Q&As

Throwaway and on phone

This is about my two daughters. They are a year apart, I will call them Cally and Rebecca. Rebecca was a rough teenager, she would sneak out, steal, lie, had trouble in school, etc. Cally was the opposite, she barely event got in trouble and was an honor student.

Due to Rebecca behavior she lost privileges. When they were both became freshman I allowed them to go places without a parent. Cally was fine alone but Rebecca causes problems usally by stealing.She would lose that privilege and every time she gave her a change to earn trust back she would do soemthing else. This happened for a lot of things, car, trips and so on. It was a circle and when she was 16 we did therapy.

She hated it and it made it worse. She was very resentful that we were forcing her to go. Rebecca really started to resent cally also because she would do things while she had extra rules and conditions

At 18 she left to live at her aunts. She robbed the place and my sister pressed charges. She almost went to jail and after that she started to turn her life around.

To the main issue, I picked her up and she made some remarks that she should have a car like Cally ( she bought her car from a family member ). I told her she should save up for one. She made a comment about how cally is the golden child and that is why she had a good childhood with opportunity while hers sucked.

I told her no, cally is not the golden child and the reason she had opportunities that you didn't have was because we could trust Cally. As a teenager you proved over and over again thag you were not to be trusted.

She got mad and it started and argument. She is pissed we "throw her past in her face."

My wife's thinks I shouldn't have said anything even if it is true

My sister was diagnosed with with cancer last year. It has been hard on our family and even harder on her. I love my sister and I tried to be there for her as best as I could. I also did everything I could to make things easier for my parents. I took over all chores, cooked everyday, cleaned the house, did laundry, took care of my younger sibling and babysat them more.

Luckily she is doing really well and has recently finished her treatment which is great and we are all grateful. Our birthdays are two weeks apart and hers was two weeks ago. My parents bought her a new car to celebrate after everything she went through which I understand, she does deserve it but I was a bit surprised because I thought they didn't have any money. My dad has been unwilling to help me get a used car since last year telling me that they do not have the money.

I didn't even want him to pay for all of it, I have been saving up and just wanted them to help me with the rest but he kept telling me that they have no money for that. Well my birthday just rolled around and my parents bought me a book that I mentioned in passing and a $25 take out gift card to a place I like. I thanked them but they saw that I wasn't too thrilled and asked me what was wrong.

I told them that while I appreciate the gifts, I thought that they were finally going to help me with the remaining $800 for buying the used car seeing that they could now afford a new car for my sister. But that's when they accused me of being jealous of my sister who had just gone through something very traumatic and that I was trying to make everything about me and why couldn't just be happy for her. They said that at the end of the day I have a job and could just continue saving. Am I the asshole?

My daughter "Jasmine" recently got engaged and it was a beautiful day, but unfortunately I feel like some behavior from my stepdaughter "Holly's" husband "Jack" overshadowed the day. I've never been overly fond of Jack, but I keep that to myself. My husband likes him well enough as he is relieved Holly found someone. She does not warm up to many people.

The issue came up when Holly called her father and said she was briefly in town. Of course my husband wanted to see her, but we already had plans with Jasmine's boyfriend "Liam" to host a get together/surprise engagement party. He invited Holly to join us and I was a bit anxious as Liam hadn't included her on the initial guest list and doesn't like her very much, but I get my husband wanted to see her.

Jasmine walked in to the surprise party blindfolded and found all of her loved ones gathered and a heart of rose petals on the floor. She immediately burst into tears and and Liam got down on his knee. I heard Jack say to Holly "oh my God what would you have done if I proposed to you like this?" I felt annoyed but continued to watch the proposal. Liam began listing all of the reasons he loved Jasmine and Jack announced to my husband "Holly is cringing. I can physically feel it" At this point I gave him a look.

Jasmine and Liam shared a slow dance and it was beautiful. Jack appeared to be trying not to laugh and I was furious. After the dance everyone began to socialize and Jack said to my husband "someday I'm going to prank Holly. I'm going to recreate that proposal and watch her die inside" I lost it and told him to get out. They trued to brush it off, but I said I was serious. No one needs his negativity and I don't want him to come back for a long time until I feel ready to see him again. My husband is angry and thinks I'm being irrational. I'm serious. I am so disgusted by him.

I (F25) broke up with my boyfriend(M29). He has two kids (9 and 7) from his previous marriage at 19 which lasted not long at all. we had been seeing each other for seven months officially three months, but our love had grown so deep so fast, that we were decided to get an apartment together. Here we are one month before our move-in day and he tells me that his ex is planning on taking him off child support. That would require him to have the children every other week. Since I don’t have children, I felt that was a bit much. We were moving in September and the child support agreement was to take place in October. I felt like that wouldn’t give us enough time to get a good rhythm in our place before bringing an extra set of humans to care for every other week.

Keep in mind, he works from 11 AM to 8:30 PM and I work from 6 AM to 2:30 PM. That would have required me to be the guardian for the children until he got home and they would be sleep by then. I expressed my concern for this as I don’t have children and that was a bit much for me, so I told him I was uncomfortable with that set up, and he lashed out at me saying “ as a future stepmother that is something you would have to do anyways” . I completely disagree but we aren’t married anyways. If we were, It would be my job to help you, but this setup would be more like me raising the children on my own. Does this make me selfish and an AH?

My nephew “George” lives with me and my family. He is my sister’s child, but she unfortunately passed away a few years ago. Her widower, “Eric” remarried quickly. George didn’t get on with Eric’s wife and kids and Eric paid no attention to him. 18 months ago he came to live with me.

Eric visits George at our house for one weekend a month, a longer visit during the summer, and we took him to see Eric at Christmas time. All of these visits are without his wife and her children, as the therapist feels it’s important for George and Eric to rebuild their individual relationship. I won’t say facilitating this has been easy. I love George like he’s my own child, and to watch Eric flounder with a child he was supposed to take care of breaks my heart. It’s hard for my husband too. All this to say, we are on a short fuse with Eric, I feel I have to be honest about that.

Anyway, Eric is meant to be coming to us in August for two weeks. A few days ago, he asked if he could bring his wife and her kids. Apparently she has been having a really tough time and is desperate for a holiday, as are the kids (wtf). Eric also said it’s been a real strain to keep his wife and kids away from his son and splitting time has been hard and he really wants to start mending the relationship between all of them. I was livid, but I went and spoke to my husband, and then to George. George was hurt that his dad was suggesting bringing them, and said that he didn’t want to see them. I went back to Eric and said I couldn’t control where his wife and the kids are, but they won’t be staying with us. If he wants to bring them, they can stay in a hotel and when he is not visiting George he can do what he wants. I made clear that I am upholding what’s been recommended by the therapist George sees (which Eric knows because he has check-ins with the therapist).

Both Eric and his wife have been up my ass about me not letting them stay. I have not blocked her because I like to collect evidence of what kind of person she is to send to Eric when he tries to act like she is not awful. Eric is saying he might not be able to come at all now because organising childcare for the kids is going to be hard, and his wife is becoming resentful of him not being around, etc. Basically because I’m doing this, George might not see Eric at all for more than a weekend until Christmas.

This is hurting me because Eric has been making a good effort until now. And George had been starting to trust him. I just feel like I’m ruining it. But if I let them all stay then Eric won’t get any one on one time with George anyway (the wife will make sure of that) on top of us all having hellish houseguests. I am trying to enforce this boundary so that Eric has to man up and prioritise his son but maybe I’m being too harsh because it might end up the opposite.

I (48m) have a daughter Lisa (15f) from my first marriage. I’m not on particularly good terms with her mother, and Lisa unfortunately became an outlet for her resentment towards me, which ended up souring our relationship massively. Lisa is a good person, but unfortunately she takes after her mom in terms of demeanor and often acts rude and entitled.

A few years ago I married again. Lisa decided to not attend my wedding and she said a bunch of hurtful things to my then fiancée Rosemary (38f). Since then, our relationship got even worse. When Rosemary and I welcomed our son a year and a half ago, Lisa sent me a text saying that since I have my perfect baby now, I could stop pestering her and trying to play family with her. It hurt me deeply, and I ended up distancing myself from her, though I kept sending her $100 a month as her allowance.

Recently we had an unplanned addition to our family. Long story short, Rosemary’s sister, who wasn’t a good parent to start with, terminated her custody rights over her son Blake (17m). Rosemary and I decided to take Blake in.

Unfortunately a few years ago Blake got in a horrible car wreck that left him permanently disabled. Luckily he can somewhat walk and doesn’t need 24/7 assistance around the house, but that’s about it. Blake is an amazing person and he quickly became a part of our family.

I decided to give the $100 allowance to Blake instead. He was beyond happy and grateful. I also made a hard decision and gave him my car. It’s a ‘22 Cadillac Escalade, and I was planning on getting rid of it this year anyway since Lisa is turning 16 in a month and I wanted to gift it to Lisa. Now it’s Blake’s car and he absolutely loves it. He really needed a car because his mobility issues don’t let him get around easily anymore, and it changed his life massively.

Of course Lisa didn’t like it. When she realized that she wasn’t getting any allowance, she called me and asked what’s wrong. It was the first call I received from her in a year, if not more. I explained that now when my family had expanded, I’m not having enough money. I’ll be still sending her mom the child support payments as per court agreement, but she shouldn’t expect anything extra. She asked me about the car since she knew about my plans on giving her a car. I told her that now the situation changed and I no longer could give her a car. I’ll admit, what I said next was probably assholish of me, since I told her that I now have two children to play family with and asked her to stop pestering me.

This caused her to blow up completely to the point she got her mom to call me and scream at me, and so did her new husband. They threatened to sue me, Lisa said she’ll go no contact and so on. I just brushed off the threats, especially since Rosemary is a lawyer and I made my peace with poor contact with Lisa years ago. They also managed to write a few mean things to Rosemary and Blake, and this is what got me wondering whether I was an asshole here.

Hi Reddit!

I (25F) have been dating Ben (27M) for 3 months. Recently, Ben started expressing discomfort with me going to my regular co-ed gym. He says that it's normal for women with boyfriends to go to all-women gyms to avoid attention from other men and to make their partners feel more secure and that his ex-girlfriend swapped gyms when they started dating.

I've been going to this gym for about a year, and I have a great routine, a supportive group of workout buddies, and I feel comfortable there. The idea of switching gyms just to make my boyfriend feel better doesn’t sit right with me. I believe trust and respect are crucial in a relationship, and this feels like a lack of trust on his part.

I tried explaining my perspective to him, but he insists that his request is reasonable and that I'm being inconsiderate of his feelings.

Since we can't agree, we've come to Reddit for opinions as we don't want to involve our families and friends. So, Reddit, AITA for refusing to switch to an all-women gym to make my boyfriend more comfortable?

UPDATE: There are so many comments now I can't possibly reply to them all! I wasn't expecting to get this many replies! Just wanted to thank you all for your thoughts and let you know after reading and discussing the comments we have decided it's best to end things. I feel the relationship won't be healthy and he thinks he needs to work on himself before being in a relationship. I was pleasantly surprised by his ability to take the criticism on board and hope this helps him become a better partner to someone in the future. I will be spending a lot more time in the gym now!!

UPDATE #2: Noticing a lot of comments saying things like, you broke up over what gym you go to/broke up over this thread. We didn't break up because of the gym choice alone or just because Reddit told us to. We discussed a few different topics last night that we just didn't align on. We (not just me) didn't think we'd be happy together in the long run as these topics would be a point of contention in the relationship and decided to break up. Damn Reddit, you get your pitchforks out when someone refuses to break up with someone showing red flags and you do the same when they break up with someone for showing red flags haha. Thanks again to everyone sharing their thoughts bad or good :)

UPDATE #3: Also noticed a lot of comments about using the term "workout buddies" and if this group consists of just males. I'm Australian and I hear people use the word buddy all the time so I didn't think this was weird haha. I did make a comment that has probably been buried but the workout group consists of 6 women and 2 men. One of the men is the brother of one of the women and the other has a boyfriend. Hope that clears that up!

AITAH for showing my boyfriend my bloody pad?

I'm a 21F in a relationship with my 32M boyfriend for a year now. We have a good relationship though he can be a bit immature sometimes.

We don't live together and have not been able to meet as often for the past 2 months because he's been traveling for work. For the past week I've been staying at his place and unfortunately got my period 5 days ago. It normally ends in 4 days but has been Longer this month 🤷‍♀️

I'm not comfortable with intercourse on my period though I'm okay fooling around in other ways. He has been pretty down that we haven't been able to have intercourse and tried to initiate it last night. I said no I'm on my period and he didn't believe me since it had been so many days. He got a bit aggressive and said I was lying. I'm already feeling like crap and this made me snap so I lowered my pants and showed him my bloody pad and asked if he believes me now.

He freaked the fuck out and said I was fucking disgusting for showing him that. I said I had no choice because he kept saying I was lying. He said I needed to be more mature about this and then also yelled at me for not going to the doc for having "such a long period". I had enough and walked out and have ignored him since then.

Maybe I was the asshole but I really wanted to make a point and didn't appreciate being pushed. Am I the asshole?

I (51F) have a younger half sister (35) who was born from my dad’s second marriage. My parents divorced when I was 12 and afterwards, my dad moved to another state. I visited for major holidays and six weeks during the summer. I was almost 16 when she was born and I remember celebrating her Baptism, her first Christmas, first birthday, etc., but, by the time she was a teen I was in my twenties and living the city life all on my own and my visits were rare. My dad had also gotten divorced from her mother when she was 12, coincidentally the same age I was when my own parents got divorced. At that point I only visited once or twice a year, if that.

During one of those visits my dad told me that my sister had been pregnant and he’d sent her to South America to have the baby and it was put up for adoption. He went on to say that by the time she realized she was pregnant, she had broken up with the father (who was 20 when she was 16…I know) and she was left to figure everything out. She was adamant about not wanting the baby, but she didn’t want to terminate the pregnancy either, so the adoption was arranged. She had a son. He was visibly emotional but believed it was the best decision at that time. I was stunned. I hadn’t really seen her much during her teenage years. My dad’s divorce from her mother was acrimonious, so that, coupled with the age difference, didn’t leave much room for bonding. Over the years we’ve spoken very little. She’s met my children a few times over the years but they don’t really know each other.

A few weeks ago I received a letter from an attorney. It laid out how I was identified as a relative of the person they were representing. I immediately remembered what my father had told me and everything clicked. I was asked if I would be comfortable with answering a few questions regarding my dad’s side of the family. Before responding I got in touch with my sister. She made it clear that I should ignore the letter and act as if I had never received it. Her son is now 19 years old and actively trying to get in touch with her. She has zero desire to meet him. The conversation left me torn because he’s already made progress in finding her. Not wanting to acknowledge the situation won’t stop what’s been set in motion. After this conversation I sent the letter back declining to answer on paper, but wrote a note on the form that I would prefer to be contacted by phone.

The law firm got in touch with me shortly afterwards. I just acknowledged what they already knew. Who our mutual father was. Who our grandparents in South America were, etc., basically it was confirmation of the family tree. Nothing that was a ‘big reveal’. My sister called me this past weekend livid. She told me I had no right to ‘butt into her past’ and I should have just ‘respected her feelings’. Now she is claiming that her husband of 8 years is finding out about this and it could ruin her marriage. Our dad has since passed away and I can’t imagine how terrible he would feel knowing that all of this is transpiring and how ugly things have become.

AITA for answering the basic questions presented to me and not ignoring the entire situation as she requested?

My (47f) husband (45m) doesn't like it when we go out to eat if I pronounce the name of items on the menu correctly in the language they are written in. For example if we are eating Chinese food I will give my order pronouncing my choice in the dialect it is written typically Mandarin. The same goes for eating Mexican, Italian or German food. He thinks that I should talk redneck like him even though I have some training in multiple languages. The last straw happened at a Mexican restaurant we frequent and I ordered my food as I normally would and then spoke in Spanish to my adopted brother who walked up at the time and my husband blew his top so I told him to piss off and walked out. Now he is saying I'm trying to be high culture and belittle him and IATA for leaving him alone and stuck with the bill. So AITA here or what?

Been a long time CNN watcher. Lately their tone and messaging seems very different, seemingly leaning far more to the right side of the political spectrum than it was before. It seems their reporting is no longer balanced. Did something change with them in order to get new viewership?

My fiancé Tom has a habit of taking my stuff without asking BECAUSE he feels I should be able to do the same with his stuff. He's constantly saying "you don't have to ask, just take it, what's mine is yours" whenever I ask to use anything of his and he expects to have the same rule applied when it comes to my belongings. I never agreed to this. In fact, I have voiced multiple times that it's rude not to ask and have voiced irritation when he uses my stuff without asking. When it comes to small stuff, I get irritated because he never puts my stuff back where it belongs and then I have to go on a wild goose chase to find the item because he can't remember where he put it down either (he has ADHD). For instance, he forgets ALL of his travel mugs in his vehicle and instead of going to grab them, he will just take mine until ALL the travel mugs are in his vehicle.

But honestly, the main issue is money and my vehicle, if I'm being honest. If he needs something and he doesn't have the money, he will just take my debit card without asking beforehand because he would expect me to do the same with his debit card if I need something. Or recently (literally a week ago) I bought a brand new vehicle and there are days when I wake up in the morning and him and my vehicle are gone because he's taken my vehicle to go to the gym instead of his vehicle because mine is far better on gas. Or he went to donate his old clothing the other day and again, took my vehicle. Or he went grocery shopping 4 nights ago and took my vehicle. And last night, we had a bunch of people over and one of his buddies needed to go to the store so Tom said he would go with him and he just grabbed my vehicle keys. I told him no. He just kind of stood there staring at me, so I said "what? You're not taking my vehicle to drive your friend around. Start asking to use my shit because I'm getting extremely pissed off that you take my vehicle all the time. And if you have my debit card, you better leave that on the counter too because you're not taking that either." He looked extremely embarrassed and put both my keys and my debit card on the counter and walks outside. He comes back in maybe 5 minutes later, saying his buddy decided to take off for the night and then he went upstairs to our bedroom.

Later on when everyone else left he said that I embarrassed him. That if it was such a big deal for him to use my stuff than I should have "brought it up" prior to this. I told him I had brought it up, several times in fact, because him constantly using my stuff is really building a wall of resentment at this point. He has his own vehicle. He has his own money. He has his own means to do shit so why is he using mine? He said he lost his debit card (true, he lost it 2 days ago and is waiting for a replacement) and that he didn't feel the vehicle issue was even something to get worked up about because I am allowed to use his vehicle whenever I want (he's given me permission but I refuse to drive it and have only driven it twice because I HAD to in the past 3 years). He says I shouldn't have embarrassed him like that and I should have waited until everyone was gone to say something. But I'm getting tired of saying anything. It's my shit, don't touch it without permission. I don't think it's a hard concept. AITA?

My wife and I separated 7 years ago after 15 years together, after I cheated on her. I was drunk and I don’t remember but I ended ip making out with a colleague and several people witnessed this. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t regret cheating, not only on my wife who is the love of my life and my children but the idea of cheating on anyone.

My wife asked for divorce at the time, but then she would lose any insurance and pension she could get through me and all benefits. I convinced her that we could still be married on paper and of course she could get a divorce whenever she wants to remarry. She agreed. We have very cordial relationship now and our children are well adjusted to this new dismal existence and they are relatively happy. Our youngest doesn’t even remember us as a family.

Now to my problem. I have been very honest with my gf that it wouldn’t be any marriage. Now after 5 years together she is accusing me of wasting her life and is giving me an ultimatum. She has gotten a nice diamond ring from me and she was very happy about it because she wanted us to have rings to mark that we aren’t available and I loved the but she knew it was not going further but since she got the ring she has been very angry and saying that I was leading her on. I feel very guilty and I doubt myself but I have never lied to her once. I feel bad but I never promised marriage. Aitah for not wanting to get married? Aitah for “leading her on”

My (50f) friend Lauren (46f) is a vegan who doesn’t drink. That’s awesome and I have no issue with that. The problem is that she is part of a small group of friends who don’t get out very often but when we do it always has to be limited due to Lauren’s choices. We live in an area where our food choices suck to begin with so having to go to eat where she can be satisfied is very limited. There really isn’t much to do otherwise at night. In addition she gets upset when any one of us eat something that has an obvious meat to it. For example, she doesn’t say anything if we get a soup with chicken or something but if we ordered a hamburger she would cause drama. Then she doesn’t drink, which is no big deal, but she will then send us videos on the harmful effects of alcohol if we get a drink or two with dinner. It has gotten on my nerves to say the least. It’s been awhile now so I am done with everyone catering to her needs. I have tried inviting everyone to specific places and invite Lauren as well. Then she puts into a group chat “Hey ladies, since I can’t eat at X why don’t we go to Y?” Then of course the other ones decide we should go to Y instead.

I have backed off of going out because I don’t want to spend money on food that sucks (remember it’s vegan not vegetarian so it’s very limiting) and is expensive or have my intelligence questioned by sending shit about the effects of alcohol as if we are not beyond old enough to know or Google it. I barely drink anyway but enjoy a glass or two every so often.

She asked why I keep bailing so I told her “I respect your choices but by the very nature of them they have limited mine. Being that I don’t have the ability to go out often nor unlimited funds I am only going to go when I know the entire experience will be what I want. So if I am in the mood for a steak and a vodka tonic I want to have them in a relaxed atmosphere and that obviously bugs you. If I’m in the mood for a salad and water I will gladly join you or we can just hang out at the beach when we have time during the day.”

She didn’t like that too much. She said that isn’t what friendship is about and I should enjoy the company enough not to care. I told her that I understood and I would gladly hang out with her when food or drink isn’t in question because it’s too expensive not to enjoy it. She said that there is nothing else to do around here. Then I asked if it’s just about friends then maybe she can eat first and join us out sometimes and other times we can go to where she wants. She then told me that she’s not going to sit around watching people eat meat. I said “Ok. I get it and you need to get that I’m not catering to your needs each time I’m free to hang out.” I later got a text from a mutual friend that Lauren was upset but she agreed with me because she was tired of the same shit. Of course this friend doesn’t like conflict so just listened to Lauren.

So AITA for not wanting to continue to eat food I don’t like or refrain from having a drink or two to keep the peace here or am I right in feeling like she’s being selfish expecting the rest of us to do what she’s comfortable with each time?

33F. My husband James is 35. My MIL is 61. She has 4 children (my husband is the youngest). And for whatever reason, my husband is the only one she goes to for anything. Whether she needs money, a ride, help doing yard work, help with literally anything actually. It has been a cause of tension in my marriage several times. And I admittedly threatened divorce probably 6ish months ago due to it because we had a newborn at home and his mom, for whatever reason, all the sudden "needed" him 20x more than normal after I gave birth. Easily 4 days a week. So, I threatened divorce. He stepped up to the plate. Now he only "helps" his mom maybe once every couple weeks. She never comes here (met our 7 month old once for .2 seconds). It's been great since that point honestly.

Anyways, on to the issue, my best friend moved out of state 5 years ago is back in town for 3 nights. We planned to go out to a restaurant in town around 5pm yesterday evening and then out for a few drinks afterwards at my father's pub. This has been planned almost 2 months in advance. My husband had our baby. It was my first night away since giving birth (literally never even went to the grocery store without the baby). But around 7-7:30pm, my husband calls saying that he needs to bring his mom to the hospital and asked me to come home so I can take the baby and he can take my car (his is currently not working). I asked what she needed to go to the hospital for and he said "does that really matter right now? I need you home." I told him it does matter, actually. Because depending on the level of urgency, she literally has 4 other options. One of her other 3 kids (who even live closer to her) or an ambulance. He admits to me that she didn't tell him what she needed to go to the hospital for but since he was in a panic, I should come home so he can rush out. I said something to the affect of "it's convenient that my first night away from the home since giving birth and now all the sudden your mother is in need of urgent hospitalization. I think I will actually stay right here. Maybe you should figure out what your mom is going for and then get back to me." I then hang up.

He calls me probably 15 or so minutes later. He's pissed off and raising his voice at me. Says that apparently his mom had tripped and hurt her ankle and that's why she needed to go to the hospital. I asked if she was walking and he says yes, she is. So I told him to call one of his siblings. I shouldn't have to cut my night short with my best friend, whom I haven't seen in years, because his mother wants him to cater to her every move. I went home around midnight. When I get home he is pissed, saying that I prioritized my plans in a family emergency. I told him it didn't really seem like an emergency to me and asked him if she went to the hospital. He said "no, she says she is fine now but that's not the point". I argued that was the WHOLE point, actually and told him I was glad I didn't ruin my night over a fake emergency. I then took over with the baby and brought her to bed. He's still pissed at me and says "this changes everything" because me putting priority on "fun time" over what could have been a bad situation makes him look at me differently. I'm unphased honestly. AITA?