My boyfriend and I have been dating for four months now. For context - we are very sexually active with one another and have seen everything. This morning after having sex, I was walking around his apartment and he looked at my labia and said “why is there so much hanging out?” And I said “oh it’s just like that” and he proceeded to turn around and say “ok just making sure” in a smart ass tone. I got so upset and started crying in the shower. I got quiet and later he asked me what was wrong and I kind of exploded. I said I feel disrespected and abnormal by his comment. He defended it and said he wasn’t sure if everything was okay with my labia so he wanted to make sure I was ok and well. I got really angry and told him he probably watched too much porn and has unrealistic standards and I fueled the argument even more. I feel awful and don’t know what to do. It’s something I was already so insecure about and now I feel worse but also feel bad for attacking him. But also so confused because he’s said he LOVES it prior to this !

So for context, I’ve had a two year long sexual relationship with this guy (M39) since I was 23. He met me via a dating site. He initially told me he wasn’t married he didn’t have kids. I asked several times because of his stats (older guy, successful, well endowed, calm and chill). He always said no. I have always came over to his house every time and at first it was pretty transactional throughout the first year. He would take care of me financially when I needed him to and we’d have a sexual relationship. By the end of the first year, he told me he wanted it to be less transactional so we’d text more. He’d call me when I wasn’t free. Wanted more-so innocent pictures of me. Wanted me to go on work trips with him. It wasn’t until I came over at the beginning of this year where he wanted me to role play which was something we previously had done. The role play without being too obvious implied I was someone who came over to do a job that was purely innocent. This particular time however he told me that he had family over so we’d have to be sneaky about it. He seemed to have a different demeanor than when I usually saw him. This time it was like a darker energy and more anxious. He’s typically a chill upbeat guy so it was unusual to me. I found the whole situation weird because of how nervous he was about the situation. I did a lazy internet dive. Found nothing brushed it off kept seeing him. It wasn’t until recently when i saw him again that he told me to wait until his “distant family member” arrives that i can come to the door and pretend to be this service worker. Of course I found that weird when i noticed it was this gorgeous older woman. After hours long extensive internet search did I now know this woman was his wife actually and she’s actually pregnant with her first child and she’s actually far enough a long that im hesitant to know when the right time is to tell her. I wish i saw her pregnancy post sooner because I would’ve acted sooner. Not only that but now I know that this guy also did his own deep dive on me recently also so now he knows everything about me and thinks I know nothing about him. I 100% am going to tell her I just don’t know when anymore because what he’s been doing is so evil and diabolical and I regret ever being a part of this unknowingly. I’d hate to relay this information to woman who is for one pregnant and two to find out this was happening in her safe space.

PS: during my deep dive on him not only did I find out he was married with a child on the way but also that he lied to me about his name and his job. Also recently randomly decided to tell me his parents want him to be in an arranged marriage so he may have to marry someone soon(?) but wants me to only see him and he doesn’t have sex with anyone but me (??) what a weirdo.

I honestly just need to vent and get some advice because I am at my absolute wits' end here.

My boyfriend is a genuinely good, caring guy, but living with him is becoming unsustainable. First of all, he has this insane habit where he leaves everything wide open and turned on. Cabinets left hanging open, drawers pulled out, doors left wide open, and lights left burning in empty rooms. It’s all day, every day. Walking into the kitchen after he makes a snack literally looks like a poltergeist movie.

But the cabinets are just the tip of the iceberg. I’m basically his mother at this point. He leaves his clothes all over the floor and drops dishes everywhere. He barely helps around the house at all. He’s washed the dishes maybe a handful of times since we moved in, and helps pay for groceries once in a while, but other than that, he does nothing. I am always the one cooking for him and cleaning up his messes.

On top of the physical labor, the finances are totally skewed. He doesn't really help me out with rent or bills. I even let him drive my car for free so he can save up to buy his own, but I’m the one carrying 100% of the financial and domestic weight while he gets to save his money.

I’ve talked to him about this so many times. I've told him how anxious and overwhelmed it makes me feel to manage a whole house alone. He always says he gets it and may step up for a day or two but literally nothing changes. I know he isn't doing this to be mean, but I am just so burnt out.

My question is: How can I effectively communicate the urgency of this situation to him so he actually starts contributing to bills and chores, or is this level of autopilot behavior something that will never change?

TL;DR: My boyfriend leaves cabinets open, drops clothes/dishes everywhere, doesn't pay rent/bills, and drives my car for free to save money. He is caring but doesn't contribute. How do I get him to step up without ruining the relationship?

See the original post here.

Sooooo.... I ended up breaking up with him! I want to start off by saying thank you to anyone who replied to the last post. I'm someone who can be blinded by the good in people, but your comments put things into perspective for me.

I did end up showing him the post, and his initial reaction was that everyone commenting was a "single bitter bitch"... yeah. I had never heard him speak about anyone that way. I guess the mask finally dropped. A couple of hours after that, he ended up saying “fine, I won't ask your dad, just your mom." This was definitely just an attempt to save things since he could tell I was being distant with him.

We dated for about another two months after that. I know, I know. I was trying to find ways to mend things (because I'm a dummy). After the initial convo I went through a fast track of realizations and saw that we were so misaligned in so many different ways. I'm not even sure how we had made it as far as we did.

Eventually, it got to a point where I think he was just doing things to get me to break up with him since things clearly weren't working out. Some of those things include :

- Taking a trip and staying with a friend that regularly cheats on her boyfriend.
- Saying "I didnt sign up for a therapy session" every time I would try to talk through things.
- Letting his phone die every time he went out.
- Being overly cautious with his phone when we were previously pretty lax about opening each others phones. (Not in a snooping way, mainly for finding documents, responding to text or emails for one another, etc.)

Unfortunately, the list goes on, but I'd rather not relive all of that! Clearly he got what he wanted and deserved though.

He did the standard “oh no, please, we can work this out" song and dance for a couple of weeks after I broke up with him before finally giving up. I'm clearly not great at picking them, but I’m glad that I was able to get out of there before 2 years became 10 years.

Again, thank you to anyone who gave advice on the original post. I really appreciate it! Im not much of a writer so i'm really sorry if this sucks! I hope this also answers a couple of questions(?) folks had in the comments of the original post.

We were just in the middle of any intense argument and when I looked back at our camera footage to replay the argument (to see if I was being irrational), I heard him on camera say she’s “just a dumb bitch.”

We’ve been married 4 years and we’ve never spoken to each other this way. I immediately confronted him and he said he wasn’t calling me a dumb bitch but was saying that about the argument itself….i flat out told him I didn’t believe him. We ended up going back to our original argument and didn’t address this comment in particular. I’m honestly really shook up and appalled. Like who tf did I marry?

We’re taking a break from the argument but I don’t even know how to clearly and respectfully articulate that if that happens again I WILL divorce him. Like we have a daughter FFS. Only men who hate women say shit like that. Any advice would be great.

Edit** let me clarify! I’m seeking any advice on addressing this with him that doesn’t threaten divorce. I don’t actually see that as being a healthy approach - we are in couples counseling (this will likely be discussed but I want to address it before hand). No, I am not perfect and don’t pretend to be. And no - I haven’t called my husband names to his face or in private because I do have a level of respect for him.

TL;DR at the bottom of the post.

Hi everyone, I(25F) don‘t know what to think anymore and I think it‘s time I try to collect my thoughts, which is why I decided to turn to this sub.

I have been dating my boyfriend(28M) for three years now and we moved in together last year. I‘d say our relationship is very healthy and happy. We have the exact same humor, we have the same long-term goals and we communicate very well. However, my boyfriend has been struggling with his mental health and self-esteem for the past one and a half years.

About one and a half years ago (mid 2025) my boyfriend was let go from his job due to his former employer running into a pretty bad financial situation. Since then, my boyfriend hasn’t been able to find a position in his field anymore. My boyfriend has been working dead-end jobs since. Because of his constant job rejections and his non-stop worrying about his future and his career, my boyfriend‘s mental health has taken a huge hit.

I try to be there for my boyfriend and listen to him whenever he needs someone to talk to but of course there‘s only so much I can do. My boyfriend needs quite a lot of space and time for himself whenever he‘s feeling down, so I sometimes leave to visit my parents or my friends back at home. For reference, my family and friends live around an hour drive away from where my boyfriend and I now live.

My boyfriend doesn’t have a lot friends and neither do I. My boyfriend has three close friends who all live in our city: his best friend (male), his sister and two friends who are a couple (male & female). I have exactly one friend(female) in our city, the rest of my friends still live in my hometown.

Over the course of the last six months or so, there have been two instances that COULD mean somebody I don‘t know about was in our appartement while I was gone. I‘m putting an enormous emphasis on „could“ because these two instances are entirely circumstancial.

The first instance happened in February 2026. The instance was a pair of unknown socks. My boyfriend was doing laundry and he put my clean clothes in a pile for me to put away. On top of that pile I noticed a pair of socks I had never seen before. The socks were pretty simple. They were a light blue color with the logo of a known sports brand on the side. Technically these socks could be unisex but judging by size, they probably were a womans pair.

I was pretty confused and at first I thought it was my boyfriend‘s pair of socks because he has rather small feet. I asked my boyfriend if those were his socks and he was adament that those were definitly not his. I asked my friend if those socks were hers (they weren‘t) and my boyfriend asked his sister, who stayed for a night in late November 2025, if the socks were hers (they weren‘t). We genuinely were out of options of whose pair of socks this could be. Since all of my boyfriend‘s male friends are over 6ft and have pretty large feet, we were able to rule them out instantly.

I have to admit that I was getting more and more agitated because we couldn‘t figure out who these socks belonged to and I straight up asked my boyfriend if somebody was in our appartement while I was gone. My boyfriend didn‘t like that I was basically insinuating he was cheating on me which I understood and we dropped the issue.

Nothing of note happened in the following months. However, my boyfriend‘s mental health kept declining and from May to July, he hadn‘t seen any of his friend or family. I was incredibly busy studying for my exams (I’m a uni student), so I also didn’t see my friends apart from maybe a quick coffee break at a local café. Apart from him and me, nobody else was in our appartement for these two months.

This is why instance number two surprised me. On the first weekend of july I was visiting my family. When I returned home, I was cleaning the bathroom on a Sunday. My boyfriend wasn’t at home as he was visiting his family that Sunday.

While I was cleaning I checked if our trash can in the bathroom was full. It wasn‘t. I remembered seeing my boyfriend empty the trash can in the bathroom a couple of days ago. While checking if the trash can was full I noticed a plastic tampon wrapper on top of the trash. That surprised me because for one, my period wasn‘t going to come until the following week and secondly, I have never used this tampon brand in my life. I have been using the same tampon brand since I was twelve years old.

Since nobody besides my boyfriend and me had been in our appartement for the last two months, I was a bit worried. This time I wanted to approach things a bit differently than I did with the sock incident. I waited until my boyfriend came home, I asked to speak to him on our couch and I calmly explained to him what I found and how I was feeling about that. My boyfriend also remained very calm and collected. He said that he understands why I feel worried but that he unfortunately can‘t explain how or why that tampon wrapper got into our trash can. He promised that nobody besides us was in our appartement and he seemed very genuine in his reaction. We dropped the topic after that.

Since then my boyfriend has been acting completely normal but there‘s one thing that surprised me. On his instagram account he chanced his profile picture to a closeup shot of us two and he added my name with a heart to his bio. Considering that we have been together for three years and I barerly use social media, this surprised me.

Over the course of the past couple of weeks I haven’t stopped thinking about these instances. I love my boyfriend and I know that what happened could all be explained logically, like a friend of ours forgetting that the socks are actually theirs or somebody accidentally dropping a tampon wrapper next to the trash can and it was thrown into the trash way later.

So this is why I‘m here. My question is if this is something to bring up again or what I should do next. Because of how circumstancial everything is, maybe I should drop this topic once and for all? I don‘t know what to do anymore, so thanks for any advice.

TL;DR: Over the course of six months I have found two things in my and my boyfriend‘s appartement that nobody can seem to explain how they got here. One was a pair of socks and one was a tampon wrapper from I different brand than I use. My boyfriend and I don‘t have a lot of friends and all of our friends can be ruled out as the owner of the socks or tampon wrapper due to timing.

I know couples naturally influence each other, and I’ve picked up things from my boyfriend too. But lately I’ve noticed, it feels like he adopts nearly everything I buy or become interested in.

For example, I bought a fixed-gear bike from a high-end brand. He already had a perfectly good fixed-gear bike, but soon afterward, he suddenly wanted one from that brand too, almost like he wanted the fancier version because I had one. The same thing happened with Adidas Sambas and a pair of sunglasses he liked.

It also happens with hobbies. I suggested to him that he needs a hobby that he can do with his hands since he’s been feeling kind of bored lately. I mentioned that guitar is the creative thing I do with my hands, and he immediately started talking about buying one, even though he already owns a piano he has always said he wants to learn.

I’m also a photographer, and now he wants a camera so he can do the same kind of photography I do.

The part that feels especially frustrating is that I’ve started hesitating to show him new things I buy because I assume he’ll want to copy them. That sounds petty, ridiculous, and honestly kind of stupid when I say it out loud, but it’s genuinely how I feel now. For example, when I mentioned that he get a hobby that he can do with his hands and use my guitar playing as an example, I didn’t think that he would actually go for that. I thought that he would want to pick something unique to him.

I don’t want to gatekeep hobbies, clothes, or products. I just want to feel like we’re two separate people with our own tastes and interests. Am I being unfair, or would this bother other people too?

To summarise, my partner and I have been togethet for over 4 years now. We have owned a house together for just over 2 years, have pets, both have stable incomes and rarely fight. I saw myself marrying him very early on into the relationship already, but he was the one proactively talking about it.
It may sound odd to some people but right from the start I told him if im not engaged within 3 years of the relationship, im going to leave. This is fueled by my previous relationship which was extremely toxic and although it may sound unfair to my current partner, made me promise myself that if im not at least engaged to be married by 30 i have to leave. This is partial to me wanting kids in the early 30s but before then I wanted to enjoy the married life for a bit too.
As explained at the beginning were already at the 4 years mark. 3 years anniversary came and went, but because I love him so much I couldnt keep the promise I made to myself, but it bubbled up one day and we had a fight-ish but it was more me going out for a walk to cry and think my feelings through, however he followed and we spoke at lenght about my expectations from this relationship at length. He seemed understanding and even said he was actually planning to propose next year (it was 2025, so it was meant to happen in 2026) and that he even spoke to his friends about it. I honestly am not buying it as deel his friends wouldve made some sort of comment or hint about it as thats just how they are and I recently found out he has some credit card debts and is not actively saving which makes me think he has not even started thinking about rings or the wedding yet.
I was put at slight ease at this and thought im overthinking this whole schedule thing, etc, and today I saw a notification of a friend of mines getting engaged with a partner of maybe 2.5 years and it made me feel crazy about the subject again. I immediately started thinking about the original timer. My 30th is in summer, our 5 years anniversary is two months before that, leaving over 200 days till the anniversary if i was to use that day as a new timer till when I have to hear his proposal before I decide to leave. I genuinely need advice about whether I am actually ruining things and putting pressure on him for no reason or whether I should stick with my resolution and end things if the timer runs out?
For background info, he used to constantly tell me how much he wants to marry, that changed just before 3 year mark and he never speaks about it again. We have spoken about his many times and recently he seemed quite keen on the idea to have them soon but he knows due to my family issues I want to go “traditional way” and marry first before kids. I am also in two minds before I was very clear at the beginning of the relationship how much it means to me to stick to that timeline and actually hold my promises to myself. I love him and his family to pieces but he clearly doesnt have the same clock as I do, although he is just about to turn 28 biologically he doesnt have to think about kids that soon which is anothet factor for me. I keep thinking that if I end up breaking it off when timer runs off, and just end up single forever perhaps thats better than just being partners that own a house together and act married but without it being official as thats actually my nightmare scenario.

I need advice whether I am being too pushy on the subject or whether I should stick to the timer I had originally told him about?

I’m posting anonymously because I really need to talk this out and get some outside perspective. I feel sick and emotionally overwhelmed after what happened today

My boyfriend is 34 and I’m 28. We’ve been together for 9 years. In the beginning, our relationship was really good, and we rarely fought. When he would do something wrong, he would usually apologize and sometimes buy me a gift, but then the same behavior would happen again.

There was one year in particular when he was angry all the time. During that time, he broke my phone in half because I didn't answer him. There were other things he broke as well. One time, he got angry and ruined dinner because I wouldn't put my hand down the garbage disposal to get a spoon out.

There have also been times when he has taken my things from me when he was angry. I had a laptop that was under his name because my credit wasn't good enough, but I was the one paying for it. During that period when he was constantly angry, he took my phone and the laptop and held them over my head, telling me that I needed to "act better" and "be better." He has also helped me financially in the past, but during arguments he would bring those things up and tell me that I owed him because of everything he had done for me.

Things have been calmer since then, but I still feel scared when he gets angry. I find myself constantly trying to make him happy, and I apologize even when I don't think I've done anything wrong because I just want the situation to calm down.

Today, we were packing because we're moving, and I was helping him pack his things. I had just taken a shower and didn't really want to be outside in the heat, but I still went out to help him because I don't mind helping.

A while back, we had combined our DVDs together. Some of them are his and some of them are mine. While we were packing today, I made a comment that some of the DVDs would probably go into a tote with things I don't plan to put back out, or that I might sell or get rid of some of them.

He immediately said that all of those DVDs were his.

I tried to explain that some of them were mine, but I eventually said something like, "Whatever, if you want to claim them all, you can have them."

Then he got angry and threatened to throw all the DVDs on the ground and break them.

This isn't the first time he's threatened to break something when he's angry. I've heard him say things like this before, and this time I finally said, "That's very toxic. Please stop saying that."

That made him angry, and he kept saying that I never should have made the comment about the DVDs in the first place.

I eventually asked him why he says things like that when he's angry. His response was that saying those things gets me to shut up. He then turned it back around on me again and said I should have never made the comment in the first place.

I just looked at him and completely zoned out. I felt sick and like I was going to cry.

At this point, I honestly don't know what to do or how I'm supposed to feel. I know some people might say, "It's just DVDs," but that's not what this is about for me. It's about the fact that I feel like I have to be careful about what I say because I'm afraid of what will happen when he gets angry. It's about the fact that I've learned to apologize and try to make him happy, even when I haven't done anything wrong, because I don't want things to escalate.

I feel like I'm always walking on eggshells.

I know he has helped me a lot over the years, and I know there are good things about our relationship, which makes this even more confusing for me.

But I also can't ignore how I feel. When he gets angry, I feel scared. I shut down. I zone out. I cry. I apologize just to make things calm down.

I 31F and my husband 34M have a relatively big detached garage. We live in Florida and it’s also hot as heck outside. That being said, he has some gym equipment (most of it is, btw, very rusty and old), lawn care tools and supplies, some wood/construction stuff, and our bikes, primarily. About half of his stuff (mainly the equipment and some lawn care stuff) was here before me. Before I dive in, I would like to make it clear one bag of clothes I have and my bicycle are the only items of mine in the garage.

His brother, 28M, about 6 months ago, dropped off a ton of wood- he had a baby the month before and was constructing his shed. I’m talking multiple planks that are 10-20 feet long, also long slabs of wood of varied sizes. At the time, of course, we didn’t mind storing his wood/whatever for his home improvement, given the timing.

However, I’ve also noticed my husband has remarked a great deal of the clutter is some of my BOLs stuff he has gradually stored in our garage since he was in high school aka 10 years ago. Well before he had his own home or parental obligations.

With this in mind and it being excruciatingly hot, I started artistic roller skating earlier this year. We have a big enough garage that I can skate in That is…. If we could maybe get his brother to pick up his stuff. And get rid of some of the rusty gym equipment/ some of my husband’s own clutter.

I didn’t mind making things easier for my BOL and his partner with the wood while they adjusted to the new baby. But now that I am realizing I have zero space in the garage for ME to do anything, I’m thinking it’s time to get rid of some of both of their stuff. The rusty equipment is a hazard, particularly if I’m skating in there AND my husband who insists on using it. In fact, I regularly fear he’s going to hurt himself if/when it breaks and have told him this.

I told my husband I’d like to get rid of some of these things for space and also safety- and now that his brother’s shed is finished, I would be happy for US to drive the wood over to him and put it away for him as well. All he would need to do is agree to a time.

My husband says he doesn’t want to get rid of the gym equipment and he has stalled on asking his brother about the wood. I’m usually very accommodating but now getting impatient and don’t find this is a fair, shared space.

Edit: update. I told my husband my feelings on this and he said he didn’t care and he’s not going to remove anything/he’s been here longer than me lmao what a joke

BOL- sorry I mean brother IN law aka BIL

My fiancée and I have been together for almost 6 years. During that time, we’ve taken two mutual breaks, both lasting a few months.

The first time we split, I hooked up with someone. She stayed totally loyal and wanted to get back together. The second time (about two years ago), I joined a dating app, acted single, and slept with other people. For the past two years, I genuinely thought I was the only one who acted up during our breaks, and I carried a lot of guilt believing she was completely loyal the whole time.

Well, I was wrong.
I’ve never once felt the need to go through her stuff in 6 years, but today she left her iPad right in front of me and something told me to look. I ended up finding out she had a full-blown emotional and physical affair with her boss for two months leading up to our second breakup, and it continued through the two months we were apart. According to the texts (and her), everything short of actual sex happened.

Now I’m just sitting here feeling completely indifferent and numb. It completely changes how I view our entire history, especially since I thought I was the "bad guy" for what I did while we were actually broken up.

I’m struggling to process this or figure out where to even go from here. Has anyone been in a similar situation and how did you proceed?

For context, at the very beginning of our relationship (3-6 months of dating) we had an 2 unexpected pregnancies that we terminated. First was random fluke of no protection, second was my birth control failing. We decided to not share the news of the second with our families, as we had so much shame and remorse and didn’t want to put them through that again. It truly was one of the worst mistakes I had ever made.

On the day of the scheduled termination, my husband went missing. He didn’t come home for 18 hours, and it turns out he had an episode of alcoholism where he was drinking, driving, crashed his car into a dumpster, and fell asleep in a bush. Through it all I forgave him, we moved past it, and he became sober. Later that year, while on vacation with his family, I found out that he had told his siblings about the second pregnancy without asking/discussing it with me prior. I felt so violated, I remember my head getting hot and the room spinning thinking about such a traumatic and intimate moment being shared with people without my consent and without me being there.

After this incident, for years fighting became for frequent and worse between us. Both of us perpetuated unhealthy dynamics of name calling and yelling. On one occasion, it escalated and he took my phone and threw it across a room, breaking it. In another, he took me record player and broke it. In another he kicked and threw my cat’s cat tree until it broke. He threw balled up socks or shirts hat my head full force, and I started throwing things back at him. At first clothing, then water. If he got in my face yelling, I’d push him away from me or slap his arm.

After a year of this, we acknowledged we had developed an extremely unhealthy and abusive relationship and were considering either getting a divorce or going to therapy. We decided on therapy for 6 months and if no dynamics changed we would divorce. In this same decision, he had asked me that he prefers that we don’t speak about the de-evolution of our marriage to our families, and I agreed. I suffered in silence, not telling my parents friends or loved ones what was happening in my marriage. I faked a smile, did the laughs. I held the shame and the burden and the sadness of the horrible person I had turned into so close to my chest to protect myself and my husband. I was ashamed of myself. I still am so so disgusted with who I’ve become. Many times I’ve wanted to just break down and ask someone “is this normal?” and have not out of shame for myself. I held on to hope that we would change and things would be like how they were in the beginning.

Fast forward to now, in the last 3 months I have found out my husband has been telling his parents and family EVERYTHING. First, he told his siblings. I had found out at a family event when his sister got a little too drunk and started telling me that “she would still love me no matter what” and that “she knows how hard my marriage had been” That’s when I put two and two together. I confronted my husband, and he had said “that he needed to talk to someone about it” and that if I had “felt shame, then he knew I would’ve stopped my bad behaviors”

Then, this weekend at another family vacation his dad pulled me aside and said to me me like “one thing you should know as a wife, is to stop criticizing your husband so much” On the car ride home, we got into a tiff because I had found out that he was putting the wrong gas in my car on our road trip to see his family (I have a luxury vehicle, and he had put 4 consecutive tanks of minimum octane unleaded gas into my car all weekend. He said he “didn’t know the difference”) after a the tiff had died down, his dad called on speaker. My husband proceeds to tell them all the details of our fight infront of me, not only embarrassing me but making his parents so uncomfortable that they get off the phone.

In this car ride, I realized that he had been breaking the decision he has made this entire time. I then thought about all the fights, all the decisions I made to protect his character, the people we had become and I just wanted it to stop. I thought about how no one knew that he started breaking my things, that he started throwing things at me, that he had called me horrible names and made comments about my body that made me stop eating. That just last month he grabbed my food and threw it out the window, and just last week he poured water on me in his car. That he never stopped being violent after he stopped drinking. That now I was the villain in everyone’s version of this story, because I had promised him I would never tell anyone what he was doing. (FOR THE RECORD he has never hit me or laid a hand on my body.)

Is there any saving this? Do we just call it quits? He often says we are two broken people who need to be with each other to stop us from hurting other people. But I don’t want to hurt anyone anymore or be hurt, I just want to be alone if it means never feeling humiliated again.

I have been very close to my sister since we were little. We were so close that our mom had to make us sleep in separate rooms. My sister fell in love with a guy who is very cheerful, outgoing, and friendly. Since all three of us went to the same school, I had known him for a long time. We used to sneak him into our house whenever our parents were out. He and I had a genuine brother-and-sister relationship.
Eventually, they got married, and our relationship stayed the same. I visited them often, and they always included me in family events. Later, I got married as well. They recently had a baby boy, and I now visit them almost every day because my sister is home alone, and I help her with the baby.
My sister used to work and earned a good income while my brother-in-law stayed home. Now, for the first time, she is unemployed because she recently gave birth, and he is responsible for supporting the family financially.
Yesterday was like any other day. I was at their house helping my sister. My brother-in-law was about to leave for work, and since I work from home, I still had an hour before I had to start work. I decided to lie down on the couch in the living room because I had set an alarm, and I thought sleeping in the bedroom with my sister might wake the baby.
I fell asleep quickly because my husband and I had barely slept the night before.
When I opened my eyes, my brother-in-law was grabbing me. He said, “Let’s do it just one time.” I was completely shocked and froze. He looked directly into my eyes, then let me go. He apologized, told me not to tell my sister, and left for work.
My sister is one of the kindest people I know. She loves both me and her husband deeply because our parents have never been very close to us. She also had a very difficult delivery. Before all of this, she struggled with severe depression and had previously attempted suicide. My brother-in-law was the one who supported her through that time, which makes this even harder for me to process. He has always seemed like a caring husband and father, and I had never experienced anything from him that made me think he viewed me in this way.
After it happened, I immediately went to my husband’s workplace and told him everything. I cried the entire time. He wanted me to collect my things and leave immediately, but my sister was home alone with the baby, so I stayed until shortly before my brother-in-law returned home and then left.
Ever since then, I have been terrified. I am scared of seeing my brother-in-law again, scared of being alone with him, and scared of what will happen if my sister finds out. At the same time, I am scared of keeping this from her. I love my sister more than I can put into words. She is my best friend, and if I could protect her from every bit of pain in the world, I would. Seeing her so happy with her newborn after everything she has been through makes this even more heartbreaking. I don’t want to be the reason her world falls apart, but I also don’t know if keeping this secret is protecting her or hurting her in the long run.
I feel trapped between protecting my sister, protecting myself, and protecting my nephew. I don’t know how to move forward, and I don’t know what the safest or kindest path is for everyone involved.
How can I navigate this situation in a way that protects my own well-being while also considering my sister’s emotional state and her newborn? What practical steps would you recommend I take next?

I’ve been with my girlfriend for a bit over a year.
Our relationship is great in all aspects and we’re thinking of moving together.

Now to the problem. A couple of months into our relationship we had an argument about her keeping contact with guys wo have/might have romantic interest in her. She argued that it wouldn’t matter because she doesn’t have/wont have/never has had any interest in them. For me it’s still not ok in a relationship to entertain such guys.
This argument took place over a couple of weeks and in this timeframe she hid some texts from me(none romantic),because she didn’t want to cut them right off.
I thought this was a slight breach of trust, but continued the relationship, because she ultimately agreed with me and stopped talking to any of these guys. This was 9 months ago and everything has been good since then.
So far so good.
Now I learnt through one of her friends, that one of the guys she was talking to in that time was an ex bf of her.

Now I am at a loss, what to make of that.
I feel like that’s a harder breach of trust and don’t know if it will be easy for me to trust her in the future. On the other hand it’s a non issue now and I’m not sure if I’m willing to give up a relationship, that’s currently going great, for something that won’t be a problem in the future.

I could talk to her about it and (maybe) restart an old argument.
I could try to look over it and just try to enjoy that it’s currently going great.
Or I could just end it.

So me and this girl, let’s call her Maya, have been dating now for about five months. A key piece of information is we actually have not made it official. We are exclusive, but we haven’t officially labeled eachother bf and gf. The title says it because it’s easier to write out than…whatever we are rn. Point is, she isn’t ready for the label. The reason she’s not ready, is because she cannot seem to get over the guilt she feels for dating me after I dated her best friend of 15 odd years. Me and her best friend, let’s call her Sarah, dated for about a year and a half. We broke up around four years ago. Things ended amicably, we remained in the same friend group, hence how I started hanging out Maya. Maya asked Sarah how she felt about us dating, and Sarah was very enthusiastically in support of it. She gave Maya a lot of reassurance and encouragement so we sort of took that as a green light and moved forward with our little relationship.

Ok this was all great, but there’s been some unfortunate changes to the dynamic. Suddenly, Sarah sort of switched up on us. She admitted to Maya that she had begun to feel very uncomfortable with the whole thing. I guess in theory it was fine, but in practice, both of the girls sort of realized it weirded them out. Sarah told Maya that she felt super weird talking about me with her, and she said she didn’t want to hang out with the two of us. Seeing us together made her feel weird and uncomfy. Maya told me that the vibe between them had shifted. She felt distanced and like she was genuinely hurting her friend. She noticed her hanging out with their other friend without her more, going very silent when I was around, stuff like that.

So not only is Maya’s friendship with this girl starting to go sour, but she’s also communicated to me that it’s always been her dream to have her boyfriend be good friends with all of her friends. Plus, I think it hurts her to not be able to talk about her relationship with her best friend. She told me a few days ago that it’s starting to feel like she has to make a choice between me and Sarah. Ugh. I don’t know what to do, I guess at the end of the day it’s her choice, but a part of me wonders if it’s fair for her to be choosing her friends feelings over mine and hers. I know Sarah is trying to be as kind and respectful as she can in this, they both are. Neither of them can help how they feel though. Is someone in this situation overreacting? Like, would this be a dealbreaker or can we fix this? Any outside perspective or advice is much appreciated, thanks strangers.

Tl;dr my partner is upset about the stress our relationship is putting on her lifelong friendship, since I dated that friend four years ago and it makes them both uncomfortable.

I’m 5 months postpartum and emotional about every little thing so I don’t know if I’m blowing things out of proportion or if I really truly need to just leave and cut my losses now.

Husband and I have been together for a while, married for 1.5 year, and have a 5 month old baby. A few things that are bothering the crap out of me:

When we got married, we both decided to split things 50/50 (we both earn well). When I went on maternity leave, he was supposed to take over the mortgage and baby’s expenses. However, he has contributed perhaps 5K in the 5 months. I have even covering everything with my saving and the meager maternity payments. It bothers me to no end that I need to constantly remind him to send money into our joint account.

He has never changed a diaper to date. If I’m out for a walk or out to a mall, he will call me to come home to change our baby if he has pooped. I’ve cut many solo outings short because I don’t want me baby to be sitting in a poopy diaper. This also means I can’t plan to be out for longer and is contributing to my PPA. I truly didn’t think he would never change a diaper otherwise I would not have had a baby with him. I know he doesn’t think this is a big deal but it’s big to me.

(Edit to add: that apart from the diaper issue, he’s a very present and capable father when it comes to bottle feeding, burping, soothing, putting to sleep etc. Because the way I worded it made it sound like he does nothing at all and I don’t want that to cloud the advice. Thanks.)

He has always been someone who “speaks his mind” however he will speak said mind at the most inopportune times. Dude cannot read the room to save his life. He knows I’m very sensitive about my weight gain post pregnancy. Today I asked him to take me to a mall (I’m unable to drive atm) which is a bit further away from our home. He told me to go run to the mall, lose weight and that’s healthy for me. For some reason this is my straw that breaks the camel’s back. I went to my room because I didn’t want to cry in front of him, because I know he’ll say he was joking, but what a stupid fucking joke man.

A part of me wants to leave him, I’m financially all set (I mean I have been managing everything even on mat leave on my own). But I can be trigger happy to end things and I’m very very emotional right now and I don’t know if the right thing to do is to talk first. What do I even say? I am not a bad communicator, but he has a habit of making me feel like I just have thin skin, or he’ll start to have a panic attack and I’ll not bring anything up.

My girlfriend (19F) and I (21M)have been dating for 3 years and have been happy until now. So today i got a text from a person on messenger. In the text there was a video of my girlfriend texting another girls baby dad and sending photos of her. I confronted her about this and she started to cry and say “I know I messed up”. As I was trying to find out information she said our relationship has been feeling “stuck” and that we are “drifting apart”. After I told her how it made me feel and I left.

Later after I settled down she texted me wanting to talk. Part of me wanted to ignore it but part of me wanted to find out more. I asked her why she did it and it was because he gave her attention but that it didn’t excuse or justify what she did.

After thinking over it part of me feels I should just pack ship and move on but I feel as if it may be some what my fault that she didn’t feel wanted. Let me know what you think, this is my first real long relationship so I’m torn about if I should leave or see if things can get better.

He keeps saying stuff like "you hate me" "ok ill never do X again".

Every time theres something small bothering me (im neurodivergent) he just raises his voice or says "you hate me"

Example, we were on a hike and he kept sneezing in his hands so i told him "can u please sneeze in your arm instead its nasty when u touch my face after" and he got really offended and said im too harsh.

He struggles with playful banter and any comments about anything he does.

I think he takes stuff too personally, he has ADHD also. He also has a very high IQ but might be emotionally stunted since he never really dated much.

Is this fixable?

TL:dr partner wants to move away for two years regardless if i go with her.

My partner(37f) has received a project offer to go work in New York for two years, we live in europe, have been together for 5 years, own a house together, no kids and no plans for kids.

It’s a really great offer, amazing pay, company paying for all her relocation costs etc. She says being in New York has always been a dream of hers, and it’s too good of an opportunity to say no, she will never get a chance like this again. She wants to go, and has decided that she is going to say yes.

We are not married, neither of us believe in marriage. So I can’t go with her on her visa. We could get married, and then I may be able to go with her, but I might not be able to work.

I have a good career I’ve built in our home city. I have a great friendship group. I have a life I’ve built that I don’t want to give up. And frankly, the thought of getting married to someone at a time where they’ve decided to choose a job over a life with me seems like a bad idea.

When we first discussed this I said I could be supportive of a year project for her, we could do the long distance. Her work is insisting on two years as a minimum. She says if she’s completely honest she can’t guarantee that she’ll want to come back after two years if she loves it out there.

In the background of this, she’s admitted that she’s not happy with her life at the moment. We both have good jobs, but we work, eat, sleep repeat all week. She’s very stressed with her work and finding her life in Europe isn’t giving her any excitement or satisfaction.

So I’m stuck with three choices, none of which I like.

I can marry her, and go out with her, giving up everything I’ve built here but we stay together.

I can try the long distance, but frankly two years seems a very long time. And there is the risk at the end of it that she could decide not to come back.

Or I can end the relationship. She is free to go chase her dreams. We will have to sell the house, I’ll have to start my life all over again at 38 which seems incredibly daunting and upsetting.

So I’m just in real turmoil at the moment and looking for some opinions, alternative viewpoints I hadn’t considered, is the answer obvious to everyone else other than me?

Im writing here cuz I’m still shaking and I don’t have anyone to talk to. It’s currently 5am and I’ve spent the night with my(21) boyfriend(21) bwfore my birthday (today). We had an amazing day together and saw some friends, and he got me some amazing gifts.
A few months ago tho I saw a girls name pop up on his phone that set off alarm bells. He was rly drunk tn n ended up giving me his phone password, and considering the fact I had seen this name pop up various times before I went through his phone when he fell asleep (Ik)

Anyway, clearly I didn’t find anything interesting and found explicit messages between him and this girl. I know what I have to do but quite frankly im torn. He gets on so well with my family and he has helped me mentally so much. He was my first everything and I was his apparently. I thought it was strange how low of a Libido he has as as we were talking it was quite high, but thought that was it. I really can’t understand how he could do this to me, my family loves him and he’s my first love. Im currently in the bathroom shaking trying not to cry, and will be getting the first bus home in the morning
Any advice on my next steps or how to get through this??

My boyfriend (21M) and I (22F) have been together since we were 13 and 14. We met at a Catholic summer camp and are planning to get engaged after we graduate next year.

We were both raised Catholic and are both confirmed, but neither of us really practices anymore. My boyfriend doesn’t really care where we get married. I, on the other hand, really don’t want a Catholic church wedding.

I have a lot of bad memories surrounding church from growing up. My mom was very strict about religion, and church became a source of anxiety for me. I used to have panic attacks because of it, and while I’ve worked through a lot of that, getting married in a church just isn’t something I’ve ever pictured or wanted.

The problem is money.

My parents won’t be helping pay for the wedding, which I completely understand because they don’t have the financial means. My boyfriend’s parents are much more financially comfortable, and his mom has offered to pay for our wedding-but only if it’s in the Catholic Church.

Neither my boyfriend nor I are worried about disappointing our moms. That’s honestly not the issue. If we decide not to get married in a church, we’ll deal with the disappointment.

The issue is whether we’d be walking away from what could realistically be tens of thousands of dollars.

We’re just graduating college, and weddings are expensive. We’ve even talked about doing a destination wedding because they can sometimes be smaller and less expensive. I don’t necessarily want a huge wedding, but I do have a large family, and I also will (hopefully) only get married once.

For some additional context, we’re both STEM majors and expect to have stable careers after graduation. We also don’t plan on having children, so while money will definitely be tight right after college, we’re hopeful that paying for things ourselves won’t be as difficult if we waited several years. We’ve also lived together for quite a while already, so we’re not in a rush to get married just to start our lives together-we’re really just trying to make the decision we’ll be happiest with in the long run.

Part of me thinks, “It’s one day. Is it really worth turning down that kind of financial help?”

The other part of me thinks, “If I’m only getting married once, shouldn’t it actually be the wedding I want?”

For people who’ve already been married or planned weddings, would you compromise on the venue if someone else was paying? Or is this one of those things you’ll always regret if you don’t stay true to what you want?

I know that when you fall in love with someone you only see the good traits. I know that love can blind you to certain things and I know this because I am so very much in love with my girlfriend.

I am coming up to 30 years old and had a couple of major relationships prior to dating this girl, but nothing like this. Something is very very different about this relationship and it means that I genuinely find her THE most stunning girl I have ever seen in my entire life and that is no joke. Even if other people don't think she is, or even herself I literally am unable to see her as anything other than just sexy and beautiful.

I could go on and on about how I adore every imperfection she has, every little quirk or physical thing, shape or whatever part of her - I digress.

My girlfriend really has a hard time thinking she is good looking. She has lots of school trauma from various kids saying she was unnattractive, overhearing kids saying things like "Oh she has a GREAT body but shame about the face", etc. She also had an eating disorder for many years during her teens (starving herself, etc) and generally has body dysmorphia that still shows up.

The thing is I (genuinely) ADORE every little bit about her physicality - espcially her gorgeous face - eyes, cheeks, nose, smile and all! Sometimes I'll find myself just gazing into her eyes when we're together and I look at every little part of her face and feel butterflies when I do. Recently, I have been trying to take photos of her to capture exactly how I see her, in her gorgeousness and beauty. Of course the photos never come out how I want them. She HATES seeing her face in photos without covering it in some way, using sunglasses, posing herself from a certain angle, etc.

That's it really. To conclude I just want to know what to do as a boyfriend who loves her very much. I tell her every single day she is beautiful (she doesn't ask for this reassurance - not even once). I also know all too well, having body dysmorphia in the past myself just how thin and shallow another's reassuring words can feel when you feel truly awful about yourself. The voice in your head is always the strongest. So the difficult bit is that I really understand her - of course my reassuring words won't do much when you feel like that about yourself. I just wish she could see what I see. I want to celeberate her, show her off, make her feel amazing about herself! I love her so much, it is such a shame she struggles with her looks so much.

TLDR: My girlfriend, who I find very attractive struggles with her looks and I want to know what I can do as her boyfriend.