He moved in with me a few weeks ago, and asked me to help him ‘learn’ how to certain things.

I started with cooking, I figured that would be one of the most useful skills to know for him. So every night when I’m cooking he ‘helped’ a bit, with me explaining why and how I do things. That has been the first two weeks or so. This week I told him to try himself without help, I found some easy recipes of foods that he likes, and left him to try things out.

Every single night this week I’ve had to do a big part of the cooking. Because he “doesn’t know how to cut this”, “doesn’t know how to do this”, or “it tastes better when you do it.” I’m tired of it. And that’s just cooking, I’ve been doing almost all the other chores myself too.

So I told him I’m done. That he’ll do his own laundry, cook every other day, and do the dishes on the days he doesn’t cook. That he can ask certain things, but only if he can’t find the answer himself, and I won’t show him / do it for him.

He got upset because ‘relationships are about helping each other’, but I feel like he doesn’t want to learn and just push things off on me. I’ve shown him how to make French toast twice, but he still claims he ‘doesn’t know how to do it’. I even wrote down the recipe! I just want him to put in some effort instead of expecting me to do it all.

I’ve talked this over with my mom, and she said I should be grateful he’s even asking to learn. My boyfriend thinks I don’t want to help him with anything. I think he’s a grown man and shouldn’t need his hand held the entire way, especially with simpler stuff.

Today is my birthday. I’m spending it alone :’)

Happy birthday to me… I’m spending it alone. I’m [F] turning 18.

My Family is only coming for the birthday food. NOT because of me. No one’s bought me any gifts, I don’t really care anyway.

I don’t have any friends coming over. Everyone at my school is a piece of s-, and my then-childhood now-neighbourhood friends don’t care about me anymore.

Since I have no one to spend my birthday with, I figured I would spend it alone. I have some money so I’m gonna go to town, and buy myself gifts.

I’ll also stop by a restaurant for a lunch I desired – my parents were too lazy to make me lunch. I’ve been starving since waking up…

I’m still sad about the fact I’m spending it alone. I wish I had someone in my life. A true friend. A true family member. But it doesn’t matter.

Netizens’ comments

Hey, I hope you have a great birthday. They’re not always special, and sometimes we gotta spend them alone (due to lack of friends I’ve had to do the same the past few years!) but keep your head up, eat some GOOD grub, and have fun doing your own thing! And buying stuff!!! Go hard!

I am going through a miscarriage and my boyfriend told me to stop being so dramatic.

He says its not like I am new to this as its my second miscarriage. I thought he would be more supportive especially after he saw how bad it was last time.

He refuses to help me with anything and still expected me to help with his daughter as well as getting his things ready for work.

I could not sleep properly because of the pain so he made me go sleep on the couch as he needed his rest.

I understand his job is physically demanding but it’s not like I am doing it on purpose. I can’t seem to do anything right in his eyes and it hurts.

Netizens’ comments

• I’m so sorry for what you’re going through.

• Please don’t have a child with this man. Who wants to be with someone who doesn’t give a shit about you?

• I had two miscarriages over 10 years ago and my heart is still broken. It is not something you just “get over”. He is treating you like garbage during an extremely difficult time, he obviously doesn’t care about you. Why should you care about him? Is there anyone you can go be with like a family member or a friend? You need support right now and to focus on getting through this, not taking care of his selfish butt.

• First, I’m sorry about what is happening. I can’t imagine the physical and emotional pain your in.

Second, you are with him because? Don’t say “I love him.” Love isn’t a reason to be with someone. You have listed 6 reasons to not be with him and zero reason you should, so why are you with him?

Today marks the 4th month since i broke up with my toxic ex and i am still dealing with the aftermath of the emotional damage he left me with. He tore down my self-esteem and i felt so ugly about myself. The best thing that happened post breakup was that i finally plucked up the courage to attend therapy sessions.

As a girl who has been dealing with pcos for years, i have never been fit nor toned no matter how much effort i put into working out during my off days. My ex is very into fit girls and he follows a ton of fitness influencers/local girls on his instagram and likes + saves their pictures. I have communicated to him that i do not feel comfortable about it but eventually when nothing was done on his part, i tried my best to not feel bothered by it.

A year into the relationship, covid hit and i got really busy at work (i am in the healthcare industry). I had even lesser time to workout and i put on a few kgs.

That was when my ex started comparing me with certain local fitness influencers, saying that if i put in more effort into exercising i can look hot like them and become more attractive to him. He even requested me to dress like them.

Of course i felt really hurt by those comments because he should have been aware of my medical condition and my commitment at my workplace.

Furthermore those influencers do not have a fixed work schedule which gives them more freedom and some of them are even fitness instructors which means they are working out while at work!

My self-esteem started spiralling down and this continued on for more than a year. On hindsight i really should have left this loser earlier.

The last straw came when i found out through a friend that he signed up at the gym his favourite influencer was working out at.

The thing is, it was not even near his place and i would not have known if my friend did not tell me when she happened to see him there. I confronted him and he said that he does not see any issue with that because he did not cheat.

By intentionally approaching someone you are attracted to, is that not emotional cheating already? So i asked him whether he would be happy if i became like those girls, dressing skimpily and uploading photos and videos in provocative angles and poses to attract likes, would he be ok with his gf behaving like that online? Why does he worship all these girls solely for their appearances, to the extent of bringing his own girlfriend down? What if they had yucky personalities?

He just kept quiet. It was too much for me to handle at that point of time and we broke things off. He started insulting me and told our mutual friends that i was just being a salty and insecure b1tch. I lost some friends because of that.

So guys, if you want to simp over influencers online, kindly do the entire female population a favour and do not get into a relationship. Never claim to love your girlfriend when all you do is attack her confidence by comparing her with others and making her feel inadequate about herself. The damage is really hard to get over and i wish that no girl would experience what i have been through…

P.S my ex is not a buff guy himself

I work at the cash register at a busy ice cream shop. A lot of people lose their stuff and my responsibility is to take it and give it to my team manager to turn it into the Lost and Found.

However, I suspected one of the team leads was stealing the stuff. The first time, someone left behind expensive sunglasses and I saw her wearing them in an Instagram post. I gave her the benefit of the doubt and gave her a wallet someone left behind. The person came back asking me and I told them not to worry and to go to the lost and found.

They came back and told me they had her wallet but all their money was missing. At this point, I knew my team manager was stealing and whenever someone left something behind and that team manager was working, I would get a colleague to cover and I would find them and return it myself. My team manager confronted me and I told her that I just wanted people to get their stuff back and she looked annoyed.

Later I got called up by a higher-up who said that I was in pretty big trouble because my team manager accused me of leaving my shop multiple times and disobeying her orders.

I told him my side of the story and he told me he would look into it and she got fired and I think it became a police case against her 2 weeks later. She’s calling me AH for making her lose her job, when she has 2 kids and is a single mother.

I knew about her situation beforehand which is why I didnt say anything beforehand. So was i wrong to tell the truth?

Here are what netizens think:

• If she didn’t want to lose her job, she shouldn’t have stolen. simple as that

• She is a single mother with 2 kids and should therefore know better. She’s a grown adult with kids and if she really needed to keep her job she should have never stolen anything. Don’t feel bad people like her don’t feel remorse for what they do and will most likely do it again. She’s blaming you for her actions. 

A man shared how his wife doesn’t want to get intimate with her and he is going to ask for an open marriage so he can be fulfilled.

Here is the story

My wife has little to no interest in getting intimate with me. I’m going to suggest an open marriage tonight because I want intimacy and I’ve been unfulfilled for over a year.

I’m just fed up at this point. I’ve tried to be understanding and kind with what she’s going through but the fact is our intimate life sucks.

We barely sleep together and when we do it’s just her going through the motions like it’s a chore. She clearly doesn’t want to do it with me anymore so fine.

I should be allowed to pursue it elsewhere then. She can sleep with anyone she wants too as well obviously because she certainly isn’t interested in doing it with me.

We’ve talked the issue to death at this point and like I said I have tried to be understanding but honestly I just can’t do this anymore.

I don’t even really want to sleep with other women. I want my wife who enjoys getting intimate with me back. I want this to be a wake-up call and maybe make her jealous or better yet get a real answer as to what’s actually bothering her.

As I grow older, I’ve noticed how people can turn their backs suddenly and simply leave without any explanation or actual conflict.

I haven’t even hit the big 2 yet and my social circle is getting smaller… I no longer know who’s true and who’s not. Everyone seems temporary. But when I open my Instagram, everyone else’s social circle is still booming.

And before anyone advises me to join activities and make friends, trust me, I’ve been doing that. But it’s undeniably hard to meet decent human beings.

Is this normal. how does one deal with the loss of relationships they truly care about?

Netizens’ comments

• Don’t believe what you see on Instagram. What you see might not be what it actually is

• The simple answer is that this is normal and relationships will form and dissolve over time.

Even your best friends will come and go due to various reasons (no time to spend with you or have different priorities in life).

It hurts but you need to get used to it. Over time you will learn who are the people that stay with you when you get into problems and ask for help.

Also cherish the relationship while they last and let go of the relationship when it’s appropriate to end.