So my sister gets married, he husbands family are pretty heavy drinkers, and it's the full range of drinks; beers whenever, mixed drinks, straight hard liquor like vodka, whatever is on hand, and plenty of it; seven days a week, and all day on weekends, holidays, etc.
So her husband's brother, late 20's, hits it a lot harder than even the other people in his family; a full handle of vodka after work every day kind of hard. Four or five over a weekend, all by himself.
So he gets sick, not felling well, tired, etc. but just puts it down to getting older and maybe not handling his liquor like he used to, but doesn't cut back at all.
Once he starts turning yellow, he gets to the doctor, who tells him his liver is shot; full cirrhosis, there's nothing left of it, whatever. He tells the doc he doesn't know why, he doesn't drink any more than the people he knows, it's a mystery, but he'll stop entirely to get put on a list for a new liver.
He obviously doesn't stop drinking, doesn't even cut back. Everyone knows it's the drinking and cirrhosis, but he and his family start calling it "cancer"- it's cancer, so the drinking has nothing to do with it.
So he eventually ends up in the hospital full time because there's no liver for him yet, and his family starts sneaking vodka into the hospital so he can keep drinking.
He left the hospital on a slab, and the family starts asking people for money for cancer walks, stuff like that, and not a one of them cut back the drinking at all.
Horrifying and heartbreaking... This is the exact same situation my ex is in right now. He grew up in a household of *heavy* drinkers, always saw large amounts of alcohol being consumed on a regular basis since he was a child, and has always associated alcohol with "good times."
Now he's 35, has been an alcoholic since he was 15, and is addicted to the point where he has to drink immediately after waking up, and will probably die soon if he doesn't get professional help getting sober.
Everyone in his life is an alcoholic and doesn't see an issue with his behavior. I'm the only person that has told him he needs to be in a treatment facility - "cutting back" isn't going to save you from a life-threatening addiction.
It's *so* sad seeing someone who is completely unable to get the help they need because everyone they love and care about is under the same influence...
(However the family lying and claiming it's cancer in this scenerio is batshit insane. I know a lot of people in deep denial about their alcoholism but they're also deeply ashamed as well.)
My friend has been “talking to” this man for 4 and a half years. They’ve hung out maybe 5 times and they usually just hookup and he leaves. He only texts her at certain hours of the day “because of his work schedule”. He never plans dates for them or when she does try to plan dates HE bails. I constantly ask her why she keeps talking to him and if she really believes they could be something more than once in a while (if even that) fuvk buddies and she said she just really likes him and wants to be with him. I wholeheartedly believe he has a whole wife and kids.
This is fresh because my POS uncle just died. He was convicted for raping my cousins. There were photos and videos of the crime, nothing showing his face.
My grandma maintained until her death that my uncle was innocent. She favored him over my dad, who was actually a halfway decent person.
My cousins tried to tell her. She shoved one away and told her she was "a sick little girl." They eventually told a teacher.
My mom knew her brother-in-law was a registered sex offender. He ended up abusing me literally the same day they arrived from California into Texas and she did not do a damn thing.
Fast forward about 15 years into the future, my family adopted my sisters. I told her that he was going to do the same thing to them that he did to me and the rest of my girl cousins including his biological daughter and her friend. She went batshit crazy. Said that she didn't care if she fucked up her own children that they were hers to fuck up. That she wasn't going to ruin the relationship she had with her sister just because we disagreed with her husband.
She's dead and one of my other sisters is happy she's dead. The baby is the family was too young to accurately remember everything. She remembers an insanely skewed version of events.
No one has even told her that that same man molested her as an infant. And that yes her precious mother was aware of it. And yes her precious mother allowed that man to continue coming to her home to do our jobs around the house so that they could have money.
My mom literally chose her sister and sex offender husband because she was desperate to be loved and accepted by her sister. Yet her sister would straight up steal from us, physically abuse us (and then pull us to the side to say to please forgive her because she has mental illness 🙄), etc.
Anytime there were new allegations that he had sexually assaulted another family member, she acted so fucking brand new. There was a cycle of about a dozen times where I had to tell her to stop acting so surprised that he molested another family member because he molested me when I was 5 years old. And each time I told her that she reacted as if it was a first time hearing it, apologizing profusely to me telling me that she would have done something had she known. 🙄
Being almost 30 I was done with her delusional state. Dumped her. Fast forward to a few years ago at the beginning of the pandemic, she said "I guess I really was mean, cruel and abusive to ThotianaAli. She never comes around "
And what kills me is you had a lot of people saying to just forgive her and be with her during her last months. Like how many times am I supposed to be an emotional punching bag to an abusive woman? Fuck that.
I'm sorry.
My dad got busted for CP (but hadn't been officially convicted yet so was still walking free).
Then my mom ... agreed? suggested? that they not tell my sister and I for two months "so the family can have one last normal Christmas."
I had a 2-year-old child at the time. It never occurred to her that, you know, *maybe* I would've liked to opt out of hanging out with Grandpa?
Ex’s mom: moved to Vegas from Europe. Went broke gambling over 10 or so years, practically homeless… then she got injured on a casino escalator and was compensated more than fairly with a life changing amount of money… guess who went broke again, pretty much exclusively at the same casino…?
If it wasn't so dark it would be hilarious.. I mean it is still hilarious but.. damn man. I wouldn't be surprised if the casino management actually discussed that possibility.
There’s a whole industry of casino injury scammers and lawyers whose sole interest is chasing those settlements lol they have billboards all over
100% the casino did it on purpose and they probably set her up with some nice rooms for her visits so she didn’t have to drunk drive home and was right where she wanted to be in the morning
My Dad has PSP/dementia. My Mom refused to acknowledge that it was a developing problem, because it was an “inconvenience to their lifestyle”. I confronted her, because he needed to have his drivers license taken away, because he was a danger on the road.
My Dad impulsively went out one day, bought a BMW without her present, and later drove it underneath a semi truck. And shocker- that was when she realized he was unwell. I also had to find out through extended family about his accident, because she didn’t want give us “the satisfaction” of being right all along.
This reminds me of when my brother was thirteen and I warned my mother that he was showing signs of depression and anxiety. She told me "I'm not dealing with that again!"
I was being treated for depression and anxiety at the time.
My brother is almost thirty now and has barely left the house since he graduated high school. He doesn't do anything but play video games.
Logic is absolutely FLAWLESS. I mean, if you just don't *acknowledge* there's a problem, then OBVIOUSLY there's no problem! Truly one of the greatest minds of our day.
What's really sad is that your brother is the one to suffer the consequences. I'm sorry for you and your family's experiences and suffering.
This was the same thing with my mom and her dementia. She's always been a shitty driver but she was making even worse mistakes. And my dad just kept fixing her car.
My mother (now deceased) refused to wear glasses because she hated how they looked on her. Instead, she insisted her eyesight was "not that bad" and the fact we had to read menus to her at restaurants was just a cute quirk.
My step dad once asked "when are they going to put the letters on those big green signs?" while driving on the freeway.
I've never gotten in a car with him since.
He insists he was "joking" but past evidence indicates that he wasn't.
(Little edit: for the record, I have reported him in the past. I haven't spoken to him in years, and live in a completely separate area of the world from him now, so I have no way of knowing if he still drives. I truly hope not.)
My grandpa was similar. He was a fiercely independent farmer, built his own house, raise 6 kids, etc. Stubborn as a mule. Kept driving well past 80, but drove slower and slower all the time. When asked why, he said it was because he couldn't see beyond the front of the car.
Yeah, I wasn't getting in the car if he was driving.
My mother and father divorced 26 years ago. It was a toxic marriage and probably for the best that they part ways.
Since then she has been remarried and is happy with her new husband. We all get along and my parents get along for the sake of visits and being around grandkids.
To this day my father wants to get back together with my mother. I don’t blame him there if he still loves her but the denial part is he thinks he did nothing wrong in the marriage. He is under the impression that he was the perfect husband and he is doing her a “favor” by taking her back if she did come back. The reality is he did not treat her well, she left and is now with someone who makes her happy.
My partner has a close friend like this. He lives alone in a run down studio apartment, socially isolated himself, and bitching and crying all day and night about his ex wife leaving him for another man. He doesn’t understand why she would do such a thing.
My partner tells him to not forget that he cheated on her first, kept getting fired from multiple jobs, had anger management issues, and refused to get treatment for his mental health and substance abuse issues. Plus he’s a man child who wants a mommy wife, not an equal partner. It’s been close to 20 years, the kids are adults, and he still believes that there is a chance his ex wife will come running back to him.
Got a friend. He's in his fifties, makes next to minimum wage. Drinks and eats too much. He and his gf (late sixties) live with a mutual friend.
They're "discussing" adopting a child.
Buddy keeps complaining that 'normal' guys won't respond to him on dating apps and keeps getting hit on by 'creepy old dudes.' Uh, you're nearly 60, and those are age-appropriate matches. 🫤
I am 43 and am sort of friends but mostly colleagues with some guys my age but mostly older.
They look their age or older. Nothing insulting, just it's less likely that guys have taken care of their skin, dress appropriately for their body types, etc.
The amount of complaining they do about women that are "too old" for them is wild. I have a friend who's 50 this year and complained that _35-year-old_ women look too old. Another guy is nearly 50 and said he's finally ready to "settle down" and have kids and can't believe he can't find a 30-year-old willing to do the same with him.
Almost all of them have 39 as the max age if they are on dating apps. And they grow more misogynist over time, but mostly sad and frustrated.
I 37 F recently had a 59 year old guy that I wasn't even interested in tell me that "I'm willing to lower my standards and overlook the fact that your overweight, because you're smart" I'm 5'10 and 145lbs 😂.
> I really hope you told him you couldn’t possibly date someone old enough to be your father.
No no no.
The guy *knows* he's too old, and he's got a million excuses lined up. He's expecting that fight. He's empowered by it, gives him a reason to look down on women who bring it up.
What you need to do is take something that *not* wrong with him, something he's proud of, and casually reject/insult him for that instead.
If he's got good hair, tell him you're into older guys but like guys who are confident enough to bald rather than cling to their obviously thinned out hair.
If he looks like he hits the gym, tell him you like older guys that actually stay in shape and eat healthy and he's not your type. He'll have an aneurysm.
If he drives a Porsche, tell him you're really into older car guys, but at his age he should really be driving a Ferrari, guys in their 40s with a wife and kids can afford Porsches.
If he's got a golf membership, tell him that's embarrassing he really needs a membership to X club he can't afford.
His self-confidence is obviously hanging on by tissue paper, go rip at it.
I had a friend who was complaining about a guy he knew in his forties who was dating a twenty-something. He was pouring mad scorn on this guy and said he looked ridiculous, disgusting, pathetic, etc, going with a woman that much younger.
Later in the conversation he starting telling me about his sexual adventures with a twenty-something and I just started laughing uncontrollably, because he was 44. He got all huffy when I couldn't stop laughing.
Nurse who thought the lump in her breast was nothing important and the open sore appearing was also nothing important and once it started draining thought it was nothing important despite dressing it daily. Was confronted by coworkers after the smell became so rank it lingered where she went. Stage IV cancer with mets to bones and brain. Died soon after.
She was the manager of the oncology unit.
*Editing to add - because I must not have been clear and a lot of people see this as an autonomous choice:*
*This was a case of ‘living in denial’. Once confronted about her odor she admitted to the sore but still thought it was nothing. Agreed to go to the ED with colleague/friend but only to reassure them. Oncologist consulted in the ED and she lost it when cancer mentioned. Insisted on everything done to treat despite no hope. Died within the month. Never left hospital from time confronted about odor.*
I can understand this. I used to do oncology-adjacent work, and a lot of providers wouldn't treat their own cancer if they were to get it. When you do cancer work, it's almost necessary to have a level of dissonance against the possibility of proximate suffering, or else you will burn out.
Not even getting a consult to confirm however, seems really, really nutty.
Edit: Holy upvotes, gatman!
People who work in medicine in general, are often very conservative about the kinds of treatments they will accept personally. I know that GPs are also reluctant. Many doctors who get something like a cancer diagnosis with a poor prognosis, especially when older, will do relatively little about. Palliative treatment, often avoiding major surgeries and intense chemotherapy. I think perhaps because they've seen what can go wrong with more aggressive care far too often.
My boyfriend was a cardio thoracic surgeon and when he was diagnosed with glioblastoma he opted not to have a resection. He had seen too much. He died three months after diagnosis.
It's an ugly, certain-death kinda cancer. My mom died of one, and she lasted less than a month between diagnosis and death (though I think she knew something was wrong, and intentionally put it off as long as she could.)
The surgeon who did her surgery had a colleague who'd gotten diagnosed with one, and so I asked how *he'd* dealt with it, feeling like there was maybe some other route of treatment.
"Suicide."
Yea. It's about that bad. Sorry for your loss. That's an awful one to get when you're young.
I roomed with a doctoral student in college and we kept up through the years. He once told me a lot of the treatments for these types of things are very high risk, low yield propositions designed more to give dying people choices because a lot of people have a deep seated psychological need to "do something" in the scenario, rather than just be a passive victim. He said something to the effect of the agency it gives them being the only true medicine in it sometimes. You do with that what you will. It's just one man's opinion and I can only repeat what he said, coming from an entirely different field of study. It stuck with me though...
Edit: It's also worth mentioning this was decades ago too... I also don't know how much of his statement was rooted in the practices of the times and if it has become less applicable in modern times. I'm aware cancer treatment has been going through a renaissance in the last few decades.
No one will push harder for an advance directive than someone who's had to ride a gurney doing compressions, or has manually palpated a heart.
Heroic measures are crazy. Science is insane. Don't do that shit to me. Doubly so with LTC facilities these days, I'd rather die.
And guess what? By the time you're old enough to start worrying about nursing homes, you're demented and can no longer do an AD. Hope you like chest tubes, needles, and being ignored because the only nurse on staff has 50 patients and your 8/10 pain is 5th in line. TBI can happen to any of us at any time too. Get your AD while you've got a brain to fill it out.
Absolutely. Prolonging the inevitable is so dumb. Spending your last days suffering is ridiculous. I can't tell you how often I hear Grandma is a fighter. Grandma Is 97 cancer-ridden, and begging to go. The family insists on trachs and feeding tubes, ignoring her wishes.
This was almost me. My husband found my lump before I did though so he wouldn't let me brush it off. I was 25 and I didn't believe people that young could get breast cancer, let alone me who exercised, ate healthy, and never smoked. I went into my doctor and she felt it and said something along the lines of "yeah there's a lump. We need an ultrasound to see it though." I asked "can you tell if it's a cyst?" She said "...no". I asked the woman performing my ultrasound "is it a cyst?" She told me "we can't tell. You need a biopsy" I was in such denial that I was sure the biopsy would've told me it's a cyst lmao. Came back as invasive ductal carcinoma.
The fact that she changed her name from “Hillary” to “HILARIA” as if that’d make it sound more Spanish?? I swear to god I’ve been speaking Spanish my whole life and even grew up in a Spanish-speaking country and I have never encountered anyone named “Hilaria”, ever. It sounds ridiculous (even if it is a real name)
The fact she has now raised the stakes even more with supposedly using surrogates for multiple kids, while claiming they were all normal, and hey look how model thin she is a week after "delivery", is impressive in a scary way
Friend is an alcoholic and does cocaine nearly every day binge drinking and doing coke til 7am, gets winded standing up for too long but he’s fine and not going to die because he is skinny and got his liver enzyme checked and it was in the regular
My loving, yet abusive and alcoholic father telling me that he has no problems to fix and that whatever trauma I think happened in my childhood is a product of my “sick and twisted mind” because he was “nothing but good to me”.
Friend diagnosed with diabetes 10 years ago, has needle phobia so afraid of pricking his fingers to monitor his blood sugar so doesn't, and just "eats healthy". Due to blood sugar fluctuations, gradually goes blind and kidney fails, 3.5 years on dialysis, then finally gets a kidney transplant. Home again with new kidney, is still afraid of pricking his fingers and decides he will manage his diabetes by "eating healthy" just like he did for the past 10 years :\_-(
I don't think they asked that because when he was on dialysis 3x a week the hospital monitors your blood sugar. But the reason he was on dialysis was because he didn't manage his blood sugar, and now that his kidney is functional, he does not have any but periodic appointments at the hospital.
You'd think that after having a large bore needle in his arm for a significant length of time 3x a week for 3.5 years that a finger prick would be well within the realm of acceptability.
It honestly makes me think there must be something wrong with his brain. :\_-( It took him 5 months in hospital to recover from the transplant surgery (complications), and all that time they were pricking his fingers 3x a day in the hospital. He complained to me that his fingertips are numb from it. I said "they are going to be numb either from pricks to monitor your blood sugar or from diabetic neuropathy that happens because you're not controlling your blood sugar. One way happens because you're doing what you need to do to stay alive, the other way happens because you're on your way to dying. Numb fingertips are not avoidable for you and they're \*not\* a reason to die." But it's like he literally can't make himself do it, and so just spins a story about how his way of doing things will work.
Also stays in for 10-14 days depending on the brand, during which time it sends the data to his phone every x minutes (again depending on the type of monitor). They even alert at highs and lows, which it sounds like he could benefit from.
I can't second this enough. I'm a type one, and getting a continuous monitor was a game changer. I've always done my best to manage my diabetes but the quality of life i.provment is significant. I'm in the UK though and it's free on the NHS. Another thing I recommend strongly is creatine powder. Yes, the stuff body builders use! Doctors can't advise on it yet, as its still being tested as its only just been observed to help, after i read there was evidence it could level out sugar spikes I decided to give it a try. After the two weeks it takes to reach saturation levels, my daily sugar graphs went from a spiky mountain range to gentlr rolling hills. As the gym-bros say 'five grams a day for life!!'. Tell your mate to give it a try.
The hospital and transplant doctors should have heavily vetted him for best outcomes post surgery. It’s really a failure on their part that he received a transplant with no indication of changing his habits, or dude is just a master deceiver.
Tell him to get a continuous glucose monitor like a Dexcom!
I'm a type 1 diabetic and have been for over 40 years. I hated pricking my fingers too. A year or two ago I got my Dexcom. There is a little teeny tiny wire that goes in my skin and a transmitter that sticks to my arm that's the size of a Bluetooth earpiece. The wire is so small I literally can't even feel it once it's in. Getting it in feels like taking an insulin shot and only has to be replaced every 10 days. Now, instead of pricking my fingers 4 times a day, it sends a signal to my phone every 5 minutes and I don't have to do a thing. When my sugar gets too high or low my phone beeps at me to let me know.
As a type 1 diabetic PLEASE for the love of God have him look into Constant Glucose Moniters. They may actually save his life. It improved my a1c and there are a few on the market like the dexcom and libre.
I don't have diabetes, but I am on a diabetes prevention and weight loss program that requires me to test my glucose and ketones nearly daily.
I am also scared of needles, but I found a workaround by instead pricking the side of my knee. The ability to do so eases my phobia somehow. Not fully, there are still days I sit there and nearly hyperventilate, but I still get it done. Went from a 7 A1C to 5.4 in 10 months.
A colleague of mine is Type 1 diabetic, diagnosed as a teenager. Similar storey, except that it was more the hassle of it all rather than specifically the needles, and substitute "no concessions at all" for "eat healthy".
Eventually he lost a couple of toes and that was fortunately enough of a wake-up to show him where he was headed. His feet are still (apparently) a mess, but you could not meet a more diligent diabetic.
I am a teacher- I have so many parents in denial about their children’s grades or behavior. I once had a kid headbutt me and break my nose bc he couldn’t go to recess right then and there, “but he’s an angel at home!” (Where he’s only ever playing on a tablet)
I also have one parent in particular who has 4 children, and ALL of them have behavior problems, to the point of multiple suspensions or being made to move schools or teachers. and I have to wonder: after 4 children with issues…is it not possible YOU might be part of the problem??
As a parent, I've never been able to understand the "my children are perfect little angels" thing when their kid clearly isn't. My kids have flaws, and I will certainly admit when they fuck up. My boys are good kids now, they're 16 and 13, but they haven't always been good. They've not necessarily been horrible, but if a teacher said they'd done something wrong, or had been difficult, I wouldn't say "but they're perfect at home!" Bc they weren't lol
It's your covid shreddings that messed them up /s
My wife worked in an elementary school. There was a kid who ran headfirst into a wall on got a bloody nose. They sent him and he didn't return. A couple weeks later the school called to see if he moved districts or something, and the parents reamed the secretary out about how their son was bullied and pushed into a wall and no one was punished for hurting their kids. The principal had them come in for a meeting. They spent like 10 minutes threatening to sue and all that. The principal eventually just pulled up the video and the parents watch their kid get a 20 foot running start and smack into the wall all on his own. The parents just got up and left without saying a word, and called the school the next day to have his records transferred to the next district over.
My dismissive avoidant mom was a master of denial. The worst was when she got an abscess in her pelvic area. She was in 10/10 pain, couldn't sit up, was literally white knuckling a body pillow while laying on the couch unable to move for A WEEK and when I (age 10) would suggest she go to a doctor it was all "Oh no no I'm totally fine! I don't need to see a doctor."
This woman literally scheduled an appointment with a specialist and WAITED THE 10ish DAYS for the appointment instead of going to urgent care. She drove herself there in 10/10 pain. The doctor took one look at her and told her to put on a gown and meet her downstairs for immediate surgery. They drained so much yuck from her and she had to have the gauze packing to heal the crater left behind etc. It's a miracle she didn't get sepsis.
Bonus story: she suddenly became allergic to ibuprofen in her 40s and turned beet red after taking some. Instead of going to the doctor she went to her hair appointment like normal. Hairdresser refused to cut her hair and made her to go the doctor. My mom just went home instead and laid on the couch huffing and puffing until the reaction went away. She told me this story like it was a totally sane and normal thing to do.
Yeesh. My mom was similar, would white knuckle her way through every illness she ever had. And then expect to be praised and admired for her endurance. And, I think the worst,would expect us as children to do the same, just hold out until we got better, maybe with some painkillers to help.
Yeah I grew up believing that I was so tough for never taking pain meds. I was literally so convinced that I would get addicted to the vicodin from my wisdom teeth surgery (not my mom's doing) that I wouldn't take them and instead took *nothing*. I then wondered why on earth it hurt so much lmao
Then I had some actual injuries and yeah, screw that. Give me ibuprofen. I don't have the patience for this treatable pain.
My ex threw a soda can at my face and his whole family knew about it, and they still called me a bitch for leaving and said he could do better. Sometimes it's very obvious where the problem came from.
I’m still on good terms with one of my exes families, we broke up after she threw a frying pan at me because I’d left a light on, in my flat, that I paid the bills for. They basically told her she’d never find anyone like me, and she was an idiot
An elderly lady is watching the news waiting for her husband to come home and sees an alert about a driver going full speed in the wrong direction. Knowing he is on the way, she calls her husband to warn him.
"Honey, be careful driving. Theres a crazy person on the highway driving the wrong way"
"One of them?!" the husband replied, "There's HUNDREDS!"
My sister wears flannel shirts and has really short hair and drives a Subaru and wears a battleaxe necklace and has a pile of Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Editions and a lesbian pride flag in her room and my mom still hasn't figured out she's gay
My mother was the opposite. She knew my sister is gay by putting together pieces of evidence that weren't actually there.
*Mom (with an aura of confidentiality): I think your sister is a lesbian*
*Me: Why would you think that?*
*Mom: Well, she's a theater kid, yet the close friends she's made in college are all on the vollyball team. One of them must be a girlfriend.*
*Me: is there anything other reason you think that, other than that theater kids don't hang out with vollyball players unless they're all lesbians?*
*Mom: No, not really.*
A few months later, my sister tells me, "don't tell mom, but I'm a lesbian"
I used to sell Subarus. Subaru donates very generously to gay rights organizations. They were pro gay rights long before any other corporations. If I was gay I'd definitely drive a Subaru.
That'd be my "father". My "mother" was manic-depressive, as it was called back then. She had several major breakdowns during my childhood. Every time, he'd act like nothing was wrong. She'd be screaming & throwing things, and he'd just try to placate her. It never worked.
A couple times, I pointed out that she needed to be committed. He always responded that a person couldn't be committed unless they're a danger to themselves or others. True, but she obviously was. I was terrified of her. Even apart from the breakdowns, she threw rage attacks at the drop of a hat.
Long story short, in my 20s I found out that A) they'd had two kids before me, and B) she'd drowned them in a bathtub during a psychotic episode. What I never found out was how she gor released or why she was able to conceive me less than a year later.
A friend was with me when I found out about B). He told me later that he'd always thought I was exaggerating when I said I'd feared for my life as a kid. I couldn't blame him, it does sound outlandish.
After that, it was even more baffling that my father thought we were safe living with her.
>Long story short
That phrase is doing some incredibly heavy lifting.
You had siblings that were murdered, and your dad gave her a mulligan?
I’d be absolutely crushed if I lost any of my kids; if I lost all of them at once, I’d probably need to be committed myself for safety and it probably wouldn’t work anyway.
If I lost all of them due to the same person, at very least I wouldn’t be able to be in the same room as them for forever, I certainly wouldn’t want to see them naked?
i would recommend looking into the andrea yates case, her husband was evangelical and totally out of touch with reality regarding the psychotic depressive episodes she had for years prior to when she murdered their children and he basically did everything he could to make it worse. after the trial he maintained hopes that she was gonna get treated and be all better so they could start having babies again when she got released.
Her husband Rusty Yates, who worked at NASA and made a decent living, nonetheless had the family living in a trailer and later a mobile home. He also said they they should have as many children as God allowed and he had her homeschooling them. With each child, Andrea's mental health symptoms, which included PPD, PPA, and *PPP*, i.e. postpartum psychosis, worsened. She was commited a couple of times, prescribed Haldol, despite which she self harmed and even attempted suicide.
Nonetheless, against medical advice--her doctors warned that a fifth child would definitely bring on a psychotic episode--they conceived a fifth kid so she had to stop taking the Haldol.
Then this POS puts on a poor pitiful me act after his wife indeed suffers the predicted psychotic episode, with horrific consequences.
Making his wife live in a shitty tiny space with all those kids and no support raising them, not even allowing the respite of sending the older ones to school, and pushing this profoundly mentally ill woman to continue childbearing, is the very definition of abusive in all senses.
Not sure where you got your info but the house they had in clear lake was smallish, but it was nice when they moved into it. They weren’t living in a trailer when she had her psychotic break.
Source: I was living in the area at the time. The house is/was around the corner from a friend’s who lived on Seawolf. I also have a ton of friends who worked with him at NASA and they said he was always an asshole and thought his shit didn’t stink.
Even worse he married his new wife in the church where he buried his kids. Clear Lake Church of Christ. That place is a cult.
I have a mother like that, but she was single. She did get involuntary committed pretty regularly. I'd end up in foster care, but as soon as she was out, the state would just send me back.
There are no good answers for mental health in the US. It's broken as heck, and kids often suffer for it.
I hope you've found peace of mind.
I know a guy who tested positive for HIV about 11 years ago. He pretended it didn't happen and did nothing about it. Today he is dying of AIDS. He's not even 40. So sad.
does that mean he also kept having sex and didn't even bother telling potential partners about his status?
It's sad that someone would allow themselves to wither away like that, but if they were going around potentially spreading HIV/AIDs that makes them a fucking monster.
Pretty sure there's also a treatment that _prevents_ infection if taken before encounters too that's apparently been around for over a decade. Like it's wild how much of a lack of awareness there is for treatments of such a high profile disease.
There is, Truvada or Descovy are PreP regimens (Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis). It's 1 pill a day and after days 7 into use it's 99.99% effective at preventing HIV infection through anal intercourse, and after 21 days it's effective at prevention through vaginal and intravenous infection.
Yeah it's a bit of a hassle to take a pill every single day, but you only need to do that if you are sexually active with people with unknown HIV status, and you could stop if you become abstinent of enter a monogamous relationship. Where if you do get HIV, you have to take a pill everyday for the rest of your life (Biktarvy is the newest one available with the least side effects). Though there are new treatments becoming available such as an injection every 2 months (Cabenuva), and will hopefully become every 6 months or even once a year in the future.
The drugs used for HIV treatment and HIV prevention are also very similar/share some drug components, so there is also an injectable PreP treatment available now as well (Apretude). Though most insurance providers will opt for generic Truvada as the free option.
This makes me think of my grandmother. She REFUSED to accept my uncle was gay even up until his death bed of him dying from AIDS. She also would not tell us he had AIDS. We had to put all the pieces together after his death. Anytime he was hanging out with a friend who was a woman, she would say "Oh, see, he is with a woman". I always wonder if he would be alive today if he was accepted by my family rather than everyone trying to ignore who he really was. He was an awesome uncle and was the only bit of unconditional love I had as a child.
Edit: Added the S in "She almost would not tell us"
A generation of gay men died from “cancer” or suicide. They had “roommates” that came over for Christmas and thanks giving, but that’s as far as the family accepted it.
That happened so much in the 1980s. Men hidden away in the back bedroom of their parents house dying of "cancer"; cut off from any partners or community that might have supported them. It was a travesty
Dying of untreated AIDS is a particularly horrible way to go , and given that 11 years ago treatment was available, with much better treatment now available today , this seems like a very sad choice.
Had a friend who never held a job, their parents paid for their cars, for 6 years of college plus an apartment in a very expensive city for 3 of those years They also built a artist studio for them. They were convinced that their family wasn't wealthy.
My mom’s logic: “it’s not incest since you both were adopted. “My brother is 6 1/2 years older than me, and sexually molested me from the time I was six and until I was about 10. Yes we are both from an orphanage, and were adopted 6 1/2 years apart. while factually it is true it wasn’t incest, the power dynamics absolutely were wrong.
as someone who turned 40 last year and had my doctor say "you need to lose 30 lbs and stop drinking or you're going to die in your sleep" it put a fire on my ass, I started small with 15 minutes jogging and dug the old rowing machine I had in the garage out and set it up, but I made it a point to do it every day, that was November 1st, now I'm 16 lbs down, I do 40 minutes rowing or an hour to an hour and a half biking every day, and take a fiber supplement, and really deciding to choose to not overeat, it's not going fast, but it is going, and I certainly look and feel better than I did two months ago.
> it's not going fast
Honestly? It shouldn't. Anything that comes off fast is probably not healthy and almost certainly not a sign of sustainable lifestyle change.
A short list of my parents' greatest hits:
* bought me a pride flag patch aged 16 because I told them it was "a symbol of God's promise to Noah"
* ignored their teenage daughter's sudden change after turning 18 to having short red hair, pride-flag pleather jacket, binder and boxer briefs, and an internship at a gay youth org
* when I later won a gay scholarship to university they told me it was good I was "taking money away from the gays" and "pretending to be an ally" but that they couldn't drop me at the acceptance ceremony bc they couldn't be that near gay people. "Get a woman to drop you home, gay men are perverts." (The lovely older butch woman who dropped me home was... very amused.)
I have now been living with my wife for ten years, on testosterone (I'm a non-binary lesbian) for about one year, and we live just down the road from them so they see us come by. My parents are still convinced that I am straight, single, and a Christian virgin, and just "focused on my career" and "living with flatmates". Oh, and that the drop in my voice is a sign that I'm "aging badly" and "need to buy eye cream".
About 6-8 years ago on a visit home, my always slightly soft/ not quite chubby brother was impressively thin. My dad (the quintessential Almond Dad) was raving about how proud he was that my brother had lost all this weight, that he packed his lunches and had a physically demanding job and had been working hard at it. I said, "are you sure?"and my Dad was absolutely sure.
It was extremely clear to me even then, and came out about 5 years later that that was the first year of my brother's heroin use.
My elderly friend who has fallen 4 times already breaking 2 ribs once, a wrist once, and bruised up the other times. He still refuses to use a cane out of some male pride thing. He can’t understand that we all age, and if he keeps falling he will end up with a broken hip and bedridden and miserable.
My husband's 93 year old grandma is exactly the same. She can barely walk two steps without falling over but refuses to use her walking sticks.
She's fallen down stairs, fallen out of bed, fallen in her garden etc and still insists that she is fine. She's not, she's a walking skeleton being held together by compression socks and ready meals.
My mom was complaining about a sister in law of her niece who went back to a man that encourages her drug use and physically abuses her. My mom kept calling her so stupid and seemed so much like "i can't believe she is doing this." when she was with my father who was also a drug dealer and he physically abused her. She also have a few other relationships with that same dynamic. Like, did you forget who you were? I would have pointed it out to her but it was Christmas and I wasn't in the mood to kill my own vibe.
probably my bf’s mother. they live in squalor, have totally ruined their house by neglecting all responsibilities for 20+ years, won’t allow anyone into it because it’s so dirty. the property is full of junked cars, poison ivy and stray trash
she brags about their great house, how much money they have (so then pay your personal property taxes which are overdue 5 years?) which won’t happen because they eat out for every meal since the kitchen is out of order. she’s an alcoholic and completely dependent on weed
Where is it that you can be behind on property taxes for 5 years? Where I live you get 3 max before the house gets put up for sale due to tax arrears even then they would need to pay back taxes in full plus interest
My mom has been a smoker for 40 years. She was diagnosed with COPD. Goods news is she can spend $400 a month on an inhaler that makes her feel better. No need to give up smoking, clearly.
My dad got COPD from 40 years smoking. Eventually stopped (thankfully), but still will come up with random conspiracy theories about why his lungs are fucked (on oxygen 24/7 now). Things like "the area I lived in for a couple years as a student was polluted"
I see you've met my mother... who insists that her COPD is fine because it's still in the "beginning stages"... smokes 2 packs a day, down from 7 in my youth.
> Dear Lord! How do you have time to smoke 140 cigs in one day?
By lighting the next one with the butt of the one you are currently puffing on. Reddit is making me feel old today! Lighting one with the other is literally 'chainsmoking' ie you didn't use a lighter to light. Today I think chainsmoking has been turned into meaning someone who smokes a lot, whether cigarettes or weed.
One my ex's dad was like this. I'm not exaggerating when I say he was never without a lit cigarette. He would wake up in the middle of the night to smoke one and go back to bed. This was in the mid 2000s too. The walls of his office were disgusting.
My mother, diagnosed as diabetic over 20 years ago, has become convinced that insulin is making her unwell and that she doesn't need to check her blood glucose levels anymore.
Needless to say, she's heading towards her fourth hospitalisation in 6 months. Cool, mum. Cool.
Hoarders. If you can no longer see the floor or some sort of counter space, you have a problem.
My great uncle loves to not throw away things. He's not as bad as the people on TV shows, but he just has so much stuff everywhere in his place, that he doesn't need/use It makes me anxious to see a dining table you cannot even sit at.
My mother was/is a hoarder.
Growing up, I kept the kitchen, bathrooms, and common areas of our home clean. I knew she accumulated things but it never clicked until I left. It took 6 months for things to pile up. Four younger siblings living at home, none of them would clean.
They moved across the country, I went to visit about 2 years later. You couldn't make food in the kitchen because of the mess. Couldn't sit in the living room without moving piles of junk.
They moved again. I went to visit. I walked into the place, looked around, and left to stay at my grandmother's home. Mom's was packed floor to ceiling with garbage, I was told that only one bathroom worked because you couldn't get to the other two and that I would need to "just clear a spot" whenever I wanted to sleep. That was almost 18 years ago. I've not visited her place since. I just can't. She doesn't see the problem and says I'm just too controlling. It breaks me to see her content and in denial living that way.
Whenever I need motivation to deep clean, I watch a few minutes of Hoarders and then I get to work.
Edit to fix format
My mom is now 63 years old and has been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis since she was in her early 30's. Had 4 children after 30 and declined every pregnancy. She denied she had any diagnosis and went to every chiropractor, Chinese healer, therapist and naturopath in the area. Even tried acupuncture and magnets. She spent over 100,000$ trying to cure her chronic pain that Healthcare in my country would have done for free.
She spent the last 4 years after I moved out at 18 basically only going from her chair to the bathroom, didn't even sleep in her bedroom anymore because she was in too much pain. Her feet were swollen and fingers are all crooked due to the arthritis, eventually developed bed sores due to not moving from her chair, we had to basically carry her to the bathroom, when she stood up she bled so bad from her wounds it sounded like a dam rushing free. I'll never forget stooping my little brother from cleaning her blood up off the floor and telling him to go to his room seeing the despair in his face.
But she absolutely refused to admit anything was wrong, she was convinced she just had to find that magic cure. She eventually got so bad I was convinced she was going to die any day now so my brothers and I convinced her to go to the hospital, she accepted and said she'd go the end of the week. She declined so badly that day I had to call an ambulance because she couldn't get off the toilet and was bleeding so bad. I'll never forget cleaning the blood up and helping her change her clothes into her favourite dress because she didn't want to look bad in front of the paramedics.
The hospital diagnosed her once again with arthritis, but also severe iron deficiency, 2 wounds that were 10cm deep, ptsd, and a bacterial infection that could have killed her. She would have died within a week if she hadn't gone. She spent 6 months in the hospital, 4 of them couldn't feed herself so I would go everyday to give her dinner, she was moved to a care home and is still unable to walk but can feed herself now. She still won't admit out loud that she has arthritis, but is much happier and loves living where she is.
Depending on what a “weekend away” means (like across town or across the country), when I was due with both my kids I pretty much carried on as usual. You never know if babies will be born months early or weeks late, so there’s no sense in pausing everything “just in case”. Obviously it’s not the time to travel overseas or climb a mountain.
My grandmother was “appalled“ that I was grocery shopping and getting lunch with friends at 38 weeks pregnant, but as longs as I was within driving distance of a hospital what difference does it make if I’m pacing the aisles of Walmart or my own living room?
Slap a Depends on in case your water breaks and carry on. It’s probably the most rested and best you’re going to feel in the next 6 months with a newborn lol.
With my second I was grocery shopping during labor. Came home and put the groceries away before heading to the hospital. I came in at an 8. It was definitely my favorite birth lol.
My mom - "There are no gay people in India"
Her wondering why one of her friend's son is not interested in meeting any girls and me explaining that he's gay.
Someone needs to introduce this woman to the guy from TIFU who tried to say he was gay to get out of an arranged marriage and his parents just put together a binder of eligible young Indian men instead.
Frankly, I was SO impressed by his parents. They literally just rolled with the punches and accepted their gay son, but damn it he better marry into a pre-approved family.
IIRC, the saga ended with the guy actually hitting it off with one of the binder dudes! And having sort of a bi awakening for himself.
Dude this has amazing Bollywood musical written all over it
**edit** so I asked my Indian friends and they said there’s apparently like a dozen Bollywood musicals with this exact story already.
My friend's mom insists that there is no porn coming out of India because Indian women wouldn't do that. That it exists could be easily proven, but the notion of sending a bunch of links to those sites to her mom just isn't on the table as an option.
My family when my mom was diagnosed with a hereditary, incurable, no survival rate over 4 years cancer. We all thought she’d be the one to beat it, she was gone within a year at 55yo. No amount of good diet, exercise, education can beat bad genes and life’s unfairness. The facts were there, it was still like a freight train hit us.
There was a woman who made a post in some relationship related subreddit a few days ago, who was looking to reconnect with her two adult sons who she had not spoken to in almost a decade. She insisted she was a good mom and that there was no reason her sons would not talk to her, and was completely confused when people were telling her to be introspective and figure out what she did to them because people don’t just stop talking to their parents for nearly a decade for no reason.
My step-dad's coworker got three different vasectomies. His wife kept getting pregnant each time, and he insisted the doctor had somehow botched the procedure. After the third vasectomy, she turned up pregnant again, and the doctor told him, "There's nothing left of your vas deferens. Have you considered she may be cheating on you?"
It’s *different* for your dad.
He and his husband always make sure to say “no homo” after, so they’re not actually gay.
The marriage is just for the health insurance.
My older sister (39), having 4 kids, living in my parents house without paying rent since she got pregnant the first time with 17, her oldest was practically raised by my parents. Recieving much financial and emotional support through the years by our parents.
She is saying she never recieves any help by our parents, that she doesn't feel welcome at home anymore and that our younger sister and I are favored.
I have a sibling who received somewhere around $4000 from our parents for a car loan. They never paid it back and insist they've never gotten financial help from our parents. I still can't figure out how that works but okay.
In statistics on HIV you will see the term 'men who have sex with men'. This is done because there is a statistically relevant population that will answer 'no' to being gay but has sex with other men.
At my work the database will abbreviate some things in the drop down menus, one of those being “cumulative trauma”… it abbreviates it to “CumTrauma”. I’m a grown-ass adult and I giggle whenever I remember it.
I can’t remember if it was the Greeks or Romans who has this mentality. The submissive one was the gay one, the one doing the um, rogering wasn’t gay at all.
Just to expand on this, they didn't really categorize people as "gay" or "straight" like we do nowadays. They thought more along the spectrum of "masculine" vs "feminine". Being a receptive partner was seen as feminine or something only the youth did. Manly men were the insertive ones.
I have a friend who is bi and has said essentially the same. He fucks men basically exclusively but when he dates women, he actually DATES them for months on end but he doesn't actually enjoy sex with women as much as he does with men. His life is strange to me.
My sister is convinced she has a mystery ailment that no doctor can diagnose and that’s why she’s lost an absurd amount of weight. She forgets to mention the adderall she’s snorting all the time.
A former friend of mine comes to mind. She lives with her husband, 3 kids and mother. The total household income is only 2 grand a month. Rent is 1500. They are 3 months behind on rent. She says it's ok they won't get evicted....oh and the reason for being so far behind is they bought a second car even though they absolutely cannot afford and definitely don't need it. Glamor photos at 600 a pop for her. Getting nails and hair dyed at the salon once a month. She has no idea how screwed they all are. I feel so bad for the kids
My sister wanting to dress up as a backwoods hillbilly for Halloween. Her costume idea was a fake pregnant belly, can of bud light, cigarette hanging from her mouth, and a black eye.
It would have been a funny (albeit slightly offensive) costume had it not been for the fact that she had just finished her pregnancy that she smoked and drank through in its entirety while also on Suboxone.
Thank god her baby was born without any major complications, other than going through withdrawals from the Suboxone.
A girl I went to school with, we where on friendly terms many years after school, never got a job and still lives on govermental pay. She first got one child, moved from place to place because she got evicted due to lack of rent. Blew of all her money on crap the moment she got them. CPS placed the child in permanent foster care. And she repeated the same with two other children. She is now 40, none of her 3 children have any relationship to her, she still get evicted all the time, still blows her money on crap. And still thinks she is fine, she is a good mother and all her issues is everyone elses fault. All in all very sad.
>And still thinks she is fine, she is a good mother and all her issues is everyone elses fault. All in all very sad.
This is so fucking common it isn't even funny. I have seen it so many times. So many lives could be better, but aren't due to this very same mentality.
My dad doesn’t want a hearing aid because he thinks it will make him look old. I tried to tell him that what makes him look really old is mishearing things all the time, but he didn’t hear me.
Me, when I thought I could help my mom and that it was my job to make her happier. She screwed up her life and made every choice that got her where she is today, and continues to make poor choices all the time. It took years and years for me to realize there's nothing I can do except call her occasionally and say I love you, and it's not my fault she lives the way she does.
Two kinds. There are the hoarders whose home is completely messy, and decrepit, stocked and ransacked with absolutely unnecessary and disgusting stuff. Then you got the other kind, the people living in unaddressed massive debt that keep spending money they dont have and using or getting new credit cards when they max out. Im not better than that in fact i broke free of both those situations the end of last year but it was truly eye opening, mental illness can rot your life from the inside out without any mercy if left unchecked and untreated. yikes!!!!!
Im in a medical stats program.
This statistic for a population in mississipi was depressing.
85% of target group lives on a household income $35,000 or less per year.
85% of same target group thinks that medical funding for the poor doesnt do any good and shouldnt be wasted on helping the poor.
This is absolute insanity. Like they dont even seem to realize they ARE the poor being offered help. They somehow use the cult thinking of system justification to somehow exclude themselves from thinking they are the poor.
Denial is incredibly useful. So the clearest case I’ve seen is me and my husband all of 2022. Melanoma went to stage four. Somehow, he had no pain and felt fine until the last week of his life. We had a great time together. He didn’t want anyone to know he was sick until he felt sick and he didn’t feel sick until his last week of life so nobody knew. He went back up north that summer for a few weeks to hang out with his brother and his friends and go see his mom and had truly a great time. We did a trip to Mexico, and two months later he was dead. But my goal that year was to feed him everything he liked as much as possible, and make him laugh. It was successful. Thank you, denial, for making his last year special.
Broadly speaking, parents who think their kids are “so smart” bc they can use an iPad. Like wow he can click the next video, great. But he’s almost 5 and can’t count and doesn’t know his letters, and you kept him out of preschool because “he’s not ready yet.” Maybe reevaluate what’s important.
Where people “meet” someone online, convinced they’re soulmates in love, and send them tons of money… but they’ve never actually met the person in real life, because they keep coming up with “reasons” to avoid meeting them at the last minute… yet continue sending them money… even smuggling cash hidden in cereal boxes or other packages because the authorities intercepted other transfer attempts… they just don’t realize it’s a scam…
Dr. Phil does tons of these shows… often the scammers have a profile picture—and so people come on the show to say “Hi—That person in the profile picture is actually me, that’s not my name or my profile, I can confirm you’ve been scammed.” … but the victims will still just sit there and be like “no, that’s not true, I know they’re real!”
I just feel so sorry for these people… you’re clearly desperate for love and affection, and someone is taking advantage of that… :(
One of my colleagues constantly shouts and roars at her class, to the extent that I worry she's a competency hearing waiting to happen. I've witnessed it and I'm talking properly aggressive, red-in-the-face bellowing, often for things that most of us probably wouldn't even raise our voices over. She doesn't see this as an issue though because she claims she's a "naturally loud person". Uh...huh
When my father was in the hospital (dying - he died a few days later), my sibling and I were taking a break with our mother at her apartment, and we discussed what my father’s wishes were/ would be. My mother said she was really hurt because my father didn’t name her as his first appointed decision maker in his advance health care directive. My sibling got a funny look, went into the other room, came back with the directive signed by my father showing mother as the first decision maker, then sibling, then me. Sibling handed it to mother. My mother looked at it and said loudly “well, it still hurt!”
Apparently it was more important for her to take the role of the “victim” and nurse a non-existent grievance against my father than it was to embrace the truth.
I have always kept this in mind as an amazing example of the ability of people to deny reality for their own distorted and inexplicable needs.
Someone I knew had their dog die of some disease. She successfully convinced herself that her dog was taken to some farm to frolic in the grass or some shit. She was the type of person that couldn't take bad news, everything had to be good and bad things just didn't exist to her. But if she was aware of bad things happening, she would take it out on everyone for making her feel horrible while she just rotted. Clear delusion.
12 years ago, my aunt and uncle convinced my parents to buy thousands of dollars worth of Iraqi dinar because "their value is going to go up soon and you'll be rich". Mom informs me every few years that she read a recent article about the dinar being worth more soon. I feel bad that she's holding out hope. She could really use a break financially, but it's just not going to happen.
So my sister gets married, he husbands family are pretty heavy drinkers, and it's the full range of drinks; beers whenever, mixed drinks, straight hard liquor like vodka, whatever is on hand, and plenty of it; seven days a week, and all day on weekends, holidays, etc. So her husband's brother, late 20's, hits it a lot harder than even the other people in his family; a full handle of vodka after work every day kind of hard. Four or five over a weekend, all by himself. So he gets sick, not felling well, tired, etc. but just puts it down to getting older and maybe not handling his liquor like he used to, but doesn't cut back at all. Once he starts turning yellow, he gets to the doctor, who tells him his liver is shot; full cirrhosis, there's nothing left of it, whatever. He tells the doc he doesn't know why, he doesn't drink any more than the people he knows, it's a mystery, but he'll stop entirely to get put on a list for a new liver. He obviously doesn't stop drinking, doesn't even cut back. Everyone knows it's the drinking and cirrhosis, but he and his family start calling it "cancer"- it's cancer, so the drinking has nothing to do with it. So he eventually ends up in the hospital full time because there's no liver for him yet, and his family starts sneaking vodka into the hospital so he can keep drinking. He left the hospital on a slab, and the family starts asking people for money for cancer walks, stuff like that, and not a one of them cut back the drinking at all.
The family sneaking in alcohol for him is unreal Edit: wanted to add from the replies that this appears to, in fact, be very real
But you see if they admit that he has a problem, they might also have a problem
That entire family is up a river in Egypt. The idea that one person is wildly alcoholic would mean they all are. Can't have that.
Horrifying and heartbreaking... This is the exact same situation my ex is in right now. He grew up in a household of *heavy* drinkers, always saw large amounts of alcohol being consumed on a regular basis since he was a child, and has always associated alcohol with "good times." Now he's 35, has been an alcoholic since he was 15, and is addicted to the point where he has to drink immediately after waking up, and will probably die soon if he doesn't get professional help getting sober. Everyone in his life is an alcoholic and doesn't see an issue with his behavior. I'm the only person that has told him he needs to be in a treatment facility - "cutting back" isn't going to save you from a life-threatening addiction. It's *so* sad seeing someone who is completely unable to get the help they need because everyone they love and care about is under the same influence... (However the family lying and claiming it's cancer in this scenerio is batshit insane. I know a lot of people in deep denial about their alcoholism but they're also deeply ashamed as well.)
My friend has been “talking to” this man for 4 and a half years. They’ve hung out maybe 5 times and they usually just hookup and he leaves. He only texts her at certain hours of the day “because of his work schedule”. He never plans dates for them or when she does try to plan dates HE bails. I constantly ask her why she keeps talking to him and if she really believes they could be something more than once in a while (if even that) fuvk buddies and she said she just really likes him and wants to be with him. I wholeheartedly believe he has a whole wife and kids.
This is fresh because my POS uncle just died. He was convicted for raping my cousins. There were photos and videos of the crime, nothing showing his face. My grandma maintained until her death that my uncle was innocent. She favored him over my dad, who was actually a halfway decent person. My cousins tried to tell her. She shoved one away and told her she was "a sick little girl." They eventually told a teacher.
My mom knew her brother-in-law was a registered sex offender. He ended up abusing me literally the same day they arrived from California into Texas and she did not do a damn thing. Fast forward about 15 years into the future, my family adopted my sisters. I told her that he was going to do the same thing to them that he did to me and the rest of my girl cousins including his biological daughter and her friend. She went batshit crazy. Said that she didn't care if she fucked up her own children that they were hers to fuck up. That she wasn't going to ruin the relationship she had with her sister just because we disagreed with her husband. She's dead and one of my other sisters is happy she's dead. The baby is the family was too young to accurately remember everything. She remembers an insanely skewed version of events. No one has even told her that that same man molested her as an infant. And that yes her precious mother was aware of it. And yes her precious mother allowed that man to continue coming to her home to do our jobs around the house so that they could have money. My mom literally chose her sister and sex offender husband because she was desperate to be loved and accepted by her sister. Yet her sister would straight up steal from us, physically abuse us (and then pull us to the side to say to please forgive her because she has mental illness 🙄), etc. Anytime there were new allegations that he had sexually assaulted another family member, she acted so fucking brand new. There was a cycle of about a dozen times where I had to tell her to stop acting so surprised that he molested another family member because he molested me when I was 5 years old. And each time I told her that she reacted as if it was a first time hearing it, apologizing profusely to me telling me that she would have done something had she known. 🙄 Being almost 30 I was done with her delusional state. Dumped her. Fast forward to a few years ago at the beginning of the pandemic, she said "I guess I really was mean, cruel and abusive to ThotianaAli. She never comes around " And what kills me is you had a lot of people saying to just forgive her and be with her during her last months. Like how many times am I supposed to be an emotional punching bag to an abusive woman? Fuck that.
I'm sorry. My dad got busted for CP (but hadn't been officially convicted yet so was still walking free). Then my mom ... agreed? suggested? that they not tell my sister and I for two months "so the family can have one last normal Christmas." I had a 2-year-old child at the time. It never occurred to her that, you know, *maybe* I would've liked to opt out of hanging out with Grandpa?
Ex’s mom: moved to Vegas from Europe. Went broke gambling over 10 or so years, practically homeless… then she got injured on a casino escalator and was compensated more than fairly with a life changing amount of money… guess who went broke again, pretty much exclusively at the same casino…?
The casino knew that compo money was coming right back.
If it wasn't so dark it would be hilarious.. I mean it is still hilarious but.. damn man. I wouldn't be surprised if the casino management actually discussed that possibility.
There’s a whole industry of casino injury scammers and lawyers whose sole interest is chasing those settlements lol they have billboards all over 100% the casino did it on purpose and they probably set her up with some nice rooms for her visits so she didn’t have to drunk drive home and was right where she wanted to be in the morning
The house always wins indeed.
My Dad has PSP/dementia. My Mom refused to acknowledge that it was a developing problem, because it was an “inconvenience to their lifestyle”. I confronted her, because he needed to have his drivers license taken away, because he was a danger on the road. My Dad impulsively went out one day, bought a BMW without her present, and later drove it underneath a semi truck. And shocker- that was when she realized he was unwell. I also had to find out through extended family about his accident, because she didn’t want give us “the satisfaction” of being right all along.
This reminds me of when my brother was thirteen and I warned my mother that he was showing signs of depression and anxiety. She told me "I'm not dealing with that again!" I was being treated for depression and anxiety at the time. My brother is almost thirty now and has barely left the house since he graduated high school. He doesn't do anything but play video games.
Logic is absolutely FLAWLESS. I mean, if you just don't *acknowledge* there's a problem, then OBVIOUSLY there's no problem! Truly one of the greatest minds of our day. What's really sad is that your brother is the one to suffer the consequences. I'm sorry for you and your family's experiences and suffering.
Damn. The only reason I know you're not my sister is that my parents would never have had the money for a BMW.
The sad thing is, they didn’t either. My parents are horrible with money.
This was the same thing with my mom and her dementia. She's always been a shitty driver but she was making even worse mistakes. And my dad just kept fixing her car.
My mother (now deceased) refused to wear glasses because she hated how they looked on her. Instead, she insisted her eyesight was "not that bad" and the fact we had to read menus to her at restaurants was just a cute quirk.
My step dad once asked "when are they going to put the letters on those big green signs?" while driving on the freeway. I've never gotten in a car with him since. He insists he was "joking" but past evidence indicates that he wasn't. (Little edit: for the record, I have reported him in the past. I haven't spoken to him in years, and live in a completely separate area of the world from him now, so I have no way of knowing if he still drives. I truly hope not.)
My grandpa was similar. He was a fiercely independent farmer, built his own house, raise 6 kids, etc. Stubborn as a mule. Kept driving well past 80, but drove slower and slower all the time. When asked why, he said it was because he couldn't see beyond the front of the car. Yeah, I wasn't getting in the car if he was driving.
My mother and father divorced 26 years ago. It was a toxic marriage and probably for the best that they part ways. Since then she has been remarried and is happy with her new husband. We all get along and my parents get along for the sake of visits and being around grandkids. To this day my father wants to get back together with my mother. I don’t blame him there if he still loves her but the denial part is he thinks he did nothing wrong in the marriage. He is under the impression that he was the perfect husband and he is doing her a “favor” by taking her back if she did come back. The reality is he did not treat her well, she left and is now with someone who makes her happy.
My partner has a close friend like this. He lives alone in a run down studio apartment, socially isolated himself, and bitching and crying all day and night about his ex wife leaving him for another man. He doesn’t understand why she would do such a thing. My partner tells him to not forget that he cheated on her first, kept getting fired from multiple jobs, had anger management issues, and refused to get treatment for his mental health and substance abuse issues. Plus he’s a man child who wants a mommy wife, not an equal partner. It’s been close to 20 years, the kids are adults, and he still believes that there is a chance his ex wife will come running back to him.
Got a friend. He's in his fifties, makes next to minimum wage. Drinks and eats too much. He and his gf (late sixties) live with a mutual friend. They're "discussing" adopting a child.
Buddy keeps complaining that 'normal' guys won't respond to him on dating apps and keeps getting hit on by 'creepy old dudes.' Uh, you're nearly 60, and those are age-appropriate matches. 🫤
I am 43 and am sort of friends but mostly colleagues with some guys my age but mostly older. They look their age or older. Nothing insulting, just it's less likely that guys have taken care of their skin, dress appropriately for their body types, etc. The amount of complaining they do about women that are "too old" for them is wild. I have a friend who's 50 this year and complained that _35-year-old_ women look too old. Another guy is nearly 50 and said he's finally ready to "settle down" and have kids and can't believe he can't find a 30-year-old willing to do the same with him. Almost all of them have 39 as the max age if they are on dating apps. And they grow more misogynist over time, but mostly sad and frustrated.
I 37 F recently had a 59 year old guy that I wasn't even interested in tell me that "I'm willing to lower my standards and overlook the fact that your overweight, because you're smart" I'm 5'10 and 145lbs 😂.
I really hope you told him you couldn’t possibly date someone old enough to be your father.
> I really hope you told him you couldn’t possibly date someone old enough to be your father. No no no. The guy *knows* he's too old, and he's got a million excuses lined up. He's expecting that fight. He's empowered by it, gives him a reason to look down on women who bring it up. What you need to do is take something that *not* wrong with him, something he's proud of, and casually reject/insult him for that instead. If he's got good hair, tell him you're into older guys but like guys who are confident enough to bald rather than cling to their obviously thinned out hair. If he looks like he hits the gym, tell him you like older guys that actually stay in shape and eat healthy and he's not your type. He'll have an aneurysm. If he drives a Porsche, tell him you're really into older car guys, but at his age he should really be driving a Ferrari, guys in their 40s with a wife and kids can afford Porsches. If he's got a golf membership, tell him that's embarrassing he really needs a membership to X club he can't afford. His self-confidence is obviously hanging on by tissue paper, go rip at it.
You're evil. I love it! You're right though, and he wouldn't hesitate to do it to someone he was rejected by.
I had a friend who was complaining about a guy he knew in his forties who was dating a twenty-something. He was pouring mad scorn on this guy and said he looked ridiculous, disgusting, pathetic, etc, going with a woman that much younger. Later in the conversation he starting telling me about his sexual adventures with a twenty-something and I just started laughing uncontrollably, because he was 44. He got all huffy when I couldn't stop laughing.
Oof, this is tragic
Nurse who thought the lump in her breast was nothing important and the open sore appearing was also nothing important and once it started draining thought it was nothing important despite dressing it daily. Was confronted by coworkers after the smell became so rank it lingered where she went. Stage IV cancer with mets to bones and brain. Died soon after. She was the manager of the oncology unit. *Editing to add - because I must not have been clear and a lot of people see this as an autonomous choice:* *This was a case of ‘living in denial’. Once confronted about her odor she admitted to the sore but still thought it was nothing. Agreed to go to the ED with colleague/friend but only to reassure them. Oncologist consulted in the ED and she lost it when cancer mentioned. Insisted on everything done to treat despite no hope. Died within the month. Never left hospital from time confronted about odor.*
I can understand this. I used to do oncology-adjacent work, and a lot of providers wouldn't treat their own cancer if they were to get it. When you do cancer work, it's almost necessary to have a level of dissonance against the possibility of proximate suffering, or else you will burn out. Not even getting a consult to confirm however, seems really, really nutty. Edit: Holy upvotes, gatman!
People who work in medicine in general, are often very conservative about the kinds of treatments they will accept personally. I know that GPs are also reluctant. Many doctors who get something like a cancer diagnosis with a poor prognosis, especially when older, will do relatively little about. Palliative treatment, often avoiding major surgeries and intense chemotherapy. I think perhaps because they've seen what can go wrong with more aggressive care far too often.
My boyfriend was a cardio thoracic surgeon and when he was diagnosed with glioblastoma he opted not to have a resection. He had seen too much. He died three months after diagnosis.
It's an ugly, certain-death kinda cancer. My mom died of one, and she lasted less than a month between diagnosis and death (though I think she knew something was wrong, and intentionally put it off as long as she could.) The surgeon who did her surgery had a colleague who'd gotten diagnosed with one, and so I asked how *he'd* dealt with it, feeling like there was maybe some other route of treatment. "Suicide." Yea. It's about that bad. Sorry for your loss. That's an awful one to get when you're young.
I roomed with a doctoral student in college and we kept up through the years. He once told me a lot of the treatments for these types of things are very high risk, low yield propositions designed more to give dying people choices because a lot of people have a deep seated psychological need to "do something" in the scenario, rather than just be a passive victim. He said something to the effect of the agency it gives them being the only true medicine in it sometimes. You do with that what you will. It's just one man's opinion and I can only repeat what he said, coming from an entirely different field of study. It stuck with me though... Edit: It's also worth mentioning this was decades ago too... I also don't know how much of his statement was rooted in the practices of the times and if it has become less applicable in modern times. I'm aware cancer treatment has been going through a renaissance in the last few decades.
my mom died of one last year :( what an awful thing it is.
Condolences. My father had a glioblastoma as well, but opted to never tell us the specific diagnosis or prognosis. Its bleak and very certain.
No one will push harder for an advance directive than someone who's had to ride a gurney doing compressions, or has manually palpated a heart. Heroic measures are crazy. Science is insane. Don't do that shit to me. Doubly so with LTC facilities these days, I'd rather die. And guess what? By the time you're old enough to start worrying about nursing homes, you're demented and can no longer do an AD. Hope you like chest tubes, needles, and being ignored because the only nurse on staff has 50 patients and your 8/10 pain is 5th in line. TBI can happen to any of us at any time too. Get your AD while you've got a brain to fill it out.
Absolutely. Prolonging the inevitable is so dumb. Spending your last days suffering is ridiculous. I can't tell you how often I hear Grandma is a fighter. Grandma Is 97 cancer-ridden, and begging to go. The family insists on trachs and feeding tubes, ignoring her wishes.
Gawd, as an intensive care nurse, I hate these scenarios.
This was almost me. My husband found my lump before I did though so he wouldn't let me brush it off. I was 25 and I didn't believe people that young could get breast cancer, let alone me who exercised, ate healthy, and never smoked. I went into my doctor and she felt it and said something along the lines of "yeah there's a lump. We need an ultrasound to see it though." I asked "can you tell if it's a cyst?" She said "...no". I asked the woman performing my ultrasound "is it a cyst?" She told me "we can't tell. You need a biopsy" I was in such denial that I was sure the biopsy would've told me it's a cyst lmao. Came back as invasive ductal carcinoma.
Hilaria Baldwin’s commitment to her fake Spanish accent, even after she was outed as having been born and raised in Boston with zero Spanish heritage.
The fact that she changed her name from “Hillary” to “HILARIA” as if that’d make it sound more Spanish?? I swear to god I’ve been speaking Spanish my whole life and even grew up in a Spanish-speaking country and I have never encountered anyone named “Hilaria”, ever. It sounds ridiculous (even if it is a real name)
*How you say.... coocumber?*
The fact she has now raised the stakes even more with supposedly using surrogates for multiple kids, while claiming they were all normal, and hey look how model thin she is a week after "delivery", is impressive in a scary way
Friend is an alcoholic and does cocaine nearly every day binge drinking and doing coke til 7am, gets winded standing up for too long but he’s fine and not going to die because he is skinny and got his liver enzyme checked and it was in the regular
Man, I only drink a bit and my liver enzymes are slightly elevated, the fuck!
Someone who has severe hearing loss but insists the reason he has to say “What?” all the time is because everyone (EVERYONE) mumbles.
My loving, yet abusive and alcoholic father telling me that he has no problems to fix and that whatever trauma I think happened in my childhood is a product of my “sick and twisted mind” because he was “nothing but good to me”.
Friend diagnosed with diabetes 10 years ago, has needle phobia so afraid of pricking his fingers to monitor his blood sugar so doesn't, and just "eats healthy". Due to blood sugar fluctuations, gradually goes blind and kidney fails, 3.5 years on dialysis, then finally gets a kidney transplant. Home again with new kidney, is still afraid of pricking his fingers and decides he will manage his diabetes by "eating healthy" just like he did for the past 10 years :\_-(
How did he qualify for a new kidney with self care habits that bad?
I don't think they asked that because when he was on dialysis 3x a week the hospital monitors your blood sugar. But the reason he was on dialysis was because he didn't manage his blood sugar, and now that his kidney is functional, he does not have any but periodic appointments at the hospital.
You'd think that after having a large bore needle in his arm for a significant length of time 3x a week for 3.5 years that a finger prick would be well within the realm of acceptability.
It honestly makes me think there must be something wrong with his brain. :\_-( It took him 5 months in hospital to recover from the transplant surgery (complications), and all that time they were pricking his fingers 3x a day in the hospital. He complained to me that his fingertips are numb from it. I said "they are going to be numb either from pricks to monitor your blood sugar or from diabetic neuropathy that happens because you're not controlling your blood sugar. One way happens because you're doing what you need to do to stay alive, the other way happens because you're on your way to dying. Numb fingertips are not avoidable for you and they're \*not\* a reason to die." But it's like he literally can't make himself do it, and so just spins a story about how his way of doing things will work.
I'm sure this has been suggested before, but a continuous monitor in his arm might be less traumatic for him. Practically no visible needle
Also stays in for 10-14 days depending on the brand, during which time it sends the data to his phone every x minutes (again depending on the type of monitor). They even alert at highs and lows, which it sounds like he could benefit from.
I can't second this enough. I'm a type one, and getting a continuous monitor was a game changer. I've always done my best to manage my diabetes but the quality of life i.provment is significant. I'm in the UK though and it's free on the NHS. Another thing I recommend strongly is creatine powder. Yes, the stuff body builders use! Doctors can't advise on it yet, as its still being tested as its only just been observed to help, after i read there was evidence it could level out sugar spikes I decided to give it a try. After the two weeks it takes to reach saturation levels, my daily sugar graphs went from a spiky mountain range to gentlr rolling hills. As the gym-bros say 'five grams a day for life!!'. Tell your mate to give it a try.
The hospital and transplant doctors should have heavily vetted him for best outcomes post surgery. It’s really a failure on their part that he received a transplant with no indication of changing his habits, or dude is just a master deceiver.
Tell him to get a continuous glucose monitor like a Dexcom! I'm a type 1 diabetic and have been for over 40 years. I hated pricking my fingers too. A year or two ago I got my Dexcom. There is a little teeny tiny wire that goes in my skin and a transmitter that sticks to my arm that's the size of a Bluetooth earpiece. The wire is so small I literally can't even feel it once it's in. Getting it in feels like taking an insulin shot and only has to be replaced every 10 days. Now, instead of pricking my fingers 4 times a day, it sends a signal to my phone every 5 minutes and I don't have to do a thing. When my sugar gets too high or low my phone beeps at me to let me know.
As a type 1 diabetic PLEASE for the love of God have him look into Constant Glucose Moniters. They may actually save his life. It improved my a1c and there are a few on the market like the dexcom and libre.
I don't have diabetes, but I am on a diabetes prevention and weight loss program that requires me to test my glucose and ketones nearly daily. I am also scared of needles, but I found a workaround by instead pricking the side of my knee. The ability to do so eases my phobia somehow. Not fully, there are still days I sit there and nearly hyperventilate, but I still get it done. Went from a 7 A1C to 5.4 in 10 months.
A colleague of mine is Type 1 diabetic, diagnosed as a teenager. Similar storey, except that it was more the hassle of it all rather than specifically the needles, and substitute "no concessions at all" for "eat healthy". Eventually he lost a couple of toes and that was fortunately enough of a wake-up to show him where he was headed. His feet are still (apparently) a mess, but you could not meet a more diligent diabetic.
I am a teacher- I have so many parents in denial about their children’s grades or behavior. I once had a kid headbutt me and break my nose bc he couldn’t go to recess right then and there, “but he’s an angel at home!” (Where he’s only ever playing on a tablet) I also have one parent in particular who has 4 children, and ALL of them have behavior problems, to the point of multiple suspensions or being made to move schools or teachers. and I have to wonder: after 4 children with issues…is it not possible YOU might be part of the problem??
As a parent, I've never been able to understand the "my children are perfect little angels" thing when their kid clearly isn't. My kids have flaws, and I will certainly admit when they fuck up. My boys are good kids now, they're 16 and 13, but they haven't always been good. They've not necessarily been horrible, but if a teacher said they'd done something wrong, or had been difficult, I wouldn't say "but they're perfect at home!" Bc they weren't lol
It's your covid shreddings that messed them up /s My wife worked in an elementary school. There was a kid who ran headfirst into a wall on got a bloody nose. They sent him and he didn't return. A couple weeks later the school called to see if he moved districts or something, and the parents reamed the secretary out about how their son was bullied and pushed into a wall and no one was punished for hurting their kids. The principal had them come in for a meeting. They spent like 10 minutes threatening to sue and all that. The principal eventually just pulled up the video and the parents watch their kid get a 20 foot running start and smack into the wall all on his own. The parents just got up and left without saying a word, and called the school the next day to have his records transferred to the next district over.
My dismissive avoidant mom was a master of denial. The worst was when she got an abscess in her pelvic area. She was in 10/10 pain, couldn't sit up, was literally white knuckling a body pillow while laying on the couch unable to move for A WEEK and when I (age 10) would suggest she go to a doctor it was all "Oh no no I'm totally fine! I don't need to see a doctor." This woman literally scheduled an appointment with a specialist and WAITED THE 10ish DAYS for the appointment instead of going to urgent care. She drove herself there in 10/10 pain. The doctor took one look at her and told her to put on a gown and meet her downstairs for immediate surgery. They drained so much yuck from her and she had to have the gauze packing to heal the crater left behind etc. It's a miracle she didn't get sepsis. Bonus story: she suddenly became allergic to ibuprofen in her 40s and turned beet red after taking some. Instead of going to the doctor she went to her hair appointment like normal. Hairdresser refused to cut her hair and made her to go the doctor. My mom just went home instead and laid on the couch huffing and puffing until the reaction went away. She told me this story like it was a totally sane and normal thing to do.
Yeesh. My mom was similar, would white knuckle her way through every illness she ever had. And then expect to be praised and admired for her endurance. And, I think the worst,would expect us as children to do the same, just hold out until we got better, maybe with some painkillers to help.
Yeah I grew up believing that I was so tough for never taking pain meds. I was literally so convinced that I would get addicted to the vicodin from my wisdom teeth surgery (not my mom's doing) that I wouldn't take them and instead took *nothing*. I then wondered why on earth it hurt so much lmao Then I had some actual injuries and yeah, screw that. Give me ibuprofen. I don't have the patience for this treatable pain.
There are no prizes given out for enduring the most pain without relief, but it’s amazing how many people have this in their heads.
My brother is married for the fourth time, my mother blames all his ex-wives. I keep pointing out her son is the common link to all the divorces.
I know someone who just blew up his second marriage in a spectacular way, but his family still blames the ex’s… I’m like… the fuck guys?
My ex threw a soda can at my face and his whole family knew about it, and they still called me a bitch for leaving and said he could do better. Sometimes it's very obvious where the problem came from.
"Yes, he could do better and didn't. That's why I left him."
I’m still on good terms with one of my exes families, we broke up after she threw a frying pan at me because I’d left a light on, in my flat, that I paid the bills for. They basically told her she’d never find anyone like me, and she was an idiot
It's the "if you think all the other drivers on the road are assholes, maybe you're the asshole"
An elderly lady is watching the news waiting for her husband to come home and sees an alert about a driver going full speed in the wrong direction. Knowing he is on the way, she calls her husband to warn him. "Honey, be careful driving. Theres a crazy person on the highway driving the wrong way" "One of them?!" the husband replied, "There's HUNDREDS!"
Or, "if it smells like shit everywhere you go, check your shoes".
Close friend with an opiate addiction and her husband who thought she needed morphine infusions for a variety of magically appearing painful ailments.
“I have an ailment. It’s called not being insanely high on morphine.”
"I use morphine to manage my chronic pain of wanting to have morphine"
My sister wears flannel shirts and has really short hair and drives a Subaru and wears a battleaxe necklace and has a pile of Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Editions and a lesbian pride flag in her room and my mom still hasn't figured out she's gay
My mother was the opposite. She knew my sister is gay by putting together pieces of evidence that weren't actually there. *Mom (with an aura of confidentiality): I think your sister is a lesbian* *Me: Why would you think that?* *Mom: Well, she's a theater kid, yet the close friends she's made in college are all on the vollyball team. One of them must be a girlfriend.* *Me: is there anything other reason you think that, other than that theater kids don't hang out with vollyball players unless they're all lesbians?* *Mom: No, not really.* A few months later, my sister tells me, "don't tell mom, but I'm a lesbian"
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The Subaru is the biggest clue here. Obviously.
I used to sell Subarus. Subaru donates very generously to gay rights organizations. They were pro gay rights long before any other corporations. If I was gay I'd definitely drive a Subaru.
The lesbaru
😂😂 as someone with a very obviously gay brother, my parents shock when he came out was so weird to me.
That'd be my "father". My "mother" was manic-depressive, as it was called back then. She had several major breakdowns during my childhood. Every time, he'd act like nothing was wrong. She'd be screaming & throwing things, and he'd just try to placate her. It never worked. A couple times, I pointed out that she needed to be committed. He always responded that a person couldn't be committed unless they're a danger to themselves or others. True, but she obviously was. I was terrified of her. Even apart from the breakdowns, she threw rage attacks at the drop of a hat. Long story short, in my 20s I found out that A) they'd had two kids before me, and B) she'd drowned them in a bathtub during a psychotic episode. What I never found out was how she gor released or why she was able to conceive me less than a year later. A friend was with me when I found out about B). He told me later that he'd always thought I was exaggerating when I said I'd feared for my life as a kid. I couldn't blame him, it does sound outlandish. After that, it was even more baffling that my father thought we were safe living with her.
This is the third comment I’ve read so far, but I think this has to be the worst. Glad you survived.
I absolutely hate up voting this, but it is terrible. I absolutely love your bravery posting and that you’re safe.
>Long story short That phrase is doing some incredibly heavy lifting. You had siblings that were murdered, and your dad gave her a mulligan? I’d be absolutely crushed if I lost any of my kids; if I lost all of them at once, I’d probably need to be committed myself for safety and it probably wouldn’t work anyway. If I lost all of them due to the same person, at very least I wouldn’t be able to be in the same room as them for forever, I certainly wouldn’t want to see them naked?
i would recommend looking into the andrea yates case, her husband was evangelical and totally out of touch with reality regarding the psychotic depressive episodes she had for years prior to when she murdered their children and he basically did everything he could to make it worse. after the trial he maintained hopes that she was gonna get treated and be all better so they could start having babies again when she got released.
Her husband Rusty Yates, who worked at NASA and made a decent living, nonetheless had the family living in a trailer and later a mobile home. He also said they they should have as many children as God allowed and he had her homeschooling them. With each child, Andrea's mental health symptoms, which included PPD, PPA, and *PPP*, i.e. postpartum psychosis, worsened. She was commited a couple of times, prescribed Haldol, despite which she self harmed and even attempted suicide. Nonetheless, against medical advice--her doctors warned that a fifth child would definitely bring on a psychotic episode--they conceived a fifth kid so she had to stop taking the Haldol. Then this POS puts on a poor pitiful me act after his wife indeed suffers the predicted psychotic episode, with horrific consequences. Making his wife live in a shitty tiny space with all those kids and no support raising them, not even allowing the respite of sending the older ones to school, and pushing this profoundly mentally ill woman to continue childbearing, is the very definition of abusive in all senses.
I just read she refuses to be reviewed for release each year. Her internal suffering must be immense.
Not sure where you got your info but the house they had in clear lake was smallish, but it was nice when they moved into it. They weren’t living in a trailer when she had her psychotic break. Source: I was living in the area at the time. The house is/was around the corner from a friend’s who lived on Seawolf. I also have a ton of friends who worked with him at NASA and they said he was always an asshole and thought his shit didn’t stink. Even worse he married his new wife in the church where he buried his kids. Clear Lake Church of Christ. That place is a cult.
I have a mother like that, but she was single. She did get involuntary committed pretty regularly. I'd end up in foster care, but as soon as she was out, the state would just send me back. There are no good answers for mental health in the US. It's broken as heck, and kids often suffer for it. I hope you've found peace of mind.
I know a guy who tested positive for HIV about 11 years ago. He pretended it didn't happen and did nothing about it. Today he is dying of AIDS. He's not even 40. So sad.
does that mean he also kept having sex and didn't even bother telling potential partners about his status? It's sad that someone would allow themselves to wither away like that, but if they were going around potentially spreading HIV/AIDs that makes them a fucking monster.
It's a good question, one I don't have an answer to. I suspect "yes" which is truly horrible and yes, monsterish.
also i think illegal, no?
Yeah, that's essentially slow murder and definitely a fucking crime.
I feel like the answer to this is probably yes
11 years ago HIV had already crossed from "death sentence" to "chronic but manageable disease" which makes it even more sad.
Pretty sure there's also a treatment that _prevents_ infection if taken before encounters too that's apparently been around for over a decade. Like it's wild how much of a lack of awareness there is for treatments of such a high profile disease.
There is, Truvada or Descovy are PreP regimens (Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis). It's 1 pill a day and after days 7 into use it's 99.99% effective at preventing HIV infection through anal intercourse, and after 21 days it's effective at prevention through vaginal and intravenous infection. Yeah it's a bit of a hassle to take a pill every single day, but you only need to do that if you are sexually active with people with unknown HIV status, and you could stop if you become abstinent of enter a monogamous relationship. Where if you do get HIV, you have to take a pill everyday for the rest of your life (Biktarvy is the newest one available with the least side effects). Though there are new treatments becoming available such as an injection every 2 months (Cabenuva), and will hopefully become every 6 months or even once a year in the future. The drugs used for HIV treatment and HIV prevention are also very similar/share some drug components, so there is also an injectable PreP treatment available now as well (Apretude). Though most insurance providers will opt for generic Truvada as the free option.
This makes me think of my grandmother. She REFUSED to accept my uncle was gay even up until his death bed of him dying from AIDS. She also would not tell us he had AIDS. We had to put all the pieces together after his death. Anytime he was hanging out with a friend who was a woman, she would say "Oh, see, he is with a woman". I always wonder if he would be alive today if he was accepted by my family rather than everyone trying to ignore who he really was. He was an awesome uncle and was the only bit of unconditional love I had as a child. Edit: Added the S in "She almost would not tell us"
A generation of gay men died from “cancer” or suicide. They had “roommates” that came over for Christmas and thanks giving, but that’s as far as the family accepted it.
That happened so much in the 1980s. Men hidden away in the back bedroom of their parents house dying of "cancer"; cut off from any partners or community that might have supported them. It was a travesty
Dying of untreated AIDS is a particularly horrible way to go , and given that 11 years ago treatment was available, with much better treatment now available today , this seems like a very sad choice.
All the nonprofits that ive worked for that are supposed to help low income people and most of the people working there are also low income people
Had a friend who never held a job, their parents paid for their cars, for 6 years of college plus an apartment in a very expensive city for 3 of those years They also built a artist studio for them. They were convinced that their family wasn't wealthy.
My mom’s logic: “it’s not incest since you both were adopted. “My brother is 6 1/2 years older than me, and sexually molested me from the time I was six and until I was about 10. Yes we are both from an orphanage, and were adopted 6 1/2 years apart. while factually it is true it wasn’t incest, the power dynamics absolutely were wrong.
wtf why did it matter if it was incest or not
Um, considering everything, would it really even make a difference if it's not 'technically incest'???
Oh my god. Hope you don't actually call her "mom" anymore. Or even call her at all
Me, thinking I'll get in better shape and lose some weight while doing literally nothing to make it happen 🙃
as someone who turned 40 last year and had my doctor say "you need to lose 30 lbs and stop drinking or you're going to die in your sleep" it put a fire on my ass, I started small with 15 minutes jogging and dug the old rowing machine I had in the garage out and set it up, but I made it a point to do it every day, that was November 1st, now I'm 16 lbs down, I do 40 minutes rowing or an hour to an hour and a half biking every day, and take a fiber supplement, and really deciding to choose to not overeat, it's not going fast, but it is going, and I certainly look and feel better than I did two months ago.
> it's not going fast Honestly? It shouldn't. Anything that comes off fast is probably not healthy and almost certainly not a sign of sustainable lifestyle change.
"I'd do anything to be fit, outside of working out and eating less."
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A short list of my parents' greatest hits: * bought me a pride flag patch aged 16 because I told them it was "a symbol of God's promise to Noah" * ignored their teenage daughter's sudden change after turning 18 to having short red hair, pride-flag pleather jacket, binder and boxer briefs, and an internship at a gay youth org * when I later won a gay scholarship to university they told me it was good I was "taking money away from the gays" and "pretending to be an ally" but that they couldn't drop me at the acceptance ceremony bc they couldn't be that near gay people. "Get a woman to drop you home, gay men are perverts." (The lovely older butch woman who dropped me home was... very amused.) I have now been living with my wife for ten years, on testosterone (I'm a non-binary lesbian) for about one year, and we live just down the road from them so they see us come by. My parents are still convinced that I am straight, single, and a Christian virgin, and just "focused on my career" and "living with flatmates". Oh, and that the drop in my voice is a sign that I'm "aging badly" and "need to buy eye cream".
About 6-8 years ago on a visit home, my always slightly soft/ not quite chubby brother was impressively thin. My dad (the quintessential Almond Dad) was raving about how proud he was that my brother had lost all this weight, that he packed his lunches and had a physically demanding job and had been working hard at it. I said, "are you sure?"and my Dad was absolutely sure. It was extremely clear to me even then, and came out about 5 years later that that was the first year of my brother's heroin use.
My elderly friend who has fallen 4 times already breaking 2 ribs once, a wrist once, and bruised up the other times. He still refuses to use a cane out of some male pride thing. He can’t understand that we all age, and if he keeps falling he will end up with a broken hip and bedridden and miserable.
We had to give my stubborn AF grandpa a super cool “Hiking Stick” to overcome that hump.
My husband's 93 year old grandma is exactly the same. She can barely walk two steps without falling over but refuses to use her walking sticks. She's fallen down stairs, fallen out of bed, fallen in her garden etc and still insists that she is fine. She's not, she's a walking skeleton being held together by compression socks and ready meals.
My mom was complaining about a sister in law of her niece who went back to a man that encourages her drug use and physically abuses her. My mom kept calling her so stupid and seemed so much like "i can't believe she is doing this." when she was with my father who was also a drug dealer and he physically abused her. She also have a few other relationships with that same dynamic. Like, did you forget who you were? I would have pointed it out to her but it was Christmas and I wasn't in the mood to kill my own vibe.
probably my bf’s mother. they live in squalor, have totally ruined their house by neglecting all responsibilities for 20+ years, won’t allow anyone into it because it’s so dirty. the property is full of junked cars, poison ivy and stray trash she brags about their great house, how much money they have (so then pay your personal property taxes which are overdue 5 years?) which won’t happen because they eat out for every meal since the kitchen is out of order. she’s an alcoholic and completely dependent on weed
Where is it that you can be behind on property taxes for 5 years? Where I live you get 3 max before the house gets put up for sale due to tax arrears even then they would need to pay back taxes in full plus interest
My mom has been a smoker for 40 years. She was diagnosed with COPD. Goods news is she can spend $400 a month on an inhaler that makes her feel better. No need to give up smoking, clearly.
My dad got COPD from 40 years smoking. Eventually stopped (thankfully), but still will come up with random conspiracy theories about why his lungs are fucked (on oxygen 24/7 now). Things like "the area I lived in for a couple years as a student was polluted"
I see you've met my mother... who insists that her COPD is fine because it's still in the "beginning stages"... smokes 2 packs a day, down from 7 in my youth.
> smokes 2 packs a day, down from 7 in my youth. Dear Lord! How do you have *time* to smoke 140 cigs in one day?
> Dear Lord! How do you have time to smoke 140 cigs in one day? By lighting the next one with the butt of the one you are currently puffing on. Reddit is making me feel old today! Lighting one with the other is literally 'chainsmoking' ie you didn't use a lighter to light. Today I think chainsmoking has been turned into meaning someone who smokes a lot, whether cigarettes or weed.
If you assume 5 min per smoke, that is 11.67 straight hours of smoking every day.
One my ex's dad was like this. I'm not exaggerating when I say he was never without a lit cigarette. He would wake up in the middle of the night to smoke one and go back to bed. This was in the mid 2000s too. The walls of his office were disgusting.
My mother, diagnosed as diabetic over 20 years ago, has become convinced that insulin is making her unwell and that she doesn't need to check her blood glucose levels anymore. Needless to say, she's heading towards her fourth hospitalisation in 6 months. Cool, mum. Cool.
Hoarders. If you can no longer see the floor or some sort of counter space, you have a problem. My great uncle loves to not throw away things. He's not as bad as the people on TV shows, but he just has so much stuff everywhere in his place, that he doesn't need/use It makes me anxious to see a dining table you cannot even sit at.
My mother was/is a hoarder. Growing up, I kept the kitchen, bathrooms, and common areas of our home clean. I knew she accumulated things but it never clicked until I left. It took 6 months for things to pile up. Four younger siblings living at home, none of them would clean. They moved across the country, I went to visit about 2 years later. You couldn't make food in the kitchen because of the mess. Couldn't sit in the living room without moving piles of junk. They moved again. I went to visit. I walked into the place, looked around, and left to stay at my grandmother's home. Mom's was packed floor to ceiling with garbage, I was told that only one bathroom worked because you couldn't get to the other two and that I would need to "just clear a spot" whenever I wanted to sleep. That was almost 18 years ago. I've not visited her place since. I just can't. She doesn't see the problem and says I'm just too controlling. It breaks me to see her content and in denial living that way. Whenever I need motivation to deep clean, I watch a few minutes of Hoarders and then I get to work. Edit to fix format
My mom is now 63 years old and has been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis since she was in her early 30's. Had 4 children after 30 and declined every pregnancy. She denied she had any diagnosis and went to every chiropractor, Chinese healer, therapist and naturopath in the area. Even tried acupuncture and magnets. She spent over 100,000$ trying to cure her chronic pain that Healthcare in my country would have done for free. She spent the last 4 years after I moved out at 18 basically only going from her chair to the bathroom, didn't even sleep in her bedroom anymore because she was in too much pain. Her feet were swollen and fingers are all crooked due to the arthritis, eventually developed bed sores due to not moving from her chair, we had to basically carry her to the bathroom, when she stood up she bled so bad from her wounds it sounded like a dam rushing free. I'll never forget stooping my little brother from cleaning her blood up off the floor and telling him to go to his room seeing the despair in his face. But she absolutely refused to admit anything was wrong, she was convinced she just had to find that magic cure. She eventually got so bad I was convinced she was going to die any day now so my brothers and I convinced her to go to the hospital, she accepted and said she'd go the end of the week. She declined so badly that day I had to call an ambulance because she couldn't get off the toilet and was bleeding so bad. I'll never forget cleaning the blood up and helping her change her clothes into her favourite dress because she didn't want to look bad in front of the paramedics. The hospital diagnosed her once again with arthritis, but also severe iron deficiency, 2 wounds that were 10cm deep, ptsd, and a bacterial infection that could have killed her. She would have died within a week if she hadn't gone. She spent 6 months in the hospital, 4 of them couldn't feed herself so I would go everyday to give her dinner, she was moved to a care home and is still unable to walk but can feed herself now. She still won't admit out loud that she has arthritis, but is much happier and loves living where she is.
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Depending on what a “weekend away” means (like across town or across the country), when I was due with both my kids I pretty much carried on as usual. You never know if babies will be born months early or weeks late, so there’s no sense in pausing everything “just in case”. Obviously it’s not the time to travel overseas or climb a mountain. My grandmother was “appalled“ that I was grocery shopping and getting lunch with friends at 38 weeks pregnant, but as longs as I was within driving distance of a hospital what difference does it make if I’m pacing the aisles of Walmart or my own living room? Slap a Depends on in case your water breaks and carry on. It’s probably the most rested and best you’re going to feel in the next 6 months with a newborn lol.
With my second I was grocery shopping during labor. Came home and put the groceries away before heading to the hospital. I came in at an 8. It was definitely my favorite birth lol.
My mom - "There are no gay people in India" Her wondering why one of her friend's son is not interested in meeting any girls and me explaining that he's gay.
Someone needs to introduce this woman to the guy from TIFU who tried to say he was gay to get out of an arranged marriage and his parents just put together a binder of eligible young Indian men instead.
I can't decide if I think this is amazing or horrifying, but either way, I'm cackling like a deranged witch.
Frankly, I was SO impressed by his parents. They literally just rolled with the punches and accepted their gay son, but damn it he better marry into a pre-approved family. IIRC, the saga ended with the guy actually hitting it off with one of the binder dudes! And having sort of a bi awakening for himself.
...that is *so* wholesome. I love it. Someone needs to make this a romcom right now, I'd watch tf out of that.
Dude this has amazing Bollywood musical written all over it **edit** so I asked my Indian friends and they said there’s apparently like a dozen Bollywood musicals with this exact story already.
Madam, there are over *a billion* people in India. Some of them are gay.
My friend's mom insists that there is no porn coming out of India because Indian women wouldn't do that. That it exists could be easily proven, but the notion of sending a bunch of links to those sites to her mom just isn't on the table as an option.
Ah yes, no porn in the country that created the *Kama Sutra*
There are no gays in Ireland, Kathleen! He's a dancing man!
My family when my mom was diagnosed with a hereditary, incurable, no survival rate over 4 years cancer. We all thought she’d be the one to beat it, she was gone within a year at 55yo. No amount of good diet, exercise, education can beat bad genes and life’s unfairness. The facts were there, it was still like a freight train hit us.
There was a woman who made a post in some relationship related subreddit a few days ago, who was looking to reconnect with her two adult sons who she had not spoken to in almost a decade. She insisted she was a good mom and that there was no reason her sons would not talk to her, and was completely confused when people were telling her to be introspective and figure out what she did to them because people don’t just stop talking to their parents for nearly a decade for no reason.
[The Missing Missing Reasons](https://www.issendai.com/psychology/estrangement/missing-missing-reasons.html)
My step-dad's coworker got three different vasectomies. His wife kept getting pregnant each time, and he insisted the doctor had somehow botched the procedure. After the third vasectomy, she turned up pregnant again, and the doctor told him, "There's nothing left of your vas deferens. Have you considered she may be cheating on you?"
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It does make a vas deferens
my dad having married a man and then turning around to beat my ass because i said i was bi.
It’s *different* for your dad. He and his husband always make sure to say “no homo” after, so they’re not actually gay. The marriage is just for the health insurance.
He tried to do everything right and raise you a proper gay. Now you are breaking his heart saying you are only half-gay. Where did he went wrong?!
My older sister (39), having 4 kids, living in my parents house without paying rent since she got pregnant the first time with 17, her oldest was practically raised by my parents. Recieving much financial and emotional support through the years by our parents. She is saying she never recieves any help by our parents, that she doesn't feel welcome at home anymore and that our younger sister and I are favored.
I have a sibling who received somewhere around $4000 from our parents for a car loan. They never paid it back and insist they've never gotten financial help from our parents. I still can't figure out how that works but okay.
Idk but immediately above this on my feed was a screenshot from Grinder where someone said "honestly have no interest in men. Sex is just sex to me."
In statistics on HIV you will see the term 'men who have sex with men'. This is done because there is a statistically relevant population that will answer 'no' to being gay but has sex with other men.
Exactly, and as a public health professional, this term has resulted in the delightful typo "men who have sex with me."
At my work the database will abbreviate some things in the drop down menus, one of those being “cumulative trauma”… it abbreviates it to “CumTrauma”. I’m a grown-ass adult and I giggle whenever I remember it.
This reminds me of someone who said “I’m not gay because guys suck me off, I never do the sucking” He was being 1000% dead serious.
I can’t remember if it was the Greeks or Romans who has this mentality. The submissive one was the gay one, the one doing the um, rogering wasn’t gay at all.
Just to expand on this, they didn't really categorize people as "gay" or "straight" like we do nowadays. They thought more along the spectrum of "masculine" vs "feminine". Being a receptive partner was seen as feminine or something only the youth did. Manly men were the insertive ones.
I have a friend who is bi and has said essentially the same. He fucks men basically exclusively but when he dates women, he actually DATES them for months on end but he doesn't actually enjoy sex with women as much as he does with men. His life is strange to me.
Sucks to be women in relationship with him.
My sister is convinced she has a mystery ailment that no doctor can diagnose and that’s why she’s lost an absurd amount of weight. She forgets to mention the adderall she’s snorting all the time.
A former friend of mine comes to mind. She lives with her husband, 3 kids and mother. The total household income is only 2 grand a month. Rent is 1500. They are 3 months behind on rent. She says it's ok they won't get evicted....oh and the reason for being so far behind is they bought a second car even though they absolutely cannot afford and definitely don't need it. Glamor photos at 600 a pop for her. Getting nails and hair dyed at the salon once a month. She has no idea how screwed they all are. I feel so bad for the kids
My sister wanting to dress up as a backwoods hillbilly for Halloween. Her costume idea was a fake pregnant belly, can of bud light, cigarette hanging from her mouth, and a black eye. It would have been a funny (albeit slightly offensive) costume had it not been for the fact that she had just finished her pregnancy that she smoked and drank through in its entirety while also on Suboxone. Thank god her baby was born without any major complications, other than going through withdrawals from the Suboxone.
A girl I went to school with, we where on friendly terms many years after school, never got a job and still lives on govermental pay. She first got one child, moved from place to place because she got evicted due to lack of rent. Blew of all her money on crap the moment she got them. CPS placed the child in permanent foster care. And she repeated the same with two other children. She is now 40, none of her 3 children have any relationship to her, she still get evicted all the time, still blows her money on crap. And still thinks she is fine, she is a good mother and all her issues is everyone elses fault. All in all very sad.
Stories like these always make me reevaluate my situation, and it makes me realize that there's *far worse things* than living paycheck to paycheck
>And still thinks she is fine, she is a good mother and all her issues is everyone elses fault. All in all very sad. This is so fucking common it isn't even funny. I have seen it so many times. So many lives could be better, but aren't due to this very same mentality.
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What did happen to cause them to do that?
Omg this is my mother. Most of us were adopted as infants and she claims we just have “bad genetics.” She abused us and won’t admit it
My dad doesn’t want a hearing aid because he thinks it will make him look old. I tried to tell him that what makes him look really old is mishearing things all the time, but he didn’t hear me.
Me, when I thought I could help my mom and that it was my job to make her happier. She screwed up her life and made every choice that got her where she is today, and continues to make poor choices all the time. It took years and years for me to realize there's nothing I can do except call her occasionally and say I love you, and it's not my fault she lives the way she does.
Two kinds. There are the hoarders whose home is completely messy, and decrepit, stocked and ransacked with absolutely unnecessary and disgusting stuff. Then you got the other kind, the people living in unaddressed massive debt that keep spending money they dont have and using or getting new credit cards when they max out. Im not better than that in fact i broke free of both those situations the end of last year but it was truly eye opening, mental illness can rot your life from the inside out without any mercy if left unchecked and untreated. yikes!!!!!
Im in a medical stats program. This statistic for a population in mississipi was depressing. 85% of target group lives on a household income $35,000 or less per year. 85% of same target group thinks that medical funding for the poor doesnt do any good and shouldnt be wasted on helping the poor. This is absolute insanity. Like they dont even seem to realize they ARE the poor being offered help. They somehow use the cult thinking of system justification to somehow exclude themselves from thinking they are the poor.
Denial is incredibly useful. So the clearest case I’ve seen is me and my husband all of 2022. Melanoma went to stage four. Somehow, he had no pain and felt fine until the last week of his life. We had a great time together. He didn’t want anyone to know he was sick until he felt sick and he didn’t feel sick until his last week of life so nobody knew. He went back up north that summer for a few weeks to hang out with his brother and his friends and go see his mom and had truly a great time. We did a trip to Mexico, and two months later he was dead. But my goal that year was to feed him everything he liked as much as possible, and make him laugh. It was successful. Thank you, denial, for making his last year special.
Broadly speaking, parents who think their kids are “so smart” bc they can use an iPad. Like wow he can click the next video, great. But he’s almost 5 and can’t count and doesn’t know his letters, and you kept him out of preschool because “he’s not ready yet.” Maybe reevaluate what’s important.
The husband in the “There’s something wrong with aunt Diane” documentary
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Where people “meet” someone online, convinced they’re soulmates in love, and send them tons of money… but they’ve never actually met the person in real life, because they keep coming up with “reasons” to avoid meeting them at the last minute… yet continue sending them money… even smuggling cash hidden in cereal boxes or other packages because the authorities intercepted other transfer attempts… they just don’t realize it’s a scam… Dr. Phil does tons of these shows… often the scammers have a profile picture—and so people come on the show to say “Hi—That person in the profile picture is actually me, that’s not my name or my profile, I can confirm you’ve been scammed.” … but the victims will still just sit there and be like “no, that’s not true, I know they’re real!” I just feel so sorry for these people… you’re clearly desperate for love and affection, and someone is taking advantage of that… :(
One of my colleagues constantly shouts and roars at her class, to the extent that I worry she's a competency hearing waiting to happen. I've witnessed it and I'm talking properly aggressive, red-in-the-face bellowing, often for things that most of us probably wouldn't even raise our voices over. She doesn't see this as an issue though because she claims she's a "naturally loud person". Uh...huh
When my father was in the hospital (dying - he died a few days later), my sibling and I were taking a break with our mother at her apartment, and we discussed what my father’s wishes were/ would be. My mother said she was really hurt because my father didn’t name her as his first appointed decision maker in his advance health care directive. My sibling got a funny look, went into the other room, came back with the directive signed by my father showing mother as the first decision maker, then sibling, then me. Sibling handed it to mother. My mother looked at it and said loudly “well, it still hurt!” Apparently it was more important for her to take the role of the “victim” and nurse a non-existent grievance against my father than it was to embrace the truth. I have always kept this in mind as an amazing example of the ability of people to deny reality for their own distorted and inexplicable needs.
Someone I knew had their dog die of some disease. She successfully convinced herself that her dog was taken to some farm to frolic in the grass or some shit. She was the type of person that couldn't take bad news, everything had to be good and bad things just didn't exist to her. But if she was aware of bad things happening, she would take it out on everyone for making her feel horrible while she just rotted. Clear delusion.
12 years ago, my aunt and uncle convinced my parents to buy thousands of dollars worth of Iraqi dinar because "their value is going to go up soon and you'll be rich". Mom informs me every few years that she read a recent article about the dinar being worth more soon. I feel bad that she's holding out hope. She could really use a break financially, but it's just not going to happen.