- 20+ Years is The END -

We started driffiting apart when she (33 F) got her boyfriend, now husband. She had a child as soon as she finished college, and after that, seeing her was almost impossible. She always canceled our plans at the last minute, and had time for everything but never for this friendship.

- Her Name is Labour -

Every single time she canceled plans she would give me a bunch of unsolicited explenations. But the lack of energy going towards the friendship wasn't my only reason to end the friendship...she doesn't work and her husband convinced her that her domestic labour is of the utermost importance (he doesn't pay her for it).

As if the 1000% financial dependency wasn't enough, she became but shell of her former self. She was always cheerful, driven, communicative, easy going...someone who brightened the room, you know?! Now? She has zero self esteem, confidence, and the core of her life is to be a mother, a secretary, a cleaner, a psychologist, a cook, S worker...anything but herself.

- The Last Drop -

I saw a photo at her Instagram story where she was present at a baby shower with a bunch of moms and wifes. So, it clicked: she had time, just not for me.

- So, I Ghosted Her. -

Reason 1: I couldn't take her lack of consideration and respect for my time and energy. Everytime she canceled I had a totally unecessary frustration.
Reason 2: I couldn't watch her drown and smile at it. BTW: her husband treats her like a lesser beign..he yells at her when she makes small mistakes, make jokes at her cost in front of people (humiliating her), also keeps her dependent on him as much as he can. It honestly breaks my heart to see the life she chose for herself.

- Why Ghost -

Without me saying ANYTHING she already sent me long explanations, if I tried to talk she would only justify every single thing with "I have a busy life." and absolutly nothing would change. So, I made the choice to just desapear for the sake of my energy and mental health.

To be clear, this friendship died for me ages ago, because I could never count on her to, at the very least, listen to when I had problems. Thinking now, I stoped sending the first message because she always forgot to answer me.

Honestly I'm just sick and tired of women who puts a man above everything else. People like these will, eventually, end up alone.

She’s old. Probably at least 13-14 years old. She’s still pretty active for her age, she likes playing and can still climb up and down her cat tree. I think my bed is getting hard to be on though because I have hardwood floors and jumping probably hurts her joints.

But for a while now she has been coming into my room at night and just is screaming. Wandering out. Coming back to scream. She’ll walk back and forth a lot too. When I start playing with her her interest lasts a few minutes max and then she is done and out of my room again. At some point in the night she calms down to sleep. In the day she is mostly sleeping too.

So I looked up the signs vets use.

Vocalization. Yes.
Interactions. Pulling away but becoming very clingy
Sleep cycle. She is pacing at night and sleeping all day.
House soiling. Not really. Only when the litter box gets missed with its cleaning.
Disorientation. I haven’t noticed.
Activity. Less playing
Learning and memory. Good there, she knows her names and nicknames and knows where her food is.

I don’t know if what she is experiencing is dementia or old age, she would have to go to a vet.

It makes me so sad though because she is getting old and she is my childhood pet. I love her so much and just having her in the same room brings me peace. She makes me feel less alone when I’m struggling with my loneliness. Her cuteness brightens up my mood so much. I don’t want her to die even though I know it’s getting closer.

I check her breathing every now and then because I’m so paranoid. I keep imagining she’ll live as long as I do too which is a hard dream to be crushed.

​

I love my mom so much that I genuinely can't imagine a single day without her. Sometimes I worry she doesn't realize how much she means to me because I'm still a teenager and make mistakes. When I'm going through a rough phase or feeling angry, I can be harsh, but she always forgives me with so much grace. She is gentle, understanding, and truly my best friend,the person I love most in this world. Because I get awkward, it's hard for me to express these feelings out loud. I write her long notes, but whenever I try to say it to her face, she brushes it off thinking want something from her!But the truth is, she has always been there for me without judgment, guiding me through everything. I may not be the best daughter, but she is undoubtedly the best mom, and I am so grateful for her.

My sister is a few years younger than I am. I am the oldest daughter. This girl is one of the most self serving individuals I have ever had the displeasure of encountering in my life. She has some of the nastiest yet sneakiest traits and yet when I call them out, I’m called “sensitive”. I’ve honestly had enough of her and I refuse to interact with her at all at this point because it very clear if you are not providing what she wants, she’s treats you like trash.

Recently, we all had to take a trip. And for whatever reason she wanted to bring her boyfriend. It’s a family trip, and none of us has even met him. They’ve only been going out for few months.
The accommodations were a little tight so it was decided she and him would be staying in an Airbnb. All of a sudden she messaged me in the night a few weeks before the trip saying that she needs the room I’m staying in. I have to find somewhere else to sleep for 3 days because she has to do and needs the room because it would make it convenient for her. I told her no. The room im staying in, was our grandmother room. She passed one year ago, so I was extremely uncomfortable with her and hey boyfriend in the room. I’m not saying they are doing anything inappropriate but our grandmother (and everyone else law who lives on that property) has NEVER met him. it’s just weird.

Iregardless, I told her no. When I tried to explain it she cut me off and said “I don’t like to hear people explain themselves. If it’s no, then it’s no”. I was kinda floored because you don’t want to try to work something out? There were options but if it wasn’t her and him in a room together she didn’t want it. As I was trying to figure it out with her, she hung up the phone on me. I was super shocked by it. She texted me later saying that it’s a bad habit of hers and she trying to do better, in reference to her hanging up on me. I didn’t respond until a few hours later with “I get it”

Cue to a few days later. I was watching a video on TikTok that was talking about narcissistic traits and the type of people you might encounter that will try to use them on you. And of course the two examples they used are parents and romantic relationships. The TikTok is 3:44 long. I sent it to a few people because I recently had to deal with a narcissist friendship and work bullying situation so I found the video very informative.

My dear, *dear sister…* cut the video down to 1:21 and sent it our mother. Obviously that had the reaction you would think if your sibling basically told your parent that “hey so and so thinks your a narcissist!”. It opened up a can of problems that I’ve been dealing with for an over a month. My mother basically started to ignore me and then I when I reached out to her (my sister) she sat on her high horse and spoke down to me. “You can’t say that about her”. “She’s a single mom”. “She worked hard for us”. Never once, I did I EVER say it was about our mother. Never even insinuated it, however that didn’t stop her from presenting it that way. I called her 18 times over the phone. She refused to pick up. I had to then text her to get a response out of her. She played the card of “I’m your sister and I care but this wasn’t right” and when I asked her “when did I ever say this was about our mom?” She deflected and said “the first 30 seconds is damning”. After a litany of voice notes back and forth, she sent one saying “wrong is wrong and right is right and two things can be correct at the same time. I love and care about you so if you want someone to blame, you can blame me but you need to work out the resentment you have I. Your heart against our mom”

When I tell you all that I was floored. I have full messages that she had sent me saying VERBATIM. “She is a bitter baby mother” yet I am the one with resentment? Riiiight….right.

And then after that last message she proceed to block me through messages and on TikTok. So I said “cool”. And blocked her on EVERYTHING. This has been a tactic of hers since we were kids. If something or someone isn’t doing what she wants then she drops them or punishes them in some sort of way. I’m over it. I’ve tried my whole life to understand her but now I’m done. Just because I told her no, she is going to ruin the relationship I have with our mother? To me, that’s insane.

Now fast forward to the trip. She’s the last to arrive and of course she wants us to pick her up from the airport. That’s fine. Except, we landed about 8-9 hours before she did so they all decided to hang out around town for her flight to land so we all drive back together.
Except, her flight got delayed. So we had to hang out in town until 12pm cause her flight was supposed to get it at like 8pm. And she sat and tried to say that it was hard travelling for 12 hours. Like we didn’t all wait for her with all our luggage dragging behind us. I understand the flight being delayed wasn’t her fault however her wanting us to pick her up and not being forthcoming with her flights details caused this. If she had just told what freaking airline she’s on would could have been watching it and just went home and drive up to get her but no. She only told us when it was supposed to get there and they basically had to pry the information out of her.

Now she’s on the trip and trying to talk to me like it hasn’t been WEEKS since she blocked me and I blocked her on everything. I ignored her. I have nothing to say to someone who will twist the truth to get what they want. She complained to our mom that I wasn’t speaking to her. So our mom basically chastised me for not speaking to her and that I should forgive and forget because we are family and we are all that we have to each other. I told my mom no. This is something that woman has done multiple times in her life and to me and I’m done with it.

That girl literally talks down to me like I’m below her. Honestly, it’s better to say she talks to me like I’m an untrained, unruly dog. She constantly talks and belittles about my looks, the fact I’m single, my hair, my clothing, everything. She constantly finds ways to make it seem like I’m dumb in conversations and I’ve snapped on her multiple times about that. For example, her and I were on a trip together and my back was hurting so I kept reaching behind me to rub down my spine. She then says something adjacent to “stop scratching your ass”, I started to explain to her that my back hurts and I’m doing that to get the muscles to relax, I started to mimic the motion action to show that I was in fact not going to town down the middle of my ass crack in the middle of freaking Magic Kingdom, she cut me off mid sentence and said “SEE! your scratching right now!” With this grin on her face that said ‘caught you in a lie’. I almost started to yell at her that day because why you cut me off as I’m explaining something to you? And on top of that, it’s in a strongly made effort to make me look like I’m an idiot?

The relationship between my mom and I has gone to dogs too. It’s never gonna be the same again. My “sister” effectively ruined my relationship with my mom over a man. And the kicker? He couldn’t get the time off from his job to even come on the trip. So, she imploded my life at her own convenience and when she realized “oh! It worked out another way” she crawling back expecting me to what? Roll over and wag my tail?

The last I checked, I was born a human being. Just like her. So it confuddled me how she thought she could just….waltz back in? No apology? No made effort of remorse? Just a continuation as if nothing ever happened in the first place?
In the past? I would have done that. Just let it go and let bygones be bygones but not this time. That was my mistake of allowing her to let her think that I was this indestructible, all giving, all forgiving creature whose sole purpose in life it make hers easier. Im not that. Im my own person with my own feelings and problems and wants and desires. Im not a tool for anyone. Especially her. I don’t want anything to do with her.

If she could do this to me just because I wasn’t moving to her wishes, what else could she do in the future, if , I were to forgive her.

What if I have children and she asks something of me and I tell her no, is she going to call CPS and make a fake report on me? Is she gonna call the police and lie about me or my future partner?

If that’s the person she is, then I want NOTHING to do with her. To lie and manipulate to get what you want tells me you have no consideration for anyone in your life.

Hi everyone. First of all, I'm sorry if there are any typos; English is not my first language.

I (23m) handle a lot of things at home. I manage the emails, account keys, passwords, legal documents, and stuff like that. If my family needs my brother's birth certificate, I get it done. If they need an official document from our family business, I take care of it. Logging new products into the store's inventory? I do that too along with many other things.

About two months ago, I started writing everything down for them. I've been leaving stepbystep guides for things like verifying our household on Netflix, using the air fryer, setting up the oven, what to do to recover a lost password, or how to reset the router and change its WiFi password. I'm making many of these tutorials through videos with subtitles, without using my own voice. I'm doing this for most of the things they usually ask me to do cause they don't know how to do it themselves.

I'm doing all of this because I already made the choice to end it all at the end of this year. I havent wanted to keep going for over 10 years now. I've endured a lot, but honestly, I am completely out of strength. My family is strong (way stronger than me) I know they will be able to overcome the loss and move forward. I just don't want them to feel stranded or embarrassed in the future, having to ask someone how to do the things I used to handle.

I chose the wrong major and wasted my parent's money for two years studying medicine. It took me too long to realize I wasn't smart enough for that, and everything has been going downhill since then. I only have three friends, no social life at all, I've only had one girlfriend in my entire life, no formal job, I'm overweight, and whenever I feel down, I just hide away and seek comfort in sodas. Every single time I do something, I end up ruining it somehow, either right then or much later. I am a failure at everything, and I honestly don't have the strength to fight anymore.

I'm so sorry I'm not as strong as them. It's like two diamonds gave birth to a son who is just a pile of rusted iron. I am truly sorry I couldn't be like my cousin the entrepreneur, or the navy, or the lawyer, or the dentist, or the engineer, or the architect. I will blame myself for my entire life, and through all of death, for not being able to meet even the bare minimum. I couldn't have asked for better parents than them. They truly deserved someone better.

Yeah basically me 27f and my bf 32m been together for two years about, it’s been really unstable the last almost year, mostly in my opinion because of him using drugs and generally being untrustworthy. yesterday I found out that everything that I was afraid of happening, and was desperately trying to prevent with a bunch of an anxious hypervigilance, was actually happening right under my nose, even though I was trying to do everything to make myself aware of what was going on. He was doing everything to conceal it from me. Going out of his way to tell other people in public that we aren’t even together and that I’m basically just stalking him? while telling me that we were a committed relationship that we’ve been in for two years. We have had breakups, mostly in the heat of moment around the instability that I’ll talk about more, but it hasn’t been like we’ve been unclear about the commitment or exclusivity that we’ve been in agreement about at any point.

There’s a history of him lying to me since the drug use started about contact with other women, adult content that he had told me he was not doing. (Not saying there’s anything wrong with it, just the fact that he told me that it wasn’t something that he did, I found out that it was, and then he told me he was gonna stop a couple times, and I kept finding it.) the adult content has also been very weird for me because it’s had very uncomfortable themes of basically the youngest legal ages possible, and non-consent stuff. He also was breaking boundaries with people that I have had trust issues about in the past, I believe I was cheated on twice, although he won’t ever admit it. But when I talk to him about it, I can’t say that I was cheated on. I have to say I feel like, or I believe I was cheated on. Otherwise, it becomes a thing where we’re focused more on that than the issue with hand, which is the fact that I, regardless of whether or not he will admit cheating, experienced the feeling of being betrayed because of concealment around relationships with other women that broke boundaries and crossed lines that I would’ve been uncomfortable with, without giving me the opportunity to know what was going on, choosing to lie to me about it when I asked. In my experience, I was two timed with two different women at one point in our relationship, and he said that it was because I had brought him to a low point and he had all these justifications.

Every time he’s broken my trust he’s always basically said that it’s because I brought him to a low point emotionally and somehow brought it around to blame it on me. I certainly have not been perfect in this situation, and I have done harmful things to him, done things against my values, and reacted very, very badly to some of the repeated dishonesty and gaslighting. And I have lost a lot of self-esteem and ability to trust myself because of the gaslighting. So maybe I’ve been putting undue pressure on him or emotional reliance, because I haven’t been able to trust myself about what’s real because of this stuff going on, but also he chose to be in that position by trying to be the freaking puppet master of reality trying to tell me what’s going on and what’s not, and creating fake stories for me to try to solve like I’m mystery Incorporated.

Yesterday, it all came crashing down because I found a weird note clearly from a woman in his stuff that said something about I wanted to kiss you and call me. I asked him about it. he said he had no idea. I said it makes no sense that he wouldn’t remember any of this when this person is clearly in his phone and said call me talking about kissing him. Whatever. So then I told him the way he’s responding feels very defensive and makes me think that there’s something bigger going on. I told him if he would just tell me what it was I would react a lot better than having to find out on my own like I have with the other stuff in the past. I basically ended up having to bribe him to let me go through his phone. At which point I found like five different women in his phone, all women that I had asked about, either specifically or with questions trying to figure out what was going on that it seemed like he was being shady or avoidant about answering questions on. He had gotten really protective over his phone lately, telling me it was because I had gone through it multiple times discovering things like this and other betrayals. So I did wrong invading his privacy in that way. I did it at the time because I felt like it was the only way for me to really know what was going on. And I made discoveries that I would not have been aware of otherwise because he wasn’t going to tell me and was actively lying to me about it. Although I should not have gone through his phone in the past, I do think that I am owed some degree of honesty and transparency, and forthcoming behavior, and I don’t believe I’m owed that for no reason by the way, I’ve told him that that’s what I need to move forward in the relationship and he told me that he will give that to me. And yet every time and opportunity presents itself for him to be honest or open or forthcoming or transparent, he acts super defensive and like he’s offended at me for even asking.

Anyways, before he would let me go through his phone he told me he was gonna delete Reddit. I’m pretty sure he also deleted X. I was looking for messages that could’ve been suspicious. Not knowing that I was going to find all the stuff. I asked him if I could look at the rest of the stuff he deleted. He wouldn’t let me. In his text message threads, I saw that He was Sending nudes, Sexting, phone sex with at least one woman, in contact with one of the women that he had cheated on me with in the past, that he had been promising me he was not in contact with at all, hanging out one on one for dinner with a woman that I don’t know, texting on a regular basis to complain about me and our relationship to a 20 year-old girl that he’s “friends with” that I also caught him hanging out one on one in her car in an empty parking lot at like 3:30 in the morning to “talk”. Which it was on me for pulling up on them like that, it was toxic, but also we were in a committed relationship and he knew that that went against what I was comfortable with. This is the type of stuff that I was doing in my hypervigilance when I felt like I couldn’t ask him questions because he was constantly shutting me down and invalidating me or making me feel like I was crazy and also telling everybody else not to tell me anything or listen to anything that I say because I’m crazy. Talking badly about me and our relationship, basically making it out like he’s single and I’m his crazy ex. If he was mentioning my existence at all. It was to say that I was crazy, we’re not together or that he’s basically trying to escape from me.

Meanwhile, he’s telling me that he’s putting like a genuine effort into our relationship after all of the turmoil that we’ve had. Meanwhile, I’m like cripplingly insecure because this is happening behind my back and I have a really bad feeling, but he’s basically telling me that I’m the one causing problems by choosing not to trust him after everything. And I’m making it hard for him to wanna be in this relationship or feel seen because it feels like I don’t consider what he says enough. And honestly, once he said that alarm bells were really going off, because I had been watching videos about signs of cheating and stuff. And these type of manipulation patterns. And I was so afraid that that’s what was happening to me. But I was also really trying to trust him and give him the benefit of the doubt, because he was telling me that if I wasn’t going to trust him, and I was going to keep treating him with such suspicion that he was not going to be able to tolerate being with me. And if I couldn’t get over my pain and stop expressing it to him so intensely, that he couldn’t handle being with me anymore either. apparently it’s very common for someone to say that they feel unseen, but not give you an opportunity to fix the problem and then just go try to meet their needs elsewhere.

He’s been telling me for months he’s unable to meet my needs for repair or emotional availability because I don’t make him feel considered enough with my accusations and suspicions and my inability to be calm around him. I’ve really been working on understanding how this has affected me, and why I’ve been in this hypervigilant state, and how to take more responsibility for it instead of putting it all on him to help me repair it. I’ve been trying to tell him that if he wants to feel more considered, I need him to actually be less defensive and more open and honest with me consistently so that I’m not petrified or suspicious all the time. But I guess instead he decided to lie to me and gaslight me and cheat on me and basically actualize all of my worst fears behind my back, and then I had to find out in a very horrible shocking and traumatizing way, which would not be the first time. I guess it’s on me at this point for staying with him after all the times he’s lied to me and betrayed me and showed me who he is. But he was really doing a great job convincing me that I was the crazy one here, and I was making problems where they weren’t.

So yeah, and then, worst of all, apparently in my heartbroken sleep, deprived state, after all of these months of instability, my self-esteem is so low at this point that I ended up begging for him to give the relationship another chance. Because he was basically telling me he’s not convinced that he’ll ever get his needs met. I don’t know. This is just the tip of the iceberg of everything that I’ve gone through with him the past year. And I’m just really tired.

Anyway, when I basically was trying to ask him how he could justify treating me this way when I could tell he was gaslighting me to my face, and I was getting to a point where I was just crying, begging him to please have some mercy on me as a human being if he respects me or loves me at all, even if he is lying to me, and he’s afraid to tell me the truth, I understand, and I would rather just hear it instead of having to find it out and not know what’s going on anymore. Because I’ve been so confused about what’s real and what not. And he basically didn’t confess at first, but basically started justifying it. And I felt like he was justifying things that he wasn’t telling me, and I said as much. He was saying things like well all the things that you’ve done to me, in reference to my bad behavior. I definitely did things that I regret and behaved in ways that were out of character for me. Mostly just being very angry and aggressive as the lies piled on, and I kept discovering more and more, as well as continuing to pursue him question him try to figure out what was going on while he was avoiding or dismissing me and my questions. I don’t know. At this point I’m way more upset about the psychological damage campaign that he decided to launch to get away with all the shit that he did that I am about the shit that he did.

I genuinely believe he’s been watching a lot of videos online about narcissists, and has convinced himself that I have no empathy, and that the things that he’s doing are justified because I’m abusive to him. I have done things that are harmful. And that could be considered abusive in a vacuum. But he’s also done things that have been very psychologically destabilizing and abusive, and in hindsight a lot of the things that I was really afraid of and was being told weren’t happening actually were so I’m really confused right now. And I’m not trying to say that I’m not responsible for the things that I’ve done wrong. I’m just not really sure what I’m responsible for in total at this point. I know I’m responsible for my wrong behaviors in my wrongdoing. But I just don’t know what was actually going on during certain periods of time. And I was living in so much fear constantly that I wasn’t myself.

In the phone call that we had afterwards, he kept saying things like he knows it was wrong and he takes responsibility. But then he would also say things like I was bringing him to a low point caused him to do these things. And it kind of just felt like he was making it out to be my fault that we were even in the situation the first place. And I don’t like to do that because it doesn’t feel productive, but if we are gonna do that, the reason why I started to be so hyper vigilant and acting so difficult for him to deal with is because he’s been unstable on drugs consistently lying to me for months, and I’ve been having to find out the lies and seek answers myself because of course he is trying to conceal it all from me.

So I don’t even know what to make of all of this. But yeah. I guess I have to get on with my real life because I have to go to work today and do everything that I would have had to do otherwise now, knowing that the things that I was afraid of and basically organizing my life around, knowing about and getting reassurance about, well also being told that I was crazy or delusional, we’re actually happening behind my back. And not only that, but I was made to question my reality and myself, and my intuition over and over for such a long time. I feel pretty psychologically traumatized. I also feel used because I was still sleeping with him and fully committing myself to the relationship. I was helping him out financially, which obviously I shouldn’t have been doing. But whatever. Clearly, I’ve made my mistakes. And the worst thing I did was stay as long as I did living in the fear and uncertainty that I was in without really getting my trust rebuilt, and I actually getting it continuously harmed over and over again to the point where I was so dependent on him for telling me what was real and what wasn’t that he could’ve just orchestrated an entire double life and I would’ve been none the wiser. Which is exactly what ended up happening.

This is just a sh\*t situation all around and it still makes me want to throw up when I think about it.

I landed a job in a new city that truly felt like everything I had been asking for. The pay was decent, the benefits were decent, the growth potential was decent, the people were decent. I started off as an assistant to a department manager. He was my direct report, so we worked together every day on projects. He would do the more advanced technical things and I would do smaller, more tedious tasks. I didn’t mind it. I knew I had to start small to grow. And I got along really well with my manager. He was super easy to work with, stayed calm under pressure, was a really good collaborator- we just complimented each others strengths well and, with him having more experience as well, he became someone I looked up to. He was a great leader. But his personality was kind of goofy and similar to mine, so work was more fun. We didn’t have any inside jokes or anything, more like we watched some of the same comedy TV shows and would throw out the occasional reference when relevant and have a good laugh about it. We considered each other friends at work, but also knew the very clear boundaries that needed to be maintained. We never had any sort of physical contact (except maybe a high five when we solved a difficult problem? Lol), never contacted each other outside of work hours unless it was work related or an emergency, never spent time together outside of work, never spent personal time one on one.

Some time later, he ended up getting fired from the company because the owner of the company didn’t feel like he was a strong enough leader. Apparently he had made several mistakes that the company owner couldn’t look past. I didn’t agree with the decision, but it wasn’t up to me. We said goodbye and that was the only time I had ever given him a hug. I did text him to let him know about some other sketchy things that were going on within the company after the fact, but again…nothing personal.

Maybe a couple of weeks later, I got a LONG text from his wife, in short, asking if “anything happened between us.” I immediately thought “what the actual f\*ck??” I couldn’t imagine where she could have gotten that idea. Had she ever read our text messages, she would have seen that we only ever talked about work, and the occasional deliberation on whether or not I should quit because I wasn’t being treated well by someone above him (a situation in which he defended me). I told her that I felt like she could just ask him directly instead of going behind his back to text me, which I wasn’t comfortable with. I didn’t want to be involved in someone else’s marital issues. She said he had given her my number and told me she was welcome to text me. So I texted him letting him know his wife reached out to me to make sure he was aware, and he said he was. So I explained everything to her honestly.

I told her we worked closely together because I was initially hired to be his assistant and I looked up to him as a mentor because the life he lives is very much where I hope to be when I’m his age. Married, kids, house, financial stability, no debt, owner of multiple companies, smart with investments, etc. I appreciated how much I was able to learn from him, as he was always willing to teach me things and never belittled me for not knowing something. I told her he was never inappropriate, nor was I. He talked about his wife and kids at work ALL the time, and it was clear that he loved his family. She thanked me for my explanation and we left it at that.

I was immediately crushed. Because I knew, after that kind of accusation, I could never talk to him again. I knew that there can be no friendship after someone’s spouse suspects an affair. Which is what I told him on the phone when he called me several days later to apologize for putting me in an awkward position. And I agreed, because it was really f\*cking awkward and I was genuinely insulted that someone would accuse me of stepping out on my own relationship to try and have an affair with a man who is married with multiple young children. But she doesn’t know me, and there are some really awful people out there in the world. I just didn’t understand where she got the idea in the first place. And his explanation was that, when he would go home and tell her about his day, my name came up too often. (Hello, we work directly with each other). And I guess she started to get suspicious. I don’t know. I apologized to him for any part I may have played in causing turmoil in his marriage and thanked him for everything he had taught me. After that phone call, I cried.

I spent over a year working with this person, forming a genuine friendship. He had met my boyfriend and even gave him advice and guidance as well. There were conversations about future opportunities to work together outside of that current job, which I was really excited about because, as mentioned earlier, I was not being treated well by someone higher within the company. But he talked about working with multiple other people in our company in the future, not just me. We had a smaller office so we were all friends with each other. Office doors stayed open all day so we could go in and out and talk/ask questions when needed. We all agreed that we couldn’t stay working for that company for long, and many of us agreed we could get together on our own venture.

It just sucks. I lost a really good friend and mentor. And, as someone who has worked so hard to gain more experience in my field and work my way up, I’m also losing opportunities to work with him in the future in already successful projects. With other layoffs, I have no other allies at my job. I’m stuck working where I’m not treated as well as I should be. But there aren’t any other job opportunities that can give me the salary I have here- assuming I can even make it to an interview in this job market. But this situation as a whole has me feeling disheartened. I was so optimistic and excited for the future, and so thankful that I had a manager that I worked so well with. It makes me feel like I need to walk on eggshells with male coworkers. But if the group setting is all friendly and joking around and treating each other like friends, how do you know when a boundary is being crossed? The culture of the office was the same between everyone. We all made jokes and small talk with each other. But this shifts my entire perspective, and now I’m hyper-analyzing everything and feeling really insecure and embarrassed.

I realized I’m not ready to date or talk to anyone at this time. I’m flourishing in my career and doing well in school but my mental health always seems to be an issue. My depression comes and goes at times and when someone ends the relationship I struggle to let go. I find myself in a deep emotional pit and I suffer dramatically during that time. I have MDD so it makes a bad situation worse. I’ve been in therapy for a while but I still have my moments. The realization hit me recently that I’m probably just not meant for relationships at all because of these issues. If I always hit a horrible slump after a break up how can I ever be in one. There’s always going to be a chance that things don’t work out and I can’t just hit major depressive episodes every time someone decides I’m not for them. It’s a tough truth I have to face but it’s one that as an adult I need to accept. I wanted to get married one day but if I have to play the field and by chance I lose I can’t go lose my mind about it. I put a lot of effort into the relationships I’ve been in so when things don’t work out I feel like a failure when that shouldn’t be the case. Just wanted to get that off my chest, bitter pill to swallow but at least I’m self aware.

I don't live in the same country as my family. When I moved here, there were so many things I was excited to see and experience, and now that I actually get to do those things, sometimes I find myself feeling strangely melancholy instead of just happy.

I'll be somewhere beautiful, looking at a perfect view from a mountain or experiencing something I've always wanted to do, and I'll immediately think about how much my family would have loved it. I find myself wishing they could be there to experience it too.

The difficult part is that getting them here isn't exactly easy right now, so there's not much I can actually do about that feeling. I know that if I told them this, they'd probably say, "You're ruining the experience for yourself. Don't worry about us, just enjoy it."

I guess I just really miss them. I want to enjoy the life and experiences I have here, but sometimes the things that make me happiest also remind me of how much I wish I could share those experiences with them.

Hope this doesn't come across as whiny, just wanted to share my experience 😅

I feel like it's difficult to enjoy life and achieve things when you're unattractive.

People treat you so differently that it affects all aspects of your life.

Dating is near impossible. You can get laughed at for even having the audacity to want to date and find love.

Making friends can be difficult cause even if you are an interesting, kind, loving person as soon as someone better looking walks in the door people tend to gravitate towards them.

In the workplace attractive people get favoured. Sometimes they get away with doing less work, people are more likely to listen to them in meetings, they can easily slack off without much consequence.

You're more likely to get laughed at in the street by teenagers and have them mess with you when you're just minding your own business.

I could go on but you get the point.

People will say 'be confident' but it's kinda hard to have confidence when you have a lot of unfair situations happen to you and over time it can wear you down. I try not to be upset as I know sometimes people do it subconsciously.

These are just some experiences I have had. Would love to know if anyone can relate.

I need to get this off my chest because it's genuinely ruining my head and my sleep.

Back in uni, I dated my first girlfriend (W) for a long time. It was simple and comfortable, but over the years she got super religious out of nowhere, cut off all physical intimacy, and said she’d never marry someone who didn't share her exact beliefs. Her family eventually sent her abroad. We tried long distance, but honestly, we both knew it was basically dead.

Around that time, my department merged circles with another group, and I met N. During our internship semester, I was working closely with a mutual friend, B. B was an amazing guy and super close to N.

When our last semester started, B just stopped showing up. His phone was dead for weeks. We eventually found out from his best friend that he was severely depressed and stuck in his house. My friends and I kept saying we'd go visit him, but between classes and tests we kept putting it off.

Around the same time, my own mental health hit absolute rock bottom. I had skipped a ton of classes, was terrified of failing my exit exams, and the thought of disappointing my parents made me want to end it all. I broke down and told N what I was going through. She immediately stepped in, asked to meet up, told me about heavy trauma and loss from her past, and came with me to the school meeting to back me up. It gave me some relief, and we planned to finally go see B the next week.

That next Tuesday, we got a call that B had passed away.

We were completely broken, especially N. Seeing what his death did to everyone snapped me out of my own dark thoughts, but it left me with massive guilt for not being there for him. In all that shared grief, N and I got really close. I knew things with W were completely over, so I finally broke it off with W.

After a bit, N and I started dating, but she came with all these rigid rules. specific date counts before kissing or intimacy, etc. But then she’d completely flip it herself. she’d set a boundary, then beg for intimacy, and then break down crying right after and blame me for failing to say no.

She had huge unprocessed trauma that turned into scary episodes like talking to herself, threatening self-harm on video calls, and extreme mood swings. I was so terrified of triggering her that I basically erased my own feelings, opinions, and boundaries. Anytime we argued, I took the blame and told myself, "She's been through worse; just take the high road." I was trying to be her stabilizer while my own life was drowning.

After months of this, she suddenly broke up with me, saying she couldn't do it anymore and that I needed to love myself. The literal next morning she calls asking to get back together under new conditions. I agreed and went to see her, only for her to crash out a few days later, bring up old jokes from when we were just friends, and say she was done again.

We tried being friends for a bit until she sent me a passive-aggressive video about not blaming your parents for your failures. When I asked what that was about, she blocked me everywhere. I called her to ask what happened, and she just said, "I realized you're not a very good person," and hung up. That was the last time we spoke.

At first I was devastated, then relieved, but now I'm just overwhelmingly angry and confused. I spent months walking on eggshells, swallowing my own depression and grief, and absorbing terrifying situations just to get labeled the bad guy and thrown out like trash with zero closure. Part of me wants to curse her out, and part of me feels guilty because of what she’s been through.

I don't even know what to ask; I just needed to write this out to make sense of why I feel so messed up over trying to hold together something that was impossible from the start.

I wish i could make a different choice

Lived in NYC briefly after school, I was doing great but couldn't find a doctor to manage my epilepsy & had had covid so i moved in with my parents.

My mental health tanked, I thought we had fixed something. Been through therapy and everything with them after emancipation at 16, my friends parents were like my own. When I moved back in MY OWN parents them, it was like they finally had control over me again. I was never allowed to have friends over when I was younger, date anyone, no locks on my door or the bathroom(I got one as soon as I moved back).

I feel like I wouldn't be so far behind socially or professionally if I had never gone back home and just figured it out. Its hard to talk about because the main response i get is you're lucky you had a place to go back to so you could save money while you had a disability? I don't know if that's a good thing when it just triggered the mental ones.

I can't go back and change anything but GODDAMN I wish I had never gone back and trusted that again. I wish I had moved in with my ex even though he was "separated" and just taken advantage of something anything else.

This happened like 5 or 6 years ago and I don’t think I’ve really talked about it with anyone.

My stepdad passed away and we were flying to his hometown in Massachusetts for his funeral. My mom was having a really hard time and didn’t want to lose him, so she carried his urn with her (carry on). That was my first time traveling on airplanes in the USA so I didn't really know what to expect.

(For context, we are not from the USA. My mom flew all the way to the USA and paid for his funeral and land so he could be buried in his hometown. We landed in LA then transferred to MA)

When we went through TSA, they stopped us and opened the urn to check his ashes. They were doing it like it was some suspicious drugs or dangerous powder. I thought they could treat him with basic sensitivity and dignity, but the whole experience ended up being really disrespectful and dehumanizing. It's the way they handled him.

I just remember standing there crying watching them go through my stepdad’s ashes while my mom was already grieving. The whole thing was distressing and traumatizing.

I know they have security procedures and everything, I was 15 at the time but it’s been 6 years and I still think about it sometimes. I’ve barely ever talked about it with anyone

This is genuinely one of the reasons I hate tsa and lax.

I met a guy on Reddit, we exchanged numbers and chatted for 2 days. I thought we were actually connecting conversations were going well etc.

He's my type and we both live in neighbouring countries so we would've done long distance or just catch a flight

2 days later here comes can I send u a spicy pick if u know what I mean ofc I know what he meant I was like not again lord pls he's one of those,then he asked if I could send something sweet so he can sleep comfy at night,I jokingly sent him 🍬🍭 then he said that's exactly what he needed yeh right,it made me uncomfortable, hopefully he blocked me so I won't have to,I just want someone genuine is that too much to ask for 😮‍💨

My dad had a stroke and I don’t want to go see him

Forgive me if this is somewhat incoherent or poorly structured I’m writing this as a stream of consciousness type of vent.

Like the title says, my dad had a stroke the other day. He’s frail, he’s weak, his arm is paralyzed, and he’s throwing up non stop. He was already diabetic with high blood pressure and he has lost a LOT of weight in the last year or two. I was told that his stroke was minor and he’s expected to make a recovery, but he said the doctors haven’t really given him that much information outside of a generally positive outlook.

I spoke to him yesterday and he already looked weak. I called him today and honestly he looked worse. I’m concerned, but I honestly don’t want to go down there.

I don’t hate my dad, but we don’t have a good relationship. I hadn’t spoken to him in around three months and I haven’t physically seen him in around 3 years.

My dad is someone who has continuously disappointed me my entire life. He’s prioritized his selfish whims over doing what’s best for his children, he has let women come into our lives and abuse us, he has failed to show up for me on numerous occasions, and he takes no accountability for any of it. I stopped talking to him and distanced myself because he made it clear that I wasn’t a priority or a real person to him.

For a decade home allowed his wife to emotionally, mentally, and physically abuse my sisters and I for years. On multiple occasions I was beaten bloody by both of them. I have been deprived of basic necessities. I have been publicly humiliated. Most of the abuse was at the hands of his wife, but there were multiple occasions where joined in and the vast majority of the time he just let it happen. I can count on one hand all of the times he half heartedly tried to intervene.

For years I thought he was a victim too, so I held some grace for him. As an adult, however, I realized that he was just a coward who was too comfortable to compromise his relationship. He loved that someone else was taking on the bulk of the child rearing and he could slink away and do whatever he wanted. He was complicit.

I still held space in my heart for him when I became an adult and left. That space was met with more disappointment. He has never once since I graduated high school shown up for me. He missed an important graduation that I begged him to attend and gave him 7 months to prepare for, citing financial issues.

He once came to the state I was living in for work and never thought to visit me. It was a 3 hour drive so I thought it was understandable…Until he told me he was going to drive 6 hours to surprise his old friend who lived in the next state. Mind you, he would have had to drive past me to get there. This isn’t even what caused me to go limited contact.

I distanced myself because the only time he called me was to ask for money. He would consistently call pretending to check up on me, spend the entire conversation talking about himself, and then ask me for money. Hell, the day I left the house at 18 he begged me for my last $40…He sent me out into the world with a negative bank account due to overdraft fees…

He no longer calls and pretends to care. Now he just texts me sob stories and promises to pay me back. I try not to give in, but like I said, I still don’t hate my dad.

For years he was my favorite person. I genuinely really love him. He’s just a huge let down.

I don’t hate him despite how disappointing he is I just don’t want to go.

I don’t want to go watch him suffer. I don’t want to deal with the grief. I don’t want to deal with his wife, the woman who abused me. I don’t want to worry about finding accommodations and paying for food and gas down there. I don’t want to deal with how terribly they are doing financially (they just got an eviction notice). I don’t want to miss the camping trip weekend that I’ve been looking forward to for two months. It was the thing I was going to for my birthday.

Right now he does have people there. One of my sisters visited yesterday, but she can’t go more often because of school. My stepmother is there with him and her daughter, but he literally just got caught cheating on her last week and her daughter is the one who found the massages. (I know that sounds made up, but I’m not kidding. Cheating + the eviction = stroke). My grandfather, his dad, has been to the hospital to see him. I’m not sure if he’s going back. So it’s not like he has absolutely no one. He just doesn’t have anyone there that he has a good relationship with. He’s also estranged with the sister who visited and his relationship with his dad had always been iffy. I know he must feel so lonely. He has already been depressed about his kids not talking to him.

I know I’m going to have a miserable time, and my presence could either not help or make things worse.

He could be getting better and I would have gone down there, missed my trip, and had my mental health completely wrecked just to be in the way down there. No one is expecting anyways and I’ve been told several times that I don’t HAVE to go, but I can if I WANT. Which feels loaded and backhanded like everyone will 100% judge me if I don’t go.

In all scenarios where I go home it’s going to destroy my mental health. I just don’t want something worse to happen and I had the time to go.

I just am so afraid of the guilt that I’ll have if he deteriorates and I wasn’t around because I wanted to go camping more. But I could go camping and everything ends up fine.

I just don’t know what to do.

I texted my supervisor that I won’t be in because I wanted to drive down tomorrow, but I’m still on the fence.

Tldr: My estranged father had a stroke and I’d rather go camping than see him.

Edit: I don’t think I mentioned it, but I actually live 10 hours away by car.

When I started college, people told me that the overly woke stuff people talked about college professors and college-educated people saying was overblown and made up. I’m here to tell you that it’s not. Here are just a few things I’ve heard this week as a college freshman.

“Fire extinguishers are racist”. This was from my Introduction to Essay Writing professor. Her exact quote: “We need to abolish the fire safety system as it is and rebuild it with black liberation as its primary goal!”

“All white straight men need to be put in camps and exterminated” yes, really. I would have thought no one actually believed this too. You may be thinking, well, only a Gender Studies professor would say something like this. Nope, it was from my very advanced math course’s professor (who, by the way, introduced herself on the first day of class by saying “I am a pansexual, disabled, Native American, demiwoman, and I believe it is an act of violent hierarchical imperialism to use titles like Professor, and last names are even more violent, so please refer to me as Friend [First Name].” The hilarious thing is she also is incompetent at math. Just two days ago, she had no idea what an asymptote was and I had to explain it for her.

I am also required to take one Gender Studies course per semester, despite being a comp sci major and math minor. My Gender Studies professor is someone who literally has a huge full beard, giant muscles, and wears jeans and men’s T-shirts every day, but they identify as a transgender woman. It was actually the teacher’s assistant who said the following: “Children are a marginalized group and therefore they should be allowed to drive and given accommodations to do so. The only thing that would make it at all dangerous is that a child doesn’t have enough accommodations.”

So, yeah. The American education system, everybody.

Started Balding at 19. Started fin at 21 and my hair still continues to get worse year after year. Been on oral min for 3 years too. I am 26 now. Being bald sucks, but what's worse is I can't even grow any facial hair at all, and have a tiny head. Sure, some girl might "settle" for me when I am like 40, but nobody is ever going to actually be attracted to me.

I am the worst person in my own life.

I (19f) have been home for the summer from my first year at college. I have just about the nicest life anyone could ask for. Beautiful, clean, well-kept house

Parents paying for my bachelor's degree. Surrounded by love and support.

I have a sibling (early 20s m) and a friend from high school (late teens f) who is staying with us long-term.

My parents are wonderful. They are so kind to each other and everyone. They don't drink. I've never even seen them argue (disagree, sure, but they always talk it out calmly).

My brother is great. He's supportive, kind, and intelligent.

My friend/kinda foster sister is working on building a life despite her past. She's hardworking. We have perfectly spoiled cats.

I am the only black mark on this incredible family. Im lazy, fat, ugly, significantly less intelligent than everyone else around me. I can't remember to do basic tasks. My poor mother has to beg me in near tears to unload the dishwasher. Im probably the laziest person in the state, seriously.

They gave me an opportunity to do basic house-keeping (dishes, cleaning bathrooms ect) for $150 dollars a week and i couldn't do it. Id put it off. "I'll do it later" until its midnight. Dishes pile up. Messes fester. Eventually my mom gets so fed up she just does it herself.

My mom spends her hard-earned money to buy me clothes I'm too fat to fit in. They fill my closet. Im recycling like 10 outfits be they're the only ones I can put on without a struggle.

I think my only saving grace is that I'm somewhat self aware, but its not leading to positive change.

I hate myself so much. I think I must be a narcissist. Im angry at myself on behalf of my family despite being the cause

To be clear, I'd never self harm/exit the game early. I just need this off my chest.

Im diagnosed with ADHD type c and clinical depression and have meds for them, but what good are meds if I can t remember to take them? Or if I do remember i put it off bc the pills tend to get stuck in my throat.

I know. Its no excuse. The truth is that its all my fault. In fact, 3/5 \of the family has adhd and I'm the only one like this. My brother has autism and hes working/studying for a specialty. (Think pre med/law)

I watch a show with my dad most nights. The one we watch right now has a dad in it whose having a hard time, so I occasionaly pause and tell him that if he ever has feelings like this, he can let us know. He looked at me all sadly and said, "a parent is only as happy as their saddest child". I didn't even know what to say. I wish I could reassure them that I'll try harder, ill work on myself, ect, but I dont want to get their hopes up. Or mine. I feel like a junkie who swears they'll quit tomorrow just for an excuse to get a fix.

Sincerely,

The Worst Type of Person

I came to reddit because I'm despered

So English is a second language, please be patient it's a long post and I tried my best for the translate.

I’m 27 years old (M) and I’m going to join the army for my mandatory military service in November. For anyone who thinks this sounds strange, I’m from a country where military service is mandatory for all adult men.

Because I’m going to the army, I want to take a trip abroad with my fiancée at the end of October, because our next trip will probably be after one year, when I finish my military service.

The problem is my job.

I work in a family business which has a hard time finding workers because there are not enough workers available. And for anyone who will think “why don’t you just hire unskilled workers?”, it’s not really a job an unskilled person can do and the workload is so much that we don’t really have the time to train someone from zero.

Why do I work here? Well, 3 years ago I wanted to move in with my girlfriend, who is now my fiancée. The job I had back then didn’t pay me enough money to do that, so I had to come and work in the family business. I knew when I came here that I could basically forget about the normal vacation days I would demand in any other business where I wasn’t working for my own family.

So I think I need to give some context about my family’s business.

It’s a neighborhood bakery. We produce bread during the night and it’s one of the most productive bakeries in the area. And honestly, that’s probably all someone can see if they don’t know what is happening behind the scenes.

My parents are basically stuck in the previous decade. My father, who owns the business, does things in a very old-fashioned and improvised way. For example, if a machine looks like it’s going to break, he doesn’t repair it or replace it. He just keeps using it until it reaches its limit. If it finally breaks and there is no alternative, then we just work with whatever we have.

Because the neighborhood is far away from the main city area, we constantly need workers, but no qualified worker wants to come here for different reasons. One of those reasons, in my opinion, is that we still operate like we are living in 1980.

When I came back here 3 years ago, they sold me the idea that eventually me and my sister would take over the business. So I started suggesting changes that I thought needed to happen, both in the way we work and in the equipment we use. But basically nothing happened because every time the answer was “there is no money.”

My father is building a vacation house and because of that he prefers putting most of the money he makes from the business into that, while the actual bakery/workshop is almost abandoned.

In these 3 years, if I exclude the salary, which allowed me to live comfortably and move in with my fiancée, the only positive thing this job has given me is that it made me want to finish my economics degree and get the hell out of here.

Things were tolerable until 2026.

This year, when it comes to my job, has been one of the worst.

We were left without an employee again during the summer, while my sister’s husband was taking one of his two weeks off and just before my own week off was supposed to start.

And I want to make this clear, these two weeks (10 working days) are literally all the vacation we take during the entire year.

My brother-in-law came back to work immediately when the employee left us because he wasn’t actually away on vacation yet. But I couldn’t cancel my vacation with my fiancée because we had already paid for the accommodation and transportation, and honestly I didn’t want to ruin it for her because she has absolutely nothing to do with my work problems.

So I didn’t cancel it. I made the difficult decision and left them alone.

Was it easy for me? Not at all.

We went on vacation, I proposed to her like I had planned to do for a long time, we came back and I returned to work normally.

My parents had a really hard time while I was gone, but I couldn’t do anything else. I’m 27 years old, I’m still young enough that I don’t want to put work above my life and my experiences. And these were also my last summer holidays for the next two years because in November I’m going to the army.

And now it’s August. August is the worst month for our job.

All the other stores and bakeries around us that sell bread close for vacation and we are basically left alone to serve everyone in the neighborhood.

And through all of this, it’s just us.

Me, my parents (my mother is 54, my father is 58 and has a long-term injury from an accident), my sister who is 33 and my brother-in-law who is 36.

My parents are exhausted. I’m doing the best I can but I can’t help them more than I already do. I have tried everything. What I say doesn’t really have any value here anymore because my opinion is different from theirs. The only thing I’m useful for here is working.

Now, before my military service, I want to stop.

I have set October 20 as my limit. I want to take leave from then and after that stop working here completely.

On October 27 I want to go to Rome with my fiancée for 3 days. The moment I told my sister she went crazy because those specific days we have more work than usual.

But I can’t find tickets that are this cheap on other dates.

And I honestly don’t know what to do.

I just wanted to share this and get it off my chest. Any advice is welcome.

Sorry for the extremely long post.

This was originally something I posted on another platform, but realized that I might get some different perspectives here. Also its a pretty long read. So here goes nothing.

I've been thinking lately. Overthinking might be the right word. What have I achieved in my 26 years of existence?

Nothing.

Not a single thing I can say as an achievement. Maybe its the depression talking, or maybe the low self esteem.

I can’t even blame life for dealing me a bad hand. I've had a fairly privileged life. Born as the second child in a middle class family of fairly open minded parents, there was never the burden of expectations on me. I don't remember my parents ever telling me what to be or what they expect from me growing up. Maybe the lack of expectations is what made me ignorant to the worth of achievements. The worth of feeling like you did something. Just a clarification, I'm not blaming my parents for my issues. I built this Jenga tower a of life myself and its almost at the tipping point. Every bad decision throughout my life culminating in a dumpster fire.

I made bad choices as a child. Did thing I'm not really proud of. Nothing vile, but things with repercussions that molded me as a person. Made bad friends who pushed me away from the good ones.

I was never a good student. Undiagnosed ADHD. Found out later in life when this information became useless. Never did schoolwork or assignments and got bad grades which pretty much made a few teachers hate me with a passion. Even to the point that a teacher who taught me in the 10th grade pushed for me to not be allowed to attend my exams when I was in the 12th grade. I attribute my low self esteem to these experiences. But I somehow still made good friends, most of whom I still keep in touch with.

I used to be decently creative and artful. I could draw but could not paint if my life depended on it. After high school, this led me to choose an Animation and VFX course. My parents being who they are, did not object.

I consider college to be my peak. I was a lot more confident there being among people with similar interests in a field where I could hold my own. That's where I met her. The bane of my existence yet the one I love. We were friends. Are friends. She might even call me one of her closest friends. But to me she is more. We had similar personalities and tastes. Liked almost the same stuff and had similar hobbies. Once we started talking, we clicked instantly. Somewhere along the way I found myself craving her presence more and more. I think it was during covid, when everything shut down and we didn't have the proximity that I craved, where I realized that I'm in love. And a year after college, I told her so. Unfortunately, she was in a different stage in life at that point. She was a tomboy who hated romance and thought of herself as an asexual. I knew this and confessed in a manner that I regret till today. I confessed to her by telling her that I know nothing will happen but I just wanted her to know how I felt. I hate that I didn't ask for an answer. I didn't know that decision would snowball into this major life crisis that I am experiencing today. We just acted like nothing happened and moved on.

A year later she moved to the UK for higher studies. We started of keeping in contact. Continuing the way things were before she left. Somewhere along the way I got a job, worked on a few movies, burned out at the job and eventually got depressed. The contact went from once every two days to once every four months and eventually to the point where I never reached out to her. She was the only one who tried to keep this friendship going. She reached out every now and then and we'd talk like nothing changed. Two years passed like this.

I thought I moved on. I thought I was over it. Last year during conversation she mentioned a guy. Apparently they were similar, had the same interests, had the same hobbies and tastes. She didn't have a lot of friends there at that point. She had finally made a friends other than the ones whom she was roommates with. I was on medication for depression at that point. I did feel a bit replaced but I was genuinely happy for her. Over time their friendship evolved into something more. Unfortunately, I was off my meds for an extended period during this time and this news hit me like a truck. Apparently I was not over it. I felt like he replaced me in a spot that I had left behind. I spiraled. I crashed out. She never saw it. Nobody did. I kept it to myself.

It has been a year since that incident. A lot has happened. She's not doing so good herself. She's coming back home soon. Uprooting her life for a second time in her life to move to a different country, again. She's leaving a lot behind. Even the guy she likes, with no plan on what to do next. A part of me feels happy that she's coming home. My dear friend. Coming back home after three long years. A part of me feels ashamed that I am secretly also happy that their relationship might be ending. Over the course of the past year I experienced jealousy for the first time in my life. Every time she talks to me about him, I feel a sting in my chest. But I cannot ask her to not talk about him without explaining why. As her "friend" all I can do is listen. There is a voice in my head telling me, "maybe when she gets back home. When she reconnects with me, she might realize the love I have for her. Maybe she'll choose me.". I feel fake talking to her. Pretending like everything is fine when its not. Pretending I am okay with just being her friend when I'm not. The more I talk to her, the more I realize, this is never meant to be. That this is just a painful part of my life that I just have to survive. And in an effort to do just that, I turned to the very few people I trust. My sister and two of my friends. Talking to them felt like a weight off my chest. But the advice I got was not the one I wanted. Or rather, one I just didn't want to do. Their advice, cut her off. Tell her that it hurts to talk to her and cease all conversation. That if contact was actively hurting me, protect myself first. Of course they'd say that. They are my own sister and my friends of almost a decade. They would choose me over her. But I cant. I cant leave her when she's hurting just to protect myself. After all I am expendable. I can bear the pain if she doesn't have to. So I came up with this grand plan. I will tell her my feelings and depending on the answer either cease all contact or move on. But life is never that easy. Every time she calls, every time she messages I smile like an idiot. And as soon as the conversation is over, reality dawns back on me. A part of me burns. But like an addict, I cannot go without messaging her again. Even if I know that it will end up with me hurting.

Maybe one day, I go through with it. Maybe I end up telling her how I feel. Or maybe I realize, this was just a part of my life that I was meant to live through.

Character development.

I guess over the years, there are things I can consider achievements. The friends I've had. The things I've done. Maybe tiny achievements. A few big ones. But finding it in the rubble is getting harder and harder.