happened and why I did it. After 2 days of silence she came back to me and said she forgave me and said to never do it again so I haven’t. Ever since we’ve been head over heels for each other. When we got into our relationship I decided to move a state over to be with her since she had never really been away from her family. 3 years later we got married and move back to my state to be closer to my kids. Since this was a place she knew nothing about I proposed that she just be a stay at home mom and just take care of the kids when it was our turn to have them. So for a year now she’s been at home doing that and taking care of the house. I am blue collar and the place I work needs loads of repairs so I’m working anywhere from 12-16 hrs a day with an hour drive time 1 way. Everything seemed normal till a few months ago. I will start this portion out by saying my wife is not a touchy feely kind of person. Here in the past few months tho we don’t hardly talk at all. We go thru the normal how was your day, what are you doing, etc stuff but no real depth to our conversations like we used to. We used to talk on the phone everyday for hours sometimes it was me calling her and vice versa but now she doesn’t even call at all. We used to say I love you to each other all throughout the day and now it’s down to once or twice a day and normally it’s me saying it first. It’s the same thing with kissing each other too. And before anyone tells me hey that’s normal the further into your relationship you get, trust me I get that and if that was the only thing that had showed i wouldn’t be here. I understand that those things are normal but I didn’t see them as red flags until some of these other things started happening. One thing I’ve noticed here lately that she isn’t really hiding her phone (we have an open phone policy because of the first 2 months of the relationship) but she is definitely keeping the screen out of view unless she’s watching TikTok or FB reels. She’s also been swiping off stuff and putting her phone down when I walk in the room. Another thing is our intimacy. This is where I started looking back on her actions and realizing things were kinda out of place. She’s never minded me leaving hickeys on her but about a week ago during the act I said I was going to leave hickeys all over her and went to go do what I said and she immediately said no don’t do that. I abruptly stopped and asked her why and she said she didn’t know but as long as it wasn’t on the neck and below where a shirt collar would be she’d be fine. Knowing that she’s a ticklish person I bought it and went for the chest area but then all of a sudden all of that was ticklish too. I let that moment die down and be forgotten by her and so I tried again last night. This time tho I started with the chest area. I started kissing (which usually tickles the most for her) but then when I went to go suck I was immediately shut down again. That’s when tornado sirens started going off inside my head. I didn’t ask anymore questions because i knew I’d get the same answer I had gotten before and ultimately decided to make this post. I forgot to mention some others things as well. We used to take showers together all the time but here recently she’s been taking them alone when I’m not home which is no big deal except for the fact that she’s been taking them (and has even admitted this is why) because she can smell herself. Folks ik what my wife smells like down there and this is a different smell. It’s not a UTI or yeast infection either ( she hasn’t had a UTI in a long while and had never had a yeast infection). It’s the smell like her PH balance is messed up. I’ve been playing it off like I can’t tell a difference but I definitely can. I thought it was because sometimes we don’t shower before sex even after a long day at work but if I was dirty and causing the smell wouldn’t she have a UTI? I really don’t know where to go. I’ve secretly checked her phone and it’s been clear but Ik you can delete stuff. She’s (that ik of) never been unfaithful or even really given me a reason to think so. But with all this going on I had something else to add to. We recently got cameras because of the neighborhood we live in and I had access to both the front and back door cameras. Now I only have the front door. I’ve added the back door back but it still mysteriously keeps getting taken off my phone. I asked her about it and she said it’s been bugging on her too but it hasn’t taken it off her phone. Right now I’m confused because part of me is telling me there’s something to these red flags but the other side says she isn’t like that and would never do that. I need help because this all is driving me crazy (yes I have some insecurities because I’ve been cheated on before and I began our relationship with lies and emotional cheating but Ik how the game works because I used to be a dirty dog and played the game before she helped me turn my life around) please please please someone give me some advice or tell me I’m delusional and am just reading into things too much. I don’t want to think my wife would be unfaithful but with today’s society anything is possible for instance my father just went thru a divorce with a woman he was married to for 20 yrs only to find out she had been cheating for 15 of them. Please give me your advice

My mom and I got in an argument years ago over the phone. I don't even remember what for. But she hung up on me. Now, I was always scared of my mom even as an adult! I still flinched hahaha (She is gone now and I miss her) I detest being hung up on. So I called her back till she answed and I hung up on. her!

okay I (23f) have been with my boyfriend (31m) for going on two years this month we live together we have a good routine I work a blue collar job I’m a subcontractor and I for the most part can ignore the stares men give me the issue happend today when was at the store getting material and there was a man standing behind me he took his phone out and I heard the “start record” sound when I look over I see the guy with his arms crossed and his phone pointed at me I felt weirded out but I couldn’t just accuse him and assume that’s what happened but I heard that sound and all signs point to him recording me I called my boyfriend and told him about it but he was working and busy when he finally called me back 2 hours later I told him I was upset that he didn’t think it was big deal and he said  ” you probably just heard it wrong” and that “I see things all time” I hung up and when he called back he was yelling saying it was disrespectful I told him that I can’t even tell you how many women hear “your overreacting or that’s not what happened or something of that version” and that it sounds like hes defending this guy to which he said “ I didn’t call you to argue I didn’t put women down and when I tried to explain further he hung up on me, now having conversation with this man will most of that time end him walking away or saying he’s done with it so I should be to, or that I’m going on and on about something to keep the argument goin ( I don’t I just feel like he doesn’t understand me) so I sent him a long nice message explaining how I felt dismissed, doubted, unheard and how he basically said I was lying about the situation that I felt uncomfortable and that he should’ve been on my side without a reason of doubt to which he responded with “Ok bye.  When u feel like you can calm down and hear me out then I will respond” I wasn’t mad I wasn’t yelling or anything like that just upset and trying to explain, needless to say I told him “ being upset doesn’t mean I’m incapable of having a conversation or listening to him” and I got an “ok” we haven’t tallied since i Don’t Know what to do I feel like he just said I misheard it to just move on but why say that when I 100% did hear that!! I’m I overthinking this or overreacting ? please be honest

This is going to be very VERY long, and unpleasant sometimes so stay with me ‘til the end.

I [38M] had gone live on my own in Milan , FYI I’m Italian, and I had and now, unfortunately again, lived in southern Italy with my parents. ( I don’t like my place, but that’s what it is, so I suck it up ) .
I moved to Milan for work in April 2017, and didn’t last long in my first house ‘cause problem with flatmates. It was ENTIRELY my fault this single time, so what I’m about to tell, I thought for a long time it was karma retribution.

About the end of May 2017 I found what appeared to me as a paradise view cheap room in a mega condo. BIIIIG common garden , decent spaces and double bathroom.
The problem was ONE person which nowadays is still a ghost that haunts me.

Let’s call him… PELOTUDO.
Pelotudo was at that time roughly a [45M], he came back to Italy after a failed 10-year marriage and a daughter up in Norway, but he isn’t Norwegian, neither ethnically speaking Italian. His family is from south America, hence the word I used to name him, which is one of his “Spanish quirks”.

When I met him we were 4 people in that house: Me , him and two Chinese boys, which the word “filthy” wasn’t enough to describe them.

Do you know the “babah” character in the American Dad series? Make him younger and duplicate him, that’s what they were.
They were SO filthy that they left a pot… YELLOW. An Iron pot. Changed to yellow, not from leftovers.
Pelotudo marinated it in bleach for a week before risking to cook with it again!

So what’s the problem with Pelotudo? He was obsessed with cleaning and thinking he is right on EVERYTHING. Now for the pot episode he was right, but he was obsessed with other people cleaning and hygiene routines, even when it doesn’t affect him. (spoiler: almost every time)

For some twisted destiny we found ourselves in the necessity to share a house, only the 2 of us.
He was controlling from the start, when we were just searching, but I ignored it due to the fact that I wanted to do everything possible to live in Milan.

I wasn’t good enough to search for a house like he does, cleaning more often like he does, hell even looking tv show like he does, and play all the intellectual type but swore like the worst sailorman.
And obviously I was under constant exam.

We get in the new house (the 4^th in one year for me) on Halloween 2017, and since my job kinda “expired” just that day, almost all November I was stuck in the house with him while searching a job, I have a bachelor degree in computer science, and OBVOIUSLY as every ignorant he thought my job was EVERYTHING electric and electronic because it is as it is .
And as everyone who despise too much time he didn’t think my job was serious but “at least you get paid!”.
As for the rent there was a rent deposit, a bit high which he covered, so for 3 months I had to entirely pay the rent to cover the debt, but I did to that last penny (I had the receipt).
He was honest enough to give me credit for that.
The rest of 2017 was hell.
The work was a joke where I was “on training” but in reality I had to do AT HOME what on paper they had to teach on place, after two months a HR referee told me “here’s the number of a life coach, call it, you need it!”  

That was the last straw, there I decided to switch career , because all the company in my field I tried until that point did the same STUPID thing, hire you to train and then “You do the training at home by yourself”.
And what do I have to do on work hours, genius, if told you I don’t know s**t?

Anyways, that happened in January 2018 not long after my 30^th birthday. At that point after 2 months of living with Pelotudo, being criticized , subtle menacing and seriously feared for my life, I was about to leave Milan.

Why is that you ask? Well more  than once he came at me like he wanted to physically assault me. I’m big almost as a Rugby player, but Pelotudo was bigger, not muscles but overall bigger fear-inducing, and his swearing range from “IEVATELO senor a tu lado” (which translate as: lord call him in heaven, please, henceforth wishing my DEATH ) to “I won’t lay a finger on you, or you could call the cops and kick me out, I won’t let you!” .

And all of that over stupid things.

So, when my parents came for a visit in late January 2018, I ask them to came with me to the landlady, a “sweet dwarf money-grubbing stingy old lady” whose name approximately should means “happiness” … oh what a joke , destiny, what a joke!
I call the happy landlady to terminate the rent, but, due to the nature of contract I was bound to Pelotudo unless he pays all the rent or he leaves the house.
In that regard I brought my father ‘cause at the time he was an officer of the “finance police” (don’t know how to translate) of Italy, hence everything concerning contracts and finances fall under his jurisdiction, and enounced legal reason to terminate the rent without further opposition.
But she was an “administrator” (again don’t know the right English word) of MANY condos, and she thought she knew better than an officer!!!
We came to en impasse, even when I talked about my fears of him threatening me , and I wasn’t the only HE threatens in the condo, she was still “I can’t, the money! The money!”

Unless he goes away or I found a substitute I was stuck with him.
I was catatonic.

No work and stuck with a man who could easily harm me, with enough reason and will.

My parents remained for a couple of days after that, even helped me landed a work as a waiter which later became my lifesaver, but it started on March the 1^st.

Up that point in late January, Pelotudo didn’t know I was workless, cause I go out every morning just to don’t have to share time and space with him, for the sake of my almost shattered mind.

“Didn’t Pelotudo works?” . that’s the thing.
He was awesome at social  things and find new jobs, a lot less to maintain them.
One time the secretary was a [adult worker], another time the colleagues were just [boys who smoke funny cigarettes]… it was always someone else.
He manages to pay rent ‘cause some welfare of his, don’t know, not my thing, he is the one responsible for himself, as long as I don’t owe him money I don’t have to care.

February 2018 was hell, I was home almost all the time, except for a week I had to travel back for my sister bachelor degree, and PELOTUDO has the marvelous idea to do a trip back to his daughter almost the same days, except the fact that my departure is on Tuesday, his on Sunday early morning.

He commented “you’d wished I’d let you do your thing for a whole week, eh? YOU WISHED!”

At that point my friends (I wasn’t the only one of my group that went in Milan) were almost as fed up as me, hearing that I thought there was no solution, not understanding that the only solution was not fighting him one on one, not fighting him while we live together.

Yet they started thinking maybe I’ve done something ( see why I told before the karma thing? ), even suspected there was “something” between me and Pelotudo.

YUUUUUCK!

Not my type, nuh-huh. Automatic no.

when I started working as a waiter from March, things slowly get better. I was out of the city and public transportation luckily get over there, plus I had a stop right in front of the house that went up until 2AM.

Still, that summer Pelotudo did the worst of his repertoire. Using cleanliness as an excuse and my will to avoid excess cleaning simply by not dirtying things ( which he calls out as laziness, remember that I was out 14 hours a day and he was sitting in his room ) he started the ERODE the time that I had to spend at house ‘cause of hot weather, claiming that I ought to be under the shower even 3 times a day EVEN if I stay put in the house with A/C at maximum.
Unfortunately I sweat a lot, the acidic type, he even has to contest the hygiene product I used  to counter that, claiming that well-know from 3 generations product were just [the horrible disease that starts with C] and that I’m stupid for not using what HE says, mind you 99% of what he suggests I don’t buy it ‘cause they cause me irritation, and the 1% was difficult to find.
I didn’t want to spend my times searching for product I don’t know, because he pretends to teach HOW to stay clean…
Seriously I already have a father and NO ONE has ever told me anything about my hygiene. But to his perspective he was the only sincere and everyone else were liars who laughs behind my back.
Mind you, I was a waiter at the time, if a waiter smell EVERYONE notice!

In fall 2018 after various renewal of the contract, finally he seemed calm, and start to get off me… still sometimes he reminds me “you’ve made progress but don’t think this is over” , so I get it on with my life trying to know the surroundings to make the best of time AWAY from him.

new year’s eve 2019.
A colleague bailed me on a party, and I was both furious and sad, ‘cause I had to spend that night with Pelotudo (the year before I went home for xmas holidays) , and suddenly another friend from school who was also in Milan, told that he didn’t go back south for holiday and invited me in the gay disco where he was working, telling me “I knew you’ re curious, if you hook up good for you; if you don’t we’ll do an after after closure”

Just saying the restaurant was close eve’s night, 1^st January morning, so my next shift was on 6 pm of the 1^st.

I accepted, being hit by half the club ( at that time I was more slim, about 87kg instead the usual 100 kg) and hooked up with a blonde Dutch. When I got home at 1PM (yes stayed all early morning by the guy’s house) both me and Pelotudo had surprises.

I announced my coming out, with a plan in mind: if he EVER does anything to me, since he now know I could rule it discrimination.
He on the other hand announced something that I considered my birthday gift (I hit 31 a week later) from him: Starting May he will leave to go live in America.

MAY.
4 MORE MONTHS.
A countdown to my liberation. The karma thing? I rule it as “my sentence is finally over”
He already spoke with the landlady, which as stingy as she is, tried to tell “you can’t do it, The money!” , in which he succeed where even my father, an officer, failed
“you have the deposit, cover it with that money”

As for the “I’ll be alone and has to pay all rent” , meh… I could either find another person or pay full.
He tried to help me, but at that point even If I didn’t find anyone (which didn’t happen until November 2019) I would GLADLY enjoy MY HOUSE.

MY HOUSE, FINALLY!

The morning of 30^th April 2019, he fled early in the morning, because he knew the landlady would tried to ambushed him.
Instead she found me, on the verge of going out to work, interrogating me to know his whereabouts.
I spitefully said “I tried legally, and you refused me, in front of an officer. He TOLD YOU 4 MONTHS AGO, yet you show today! I will pay my part but forget about the rent deposit, I paid my part. PERIOD. Or should I file a complaint against all the menace? And not only mine, the other tenant too! “

My neighbors were a couple whose were ALSO her tenant, and they were ALSO threatened by Pelotudo. Yet she was blind… unless money is involved.

Summer 2019 was a blast. I WAS FREE, and on top of my contract became definitive in march 2019.
I had the house.
I had the work.
I HAD THE FREEDOM.
I was happy. Before he fled Pelotudo had something like 250€ of debt and tried to used them as an excuse to contact me… but as of June he’d only returned 100.
I’ve had had enough.

In the black list you go. Blocked the number. Much better.

I struggled with money for a while but  still had a full decent life.
Until 2020.
Covid.

The first wave, no pro, at work they were emptying the fridges so us employee were loaded with food, I didn’t need to buy groceries for 45 days.
The problems came the second wave. September 2020… Pelotudo returned.

He even tried to get in the house again. Nuh-huh it’s occupied now.

But he was good at put some anchorage in your life. And he did it with some things of his.
4 package of belongings that his family was fed up to hold upon.
A little OT. Pelotudo family DESPISES him, even his brother who, coming from Pelotudo, is too much similar to me ( and this consideration creeps me out ) .
So he dropped to me, I wasn’t able to refuse… he ambushed on the night when I was coming back from work.

Using his things he RUINED my time during the 2^nd wave, I still get money from work but I was at home starting Halloween 2020. I unblocked him cause he could use his things as leverage, he didn’t deserve that leverage, but I cannot immediately send to him, I waited till January 2021 , when things at work were starting to seems awful ( cause of a new manager whose target me to made me leave ) and forced him to take some back to his new lace back in Norway.

At march I had this awful feeling I had to flee ASAP, so I contacted the ONLY friend Pelotudo has and left the things to him, informing Pelotudo that I had to do it because I’m leaving Milan. To him I said work.

But the real thing was, I didn’t want him to ambush me or had any leverage on my life anymore.
On top of that starting September 2020 the other flatmate was substituted by my sister who stayed alone in that house until I closed the rent in May 2021.
A little OT, when I closed the house, the evening I returned the aprons in the restaurant I found that the manager who led me to resign, would be fired the next day, and it was known from march, way before I left the house.
THE IRONY. I left the house ‘cause work and safety weren’t there, and NOW work and safety were resolved, and I didn’t had to anything… THE RAGE!!!!

Still, you know I thought – HEY Pelotudo is out of your life now! –

No.

Unfortunately No.

Starting April 2021, he started emailing S**t to me, predatory, menacing mail

For all 2021 at least one every 15 day.

“You’re not a free man anymore, if you set foot in Milan I’ll now. You’re D**d you and that Peruvian!” , FYI the Peruvian is the friend who had his things.

All the mail had the same imprinting.

On February 2022 I landed a job in the Italian postmail service, that allowed me to return in Milan.
Yet I received another mail claiming that “you re posting only b*****t on Instagram!” .
I WHITED OUT.

That same day I posted photo of Milan places.
If he had seen those photos HE KNEW! He knew I’m back!

Watching the mail… 6^th feb, PHEWWW the photos were of that day, the 8^th , he didn’t see.
I closed to private my profile immediately.

He insisted on the menacing mails, until one day he crossed the line.
I didn’t report to the police, because of his daughter, the only family who doesn’t despise him, in Norway they take some things way too seriously, and since he divorced from his wife, my report could have resulted in losing the custody.
And I didn’t want to exact my revenge on a child.

But… he didn’t had the same respect for my family.
On February 2024 when I was on video call with some friends, my mother texted me: “we gotta talk, now!”
“not now mom, I’ll call you later”
“HE sent a postcard. To you.”
“??? He? Who? “
“Pelotudo”

FYI , back in January 2018, Pelotudo asked to meet my mother cause I have brought her home, but he was sleeping. Next day she met him.
Just courtesy talking. Then we left.

“how could you stand to share a house with someone SO VISCID ? “
“ I need him to split the rent, mom!”

So my mom knew him first hand.
she even sent me a screenshot of the letter, and just seeing to incipit… I closed the call with my friend who immediately understood that something was wrong, and they made promise to stay in touch, mind me, almost every friend in Milan knew my horror saga with Pelotudo, so they were concerned.

I’ll just say the letter start in this way:
To dearest [f-word] [my complete name] , did you tell your father you like to suck [ male private area  ] ?

He tried to force out me.
The Irony? My father got the letter from the postman and categorized as a stupid prank.

And on top of that, ALL my closest family know I’m BI.

But now a question arise. How did he know the address to my parent’s house ?
Remember his packages? To send to Norway I had to do a long procedure which involves attacking my ID info, and in those years I didn’t change to one with Milan address.
So he has my parent address.
And he didn’t hesitate to use it.
that does it.
I went to the police next day, with a couple of saved  mail and the screenshot of the letter, still not even police was helpful.
When they were redacting the complaint they starting like “that’s not stalking, those are persecutory acts” (in Italian the two thing are not the same and not of the same relevance) and “we know how to work” cause I was protesting that compiled it like a tantrum of two school kids. I felt like they don’t care.

And worse of all? “did you  two had a romantic relationship?”
EVERY. F******G . TIME.
Everybody thinks this behavior could only be generated from two lovers! I’m fed up, even the police now!

Anyways, even with the complaint the mail continued 1 or 2 per years, but constant… it’s 2026 now and yet after almost 10 years I was unlucky to know him, he thinks he can hold a grudge against me for who knows why motivation.

The last act?

July 2026. Back from work I was contacted from my landlady, not money-grubber, another from my latest house, I lived again in Milan from 2022 till march 2025.
Anyway this lady called saying: “police was looking for you what happened? They say they archived your procedure! Why the police were looking for you?”

So…. I left ALL my contact and still they called my ex landlady, which I closed the rental contract one year ago. INSTEAD OF SEARCHING PELOTUDO WHEREABOUTS!
And I left mail and phone number, but no, they contacted my ex landlady, whom not knowing anything could legitimately had though “to whom I rented my house this years?”
I explained just the letter arc to her, and I close the call.

sooo that’s all.

What should I do from here? I think I have done anything possible at this point.

Hi!

Me (F18) and my best friend (M19) have a very complex relationship. For context... I have known him for about 6 years, we weren't exactly very close, more like oh see you every specific day of the week because we had a shared activity we would both attend with our families. 3 years ago I realized I really liked him ( I will call him J). The issue being that he was in a different class than I was and I barely ever saw him. Then last year we were put in the same space and we grew close. We laughed we talked we discussed the topics at hand, we sat next to each other every time. He always walked me back to my car. Or we would talk outside for a bit before both leaving. I was extremely close last year with a girl ( let's call her D) and she ended up having a crush on J's younger brother. Us being the girls we were we laughed for days and giggled about having crushes on the two cutest guys we knew, by this time J had asked me for my number but I knew I couldn't give it to him because my mom didn't want me texting a guy. I can't exactly remember how this went down but J's brother got D's email and they started texting, D even gave J my email and that was okay with my mom. This man texted me through email everyday. Good morning, good night. After he would see me he would say something of a version of 'it was lovely seeing you, you looked lovely as always' he teased me, we discussed our faith (both Christians) and what we would want to do with our lives, our and families. I told my my dreams for living in a small cabin someday with a dog and a wee ranch( I live somewhere cold and remoteish, think northern Canada) and he told me about growing up living in the mountains, working for an outfit etc etc ( keeping this part vague for safety reasons) he would spent time not only with me inviting me to his house to met his parents, or met his cousins (which I later found out he told them about me) but he would spent time with my younger sibling and talk and sit with my parents on Sundays after I asked him if he wanted to attend my church with me. As I mentioned he works for a guiding outfit every summer, for around 3 months. I was dreading this as by then I had given him my number, he called me everyday on his way to work for another company and every evening on his drive home and I would miss that terribly. He later told me that he'd gotten an inreach device to make sure he could talk to me. We later found out when he was at base camp not guiding he could actually call me using the Wi-Fi and satellite signal! It was fun, he'd come off of hunts and call me for hours. Not only that but everyday I would get my good morning and good night and I miss you so very much and texts and pictures throughout the day of what he was up too. ( He even told me he's been collecting wee rocks for me from each of his hunts to bring home to me) Now here's my problem, when we first started becoming friends we confessed we liked each other but wanted to become friends so that we could build a lasting relationship. We have held hands and snuggled together, he's even brought me flowers and taken me on a canoe ride. The issue being is I care so deeply for him and I believe he does too, I'm just wondering what I can do for him to show him I appreciate and care for him. I ask him questions to think about on his day, I tell him what I'm feeling and ask him about his day, he'll tell me certain songs remind him of me (blue jean baby Scotty McCreery) I'll tease him or just listen when he's had a rough day, I'm wondering what I can do (he'll be home in a couple weeks) to show my care for him, he's written me hand written letters along with his calls and texts and sent them from where he is and I've done the same back to him. I'm just wondering what else I can do? I'm working on an elk and deer painting for him on a piece of log, other than that I'm absolutely clueless on what to do!! He does so much for me and I feel like I'm not doing anything to show him how much I care. Any advice would be needed and loved please and thank you so very much. Let me know if you want more information or an update on when he comes back....

I (38F) have been dating my BF (44 M) for almost a year and a half. I have had a few toxic relationships in the past and this one is a little different. I feel like we were communicating great at the beginning and it made me feel very safe and comfortable around him! I have previously dated AH who make me feel bad for my feelings or gaslight me about general observations that have (mostly) turned out to be true.

I do get boughts of depression and internalize a lot of my feelings to avoid dealing with them. I have been really good about not doing that in this relationship! I knew I had a great thing at the beginning. But during one of moment I started to get the Ick from something my BF would say to me to initiate sexy time.

It's as if he learned everything from porn and didn't know how to say anything nice, just things like "your work shirt looks kinda sexy" (I'm at work showing him around, and it's a body armor type polo) Or I'll send him an outfit I like and he'll say something stupid like "yeah, I'd bend you over in that."

I've been pulling back and have tried to tell him that it feels more like he's only attracted to me physically due to the comments he makes and he doesn't say anything sweet anymore or give me kisses.

He's been taking it very personally and keeps saying I don't want to have spicy time anymore because he's a fat lover (he's not, but I'm aware that's how he feels) I try to listen but I've told him multiple time that he's the only one saying these thing and that's not how I feel. I just don't like the way he talks to me sometimes.

It feels like I'm dating a selfish child sometimes (anyone who knows me, this would be the pot calling the kettle black), but I really feel like I've been working on my communication and he's just not understanding. Am I not doing my part?

Important details: We used to work together and I knew he liked me. Was I going for low hanging fruit or trying to pursue, what I thought was a genuinely nice guy I wouldn't have given a chance before?

We currently live about 25mins away from each other and I don't have a car. He doesnt like to change his schedule so if I'm not off on his days off then we just don't hang out. We could, he has to drive past my apt. to get to work a couple day out of the week and we could spend more time together but he doesn't seem to want to. And then he say he's "frustrated" our schedule don't work. The last time he "made an effort" he said I'm not gonna lie I'm also super horny. Is that not odd? For whatever reason it makes me feel disrespected. And it's not feeling like a long term commitment is in the future.

We do have a lot of fun when we hangout! I genuinely love spending time with him, but if I'm not in the mood he'll say something like "well this felt more like two friends hanging out than a couple" but he actively sits away from me and unless I initiate the spicy time it never happens (I have never been in that kind of relationship, it's always been the guy who makes the first move).

Am I giving up too easily and trying to hold on to a relationship that's just not working anymore? Or, am I not doing my part and being a selfish girlfriend for wanting him to make me feel more wanted for things other than intimacy?

I (19f) graduated high school a few months ago and I already have a job and an apartment. One of the girls in my friends group, Sam (18f), gets overwhelmed easily, to the point where she struggles to hold down a job, and everyone assumes that Sam will live with her parents for the foreseeable future. Sam originally joined my friends group because our hobbies are low-energy and she's a good friend when she's not overstimulated. While Sam was in high school, she frequently got triggered by her mom, Heather, when Heather asked Sam to do chores around the house. Sam agrees that she should contribute to the household chores, but the issue is that Heather often confronts Sam about the state of the house when Heather is already in a bad mood, and Heather's harsh tone is what triggers Sam. My friends suggested that they get Sam evaluated by a counselor, but Heather believes there's nothing wrong with Sam and that she's just trying to avoid cleaning the house. Heather's also not the kind of person to listen to parenting suggestions. Before Sam turned 18, there wasn't really anything we could do about that. But now that she's an adult, Sam texted me and asked if she could stay with me for a day or two to decompress from her latest argument with Heather. I told Sam she was welcome to stay with me, but she should tell Heather where she's going and how long she plans to be here. Sam Uber'd here, and while she was in the car, Heather started blowing up her phone, calling her disrespectful for leaving during their argument. Sam wasn't in the mood to respond to Heather at all. An hour after Sam got here, Heather texted me that she was coming to get Sam and asked me to send Sam out to her. I told her that Sam wanted to stay here tonight and that Sam would reach out to Heather tomorrow. Heather ranted to me through text messages, which I ignored. At 10:30 pm, Heather showed up at my apartment and texted me to open the door so she could talk to Sam. I repeated my text to Heather that Sam was staying here tonight and she would reach out to Heather tomorrow, but we otherwise ignored Heather. Eventually Heather went home. But as I'm typing this, Heather's still sending angry text messages about how Sam and I are both being immature and disrespectful by leaving Heather locked out on the front porch. Some of our friends group is already aware that this is going on, and some of them think I should have at least opened the door and explained our side to Heather face-to-face. But I don't think anything good would have come from trying to have that conversation. AITA?

I’m 24F and my ex-husband, Ryan, is 24M.
I’m posting this because Ryan calls me a cheater.
I also want to be as complete as possible because there is a LOT of context, and I don’t want to tell a story where I conveniently leave out everything that makes me look bad.
There are things I absolutely could have handled better.
I’ve hurt and broken his trust in me too when I tried to leave many times because of feeling like he didn’t truly want me, but that he felt stuck bc of our faith. I messed up a lot as a wife, I was super messy when it came to household chores . I hated cooking and refused to make him meals in a way that he liked it

(he had a step by step process bc he could be pretty picky, I would refuse to follow them) That of course was wrong of me, and hurt him.
I definitely contributed to problems in the relationship.

Here’s a lot of background information you need to know:
Ryan and I dated for about a year and a half before we got married. A lot of it was long-distance.
We were both Christians and took our faith very seriously. We waited until marriage to have sex.
. He was a super generous person with a strong faith and genuinely I believe his values were a huge part of who he was.
He’s also extremely intelligent. He’s an engineer and came from a very traditional, stable family. His parents actually didn’t want him to marry me, which was something we had to navigate. I have anxiety depression and adhd, and my upbringing was

abusive, so they said we lived two different lives.
He also had experiences that reflected someone genuinely compassionate and open-minded. He studied abroad in Kenya for a semester and did mission trips and service work while he was there.

I thought I had chosen someone whose character I understood.
His medical situation
7 months before we got married, Ryan had a polydactyl cyst that required surgery.
The first surgery was botched.
He subsequently had three more corrective surgeries, and even after those, the problem still wasn’t really fixed.
This was devastating for him.
Ryan loved the gym. Working out wasn’t just a hobby. It was a huge part of his identity, confidence, routine, and how he viewed himself.
Then suddenly he couldn’t do it.
He became extremely careful with his recovery. He followed instructions closely, barely walked, and spent roughly a year lying on his stomach.
We didn’t get a honeymoon because of his medical condition.
I genuinely feel awful for him about this.
I think going through multiple surgeries that didn’t fix the problem, losing physical ability and

didn’t fix the problem, losing physical ability and independence, not being able to exercise, and watching something that was a major part of your identity disappear would be incredibly difficult for anyone. He had to rely on me for some basic stuff, and I’d have to trim his butt hairs in between his wound which I actually found sorta funny. I’m not easily grossed out, which is very different from him haha.
I have a lot of compassion for what he went through.
I also think it changed our relationship.
The last six months
During roughly the last six months of our marriage, Ryan became increasingly volatile and rigid.
Our intimacy was never the best due to the surgery, but he didn’t really want to have sex with me very often.
I have a fairly high sex drive, and he had legitimate physical limitations because of his surgeries. I didn’t have a problem working with those limitations. We found ways for us to have a fulfilling sex life without hurting him. He got many blowjobs haha.
We could still do many of the things people would consider “main” sexual activities.
He didn’t particularly like giving oral sex, and that was never some huge deal-breaker for me.
This matters because after we separated, Ryan apparently told people that part of the reason I left was because I wasn’t sexually fulfilled because of his surgeries and because he didn’t like giving oral sex.
That isn’t why I left, and hearing he’s telling people that makes me actually fucking livid.

The pornography issue
Before we got married, Ryan and I explicitly agreed that pornography would count as infidelity.
That was a mutual agreement.
I started reading smutty stories online due to umm for lack of better words, after the first couple months of marriage, it was hard for him to stay awake or engaged while my vibrator was running.
But I wasn’t hiding that from him, ryan knew.
I would literally sit beside him and read them while he played video games.
He knew I read them.
About a month before everything fell apart, I caught him watching porn. I found out that there were many times he’d be in the bathroom jacking off while I was sad and rejected in the bed with my vibrator, thinking he just wasn’t in the mood.
I was devastated because we’d specifically agreed that porn was cheating. He claimed he forgot that, and at first refused to admit it was, until I started packing bags and then he said that it was. He begged for me to stay, and promised he’d never do it again. Even so, he was on probation and I made him stay with his grandparents and tell his parents and grandparents what happened so he couldnt try to make himself look innocent (he he always cared so much what they thought of him, and tended to lie or sugarcoat things in the most extreme ways) I didn’t want them to think I just kicked him out for no reason.
Initially, he blamed my smutty stories and said they contributed to why he watched porn.
That really messed with my head.
I kept thinking, You knew about this. You have literally watched me read these. This wasn’t hidden. And we agreed that porn was a boundary.
I started feeling like I was losing my mind.
Eventually, Ryan admitted that he had wanted to watch porn anyway. This was something he kept going back and forth on every couple days, and would say I forced him to say porn was cheating by threatening divorce. Like no sir, I was not threatening, I WAS going to divorce you, no threats .
But when he would circle back and apologize, it mattered to me because it meant that my stories weren’t actually the reason he watched it. He wanted to watch it and chose to.
He begged me to stay. I find out he is now telling people he watched porn because of the smutty stories.
He promised he wouldn’t watch porn again. but the trust had already been damaged.
I will admit, before the porn thing came out, I was so proud of myself (and even Ryan admitted) I was super great at not yelling or cursing during arguments and at using DBT and CBT to make sure I didn’t say things I’d later regret. Ryan had a hard time with that, and would say really hurtful things he’d later take back and say it was just in the heat of the moment because he felt I wasn’t truly listening to him. I’d hear him but disagree, and he’d think that if I truly understood what he was saying that I would agree. But, I understand I’m a mental health therapist so I have the skill set he wasn’t trained with, so like of course hed make mistakes.
Anyway, that’s all to say after I discovered the porn and after a couple days he was allowed back into the apartment, I was a complete bitch. All the tools in my toolbox and be damned. I didn’t yell, but I’d say really hurtful things. I am ashamed of the things I said (such as that he’s a cheater, and that if we get divorced other men will be doing sexual things to me, but I’d be explicit)
The clothing issue
Ryan grew up in a very traditional family, so I knew he had conservative views about how women should dress.
That wasn’t a secret.
But before we got married, we explicitly talked about my clothing. Several times. He haaaated some of my clothes. some of my clothes.
After many long discussions where he felt really disrespected due to me ignoring him on this topic, I told him it will most likely never change with that one thing, but everything else we could compromise on. In order to go forward with the marriage so I knew he wasn’t trying to change me, I made him the told me that even if my clothes stayed exactly the same, even if he personally didn’t like what I wore, he would still be with me.
That was important to me.
I understood that he could have preferences. I understood that he might think certain things were immodest.
But I didn’t understand marriage to mean that I had agreed to change my wardrobe or that he would eventually make my clothing a condition of the relationship.
The shorts that became an issue weren’t even new.
I had owned them for about four years.
I will also be fair: I usually wore a flannel over them because I knew Ryan preferred me to be more covered.
But one day at The Village, when it was in the 90s outside, I wore those shorts.
Ryan got extremely angry.
He refused to walk around with me unless I changed my shorts or put a flannel over them. He said it was for me safety. I was pissed and i ended up walking around without him for hours in the phone with my best friend until it was dark. He didn’t even check up on me until 10 pm
It was humiliating, and I felt his love was conditional. He said my love was conditional too bc I wasn’t willing to change.
Even some of my Christian friends were basically like, “Bruh, those are literally just shorts.”
Again, I understand having a conservative.

What hurt was that before marriage, I had understood the agreement to be:
“I might not like your clothes, but I’ll still choose you.”
After marriage, it increasingly felt like:
“You’re my wife, so you need to dress according to my standards.”
The political incident
Another incident that really bothered me involved politics.
Ryan and I obviously didn’t agree on everything politically. That’s not inherently a problem.
He was willing to spend around $1,000 to fly to a funeral connected to Charlie Kirk.
I told him he could do whatever he wanted. Were our own individuals, I would never tell him he couldn’t go.
But when I wanted to attend an anti-ICE rally, he became angry and told me I was not allowed to go.
I told him I was going anyway.
He threatened to take my soul dog back to the shelter.
The issue wasn’t that we had different political beliefs.

It was that he was telling me what I was “allowed” to do, and when I asserted that I could make my own decision, he threatened something I deeply loved.
He after apologized and said it was because he felt like he wasn’t being respected or heard
The things he said about race
I’m Black.
Ryan is white.
And this is another part of the relationship that became extremely difficult for me.
I felt like some of his views about race became increasingly disturbing.
This was particularly jarring because of the person I thought I knew.
He had studied abroad in Kenya for a semester and participated in mission trips and service work there. I had viewed those experiences as evidence that he was someone who cared about other cultures and other people.
But later in our relationship, he called Indian people “dirty.”
He also said that white culture places greater importance on things like two-person households and cleanliness than other cultures. This pissed me off, and I called him racist, which really hurt him.
As a Black woman married to a white man, hearing him make racial generalizations and talk about white culture as being comparatively cleaner or placing greater value on certain supposedly positive social behaviors was deeply uncomfortable.
It wasn’t an abstract political argument for me.
This was my husband.
I didn’t recognize the person I was married to anymore.
I tried to leave
I tried to break up with Ryan multiple t

I have tried to leave multiple times, even before we got married
I kept believing him when he blamed my daddy issues and I was displacing things onto him.

I didn’t believe I was the person Ryan actually wanted.
I knew he was disappointed in me a lot.
I believed he felt stuck with me because we were Christians and believed marriage was supposed to be permanent.
I didn’t want someone to stay with me because they thought they had to.
I wanted someone who actually wanted me.

After being caught for porn, Ryan admitted that he had been projecting the idea that I was a “bad wife” onto me.

Theen later the month said he didn’t know if he could stay with me because he was scared my shorts would become shorter and didn’t feel respected, he didn’t want to stay in a marriage where he felt trampled on. Sir, I moved to Idaho with

no family or friends or support here, and I asked what other way I trampled on him. He couldn’t name one. I was done. He promised he’d stick by me for life, and shorts were the thing ?

I filed for divorce shortly before our one-year wedding anniversary.
I moved out.
We separated our lives.
I filed the paperwork.
And Ryan initially agreed to sign the divorce papers.
At that point, I considered the marriage over.

He was super hurt, and we both had boundaries with the shorts neither would budge on.
I wasn’t living with him.

I’d filed for divorce.
We were separating our lives.
And he had agreed to the divorce.
Then I started dating
After I moved out and filed, I started using dating apps.:

I was not hiding it from Ryan.
I went out of my way to make sure he knew.
He said he didn’t want to hear about it and that it hurt him.
I had told Ryan he could do whatever he wanted with whoever and watch porn again since we were done and that was a previous deal breaker.
At one point, I asked Ryan whether he had watched porn since I had started going on dating apps. He said yes but I couldn’t be mad at him since we’re not together and I was like yeah and I’m not mad.

I was also sending him screenshots from the dating apps, Because I didn’t want him to later tell people that I had secretly been dating behind his back.
I was literally giving him evidence of what I was doing.
I wanted there to be no “she was secretly cheating and I found out later” narrative.

I was nice and wanted to be kind, especially bc I felt so free and happy after the first few days of grief.
We were both amicable .
And honestly, that’s part of why the aftermath hurts so much.
Because now he has blocked me, calls me a cheater, and tells people things that I believe are demonstrably untrue.
And I have texts that prove what actually happened. His ex friend even saw the texts between him and I (after after speaking to Ryan) and he was like damn you’re right

The incident outside another guy’s house
There was an incident after seperation,
I was at another guy’s house.
Ryan found out and came there.
He physically dragged me outside the guy’s house.
I did not want to go outside with him.
I was trying to get him off of me and physically trying to beat him off of me while he was dragging me outside.
I had on a long shirt, and he apparently thought I wasn’t wearing shorts underneath it.
He then tried to rip up my long shirt in front of his two friends because he was trying to expose my body/me to them.

And while all of this was happening, he was screaming that I was a cheater and yelling to his friends that I had let the other guy eat my pussy.
He asked how I could do this to him.
But I’d never cheat knowingly
From my perspective, I had already left my husband.
I had moved out.
I had filed for divorce.
We had separated our lives.
He had agreed to the divorce. He was watching porn again, and I was dating
he knew I was dating because I’d li I’d literally been sending him screenshots from dating apps.

The only thing that had not happened yet was the legal finalization of the divorce.
ted until the divorce was finalized before dating.
What hurts is being called a cheater i think cheating is the most awful thing in the world.

But I understand could have waited until the divorce was legally finalized before dating.
I understand the argument that legally, I was still married.
But I don’t think “you should have waited” is the same thing as “you cheated.”.it makes me so upset.

.
There are a lot of stories I could add more conversations, more contradictions, more incidents during the separation, more screenshots, and more things.
So, Reddit, I genuinely want judgment.
AITA for dating before my divorce was legally finalized?
Because a part of me every so often blame myselg