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I have a horrible irrational fear of flying. It's so bad, that I hyperventilate and insane panic attacks for the duration of the flight. It's so bad, that I'd rather take a 2 week freight boat trip instead. On my last flight to New York City in 2008, I literally closed my eyes and had my iPod blasting in my ears (pressing them in as hard as I could so I could pretend I wasn't on an airplane), the whole time. I had had xanax and a glass of wine before hand and it just didn't do the trick. This fear did not come about until 2001 or so, when I was about 16 years old. Before this I flew quite often, including to Europe at least 5 times round trip. I'm not sure exactly what made me start having this intense fear, but I think it was around the time that I realized how scary death is and especially how scary and awful a death like that would be. Eventually I started having the idea that even though the chances are extremely, extremely low (I know that I have a much higher chance dying just driving to the airport) that I simply have the exact same chance as anyone to be the 0.00001 percent who do get in a crash. The statistics do not safeguard me from being the unlucky passenger who will die in a crash when I board that plane. So I either will or I won't. 50/50. And then of course I start thinking about how horrific that kind of death would be. I'm sure it's a ridiculous way of thinking, but I just can't get it out of my head. I am moving overseas in about 5-6 weeks and having to take a 9 hour plane ride with my young kids. I like to think of myself as a normally rational person, and I wonder if there is something I could learn or a different mindset I could put myself in to make this an easier process.

I have a horrible irrational fear of flying and a long overseas flight coming up in 5-6 weeks. Need some help getting over it because this time (for the first time) my kids will be with me.

My mom and I were finishing our vacation in Cuba and were at the airport, waiting for our flight back home. Since it's an international flight, we'd have to wait about 2-3 hours, and plus it was delayed. In the hot Cuban weather, we were stuck at the airport in a departures hall that was super nice by Cuban standards. Bars, shops, and smoking areas. I was maybe 16, I'd always been sensitive to smoke but had managed to avoid it most of the time. My dad didn't smoke in the house, I didn't hang out with kids that smokes but we didn't think much of it. We got into the nonsmoking section, just some chairs at one end of the departures. We set our stuff down, bring out some books, my mom looks for any booze worth buying. Within a half hour, I'm breathing heavily due to these lovely Quebecers at the open bar blowing their smoke right into the non-smoking section. I go up and ask then to kindly either stop smoking, or blow their smoke in another direction in French. They refused to, threw a bunch of offensive slurs in my direction and I went back to my seat. Another five minutes pass, and I'm not looking good for wear. I'd never had to be in a room with smoke for so long in my life. We moved to the other side of the terminal, to the other "nonsmoking section" (just seats not in any cordoned off area, next to the smokers area). Minutes pass and I'm heaving, unable to get words out properly. My mother doesn't speak a lick of Spanish, the other passengers keep asking if I'm okay but the Cubans don't seem to pay attention. I'm start feeling light headed, and my mom begins panicking. A lady, prolly in her mid-20s comes over and realizes I'm close to passing out. She spoke Spanish, and managed to get the guards to get me out of the area. She made sure somebody took me to get first aid and see a doctor. Some Cuban army guards take me through a mad dash in a wheelchair in the airport to the medical centre and a local doctor gives me oxygen. Within a half hour, I was shaken but fine. The Cubans didn't charge me anything. They let me board early, Air Canada was super nice and bumped us to first class and one of the passengers that was a nurse (or perhaps a doctor, the day's kind of blur for me now) checked up on me every half our during the flight. When I landed in Toronto, Air Canada had a medical crew on the ground to make sure I was okay. In the end, I guess nobody wanted a dead foreign national on their land, or a dead citizen on their plane, but it's still the most kindness I'd ever received in one day from people I never got the chance to properly thank for all they did in keeping me alive.

Cuba, you need real non-smoking sections. Mes amis au Quebec, je suis ni un maudit francais ni une tete-carrée anglophone :( And also to the asshole who blew smoke right into my face, I hope it rains all week during your next vacation.

I live in California. My neighbors are generally nice people. 2 adults, 3 kids. Ever since the start of 2016 the father of the apartment bought a loudspeaker, and it's incredibly loud in the morning. Starting 7:50am. I have night classes(and soon to have night shifts) so I tend to sleep in, and it's been keeping me wide awake... Making it hard for me to concentrate in class and home works,etc,etc. It's bad enough they slam the doors every chance they get. I don't mind the slamming and kids yelling, but the music is just godawful annoying. I first went down there, and asked them to "please tone it down". He said "sure thing" then offered me... an apple? Peace and quiet for 2-3 days. Then 3-6 days a week He blasts his music in the morning. So i decided to write down a note informing that I have night classes, and that their music is too loud. 10 minutes later he saw the note. I heard him ripping the tape followed by two loud thuds(door and gates were slammed), and I heard him reading it out loud. Then he started laughing, and then arguing with his wife... Surprisingly it was quiet for 2 days. Then on the 3rd day, he was blasting his music...Again. At this point I'm afraid of confronting my neighbor. The burst of beats isn't even the worst part, it's the bass. It hurts my ears and I can't block it out with earplugs. The floor and bed is vibrating. Even if I am awake, I can't thoroughly do my homework or enjoy watching TV since it's incredibly loud.

Neighbor bought a new loudspeaker. Plays loud music in the morning. I have night classes, and soon to have nightshift jobs. Asked them twice to keep it quiet, and they still play loud music 2 days later. I can't move apartments.

I used to have this reoccurring nightmare almost every night of my adolescence. It was absolutely terrifying and I would wake up in a sweat every time I had it. It finally subsided when I went to college. It starts as I go off to college and move into my new dorm room. Now, this is not your normal run of the mill dorm room. It is ocean front! I have no idea what college it was supposed to be, but as I walk in I see an entire glass wall facing the waves. My bed is positioned on the opposite wall facing the water. I walk in an set down my luggage to drink in the view. I lay down on the bed, and watch the tide come in. As I lay there, I notice that there is a storm moving toward me. The clouds get darker and darker. It is a menacing storm that slowly makes its way closer and closer. All this time the anticipation and tension is growing in my mind. As the storm gets closer, the waves pick up and start crashing against the glass pane of a wall. The waves get bigger and the window wall is taking on a lot more pressure from the rising ocean swells. It is at this point that I see a rogue wave headed my way. I am paralyzed. I know that it is dangerous, but I cannot move. The wave is getting closer and closer, and I start to see a shadow on the crest. I can't tell what it is until it is almost to my dorm. It is a great white shark riding the wave straight towards me. A crack of thunder rings out before I see a sharp bolt of lightening hit the water in front of me. It took my attention off the wave for just a moment, but when I looked back, the wave was right on top of my dorm. The wave crashes into the wall, shattering the glass and a huge rush of water rushes into my room. The shark rides the wave all the way to the end of my bed. In slow motion, I see the creature open its huge mouth ready to devour me - almost like he was riding the wave for this specific moment to occur. I cringe. My muscles tighten as I prepare to lose my life. The the shark closes his jowls and bites ……my big right toe. EVERY.FUCKING.TIME. After a lot of research and speaking to my psychologist, it seems that this dream explains a lot of my personality. When confronted with an issue, I usually will make it out to be much larger or worse than it actually is. And then when I finally have to address the issue it is nothing compared to what I built up in my own mind.

Shark bites my big toe, shrink thinks it is my subconscious telling me that I am making problems out to be bigger than they actually are.

About 1-2 yrs ago, my GF had a class with a guy and she got his number and started talking to him to "set him up with a friend." I discovered that their messages were a bit too flirty. At one point, he was saying that the girls in the class don't like him. And she said "well I hope I'm not standoff-ish, I would date you if not for my BF." (Not these exact words, but that was the jist of it). That was the worst message, and she seemed to understand how that hurt me and she said she won't talk to him anymore. She told me she only saw him as a friend and that I had nothing to worry about, so I tried to get past it. So time goes on and last month I found out they still talk, although not often. A recent conversation started about a TV show they watch, and my GF said a part "reminded" her of him, because the character meets a guy in Mexico, whilst having a BF, and feels guilty b/c she has feelings for this guy she meets in Mexico. Now the weird part is, that just a few weeks ago this guy ended up coming out as gay. (They haven't talked since he came out). So I am positive nothing happened b/w them and I never had anything to worry about, but I am wondering if this behavior is excusable or not just b/c this guy is gay. I should also mention him being gay was a big surprised to her. This has been my only long term relationship, and I don't want it to end, but I am having a hard time seeing how I can trust her from now on.

GF messages guy from class in a flirty way, eventually making it clear that she had feelings for him. Turns out he is gay, but I still feel like I can't trust her anymore.

Here it goes Couple weeks back GF of 6 months drops the "I love you" I was taken back, and told her on the spot that I just dont feel the same way, butI still care and want to be together. Fast Forward to today, we start talking about the L word again. I say the stupidest thing ever thinking it would make her feel better about the fact that I won't say it. I said; " I really do want to say I love you, so you don't feel like i dont care as much." Safe to say she flipped. I was really confused why, because I honestly thought I was saying the right thing, It's safe to say that this ticked her off a lot. She is already super insecure, and I fear I just might have started the end of our relationship.

Basically I said something really fucking stupid, and I need help on how to fix it and show my GF that I did not mean it the way it sounds. Any advice would be great.

Hey everyone, A few days ago I posted [this]( I deleted the profile shortly after creating it, within 24 hours, and within 2 hours of talking to my father while pretending to be some random woman on the site, he told me quite a few things that shocked me. My biggest dilemma after was how to proceed with this information. I decided to tell my mom, not my dad, so I did yesterday. I didn't tell her I made a profile, I just told her i got into the site and saw that he is talking to various women. I didn't want to tell her details, although she kept pressing. She has been monitoring him too and told me she's seen him on yet another site and asked me to get in there as well. I refused, saying this is inappropriate and it makes me uncomfortable and she can't ask me to do that anymore. She got upset, told me I need to be the one to do this, it's my family and she can't believe I'm refusing to help her. At first she was emotional, then I feel like she got angry. She said we've all abandoned her, I too after my dad. I'm really upset she would say that of course, it's not true but she doesn't see it. I offered once again to bring her to stay with me for a bit, she said that's the worst idea ever to leave him alone and hang up. I've spoken to my dad, as normally as possible and his behavior with us is the same, he asks about work, health etc. I asked him how they're doing, how's mom etc and he keeps telling me "we're fine, no news from us, you tell us yours". I've noticed that they don't even argue anymore, they hardly speak, and there's a palpable discomfort between them when they're in the same room. From what I understand, not only he hasn't stopped but he is opening new profiles on new sites as well. I'm waiting for my mom to calm down and stop being upset at me so I can talk to her again. I was thinking to encourage her to talk to him about it and tell him she knows. I'm of course very upset my mom is mad at me for refusing to get further involved. She only talks to me to tell me things are getting worse and to do something. When I say no, she gets upset, laments about how we all abandoned her and hangs up. How can I help her get past this stupid way of thinking, and into doing something more constructive?

I told my mom about what I found, and instead of doing something about it, she's now very upset at, and accusing me for refusing to get involved further !

Let me preface this by saying that I understand that we are both young. Roughly three years ago, my girlfriend(now ex) and I got together. For almost six months we had messed with the idea and had been really close friends until that point. It started off about how any relationship does, and then 4 months into it, she cheated on me with a girl she had a "crush" on. It hurt. A lot. We "broke up" for about a week before she managed to talk me into discussing what happened. After a long discussion, I forgave her and we began dating again. I tried my hardest to forget that point in our relationship. During the three years that we we're together, we went to PA multiple times, we went to the beach multiple times, we went on at least 150 dates. Within those three years, her brother overdosed but survived and went to rehab. He came back a few months later and overdosed and passed away. Within those three years, roughly 9 members of my family passed away. During these tough times, I was there for her and she was there for me. A year and a half ago we transferred from public school to doing online school so that we could take jobs and do more with ourselves while going through school. Six months ago, she asked if she could talk to her ex again. Her ex's father had died in a fire and was going through rough times. I agreed, thinking she had truly changed. Fast forward 5 months and they are hanging out 4-5's a week. My girlfriend is blowing me off to be with her. Fast forward another month (four weeks ago) and she tells me that things aren't the same anymore. She told me that she doesn't want to feel guilty for her feelings and wants to be with her ex instead. I was mature about it and told her I understood. In all honesty, I am glad she didn't cheat on me again. I am happy that she is happy. I am glad she has found who she thinks she wants to be with, but now I am out of luck. After three years. After three incredibly strong years with a few lows and a TON of highs and experiences, and she manages to get over me like that. I just don't understand. How do I get over her?

After three strong years of an amazing relationship, my (ex)girlfriend left me for her ex after they had talked again for roughly six months. How do I get over her? PS: Sorry for long sob story, it's just been on my mind for too long.

Im d.d for the night. Take her and her friend to a party where I know no one. Everyones drunk by end of the night except me. she is sitting down and the guy next to her puts his hand on her thigh. im standing 2 feet away and waiting for her to take it off...nothing. Then he moves his hand around her...nothing. Now i know her when shes drunk and how emotional she gets. I asked the guy nicely! and as im taking his hand off her "hey man i know your drunk, please dont do that in front of me'. He is wasted barley knows what im saying. then puts hand back on her thigh. again i say the same thing taking his hands off. She looks at me as if i made the biggest scene in the world. gets up and pouts and sits in a chair closer to me. "I cant believe you" she says with out looking at me. I am in disbelief and walk outside for a boag. While outside her drunk friend comes out and has a 45 min drunk passionate talk about 100 different things that i wasn't mad at. I finally go back in try to forget about it and my girl looks at me and says "i cant take you anywhere'' I handed her a water bottle and walked out. as im walking out in a little girl voice she says "dont ever talk to me again" as if teasing it. She always had a tendency of becoming a crazy bitch while drunk. Her words not mine. But that one took the cake. 5 strikes you're out i guess =/

I asked a drunk guy to take his hands off my drunk gf thigh and back twice. Both saying 'please' trying not to cause a scene or upset her....still ended up causing a scene and upsetting her. Dont know what else i could have done.

Story time! So I used to go to a very exclusive private school which had like 350ish students total. All seventh graders had to take Chinese as their language credit, including myself and my crush, whom I was too shy to ever talk to. With one Chinese teacher, all classes shared the same room. This is important. Second semester, Valentine's day. Our teacher gives us some busy work, paper heart cutouts. The project was to write "I love you, ___ " on it in chinese, color it, and turn it in. I figured only the teacher would really see it, and dumbass me put my crushes name. Come next Monday, mine is being proudly displayed outside the Chinese room, and there it stays till a week before summer break. Still wouldn't be too bad, what with all of the other hearts up right? Wrong. Nobody else had written anything serious (think "I love you, violent video games"). So mine was one of like three that had something serious. She didn't talk to me much after that.

Let me creep you out in Chinese!!! Edit:Also just remembered the time I sneezed in my crushes hair by mistake. That one stopped talking to me as well. I am not a ladies man.

Let me start out by saying that I am in a great relationship. I love her so much, and we fit together really well. She is goofy and intense and very dedicated to everything that she does. We are still very much into the relationship being in our early 20's and still wanting to have fun. We are such a perfect match and almost everything about our relationship is great. The only thing that is kinda bad is the sex (we dont really do it very much because its very painful for her and sometimes it is awkward). She really is one of the most amazing women that I have ever met and I really would never want to lose her as my friend or my SO. The part of relationships that I don't like so much is having feelings towards other women. I realized this the other day while getting my hair cut. The girl was not the best of looking but her hair was really nice (she is a hair dresser) and her makeup and clothes were well done. She was about the same age as me and even knew a girl that I work with. As she cut my hair we started up a conversation (I am a very terrible conversationalist but she was able to get me talking and stay talking). As we talked we had a lot in common and even our styles were very much alike. When she was done cutting my hair it looked awesome. But I was sad that I had to leave and know nothing about her other than what we had talked about. Now I realize that I might not want to go back to her in a month or two for another hair cut (even though she did a fantastic job). Because I am committed to another women and don't want the temptation. When I think about her I feel smitten and then immediately like a jerk and super sad for many reasons. Even as I write this I am hoping that she will for some really weird reason recognize this and then search me out. Like I said I love my girlfriend and while she can be a bit clingy and maybe not extremely sexy I still want to be with her. The problem of complete monogamy is that you have to deal with these feelings and you can't talk about them to anybody or you are a jerk (even when you don't feel like acting on them). Even if you might be able to love two people then you cannot even have a platonic relationship with the other person.

I got my hair cut and was smitten with the hair dresser and not sure how I should handle the feelings I get since I am in a great relationship.

So there's obviously a lot more to the story, but basically me and my girlfriend of 5 years -- both college students, 2 hours away from one another -- are breaking up because we realised that while we love each other and are best friends, we want completely different things out of life. We're both graduating in the summer, and we both have completely different goals for the next 10 years, so it'd never work. How do I get over this, though? I've had rough break ups before, but by that time I wasn't really in love with the other person so it was a little easier to get closure. I guess it worries me that I might wake up one day realising it was all a big mistake, and that I should have made compromises.

me and my girlfriend are breaking up because we want different things out of life, even though we're still in love. How do I get closure and move on with the constant fear that I'll wake up one day and realise it was all a big mistake?

Because obviously, philosophy developed in a vacuum, without any influence from the way people saw the Universe. Religion and philosophy have no overlap, they never tackled the same questions, they never influenced each others, and every single philosopher that talked about gods and religion did so to criticize how ridiculous the whole concept was, since a philosopher is obviously a freethinker. Religions and philosophy have no links whatsoever, Lao Tseu and Confucius aren’t real philosophers (or aren’t Taoism and Confucianism really religions?), Descartes spent his life upvoting everything on /r/atheism, and the Bible is universally considered by philosophers as having no value of any kind. Seriously, people, no one gives a shit if you don’t believe in God, least of all I: I don’t either. But this kind of circlejerky shit doesn’t belong here. It doesn’t make you look edgy, it doesn’t make you look educated, and it doesn’t make you look smart. It just makes you look like a twat with a superiority comples, and when you reject anything religious just because it is religious, without any nuance, all it demonstrates is a severe lack of critical thinking skills, which is pretty ironic considering that they are what makes all the difference between brave, supremely intelligent and enlightened individual like ourselves and the dumb funDIE plebs, according to the atheist community.

You can take away my internet points, but you will never take my conviction that what you just said embodies everything that is wrong with the atheist movement.

You cry at night? Stop being a fucking pussy. And yes, pussy means cat, but pussy also means vagina, and I don't ever recall hearing someone refer to a cat as only a pussy, but I hear people use pussy for vagina every day, so I would even argue that it's taken over the majority meaning of the word, especially with younger speakers. Pussy = vagina, pussy = weak, vaginas are one of the differentiating biological parts that women have that men don't. It's a synecdoche-based gender insult. So no, I'm not going to just let it go, any more than I would let faggot go as an insult even though it's only a bundle of sticks.

Words hurt, and it's up to the people who use them to temper their use and not up to the person who they're offending to not be offended.

We've known each other for a few years now. We started seeing each other roughly 4 months ago and it has been good, really good, for both of us but just a couple of days ago she told me that: 'I can't have a relationship now, not with anyone. But if I could it would be with you' and it blind-sided me, I didn't see it coming. I believe she is being genuine when she says that (rather than a 'let them down gently' excuse) for the reasons I'm about to go into. She's just moved to a new town, it's a couple of hours away and she started a new job. She is incredibly busy, on top of the new job (which has long hours, leaving no time for a social life throughout the week) she is doing her masters degree and will possibly have to take an A-level relevant to the subject she is going to be trained to teach in next year. The masters itself already ate away at a lot of her time but we always found a way to meet each other throughout the week and weekend before she moved away. She also just came out of a three year relationship. The thing is she introduced me to people she knew as her 'better half', we've met each others closest friends, she told me 'we are pretty much together aren't we?', she asked me to move to the new town with her (more than once). My response to that was: 'It's a really big commitment for me this soon, the job I'm working is going to last up until around christmas [I'm temping at the moment] and I think we should just keep doing what we've been doing until then and see how things work out, so I'm not saying no but I'm also not saying yes.' I assumed we were getting more and more serious because of these factors. I don't believe I've been pushy, clingy or needy, if anything she has been the some-what needy one but not overly or off-puttingly so. Then she hit me with the 'I can't have one' thing. I guess I just need some advice on whether I would be doing the right thing by waiting for her to be ready or would I just be wasting my time? It could be a week from now, it could be a year before she is ready. Was I wrong to assume that the 'relationship' was heading in a more serious direction (imminently)? I do like her a lot and I do want a relationship with her. Or am I just being let down gently? Edit: She said that she still wants to see me, as in carry on dating because she does have strong feelings for me she says she just isn't ready right now for a full relationship.

Person I've been seeing told me she couldn't have a relationship due to numerous realistic reasons. I believed we were getting serious for what I believe are valid reasons and I don't know if I was wrong or I am just wasting my time?

In 7th grade, in my history class I was messing around with my pen when the ink exploded on my hand. Luckily the classroom had a sink in the back of the room, so I raised my hand and asked the teacher to wash my hand as my hands were covered in ink. So I quietly get up from my chair (I was assigned in the second row) and casually went over and went to the sink. Well one of the other kids thought it was funny to come over and smack me on the back of my neck. Except, it wasn't just his hand. This kid has a bunch of "itching powder" he got from a local smoke shop and smacked it on my neck. Only this stuff wasn't normal, as there very thousands of microscopic needles in them. After I got smacked, my first reaction was to put my hand over it, which was a big mistake, the needles latched on to my hand, and it hurt like crazy. So there I am, thousands of tiny needles in my neck and hand which also covered in ink, which by this time, everyone has noticed, except they don't see the needles, and they just think I'm overreacting. I told the teacher that I was bleeding and that I needed to go to the nurse, but he declined, and I had to sit down for the rest of class. Afterwards, I went to the bathroom and washed it out with hot water, which got rid of most of the needles, but it still stung for the rest of the day. Oh btw, the kid never got in trouble even after I told the principal.

Got thousands of tiny needles in my neck and hands, teacher wouldn't let me go to nurse, was in pain for most of the school day.

Same. My dad lives a block away from where I grew up. I never saw the guy. When I was young, I used to see him often. This was after my parents divorce. Around the age of 6, he started dating a lot and that's when he didn't seem to care much. The girlfriends were awful. I stopped seeing him as often all through high school. Maybe saw him two to three times a month. He took my mom to court to try and bail on child support and actually got his payments lowered even though he's wealthy. He tried many things to financially cripple my mother. In college he helped split my tuition the first year, then my mom was laid off like many others in 2008 by a big fortune 500. My mom found another job quickly, but was budgeted for my dad to help out. He stopped making his payments. My senior year, I talked to him after not for 2 years. He said he felt bad and would help pay for the last year if I got a job and worked 30-40 hours a week. I had been freelancing in film all through college and maid more in 2 days work than I would working 40 hours all week but he didn't like what I did because it was creative. He paid for one payment my senior year and then bailed again because he wanted me to work more even though I was already having trouble with school and work. I'm not sure what's worse. Not having a dad, or having one that you never see and tries to cripple my mother in every way possible, forgetting that I exist. The worst part was not talking to my dad for months, but one day passing him at the stop sign since we live so close and not even waving or saying anything. Just a mutual shared sadness look.

I want to be a dad my kids love and actually support them. This doesn't affect me now, but I still think about it from time to time. It'll make me a better parent.

So unlike my last fuck up and many other fuck ups, this one actually happened today about an hour ago. I'm on the train to work right now as I'm writing this. I guess this is just my fuck up account now. I work at a foreign language school about an hour and a half away from where I live. Most days my alarms on my phones are set for 5:30 so I can wake up and get ready to catch the 6:10 train. Last night though, I set my alarm for 5 so I could wake up and get breakfast. I usually get about 4-5 hours of sleep but today I got less than 2 because I couldn't fall asleep. Normally I'm just kinda groggy when I wake up and it takes me a few minutes to clear my head and get ready for work. Today my scumbag brain was super fucking wired and responded to the alarms screaming "Wake up motherfucka! You gotta synchronize like your alarms if you want to wake yourself up!" So the first alarm went off and I jumped and started singing, "You have to synchronize! Sync sync synchronize your singing! Synchronize your sleep!" I was practically yelling and the blinking lights from my phones had my sleep deprived brain had me thinking I was some kind of pop star. I woke up my younger brother who I share a room with and he was pretty pissed. "Turn it off! What the hell man!" I continued singing. "No can do! You gotta synchronize!" My singing and his yelling went on for another 30 seconds or so before scumbag brain finally made me realize what the fuck I was doing and I turned off my alarms. I felt bad since my brother had gone to sleep even later than I had and was exhausted. I ate breakfast and apologized for my stupidity before leaving for work.

I synchronized my singing spectacularly like I was a song from Steven Universe. Accidentally woke up younger brother with tone deaf nonsensical song at 5AM because of synchronized phone alarms.

UK based hospital doctor here, and have made a new throwaway just to comment here as I don't want my job tied to main account. I welcome patients taking an interest in their own health and looking up their symptoms. As someone has posted, you know your own body better than me and have much more time (and motivation) to look into your own symptoms. Googling it might also help you to better define and describe them to me. On the other hand, I see patients with symptoms like yours all the time, have my medical knowledge and the training to read and understand research papers, and also to critique what is written. I tend only to read the scientific press rather than yahoo answers and forums but I do pick up the odd development I've missed through the BBC news website. When someone comes to see me brandishing a stack of print outs, I'll try to read them with you(within reason), to see if there's anything which stands up to scrutiny there, and if its all bollocks try and tell you why. Generally forums are not a good source as it tends to be anecdote, often posted by users who have had a bad experience or misdiagnosis ("my doctor is rubbish, he missed the obvious signs so I googled it and bought some mystic crystals from America and I've never been better").

please be curious and take an interest in your health but please be prepared to engage in adult conversation with me about it. Don't bring anything that originated in the daily mail into my hospital or else.

I've been in contact with my step-dad (my mom's ex-husband) for the past several months on and off. I've been dropping hints every once in a while that I miss him, still consider him family, miss my brothers and sisters, etc. I've told him that even though my mom is married once more (to my new step-dad, who I just call dad. I never had my biological father around, the first one was this individual in question), that I still want to have a relationship with him, as I want him in my life. It took him a few days to respond (I actually thought he was trying to avoid me, since in the past he had delayed replying after I said something mushy and personal). Well, 3 days after the original message, I woke up with a message reply from him, a pleasant surprise considering I thought he would not reply to me. He said that he didn't know how he could support me initially, particularly given the fact that he was moving to California to start a new job. He asked me if I had his email address, insinuating that he would try to be the dad that he couldn't be prior. I'm wondering, how do I continue to approach this? How do I establish a relationship without either scaring him off or making him think I'm only doing it for money? I am NOT in it for the money, I just want a relationship with the my original "dad"

Just told my mom's ex/step-dad that I want to have a relationship with him once more, insinuated that he would try to be the dad he hadn't been growing up.

i'm a sub (and i've had multiple masters in the past, so i'm pretty qualified to answer the question), and usually the sub has much, much more loyalty to their Master than to their playmate. I'm sure it's happened before, but it's rare for a sub to just suddenly leave their Master because they like somebody else better. A playmate of mine would need to do something really incredible to get me to leave my Master for them. Keep in mind that my Master has all of my loyalty, so it's unlikely that i'd ever just get up and leave him for someone else, even someone that i know well and trust. On top of that, Master can tell me who i can and can't have sex with, and He can even tell me where i can and can't be, so that would make it difficult for the playmate to "cheat" on their Master without Him knowing. If i wanted to leave Master, i'd have to leave Him completely, and i'd hate having to do that. While the sub technically can leave their Master at any time, it really doesn't happen that often. Every time that i've had to leave a Master, it was for a reason that had nothing to do with how Master was treating me (most of the time it's been because they've had to move someplace far away, and long-distance Dom/sub relationships just don't work). Each time i've had to leave a Master has been incredibly difficult on me emotionally and mentally, and i hate doing it. Usually subs almost never actually just leave their Master. It just doesn't happen. We just have too much loyalty to our Master for us to even consider saying "nope, I'm out".

Technically it could happen because the sub is completely able to leave the Dom/sub relationship at any time and for any or no reason at all, but it's really, really unlikely. I've never heard of it happening before, and I've never even considered doing it myself.

I was in a relationship for almost three years, during those years I was also really busy with work and getting my bachelor’s and master’s.This put a lot of strain on me and the relationship, it resulted in short-term break-ups. A few months before graduating university we REALLY broke it off. He did say that if I ever had second thoughts, I should let him know. But I had no doubt in my mind, I wanted to focus on graduating, promotion at my job and myself. Now more than a year and a half later, things have calmed down. I have a great job and feel much more at ease. In the meantime I have been alone and enjoyed it and then started to date again, but I kept comparing them to HIM even though I tried not to. I realise I want him back… However, I know he has a girlfriend for 9 months now. Should I reach out to him, to see if there is any chance for us to get back together? When we were already broken up, when he started dating this woman, he let me know that I would always be the big love of his life. He looks truly happy on his pics on FB, should I invest in getting over him and just leave them alone and not stir things up? Or take a chance, make myself vulnerable and ‘fight’ for the love of my life?

Ex told me to let him know if I ever wanted him back, I now want him back but he has a new gf, should I reach out to him?

So starting in September I have the opportunity to go back to school for video game design, which is great, but I'm stricken with a difficult decision. Essentially I have narrowed my choices down to two separate schools. Pro's: -Cheaper tuition -Placement opportunities -good reviews Con's: -Living is expensive (Toronto) -The programming I have done in the past wasn't something I was overly interested in -Longer course Pro's: -Private college with smaller class sizes -compressed course (74 weeks straight) -interesting content -I am already in the city that offers this program -living is cheaper Con's: -It's a private college (Tuition is through the roof) -I am not an artist (they say you don't need to be) -it will double my student debt (bringing it 50k+) Other notes: -A big factor that is weighing my decision is that I am also in a long term relationship that very well may turn into a long distance one if I decide to go to Humber. Currently i Have been living with her for the past 2 year, and if I move to Toronto, I would be doing it alone; whereas if is go to Trillium, I would continue living with her (sharing expenses) -Something else worth noting is the private college gives you all the tools you need to do the program (tablet, programs, books). This is all included with your tuition. -on a final note, due to financial issues, transitioning to Toronto would be a difficult one. On top of moving fees as well as starting rent, I owe $1050 to Humber before I could get in. The same can be said for Trillium, but I would only owe $545, and it would be cheaper to move.

Can't decide on what school to attend. Public college is cheaper and has a well credit program, but cost of living is more. Private college is expensive, but cost of living is cheaper and more convenient to attend.

When I was really young, I mean like 5 or 6 I was in a school play, I didn't have a major part (actually I think I did in this one, my memory is hazy) and I always considered plays girly anyway I'm British and my father was a good man, a good father and an alcoholic. I was hit when I was young like most children if I was really bad so I really respected him, I never swore around him, I considered him to be somewhat reserved, he could laugh with friends but he was quite dull with me at times, I guess it's why I'm dull a lot of the time on my own, I have a high tolerance for boredom. He never expressed feelings much, I mean he was happy to see me a lot it's not like he didn't like me, it's the little things like "ask me another stupid question and I'll give you a stupid answer", he spoke to me like an adult not a child a lot, so I matured early on which is not great for a child really but it's who he was and it's made me who I am. Anyway after the play I was in the back of the car after the play and he said to me he was proud of me, I mean that had a massive affect on me, never before and never after, no one has said that where it's actually meant anything but my father was proud of me for doing something as pathetic and girly as that. It didn't have the affect of he'd be proud of me for doing anything it had the affect of he'd be proud of me for doing things I even hated. I don't know how to explain that well, but it made me not feel so ashamed about arts and crafts etc things that I'd always viewed as pointless, pathetic and girly. I'm still not into that stuff but I'm not afraid of doing things that I enjoy even if it's one of those things. I hope that makes sense.

Dad was proud. EDIT: No one has had expectations of me other than to be reasonably smart, I never tried to impress him or my mum. Just for context.

Hello /r/relationships. I have a hard time asking for help/talking about my feelings in person so I'm coming to you guys. A little bit of back story. A few years ago I was engaged things didn't turn out so well with her breaking up with me for another man and since then I've been pretty scared to get into a relationship. So a few months ago my friend ended up texting a friend I've had a crush on asked her out on a date for me. I was so upset and happy and nervous I didn't know what to think, but after waiting for her reply she said she would love to. Things were great after so long of being alone and scared I finally had someone who I actually felt care about me. I didn't even feel this way with my ex-fiance. I could feel her compassion towards me and my past and that's what I loved most about her is the warmth she brought. Anyways during our short relationship we had our share of arguments, but they were always about little things that I did that she found annoying. We had a few arguments about beliefs also but for the most part it was my little annoyances. So a few days ago she was talking to me about how much stress she is under and that she doesn't know if I'm the right person for her. After talking for a while we finally broke down and just told each other that we love one another and was sorry for even thinking that. Then the day after she asked me to call her and that we never really talked about what we were going to do to stop the arguing. That phone call was the end of our relationship. She decided that I wasn't the right person and that shes sorry. I'm just having a really hard time with this since for the first time in a long while I was actually happy with my life and the future I thought we had together. I never knew I could feel this way again and she made me feel even more than I thought I could. What are ways I can deal with this? because for the last two days I've slept a total of 25 hours. We have the same group of friends also, but she knew them before I did so I don't know if I just ignore future plans to hang out with them or what. I'm just a mess and I can't talk to anyone about my feelings because I'm to afraid of breaking down in front of someone. Anyways thanks for just anyone person who takes the time to read and respond. Have a good day.

Having a hard time with my breakup. What are ways I can deal with it besides hanging with friends because we share the same group and I'm also to afraid of breaking down in front of them.

F (27) married my high school sweetheart M(28). We’ve been together for 9 years, married for 4. I have been contemplating divorce for over 2 years but can't make a decision. A couple years ago he went through some mental health issues where he treated me really badly. Now he’ s so much better, but I just don’t feel the same. The good: He’s a good, kind person, loyal, smart, ambitious, successful, helpful. He’s all I’ve ever known and it would be hard to imagine life without him. The bad: He is unemotional to the extreme, says he does not have lots of feelings. He has a very intense personality which can feel dominating or controlling at times. He’s a workaholic. He can be arrogant. He’s not affectionate or romantic in the least. He wants kids and I’ve never been sure that I do, which seems like a big red flag. I am terrified of being alone and worried no one else could ever love me and that I'd regret leaving him. On the other hand, I don’t want to be unhappy for the rest of my life. But I could stick it out, only to have him dump me down the road if I don’t change my mind about kids, and then I’d be even older with less chance of finding anyone else. My mind is spinning. How do I rationally evaluate what is best? How can I come to peace with my feelings and make a decision one way or another?

In a bad marriage with a good person. I can't get over our issues but worried it's a mistake to divorce. How can I make up my frickin' mind and know it's the right decision?

I (23/f) have noticed a pattern with my boyfriends/people I date. I am naturally a kind, giving person. I like making the person I date happy, and I will often buy them little gifts and go out of my way for them. But I guess I am human, because I am usually disappointed when that kindness is not returned. I am currently dating someone (m/25) who likes to party. We usually hang out on a Saturday or Sunday and he will have gone clubbing the night before. When we hang out, he's oftentimes exhausted from the night before. Last time we hung out, we went back to his apartment and laid down for a minute and he fell asleep. This weekend is our second to last weekend before he goes away for a month (the next weekend after, he has a friend staying with him) He is spending 4th of July-Saturday morning away with friends at a beach community and partying for 48 hrs straight. Then he's picking me up, taking me to his friend's house to watch a UFC match, something I really don't like. I asked if, for our last weekend together, if we can do something we both like. He told me its an important match and he wants me to meet his friends. So basically, because of my kind nature, I agreed, and I'm making chili for him and his friends. But it still doesn't sit well with me. It feels like he has an over-full schedule and just squeezes me in. Now, he's not an asshole. He sometimes drives me home even though i live an hour away from him, and last weekend, I met his parents. And I think from his perspective, he wants to see me even if he is exhausted from clubbing until 4, and makes it happen no matter what. I don't want to sound selfish, but is he being a little self-centered? Like I said, this seems to happen with me a lot in relationships. I love giving but I feel like there should be balance.

I act nice to my boyfriends/dates all the time, buy them stuff/do stuff for them and am disappointed when it's not returned. Latest guy I'm dating is this party animal who is pretty much squeezing me into his social life. I really like him. Help?

So here's the situation; I'm (16m) currently still in school, in my second-last year, and I'm thinking 'Fuck it, don't wanna have nothing to show for myself from a lack of trying'. So I've been volunteering around the school, trying to put myself out there, and at one of the things I went to there's a girl (16 too) who I find myself attracted to. She's very pretty, and I just sort of feel drawn to her, but I digress. I'm considering asking her to see a film or something like that, but I'm wondering if it would be better to try and get to know her first, maybe walk to a class with her a couple times first; see if we have any common ground. I don't want to inadvertently get myself passed off as only a friend, but then again it might be odd if I ask out of the blue without knowing a tap about her. Obviously there are things like Facebook and mobiles so I could get both and continue talking from there. So I suppose the question is, would it be better to just dive in or see if we have anything in common first. I've never really done some thing like this before, so I'm fairly initiated to the ways of dating at school (my first and last girlfriend I was sort of told I was dating XD)

I'm trying to get to know someone better before I ask them out; what would be the best way to do this, and how long should I do it for before I ask them? Thanks in advance :)

I started talking to this girl about 2 weeks ago, and I honestly have never felt better about someone that I have met. We talked for 10 days before we went on an actual date, and we hit it off on everything possible. Great kissing, conversations that don't end, constant laughter. I was thinking there was nothing that could've possibly gone wrong on that date. The next day we start talking and something seems off almost immediately. I brushed it off thinking she was just really tired or busy and try to talk about how the date was for her, and she tells me that in all honesty she isn't completely over her ex (they broke up 8 months ago or so) and that it wouldn't be fair to me if she just bit her tongue and acted like everything was fine. She did, however, want me to keep talking to her the same way as I had before, because she had never met someone funnier or sweeter than me, and that I am awesome to be around, as well as that she had an amazing time the night before. I was about to not talk to her, but then I remembered how I had felt about her before she told me about her ex, and I decided I would continue talking to her. After talking to her for most of the day, she tries to act as if she didn't tell me that she wasn't completely over her ex, and it feels really weird for me, and I don't really know what to do. Help me please?

Went on a date with a girl, was told the next day she wasn't completely over her ex that broke up with her 8 months ago, yet acts and talks to me like she never said any of that. What can I do?

I'll start things off... When I was around 14 years old I had this dream. Escape dreams are pretty common for me- running away hiding in a building or rooftop, I also always back myself in a corner and have to wake up before the bad guys get me, but this one was different. I started out escaping from a pirate type ship, I jumped into the river it was in and started swimming with the current down stream. At this point my powers started to manifest, I could manipulate the elements a little bit, which I used in this case to hold my breath longer and swim faster. I got to shore, where I met up with some friends. I saw the pirate guys coming in boats from their larger ship, so we fled into the woods. As we ran I slowly got more used to my power, and was eventually able to use it to form protective shields around us. We kept running, dodging bullets, explosions, etc, through the woods. Eventually the enemy got so desperate to kill us they crashed an entire airship into us, but my force field kept us alive. That shit was so intense. Finally we arrived at an ocean shore where there were a couple of ships docked. We knew that the leader of the bad guys was in one of the ships, and all we had to do was go in there, kill him, steal a ship, and we'd be free. Given that I had just saved us from an entire airship crashing into us (think the end of Return of the Jedi), I was like okay guys, this should be simple, I got this. But my friends were too afraid to go on. So I said to them. If by now you don't trust me, I don't know what else to do. And I just leapt into the air and flew away across the ocean, to freedom, leaving them behind. Since having that dream I've basically left that circle of friends to make a new closer set, left a company where I was carrying most of the weight to start my own business, left the religion I was raised in, despite most of my friends belonging to it, and most recently realized I am gay, filed for divorce, and came out to my family and friends. There are many more smaller examples in my life, but it seems like from a young age my subconscious was telling me, you're different from the people around you, and if you want to grow and be yourself, you can't be afraid to leave them behind.

I think my subconscious new I was gay long before I did, and tried to prepare me for potentially losing everyone around me if they chose not to support me.

I know I may be beating a dead horse but in a way every story is different. Ill keep it short and sweet. Also guys, this is a relationship question, not a "gimme tips on how to be attracted to girls or how to force myself to enjoy this" thread. Just trying to keep my relationship strong and happy. My(19f) boyfriend(21m) suggested a threesome about six months into our relationship. We have been together well over a year now and I have finally discussed the idea with him seriously. Yesterday we got into contact with some possible ladies to join us. The second a girl responded, I had the weirdest sensation in my head, heart, and stomach. I at first felt a wave of intense jealousy, but that subsided and then came the curiosity and realization that this is real. This is happening. We have talked about how this act is going to happen and I explained to him how important our relationship is and we agreed that we would prefer it stay intact. I explained to him these conditions: Feeling of strong long term commitment, trust, & respect, Understanding of my feelings and what I will be experiencing, which is entirely new Understanding that I don't know what I'm doing yet in terms of doing sexual stuff with a girl Details on when, where, who & what; especially last two Agreements on what is and is not okay with her Correct safety precautions, no exceptions. We agree that there shouldn't be blame post-activities considering we can't control what happens in the past Understanding I am willing to try this once, any other tries are pending Anyway, it just got me curious about how this is going to work out and it raised several questions: 1: besides taking it out, What is the best thing to do to ensure I am comfortable? 2: what are the positive and negative effects of doing this? Anyone experience it? 3: what else should I be asking and what are the answers?

gonna have a ffm threesome with bf and I don't want it hurting us, so what things do I need to take into consideration ahead of time so I don't mess this up.

Yeah, but it's still good to know it's there. I lived in a place with asbestos in the outside walls, and they told me, which I thought was nice. I wasn't exactly going to bust down a wall, but it makes a difference in how I'll treat the wall. Certainly I should treat my walls well anyway, but no one is equally careful with everything. If I'm carrying a carton of eggs, I'm careful because I might get egg all over stuff and have to clean it. If I'm carrying a carton of mercury fulminate, I'm extra careful because it'll vaporize me as well as the house around me if I do.

It's kind of nice to know if accidentally tipping a bookshelf into the wall will rack you up $100 (or $20 a few hours mudding/painting) or if it will outright kill you.

My parents had gotten into a heated argument a day before my Birthday - I think I was about 17? - and I was big enough to get between them and hold them back from each other. My Mom calmed down, but my Dad decided he was going to tear me a new one for stepping up to him and basically threatened me with bodily harm and that I should, "Watch myself if I knew what was good for me." The next day we're going to the Mosque for Friday Prayers with one of my Dad's colleagues. This guy realized it was my birthday after prayers and congratulates me. Dad, decided to congratulate me as well by saying, "Happy Birthday," and tried to come in for a hug. I didn't want to get pissed off infront of my Dad's work friend, so I stepped back and offered a handshake. Awkward drive home later I found that my folks didn't bother to buy presents or anything. I did, however, get a cupcake from my little sister and a card from my Mom. Cupcake was awesome - Banana - and the Card had a Cat on it.

Dad got angry at me for stopping a Domestic a day before my B-Day. Awkward birthday handshake from Dad and a Banana cupcake and cat card from sister and Mom.

It's literally happening right now as I'm typing this. So I've been in college for a little over over a year now and one of the first weeks I moved here I met our neighbors from down the hall. Two blonde haired light eyes beauties that might not be slam dunks but damn were they enticing. My roommate and I have cooked up fantasy after fantasy with these two and we've just been pussy footing around pretending they'd totally be into hooking into us, despite them both being in relationships( and Us As well at the time). Anyways, fast forward to tonight and they both come over to my apartment. My roommates at work but they each have a bottle and don't wait for him, and so we start pounding shots. So I'm texting my roommate and he doesn't believe me. He's working on the other side of town and has to see for himself, so he's rushing home while I'm getting good and plastered with these two girls. They both start alternating bathroom breaks being girls and their dumb bladders so each one is one on one with me one after another. They Sachs tart to come onto me. Hard. One girl is already starting to feel me up, but I know my roommate prefers her over the other girl for his own reasons, so I don't want to leave him with nothing to look forward to. So me being generous, I talk my roommate up to one of them to give him something to look forward to when he comes home, just to mess around you know? Nothing's gonna come of it. My roommate gets home and quickly catches up in the Smirnoff Olympics, and that's when she drops the bomb. The one I've been wing-manning HARD for my roommate says she has a secret. She's been single for months and has had a hard on for both of us. And since my roommate was "such a great guy" she just jumped for it and lo and behold, they're on the other side of my wall fucking each other's brains out while I listen and pretend to do calculus homework. Oh and the other girl got sick and went home.

I had a chance to fuck the girl next door and passed her off in the biggest backfiring bro moment of my life. And am now lonely in the dark.

I found out that my bf has been messaging women on reddit/gonewild. He has told them how badly he wanted to have sex with them and explained (in detail) what he wanted to do with them. He even told them about me and what he does with me. He asked them if their BFs/ husbands were ok with their gonewild pictures. Then he told them that it is ok as long as they do not find out about it. In his messages he had asked them to send him pictures and invited them for one on one cam sessions on Skype. This is not the first time he has done something like this. Last time when we talked about it, he promised that he would never ever do something like this again and how sorry he was about his actions. Now I know that he really didn't mean it because he has gone and done the same thing again. I don't think I could ever trust him again. I really love him. We have been in this relationship for almost three years and this is not the first time he has done something like this. I always thought that things would get better and he would be faithful to me (because that is what he said). But now I feel like things would never ever improve. Would you be ok with this sort of thing? Anyone out there who has faced a similar situation?

BF has been messaging women on reddit-gonewild and telling them he wanted to have sex with them and asking them for picture and one on one cam sessions on skype. What would you do in a similar situation?

Before I get into it, let me explain a few things. Friend and I go to an art school. She's a photo major and I've had her take pictures for me once before. It's pretty normal here to work with other majors to collaborate and both create work for your portfolios. A couple of weeks ago, I had her take photos of one of my pieces, which required a little bit of setting up in her living room. We were both pretty busy, so when I still hadn't gotten the photos from her a week later, I wasn't too bothered. I sent her a text as a reminder and she said she'd try to get them soon. Then another week passed, still no photos, and now she won't respond to texts. (Her phone wasn't getting them?) I found her in person and I'm like, hey, I kind of need these photos ASAP, and she says she'll get them to me soon. A few days later and I'm freaking out because I need to get a printed portfolio together for graduation, and still nothing! So I find her again and I'm like hey, WHAT IS HAPPENING? She lost the photos. She claims her cat chewed the SD card out of the computer and now it's on the floor somewhere. (It seems far fetched but this cat is the kind who would figure that out). Now she won't bother to look for them because she's "too busy" and "it's not my fault", thereby inconveniencing me and forcing me to redo photos that I really don't have time for right now. Luckily I enacted my plan B and they turned out ok. I brought this whole thing up in the therapy group we're both in, and the head counselor had us try and do a little exercise to try and help. We were both just supposed to respectfully relay our experiences, so I said: "I'm disappointed and frustrated that you lost the photos. I understand that stuff happened with the cat, but I relied on you to get this done and I really thought you'd follow through." She got defensive and said she had nothing else to say and wouldn't participate in the exercise. After this whole experience, I'm really just turned off to this whole friendship. This has been the latest in a series of unfortunate events. Recently she's freaked out because she thought she was pregnant from a ONS (where she lost her virginity) and didn't bother to get Plan B when she thought the condom broke, impulsively adopted another cat she can't afford to take care of, and been in a mental hospital 6 times in the last year. Needless to say, I'm burned out. Problem is, her dad died recently and she has no other friends, and I feel like a dick for dipping out. I just... don't want to be friends anymore. I'm not getting anything out of this relationship and it's stressing me out.

Friend lost my portfolio photos and has been an overall trainwreck. Her dad died and she has no other friends. I'm worn out and want to end the friendship. Should I bother saying anything or just ghost?

I know looks, ethnic background, religion, money has nothing to do with asking out a girl. I'm not rich or middle class, not poor either, money doesn't satisfy me at all. Regardless I'd say I have some "style" since I'm wearing the trends, however today my friend was saying something about this girl that is on our school. He said she comes from a rich family, and looks like one of those snobby white girls that expects a lot. If I wear to describe her without showing an actual picture, to me she's pretty cute. Other people think differently. That's fine. Basically my friend was saying how she isn't my type, but he wasn't degrading me or anything. He was just telling me how usually the "rich snobby white girls" are always like what you see in the movies. Don't get me wrong, I don't believe that. But would you still go after a girl even after hearing something like that? Like I mentioned earlier, it's all about confidence and personality, and just being yourself. I know for a fact I'm nowhere near her family income and race, but I'd still go for it since I got nothing to lose.

Would you still go after a girl that looks like a snobby rich girl, even if you yourself is confident, but know you aren't "rich and all that".

My experience is surreal, I still look back and don't believe that I've lost 200lbs. I look back at my pictures and see how big I used to be. Then I look at people on here, and realize how far I've yet to go. Pro/Cons as far as having a VSG. Pros You can go and have a full gastric bypass from a sleeve. Sleeves work better with younger people because they have more flexibility. Bigger stomach than a bypass, and if they stretch it and want to get a bypass to make it smaller they can. You take less vitamins than a bypass, you absorb more nutrients from food. \ Liquid pain meds are the shit. (mine tasted like mt. dew hahaha) Cons It hurts, don't kid yourself your abdomen is going to feel like you've been punched a thousand tiny times. Nausea rate for surgery is stupid high, I have a story about this. I miss a lot of foods as they don't agree with me. I miss carbonation but, I've accepted that I probably won't go back to drinking any of carbonated beverage for a long time as they will stretch your stomach. I had to have an injection twice a day for 2 weeks after surgery to prevent blood clots, that sucked a lot. The drain they install was 1. gross to empty, 2. the weirdest feeling having a 3 foot tube come out through a tiny hole in your chest. still cringe about that. My surgery experience overall was good. I got released early, my wounds healed up faster than normal. However they screwed up when I left and gave me pill form nausea meds, and I was supposed to get liquid or dissoluble so I had to go to the ER less than 2 days after surgery. After not being able to digest anything and water very little without being sick.

I'm glad I did it. But its not some magic fix, I was over 500lbs and with several co-morbids I was facing, it was the last resort.

Maybe this is silly compared to some other issues you guys have. My fiance (31/m) and I (23/f) have been together for just about two years. Right now we're waiting for immigration stuff to come through so he can finally move here permanently. We see each other every 2-3 months roughly. For our time together, we put all of our expenses on a card. He has one and I have one. (It's in my name) We put our flights, food, travel expenses, etc. on there. He sends me $150 a week and I put about half of that towards the card. The worry that I have is that we are fundamentally quite different in our spending habits. I am a very frugal person - don't eat out often, live in a tiny studio apartment, watch my spending daily, put money into my savings account no matter what every paycheck. He likes to go out with his friends, eat out, have a few beers, buy video games, etc. I feel like while I am very future minded, he is firmly grounded in the present. Part of the reason I love him so much is his carefree attitude. He mellows me out and I do appreciate that. Still, I refuse to live paycheck to paycheck. I've made that clear to him. He makes more than I do, and he admits he needs to save more. I feel bad nagging him though when he's sending me $600 a month to help pay for our trips. I'm just don't want money to cause an issue when he's finally living here. He's joked about me having to be in control of the money, but I don't want to feel like a mother giving her kid an allowance. I feel pretty strongly about not having separate accounts. Part of being married, to me anyway, is sharing everything with your partner. I don't like the idea of us having these separate accounts we hide from each other. He agrees. Do any married folks have any wisdom they can impart? Any tips? He's a grown ass man and I'm not going to dictate how he can spend his money but I do want him to be more aware of his spending habits.

Fiance feels like money burns a hole in his pocket. I am frugal to the point of it being annoying. How do we make this work?

The rule when we were growing up when we were still in middle school was, once you get to high school, if you get a job, you will have to pay for your stuff (car, car insurance, gas, etc...), but if you got into a school activity, they would pay for all of it. Well me, I was never a sports type and the clubs in school didn't interest me. I play a few instruments and take lessons every week outside of school, and also have a job where I work another 3 days a week. Now my little brother on the other hand just plays basketball. Didn't pay for his car, gets his gas and insurance payed for, and all the upkeep payed for. I feel it's super unfair that they're discriminating against the kid that wasn't interested in a school activity, and paying for my brothers shit just because he is involved with one. I feel like playing basketball has some pros, but I feel like if you're to get a job when you're young, you will get plenty of good life experiences and there are just as many pros that come with having a job. How do I explain to them to get them to understand how unfair this is and why they are discriminating me from my brother when we are BOTH doing something productive, but they'll only help one of the kids P.S. they are not making me pay for this stuff just because i'm 18. It's been happening for years.

Parents pay for my brothers things because he plays basketball as something productive. My parents don't pay for my things because the productive thing I do is working. how do I talk to my parents about this in a way where this can possibly change?

Don't use brute force! This is your mind you're living in; you must use MindCraft! Blow your enemies away with a Telekinetic Blast! Or do like me, and gun them down with dick lasers! Nah, but I did experiment like a damn fanatic a few years back with that lucid dreaming stuff (flipping light switches on and off to see if it's a dream, habits like that). I don't do it anymore, but it seems that when I dream, on some level most of the time I'm usually aware enough to know I can't die. I do lucid shit like throwing hadokens without really thinking about it. I just 'know' I can do it. It's weird. I guess I'm just often lucid on a subconscious level... SUB-LUCID. It's the best of both worlds, you go with the plot but you're never really all that afraid.

I fucked some HUGE ass bitch in a dream. I was coming out of a dorm room shower and there she was, the janitor lady. Best dream ever.

I feel as this isn't creepy, but it needs to be posted; I get more blood to the right side of my brain than normal (Is there a name for this condition?). This means I think more with math and go on tangents too often, all coming down to an overall distracted and very slow kid in grade school. In third grade, my teacher cared less for my own needs (I didn't know I had the condition then), and more for her own wants on the standardized testing (The Colorado test is mostly a score for the teachers). Throughout the year, she would come uncomfortably close and ask me if my parents took me to the doctor for ADD (not my condition) drugs. One time, she even pulled me out of art class by just walking into the room saying "Hey, I need to see /u/stefonio for a minute." being no short of blunt.

A teacher wanted me on ADD drugs so I could get higher scores on Colorado's standardized testing. I don't have, and have never had ADD.

I went to school in England (my leaving year was 2000 to give you an idea of when these things happened) Highlights from High School include: An English teacher who pronounced Sci-Fi as "Sky-Fy" - when questioned about it she said Sci-Fi didn't stand for anything and her pronunciation was correct. When I told her it stood for science fiction I was sent to the head of department for correcting her/being wrong. The same English teacher ran a class on themes and music within films. She told the class that Carmina Burana by Carl Orff was used as the theme for The Omen. At that time (I'm still as geeky now) I was really into music and soundtracks from films. So I put my hand up and tried to explain that it's often confused with the theme, but it was actually written by Jerry Goldsmith and he won an Oscar for it (bear in mind I was 13/14 years old here.) I didn't do it in a patronising way. I was berated in front of the class by the Teacher and asked for proof, otherwise to keep quiet. The next day I came in with the a movie soundtrack CD with the Omen on it and Carmina Burana on a separate CD. The movie soundtrack even had inlay notes explaining about the Oscar win and the confusion with Carmina Burana. The result? Detention for a week and the teacher refused to admit she was wrong. I lost a lot of respect for her after that. Other highlights of bull information: I was taught by a High School teacher that black people don't swim in the olympics because their bone marrow is heavier. Another High School teacher told me that once water has been boiled and returns to room temperature. It will have a higher boiling point the second time it's boiled because it has "less oxygen to interfere with the boiling process, as it all evaporated the first time around." Oh and one of our French teachers believed that nosebleeds were caused by students on command for attention. This same teacher called me by the wrong name for 5 years. The funny thing is I have a French name, in a class full of English named students. Thought that might have helped?

Teacher pronounces Sci-Fi as Sky-Fy. Same teacher said that the Omen's music was written by Carl Orff. Also some of my science teachers were/are racist and/or incredibly stupid. And my French name is difficult to remember by a French teacher.

Hello r/advice. I am currently in my senior year (will graduate next may) of undergrad studies, studying animal science. I choose this degree, because all of my life I have wanted to be a veterinarian...until I actually started working in veterinary hospitals. The first one I worked at I was bored to tears with, but I thought that it was just because I was basically janitorial staff. The next hospital I worked in I still hated, though I assumed that was because the vet I worked with was a hard ass and we didn't get along. The one I work at now, has me realizing that this profession is just not for me. I love the vet, I love the staff, but I hate working on the animals...watching tests, performing exams, etc., completely bores me. My plan was to go to vet school after undergrad...but if I don't like the work I'm doing now, should I really waste four more years on a profession I might not like? I'm just not sure what I should do at this point...There aren't many jobs for an "Animal Scientist" that don't involve sitting in a lab all day, and that is definitely something I do not want to do. My other option is to get a masters degree in a field I do enjoy. I really enjoy working with people, and psychology has started to seem more and more interesting to me; however, I'm not sure if I could get into a masters level psychology program given my current major. I am also considering getting a masters degree in Student Affairs (essentially, working in the housing/administrative portion of a university, something I do right now and love). I know this sounds ridiculously confusing...I just really needed to get it off my chest that I'm not happy with my current major. My whole family expects me to be this amazing vet who makes hundreds of thousands of dollars, and I just don't see that happening... What would you guys do if you were in my shoes? Stay on the vet path because I've already put so much time into it? Or go with the Student Affairs/Psychology route, or possibly something totally different? Also, if anyone knows a good career with a masters in Animal Science, I'd consider that as well. Thank you, and sorry for the length of this post.

Stuck in a major I don't like, was going to go to vet school, now not so sure. Future plans are up in the air but I do want to get some sort of Masters Degree. Not sure what to do.

I've been with my girlfriend for 13 years. We live together for the past 8 years, and have two sons, aged 2 and 6. I'm not happy, I been so for months now. I don't picture myself together with her in the future. Other signs tell me our relation is finished. I continue in it for our sons and because the youngest is way too young, a baby. I'm aware that the baby needs both, very much. Also my older son, of course. I don't know what she thinks, but she's knows things between us aren't well. Remaining in this situation is the best option for our sons, but not for me, in the medium-long run. And also not for my gf, it's unfair. I know I'm going to leave, the question is when and how. As time passes our arguments get worse, I've started to wonder if I make more trouble by staying. If leaving in the short term would be best for all, sons included. What do you think?

Me [37M] in a 13 years relation gf [38F] with two young sons. I'm unhappy, it's over. But I feel it's too soon to leave, because of them. What should I do?

We've been in a relationship for 3 years. Everything's been going really really well up until this past November. He decided that he needed time to himself and needed a break. He assured me he still loved me more than anyone he's loved before but needed to make sure that he was ready to be with me 100%. Fast forward to early January, the break went nowhere and we're still acting as though we're together. One weekend, we are out to lunch when I ask him if we're ok and whatnot. He takes his time to answer - which I know is not a good sign. We go home and talk and he brings the break up again. This time for real, more like a break-up. Same reasons, wants to make sure he wants to be with me, wants to make sure he's ready for the commitment. I say ok, we agree that during this break we can see other people. Fast forward again to last Friday. Up until then we had STILL been acting as a couple. Still talking, seeing each other, and hanging out. I casually ask him if he's seeing anyone and he says he has - just for about a week now. He went on a date with her Friday night and then slept over at her house Saturday night after work. I was furious. I didn't know what to do. Then I realized, I set myself up for this - I told him we could see other people. Now we are mostly no contact up until May when we said we would talk about our relationship. I'm broken reddit, I have no idea what to do. I am positive that he is who I want to be with but I am so scared he will not want to come back to the relationship this May. I know he loves me immensely. I just want him back more than anything. Advice, please?

boyfriend and I break up after 3 years. Tried breaks a few times, ended up still seeing each other. Found out he's been talking to another girl, now we are pretty much no contact. Broken, need help.

I play five instruments. Guitar, drums, bass, keyboards, and vocals. I have been playing guitar the longest (6 years) and am the most successful there. Has it gotten me laid? I don't know. People say that girls like skills, and I certainly have them concerning music. I can also skateboard, and am studying nuclear engineering with plans to work in national security. I was captain of my high-school lacrosse team and am also quite confident. The amount of pussy that I don't get is astounding to me. Its like I have all of the skills and qualities that should make me a lady killer but for some reason I'm just not and I have no idea why. Although I have never really tried to exploit these skills to get pussy before, they're just things that I love doing.

Accomplished musician that can play all the "sexy" instruments quite well except the sax and is flabbergasted by the amount of pussy that he doesn't get.

I think you need an amount of arrogance though. Hear me out. Looking at a machine or job or program or whatever and thinking "I could too better" or "I could improve that" is arrogant. You're believing your work is better than what you see, and that you can make/do it better than another's work. Now, the catch is that this form of arrogance is restricted by 2 things: 1: it's "small". It's not constant boasting, but rather it's a small amount of arrogance that leads to a change because you're trying to do better than an established job/work position. It's also not typically ever displayed, or if it is, people would (mis)associate it more with improvement/DIY rather than arrogance. 2: Arrogance, as a word, has a negative connotation. This means when you think of the word arrogant, it brings to mind the jerks and never-do-wells of life. However, I would argue positive arrogance is defined by your attitude and that this"positive arrogance" is a driving factor in seeing something and trying to do better.

Arrogance is useful when paired with good emotions and the person isn't a jerk, because it leads to change and improvement of old or current jobs or machines through the assumption a person can make it better. Feel free to debate/question/agree!

Behind the wheel of my car....... DRIVING..... I went to a concert with a friend. He worked at the Guitar Center on Clark st, and we were going to a show at the Metro, also on Clark street, about 4 blocks away. In that 4 blocks, we downed a bottle of jack daniels. We go in, concert ensues... but not for me. I was in the venue, then I woke up... Behind the wheel of my car.... DRIVING. So.... Apparently I got into a fight, got kicked out of the Metro, and stumbled to my car, where I passed out in the passenger seat. My buddy finishes the show, comes out to find me passed out in the passenger seat, and drives my car to his girlfriends house. Now for those non Chicagoans, the city is set up in a grid. All east/west streets north of the 0/0 mark(If I remember correctly, madison/monroe) have names, IE, Belmont, Howard, etc. All streets south of 0/0 are numbered , IE first, 140th, etc. IT is set up where 8 blocks is one mile... So... back to my adventure. My buddies girlfriend lived by Belmont and Ashland, a street that goes pretty much the whole way in chicago from Howard(the northern most street in chicago) to wherever south... When I woke up, as I said, I was driving. I looked at the street sign I came up to and saw that I was on Ashland. At the time, I lived on Howard, which is 7400 north. So when I saw Ashland, I was happy. This will get me home... Then I saw the cross street. 126th..... Then 127th..... then 128th..... Finally I realize that I am going the wrong direction. I come to 129th, which had a stop light, and treated it like a stop sign. I got past the intersection, and made a u-turn. This is where my night should have gotten worse. Red and blue lights... All I remember was having my hands on my trunk, then the police cars trunk, then being in the back of the police car, then driving again... I was let go. I barely had woken up after driving dozens of miles blind and drunk, and been pulled over, and let go.... I woke up the next day with a bitch of a hangover, and a speeding and running a red light ticket. How I didnt kill anyone, I will never know. I think I got let go, because they would have had to put me into cook county jail, and they figured with all the gang bangers and thugs, Id get my ass beat.... Who knows... Only saw the cops again at the court date, where I pleaded guilty to my 2 infractions, but made sure to thank them on the way out.. I am just glad I didnt hurt anyone...

Got wasted, black out drunk, woke up driving before getting pulled over by Chicago's finest, and didnt get a DUI even though I had driven easily 25 miles blind drunk.....

I used to be terrified of Chucky, that fucking doll that casually murders people and can't be killed, when I was at the age of 5. My mom, lovely woman, would sometimes change the channel to a Chucky movie if she knew it was on while I was watching TV becaue I probably would if I had children, too. I'm in bed after she basically committed an minor act of child torture, these scenarios start playing through my head. Chucky is probably under the bed. In my mind at the time it was very possible and you have to keep an open mind. Another scenario, he was on the top bunk and would jump down and slit my throat. Last scenario, he's at the end of my bed about to start shaking it back and forth just to fuck with me. The bed starts shaking. I do not shit you when I say the bed started shaking. If I had not gone to the bathroom before bed it would have happened at that moment and at wide open throttle. I ran into the living room, the whole house is shaking. Earthquake. This was in Washington across the bay from Seattle about 15 years ago. To this day I check the fucking bed and no closets are left open. Fuck Chucky.

Terrified of Chucky the killer doll, 5 years old, went to bed and thought he would start shaking my bed, bed starts shaking, dry heave my already empty bowels, Earthquake.

First off this did not happen today but on the 4th of July. Me and my Brother were out shopping for fireworks to cerebrate 'Murica the best way possible, blowing up shit and barbecuing. As we are shopping I notice near the 300 gram section a firework with a Confederate flag on it. Due to the controversy going around about the flag I thought that soon the firework would likely be pulled so I shrugged said fuck it and bought it. As it gets dark we begin to start up the party on our street. Our Neighborhood will often come together and bring a lot of food and just have a good time in general. I should mention at this point the party is directly in front of our house and our neighbors do happen to be black. As the night goes on we start shooting off some fireworks and i figure why not light the one with the confederate flag now. So I go into the street and light the the box. It fires 3 balls with some colors I can't even remember, all I do remember is that some how those three balls caused the box to tumble and fall over. I look in horror and fear as the next barrage of fire shoots sideways thankfully at no one however it just had to aim at my black neighbor's house. I run into the street and attempt to stomp on the box to try and stop it from firing once again and sure enough it stayed in the box. My brother came near with a garden hose and sprayed the box down for a solid minute until we were sure that nothing else would be coming out. I could not believe it, of all the stuff that could have gone wrong, a firework with the Rebel Flag just had to tip over like a drunk guy. And it couldn't have just tipped over in any ol' place nope right near the black neighbor's house. I ran over to their front yard but thankfully all that was hit was a garden light. I took the box and chucked into the trash before anyone got to see what was on the box and went to my neighbors again. I felt like utter shit at the time and was apologizing over and over. Thankfully they are great kind people and simply laughed it off saying nothing to worry about there was no damage and no one was hurt. The rest of the night everyone had a good time. Still feeling guilty about the whole thing i went to a hardware store and bought them a new light even though the other one simply had a burn mark at the top. To my luck however they still do not know what was on that box and just assume it was some strange one like dragon breath or something fire i dont know.

Bought a firework with a Confederate flag, and it tried to hit my black neighbors. Everything turned out fine in the end but i almost shit a brick.

I was involved in a love triangle as well. My co-worker/great friend was having trouble in her marriage (her husband was becoming distant, filling his time with work and video games while ignoring her) and while I was trying to help her through it, we grew closer and closer. Nothing ever happened sexually until she left him. She obviously love(d/s) both of us and it caused her a great deal of anguish and guilt. They divorced on amicable terms, though he blames everything on me and hates me for it. I hate the dishonorable position I allowed myself to occupy and I feel guilty nearly everyday 2 years later for having been the catalyst in destroying a marriage. We have a great relationship though, and somehow, it has made the two of us better people. Her pain is finally starting to wane to manageable level, though I'm sure there will always be a part of her mind that dwells on it, as will mine.

My girlfriend and I were in a love triangle that ended her marriage. It hurts everyone badly no matter what, but you can find happiness.

I would like to preface this by saying that this girl and I are not monogamous, we've made it clear that as of right now neither of us want anything serious, and we've agreed to not get mad if one of us hooks up with someone else. I'll refer to the girl I'm dating as Kass . I have been hooking up with other girls, but I've had the decency to be discreet, it doesn't end up on social media, I don't hook up with or even flirt with other girls in front of her, and I don't talk about the girls I hook up with. However, there is a guy I really don't like who goes to our school and often sits with Kass and I in the food court. He's basically Thad Castle from Blue Mountain State, just imagine that. This guy, Thad , has been flirting with Kass for a long time but she's always ignored it. Lately she's been flirting back with him, and tonight she told me that she is at his house. I'm not a jealous guy, but right now I'm very jealous. I feel like I can't tell Kass that this bothers me because we did agree that we're allowed to hook up with other people. We said nothing in our agreement about being discreet. I've never told Kass that I don't like Thad but I thought it was obvious. Should I say something or leave it be? Kass and I have intentions to become serious, but we decided to just keep it casual for now.

Girl I'm dating but who is basically just friend with benefits flirts with jocky guy I don't like right in front of me, she went to his house and I'm jealous now. Not sure if I should say anything.

no one agrees with how their government is run 100%. that is the point of opposition parties and political discourse. When you pledge allegiance, you are publicly showing that you care about the process ( I take it that you do in fact care, since you claim to be involved with local politics) involved in improving the nation as a whole. So are the conservatives a bunch of loony gun toting bible thumpers? are the liberals a bunch of hippies that only want a handout? are you a normal human being that believes something in between? That is the point of the pledge of allegiance. It means: I love this country enough to think about what it stands for and where we come from. Saying it together reinforces that we share a common culture and goal of improving the system we live in, even if (especially when) we disagree on exactly how it should be/has been done.

a pledge of allegiance is not a pledge to the government (which often makes mistakes) but a pledge to the nation and the values it stands for. Consider standing up and showing you care about how YOU are represented.

My boyfriend and I are very non-traditional. We've decided to get married. We live in Salt Lake City. We could care less if we have a ceremony, yet we’re under an enormous amount of pressure to have a wedding from friends and family. His parents are very religious and mine would be broken hearted if they didn’t get to see me wed. However, none of them are willing to help us pay for a wedding. Understandable. He and I love to travel and put as much of our budget as we can toward future trips. We’ve been dying to see Thailand for three years, and having a wedding would mean we couldn’t afford the trip we have planned. We are also trying to save for a house. We’re not in the poorhouse, but every dollar we save goes to those things. I don’t understand how the average wedding here is $10,000. That’s ten thousand freaking dollars. Where is this money coming from? Even a dirt cheap wedding of $2000 seems absolutely excessive to spend on one night. When I tell people “We can’t afford to get married,” they look at me like I’m out of my mind. We just barely bought our first couch, how in the world could we put ten grand toward a party? I’m not trying to shame anyone for their budget; if you have it you ought to have the wedding that you want. I just don’t have it and I'm not sure I want it. Thinking about shopping for a dress, picking out flowers, taking engagement photos - the whole lot of it just makes me so stressed I could barf! I don’t even want a ring. At the same time, however, I think a ceremony is necessary to help legitimize us as a married couple. I want to start our married life off on the right foot, especially with our parents. Making them happy would make me happy. How to have a wedding and reception for under two grand that makes everyone happy, including us? I’ve spent the last two months researching every way to cut costs, trying to come up with creative ideas, etc. These are the problems I keep running into: Eloping seems pointless when neither of us care about the ceremony. We also feel like the reception is the most important part if we’re doing this for the sake of friends and family. Neither of us knows anyone with a backyard or any sort of large space that can accommodate a wedding. Providing booze and food are the biggest priorities for us. It should be a party! But also the most expensive part, and even more expensive at a private venue. Yes, we do have a few friends that could help us with photography, the cake, etc, but I just don’t like asking for those sorts of favors.

Need to have a wedding, can't freaking afford it. I’m just reaching out for ideas and viewpoints I might have missed. Even just commiseration. Am I a huge cheapskate? Thanks for your comments.

This may sound ridiculous right now, but if you have no serious health problems, join the Air Force. Im leaving for USAF basic training in September, and trust me, the benefits are ridiculously good. (BTW 95% of Air Force jobs are not flying!) a) You make great money for someone just starting work, plus free housing and reduced food costs. b) You get $1400 a month before you even rank up, and get paid during boot camp, which is 8 1/2 weeks. (Plus you rank up very fast when u first get in.) c) First 2 years of your college is free, plus an extra $40,000 per year for any additional years. d) Once you get out after 4 years (if you desire), people hiring will LOVE to know you have a military work ethic. e) FREE HEALTHCARE + VETERANS BENEFITS. f) You wont be shot at, like every other branch aside from the navy g) Female humans think its really attractive.

Fuck bitches, get paid. But seriously, you're entire life will be taken care of. If you wanna not only survive, but thrive, go talk to a recruiter. Theyll tell you more. Good luck.

Hey all, I'm really caught at a crossing point, I've been with this girl for a little over a year and we've been on "Break" for about a month or so now. We've had issues before and differences and we decided that a break from our relationship to focus on ourselves was what we needed At first I was okay with it as we did need a break from our 24/7 hang out but now she's talking to other guys, she had intercourse with one a couple of times and when he didn't work out she found someone else and is talking to them and probably flirting/making advances on him... she says she's having fun on her break and that she's not focused on relationships, this hurts me as I get to know about all of it and get nothing from her she's always flirting and wanting to fuck that guy and even saying if she finds interest in someone else I should move on and yet says she still loves me and wants to be with me and that she's my baby etc so do I try and rekindle things because when we were together she was loyal and I love her greatly and would hate to see this go because she's pretty much everything I could want in a girl aside from these antics that she's pulling now.

went on "break" from year relationship and now she's fucking another guy and flirting saying it could go either way and that I may loose her to a guy she finds interest in what do I do?

Hello Reddit! This is my first time posting so I'm not really sure if I'm in the right place... I am a 23 year old female with dreams of travel and helping others. Background: My family didn't have a lot of money when I was younger. I have held a job since I was 16 to try and support myself the best I can even after my parents finances took a skyrocketing turn. I've always worked some combination of two jobs since high school to foot the bill for my own expenses. Part of that is guilt, part pride. I've got my college degree and I'm currently working on a Master's while - you guessed it - still working two jobs. Studying abroad has always been a dream of mine I just could use some advice on how to make it practical. The Problem: I can't help but feel like life is passing me by. There is so much of the world I haven't seen; I have never left the United States. My Master's work is in statecraft and national security yet I've never even seen some of the countries I've studied so much. I am surrounded by trust fund kids at my school who pop off to Israel, Morocco, and India at the drop of a hat. In my undergrad, I tried for competitive scholarships and got rejected. I once thought I had found a program in Russia but it ended up being some shady scam. Just saying "fuck it" and taking out the student loans to cover a jaunt isn't an option for me either. That's not the kind of experience (or debt) I'm after. The Question: In sum, I have heard there are volunteer travel opportunities where participants can volunteer in exchange for expenses being covered. I love the idea of making a difference especially with kids who have experienced a way different kind of poverty than I did growing up. I want to travel the world in a meaningful way. Has anyone heard of a low/no cost volunteer travel program where this is possible? If you have participated, what kind of expenses did you have? How did you save for odd and end expenses? If it was for a longer stay what did you job wise and for your bills back home? Can anyone point me in the right direction?

Is low/no cost volunteer travel possible and can you send me in the right direction? I want to make a difference and give back while I see the world. I'm a full time grad student with two jobs and monthly bills terrified of more debt.

We are away for the summer and she doesn't have friends where she is. She gets approached frequently by guys. She made friends with a guy who works there after he kept writing messages to her on her coffee cup. He also invited her to a pool party at his house (she didn't go). Lately he "keeps running into her" and said he wants to get a bike to loan her. I told her this is not a "friend" thing to say/do and she disagreed and asked me why I have to assume things. The conversation became much more of a conflict than it should have. I don't doubt at all the dude is interested. I do trust her intentions, but I don't totally trust her on a slippery slope. She's definitely doesn't like hurting people's feelings, and would rather not say no to people on small things. This has come up in the past. So... is there a good way to handle this? I know that she's lonely where she is, and that asking her to not hang out with this one "potential friend" is kind of a big thing to her. Still, it bothers me enough to post this.

A guy has clearly shown interest and I would feel more secure if she stopped hanging out with him. Can I express this without being insecure?

I woke up a few minutes ago, I can't stop thinking about leaving her. I really don't want to lose her. I love her so much, she's so nice to be with, she cares, she's extremely good at sex, she's sometimes funny, and for the most part everything's calm, but... We can't be together because we're so different, and I really don't think this will work out. Our core differences create issues, and those are really heavy and important, things like our kids, the reasons we do something, our philosophical differences, our intake on life and the world, etc... I can't just break up with her because I'll end up being convinced I don't need to break up because she's just so good at convincing me of that. I have told her before to break up and that's what has happened. If I want to do this, I have to just cut contact suddenly. (or you guys give me a better option) But I hate doing that. I hate everything about this decision. I hate that I have to tell her, I hate that I'd lose her and all of the nice things she has, I hate that I'll be leaving someone I love, and she'll probably never talk to me again, that's really heavy for me. I don't know, man... I can't see any other way. I'm not going to be able to go to her country (we're in a long distance relationship), at least not anytime soon. Honestly, my only problem here is that I know if I leave, I'll end up being the one considered 'not in love'. I don't want that, because it's not true, I really love her. She's amazing, really. And the next guy she dates will definitely see that, and I'm sure she'll make the right choice that time. She's the only one I have basically to constantly talk to. There is a reason for me wanting to leave, definitely, it's because at our fundamental, core personalities, we're opposite and different. We think in different ways, we do things for different intentions, we even do the same things for different intentions than one another. I understand if we had differences like "oh I like this music" and "oh I like that music". But this is just our basis, our basic understanding of life itself. I don't know what to do and I need help. I swear to God I love her, and I know that she loves me too, there's no doubt about that, she tells me she doesn't doubt my love for her too. And I have never put less for her. I have always tried my best, I have always been nice, I have no reason not to, I love her truthfully.

Can't decide if I have to or need to or even how to break up with girlfriend when everything else is fine, other than we won't work out, we're not compatible because our differences create issues.

35 (m) I was pulled out of NYC and thrown into Oklahoma city for 3 months and put under a crazy amount of stress. An intense pass fail class to see if I would get my dream job. Pass and I become an air traffic controller. Fail and try to figure out what to do with my life. My classmates were a little crazy. Everyone was having sex with everyone else. (Hey. It's good stress relief.) I was newly married and my wife was back in NY. I needed to do something crazy to blow off some steam and didn't want to cheat. I decided peircings were the way to go. I got them done by a nice Hawaiian guy named Edwardo. I did not tell my wife. When I got home I met her at a bar and tokd her what I did. Needless to say she was surprised. There we are in a fancy New York City bar and she demands I unbutton my shirt and show her. I of course obliged. Nipples are the way to go. No one knows I have them unless i tell them I do. I have never had any issued as far as metal detectors or airports. That's all BS. I got them angled towards my bellybutton. I think they look cool that way but there are 2 issues with them on an angle. Hoops won't look good and you have to be carefull lifting your shirt. I don't think horizontal barbells have that issue.

Got my nips peirced and my wife didn't know for several months. Edit. There are a few things you can do jewelry wise with barbells. I have spikes on the end instead of the usual ball.

We have been going out for 3 months this summer and having a great time. We really care about each other and think the world of each other. Our relationship seems to just keep growing and growing and now it's going to be cut short by college, or is it? Do you guys think it could work or recommend going for it or is it not worth it? Regardless we have agreed to stay in touch and be friends througout college because we both have the same end-game city and plan for life, just to keep our options open down the road if we live in the same city it could rekindle. The other option would be to try the LDR which would be about 5 hours. I think we're both down but a little worried our relationship would just fizzle out and we would also lose that friendship then too because we would only have known each other romantically. I have classes until 1 pm on Friday's so I could get up by 7 or 8 Friday night and then be with her for the weekend and then come back Sunday night or early monday morning before my 11 o'clock class. In the breaks we would also see each other and I would try to get a summer internship in her city, because that's my favorite city in the world and I want to live there for the rest of my life; as does she. I really care about her and want her in my life, preferably romantically but we also get along great as friends as well!!! We could try the friend route for college, see other people, and then see where we are after college and if things align, give it another go. I'm just worried though that if we try this, she'll find a boyfriend, and stop contacting me after awhile because I'll just be some old ex from a different city and I really want her in my life because she is the coolest funniest person I know. I also don't want to lose her because of a strained LDR. Which route do you think I should go? Also, ask me any questions if you need more clarification about anything.

Should I give this LDR a go or go the friend route? And should I realistically expect to be friends with her if she meets someone else in that time?

It was five years in the making. I was doing security for an anime convention, and had just been dumped from a two year relationship and trying to snap myself out of it. I had already made up my mind before the con to try and be social, and just try and make some friends. I'm already terrible at this, and with the dumping (well, cheating on me then dumping) hanging over my head, it wasn't easy. So I talked to strangers when they seemed amicable enough, made idle chatter, comments, and the like. It made my time on-duty easier, and it made sure I didn't have many moments to dwell on recent events. One random encounter involved a gorgeous looking girl who had a quirky hat that I remarked on, and found she had made it herself. We talked for a few minutes, exchanged contact information (IM names), and didn't see each other for rest of the con. We kept in contact here and there after the con. I found out shortly after she was quite a bit younger than me (at the time she was 14, I was 19) and in a relationship, which that's fine by me because I wasn't really looking right that moment. We talk off and on like this for 4 years, sometimes not even talking for months just because of busy lives. Just before she graduates high school, her boyfriend (long-distance relationship) breaks it off. She had already been accepted to a college in his area, and it was at the point of no return so she's pretty distressed. At one point she starts talking to me about it, and I try and do her a favor by sharing with her my go-to movie when I'm having relationship/life problems: High Fidelity. I pick her up and take her back to my house and show her the movie while cooking dinner. We end up talking for several hours after, and talking over the phone even after I take her home. Phone conversations jump in frequency and after about a week of this, after one particular 6 hour conversation she just nonchalantly asks if we should try dating. Hey, why not. We've been dating for going on 5 years now, and we're now engaged! We weren't sure how it was going to work out with her imminent move (from Texas to Illinois), but since we were doing so well up until she moved, I agreed to move with her and we've been living together ever since. Once she finishes graduating this summer, we'll be moving back down to Texas. What's interesting to note is that looking back on the 3 conventions I did security for, she was in pictures for all 3 conventions. In the background or dressing up as characters (she did Terra from Final Fantasy 6 one year), I'd seen her a dozen times before we even actually met.

Made a random comment to a girl, we stayed acquaintances for almost 4 years, then seemingly randomly decided to try dating and are now engaged

Ok! Story time!! When I was in second grade, I won a "free lunch in the park with the teacher and a friend" because during open house my parents were the only ones smart enough to actually participate in the silent auction for that thing.. Anyway, it was me and my friend at the time and we had pizza with our teacher. But before we actually sat down on the grass and ate, we were supposed to get our food and then sit. But because I was little and though I was "smarter than the adults" I only asked for one slice instead of the 2 pieces that everyone else got. When I finished my 1st slice, I got up and went to get the second slice, but before I could grab it, one of the PTA moms said that I couldn't get more than everyone else. I tried explaining to her that I only got one slice and was getting me second, but she was a stubborn women who just told me to sit back down.

Little 2nd grader me only got one slice of pizza instead of 2, and I still have the grudge against the women who wouldn't let me get the rest of my lunch.

You are the parent. It is still your job to reverse stupid decisions for him, with or without his consent. Until he is 18. otherwise, if you decide he should make his own decisions and live/learn through the consequences, then you need to be supportive of whatever decision he makes, while still trying to offer advice and guidance.

Either let him make his own decisions, and SUPPORT him even when he doesn't take your advice...or make his decisions for him until he is 18. Those are your choices. You can't let him make decisions and then not support him.

Keep your head up. I was supposed to run Boston, but mid-January got this strange pain in my lower achilles where it inserts into the calcaneus (heel bone). The thing is, I don't think it was achilles tendonitis because I've had that before and this was a different pain. Regardless, it's now been about 9 week since then and today was the first day I've been able to run. I still don't know what caused the injury or what the injury actually was... But I've been forced to drop out of Boston. I saw an orthopedic surgeon (after about 5 weeks) who specialized in sports medicine and foot/ankle injuries (about 3 weeks ago), at this point, my ankle was feeling fine, but only started to hurt after I ran a mile or so. He didn't see anything wrong... so doing what doctors do, he guessed it was achilles tendonits and attempted to treat it. After assuring me there was no harmful side effects, he gave me a cortisone shot to reduce any inflammation (which wasn't even evident if it was present)... Much to my dismay, I get home and do a little research out of curiosity to find that cortisone shots around the Achilles are VERY controversial because there could be a link to Achilles rupture because the coricosteroids may weaken the tendon.... After further research, i find that this has only been proven for injections into the achilles and not around it (like mine was) though it's still not advised due to possible mistakes. Neverthless, I was still freaked out (and extremely pissed off).... Not only did the shot not help my ankle feel better, it caused it to feel weird/stiff for the next 3 freaking weeks!! .... well, like I said, I was finally able to run today, be it a mere 5 miles. Even though I've biked an average of 30 something miles a day, everyday, to keep my cardiovascular fitness up, my legs are toast. It's going to be a long recovery back to where I was at before..... That first run back felt slow and awkward... but it was GLORIOUS!

Hurt achilles/heel, dropped out of Boston, saw Doctor that made it worse, missed 9 weeks and finally ran again..... NEVER TRUST DOCTORS WITH OUT DOING RESEARCH FIRST!

So one night I was enjoying a nice fireside group whiskey and vodka induced drunken discussion with some friends. One of my friends, who happened to be of the female gender, leans over to me and says, "Hey big bwoi," I assume she meant boy, but at this point the alcohol had totally consumed her ability to form words, "how about you give me a little sucky suck on my big ole' diclit?" ......Naturally, I was taken aback, however, not at the thought of her supposed "diclit," but by my inability to imagine how this miracle of natural anatomy even looks. Needless to say, I should've sucked that diclit.

My friend suffers from diclit, scientificaly known as clitori engorgium , a uniquely provocative feature to be only appreciated by the most open of sexual partners.

This will basically be an angry rant... So the whole year mostly due to anti-social reasons I've barely used the kitchen in the flat I share with seven people. Also, I've barely done the clean-up for it, except for a few times taking out the trash and emptying the refrigerators. I know it's not the best for me to do that, but since I barely use the kitchen it seemed okay. Thing is, now most people have left... and they left the kitchen without doing a spot of cleaning to it. There's one person left, and we've cleaned up a tiny bit 'together', but most of it I've done, cleaning around their ridiculous piles of food left over on the counters, in the fridges, and all their pots, pans, cutlery, etc. I've given them some small tasks (that wouldn't take longer than five minutes to do) just because I don't like being the only one doing the serious cleaning, and I just want someone to fucking do something because I'm busy packing to leave too!!! They have said that those tasks will be done, but later, except they are leaving tomorrow and none of that has been done. They're dead easy tasks and I've been doing most of the hard work but nope. Even worse, all their stupid stuff is all over the place, so I can't even properly clean without thinking that they'll mess it up all over again. No one else is around to help at the moment, later my SO will come for our first anniversary and he said he'll help clean but I don't want to because we're supposed to be having a good time!! And if the kitchen doesn't get properly cleaned, well, we all get slapped with a fine. So it's my job to do this, and the remaining person has made it clear that if they can't do the small tasks I assigned, can I do it because 'it makes sense' since I'll be the last person left. No. That's not fucking fair. If I knew that 'last person has to do all the cleaning' well I would have found some way to move out. It's supposed to be a joint effort; yeah it's shit for them that the other five people barely did anything, but at least help out. You're not the only one that has lots to pack and lots to do. Except I've been actually packing and you've been going out at random when you said you'd be 'free' helping clean the kitchen. So, yeah. I just know that tomorrow they're going to pack away some of their stuff but do nothing else to clean the kitchen and just run away and leave the whole goddamn mess to me.

Everyone else moves out, I do most of the cleaning of the kitchen, second-last person to move out expects me to finish the clean and doesn't help much

I think the problem is two fold: the parts and the purpose. Math simply looks scary, particularly at the intermediate levels. The ironic part is that those complex-looking equations, with all those greek letters and weird squiggly lines, are meant to simplify the process of doing the equation. Yet, many professors and and teachers simply fail to adequately explain what each piece means individually (X is this, epsilon is that, etc). If they did, suddenly many "math-averse" students would suddenly begin to see it click. You just have to label all of the moving parts clearly before you can know what you're doing. We just need to do a much better job of meeting students on their level. The second problem is that math without a goal is just exercise: it's useful for keeping you sharp, but not very interesting or practical. In high school, math is just numbers and squiggly lines that we're suppose to all memorize so that a teacher can get tenure. As you can imagine, not the most motivating circumstances. After leaving high school, you discover this whole new universe of actual purposes for math in research. Suddenly math is not a subject , it's a tool , and a damn good one at that. I left high school as a C student in math with a petulant attitude problem. Now I'm getting my doctorate in quantitative research methodology in a social science field (probably still with a bit of that petulance, but hey, no one is perfect). Anyone can do it, you just need a halfway decent mentor, a goal, and a slight bit of work ethic. Learning math is not a quick process for most people. Having a goal in mind and knowing that math is your ticket to answering questions and puzzles that you are personally passionate about is an absurdly motivating feeling.

We need to be more patient in explaining the parts of equations and we need to demonstrate how math is used beyond the textbook and homework problems.

It's been only 2 months but I'm having an incredibly hard time dealing with the loneliness. My gf (23/f) broke it off with me just before the month July. The 2 weeks leading up to that she wanted to go on a break. And said she still loved me and would be back. In those 2 weeks i found out she likes another guy and ended up sleeping with a 3rd guy. Meanwhile she still claimed to love me and she just needed to "find herself" eventually it became obvious thst she didn't have any intention of getting back together, not that I know of anyways. I loved her a great deal. She was beautiful and caring before this all started. I was getting ready to propose to her this summer, and had agreed to having a kid with her after the summer if we could make things work. I was fully prepared for the commitment and truly wanted to start a family with her. She was the reason for all my effort in the past 3 years. Every change I made was for her. I gave her a home when she had nowhere to go. I moved across town when the new neighbors were harassing her. I did what I could and she still left me for a man who's already cheated on her. I was faithful, i was loyal and never hid anything from her. Now that it's over I feel myself wanting to go back to her.. we haven't spoke other than some formalities about her belongings and one time she even told me that my feelings don't matter to her. She was my first true love and even though my friends all say I can do better and that she is just toxic to me. I still feel myself wanting to mend things due to this overpowering loneliness. I've been doing all the typical things to help cope. Excersice, going out with friends, embracing my hobbies. But in the end it doesn't seem to be helping. I'd like to know if anyone has any good advice to give me. I'm not exactly the best looking guy and the interest in me is basically zero. So Trying to move on with someone else isn't really an option. Any advice is helpful advice..

gf of 3 years left me for something better. I can't cope with the loneliness the usual ways and need advice badly before I slump back into depression.

These last two years have been miserable. We jumped the gun way too quickly and prior to this event, we weren't even sure if we would stay together. He's a really kind person but we're just not the right fit. Anyway, the engagement ring was bought initially for his ex. They were engaged for about 1 year before she broke up with him. I didn't see any point in making him buy a new ring so we re-sized it to fit me when I stupidly accepted his proposal. I had the ring for about a year as well and the only time I take it off is to cook. I've done this numerous times and have never had a problem but recently, it disappeared a day later. I'm not sure if it somehow accidentally got mixed in with the trash and tossed out or if one of the animals got to it and moved it. Either way, it's my fault for being careless. He bought the ring for about 4K and did not have it insured. I feel like a piece of shit. The ring had sentimental values and I had planned on giving it back to him if we were to end the relationship. He bought the ring with the money his brother left him after his brother died in Iraq. I don't know what to do. I don't even have 4K in my bank account because I'm a student. Prior to our engagement, he told me he tried selling it but couldn't get more than 1K for it so he decided to keep it and possibly give it to his sister. since I actually have 1K in my account, I offered that up to him and he got a bit upset, saying that he could've gotten a couple thousand out of it through Ebay. I told him it isn't right that I lost it and that we might not even work out so I should pay him back for it. He told me not to worry about it but he looks so devastated. I don't think we'll end up staying together although I'm going to give couples counseling a try before I make my final decision. Either way, he's a good person and doesn't deserve my stupid ass losing his ring. Is there anything I can do to make this situation better besides stay with him and just buy myself a cubic zirconia?

I'm a fucking idiot in so many ways but the most recent of which is losing an expensive ring. I would like to make it up to him.

I have a friend who is very very overweight and is working on getting in shape. He's a really nice guy and we've been friends for about 4 years so were pretty close and I know he's sensitive about his weight. Like I said, he's been working on his weight and I've been helping him out by being his gym partner and if my girlfriend cooks a healthy meal, I'll invite him over dinner. Well the other day he came back to my place after we left the gym and he sat down on the couch but because he's really big he kind of fell down on it and it broke. He was really embarrassed because he broke it and because he was in front of my roommates (3 other guys) and he left. This was 4 days ago and I haven't spoken to him since then, most likely because he's afraid I might bring it up. And I wouldn't bring it up, but the couch is really really broken and it cant stay like that, especially because I have roommates and since he's my friend, they're looking at me to replace it (as they should) but the couch was pretty new and part of a full set, and I cant really afford to replace it right now. So my question is how can I bring it up to him in a way that doesn't make him feel so bad? I know it's an embarrassing situation regardless, but he still my friend and I don't want to just destroy him.

overweight friend broke my couch when he sat on it and I can't really afford to replace it so I need to ask him for the money to pay for it.

So, a friend of mine that I've known since coming to college last semester has started acting really strange towards me. I don't mean to play the whole he said/she said thing, but the mutual friends that we have had been telling me things that he'd said about me recently, and he sounded extremely interested. I have feelings for him so this was great news to me. We usually go out together with a group of people, we were under the influence if that makes any difference. We came back to our friend's house and slept in the extra bedroom together. We made out for a while and he tried to go farther, I said we shouldn't because I'm uncomfortable with sleeping with people I could potentially see myself dating. He was incredibly understanding and we continued to make out for a while. He was very sweet and rubbed my back and kissed my forehead, it was pretty awesome :) Afterwards we texted for a little the next night, and that was it. Which I'm fine with, I'm not a huge texter nor am I a very clingy person. Whenever I see him now besides fleeting eye contact, he doesn't really acknowledge my existence. This past weekend he told a mutual friend of mine that he couldn't see anything serious coming out of it, but he continues to text me when I know that he's been out drinking. I know he had a girlfriend that broke his heart last semester, and I'm totally fine if he isn't ready for a relationship because of that, I have my own issues and I'm not sure either. But I could definitely see us having a future someday, we have a lot in common and he's a great guy. I'm just trying to figure out his thought process. Should I continue to pursue him or should I just move on?

Guy I have a big crush on will sometimes act like he's interested and sometimes he won't, don't know how to feel about the mixed signals.

I became friends with a guy about two years ago, and last year, he confessed that he was in love with me. He was going to move out of girlfriend's place, and he wanted to start a relationship with me. I was really shaken up by this, because I had feelings for him too, but I could ever tell him that, as it felt like a betrayal to my current SO. I told him that we were better off as friends, because I already knew we wouldn't work out, even if we didn't have partners in the picture (I'm about half sure on this, as I got to know him pretty well and know his various neuroses). Things were pretty rocky between us for awhile, and along the way he had told his gf about how felt about me (which I find odd that she would still want to be with him in spite of that) and we didn't talk for a few months. We started talking again, under the condition that we would keep it friendly, and that he wouldn't cross those boundaries anymore out of respect for our relationships. I still have feelings for him, and as much as I want to talk to him about it, there's really nothing to say. I'm happy in my current relationship, and he's seemingly happy in his. I've noticed that he's been pulling away from me lately (talking less, mainly), and I'm guessing that's probably intentional as a way to move on. But, I'm pretty sad about this, and I miss our interactions. I know that's probably selfish, but I get this sad feeling in the pit of my stomach about it. I'm not really sure what to do. I'm loyal and in love with my SO and we're a good match, but I have strong feelings for my friend. Is this common? When it comes to a guy in a relationship, when they confess love for someone else, is it really love, or is it lust? Are they looking to have an affair, or is a guy like this serious about leaving his gf? These questions are really confusing for me. Lastly, how can I get over how I feel about my friend and move on?

Romantic feelings for a friend who confessed love for me last year even though we're both in relationships, and feeling sad about him pulling away from me - looking to get over it.

As expected there is already a fair amount of advice telling you that you should be worried. I firmly believe that it's not that simple. I have many guy friends that I have previously fooled around with or slept with, some of them for reasonably extended periods of time. I currently am with a guy that I love like crazy, and there is literally nothing that could be done to lure me astray. He trusts me completely, and he's not wrong for doing so because I would never betray him. Ever. My guy friends are friends only. We are mature adults and respect each others relationships and life choices. We have all moved on, and stayed friends. None of them are trying to sleep with me, and likewise I am not trying to sleep with any of them. Their past is not the issue. The only thing that you should be worried about her current behavior, and your own approach. Is she respectful of you and the relationship? Does she take your feelings into consideration? Have you expressed any/all concerns about the situation in a manner which is respectful and not accusatory? Are you aware of the reasons why you feel threatened and taken the time to ensure they are not an emotional knee-jerk reaction to a situation that you are not accustomed to being in? If she's chosen to be with you and had given you no other reason to be suspicious, then I think you are overreacting. It's possible he harbors some feelings, but you are not in a relationship with him and what he does doesn't matter as long as she handles it in a way that respects your relationship.

the whole "guys and girls can't be friends because guys always want to sex them" is horseshit and you should not let the past dictate how you handle this. Let current behavior be your compass on this.

I'd rather know something for sure, then be deluded. That way you can make a decision about it earlier, before things will really make you unhappy. They say ignorance is bliss, but that's really more of a ticking timebomb until you get snapped back into reality.

Would you rather be happily in a relationship for a while, with your significant other cheating on you without your knowledge, or would you rather find out immediately so you can be unhappy, but not being hurt further?

This happened about 5 years ago while on a family vacation in Mexico. We were looking for things to do and my dad says he'll buy my brother and I a snorkeling trip for the next day. We agreed, had dinner, then me and my bro go to the bar at our resort for some drinks. My dad warns us not to get too wasted because the snorkeling trip is booked for 8am. Whatever Dad. We get to the bar, meet some girls, one thing leads to another and I get absolutely hammered off tequila shots. Blackout. Wake up to my dad knocking on the door pissed off saying to get the fuck out on the boat. Here's where the story begins. The rocking boat, scorching sun, and cheap tequila hangover were bad enough; then about two hours in I get the urge to explosively shit my shorts. No bathroom. I didn't want to move, but I decided taking a good ole fashion aqua-deuce is better than shitting on the deck. I grab some goggles, get in the water and swim away from the group of people. I figure I'm a good distance away, dive down a little, pull my shorts down and let loose. This was some next level shit. There's shit floating all around me, and that`s when I realize that fish fucking love shit. Tons of fish start pecking at it, and at this point some of the snorkelers are heading over since there's so many fish. I panic because I'm surrounded by my own feces so I just start wack-a-mole-ing the floating turds, trying to break them up. This causes more fish to come and more snorkelers as well. Before I know it, I'm surrounded by fish and snorkelers... and we are all swimming in my shit. In the end I'm not sure if anyone noticed my shit floating around, but it was still embarrassing as hell.

Got wasted, went snorkeling hung over, explosively shit in the ocean causing fish and snorkelers to swim in it. Edit: I realize all tequila is Mexican, I just meant local no-name tequila, for sure not for export.

Important info, I was having a really bad day. That happens when you are fucking bipolar. My friends and I (5 people total. I was the oldest at 17, while they were 16) had a fun day just walking around LA. We lived about 2 hours away, so we didn't venture there too often. We went to go see a show that another friend of ours was in. When the show was over (around 11 pm) we all exited the theater. Our dumb asses got lost trying to find our way back to the car. We ended up in a sketchy alley. Well, the obvious happened. We got jumped. I was leading the way, so I got punched square in the face first. I remember the pain. I remember the blood pouring from my nose. But I just started laughing. Like a fucking mad man. I have no idea why, but I couldn't stop laughing. I was choking on my own blood, but I kept on laughing. The same guy threw another punch. Just before it hit me, my body shuddered violently. MASSIVE adrenaline rush. Everything slowed down but I quickly lost consciousness. According to my friends, I just lost my shit. I went insane on all 4 of the attackers. I snapped out of my trance. Apparently I was gone for 30 seconds, but now they were all on the ground bleeding profusely. My shirt and pants were soaked. Had a pounding headache. And stood there shaking, coming down from the adrenaline. My friends stood there in just as much shock as me. One of them had been hit as well, but he was fine. We all agreed to get the fuck out of there as they told me the story of what I just did. Before we left, I gave one really hard kick in the spine to the first guy who hit me. I am a Schizophrenic Masochist who doesn't fear death. I have nothing to lose. If you are going to fuck with me or my friends, you better run. Run for your fucking life. EDIT:

I was having a bad day, friends and I were in sketchy alley in LA. Got jumped. Blacked out and lost my shit on them. I beat the crap out of the 4 assailants, by myself, to protect my friends.

Back in the day (and we're talking' way way 2000-years way back) every Jew was a member of one of twelve tribes , Leviim (Levites), and Yisroelim (the rest of us): Cohens are considered descendants of Aaron, brother of Moses, and are the original tribe of priests, in charge of offerings made in the Temple in Jerusalem and other important religious duties -- today all over the world Cohens (who often have that last name, but not always) offer special blessings to the congregation at certain times, though they obviously have no temple duties. Because of their important religious and political role in the Jewish communities, Cohens are traditionally forbidden from marrying converts, divorcees, and mamzers (those born out of wedlock or to those whose parents marriage is not recognized). The other priestly tribe is the Levis/Levites: they can perform all the same functions as Cohens except for high priesthood (not really an issue in the absence of the actual temple), they don't give the special blessings of the Cohen, and they are not subject to the same restrictions on marriage.

Cohens are a priestly class, descended from Aaron brother of Moses, who had specific restrictions on who they can marry because of their important social and political role in the community.

So here's how it is. I am a sophomore in high school and I asked this girl out after a while. We will call her alpha. We dated for 2 weeks. I broke up with her, and she said it was alright to date her best friend (who liked me a lot). We will call her beta. So I started dating beta and we dated for about 5 months. I then broke up with her, I went on a school trip (alpha was there). Before the trip I thought I might ask beta out again (this was weeks after I broke up with her). I then asked alpha out (don't ask me how/why, I don't remember that night) and we started dating. We got back from the trip asked beta if it was all right and she said sure (we were both still friends with her, we wanted her to be alright with it). Beta got a boyfriend and everything was good. Now I think I might like beta more than alpha.

I dated one girl, then dated her best friend, now I am dating the first one again, but I like the second one more. I know that was confusing. Sorry. I can provide more detail if necessary. Edit: Formatting

Little background: We've been seeing each other for about 2 months. Everything is good, but it's still too early for a relationship status. Some days we're very romantic, others we're sexual or, interactions are short and super platonic. Recently I've been under a ton of stress: lost my job, have an awful roommate and I was told I have an incurable auto immune disease (not HIV/AIDS, they think it's lupus). That, with my period has made me incredibly sensitive. Last week things in his life made him a little standoffish, and even though I knew it had nothing to do with me, I had a emotional outburst. The next day I realized my mistake, and in another rush of emotion I sent him a message about how bad I felt and that if he wanted out because of it I would respect that. He told me he appreciated what I said but I needed to chill out, and if I didn't want to chase him away to not give him so much pressure. We've since spoken, mostly small talk and updates on the day, what we've been doing. I'd like to hang out with him this weekend (the last time we hung out was Valentine's Day). I don't know if I should ask. Since I acted needy/emotional I should wait on him to want to see me?

I had a bad week and took a little emotion out on him. I think he recognizes that, and since we've talked a little but now I want to hang out. Assuming he does, do I wait for him to contact me to hang out?

M(27) was dating F(24) for just about 5 months. We never fought and rarely even had any issues at all. It really was good times. Although throughout our time together she was battling demons, and I guess they finally got to her. She told me that she still cared about me and thought of me as the best boyfriend she'd had or will have. She just needs a lot of space right now. So I am hurting a lot, but I care about her and love her so much that I want to see her get through what she is trying to get through.

I love my girlfriend, she needed to be single to have the space and time she needed to get better. Should I stick it out and risk more heartache? Or should I not take the gamble? Do you have any experience in a subject like this?

I'll start off by saying that my wife and I have separated and went through a custody battle for our son which I ended up winning. She had been far from a perfect wife I'll admit, with cheating twice and ruining my credit and finances to the point where we had to move in with my parents and I had to give up a car in my name. She was immature, selfish, and only doing what she wanted to do. I had let her get away with it for the longest time since we have a 1 year old son and I was trying to avoid separation for his sake. It came down to me not being able to handle it anymore and I served her with a citation which kept my son with me until the court hearing. Long story short, I won the custody battle and had temporary orders giving me primary custody. The judge didn't want to go through with a divorce and suggested we try and work it out. (Personally I've never heard of anything like that but it is what it is I guess.) So through counseling, psych-evaluations, parent and co-parent counseling we found that we still wanna work it out between us. We got married for a reason and the counseling really helped her with her issues. Now for the issues. Her father hates me. I found it was his idea to take it to a fight when my wife just wanted to agree to my terms and we could have a civil temporary separation. He stated since it was his money paying for the lawyer that his daughter hired, that he gets the say so on what happens and his daughter just needs to sit and agree. He wasn't too happy when I won in court. My mother hates my wife as well and for good reason, but she constantly stated she would let me handle my marriage. That apparently changed after court. She doesn't agree with my decision or the counselors advice, and has made it nearly impossible for me to get anywhere with trying to repair my marriage. I'm just getting back to working and am in the process of buying a new vehicle and an apartment, but there are times when I am unable to leave to get what I need to get done, done. She also refuses to have my wife stay in her house and her father refuses to let me stay over there. It's also stated in the court order that until the orders are done with that my son is to reside in my current home of residence which is my mothers house. My mother has become obsessively controlling over me and it's beginning to damage a marriage that is being repaired.

Wife and I went through a separation that involved a custody battle with temporary orders. Wife and I are attempting to work it out, my mother and her father are making it increasingly difficult.

I punched out a few windows one 4th of July. Cut my hand open, deep. Anyway, i lose a shitload of blood and bleed out on the street waiting for the ambulance. We make it to the e.r. do the physical portion, height weight, depression level, etc. After wards i get rolled into the operating room, i mention something, and then say something along the lines of ''you only hate me because i'm black'' to one of the other nurses. Guess what color my doctor was and how close he was to us? Black and earshot.

unnumbed stitches to the the thumb. The next day me and my buddy got drunk, i ended up punching him with my stitched hand, that shit didn't heal for what felt like forever.

Well, the Aztecs just sacrificed people right and left, to the point where pretty much every city-state rebelled against them when the Spanish arrived. Many natives practiced human sacrifice in some form. Many of them, especially in places like East Texas and pre-horse Midwest, were also cannibals, with some tribes such as the Tonkawa and Karankawa filing their teeth to points in order to better chew on human flesh (though the reason there may be made up by settlers, they were documented to actually file their teeth down by Spanish, Mexican, Texan, and American settlers, and their camps often left gnawed-on human bones in cookpots, so take that as you will). Many practiced slavery, many more practiced genocide (Looking at YOU, Comanches), and basically just raided each other for food, slaves, and people. They were really no better than the Europeans at the end of the day, the Europeans were just simply better at killing them off than they were. Even still, that didn't deter many tribes like the asshole Comanche from raiding and burning European/Mexican/Anglo settlements just for the hell of it and to plunder them.

the Natives were far from innocent people. They waged war, committed genocide, practiced slavery, and many other things in various forms and degrees throughout the Americas. While some truly were peaceful hunter-gatherers, many, many more were not.

I was hospitalised a few years ago with a severe spinal injury and was put on Fentanyl patches after they discovered I was manipulating the PCA (patient controlled analgesia) meter. After observing how the nurses programmed them and discovered the plastic case was flexible enough to pop the fascia open without the key. I changed the rate from 2mg every 5 minutes, to 5mg every 2 minutes. I thought it was a brilliant strategy, as this could be easily put down to a simple mistake in numbers if discovered. I had gotten away with this for over a week and half before the questions about morphine usage not adding up and the fact that I could hardly keep my eyes open made them suspect something. So onto the Fentanyl patches they put me, Cause I was obviously in way too much pain to be cut off but could no longer be trusted with dosing my self. Now they say that the patches give a controlled dose that is almost impossible to manipulate, I call bullshit. After the third day of the patch it came time to change it out, That's when I took the old one and waited for the nurse to leave...... And licked it. I had to keep slapping myself to stay awake for the next 2 or so hours because I swear I didn't posses the ability to breathe sub-consciously any more.

Messed my spine up, Got addicted to morphine very quickly and 'hacked' the morphine meter. Got put on Fentanyl patches cause they're 'safer' and put myself on the brink of respiratory arrest when I licked one of the patches

I have been with my boyfriend for four years. It's a solid, stable, healthy relationship and he is great. We still feel like we're in the early stages of a relationship, with all the sex, giggling, playfulness to match. Basically, lots of happiness. We're both in graduate school pursuing difficult fields that we love, and we're both rather poverty stricken. Our parents don't financially support us in any way (a lot our friends seem to have parents who do... it seems common for our very expensive city.) So we struggle by the best we can. We don't talk about marriage much except in fantasy terms now and then, and my boyfriend has made it clear the reason he won't propose anytime soon is because he simply doesn't have the money for a ring or to support a stable lifestyle of another human being, or if we were to decide to have a kid. Also we can't afford to get married unless we were to go to a courtroom kind of ceremony, and we both fantasize about at least a decently nice wedding with our friends and family. I am fine with it except occasionally I get paranoid about it... because every now and then, I have female friends who will say things like "No ring after four years? Wow... I wouldn't do it, but... I mean you must be really secure in your relationship to put up with that." Pretty much EVERYONE I know who has been in a relationship for longer than two years seems to get engaged right away. I know half these marriages will end in divorce (just plain fact) but sometimes I start to get nervous that, am I being "stupid" for not wanting him to marry me after such a long time together? Basically, often acquaintances or friends will seem to suggest that he must be stringing me along for having not proposed after this long. I'd be interested to hear if anyone else has been in longterm relationships or just has advice about how to handle comments like this, or if I should be worried at all... [

Longterm boyfriend and I have no plans to get married anytime soon. Friends/acquaintances seem to say we are odd or that he's stringing me along.]

Hey, first of all sry for my bad english, i'm german. I'm a married 28yo guy. My wife has a shitty waitress job and starts working when i come home from work. I don't drink alot of alcohol, but today i felt like doing it after work. I knew there was a bottle of red wine somewhere in the depths of my kitchen cupboard. So i got everything i need for a nice evening with me and myself. I cut some salami and cheese and got me a big wine glass. Then came the first shock - i couldnt find any corkscrew. I called my wife, knewing she had one somewhere. Couldnt reach her at work. meh - but since i am a skillful tinkerer i ofc knew what to do! I remembered a life hack ive seen some while ago and put the bottle into one of my old army boots and hit the boot against the wall... like 20 times, but nothing happened. Next i got me a thin screwdriver - without really knowing how it should help me. I pierced it into the middle of the cork and tried to pull it out... somehow. Ofc it didnt work and i nearly hit myself in the face with the tool. Next idea was a cake fork, since i was sure that two more tenons were somehow useful. It was quite hard to push the fork in, so i used all power i could apply... tilll. PLINK The cork was in the bottle, the wine was everywhere. On my shirt, on the wall, the table, the floor and on the conctract papers of my wifes new work, she has to sign tomorrow, to finally have a better job! I just wrote a nice long email to her new work, in which i told them, that TIFU and it would be nice if they could give her a new copy. I sent waifu a screen of the email - wow, she hates me atm.

I sprinkled my whole appartment and the yet to be signed contract papers of my wifes new work, by attempting to open a bottle of red wine.

Basics: Niece is currently living out of state with her parents (in NH). She is less than 1 year old. Brother is currently unemployed, with a history of drug use and erratic behavior. His girlfriend is the sole provider for the entire family and "doing the very best she can". She's a very nice person and I've seen her smoke weed one, but beyond that she's wonderful. While there are always loving pics on social media sites, but I'm concerned about her being a "bartering chip" to get money. Why am I doing this?: Brother took out a loan on the title of his car for 3K which he nor his gf couldn't pay back. The baby was only a few months old and for the sake of her, my father paid the bill to get the title of the car back. He didn't want them to be with out transportation in the event of something bad happening. Cue a few months later, they needed more money so they asked for the title of the car back so they could take out another loan (to which they had not paid a cent of back to my father). They said they needed more money because they where being evicted, the need of the first 3K has not been discussed. I'm not entirely sure I believe the eviction as it has been said several times in the last few months and in different lights ("we're being kicked out on this day" or "I need money to pay this month"). It's my understanding they may have a structural payment plan with their landlord that they aren't consistently paying. Cue abusive messages from my brother about how the car has been repossessed for not making payments on the loan and they need money asap. "It's for the baby" they keep claiming. I stepped in and said I was concerned for the well being of my niece to which they responded "She's safe and healthy and at no risk." So they're using her as a bartering chip now? Guilt money from her grandfather for a car? With a history of drug abusive coming from my brother, I am concerned about large quantities of money going missing over a short period of time. While I understand my brother is bringing in zero money, there seems to be a missing link here. Questions: Am I being overly concerned about my niece? With eviction and a past history of drug use, are these valid reasons for CPS to get involved?

Niece being used as a bartering chip to guilt my parents for more money. I'm concerned because there has been talk of eviction and they have no where to go. Brother has extensive drug history and gf is sole provider.

Disclaimer: I am new to Reddit and this is my first post. Right now I am working at a high-line car dealership. I've had the job for 6 months and I have never worked in the industry before. My direct managers are the best bosses I have ever worked with (the general manager is basically a jock from an 80's movie, but I don't directly work with him everyday) and I really like my co-workers. However, the hours are brutal, I have had no social life since I've started, and in my best month I only made $2k because it is extremely difficult to build a client base in a store that gets only 4-5 customers a day and we are on commission only. I have decided that I am miserable and I want to quit, but I don't have another job lined up. Yesterday, my boyfriend told me that he will be working in Hawaii for 2 weeks and he wants me to go with him. We live together (5 years) and he has seen how stressed out and unhappy this job has made me and he said that if I lose my job for going on the trip he would be supportive because I've given my all and he just wants me back to my old self. I'm not struggling for money, but I'm grateful to have a job and I have never quit a position without having somewhere else to go. I also feel like my sales managers would be really disappointed because of the time and energy they have put in training and helping me and I'm afraid of giving up a job with such awesome supervisors. On the flip side, I feel like I've begun to hate my life, I have never been to Hawaii before and this is a great opportunity.

My job sucks, but my bosses are great, I could go to Hawaii for 2 weeks, although it will most likely cost me my job- do I go for it?

I have a long history of recurring dreams. But for like 3 days I've been having an updated version of a recurring dream I had as a child. In this dream, I am pregnant. I'm riding something like a moped over a narrow ridge over a river. The scenery is always the same. Bits of pavement, then dirt path, then suddenly the path is covered in water and I fall into the river. I'm desperately trying to hold on to the banks, but the river is so fast and there is a waterfall coming up. I scream and flail, and there are strange creatures wrapping around my legs in the water pulling me from the banks. But I manage to grab on to a really decrepit looking wooden structure, like stairs and pull myself out. I catch my breath and walk up the rest of the ridge into a building, I am now soaking wet and naked. The small doorway is covered in needles and spikes that are cutting into me. The door is blocked by a saw blade down the middle. I see a foot button on the ground, reach past the blade and push it to remove the saw blade. Now that I'm inside I see that the building is rotting. There is a man inside who wants to kill me, I can't see him but I know he's there. I run but the building is a maze of broken things and boards. The man is chasing me now. After much running I wind up in a gift shop at the other end. Then I wake up. I always have a bad day after this dream. Every time.

Weird dream involving pregnancy, being swept away by a river, and a crazy man stalking me through an abandoned horror film-esque house ends inexplicably in gift shop. Day ruined.

I don't have a foreskin, but my friend does, and I can tell you a terrible story! So I'm downstairs at my friends house hanging out with some people, friend is upstairs boning his psuedo girlfriend (or trying to) and they were not using lube. I hear a bit of screaming and dude comes down the stairs naked, blood all around the area of his junk, a look of pure fucking horror on his face, he looks at us (we have about the same look on our faces) and goes back upstairs. Story I got from him later: she was riding him and it was really rough getting in but they just pushed at it and pushed at it until it was going smoothly. After a bit they noticed a bunch of blood, WAY too much blood for a period. Girl is freaking out thinking she's losing her lifes blood out of her hoo-ha, guy is pretty sure it's him, and it was. Went to ER and yeah he ripped the foreskin very, very badly.

Friend is not circumcised, didn't lose lube and ripped his fucking dick. edit/clarification: some people seem to think I'm saying uncircumcised men should use lube, when all I was doing was sharing a story relevant to the posters question. Thanks!

First of all, i don't have any kind of problems with gay people. I'm a 20yo male. In general i'm a funny person, last week me and some friends were talking during lunch and when the subject "Gay marriage, etc." came, some of them pointed out that if they didn't knew me well enough, they would probably tell that i was guy, because of the way i act, and sometimes, dress. I'm straight, and I don't want girls to say "Oh, i thought that you were gay" while I'm hitting on them (never happened to me, saw this on movies)

Some friends told me I look gay and I don't want to be that way, need ideas to look manlier. sorry for my bad English, its not my first language

The other day, my gf had some college friends over to her apartment and it offered me a chance to meet them since she and I met after she graduated. For the purposes of this post I'll call my gf Abby and the relevant conversational partner Betty. Since they were all catching up with each other one of the major topics was love interests, dating scenes, that sort of thing. At one point I stepped out of the main area to get a beer from the kitchen. There's not much of a divider between the kitchen and this area so I could clearly hear the conversation. When I was in there Betty said that she had been using dating sites but that most of the guys she met were too short. The other girls in the room sort of moaned in a statement of commiseration. At this point I could hear Abby whisper to Betty: "I'm so glad that [sundaythrowaway12] isn't short," after which they all laughed. I returned to the room and acted like I hadn't heard anything. The rest of the evening went smoothly. In the days since then I can't get over this statement. I guess in one way it could be interpreted as a compliment but in another it feels like a huge insult; if I had been shorter Abby wouldn't have dated me (for information I am 6'2" and she is about 5'5"). I also have quite a few short friends and I could imagine how it would hurt them to hear this group laughing about their dismissal of short guys. Since that incident I just can't help but think of Abby as shallow and judgemental. Am I overreacting to this? Should I confront Abby, or just suck it up? I do think we have a good relationship but my opinion of her has already started to slip in light of this.

I overheard my gf and friends denigrating short guys and her imply that she wouldn't date me if I were short. Am I right to be skeeved out by this?

Had a debate with my friend this morning. I said that the cost (financial, human lives, and civil liberties given up) far exceeded the benefit of having Osama dead. He didn't agree, and said he wished I woke up racist, instead of an America hater. I told him this has nothing to do with hating America, it's just simply about costs versus benefits. The costs were simply too great. It may have been a victory, but it was a Pyrrhic victory. Another friend, an ultra-conservative who hates everything Obama has done up until this point, agreed with him. He knows that this will hurt his party greatly, and will most likely keep Obama in office for four more years. But for me saying that the cost far outweighed the benefits, I'm a hatemonger.

I'm more horrible than a racist for thinking that the unimaginable amount of money, excessive amount of human life, and the numerous civil liberties we gave up were an appropriate price to pay for the head of one man.

I had a similar problem with my husband but with a different game. You need to sit him down when he isn't playing and explain to him that this is unacceptable. Be calm but be assertive. Don't blame him or yell at him as this will only piss him off and won't do you any good. Express that you have been feeling neglected and that you have certain needs that have to be met in order for you to feel happy in this relationship. Tell him that it is fair that he breaks his promises to you or cancels plans to play a VIDEO GAME! Relationships require BOTH people to be contributing and he is being the lazy partner who makes you do all of the work. Tell him that this is unacceptable and that you can't be in a relationship where you are ignored or put on the backburner. Things need to change. If he cannot accept that and make strides towards becoming your partner again, you may just have to leave (you do not need to stress this to him as he may see it as an ultimatum which some people don't handle too well). You need to look out for you and do what is best for you. Confronting my husband and being assertive but calm, rather than yelling and blaming, seemed to really get through to him and make him understand that what I was saying was true. I guess maybe because it was out of the ordinary. I yelled and blamed when I was angry but have since worked on my "fighting" skills and things go over much better now. Good luck dear.

I had the same problem in my marriage. Be assertive and express your needs calmly. If he refuses to meet your needs, you may need to move on.

I never said I wouldn't do the same for a man, but I have never had a man freak the fuck out on me for extending an offer for help. I have, however been called a pig just for holding a door open or offering to carry bags or lift something. I live in the midwest and open doors for everybody, or hold the door open for the person behind me. What pisses me off and is clearly going to get me downvoted to shit is that just because I help a woman because she is a woman I am being sexist. I was raised with the practice and belief that chivalry is in place to show respect for women. Opening doors, carrying bags, standing up at the dinner table if she excuses herself, etc. So by showing respect and trying to act like a gentleman I am looked at by today's society as a pig? That is rightfully fucked up. I wouldn't have a problem with a simple "Oh, no thank you" but I get a glare or a snide remark in exchange for me offering help with a smile. What would you rather have me do?

People need to stop being so sensitive about shit and maybe extend a thank you when someone offers help. Not all men are rapists you know. Some of us actually want to be nice.

But that's taking things from an inherently rational perspective, which is unfortunately moot when it comes to this issue. The expression of emotion is something that people do on a regular basis to make the emotion feel legitimized. Because many people have a tendency to intrinsically tie their personal identities into what they feel, the legitimization of these emotions also legitimizes and validates their existence. The very act of someone else receiving this intimate communication of emotions makes the person feel valuable and restores their inherent self-worth or confidence that may have been threatened by a destabilization of their own worldview or perhaps simply a differentiation from the status-quo of their life. Stereotypically it tends to be women who are put in the situation of trying to be validated in this fashion. For men, we tend to solve our problems to eliminate the source of the destabilization rather than treat the emotional tremors that these disturbances cause. In short: -Women: "I need to talk about my feelings because I want you to tell me that it's okay to have these feelings and you listening will make me feel important do you, which gives me a greater sense of self-worth." -Men: "I have feelings. I get horny, therefore I have sex. I get hungry, therefore I buy food so I can eat it. I get angry, angry I go get rid of what makes me angry. When I get sad, I watch movies to achieve catharsis and feel better about my life through a combination of Schadenfreude and living vicariously through the protagonists." These are but a binary and a cartoonish example of what I'm talking about. But as you might guess there are blurry lines between the two. Those of the more masculine mentality still have the need to express emotion sometimes for the sole reason of releasing tension or for the same reason women do. It's like when you say, "Am I Right?" at the end of describing something you feel strongly about, and then having the group you're with either look at you like you're crazy or join in with a "HELLS YEAH!" With the former response, you receive no validation and feel like a complete idiot. With the latter, you are THE MAN and you know it, dammit!

Men and women need validation and expression of their feelings, they just do it in very different ways. For women, that validation often comes from being listened to and understood, though this can be true for men too.

I'm a new graduate from an Environmental Engineering program, looking for my first job. Here's a timeline of my situation: March: I see a great job posting at a new startup. I apply and forward the posting to a friend (lets call her A) who might also been interested, never thinking that we'd both get interviews Early April: We both get interviews, yay! Mid April: We both get called back for a 2nd round of interviews. Things start to get tense. Late April: A gets the job ... Now: The job isn't what she expected, and she has decided to quit I was a bit upset when A got the initial offer and I didn't, but I didn't take it personally. We've been friends since high school and still are. The difference between her and I is that she is very charismatic and always dives head first into anything that interests her. Her pattern is to work really hard on something for a few months, and then either get bored of it and stop making an effort, or burn herself out and need extended time off (often resulting in her losing a job or flunking out of a school term). I, on the other hand, am more of a slow-and-steady-wins-the-race type. It comes across less well than her style in interviews. But in the long term I'm someone who you can rely on to be there through thick and thin, and to only make promises that I can follow through on. The job in question is with a brand new startup that makes smartphone controlled hydroponic pods for growing fruit and vegetables. The founders are recent mechanical and computer engineering grads who want someone with a chemistry/biology background to fill out their skill base. The product is still in design, about 6 months away from launch. A has found the work to be too structured (eg. you have to do this task so that we can present it at this specific meeting), which is why she didn't like it. However, based on what she's told me, it seems like the type of work that I would really enjoy and be good at. So, I know that there is a position open, that I want it, and that I was inches away from getting it not so long ago. How do I approach putting my name forward again? Should I wait for the founders to publicly post an opening, or should I try to get in touch before that? If I get in touch without there being a posting, what should I say that's convincing but not too aggressive? Another note is that the founders are in my extended social network, if that makes any difference. Specifically, they are both close friends with my sister's ex-boyfriend. I'd never met them before the first interview, but we know a lot of the same people.

I want a job that I interviewed for 5 months ago and that I know through not-so-professional ways is open again. How do I snag it?

I wasn't sure whether to post this in r/relationships or here because, frankly, I'm not sure where my guy and I stand. Here's the deal: It's been over a month since our first date. He has not asked me to be his girlfriend. I've asked my friends and my sister who are currently in relationships and almost all of them have said they asked for the label (from the guy friends) or they were asked to be the guy's girlfriend. We see each other once a week for a few hours. We have dinner and we watch movies or go to his place and watch TV shows and we enjoy ourselves. I refer to him as "the guy that I'm dating" whenever I talk about him to my friends, but some of them have just started calling him my boyfriend. But as far as I understand, he's not... right? And he introduced me to a friend of his as a "friend". But we hold hands and we've kissed and stuff (no intercourse, though). And I'm going away for vacation tomorrow for a couple of weeks and we saw each other last night. Before I left his car, he said "Be careful." So it's clear that he obviously cares about me. I'm just not sure if we're still in casual dating mode or if this is something serious? I'll be going away for school in August and some part of me thinks that we'll stop seeing each other before I leave (he's done with school), so I figure maybe that's why he hasn't asked me? Do all guys ask a girl (or a guy) to be their boyfriend/girlfriend? I'm just so confused.

Been dating this guy for over a month, not sure if we're officially a couple now because he hasn't asked me to be his girlfriend.