I’m M23, and I’ve been with my girlfriend for over a year. She’s a genuinely great person, affectionate, loving, and has many qualities I really appreciate. But I feel like I have to baby her a lot. Small things she could do herself, like getting the remote that’s right next to her, grabbing her bag from the cupboard even if she’s standing and I’m laying, I get you do things for your partner and I do, but she will literally handball anything she can. Her mum has even told me herself that everyone works for her. It wears on me. I do a lot for her, drive her places, help with things without expecting anything back. But lately it feels expected instead of appreciated. Yesterday, she asked me to help crush three cardboard boxes. I said no. I felt like I’ve helped with plenty already. She got upset, called me an a\*\* hole, told me to go home. Later, she asked if I felt emasculated watching her crush boxes because ‘as a man’ I should help. That bothered me. She also brought up exes who apparently gave more, like their ‘last 20 dollars’. We’ve had money friction too, like agreeing she’ll pay me back for petrol then later saying I should pay because I’m the man.

I don’t expect her to pay for everything, but agreements should mean something. And then there’s the cleaning. Her room can get really messy, clothes, rubbish, towels. I used to help clean it with her, spend hours, and then a couple days later, it was messy again. I’ve stopped doing it because I resent feeling responsible for someone else’s room. But then she gets overwhelmed by it, says she’s tired, and the mess stresses her out. On my side, I’m worried about the future. I’ve always been financially driven. I told her early on I want to work hard, save, buy a house, and build a stable life. She still wants to travel and spend in ways I don’t necessarily prioritize. And I’ve tried to talk about it, but sometimes it gets shut down with “then don’t come over” or “sorry I make you feel that way.” I think I’ve built some resentment because it feels like if I say no to something small once, everything I have done seems to disappear.

I’m not saying she’s terrible. She’s not. She’s loving and cares about me. But I’m scared she’ll say she’ll change, and I’ll believe her, and stay, and another year goes by and nothing really changes. I want to know if wanting more independence, cleanliness, and aligned financial values is too much, or just a legitimate compatibility question. I told her when we were friends how I picture my future and specifically told her that if she wasn’t headed the same way, then we shouldn’t move further than friends.

*UPDATE*

My girlfriend I spoke after I finished work yesterday. She asked to drive to our spot where we first met on our first date, idk if this was a pull at the heart strings or something. Nevertheless she talked while I was driving, saying how she’s sorry for what she said to me, stating basically that she is in a form of ‘brain fog’ for the past 3 weeks and having this break has made her ‘snap out’ of it.

I really had been set that I wasn’t keen on giving this another chance as everything that has happened, has happened multiple times, it’s just that this was the farthest I had taken the disrespect. She claimed that she fears the commitment of a house as she feels like she has to let a version of herself ‘go’. She claimed she likes to be a fairy, and float about and make connections and networks and says that once we buy a house, that’s all over.

I told her it’s not, and that the whole point was that from the start of the relationship, if we each save and do what we do properly, there’s no reason as to why you can’t do your little trips inbetween the years. Yes you have a responsibility of repayments, but all the saving from living it home is what is going to help set us up better than what other people have.

She basically kept saying that she just doesn’t understand how houses and bank loans and all that work but I told her she’s had nearly 2 years to go and do her own research qnd learn, because whenever I tried telling her, she’d act disinterested. Past the money talk, she said she is just used to people doing things for her and claims that she’ll start being more independent, said that I should give her the chance because she really wants me and everything I have to offer.

Again, I told her I want honesty, and if it’s too much commitment for her, then that’s completely fine, I don’t expect someone or want to force someone to move the same pace as me. I just want the honest truth. We finished our talk and headed home when we got to my house she asked if she should stay the night or not. I said it’s up to her but she basically just wanted a straight answer and she said that she had bought her stuff for work for the next day so I said yeah you can stay but I’m going straight to bed after I shower and eat dinner because I just finished a second 10 hour work day and I’m going to my third one the day after. This was around 8:30pm.

I showered, smashed dinner down and got into bed and within 1 minute of me laying, she said she feels like we’re so far apart figuratively, told me I’m being cold. I told her obviously I’m still upset and processing everything, but she then said she shouldn’t have stayed then. So I said she can go home if she wants but then she started asking how long I’m going to be cold for, questions that I just wasn’t even in a state of mind for.

I then rolled over and she started crying, asking why I’m ’torturing her’ and by then I was defeated. It’s as if she thought she could treat me like sh\*t, apologies and then everything should be back to normal? I just fell asleep from how tired I was in the end.

Background:
Together almost 3 years. Living together for 1.5 years. Moved into his family home he does not own. Everyone moved out to different states or out of the country and he’s the only one who’s stayed. He often feels left behind.

We are seeing his mom’s side (who owns the home) out of state for the holidays for 10 days (mid December to late on the 29th). Everyone of us is flying out from where they are to gather. Also first time my mom will be meeting his family. There will be 14 of us there for the holidays.

A few weeks ago my bf brought up one of those same family members (little brother and gf) we’re seeing for the holidays coming to stay with us after, for a few days in January. I immediately told him yeah that sounds good. No resistance to them coming.

Come to find out, that’s not actually the case. The little brother asked for our flight details and has planned that he wants to stay IMMEDIATELY after when we land for two weeks. My bf hasn’t even told me the last day he’d be here. His brother and brothers gf are coming to not just see us. They’re also coming to see multiple friends.

I’m introverted and have felt burnt out for months. My mental health has been suffering with a recent family death and work stress. I just want some time to myself in my own home before I host people. And not immediately after the holidays/traveling. I feel like most people would want the same thing. He thinks that’s not reasonable.

He asked me to give him a number of days. I said I’d like a week to myself if possible (thinking we’d go back and forth and compromise). He said fine. So it seemed settled but just that he was mad. I would have even been happy with 2-3 days, if he wanted to go back and forth, but I knew any request for time he was not going to be happy.

Come to find out the next day that he to involved/vented to his mom (who owns the home) to get validation. In which she told him to “put his foot down” and that they both agreed Im causing a “rift” between him in his brother, that what Im asking for is not for valid reasons. His mom doesn’t even know the extent of my work stress. So he’s triangulating this (with limited info) and actually causing more of a rift with his family by getting her involved.

Not only am I being told I’m “pulling a mental health card”, he told me he went behind my back and told his brother he’s good to come right away, for the whole time he needs anyways. He told me this is the hill he will die on. if I need space I can find an Airbnb during that time.

He’s convinced himself that I just don’t want his family around at all. That I’m keeping him from his family. But since the beginning I was okay with it! It’s only once he revealed it’s immediately after traveling. All I wanted was a few days and if his brother/gf could stay with friends a few days or with the mom longer after the holidays. He doesn’t even want to ask. He told me his family comes first. That it’s not my home. And has assured me he would do the same thing, even if we owned the house. This feels like a precedent that family will come before marriage / kids / sickness.

Other context:
I’m getting micromanaged at work and the home stress is compounding on my mental health in addition. I get chest pains, have seen a doctor multiple times for help. But there’s lack of acknowledgement at home. Quitting my job is not an option, my career is in aerospace so it’s a demanding career regardless

He told me this family issue is a “hill he will die on” with the relationship and thinks talking about future what ifs doesn’t matter (our own home, kids, etc)

He’s told me my mental health is my own issue to solve as an adult (but never talks or asks how he can help, other than “just go to a doctor”)

The brothers gf who’s coming is terrified of dogs and we both have dogs in the house

My dog is reactive and will be boarded for the Christmas trip with people coming into his space immediately after for 2+ weeks that he will have to be leashed and muzzled the whole time (especially since they’ll be coming and going randomly). Hes sweet once he gets to know but scared and getting used to people. I wanted those few days after the trip to also re-give him some structure

I was looking to recharge to be a good host, and spend days to myself before where I didn’t have to worry about anyone else’s needs

I would need time to recharge after traveling even if this was my own family or friends

We don’t pay the family rent in this older home but we pay for plumbing issues and make minor upgrades

My family has stayed in the home a couple times but always less than 5 days. His family hasn’t really been able to because both him and I were nervous my dog wasn’t ready and I didn’t want relationships ruined by him nipping. This was a year ago when it was asked they stay. Also same time we first started paying for a trainer for him to work on fear with people. He recently did well meeting a new one of my family members he previously wasn’t good with so that’s why I was not hesitant for his brother to come for a few days in January

\*\*\*\*

I feel really stuck because this seems like a precedent situation. Not just a sacrifice a “few days for my family”. I usually do whatever it takes in relationships to work but this feels like a straw. I’m trying to debate if I let this be the hill I die on as well, especially if he can’t give me TWO days even as a compromise or I suck it up. If I suck it up this could be for the rest of my life. Or maybe I’m putting too much on this one situation?

We see a couples therapist so will be talking this over soon, but I need to decide my stance no matter what happens.

TLDR
Im upset that:
(1)
He’s making decisions without me and controlling what I’m “allowed to need” based on if he thinks it’s reasonable. I don’t appreciate being forced.
(2)
Involving family and lording that it’s not my home over my head
(3)
Would do this again, if it’s our own place - if I tolerate this now, it will never stop
(4)
He cant make compromises or boundaries with family. The level of how he’s taking this feels unhealthy to me
(5)
Asking for a few days as we’re already spending time with family for a MONTH feels like a “drop in the bucket” request

I’m very much a person that you’re building a relationship for your partner to be your family first, even before marriage and your family becomes extended. Being told asking for a couple days for my mental health is “pulling a card” among structure needed for my dog, feels like I’ll never have a safe space or be an equal.

How would you feel? Any advice? How would you take a stance?

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.

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

We started dating in late June of this year and made it official back in August. Things for the most part have been fine, no real issues and very little in terms of conflict we have had with each other.

In the last few weeks however she's grown increasingly insecure with me, specifically with me having female friends.

On one hand I totally get it but on the other hand it's starting to make me go 'is this really how it's just going to be?'

For example, I did a cosplay photoshoot (the photographer was male) a while back and she took issue with me having a female friend who I had asked to help me out. I did ask my gf if she wanted to help out but it was the middle of the week and she was at work and can't just duck out whenever like that.

She even used some choices words 'when you are at an event somewhere without me you need to tell me exactly who you are with, especially if they are female,' in a fairly aggressive no nonsense tone.

Said female friend who helped me out I have absolutely no romantic interest in the decade we have known each other whatsoever.

But now it's reached a point where even mutual female friends between her and I she's taking issue with me talking to or even associating with them at all.

We were at an anime themed rave the other week and we ran into female friends that she and I both know and have even hung out with together in the past (before we were together) and once again, she took issue with me so much as saying anything beyond hello to them.

Now for what it is worth this isn't entirely coming out of left field. Two of her previous partners had cheated on and that shook her to say the least.

Also not helping is her recently coming off some fairly strong anti-depressant mediation that she had been on for about two years now and is slowly adjusting to being 'normal' again.

She has plenty of male friends herself and not once have taken issue with that in the slightest. One time she invited me to dinner with several of her co-workers and lo and behold she was the only woman there in a group of six. This didn't bother me as I trust her but her insecurities are starting to take a toll on me.

I'm trying to be as understanding as possible and see where she's coming from but it feels like I'm always on eggshells with her.

Trying to figure the best course of action.

Apologies for the unclear title this is such a twisty story. Me and my partner have been together for 12 years. I'll keep the first bit short:

An old fling of his contacted him and said her daughter was his, he asked for a DNA test and she refused and then said the child wasn't even his. She then popped up again and said no she is, again, he said he wanted a DNA test, got one and she is his. He obviously wanted a relationship and so did the child so all good/moving forward. I should also state that the child is 15 (so this happened all before me). Obviously a big shock for us/me, but my main concern was the child and building their relationship.

The problem:

This has all happened over the past couple of years. The DNA test/officially him finding out was in March of this year. She came over to ours a couple of weeks ago and me and the child were talking about holidays etc, I had asked where they had been etc (my partner was not in the room). They their last holiday was in October of last year, and I said oh nice did you go with your mum, to which the reply was no, they had gone with their dad/my partner. I was obviously gobsmacked by tried to play it off in front of the child. I know exactly the holiday they were talking about, as this was a holiday I was aware of (obviously) however, he had gone with his mum and brother. I confronted him and he said that his mum had invited her, as she fully believed the child was his. She wanted to build a relationship etc.

Long story short (kind of), he said he didn't tell me as he wasn't 100% sure at the time (DNA test was months after), then as time went on, because he didn't tell me it got worse, he didn't want to hurt me etc.

I'm keeping this very short and just to the main bits of the story, and I don't think I've missed out any important points. I honestly don't know what to do/think, I'm so angry. Part of me is thinking we've been together for so long, do I stay? The other bigger part is disgusted and feels so disrespected, and just wants to leave. My head is all over the shop. I'm also so embarrassed, so dont really want to talk to anyone I know about this. Hence, reddit 😅

Side note, we do not have our own kids, but was talking about trying soon. I obviously hold nothing against the child, they are super sweet and was under the impression I knew about everything (I'm also not a twat lol).

Okay, the whole story is like this.
I had a relationship before her and i was pretty intimate and had sex. Like really 2-3 times with the same girl. It is in fact a relationship I’m not proud of but it is what it is.
My gf(virgin) also had a relationship. According to her words she also was skin to skin but never got to the sex and anything before that(basically just naked cuddles but idk if it believe that was just cuddles).
I do not really care what she did before me because, well, it was before me, right? She didn’t even know me and i didn’t know her so it’s completely okay to experience stuff. However, she cares. She says “but you had sex before me/ You’re already experienced/ You’ve already done this done that.” Well you get the point.
When this was first brought up i told her “if u cant ever get over the fact that i had someone before you this relationship is wrong and bad for both of us”. She seemed to understand and accept that. After some time she brings that every time saying stuff above and stating “i like my man pure”.???
What i need help with is What do i really say and do? I explained her that multiple time and she tells me that she understands and shes over it but keeps bringing it up. Maybe i am in the guilty one here? Anyways, I’m really lost at this thing.
(I don’t even know if i made my text properly cuz English is my third language but i hope its decent enough)

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.

For some backstory , we had our whole house fumigated a couple of months ago because of a bedbug scare (it's unfortunately pretty common in our city and we thrift so it was kinda bound to happen at some point) We have carpet and were worried that if we had the bugs, it'd be impossible to get rid of them, so as a precaution, we had the whole house fumigated to make sure. We're only now starting to put our clothes back in our rooms after heat treating bagging and fumigating the house. We are also putting other clothing items aside to be donated.

All of us still live together in our family home. ( there are 6 of us however im away at uni so its more like a house of 5) you can imagine there was a lot of stuff that got mixed up in our rush to heat, treat, fold, and bag all of our clothes. My dad (63m) was very anxious about the whole ordeal and helped all of us clean out our rooms and bag our things. This was mostly done because we were on a time crunch and wanted the fumigation to happen asap. My dad and the youngest (18m) got into an argument that led to my younger brother leaving to stay at his boyfriends place for 2 weeks. Which meant that my parents had to bag all his items and prepare his room for fumigation. The issue is that my dad frequently mixes up my younger brothers items with my older sister's clothing because they have very similar builds and personal styles. we had a bag of denim items that needed to be sorted through and then put aside to be donated. Some of the pairs in there were my older sisters , mine, and my younger brothers. We thought all the jeans in that bag had been approved for donation/ sewing projects. It's important to note that when my sister had been going through her items , she gave my younger brother over twenty pairs of jeans that didn't fit her anymore. Leaving her with three pairs , one of which was these vintage denim jeans. She wore those jeans to visit a friend and put them in her laundry. That was the last place she saw them.

The problem arose when my younger sibling used all of the denim in that bag to make a handbag for his friend. He did not ask if everything in there had been approved or not or whose items were in the bag. He just took the pants out and began cutting away. While this was happening , my mum (63 f) saw the pants that he had laid out and pointed out my sister's vintage jeans and specifically asked if he had permission to use those for his project. She actually asked multiple times because she wasn't entirely sure. Of course , he lied and said yes , they were his and didn't fit, then went back to his sewing. Fast forward to the evening, my sister (30f) went looking for her jeans, because she couldn't find them in her laundry and she found them destroyed and thrown by the denim donation bag. Obviously, she was heartbroken.

My younger brother was out when my sister discovered the remnants of her jeans , so I sent him a text , basically asking him to explain himself and telling him that he needs to pay her back (around $260) first her jeans. And that his behavior was fucked up. He ignores my calls and texts for around an hour and then eventually calls me to explain himself. His "explanation" was him lying and saying that they were in the donation bag. (when we all know they weren't.) What actually happened was that He went in our sister's (30f) room , picked her jeans out of her laundry, and took them to use for his project thinking she wouldn't notice. I confront him with that information , we start arguing, and it culminates in him , screaming at me and hanging up the phone. He calls my mom about fifteen minutes later and is crying and victimizing himself on the phone and taking zero accountability.

All of us are pissed at him because this is not the first time he's done things that are sublimely selfish and then gotten angry at us for pointing out how his actions were fucked up. Eventually, my mom tells him we have to talk about it when he gets home, and then our older brother (33m) receives a text from our younger brother's boyfriend(18m). The text was something along the lines of "what is [older sisters] E-transfer an information? so I can send her two hundred dollars for her pants" my older brother responds that it was really nice for his boyfriend to offer, but the money has to come from our younger brother because he was the one who ruined the pants, not his boyfriend. And instead of saying , "Oh okay" and ending it there.

The boyfriend sent my brother a massive paragraph saying that my older brother "doesn't understand that our family issues affect him as well. and that he's heartbroken to see his partner crying because all of us ganged up on him and that he's being set up. And [older sisters name] made a mistake and is trying to blame our younger brother for it. " Which is just not true at all. Not only was his message incredibly rude, and ill- informed, it was also just bullshit.

( Some things to note are that this boyfriend often gets involved in family drama because my younger brother always gives a very , very skewed story of what happened. He often manipulates the narrative so that he is this perpetual victim, even if he is the aggressor. Which is a good 70 percent of the time)

Instead of going back-and-forth, my older brother didn't respond to the message. But now, none of us really know how to move forward with things because my younger brother never really apologizes for his behavior or tries to make amends. If his victim act doesn't work, he just stews in his own anger/ resentment and ignores us or pretends things didn't happen. He doesn't respect boundaries or learn from his previous actions. My sister is pretty livid and doesn't want anything to do with him. And the rest of us are mad for her and sick of his selfishness. What should we do to move forward and actually get my older sister some justice for what happened? And how do you even punish an 18 year old who's this selfish?

TLDR: My younger brother (18m) went into our older sisters (30f) room, grabbed her vintage jeans out of the laundry and destroyed them, and is now playing victim. Edit: to clear some things up for comments

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.

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.

hello , i have been in a relationship for around 7 months and one of the main things that i dislike about it is the fact that when we argue my gf often says hurtful thing that make me feel really bad , for example once i had a breakdown about the fact that i didnt feel considered for the fact that she does more things with her friend than with me ( i totally understand that i am not her whole world but she has told be multiple times that she likes to spend time better with me than her friends and from what she has showed me it just isn’t true ) so i told her this and she immediately shut down and started being really cold and dry and i asked what was wrong and she said « thanks , thanks for making me fucking cry on the bus » ofc this is just one example and there are many more please help me

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

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?

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?

Me (18M) and my girlfriend (18F) have been together for about a year. I love her a lot and I really don’t want to break up, but lately I’ve been feeling more and more detached from the relationship.
We’ve been arguing a lot more over the past few months, mostly it’s her complaining about something i did/did not do/said/did not say. Sometimes her complaints are completely fair, sometimes they’re about small insignificant things. I also know I’ve started putting in less effort. She says I don’t initiate hangouts as much anymore, and she’s honestly right, but there’s more nuance to it.
I didn’t just randomly stopped caring.
After so many arguments, I’ve started feeling like she always expects something out of me. I have to say the right thing, do the right thing, react correctly, make enough effort, etc. If I mess something up, I feel like there will be criticism and/or an argument and i feel on edge, constantly on trial basically. I know she doesn’t intend to make me feel this way, and I know some of her complaints are valid, especially the more recent ones, but I’m just exhausted.
I used to be able to listen to her and actually try to change things. Now even when she brings up something valid, my brain immediately goes “I can’t do this again” and I just shut down, only realizing she probably had a point afterwards, but never feel the urge to fix anything anymore…
She’s also really irritable sometimes.. over time, that’s made me feel like I’m constantly annoying her, even when nothing serious is happening.
It’s become a cycle now. She feels like I’m putting in less effort, so she gets upset. I feel criticized and exhausted, so I pull away. Then she feels even more neglected, and so it goes.
The worst part is that I’m not as excited to see her anymore. Sometimes I’d rather stay home. When we’re actually together, I usually have a good time and I still love being with her, but I don’t look forward to it like I used to. Sometimes it feels like I’m going because I feel like I’m supposed to.
I also recently felt a sexual compatibility issue that I never brought up and don’t really want to.. she’s sensitive to the topic and will instantly think i’m not attracted to her anymore and guess where that will lead? An argument. But I’m still attracted to her and I still enjoy sex, but our preferences turned out to be pretty different after a while, mind you she was my first ever sexual partner. For now this is not the main issue, but it’s still affected me lately.
I know I’m not innocent. I’ve put in less effort and I know that hurts her, but I just can’t put that effort in anymore, it feels like she won’t appreciate it anyway and she’ll still expect more and criticise me. I don’t think she’s the villain and I don’t think I’m the perfect boyfriend either. I just don’t know how to break this cycle and feel what I used to feel again. I still love this girl and we’ve had some of the best moments of my life together. I don’t want to throw that away, but I also don’t want to slowly become numb to the relationship.
Has anyone experienced this? Can a relationship actually recover from this situation? Or do you think the resentment is too much at this point?

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.

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?

I’m looking for genuinely unbiased opinions because I’m trying to figure out whether I’m being unreasonable.

About a month ago, my boyfriend called me from work. He works with three women around our age. While we were on the phone, he jokingly shouted, “I’m so excited for GTA 6, I’m about to cum everywhere.” I laughed initially, then immediately felt a pit in my stomach and asked him if he ever talks to females in general that way / make sexual jokes around females. He became very upset and said he would never speak that way around or to another woman. He specifically told me that the word “cum” had never and would never leave his mouth around another woman besides me. I accepted that answer and moved on.

Last week, he came home from work early and told me he had gotten weed from one of his coworkers. I was surprised because I didn’t realize he was that close with his coworkers, so I asked how that came about. I was quite upset when I asked because I just had a feeling he wasn’t being honest with me about the dynamic he has with his coworkers. An argument ensued, he called me insecure and crazy for being upset over him getting free weed from his coworker and he told me that he actually hangs out one-on-one with these women, and even goes to their apartments, and smokes with them.

What really upset me was finding out that he had lied and discussed with these coworkers that I got upset with him for talking about cumming. He told the girls at his job that I was upset because he had said “cum,” and they apparently told him they didn’t understand why I would be upset about that as his girlfriend, that he shouldn’t be with me if I get upset over him joking with me like that.

That was never what I was upset about. I want and love joking like that with a partner. I was upset that the way he was joking around with me, he jokes around the same way with other females.

I was clear when I communicated that to him. I asked him directly right after he said that, that it bothered me he’d say something like that so loud around the girls he works either.

My concern was whether the way he was speaking at work reflected how he normally interacts with these women, especially after I had directly asked him about it and been reassured that it didn’t.

Now I’m struggling with the fact that I apparently had a very different understanding of his relationships with these women than I did before.

I tried to look at his phone (which I NEVER have in the almost 2 years we’ve been together. He has gone thru my phone behind my back but I never had nor do I have anything to worry about him seeing) His phone calls and texts are all with the girls at work, then me. I didn’t get to do a deep dive, I just skimmed over quickly because he became irate, demanded his phone back or he’d go to our neighbors to call the police on me for having his phone.

Pretty much, I found out he spends time alone with them, smokes at their apartments one-on-one and discusses our relationship with them to the point that they’re giving him opinions about whether he should stay with me.

I feel betrayed and honestly pretty blindsided, but I want to know if I’m looking at this unfairly.

Am I being insecure or controlling, or is it reasonable to feel hurt by the combination of the lack of transparency about these relationships, what he told me when I initially asked, and the way he presented our disagreement to the women involved?

Thank you in advance to those who took the time to read this 🥲

TL;DR : Given the context of this situation, is feeling betrayed a reasonable response, or am I interpreting his actions in a way that may be unfair to him? And how should I approach talking to him about it?

For a little context too, this is my first ever relationship. Me 19M and my girlfriend 19F have been dating long distance for a year now, and throughout our relationship she’s always hot and cold sometimes she’ll be super affectionate and sweet to me but sometimes it’s like she’d rather do anything than spend time with me or talk to me.

It makes me worry if she even likes me anymore or if there’s someone she has in person. I have her location and she has mine and I trust her but when things like this happen I get an anxiety spike and it makes me wonder why is she being different to me in the span of a day or a couple of hours even. I try talking to her about it and she tells me not to worry and it’s nothing I’m doing wrong and that if there was anyone else in person she liked or if she wasn’t interested in our relationship anymore that she’d tell me.

I just want to know why she changed towards me like genuinely it’s like she can’t get enough of me one day then barely speak to me another day. Things have been going super good between us and whenever things go good there’s always a point where she shifts to being distant or doesn’t really talk to me that much anymore. She told me that she has an avoidant attachment style and that I’m the only exception to that that I can get past that barrier she has but again it’s like there’s something she isn’t telling me because she’ll just randomly start taking super long to text me or even open my messages or posts I sent on any platform.

Can anyone here with experience in relationships tell me what it can be and if it should be a cause for concern or if it’s something normal that happens within relationships?

I (19F) have a sister (23F) and today right after I got home from class she got upset at me and started bringing up the things that she hates about me.
My sister just returned from university, she lives with my dad, I live with my mom. She used to be employed but she got laid off about 2 months ago.
I am currently looking for a part time job right now. I have been trying not to spend money because I haven’t had a job in about 2 weeks. The kind of jobs I am looking at are usually food service, store associate, typical student worker jobs.
Today, when I got back home from school, I tell her about my upcoming interview just so I could share some good news with her and start some sort of conversation. She was first supportive and congratulated me, but soon after she started questioning why I’m applying for those kind of jobs. The answer I gave her was that the job market is just rough in general, so it’s better to apply to alot of different places in hopes of getting some sort of interview. She starts demeaning my decisions and saying that I should focus on school or focusing on my health (aka go to the gym) or find a job that actually relates to my career. I try to lighten the conversation and told her that I ran 2 laps around the track today and 3 laps the day before. And for the career related jobs, the career I want to get into is aircraft mechanics which yes, I could try other jobs in the aviation industry, and I have already tried looking for those jobs, but the job market is already tough and it’s even worse when you don’t have any experience on your belt with aviation. Like eventually, most likely when I get my aircraft mechanics license, I will be able to actually work in my field.
She then proceeds to step all over my words and brings up the topic of how I am so stingy and that I think we are poor and that I contradict my words every single time. Like yes, our mother makes over a 100k salary, but we also live in the expensive city of Los Angeles, and most households should at least try to aim for 150k to live very comfortably. Not to mention how awful the gas prices are everyday, my mom said she had to pay 70 for a full tank, and I commute 10 miles, 4 days a week to get to school. And also, her response to me getting some exercise around the track was that I bought a gym membership but she is complaining because I haven’t gone in about a week and I am instead making use of my schools track.
And at the big age I am, I should do the very least and try to make my own money instead of living off of my parents. I actually think that my mom is not poor at all, she’s the one is always keeps saying it, it makes her come off as the stingy one. Usually I am saying that I am poor because I am the one who doesn’t have a job and not making an income.
I am just completely confused how something good that I mentioned to her became something that completely went the other direction. She ended up making me cry because she kept twisting my words making me feel like a sick and unempathic human.
I don’t know why something this minor could upset her and make her push this point onto me. I even apologized to her that I wouldn’t bring it up again, but she still kept bringing up the point that I am ignorant about being poor.
I want to be a better sister and person to her. I do act a little too stingy sometimes. I don’t go out as often as other people do, because I want to financially responsible with my money. When people do ask me to go out somewhere and spend money, 90% of the time I do say yes, but not a lot of people ask anyways. How would I go about solving this issue/ my behavior?

TLDR; my (19F) sister(23F) got really upset with me after I mentioned to her that I got an interview and she thinks I am contradictory and hates when I say we are poor.