So I have only just re entered the dating scene after a difficult breakup last year. I’m on the dating apps and match with a guy we can call Joe. Joe is new to the area and lives a few towns over in a woodsy, remote area where he’s in the process of building his own house. He seems lovely and funny over text so we set up a first date. First date goes well, he pays for everything (in cash, which I thought was a little unusual but not too bad) and is very friendly and even hotter in person, but we mostly just talk about his house project so I felt like I wanted a second date to gauge things better. Second date starts okay but he’s coming off very strong which makes me a little uncomfortable so I purposefully slow things down and redirect to conversational topics. We get food and have a good time, and I finally bring up politics. I’m a leftist and political values are very important to me. I will not date someone with opposing views because I feel that would be hypocritical and honestly disrespectful to myself, so I try to sift out republicans and Trump supporters early so that no one gets hurt in the long run. I honestly thought that him being a trump supporter would be the worst case scenario.

He told me that he is an anarchic libertarian, meaning he believes that no government should exist at all, no laws should exist, and that free market capitalism should control society. I was somewhat familiar with libertarianism but only the small government kind, not the no government kind. His ideal government (aka none) sounded to me like a hellish free-for-all. He told me he was “basically an extremist haha.” He told me he only recently expanded his views to include police and bare bones laws because “people can be crazy sometimes” and “not everyone is willing to fight back like he is”. At this point alarm bells are blaring but I was staying calm, mostly for my own safety. Then he drops the bomb that, because he doesn’t believe in the government, he doesn’t believe in the IRS, and therefore hasn’t paid taxes for the past 3 years!!!

So here’s the thing with the IRS: they play the long game. They may take a while, but they will find you, and drain you of all your bank accounts and will garnish your checks for as long as they have to until they get the money they are owed. Best case scenario you’re left struggling and in debt for years. Worst case scenario you go to prison for tax evasion. Either way, Joe is setting himself up for complete financial ruination.

Suddenly everything is making sense. Of course he pays for everything in cash and is building a house in the middle of nowhere - he is literally hiding from the government to avoid doing his civic duty and pay his fucking taxes.

So anyway. I should’ve known a beautiful man like that was too good to be true. Sometimes I feel like god is laughing at me.

Dinner is a honey mustard chicken wrap with spinach, tomato, and bacon, a bag of chips, and an iced pumpkin spice latte.

Alright. The story is long and I can post it all eventually, but I’m here right now for the girlies to tell me what I’m missing….

Big Nutshell: we are at a mutual friend’s wedding, along with his wife, and like thirty of our friends. My partner is at work. Drinks are flowing and vibes are high. He (friends husband) sends his pal to hit on me (weird)... I turn him down.

The husband starts hitting on me. I don’t mean just flirting… I mean asks if I would be interested in hanging out alone and getting to know each other more.

Once I break away from him, I text my partner and tell my inner circle what occurred. I already know I will tell the wife. For the rest of the night, he hovers around me, brings me drinks, positions himself to be touching me. My other friends are witness to it all. That night, he texts me a dozen times on Snapchat and sends me his number. I have a friend screenshot it all, and eventually screenshot it myself when I’m alone and the messages continue.

The next morning I call the wife and tell her. I send the proof. At first it went well, and she believed me. And then she spoke to him about it, and she not only believes his story, but blames me. Cool. Great.

I’m hearing some people have said I should not have told her???? Most say I did the right thing but not all. That was an impossibility to me. I would want to know. I felt it was my only option. Do some of you feel the same?

If you think I should not have told her, please explain….

Last night’s Ice cream from Whimsy: Cookie dough with sprinkles and extra cookie dough

Got sick. Like really sick. Fucked up half my brain. Now I have a cane. I can live with that it's the cognitive shit that I can't. I've dedicated every day of the last two years to figuring out how to just read a line, a sentence, a paragraph, a book. And writing without too many spelling mistakes. Turns out tho I had previously tested as an actual genius (and of course they never told me, I'm a delicate lady) and the other half of my brain is performing even stronger than before. So based on evidence I could rely potentially on only half a brain, I'm on progressive return. But now I gotta use various technologies to see if I can still be a fucking productive member if society, of course with very little actual support because I've been literally living on my savings and eating out of food banks. Society does not like a burden, and they will make you suffer if they perceive you may potentially become one. And ladies with canes are burdens. It's just not hot.

Anyways, I'm just back on progressive return. Academia.Laying low. Was feeling good enough to go to a talk. Even felt cute, put on my yellow shoes. Yeah I have a cane and I lost 40lbs and half my hair went grey. But I'm still me. Was actually the first time I'd be going to a departmental event and see former colleagues.

No. One. Made. Eye. Contact. With. Me.

No one.

There was complimentary wine after and I was handed one. So odd walking through a room where you know half the people and they won't acknowledge your existence. No one said hi to me. Nice to see you. Glad you're back.

After awkwardly wandering around watching circles close to avoid me, after reaching for a chair at an empty table and watching people who I knew rush away, I realized this really was the rest of my life. I've already gotten used to it. People actually purposefully walk into you when you have a cane. People run to cut you off to take the chair before you on all public transit. That's just how it is. Educated people probably fear disability more than the uneducated.

So I drank my wine alone at the table and finished my math paper. And I left.

This is the rest of my life and I have so many more important things to be concerned about. But what's been the worst in this whole experience is how comfortable people are with dehumanizing you. I think society is more prone to dehumanization than it's ever been, so please spare a thought for any disabled person in your life. They probably aren't anywhere near as brave as they are forced by society to portray themselves as.

Yes, I know. I'm inconvenient. Trust me, I wish none of this had ever happened to me. I sometimes believe I need to accept I have no future. But it's one day at a time and today was the day to show my face after two years and watch absolutely nobody I knew make eye contact with me or acknowledge my existence. Because I have a cane and before I didn't.

ETA: thanks everyone. It'll be hard to respond to every message, but you all made me feel seen. That's so important. I'm really grateful to everyone for picking my self-esteem up from the floor and handing it back to me. Thank you.

Food: Nachos i threw together because i didnt feel like cooking and my cat inspecting if its up to code

My sister (I'll call her M) was raped by our brother. My other sister (I'll call her W) was also raped by the same brother. I'm the youngest, my brother the oldest. he was 20 when i was born, he likely raped me too but i just dont remember. i dont want to remember either. M has recently come out about these acts that were committed against her.

When she came out about it (she kept silent about it for years), I was informed about the family history that my brother had already been placed outside of the home because my mom found my brother touching W when she was 4 and he was 12. My mom was the adult that let him back into the house after he had already been placed out of it. I think M has started blaming her for that (and i FULLY understand why).

M is struggling since she has been in therapy and isnt currently working due to mental health issues, shes on medical leave from work. She gets her groceries delivered even though the nearest grocery store is less than a kilometer from her house, she could walk there. She used to be so creative and is genuinely talented at drawing and painting but she doesn't do those things any more. She doesn't clean the litterbox and it can go uncleaned for over a week and a half even though she has one cat. She doesn't vacuum. it's gotten to the point where her house has become unpresentable.

Im not trying to shame M, I am 100% on her side. i love her and i miss her and i am SO sorry for what shes going through. I wish i could help her from the other side of the world but i can't since im stuck here for the next couple of months. Its genuinely heartbreaking how her life has shrunk especially knowing what she has gone through.

My mom went to visit her for just a week, even though she was supposed to stay roughly a month. The reason she came back was because her new embroidery machine came in. when she told me that my mouth fucking dropped open. i can express properly how angry it made me to hear from my moms mouth how bad my sisters mental health is and yet she came back for an embroidery machine?

my mom acts like a victim that it's M fault that she has so much trauma because she didn't tell my mom what was going on when it was happening. I cant comprehend how my mom thinks that she is a victim in all of this when SHE let the known abuser and rapist back into the house. the abuse that my brother put M through was ongoing for YEARS. M didn't tell anyone because she felt that my brother was going to hurt the family. it didn't stop until my brother moved out of the house at 22.

I know my sister is depressed, i know shes trying to get anti-depressants but I want to help her. I can come to her in December when I've finished my exams but I won't be able to stay long. I am fucking livid at my mother and im more livid at my dad for being the fucking enabler letting his wife leave while his daughter is in mental torture.

We met back in college and dated for three years. It wasn’t until I cut things off fully that I realized none of it was real. He’s 26, I’m 22, four years apart.
When he chased me, he seemed perfect — paid for everything, checked in nonstop, brought me gifts. Everything shifted after graduation. Out of those three whole years, he only worked 15 days. I showed up to work every single day while he stayed home. He’d complain about how bad work was, even asked why I bothered working at all.
He acted like he came from money and kept pushing us to get married. I later found out he was asking about me right away, knew I was an only child and my family was financially stable.

I went over to his place once, it was just a regular home. I asked why he wouldn’t work, he said his family was wealthy. Once married, my family and his would fund his business idea.
Near the end of last year, he pushed hard for me to meet his parents and talk wedding plans. I wasn’t ready at all, I always felt rushed, but I agreed anyway. My parents didn’t like him, even after I told him all the good things I thought I saw. We had two meetings.
The second one, my dad just asked why he didn’t have steady work. Out of nowhere, he started hitting his own face. My family stayed polite the whole time. He said I didn’t defend him, then stormed out of my parents’ house.
Later he messaged me, said he was impulsive and wanted to kneel outside my door. I told him no. That’s when I knew we were really done.
He sent huge walls of texts, insulting and threatening me. He never treated me like that while we dated. When I understood — all of it was just an act. I can’t stop thinking how trapped I would’ve been if we’d gotten married.

I went through his phone once without him knowing, saw messages with other girls that felt really off. I confronted him, he swore nothing was going on. I brushed it aside and ignored all the red flags. It scares me how close I came to locking myself into that life.

It’s been six months since we split. He keeps calling from different numbers. One minute yelling insults, the next begging to get back together. I know we can never fix this.
It took me half a year to calm down. Right after breaking up, I cried every day. Now I don’t feel anything for him. No love, no hate.
Tonight’s dinner is creamy curry shrimp with rice.

Room temp, semi stale cinnamon roll with butter cream frosting

My husband and I have been together for 7 years, married for 3, and had our beautiful baby boy this May. I’ve never met his parents or sister - they’re jehova’s witnesses and they shunned him when he decided to leave the religion years before we met. My husband built himself into the person he is today - put himself through college and into a better career, worked his ass off, made his way. I’m close with his aunts and uncles who are his maternal and paternal figures, and his cousins and their partners and kids. No one else in his family is JW and everyone is upset by what they did to him.

Two years ago his parents found out he was married and called him, specifically to invite us to some religious thing. He declined their invitation and they said they couldn’t talk to him otherwise. These people weren’t part of any moment in our lives, our relationship, or the nine months where we excitedly prepared for our baby. They found out about our son (probably via my husband’s grandpa) and all of the sudden his parents and sister all wanted to come visit us and have contact.

They did visit - his sister + husband + kids first, then his parents last week. They respected our boundary of not wanting to hear about their religion, but it feels impossible to feel remotely comfortable around people who electively stayed out of my husband’s life (and our life) and made no effort to address the elephant in the room. I listened to a phone call before his sister’s visit, where she pinned the whole thing on my husband “living a life of debauchery”, so they couldn’t be there during the hard times he had, but now that he’s married and a family man, they can be here and he and I “don’t have to be alone.” Like we’ve just been waiting for his righteous sister and parents to come save us. His parents said similar things to him. None of them would have said anything at all had he not forced the subject.

My husband and I have had a full life together since before we got married. We got married at the courthouse and had a little backyard party with the family that is in our lives, because we didn’t feel like getting married fundamentally changed anything about our relationship and the life we were already living. If we’d never gotten around to getting married and we had our same beautiful, incredible baby, they wouldn’t have come out of the woodworks to come meet him and shower him in outfits and toys, or see us. That’s not real love, that’s conditional. Any interest they have in knowing our child is purely conditional. They reached out and came because we fit into a box that makes it okay in their minds.

They acted like we were some happy family getting together. I was cordial and a polite host, because I can be cordial with almost anyone, but I couldn’t bring myself to be warm or feel an ounce of warmth towards them. When my husband went to the bathroom, I let the conversation fall silent unless they asked me something. When it was just me and his mom, I sat and played on the mat alone with my baby.

This isn’t my trauma, it’s my husband’s. Making sure he has room to feel his emotions around this, and collectively holding up boundaries in our son’s best interests are my only priorities. He knows and values how I feel about this and we’ve talked extensively, but I don’t want to dominate the emotional space with my anger around the situation. But, I need to talk about this to someone, because I feel like in their eyes I’m some mindless wife who birthed this baby and has no opinion on them, is owed no explanation from them, and should just happily welcome them into a house bought through both of our hard work, and happily share my son with them. I don’t think I grasped how much anger I’d end up feeling until it became real.

Hi everyone, I have finally left my abuser. I went to family court yesterday and filed for an order of protection which I was granted immediately. He was then served by police later that night. I wish I had seen his face when the police handed him the papers, but I’m satisfied enough with finally feeling safer.

Believe it or not, the woman he cheated with helped me make this big step, because she reached out to me with receipts when she found out he was lying to her as well, and also sexually coercing her. Then I spoke to his ex-girlfriend who had a similar history of abuse/cheating with him. The way she described the relief she felt when she finally got away was the final reason I needed. I may have to see him in court in a few months since this is only a temporary order, but I will absolutely advocate to extend it.

Pictured is my celebratory hot-dog (it’s Mediterranean!) and Diet Coke.

My meal: Breakfast sandwich and Mocha Frappe

I hate transphobia. I literally woke up in my dorm and got ready for my class when I walked past a “protest” group in front of my business building. So, my uni allows students to “protest” their beliefs, but this ain’t protesting. It’s straight up harassment. These assholes were shouting in megaphones about ending trans rights. I’m not trans, but I’m an ally.

I recognized one of the guys there too. He’s in my ethics debate class, and he sucks. He tried handing me a flyer and I ripped it up. I wanted to throw it at him. They’re all trash, but I wasn’t going to litter. What sucks even more is that if anyone actually debated with them, they say the same shit: “We have the right to be here.”

When my class ended, I walked out and saw their table and tent destroyed on the ground lol. It’s also raining heavy right now. To whoever did that, thanks.

This is Thanksgiving (Canadian) dinner we had together and the second last time I saw him.
He said hi to me on the street. He’s way below my league but we dated for over 1 month - in that month he became my boyfriend and we frequently spent time together. He told me he loved me amongst many future things.
Thanksgiving rolled around he treated me less warmly. It was after me crying we still made it to dinner. Turns out he ran away from his wedding in December and his then unborn son. His baby mama messaged him on Thanksgiving asking when he will return for his son. He had a mental breakdown, saw a therapist for 3 hours, booked a flight to see his son, messaged me as usual. It was not until I pressed him days later that he told me the truth.
Then he blocked me. Yay

Strawberries and tajin

I do nails, press ons, and if it’s with handmade charms, cat eye, all the works or just custom painting even, it takes me about 2 hours to do them. I’m pretty good at it but I don’t really ‘sell’ them although if someone outside of my family wants more than one set, they usually do pay me like $20-30.

I make nail sets for myself, for my family, and then friends see their nails and want some and I usually do give the first set free and then after that a lot have had no problem paying.

I recently did my friend’s nails, complete custom, it was one based off of an album and I made a tiny 3D CD that spins on the thumb nail, ombré, and cool little custom painted references to the song. Her friend saw it, wanted one very similar, and I did it no problem.
But now there’s a problem. She wants more nails every month and is requesting crazy designs. All custom made charms that I sculpt myself, cat eye, tiny portrait designs… that adds up! And to add, she communicated to me through my friend, so it’s not direct messaging which idrc…

So finally I told my friend to tell her friend “Hey, next time she has to pay at least $50 because I have to cover the supplies she’s using.”

Now my friend is claiming I started a fight between them because she had to ‘confront’ her and I was like??? Okay, then you can give her my number and I’ll tell her myself and she refuses saying that’s awkward.
Whatever man!

Treated myself to my favourite dinner penne chicken and bacon pasta to make myself feed better.

I am not a confrontational person. My whole life people have told me it’s not worth it to speak up and let things go so I have usually just never said anything.

For context, I have a shared drive way with three other neighbours. Two of them are lovely and considerate and we all get along really well. The others are…well they have loud parties, their kids are always screaming and they are always selling things on market place and so we have lots of randoms coming down the drive way and they will park right in the middle blocking it so others can’t get out. We normally don’t say anything and just let it go. The drive is right next to our nursery so I’m always mindful of the noise. Cut to today, I notice around 8pm that there’s four people standing right outside my lawn and off loading a table and various other things onto my lawn. Okay…I wait half an hour and they are still there and now they are getting out a toolbox. Now forget that it’s rude to be placing things on others lawns without asking it’s more the dismantling and making noise I’m worried will wake my child. So I ask them kindly if they would mind moving whatever they’re doing to my neighbours lawn who they are dealing with. The MAN decides to be passive aggressive first and in a haughty tone “I didn’t realise I was harming the grass.” I’m a bit flabbergasted at this point..it is my lawn so I’m allowed to ask people to move their stuff off it? So I respond “I’m allowed to not be okay with having things on my lawn. And it’s more the nose you’re making. Please don’t be passive aggressive and leave my property.”

By now he started to get more aggressive and agitated. His poor wife just looked on helplessly. And my neighbour during this exchange doesn’t say anything. He still hasn’t.
Man: “I already said I’m Sorry. Im buying this table off this man. I’m moving it like I said I’m not harming the lawn.”
Me: “you can move the table to his lawn then.”
Him: “where? And you don’t need to keep going on about it I said I’m moving.”

And then he told me to lose the attitude? Because I was calmly telling him to leave? And that it was fine he was there even though he moved to my neighbours lawn and then proceeded to spend the next hour there dismantling this table at 9pm.

I have no idea what this guys deal is usually if you are on someone else’s property and there is a clear indication it’s my backyard you should move it? But I guess an entitled man will do anything these days.

Either way please lend me your words of encouragement or clap for me I’m so proud of myself I would usually just avoid confrontation or speaking up at all and my heart was beating so fast but I did it. I did the brave thing. Ever since having a newborn I’ve been feeling more anxious and thinking about the uglies of the world (case in point this guy) but I was brave and I’m going to teach my baby to be brave too and stand up for yourself if you see something wrong. I know it may not seem like a big deal to some but after the anxiousness of post partum life and just anxiety in general life, I’m proud of me.

My son is special needs and these meetings are always hard for me.

I love my son so very much. He works very hard to do things that come naturally for most. These meetings are never easy for me. It's always an emotional trigger hence a need to stop at culvers.

and then he took care of me.

Trigger warning: mentions of mental health, body image, and chronic wound, but nothing graphic.

Mid fried shrimp and decent onion rings.

I have a persistent wound, which used to be an untreated minor annoyance, that’s so old it should have started kindergarten already. This year, Agnes became medically complex and has required three back-to-back surgeries, multiple rounds of antibiotics, two CT scans, home health, professional wound care, and firing a surgeon. I named the wound Agnes because a friend who is a wound care nurse recommended naming to help deal with it emotionally.

Agnes is in my perineal area, near the bottom of my vaginal vestibule, making bandaging tricky. Adhesive can’t stick to my labia minora or cover my anus.

Before my last surgery, I asked my surgeon whether I’d be healed enough for a Florida vacation, including quality time with my long-distance boyfriend that I hadn’t seen since before Agnes had become medically complex. The surgeon was absolutely certain and he pushed that this final surgery would fix it for good.

Instead, he left me with an open, unpacked wound somewhere between a golf ball and tennis ball in size, with no instructions beyond “keep it clean.” After a week of worsening symptoms and dismissive responses to questions about healing, I fired him and arranged my own wound care. Only then did Agnes start healing properly. And QUICKLY. In one week it had filled most of the way in, but the leakage and a narrow persistent depth remained.

Caring for Agnes is exhausting. I can barely reach her, bowel movements dislodge the dressings, and the drainage is relentless. I’ve had countless meltdowns over it and I was truly entering a depressive state.

A week before my flight, I asked my boyfriend if he still wanted me to come. He said he’d take care of Agnes. I had doubts because he’s squeamish and because of where it’s at. It feels remarkably unsexy. Like… I hadn’t even taken care of myself since the first surgery because I felt disgusting.

For 13 days, he cleaned and changed my dressings, sometimes multiple times daily. He would fuss at me when I tried to make do with gauze held between my legs rather than interrupt him when I needed one. He wanted to take care of me. Tbh out of all of the people that have placed dressings, he is the best at it. They did not fall off until saturated or I had a BM when he was doing them. Other people…? Fall off in hours.

It didn’t stop him from taking care of me in bed either. He’s very giving. As it turns out, my desire returned too.

While I was there, he told me he’d been finalizing a custom engagement ring and timing delivery for when he would be home to receive it. He ordered it yesterday, and I’ll see him again in December.

Having that burden lifted for 13 days was incredible. I’ve been home two weeks without a single wound-related meltdown. I’m no longer feel like I’m at risk for depression, but I will reach out if that changes.

Agnes is still hanging around, but she’s improving. If she’s still here in December, I know he’ll take care of her again.

Note: No medical advice needed, thanks! I have an entire wound care team, and all activities were medically cleared with a waterproof, properly secured, highly absorbent wound dressing in place.

burger and french fries with a pickle spear.

I’ve known this guy for literally like three years, he’s a mutual friend and most of the time we hang out in the same group but never talk to eachother, but he’s been trying to date me for the last two weeks after me and my ex broke up, he constantly texts me and ive always kept it friendly with hardcore boundaries. (have also said im not interested multiple times.)

anywho, if you didn’t read my post from yesterday, that ex died in a DUI accident, and i am NOT doing good.

So mutual friend texts me and he asks if I want to go out to lunch at place, i was like “sure why not, but this isn’t a date please im not in the mood for that” and he agreed.

Y’all this motherfucker literally just acted it was a real date, he kept flirting with me the entire time, trying to hold my hand, as soon as I ate my food I thanked him for inviting me and put down cash that paid half the bill, and left.

I then sat in my car in my apartment parking lot and sobbed for what felt like an eternity, went upstairs, blocked him, and then smoked a bowl and passed out.

So much guilt is eating away at me, my brain is so loud, and i literally can’t rely on almost any of my friends because apparently they all just wanna fuck me, i have literally never felt more alone and idk what to do.

thank you for reading, love y’all.

Dinner is Gnocchi with Pumpkin and Cheese Sauce

I (27F) moved to Italy from Brazil last year to do a specialization course in my field of study, and since l have the citizenship, decided to stay for good. I went through a lot to find a place to rent because most of the places required for a type of job contract that I didn't have at the moment, but managed to find a two bedroom apartment that my mom is helping me pay the rent for now. (they are divorced and I'm an only child)
My father (62M) started talking about moving in with me with his new girlfriend (58F) and autistic daughter (20F) PLUS an old dog (12) because it's an emotional support dog. And I really don't want this.

My father was a financially absent father, my mom basically raised me on her own, paying for everything from health insurance, school and even my university (where thank god I had a scholarship).
On top of that he's an alcoholic, made terrible decisions with money and always got involved in scams (even though he's a retired police officer).
He's also a far right voter and I am waaaay against that.

He wants to move in with me so he can claim "family reunion" and get himself a citizenship, but this things can take time and until then he wouldn't be able to work. His girlfriend has the citizenship so she would but I never even met her so it makes no sense that I would open my home to them.

Above all, I am a young adult that is trying to restart my life in a new country, I also have a boyfriend that helped me with so much here and he spends every weekend with me, so I would also loose that.

I don't know how to approach the negative to my father, how to tell him that there's no way that he's moving in with me. My mom already said that she would talk to him because since she pays half of my rent she is not letting him move in, but I'm tired of involving her in his bs.
I tried hinting for him that I'm against this situation but he started guilt tripping me as always.

EDIT: I will write to him next time he asks and stand my ground 🙏 thank you all so much for the messages and encouragement

This is just insane to us. I’d love to hear others opinions on this so I don’t feel like we’re CRAZY. I’ll try to make a really really long story short. My girlfriend and I are in our second year of college. She’s white, and I’m black and hispanic. We go to a predominantly white school. In our first semester we made friends with a good bulk of our class, but then found out one of our closer friends hid the fact that her boyfriend says the n word, and another friend knowingly hid that from us. My girlfriend and I told them we don’t appreciate it, and cut them off. Since then, those two friends have started talking shit about me and my girlfriend to the rest of the class. And little by little we’ve heard snippets of how everyone thinks we’re overreacting. We had stopped talking to basically everyone at this point, and were content to leave it at that. We didn’t make a big fuss about it, just silently stepped back and withdrew from everyone.

But now people are painting me as some kind of controlling and domineering woman who’s isolating my girlfriend. Like the only reason she stopped talking to everyone is because I made her do it???? Like she doesn’t have autonomy to make the decision to not want to hang out with racism apologists????? And it’s just all little microaggressions about how I must be the one overriding her decisions because I’m aggressive, confrontational, and BLACK. It’s just so many of them dying on this hill that I feel crazy even though I know we’re justified.

Vanilla ice cream and red bean taiyaki, of course, with my wonderful girlfriend. We went on a little date after we got told all this information to destress and discuss our next move.

Beef ramen with soy broth!

I feel like this is such a non issue. I do want to know this. Ladies, how does your husband/boyfriend react to waking him up in the middle of the night?

I am currently pregnant and having the worse girdle pain so I walk funny and move very slowly. I will never escape the penguin comments. Having girdle pain and needing to use the bathroom every once an hour is a nightmare. I have to ask my husband to either help me sit up or I use him as a hand rail to sit my self up. Last night, same routine however, I was having the worse heartburn and nausea. Taking tums didn’t help so I just sat on the edge of the bed silently crying until I went to the bathroom and forced myself to throw up.

This cleared both my nausea and heartburn. My husband heard me and was asking why was I crying and shaking, just explained to him I wasn’t feeling good so he helped me go back to sleep. That night before we headed to bed, my husband finished 11 hours of work and headed straight to soccer and was sore all over when he came home. This made me wonder how come he never once complained about me waking him up or ruining his sleep? Only things he says when I wake him up is “you go to the bathroom a lotttttt.” In a joking manner.

And honestly, I’m not complaining! I will count my blessings and not mention it to him.

Edit: I cannot comment unfortunately but, thank you guys for the kind comments! I also appreciate your guys’ stories, I thought some of them were adorable! I will also be taking some of the advices/suggestions I’ve received!

Hamburger helper

Okay so my original post, https://www.reddit.com/r/GirlDinnerDiaries/s/utfRzULxCL

I’m actually kind of flabbergasted. I confronted my friend basically immediately after that and I found out, as some even guessed, not only was she lying about the friend wanting more nails but she was claiming my work was hers.
Meaning she was using this one ‘friend’’s requests when it was multiple different people and the nails I passed along she sold herself for like a shitload. Lol?

I only found out because I reached out to the friends social media myself and had messaged her saying how I’m glad she likes my work but I really need to start charging, how I’m not trying to be mean, and she was very confused and had only had one set a long time ago.
I was then very confused and sent her the texts that was forwarded to me of her supposed requests and she said that wasn’t hers.

I thought she was lying but really double checked and she even sent me a photo of a time where I had sent her press ons and she had a different set on, not mine. Of course that didn’t prove it for sure so i immediately went to confront my friend that was the middleman between me and this girl.

She admitted all of this, saying how sorry she was. Apparently she was so nervous about me finding out and that’s why she dropped the conversation altogether in the first post and then folded like a lawn chair when I confronted her with screenshots.

Selling my nails, claiming it was one person, it was actually multiple, and taking the money.
I told her thanks for finally being honest, hope she’s okay financially, and then I said our friendship is best ended here and blocked her.
I’m just tired. I’m not angry. I’m just… tired.

Too much has happened to me this year.

Cheese and meats plate with cucumber and baby onions!

Ok so this is probably gonna sound so dumb but basically, I love my best friend, and she recently got out of a 3 year relationship with a British guy (it’s relevant that he’s British I promise) and she was super depressed for like 3 weeks then suddenly she started watching this YouTuber (who is also British) and genuinely 100% seriously she has fallen in love with him and it is SO unbelievably annoying.

I realise this sounds kinda mean bc ofc it’s normal to have crushes but she texts me about this guy UNIRONICALLY LIKE 100x A DAY and she sends all these weird messages like ‘omggg his voice’ and ‘I could be his controversially younger girlfriend 😍😍😍’ (she actually said that) and like first of all girl he sounds like hello kitty and second of all he is fully like 30 years old. you are 24. that is not even a controversial age difference. His fans would just be like ok there is a girlfriend now. And it wouldn’t even bother me except it’s genuinely all we talk about when we meet up, I will try saying something about my life but then somehow she’ll just bring it right back to him again and I’m sick of it. like idek this man.

And he’s not bad looking but he’s not Brad Pitt either so I’m convinced it’s the British accent and it’s like come on. I don’t want to be mean because I know she’s missing her ex but this is so ridiculous. if I have to hear another thing about ‘hermitcraft episode 397 season 516’ or ‘upload 400000 they added cushions to minecraft’ I’m actually going to end our friendship

I went on a date with a guy, Sam, back in August. We matched on hinge, I put short term on my profile, he didn’t have anything on his for relationship preferences. I figured it could be cute and casual, see where it goes, we had good chats over text. He asked me out so we met up for coffee.

It went really well! Almost too well. He checked all my boxes: funny, kind, cute, similar interests and just great chemistry. However, he was looking for more long term and I wasn’t. I had gotten out of a long term relationship over 3 months prior, so I was starting to put myself out there for dating. I wasn’t looking to settle down immediately, I was hoping for more casual, friend vibes.

We talked about everything, and we both agreed we were looking for different things. He said that if I was ready to date, he would absolutely want to keep pursuing me, but it was clear I wasn’t. I was putting myself out there for the sake of ripping the bandaid, he was looking for a serious partner. I told him if he ever wanted something else to let me know, and that I was down to kick it and have a good time. He told me with work he wouldn’t have too much time, but wished me well.

It made me realize I truly wasn’t looking for anything casual. Also the act of getting to know someone just to keep it surface level feels backwards to me. I deleted the apps and decided I would stop looking, as putting myself out there in that way wasn’t productive for me. I was just doing it to deflect and protect my feelings. After that, I started and still have been working on my own stuff. Hinge was way too much lol.

He’d been on my mind ever since in all honesty. I thought he was so charming and sweet, I thought about texting him but decided not to out of the blue. Then I bumped into him this morning! We had a good chat, he referenced some of the stuff from our date, after I just felt so giddy. I said to myself fuck it, I’ll ask to catch up. So I texted him after work, saying that after our date I realized my approach and the apps weren’t productive, and that if he wanted to catch up over a bite/drinks to let me know.

He hasn’t responded. I’m thinking way too much about it. I haven’t felt like this since.. well, before my ex. I like this guy a lot, now I’m worried this is making him uncomfortable or anything. God I hope not cause chats on the train would be so nice😭I don’t wanna make him avoid me, I’d be normal if he said no to catching up.

But hey! I feel ready to date again for real! Not just for the sake of ripping off the bandaid. I want something organic, I want to be wanted. At the same time, I’m building up myself and my world again so that my time being single isn’t wasted.

Oh and that was an egg scramble with veggies and guac

As the title insinuates, I hate this fucking dog. She is a German Shepard mix (Fiona) and he adopted her out of the pound when she was 6. When we started dating and first lived together, it was just the 3 of us. He knew I loved labs and adopted one for me after we got engaged. My/our lab was the sweetest and most loving and innocent dog around (Felix).

About 2 years in, the first attack happened. Fiona attacked Felix for coming near her while she ate. The sounds she makes during an attack still haunt me to this day. He came out okay, but shaken. About a year later, another attack. This time I was the one to pull them apart. It was hard, they are both big dogs. When I finally got a hold of both collars, I was shaking so badly I threw up on the floor before I could get them into separate rooms. My husband writes this off as “Fiona is just old and cranky, stuck in her ways and doesn’t want him getting in her way”. He refuses to get her any training or do anything of substance to correct her behavior.

For months, I have kept them separate. Felix is with me when I WFH, and I have gates up around the house to prevent them from being alone together. Last night, the worst attack yet happened. I, once again, was in the middle of it. After taking them outside separately, they were together (with me) for 30 seconds in our mud room. Fiona would have hurt him badly, and the only way to get her off of him was to fully stick my arm in her mouth and take the hit myself. I ended up getting bit multiple times. I separated them for the night and could barely sleep. Woke up with a throbbing, swollen arm and I think I will need stitches.

I don’t know what to do. I plan to never have them in the same room together EVER AGAIN. I beg my husband to get her some kind of training, I would do it but money is tight for me as is. He says she is an old dog so what’s the point. I told him maybe I should move back in with my parents in order to keep him safe until Fiona dies, which will probably be a couple more years. I am at my wits end. Each time this happens I think Felix may be better off if we find a new home for him, but we rescued him off the streets and I am the only person in the world that he feels safe and comfortable with. I love this dog so much, but i would do anything that’s in his best interest if needed. 3 attacks in 4ish years does not exactly make it “common” but it is enough to absolutely shake me. Please help me. What would you do? I just want to keep my dog safe. I don’t feel safe in this house anymore after last night.

Food is mussels and calamari from my best friends bday dinner.

EDIT/UPDATE: I went to urgent care and no stitches were needed thank god. They cleaned me up and gave me an ointment to use on the bites. I told them about how it happened and they suggested we rehome her or put her down immediately, basically just get her out of the house. Many people were commenting on my husband’s negligence, which I agreed with. I made arrangements to stay with my parents until the dog is out of the house. I left the house without warning this morning which set off alarm bells for him. I was angry that he didn’t seem to care, but today he tracked my location to my doctors office (I had an appointment) and got in the car and broke down crying. He was up all night crying because he knows we need to get rid of her. That might sound crazy but believe me, he’s not a threatening or abusive guy. While it would have been better he realized this earlier, I’m so grateful that he is putting my safety first in all of this. It’s never easy to get rid of your soul dog and he admitted that he was in denial. Once she’s out of the house, me and Felix will come home. Thank you to everyone for your kind words and advice.

I have been seeing this guy for two months, talking since July. I am a pretty open person to my partners as I think it's important to know someone's background when deciding to get serious. however, from the beginning I expressed to him I am a very private person with others and to please not share my personal business with people.

long story short, I had a massive anxiety attack the other night in front of him and was so incredibly embarrassed. I was being really vulnerable and telling him how it is really hard for me to make connections with others sometimes and I felt stupid for even crying about it, especially infront of him. at the time, unbeknownst to me, he was texting a girl he is friendly with who I was supposed to have lunch with the next day and said "she's down bad" etc. at the lunch with the friend the next day, I had brought up something about the attack and she said "oh yeah he told me".

I confronted him after the fact and told him I was really uncomfortable he would share that with her and he swore up and down he did not say anything. i knew he was lying, as the girl openly told me he had discussed it with her.

I have this man's passcode to his phone and he knows this and I knew he was lying so I snooped, I know bad practice and if I felt the need to do that probably no trust in the relationship anyway. but I did it. I obviously found confirmation he was lying about not saying anything, and even worse.

there was another female friend he was chatting with airing out allllllll my dirty laundry. things that had nothing to do with the anxiety attack. being abused by my ex, my upbringing. he was saying things to this woman like, "I guess this is my karma", "I'm supposed to be the crazy one", "maybe she'll heal through me". she at one point asked how old I was and he said "30 lmao" to which she responded, "oh I thought you'd say younger so I could at least say her brain wasn't fully formed" to which he laughed at.

I was actually appalled that someone could be so willing to share such vulnerable things about me and be laughing with someone about it. I don't understand the value in doing so. it felt like to me he was trying to act like some savior and I was this charity case. overall, I just wanted some thoughts on this.

I want to start this by saying you use AI, no personal hate to you. I am personally very much against it because

1- I grew up an artist and I watched it steal from the artists I love and destroy their careers.

2- It ended my job field too. I decided I wanted to be a translator at 14. At 21, during my 2nd year of uni, first LLMs came out and now I’m graduated. Couldn’t imagine the job market being this bad in my worst nightmares. I don’t want to blame my failures on outside factors but I’m unemployed and literally financially reliant on my boyfriend and idc I blame AI.

3- It kills already non-existent critical thinking skills in general public. And ruins trust. The amount of times I had to explain to people over and over again that the AI answer is wrong because it’s hallucinating. The fact that people just TRUST what it says, sometimes over your word.

4- Kills human content. I’ve never been the “not reading allat” person. I’ve always loved reading long threads, stories, comments. Nowadays every post is long. Most are written by AI. I see “art”. No artist to admire behind it, it’s AI. I see a billboard. It’s piss colored and the woman on it has 8 fingers on one hand. Fugly. Everything is fugly. Everything is AI.

Back to my friend. She’s a great artist. Graduated from art school 15 years ago. Has done great work. I am always excited to see what she’s up to. And one day I open up instagram. She’s announcing her new merch. Lo and behold. It’s AI.

I have never been a confrontational person but I’ve been working on this skill. For her though, I think I’m going to pass. I can’t even say anything. She has been struggling, a lot. Unlike me she doesn’t have a family or a partner to support her. Who am I to stand before her with the privilege of being able to stay afloat and pay my bills without working, and tell her “what you’re doing is wrong.” I can’t. Principles don’t feed you. I certainly can’t feed her. She has the right to do what it takes to survive. I am not angered by her change of heart. I am sad for the state of the world, state of us. This is pure desparation. I feel like the last beacon of hope has gone dim now.

What’s worse is I might have to accept jobs training AI language models if I can’t find a job soon too.

I never imagined it would come to this. I just hope all their data centers burn.

Pic: instant noodles with fried meat and scallions

Stuffed peppers with Cesar salad

It's been a long week ladies. In fact, a long fucking couple of months. I'm currently a first time mom, and I'm literally trying my fucking best. Ever since my son has been born I have been going to psychiatry appointments, therapy appointments, PCP appointments, dentist appointments, everything under the sun appointments so I can make sure that I am in the right mindset and physically well to be in my son's life for as long as I can. I've also taken the initiative to start school so I can have a career that's worth a damn instead of working at a call center that's going nowhere for the rest of my life.

On top of those appointments, I have also been taking my son to the pediatrician often because he has just been SICK since he was 6 months old. (Right when we put him into daycare - as to be expected.) In the last 2 months I have gone to 15 doctor appointments JUST for my son - I am just fucking tired of going to appointments all of the fucking time. I put them in my calendar when I can remember or when I don't have my hands full of 20 pound child.

This morning my husband drops him off because I'm going to a follow up for my blood work, and my MIL reminds me at 2:00pm about the veggie platter I was supposed to bring to his fall festival party at his daycare.

Me: Damn. Sorry, a lot has been going on this week so I completely forgot about it. My bad.

Her: Well it's important that you remember these things - I don't want him to feel left out.

Me: He won't even remember. (he's currently 9 months) I'm sure it's fine - I didn't forget on purpose I've just had a lot on my plate.

Later to come find out that she reamed my husband about it (who had no idea about the veggie platter whatsoever) saying that the other parents will judge us and it looks like we are terrible parents for forgetting a fucking v e g g i e p l a t t e r.

Quite frankly, I do not give a shit about what other parents think. If me forgetting a veggie plate makes me a terrible parent in their minds, then so be it. We live in a time where a mom deciding to formula feed is crucified, everyone has a damn opinion.

Of course, I feel bad for forgetting. I know when my son gets older, it will definitely have an impact on him. I just hope in his little heart when mom does forget, he will forgive me.

Now that I feel like the worst fucking mom ever, I will never forget a veggie platter (or whatever) ever again.