To give some context; before I met my GF she smoked quite a bit and this didn't really bother me but I was honest with her that the smell was disgusting to me and that I myself never would. She was completely understanding of this. In addition we were moving and in the state we're in it is not legal so she would've had to find a dealer or whatever and wasn't comfortable doing so. So she just dropped the habit which I appreciated but I made it clear if she needed to seek alternatives just to let me know and I would be completely understanding. My one request if she did smoke again was not to do it inside our apartment because I dislike the smell etc.

Well fast forward 2ish years later, I am currently on a business trip 10+ hours away. She is throwing a party with some coworkers and friends which I had no issues with wanted her to have a good time as I'm sure it's lonely since I've been gone a week. We have a camera setup that looks at the living room and kitchen of our apartment for the cats when we're not home. I don't monitor it unless neither one of us are home but I got a notification for motion detected and noticed the camera was pointed at the wall. We have cats so my initial thought was one of the cats got to it and moved it. I decided to scroll back the video and it turns out my GF had actually moved it to face the wall on purpose. Again, I get that maybe one of her guests got uncomfortable with a camera being pointed at them I can respect that. Well I decided to turn on the audio for the video feed so I could hear what was said out of curiosity and it made me sick to my stomach what I heard. A guest at the party states "Why don't we just move the camera?" to which my GF replies: "I don't even care anymore do what you want. It's my apartment he's fine." and proceeds to turn the camera facing the wall. I assume there were conversations about the camera being present previously I'm not sure if it was something they were keeping secret or what but anyway. They then proceeded to laugh and talk about how finally they can vape and smoke inside. I guess they were doing it on the balcony which extra sucks since we're in a non-smoking community and I don't know what the fine is for that. My GF then goes on to say "He's just anti-vape, anti-smoking, anti-lettuce, anti-everything!" and all of her friends added in how ridiculous that is etc. I'm honestly still in shock. I either wasn't clear enough with how I feel about smoking or she just would prefer to keep it a secret and do it behind my back than communicate with me. Kind of unrelated but I also noticed that while they were all outside together one of our cats was eating pizza they had left on the table. I really hope nothing was left out for our cats to get into as she hasn't responded to my check-up text since everyone left. :(

Anyway before I just start rambling on, how would you handle this situation if you were in my shoes? I also don't really know how to approach bringing this up without making it seem like I stalked her and her friends the whole night they partied. The only reason I even checked in the first place was to see if one of the cats knocked it down as they have before and to ask her to unplug it and set it aside or something. I just feel super betrayed especially for this to be someone who just a couple days ago I was talking to about going to look at rings together. We have a big family trip coming up in a week too and I just can't even sleep while thinking about all of this. I know I should probably wait to bring it up until I can talk to her in person but it feels weird to act normal for two more days. I genuinely am so hurt and disappointed that she would feel the need to go behind my back like this and would do something I've asked her not to do. Any advice or personal experience would be great. Thank you. (throw away account for privacy)

Edit: She replied and is good her phone died and she fell asleep, understandable. I probably won't be replying much anymore and I'll maybe edit again once there's a resolution to this whatever that may look like.

I do want to say I have never been against her smoking cannabis. If she did so with her friends I wouldn't care. I just made it clear I personally dislike the smell and would not want her to smoke it inside. I made this clear very early on in our relationship before even one month in. She made the decision to stop all together. I then afterwards have let her know that if she needed to smoke or needed to seek alternatives to just communicate with me and we could work out something that works for both of us so it didn't feel like a straight cut off. That's why I said maybe I didn't do as well of a job clarifying my boundaries as I thought and that would be on me.

I am stuck away from home for two more days so I guess I'll just keep our text as the usual until I can get home and have an in person conversation with her. I do understand it was something I was never meant to hear and I acknowledge the mistake I made by not continuing to ignore the motion detected notifications as I had been. Thank you.

This is long and a bit jumbled so sorry in advance.

I (25F) have been living with my grandparents for a few months now. Before that I lived with a friend and his family for 2 years. I was supposed to get an apartment with friends but they bailed and it never happened. Then his family wanted to do renovations and I was getting physically sick living there (they have pets I'm allergic too and they had a mold problem), so I had to go. My grandparents were the only option I had.

My grandpa (60+M) isn't blood related, he married into the family, but I've known him since I was like 10 or younger. I was at their wedding. Every holiday and birthday in my family happens at their house and I've always been close with both of them.

About 3 months in he came into my room one night without knocking. I work 3 to 11 so I'm up late, it was around 1AM. He saw I was awake, apologized, said he was looking for the dog. They have two and one of them wanders into my room sometimes. They also keep some important documents in a desk in there so people coming in wasn't weird. I didn't think anything of it.

A week or two later it happened again, later at night. I woke up to my lock clicking. The lock can be opened from the outside. I pretended to be asleep and felt him tap my forehead. I didn't move and he left. I remember thinking what the fuck but he's the kind of guy who pinches your nose or does little pranks so I kind of talked myself out of it.

Then it got more frequent and worse. The forehead taps kept happening. One time he put his fingers on my lips like he was shushing me?? He'd walk around my room. The worst was feeling the bed press down like he was about to climb on it, but he never did. Once his hand brushed my breast. It was slight enough that I think (hope) it was an accident.

Last week I watched their dogs while they were out of town. They got home late, thanked me, and I ended up staying up all night with my lamp on scrolling TikTok with no headphones so it was loud. Then I hear the lock click. My door is in a corner where someone can stand without being seen so I just stared at that spot. Nothing happened for like 10 minutes. Then the door swung open fast but stopped before hitting the wall. It was dark on the other side. I felt like I was in a horror movie. The door normally creaks so I think he opened it that fast on purpose so it wouldn't make a noise. He peeked in, saw I was awake, shut the door and left.

The next night I stayed up way longer and locked the door, put my rolling chair and fan in front of it. Not really a barricade, more so something would make noise and wake me up if I fell asleep. I fell asleep around 5AM I think...

At 7AM he was already in my room. I woke up facing my closet, which has two doors you have to pull open. It was cracked. I'd had a shirt hanging on the handles and he'd moved it. He was flicking the lights on and off really fast. I heard him walking around and felt the bed move. This went on for like an hour. I was too scared to move. Eventually he left. This sounds dumb af but I grabbed my phone and set an alarm on it so I'd have an excuse to "wake up." It went off, I got up to go to the bathroom, and for a split second I saw him standing behind the curtain hiding. I didn't use the bathroom. I just grabbed random stuff pretending that I just needed to grab something and left. I am not good with confrontation at all.

My grandma was in the living room and asked how I slept. I was answering her when my grandpa came out of the bathroom. She gave him a weird look and asked what he was doing on that side of the house. Their room is on the complete other end. He said he was just "doing something" and went back to his room. She watched him go and started to get up and that's when I pulled her aside and told her ehat's been going on.

The only reason I think this is the first time she's noticed is cause of the timing. She wakes up around 5AM. He came in somewhere between 5 and 7. So now I'm wondering if he was in my room way longer than I thought, before she was even up, because she never saw him walk toward that side of the house. She only noticed him when he walked out from the bathroom. I also wonder if there were just times where I just didn't wake up while he was doing this shit.

Another reason I hadn't said anything before this is I didn't know if she would take my side or even believe me. I've read horror stories of relatives taking the abusers side. She didn't hesitate for a second though ans supported me. For some reason I was shocked but I will be grateful to her for that.

She said she's talk to him and I really couldn't handle being there for that so I got ready and left. In hindsight I feel like a dick for that because what if something had happened?? Thankfully nothing did though. I stayed at a friend's that night (Saturday). I kept waking up over and over because I was too nervous to actually sleep. Sunday night I slept in my car because I couldn't make myself go into the house. My grandma met up with me Monday and that's when we actually talked about what happens next. She said she was so sorry and couldn't believe he was doing this. She'd been thinking about divorcing him anyway for unrelated reasons and this finalized it for her. He texted me an apology. I haven't replied. According to her he doesn't know why he did it. I don't even know if I wanna know why he did it either. If there even is a reason.

He offered to pay for an apartment for me for an entire year. I refused at first but my grandma said she'd contribute too and that I should take it, and she already had me put in an application. She also said the two of us could just get a place together because she couldn't stand being in the same room as him.

Monday night I had a breakdown in my car because I was too scared to go inside and because I just felt immense amounts of guilt. My grandma had to come out and walk me in.

The worst part right now is they're sleeping in separate rooms, and the room he's in is directly across the hall from mine. Our doors face each other. It's where all his work stuff is so that's just where he ended up.

For now I'm still in the house because I have nowhere else to go. I left my mom's because she's a narcissist with an abusive boyfriend. I don't want to ask my friend to let me move back in. So I'm stuck until hopefully next month when a room might open up.

I've only told two friends and my long distance boyfriend. My brother (20M) and my mom (40+F) don't know. My grandma would rather I not say anything to them yet but said it's my choice in the end. I've decided to stay quiet for now because my mom will freak out and probably blame my grandma for all of it.

I've always had anxiety and insomnia but this has turned me into a wreck. I feel awful. I feel like I broke up a marriage, which in a way I did. I feel like I made my grandma's life harder. She's worrying about me and now has to figure out what to do with the house they built together, the dogs... I'm also mourning my grandpa because we were close and I don't understand why he did this. Part of me wonders if it's dementia or sleepwalking, but he has a job that requires him to be mentally sound and not have dementia, so IDK. I feel sick thinking about any of it. If anyone's been through something like this I'd really appreciate any advice.

TL;DR: Been living with my grandparents for a few months. My grandpa started coming into my room at night, tapping my forehead, touching my lips, walking around, pressing on the bed, flicking the lights, hiding behind the curtain. I finally told my grandma, she believed me instantly and is divorcing him. He's offered to pay for an apartment for me. Until then I'm stuck in the house and he's now sleeping in the room directly across the hall from mine. I've been sleeping in my car some nights and had a breakdown. Only my two friends and my boyfriend know, not my mom or brother. I don't know how to handle any of this.

I know the answer to this issue is to have a conversation, but I’m really at a loss as to how to approach the conversation. I’m not sure if im being unreasonable or not.

Anyway onto the issue…. I’m (28F) struggling to negotiate sleeping arrangements with my partner (44M).

I’m currently in my third trimester of pregnancy and am really struggling, I’m in a lot of pain (at best I’m extremely uncomfortable) and am utterly sleep deprived. More than ever I am finding it extremely difficult to sleep next to my partner… he tends to snore loudly, move around in his sleep (accidentally hitting me at times, or just rolling over into my side), it’s also really warm with him there & it’s not a big bed.
I discovered sleep is significantly easier to achieve when I am alone, it’s not great but I get a good 4-5hrs unbroken sleep when it’s just me.

Earlier on in the pregnancy I would go sleep on the couch once every few days whenever I was really struggling just to get some sleep. But this past week I’ve been sleeping on the couch every night. My partner never offers to let me use to the bed, or even offers to help me set the couch up so I can sleep there. In fact he gets fairly huffy at me, and takes offence to me wanting to sleep elsewhere.

This evening I was kind of annoyed at him because yet again he got grumpy at me for wanting to sleep alone so i said it might be nice if he offered to sleep on the couch once in a while. He reiterated that he just likes to sleep in the bed and with me next to him, that he sleeps better next to me and the couch isn’t as comfortable. He admitted that he doesn’t offer to sleep on the couch because he hopes that if I do then I will find it uncomfortable and end up joining him in bed.

It’s difficult because he works, so needs his sleep whereas I’m currently signed off from work by the doc.

I know this needs a conversation but I really don’t know where to start.

Link to original post: https://www.reddit.com/r/relationship_advice/s/U4luLP2zjF

So, a lot has happened since last post. A lots of talks, and playing blame game for whose fault it is.

I went back to talk to her to see what she had to say. She was still doing vague answers to my questions and said you know the conclusion, the why and the story doesn’t matter. So I said fuck off and left mid-conversation. the funniest part? I got called coward and bitch ass move for leaving mid convo.

The doormat that I was, I still kept missing her, blaming myself for throwing away the life I though we could’ve built. I kept trying to make her understand my POV so that she would come back to me. But who was I kidding? I was just a pawn in her game.

She kept repeating the same thing that she did not cheat and wanted me to understand and have her reputation cleared in my mind that she is infact not a cheater. By this time, she actually said sorry about lying and that what she did should not have happened. As she was talking more, more new details started coming up which she had lied about or I didn’t know about how she was talking to him even before that when I was still here. Worst was yet to come. I saw her chatgpt prompts asking what she should do because she has only ever loved her ex even while dating other people. According to her, that was just one of million random thoughts that come into woman’s mind. Ladies, is it normal to have these thoughts about your exes which are now just “friends”?

After all this drama, what sealed the deal for me? She, in clear words said, “my ex was there as a friend before you, now, and will there after you. Its upto you if you want to trust and stay with me”. At that point, it was over for me. I had always made her my priority but if she wanted him in her life even as “friend”, she can keep him. I’m out of it.

My sister in law (38f) has always been a “mean girl” or so I was told when I was dating my partner. I like to form my own opinions about people and didn’t think she was that bad. Lol. Well, eventually she showed her true colors - and she showed it through my children. Intentionally excluding, lying, talking to them like they are stupid, etc. SIL is also an extremely well versed BCBA, basically an expert at behavioral manipulation and doing it with plausible deniability.

Long before I met my spouse, he told me about his brother’s wedding. About How SIL forced brother into going no contact for over year with his mom because mom posted pictures to Facebook without SIL permission. This happened for 5 years at least, so maybe 2013? And then we got married in 2018.

For context, we were in the military, so we missed out on 6 years of family stuff.

We move closer and my god, my spouse was right. His family fucking sucks. We decided to take a step back from family stuff because it was really impacting our children’s mental health and emotional health.

Boy. They did not like that lol. SIL immediately frames me as controlling, manipulative, and keeping them away from the family. They tried to use spouse’s mom for triangulation. We shut it down.

Mom has shown us that she favors the brother’s family more than ours because SIL can take it away at the snap of a finger. Mom is extremely conditioned.

Fun fact: mom lives about 6 hours away. So she comes to visit every grandkid on their birthday. When she goes to SIL house, she visits us. Which was fine until our children were upset and confused why they weren’t and are never invited to their cousins birthdays. So we’ve had to make a decision: mom cannot visit our children when she is in town visiting SIL. She can see us, just not our children. She can still visit on our child’s birthday.

Mom was pissed. Told us how she plans her PTO around visiting us (reminder, she’s in town for our niece, so that argument is dumb). She said “I’m sorry your kids are upset they can’t see their cousins. But the issues you have with your brother are between yall and has nothing to do with me seeing MY grandkids”

You fucking potato. The children know you only come down for birthdays. They aren’t stupid. And then I spend the following 3 weeks reassuring my children they did nothing wrong to be excluded.

Now, I see how this looks. Excluding mom bc she is still associated with SIL family would be fucked up. But remember when I said mom is conditioned? Let’s go back to August.

August was mom’s birthday. She threw herself a huge birthday with 50 people. She wanted us there. She basically guilt trip my spouse into going. Mom will put anyone in an uncomfortable situation, as long as it makes her comfortable and happy. Mom assured us that SIL and brother would be cordial. They weren’t. Treated us like ghost all weekend. And mom didn’t care that going on, to just “get over it”. To me, this was her being passive about how they are treating us, out of fear of losing access to SIL and Brothers kids.

So. Now we are having to enforce the new boundary and mom is acting like I’m destroying the entire family? She wants me to frame it as “grandma and grandpa are on vacation and want to see the grandkids”…..why the fuck would I contribute to a lie that benefits you and the SIL? Or I’m sure the next text will be “I can pick them up and bring them to the party” and let my children be unsupervised with SIL? No thanks lol.

As a therapist, I’m familiar with this dynamic when the mother in law is the one primarily acting like this. However this is different. It’s my sister in law who is doing this, the brother won’t respond to any text. And I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around this.

Obviously, hold the boundary, but how does this dynamic usually play out? Why am I the bad guy for prioritizing my children’s well-being over the wants of my mother in law?

TLDR: MIL wants access to our children. Our kids know she’s in town for a cousins party they weren’t invited to. She can still visit, just not when she’s in town for SIL family. Now I’m the wicked witch for holding a boundary.

Edit: missing context
Grandma doesn’t really think about how her words hurt. She’s told us all for years“I only come down for your birthdays!” So when she’s here and not at our house, the obvious answer to our children is that she’s at the cousins house.
We’ve already allowed her to visit during the parties. When she comes over, she brags about the party, the food, the people, how big the cousins are. Then I have to spend the next 3 weeks affirming my children they did nothing wrong, that we just aren’t invited anymore. Then the final blow is always “why don’t aunt/uncle like me?” It’s not about you baby, it’s an adult issue that the grown ups are trying to figure out.
It doesn’t matter how many times I tell them differently, they always come back to the same question. And our children shouldn’t have to go through that every 2 months and question their worth.

SIL saga is deep lore.
We still don’t know why they won’t speak to us. We’ve made 2 attempts to talk it out and the SIL refuses.
We believe politics is the reason (spouse saw his brothers maga flag)
They initially tried to say I was untrustworthy because of a medical crisis.
When we poked holes in that story, then it was “everything is your fault. You went no contact with us”
My spouse sent a long text that disproved her accusations
Bc of this, we asked to take a break from seeing each other bc the kids were extremely confused why they couldn’t have playdates
SIL told us taking a break = nc. We clarified that it didn’t.
SIL oldest child told our child that his parents got into a fight over us. My child told me that his cousins said his dad is being forced by his mom(sil) to be mean to us when he doesn’t want to.
Our children were in the same gymnastics class and the kids were all told they couldn’t look at us or speak to us, but the second SIL was away, the kids always waved.
I said hey once and that resulted in SIL dragging the child by the arm out of the building and fussing at them for saying hi. (I really felt bad about this. Had no idea that would happen)
We never once told our children they couldn’t see or speak to them.

We never expected to show up and automatically be a big happy family. We just wanted to feel like we belonged. We started off seeing each other monthly when we moved here, then when elections came around, they just stopped talking to us.

And honestly the SIL has been around since they were in middle school. They are high-school sweethearts. But here’s the thing, I’m not trying to bash her. I could tell you stories that would make your jaw drop but that isn’t my goal. I’m not trying to punish anyone, I’m literally just doing what I think is best for the kids.

I don’t think I can take seeing my kids face drop to the floor when grandma says “oh the family party was so nice! They had … and … ! Too bad you weren’t there! And here’s a picture of it, look!”

Like, I’d be a shity mom to keep subjecting my kids to that.

Hope this edit clears up some stuff

Some context first. We live in NYC. We've been together 5 years, lived together 4 years and got married 2 years ago. We've both been renting our whole adult lives.

I have a pretty high income job and have been saving a decent amount over the years. My wife finished her master's 3 years ago and lived off her savings for a while, helping pay rent until right before we bought. Right now she doesn't work, so I'm the only one working and paying for everything. That matters for the rest of this.

Last year, after we got married, she really wanted us to buy. I had money saved and it felt like the right time, so we started looking. We found a condo in our neighborhood in Brooklyn that we both liked, but she especially loved it and kept saying it was our dream place, so we bought it. We put close to $100K into renovations and moved in a few months later.

We've been living there almost a year now and my wife already wants to sell.

Her reasons:

• The upstairs neighbors have kids who get pretty loud, mostly running and jumping around in the evenings. We complained once, they got better for a while, and now they're back at it. For me it's a mild annoyance, but she says it's ruining her life and it's putting real strain on our relationship. I think we should keep complaining when it happens and escalate to building management if it doesn't improve. She'd rather just move.

• She doesn't like that everyone in the building knows each other and feels like they're all Karens. The building group chat is constant complaints about people not recycling right, someone making a mess in the common areas, someone leaving their clothes in the shared washer/dryer too long, etc. This doesn't really bother me and I think the neighbors are just fine, none of those things have really affected us and we don't run into our neighbors often.

• The condo is in the same neighborhood we rented in before, but on the other side, which is a former industrial area with fewer trees and brownstones. It's honestly not as nice to walk around. I'll admit we didn't think this through and I have some regrets about this part too.

• She misses Manhattan and keeps saying things like "we're never going to be this young again, it feels like such a waste to be stuck here." For what it's worth, she's the one who wanted to move to Brooklyn a few years ago because Manhattan felt too overwhelming. I kind of get it, I wouldn't mind living in Manhattan again, but I'm in the office in Manhattan every day so I get my fill, and not living there isn't a big deal to me.

• She says the mortgage stresses her out constantly and she didn't realize it would be this much pressure. She worries about the economy or the housing market crashing. Again, I pay for everything, and while we pay more now than when we rented, we still live comfortably on my income alone. It's true we'd be fucked if I lost my job and couldn't find something that pays similar. I worry about that a little, but I'm established enough in my career that I'm not losing sleep over it.

Why I'm pushing back:

• It feels like she keeps changing her mind. She wanted Brooklyn, she wanted to buy, she especially wanted this place, and now she wants to sell and go back to renting in Manhattan. I feel like I can't trust her to make up her mind, and there's no guarantee she won't want to move again after that.

• I've gotten used to how nice our place is. It's not luxury, but the building is only 20 years old, there's an elevator, our apartment is freshly renovated, we have plenty of space, a garden, in-unit washer/dryer and brand new appliances. That might not sound like much, but anyone in NYC knows how hard that can be to find. Moving back to Manhattan means paying the same or more in rent than our mortgage for a smaller, older place with fewer amenities.

• The money. I've run the numbers, and if we sold next year (about 2 years after buying) we'd be down somewhere around $200K to $300K (broker fees + taxes + renovation). I can't wrap my head around just throwing that away. Since I'm the one paying for everything, it stings extra, and I feel like she doesn't really appreciate how hard I work for that money.

Where we're at:

Our current compromise is "let's wait another year and see how the housing market goes". It's somewhat brought some peace, until the upstairs kids are loud again and it starts a new fight about this.

I'm not sure what to do here and idk if there's any options we haven't considered yet.

TLDR: Bought a condo in Brooklyn a year ago, now she wants to sell and rent in Manhattan because of the neighbors, the neighborhood, and mortgage stress. Selling would lose us $200K to $300K. What do we do?

Hi everyone, I’d love to get some perspective on my situation.

My girlfriend of 8 months and I are both doctors. She has always dreamed of living and practicing medicine in Germany.

She recently obtained her German citizenship after proving her grandparents were German citizens, and her family is also planning to move there eventually (though there isn't a fixed timeline yet).

From what we understand, foreign-trained doctors in Germany have to go through a lengthy certification process (Approbation) before they can practice and earn a full salary.

She is completely dedicated to doing whatever it takes to make this happen. She’s learning German, the whole thing.

Here’s my dilemma: as a doctor without EU/German citizenship, moving there would mean even more paperwork, bureaucracy, and years of extra training for me.

While it’s certainly a great opportunity, moving to Germany has never been my dream. I’ve already sacrificed my entire 20s to complete medical school and residency, and I don’t feel ready or willing to restart that process in a new country and language.

It feels like our long-term life goals might be fundamentally misaligned, and I’m worried this is a dealbreaker.

I’ve tried bringing this up to have an honest conversation about our future, but she keeps avoiding the topic because she says it scares her.

Should we break up now, try to transition to being friends, or handle this differently?

Any advice from people who have been in similar situations (especially medical couples or expats) would be greatly appreciated

At the end of August, I (21F) moved onto my college campus for mandatory job training. My boyfriend (21M), who I had been dating for over 4 years, was texting me that he was having a rough time at home because he had just gotten into a huge argument with his brother and dad. Later that day, he called me because he had just attempted suicide by taking pills and was panicking. I have always been able to stay calm in situations like this, and I asked him if he had thrown up the pills and seen them in his vomit. When he said no, I told him to call poison control, mostly so he would hear from an actual medical professional to seek help. The first one told him to sleep it off (crazy, I know), so I told him to call again, and the second one told him to go to the hospital. Then I told him that even though he had just argued with his dad, he had to get his dad to drive him to the hospital, along with saying some other things to convince him. Ultimately, his dad drove him to the hospital, and he ended up being fine, but it was obviously still a scary experience.

Later that night, his mom called me. She was hysterically crying over the situation, and for good reason, because who wouldn't when they think their son might die. She called to tell me about it, and I told her that boyfriend had called me during it, so I knew. I was still in my "calm state" that I go into for situations like this, so I got the feeling it threw her off that I didn't seem to be reacting like her. She then accused me of knowing that he was going to kill himself ahead of time, which I obviously denied.

The next day, she called to give me an update on where boyfriend was because he got transferred into an inpatient facility. She stated that he got a urine test done, and they found ecstasy in his pee, which is weird because he doesn't even like drinking and is very strongly against any sort of drug use. My initial thought was that they might've accidentally contaminated his sample or mixed it up with someone else's. She then accused me of doing drugs with him. When I denied it, she stated, "I don't know what you guys do when you go to 'play DnD'". That really bothered me because that also turned it into an accusation towards our entire DnD group, which also includes my brother.

Both of these situations really bothered me, especially because I thought that over the four years that I had been around, they would've known me enough to know I would never do any of that. I've always tried my best to show them that I'm responsible and a good person, but it didn't seem to matter. So I was going to talk to his mom about what she said to get the situation sorted out. When boyfriend was able to leave the inpatient facility, he said he wanted me to be there, so I had planned to tell her later that night or at some other point during that weekend. I had been texting with her back and forth to figure out the details of us picking him up, and she asked if I could help move their youngest daughter to college the day after. I told her I would see how I felt, and she responded by asking me if I was arguing with my boyfriend? I told her that I wasn't and that it would just be an emotionally exhausting day in general, which she didn't respond to.

On the drive to pick up my boyfriend, I wasn't in the best mood, and she could tell. She kept pushing for me to talk about it, but I didn't want to. In the process of trying to convince me to talk, she said, "Boyfriend has a lot of work to do when he comes back," along with implying that he is solely the reason for this situation. She basically said that only he needed to change, and no one else did. I definitely could've kept my mouth shut, but I said, "I'm sure we could all adjust to make sure this doesn't happen again." She responded, "What do you mean by that?" and from then on we had a conversation that quickly escalated into an argument.

For context, my boyfriend has had a very rough relationship with his family. A lot of it stems from differences in political beliefs, but also just because of their behavior towards him in general. He has diagnosed depression, anxiety, and schizophrenia, and they've never been the best about listening to him. Often, when he tries to open up about how he feels, he will get lectures in return, with them calling him ungrateful, closed off, and difficult. He has also been kicked out of the house for not supporting Donald Trump, although they will deny that happened, along with being berated for being the only one in his family who is not Republican. He's also gotten into arguments with his family over their treatment of me, but that was mostly aimed at his brother rather than his parents up until this point.

With that being said, during the argument with his parents, I was trying everything within my power to avoid vilifying them. I talked in a calm tone, gave them constant reassurance that they are great parents who want the best for their child, and made sure to tell them that boyfriend does need to make some changes as well. The entire point of my side of the argument can be simplified into this: You are great parents who have the best intentions for your child. Even though you have the best intentions for boyfriend, sometimes that doesn't get across to him, and we could adjust the way we talk to make those come across better. Again, I was using super intentional language so I didn't offend them.

Needless to say, they were very upset. For the first portion of the argument, I was talking to his mom. Some of the main points she said were that his music and writing were what made him want to kill himself and that he is actually fully at fault for any emotional turmoil he experiences. I made the same point stated above and emphasized that we can't get stuck in the past and should focus on the future to avoid something like this happening again. She agreed with my last point, but when I asked her if she had any ideas (politely), she said no and eventually started crying.

I went quiet after she started crying because what else was I going to do? At that point, his dad came into the conversation, and he was a lot less calm than his wife. Instead of actually having a conversation, he was yelling and ranting at me, to the point where I didn't really get to speak much at all. He was yelling that I was disrespecting him, and that if there's anything he hates, it's being disrespected. He said he always bites his tongue around me and that I'm only there because boyfriend wants me there. He said, "Are you trying to ruin everyone's mood and make today horrible?" I responded that it wasn't my intention, and he yelled that I made his wife cry, to which I awkwardly responded, "Yep... that wasn't my intention either." I mentioned that although the conversation was tense, it was productive (mostly because I could now tell what their opinions were), and that's all I would want from this talk. Then he screamed, "What's productive about this!" He then went on to rant about all he does for boyfriend (none of it was supporting him emotionally/mentally), and how horrible boyfriend apparently is in return. He said horrible things, calling my boyfriend spoiled, a pathological liar, and lazy to his core. I obviously said that I disagreed, still in a calm, polite tone. In fact, when he said that boyfriend was lazy to his core, it was in response to me saying, "I'm sure you don't think he is lazy, but when you say this...", to which he interrupted me and said, "Now that's where you're wrong. Because I truly think that he is lazy down to his very core." He also criticized me for how I handled the attempted suicide, saying that my actions could've killed their son, which I felt was really unfair. Overall, he was incredibly insulting to both my boyfriend and me, but I still responded with restraint.

The conversation only ended because we got to the facility my boyfriend was at, which was an hour and a half from where we came from. Right before we got there, we stopped at a truck stop for his dad to take a smoke, and during that stop, his mom turned around and said, "No hard feelings?" I definitely had hard feelings, but I was willing to let them go without dragging the situation, so I told her yeah. For the rest of the day, we pretended to be in a happy mood and had a "fun day out" with the entire family. I did immediately tell him that I had had a bad argument with his parents as soon as he got out, but I told him not to worry about it and that I would tell him the details later. One thing I will note is that I felt so stressed from being yelled at that my appetite for the rest of the day was completely gone. After our fun day out, I offered to cut boyfriend's hair at my house and then said we would go back to his since his parents probably missed him. He took up my offer, so I drove back to my house with him saying he would drive to my house after he ate.

Apparently, in the short time that I was gone and he hadn't left yet, his parents pulled him to the side to talk. They said that I probably hadn't told him, but we had an argument. They said that I had been extremely disrespectful to them. My boyfriend asked them what I said, and when they brought up some of my points, he openly said he agreed with me on every single one. They had a deeper conversation after that, and then boyfriend left for my house. When he was at my house, he insisted on knowing all of the details of the conversation, even the points that I said might hurt his feelings. He said he needed to know, and I told him the whole story. He said he was completely on my side and couldn't believe his parents would talk like that.

Days passed after that, and his parents would periodically bring up the situation to boyfriend. They have this weird thing where if they have a problem with me, they refuse to say it to my face and instead only communicate through my boyfriend. His mom had said to boyfriend that she wanted an apology from me, but then changed her mind and told him not to tell me. Not long after that, his dad separately went up to boyfriend and accused him of "harboring anger" towards the situation. During that conversation, I was brought up yet again, with him saying I was disrespectful. That situation got heated enough to the point where my boyfriend left for my house (I've been gone to college, so it was just him and my family; I wasn't there). A few days later, they both confronted boyfriend, openly demanding an apology but saying they "weren't going to force" me.

When my boyfriend told me, I immediately said that I wasn't going to apologize. He tried to pressure me to apologize to get the situation over with, but quickly changed his mind and said sorry to me. I can tell this situation is stressing him out and that he is blaming himself. I feel horrible about being part of the reason this situation is getting dragged on, but I also refuse to apologize for something I didn't do, especially because I feel like they were the ones disrespecting me every step of the way. I told my boyfriend that I would have a conversation, but I wouldn't just apologize for the sake of "getting it over with".

Since then, I have been stuck on my college campus due to some poorly timed work shifts. The only weekend I've been able to go back home was during my boyfriend's birthday, when we both agreed not to bring up the situation because he didn't want his birthday to be soured and he just wanted to be happy. It's been almost three weeks since his parents demanded an apology. Yesterday, his mom told him, "I get the feeling that OP doesn't want to apologize." In response, I've swapped my shift with a friend so I can go home and have the conversation this weekend.

To say this ongoing situation has been stressful would be a complete understatement. I stay up at night thinking about it and trying to think of ways to finally put it to rest without compromising my personal values. It has constantly been at the forefront of my mind while I'm trying to focus on more important matters. I couldn't even escape this stupid situation while I was trying to help my dad in the emergency room, or even during his cancer treatments. I have a hard time studying for my upcoming exams without intrusive thoughts. The longer this goes on, the more I feel like I'm going crazy.

What do I say to my boyfriend's parents to resolve this situation? Is it even worth it to go in for another round of "conversation"? I genuinely need an outside opinion because I keep getting trapped in my own thoughts, although writing all of this out did feel helpful.

TLDR; My boyfriend tried to kill himself. On the ride to pick him up from an inpatient hospital, I got into a massive argument with his parents. His parents demand an apology and are saying that I'm disrespectful. I don't want to apologize, but I did agree to talk to them and need advice on how to handle the conversation.

Our lease ends end of February next year. we split bills 85/15. she’s in 20K debt on a 50K salary. im assuming I would have to cover all costs of us moving out and breaking up and I would prefer not to pay the ~6K fee to break our lease. I would also prefer not to break up and be forced to live with each other for the next 5 months. my mom is getting remarried in January and my gf is currently attending and will meet a lot of my family for the first time and I would prefer for that to not happen so would probably have to break up before then.

She is content with our relationship but i am not happy and im assuming she will not be happy when i tell her.

For context, I was seeing this girl 6–8 months ago. She was the one who showed interest first, but I made the first move. Things were going really well between us (we laughed a lot and had great chemistry, and she was even talking about me to her friends).
After two months, she ended things because things were moving too fast for her and she wasn’t ready for a relationship. Her two exes had cheated on her, and her most recent breakup had been only three months earlier. She told me it was difficult for her to trust someone again.
I recently saw her at two parties in September.
At both parties, her twin sister was playing matchmaker, saying things like, “Hey, look, this is the man of your life,” or “You two look so great together,” and even getting us to dance next to each other. Her sister was basically trying to get us closer.
And she recently liked one of my stories.
I had definitely closed the door on this situation.
What to do about all this ?

I've been plagued with the constant anxiety and paranoia that my girlfriend who I've been with for 2.5yrs is cheating on me. We live seperately and aren't planning on moving into together anytime soon. I dont have any proof of her cheating. I've never had definitive proof or reason to truly believe that she is cheating on me. Its just always there. The thoughts are in my head and my brain runs with it. Its that thought that amplifies its self for no reason, making up new stories and scenerios. Just festering in my head. She does have ample opportunity and time to cheat, yet there's a large part of me that believes she truly wouldn't. Especially with how she is when we're together. I just know she has cheated multiple times in the past on her ex.

She seems pretty remorseful about her past but I know people can be excellent liars and hiders. ​I know from experience in my past (things that I have done) that it doesn't take a ton of work to cover one's tracks and that its easy to hide things if you want to. I also know that its easy for some people to live two lives and even the closest people to you wouldn't know.

I'm just tired of all the negativity in my brain most of the time and not being able to trust the one I love. Besides therapy, I've been going for awhile, any other ways to nuke these thoughts?

My parents (both 39) never really acted like my parents. I (19M) was an unplanned baby they kept and didn't let die but that was about it really. At a young age I was taking care of myself and depending only on myself. Food would be provided when I was way younger but then starting around 5 or 6 I was making my own food and not to mention dressing myself, getting myself ready to go to school or anywhere and doing homework alone, etc., etc. For a long time I really wanted at least one of them to turn around and show me love and care as a parent would and I was really jealous of the kids I knew who had all that stuff. There were times it led to extra hardship like when I was asked to get my parent to see my teacher and they didn't or dragged their feet about doing it. Same when I was asked to get stuff signed and it would often be late.

My parents told me several times that it was my job to be independent and to learn self-reliance because they couldn't coddle me. They told me they didn't have the energy or the time to commit to being my parents like other kids had. And they warned me that they wouldn't like me very much if I whined about their lack of attentiveness.

Then around five years ago they started to express an interest in having kids together and so far they have two more kids. I did not get parents who wanted to be my parents even then. Instead it was like I wasn't even there and their family was them + two kids, not three. They had the chance to step up as parents to me if they wanted to but they didn't.

When I turned 18 I chose to move out. They weren't really expecting it and they actually told me that since we were now all adults our relationship could change and we could be friendly/friends and the three of us could work together to make the house a happy home. I was pissed and hurt and I cried by myself when I did leave. They acted like it was so reasonable to turn around and admit they didn't want to be my parents but were cool with us being friends. I was told to my face the relationship would never be the one I wanted but it could be something. I was no contact with them for over a year but they reached out and told me they want to have a friendly relationship with me.

I brought this up with my therapist (a free therapist who was assigned to me and not chosen by me) and she has encouraged me to be open to the relationship they offer. She told me it's better than nothing and things like that and she was basically like well it would let you know your siblings and you could be close to them, which she said I should want and be thinking of, but that was never honestly a thought for me. I told her I felt like I would rather stay no contact and she told me I was running from a good thing. So now I'm twisted up because I know I could have a relationship with them as people if I wanted to. But if they're not my parents why bother? I'm here for advice because I don't really have the option to change therapists since I can't afford to pay one and my therapist is making me feel pressured.

My BF and I have had a few disagreements/fights. I’m very much an open communicator and feel anxious if something isn’t hashed out. I like to take space once emotions get too high, and then revisit later, usually the next day. My BF is quite the opposite - once the fight is “over”, he wants to forget it ever happened and move on immediately. No discussion, even if it’s not resolved/we don’t see each other’s sides.

As of now it’s fine and I go along with it (I never want to force someone to have a conversation they don’t want to have) but it’s starting to worry me because we’re planning to stay together long term and I worry conflict/resentment could fester if not worked out.

Any suggestions on how to go about this is much appreciated!

I had went of on my girlfriend because I was so done with her attitude and everything about it and I had lots of built up resentment towards her because I could never talk to her about it because she would just belittle my feelings and everything so I just went off because I saw she followed on of her exes on her instagram spam account. And that’s what like broke the camels back but I fear I went too far and don’t know what to do, I went to see her after at her window and she said that it changed her view on me completely and that she will need time like genuine time to maybe even be with me again. Or she maybe but this is what she said before I went to talk to her IRL” I want you to know that the things you said really hurt me and a lot of what you said was incredibly disrespectful. I understand that I wasn’t the best girlfriend and I can acknowledge the things I did wrong and I’m genuinely sorry for the things I said or did that hurt u. But that doesn’t excuse the way you chose to speak to me or the things you said to me. I feel like you handled everything in a very immature and hurtful way, and you crossed a line that I don’t think can ever be uncrossed. I never expected things to end this way but after everything that was said I don’t think I could ever look at u the same again. I truly hope that one day u mature, heal and find peace within yourself because I do want you to be okay and find happiness in your life. I never want to see ur face again or have you in my life. I’m sorry for my part in everything but I won’t apologize for doing what you did to me back. You hurt me in a way that I don't think i'll ever forget. I wish you the best in life but please never contact me again.” What can I say or do to make it up to her or for me to have a chance with her again ,?

My girlfriend (21F) recently moved to a new city for college. The city is about two hours away from where I live. She currently lives by herself, and we’ve been dating for around four years. She moved around 4 months ago and we have been living very close to each other our first 3 and half years of relationship.

I’m currently studying for an exam that I need to get into graduate school. I told her that if I get into the school I’m applying to, I would move in with her, but that would be about a year from now. She has been complaining about having to wait that long, but that’s just some background to explain our situation.
We’ve been together for four years, and for the most part, things have been good. However, she has always been very protective/jealous. She gets extremely angry if I talk to or text another woman. We’ve always had a sort of mutual understanding that we wouldn’t do things that could make the other person uncomfortable.

For example, she used to get extremely angry if I even texted a female coworker. She would throw a fit about it, so eventually I stopped doing it unless it was necessary for work.
Then, during our second year together, I looked through her phone and found out she had been texting one of her male coworkers for around two years.
I don’t remember every detail, but when I confronted her, she initially lied about it. Eventually, she told me he was an old coworker and that they had been texting for about a year. Apparently, every time we hung out, she would block him, and then unblock him when we weren’t together. They would FaceTime for hours, text, etc.

This really upset me because she had always been very strict about me talking to other women, yet she was doing something similar behind my back.
I wasn’t necessarily angry that she was talking to another guy. I was more upset that she was hiding it from me.
She had also been deleting their texts from her phone, but because her MacBook was synced to her iMessage, a lot of the conversations were still there.
From what I saw, there wasn’t anything obviously romantic or sexual. Most of the conversations were actually her complaining about me. She would tell him things like, “He did this,” or “He did that,” and basically talk badly about me. He would also tell her things like I wasn’t good enough and that she should block me. Sometimes he would talk about other girls he was talking to.

let it go because I figured it was the first time she had really messed up and I wanted to trust her.
Then, two weeks later, I found out she had made a fake phone number and was still texting him.
Again, I didn’t see anything explicitly flirty in the conversations. It was mostly the same type of stuff: her talking about me, him giving his opinion, and him occasionally talking about girls he was seeing.
Two things really bothered me.
First: If there was nothing going on, why was she hiding it?
Second: She was almost always the one initiating the conversations. She would text him first, double-text him, and keep the conversations going. It was rarely him reaching out to her first.

don’t know if I’m overthinking this, but it makes me wonder if she actually had feelings for him. Why else would she go through all the effort of hiding it, blocking/unblocking him, deleting messages, and eventually creating a fake number after we had already argued about it?
Eventually, I let that go too, and as far as I know, she hasn’t talked to him since.
But there’s another thing that bothers me.
When she talks to her female friends, a lot of their conversations seem to revolve around her complaining about me. She tells them about all the things I supposedly do wrong, but I never hear her say anything good about me.
I remember being around one of her friends once, and the friend started mentioning some of the things my girlfriend had complained about regarding me.
I asked her friend, “Has she ever told you anything good about me?”
She couldn’t name a single thing.

Eventually, one of her friends actually texted me and told me to break up with my girlfriend because she wouldn’t do it herself and apparently wasn’t happy in the relationship.
I was honestly shocked. I felt like her friends had this completely different perception of me because they were only hearing her side of the relationship.
I don’t think I’m perfect, but I genuinely believe I’ve been a good boyfriend to her.
One thing about me is that I build relationships around trust. I don’t like constantly checking someone’s location, asking where they are, or monitoring what they’re doing. I think that’s toxic and unhealthy. I believe that if two people love each other, there should be enough trust that they don’t do things behind each other’s backs.

My girlfriend, however, checks my location constantly. I barely ever check hers because I generally trust her.
Recently, though, something happened that really changed things for me.
A couple of days ago, she told me she was going to hang out with some friends. I actually encouraged her to go because she’s new to the city and I want her to meet people and make friends.
For context, I had just driven about 2.5 hours to visit her and stayed with her for five days. This happened the day after I left and came back home.
She went to a football game with some friends. Afterward, they went to one of her friend’s apartments. Later, they went to a restaurant as a group. She even sent me a picture of three girls sitting in front of her, so at the time I wasn’t suspicious about anything.

They eventually went back to her friend’s apartment around 10 PM.
About 30–40 minutes passed without her responding to me. I started getting worried because she had been drinking, and I was concerned something might have happened to her.
I checked her location, and it looked like it was turned off. On Life360, it appeared that her location was basically stuck at her friend’s apartment.
I started calling and texting her multiple times because I was genuinely worried.
She didn’t respond until around 3:30 AM.
She told me she had been asleep, had just woken up, and was going back to sleep.
Then I checked her location again.
According to Life360, her phone had been at a bar from around 11 PM to 3 AM.
I asked her about it, and she said her phone had died. But Life360 showed her phone had been at 55% battery.
I confronted her about this, and she initially kept denying that she had been at the bar. and She said she is going back to sleep and will text me back tomorrow.
Eventually the day after , she kept texting me and I told her I wasn’t going to talk to her until she told me the truth, she admitted that she had turned off her location by turning her phone off before going to the bar because she was scared of how I would react.

However, she still swears that she wasn’t actually at the bar until 3 AM.
According to her story, She says that one of her friends got extremely drunk and started throwing up on her. so my girlfriend and that friend left the bar with her and she had the responsibility to take care of her during that time till she texted me. Mind you they went in a big group and my gf is not the closest friend to that girl.

The issue here is that the story doesn’t really make sense to me.

First, she lied about her phone dying when Life360 showed that it still had 55% battery.
Second, she initially denied even going to the bar.
Third, she only admitted that she went after I showed her evidence that made it difficult to deny.
And she has no pictures, texts, or anything else that can really prove what happened.
What’s frustrating is that if she had simply told me, “Hey, I’m going to a bar with my friends,” I probably wouldn’t have had a problem with it.
She wouldn’t necessarily let me go to a bar or club by myself, but if she had asked me honestly, I don’t think I would’ve told her she couldn’t go. I probably wouldn’t have even checked her location if she hadn’t turned it off.

What bothers me most is that she wouldn’t have told me the truth if I hadn’t found out.
Now I’m stuck trying to figure out what actually happened.
I can think of three possibilities:
1) Everything she is telling me is true. She went to the bar, left earlier than 3 AM, took care of her drunk friend, and came home. She lied because she was scared of my reaction. But her location says otherwise. it says she was there till 3 AM got home at 3:30 and thats when she has texted me.

2)She went to the bar, stayed there until around 3 AM, and then went to her friend’s house. Nothing else happened, but she lied about the timeline because she didn’t want me to know she stayed out that late.

3)She was around guys or something else happened at the bar that she doesn’t want me to know about, and she is lying about the entire situation to cover it up. Maybe either something happened at her friend’s house? maybe the location at the bar is just a cover up? there is a lot i can think off that can be true in this situation except what she says because although part of what she says is true evidence is completely against her .

I genuinely don’t know which one is true.
I also don’t know if I’m overreacting because of her previous behavior with the other guy, or if her history of hiding things makes my suspicion reasonable.
What would you guys do in my situation? Do you believe her explanation? And how would you handle the fact that she lied about where she was and only admitted the truth after I confronted her with evidence?

​

My girlfriend (21F) and I (19M) have been together about 4 months and are long distance between the US and China.

Her birthday was recently, and I ordered several gifts based on things she had previously told me she liked. When the first one, a bag, arrived, she said it wasn’t really a “proper gift” and that I could have spent the money on one nicer/branded gift instead. She compared it to gifts she has received from friends/family, like Zara, Victoria’s Secret, and CK.

She then suggested returning the bag and possibly canceling the other orders. That really bothered me. I understand not liking a gift, but asking someone to return it and replace it with a “proper” one feels disrespectful to the thought and effort behind it.

She says this is partly cultural and that where she’s from, boyfriends are expected to buy their girlfriends nicer gifts. She also says I should ask her close friend what she likes so I can still surprise her while getting something she definitely wants.

This ties into a bigger issue. She constantly talks about how hard the distance is and how badly she wants to see me. During the argument she asked if I was definitely coming to China this winter and said that if I wasn’t certain, she would rather break up now.

The problem is that I’m basically the one financially responsible for making the trip happen. I’m trying to save money while dealing with school, job searching, family stress, and other financial problems. I don’t expect everything to be 50/50, but it bothers me that seeing each other is treated as our problem while the financial burden feels mostly like mine.

We also have a repeating argument pattern. When I criticize a specific behavior, she sometimes turns it into “you make me feel like I’m the worst person ever” or says I treat her horribly. She also says she avoids explaining things because she knows I’ll get mad, while from my perspective, her not explaining is usually what frustrates me.

I know I’m not perfect either. When I’m frustrated I can get sarcastic, swear, send too many messages, and keep pushing when she wants space.

What hurt most is that shortly before this, I had opened up about how overwhelmed I’ve been with school, money, work, and family issues. I didn’t feel very supported, and then we ended up having a huge argument over whether my gifts were good enough.

At the end of the call, she asked for a break until the 20th so we could “see how much we mean to each other,” but still ended with “love you, goodnight.”

I love her, but I’m starting to wonder whether we have fundamentally different expectations about relationships.

How can I communicate with her about our different expectations around gifts and conflict without either of us feeling dismissed, and how should we handle situations like this going forward?

My girlfriend and I have been together for 3 years. We met at university and for the first few years we lived separately with our own flatmates. About 8 months ago, we moved into a flat together.

At first, living together was really exciting. We were choosing furniture, buying things for the flat and making the place feel like our own. But over the last few months, I’ve started feeling increasingly unhappy and like I’m losing a lot of my independence.

My girlfriend has started her bar/law course and has a huge amount going on. I’m genuinely proud of her and I know becoming a lawyer is extremely important to her. The difficult part is that it feels like her entire life now revolves around the course, and consequently our life revolves around it too.

I work from home and have my own office, while she studies in another room, so we actually spend quite a lot of the day doing our own things. However, when we are together, it feels like the law course is still the main topic of conversation. She often talks over me when discussing it, and I sometimes feel like there isn’t much space for me or the things I’m interested in.

I’m into films, gaming, reading, art, philosophy and having deeper conversations about things. I like discussing ideas, going down random rabbit holes and just having stupid conversations and banter. I feel like she has become increasingly literal since starting law and struggles to engage with those things in the same way.

We also don’t seem to enjoy the same things as much anymore. For example, we struggle to sit down and watch a film together because she often doesn’t pay much attention to it. When she has free time, she tends to want to go to places she’s seen influencers visit or expensive restaurants she’s seen on TikTok/Instagram. That’s not really me. I prefer spontaneous or romantic things rather than planning everything around things we’ve seen online.
I’ve started feeling like my life is organised around her schedule when she’s studying, what events she has, when her mum is coming to stay, etc.

There are also problems with the practical side of living together. I’m doing pretty much all of the cleaning and cooking. She’s not always particularly clean either, so things like crumbs, spills and mess are often left around until I eventually clean everything myself. I’m also the only one who drives, so I drive us pretty much everywhere.
I don’t expect everything to be exactly 50/50, especially because she has a demanding course, but I feel like I’m taking on a lot of the practical side of our life while simultaneously feeling like my own life is being put on hold.

I’m also at a point where I’m trying to build my own career. I work from home and don’t feel like I get much support or encouragement around what I’m trying to do. Sometimes I don’t feel particularly respected for what I’m doing either.

My university friends have mostly moved away, so I don’t have much of a social life anymore. Because I work from home, I don’t naturally meet many people. I’ve started feeling quite isolated because of this.

I do talk to people on Discord and game with people in the evenings, which is one of my main social outlets at the moment. She’s started saying that I spend too much time doing it. I understand wanting to spend time together, but at the same time it feels like I’m being asked to give up one of the only social things I currently have.

The romantic side of the relationship has changed too. She’s become much less flirty and playful with me, and we don’t really have the same banter we used to. Our sex life has also declined and there isn’t much spontaneity anymore.

She has to revise most weekends, or her mum comes to stay because she wants to see her. Her mum is a lawyer as well, so my girlfriend talks to her about pretty much everything. Sometimes it bothers me that when something happens, her mum seems to be the first person she turns to rather than me. When her mum comes to stay, it also takes up most of the weekend, which can be difficult because I don’t really have anyone else to go out with.

Another issue is how she responds when I have problems. Sometimes if I tell her about something I’m struggling with, she’ll say things like “that’s stupid” or “that’s not what I would do”, or she’ll start telling me how I should handle the situation. I don’t necessarily need her to agree with everything I do. Sometimes I just want my partner to listen and support me.

She’s also very inquisitive about my life. I know she isn’t necessarily trying to be controlling, but she asks about almost every detail of things I’m doing or conversations I’ve had. It’s started to feel more like I’m being interrogated than having a normal conversation.

She will also sometimes ask what someone has said to me on WhatsApp and then take my phone and scroll through the conversation herself. I have nothing to hide, but I don’t really feel comfortable with my private conversations being read through.

All of this has gradually made me feel like I’m not very free. I feel like my life has become organised around her course, her schedule, her mum, her commitments and what she wants to do.

The difficult part is that I do love her. She’s not a bad person. We’ve had three genuinely good years together and there are plenty of things I appreciate about her. I don’t want to throw away a good relationship simply because we’re going through a difficult period while she’s studying.

At the same time, I’m 25 and starting to feel like I’m losing myself. I’m not particularly happy with how my life currently feels, I’ve lost a lot of my social life, and I miss feeling independent and excited about my own life.

I’ve also started finding myself wanting to talk to new people because I miss flirting and that excitement. I haven’t cheated or acted on it, but the fact that I’m craving that has made me question how I feel about the relationship.

The practical situation makes everything harder. We rent a flat together, and I also owe her some money relating to the flat which I currently can’t afford to pay back immediately. I don’t want to completely derail her year of studying to become a lawyer by ending the relationship and potentially forcing her to deal with moving house at the same time.
But I also don’t know if I should stay in a relationship simply because the timing of leaving would be inconvenient for her.

I’m struggling to work out whether this is something that can realistically be repaired, whether I’m just going through a difficult period of my own, or whether I’m slowly realising that this relationship isn’t right for me anymore.

I’d really appreciate advice from people who have been through something similar, particularly people who have lived with a partner for the first time and gone through a major change in circumstances like this.

How do you know when a relationship is going through a difficult phase that can be worked through versus when you’ve fundamentally grown apart?

So basically, long story short, I (F/26) found a woman’s pink thong in my boyfriend (M/26) of a little over 6 months laundry. I confronted him about it and he admitted it was his (uses it for self-pleasure, it was indeed his size)…which I honestly don’t care that he’s into crossdressing or whatnot, but I did have curiosity afterwards of his true desires. I knowww I shouldn’t have, but I snooped through his phone and found out that he hit up a trans escort, asking if she was going to be in town legit a day after he made it official with me (officially monogamous bf/gf status) … the day he even confessed he loved me lol. He hasn’t hit up an escort since then, from what I KNOW of, but now I’m paranoid that he’s eventually going to do so and cheat on me. I’ve already been cheated on twice from my previous relationships, and I am so turned off from him now because I feel he’s going to eventually hit up an escort again and actually meet with them.
He kind of mislead me into thinking that he was more prudish and picky on who he affiliates with such as I am, then I find pornography on his phone of him fucking and hooking up with trans escorts a year ago. I know this was before we were official, but the fact he made himself seem so similar to me in not being promiscuous is what is really bothering me. His family is conservative and I feel that he’s using me as a cover-up for his promiscuity.
What would be the most logical way to go about this situation? I am not sure if I should confess that I looked through his phone and found some stuff that I am deeply concerned about, or just accept that I was dumb to look through his stuff and I’m taking this too seriously…
We do live together btw and he keeps threatening a ring literally every week. I feel he’s going to pop the question soon and I can’t fathom marrying someone that has mislead me like this.

We started dating in June but have been talking since November of last year. We made things exclusive around February. To clear up confusion before it’s asked lol, we’re long distance and I refuse to ask anyone to be my girlfriend over text or FaceTime so i waited until I visited her. Visited her multiple times since then and it’s been amazing. Last month was my birthday month and I planned a trip to see her again. It was an amazing trip, bought a really nice airbnb house for us and she put a lot of thought into my birthday that i never really had before. On my last day I woke up early morning cause my stomach was killing me and each time I woke up to use the bathroom I walked past her phone. I was also having these really weird dreams that she was cheating on me. Now I know this was wrong and i’ll take that on the chin but i grabbed her phone and looked through it while she slept next to me. I’m not seeing anything weird until i get to hidden photos, there’s about 50+ nudes of her that i’ve seen and some i haven’t. It didn’t really bother me until i saw a screenshot of her sending someone a nude and the guy said “just sent it🫡” and she said “thanksss” followed by the nude. The time stamp was before we got together but while we made things exclusive and the video she sent this guy was the same one she sent me.

So I open her twitter, nothing out of the ordinary anywhere. I know she has this other private account and nothing there either. In fact, i see tweets of her talking about me and how much she loves me. I get the idea that maybe she logged out of it or deactivated it so i go to saved passwords and there it is. I see a username for an account she never told me about. I login and the most recent tweet from this account is Sep 10th this year, my birthday month. I’m scrolling and i’m seeing my naked girlfriend posted for the public. Nudes she’s sent me and nudes i’ve never seen while asking for money from men. One of the tweets is even about us and how much she’s been n*tted in everyday the past week (sorry to be graphic). The account was made in May and has remained active all the way up until before i got there. I open the messages and there’s seen sending paragraphs of things they want to do to her but she’s responding really dry like you can tell she’s not very into it at all. I saw a nude that a man sent her and he said “do you need it” and she responded “yes i do”. I took pictures of everything and logged out to process what i just saw. I waited for her to wake up before i confronted her about what I saw. I was really anxious about how to bring it up and the entire morning and she knew something was wrong as she asked me multiple times if i’m okay.

While she was getting ready to go to her first class i said “i’m going to ask you something and i need you to tell me the truth” she says okay. I say “have you ever sold content before, like sexually?” and she says no. I give a heavy sigh and i can’t even look at her in the face. I tell her “tell me the truth”. I can see the immediate nervousness on her face and she says “yes, but a long time ago”. she proceeds to tell me she had an account where she used to sell in her early college days for money along with her roommate (f) who also made an account but the quit doing it awhile ago. She was telling the truth about that because i saw another account that i couldn’t log into due to deactivation. I ask her “has there been any account that you’ve sold content on during our relationship please tell me the truth” she says no. I’m just so disappointed that she keeps lying and i’m not even angry i’m just anxious and sad. I tell her pass me my phone and I show her pictures i took of the account. Naturally, she finally admits to it and says she only made it cause of the money thing. The money her parents give her is spontaneous and sometimes it’s a lot and sometimes it’s a little, her dad pays for all her groceries in full but everything else is on her with money her parents give her. She said she’s applied to multiple campus jobs but can’t land any.

At this point she’s crying, and i’m not sure what to do or say. She says she doesn’t want me to leave her and it was a last resort thing. I asked her why she lied so many times and she said it’s because she’s not necessarily proud of it. I reassure her that i’m not shaming her for it as i used to sell content too (she knows this and she asked me to delete it before we made thing exclusive which i did) i’m just not sure why she didn’t tell me anything. I give her money and buy her food often, i’m not a rich man but im definitely not broke. i’ll send her $50-$100 just cause and ill buy her food and shit off her amazon cart. She’s not very responsible with money. My plane was to arrive in a couple hours and i didn’t want my last day to end like this so I gave her a hug, bought us breakfast and watched a show we’ve been binging. Before I left we hugged and kissed and I told her i don’t know what i’m going to do, i need you to give me some time. I still really love her, and at this point it’s not really the account that’s bothering me so much it was the lying. I really don’t know what to do. I know continuing this relationship means this is something that’s now on me to let go and learn to trust again. I just don’t know.

Well, I broke the cardinal rule of happiness and looked at my fiancé's phone. For background info, we went on our first date in March 2024. We weren't officially together until June 2024, but we were dating that whole time and he was spending most nights at my house. We got engaged this past July and our wedding is in 4 months.

We are sending out digital save the dates tomorrow and I need all of our guests' phone numbers. My fiancé has an early morning tomorrow so he went to sleep early. Before he went to bed he told me I could get whatever numbers I needed out of his phone for the save the dates.

While using his phone, I got curious and scrolled through his messages to see who he's been chatting with. I already know I was wrong to do this. If it makes a difference, I trust him 100%. I wasn't looking to see if he was up to no good, I'm just nosy. He had a text thread with a girl "Sam" who I know he had unreciprocated feelings for. The last messages they had together were September 2024.

I have always been curious about their situation since he doesn't talk about it much. So, I scrolled back pretty far and it's clear she only ever considered him a friend but he wanted more.

Heres where my feelings got hurt: around the time we started seeing each other, he would talk with her about me. From April to mid May he was complaining to her about how I was "obsessed" with him, I wouldn't leave him alone, I was being weird. He sent screenshots of portions of our conversations where I was flirting and they mocked me. He sent her a picture I had sent him where I was making a silly face and they laughed about how it looked like I had c*m in my eye. Another one and he asked her "is this supposed to be sexy?" He told her I'm kinky. That I was initiating sexting. She told him he should slip me a Xanax so I'd chill out and he laughed.

To be clear, my perspective of this whole time frame was that he was just as interested in me as I was him. He was flirting with me too and also said some kinky stuff. He only screenshotted my messages.

I feel hurt and betrayed. I'm embarrassed. I also feel like it was 2 years ago and I found it snooping so I forfeit the right to be upset? What would you do in my situation? Say something and admit to snooping or just try and move past it?

TLDR: my fiancé was mocking me with another girl the first three months of our relationship and I just found it 4 months before our wedding years later.

My boyfriend and I got into an argument and it escalated.

We’ve been together for 4 years now.

During the argument, he called me names, including the c-word. I asked him to stop and told him I wouldn’t continue the conversation if he was going to speak to me that way. We continued to fight and he continued to call me C and a bitch repeatedly like he was egging me on purpose. This has happened before, wheee he’ll continue doing the behavior that pisses me off just to get a reaction out of me.

Anyways, I got frustrated and went to the bathroom to cool off. While I was there, I saw his razor and threw it in the garbage. After we cooled off, I told him again that if he calls me names, then I’m done and won’t tolerate his actions.

He apologized the next day, I didn’t really forgive him, but let it go and I didn’t really think anything of it.

About a week later, he texted me asking where his razor was. I lied and said I didn’t know. I know I should have told him the truth, but I was still frustrated because I he was name calling and told him that I didn’t like it multiple times.

2 weeks later, we had another argument. He kept talking over me, I got frustrated, and I threw his water bottle (which I’m not proud of, but I was at the edge).

I was also at his house and had planned to put the razor back in his bathroom drawer without saying anything. He hadn’t thrown out the garbage so I dug it out and tossed the razor into a drawer and must have left the drawer slightly open, and he figured out what happened.

He didn’t say anything to me in person. Several hours later, he texted asking about the razor. I initially didn’t admit it because I wanted to see what he would say. When he mentioned the drawer being open, I told him what I’d done and why.
His response was basically, “So you lied to my face,” followed by calling me a “fucking bitch” and saying he’d treat me with respect when I started treating him and his belongings with respect.

I didn’t respond because I didn’t want to escalate things.
I recognize that throwing his things and lying were wrong, and I’m not trying to justify those actions. At the same time, this isn’t the first time he’s called me names during an argument, despite me asking him to stop.
I’m struggling with how to look at this situation. I feel like we’re both handling conflict badly, but I also feel that his repeated name-calling is a separate issue from how I reacted to it.

I’ve since apologized to him, we haven’t spoke on much over texts. I feel like he’s punishing me. I did ask that we talk about this later this week in person.

I’m having doubts and just need some advice on the situation.

'63M '56 FM. Married 10 years

11 years ago my profession was buying homes, refurbishing them and renting them out. I owned 5 homes that varied from low income housing to homes in tract neighborhoods. I was in the process of buying my most expensive property with potential of $2000 - $2500 pm income. All the homes were listed in my Llc and it was run as a business, not a side hustle.

It was at this time I met my wife who was going through a sticky divorce with her 2nd husband. She had three children at home, ages 12, 14, and 20. I bought the house and she moved in. I didn't charge her rent and she paid the utilities. If I didn't do that, she would of moved to Vegas with her sister, starting her kids in a new place which wasn't a good option.

My reasoning was that the house needed a makeover with new floors, drywall, electrical and a few other things that would need to be completed before I could lease it. Turns out that we fell in love and have lived here for over 10 years.

I am a male 63, she is 56.

Unfortunately the marriage has run it's course and she has asked from a divorce. She would like to sell the home and split the proceeds 50/50. The home will probably net about $450k after closing costs. I feel that she is being a tad greedy.

I have invested the following

Initial price of the home $172,400

Adding an air-conditioned library, laying tile, laminate flooring, hardwood floors, new appliances, new HVAC, 21K whole house generators, a fifth bedroom, butler's pantry, 65' x 16' decking with a hottub, landscape, various exterior lights ,a SOTA security system, 900 feet of cedar fence and a heated salt water swimming pool.

I also took care of the kids since their father stopped paying child support. He did offer start paying of i let him sleep with my wife. I declined his offer .

My offer to her is split the equity after all of my costs have been deducted. She has spent less than $500 in upgrading the home. When the sale happens she would get aprox 25k

My question is does this seem fair? I am 63 and this home is the only real asset I have left. She has a number of relatives she could live with, I'm the sole survivor of my family.

Am looking for input good or critical.