​
​
Questionnaire is by https://www.reddit.com/useBrouHaus/
1.How do you respond when a new acquaintance says, "tell me about yourself.
I’d probably brush the question off and flip it back some way or the other.

1. Now, tell me about your internal experience of yourself. What makes you, you?

As soon as I read this question, I dreaded the answer. The truth is, I don’t know who I authentically am. I am what others need me to be, the only thing I’d say was somewhat personal/what I pride myself in is being semi-intelligent. That’s it, outside of that I don’t know who I am or what defines me as me

1. You just had a really good day. Describe it. It can be a real recent example or an aspirational one.

An ideal day would be one full of enjoyable activates, where I wouldn’t get the chance to “get in my head” and focus on all the negative things and problems I’m dealing with. Ideally, I wouldn’t have any “off” time, because as soon as I take breaks, I tend to get bored

1. If someone is upset with you, what is the typical reason for it? Give a recent example.

The typical reason would either be me being impatient or getting snappy, although immediately trying to apologize for my irritation. It could also be for taking thing too personally, being to debitive or just in general being too over the top and not taking a step back to think and reflect on how my actions could affect me + others.

1. How well do you handle stress? What are your coping mechanisms? Give an example of a recent stressful situation and how you handled it.

Really depends on what defines “handling well”. I often shut down my feelings and suppress whatever the hell is going on inside of me as I focus on finishing the job as effectively as possible. This sometimes doesn’t succeed, but most of the time it does. However after the task/job/assignment is done I often break down because of me being completely overstimulated and often needs to retreat back and into my own space

1. What pushes your buttons? What makes you angry? How does your anger manifest? Can you be openly angry with others?

I have no problems telling people what I really think, and I also have no problem telling people what I think is wrong with a situation. However, I do believe in looking at things as objectively and non-biased as possible. What really presses my buttons, however, is when people try to withhold/lie/manipulate me and take me for being more stupid than I am. I absolutely DEPISE when people think I’m not capable of handling bad or hard news/information etc.
I don’t take betrayal or feeling under prioritized and unimportant too well either. I have no problem cutting people off who’ve wronged me.
In general, I do tend to have a short fuse so things like people walking and talking slowly, goofing off, doing things too slowly and not efficiently also tends to push my buttons. I often get impatient, passive aggressive and pushy to finish uncomfortable things, but I do think it takes quite a bit to really anger me.

1. What’s your deepest fear? Why is that your fear?

Failure, being the worst, no one ever liking me, never accomplishing anything, not being satisfied or valued or being seen as incompetent and stupid.

1. What types of memories cause you the most shame? What feelings cause you the most shame? What is it about them that causes you shame?

Talking about past times i either didn’t accomplish something I should’ve, or talking about a time I was different and therefore being ashamed of the lack of things I’ve done since then

1. What is your relationship with pleasure? What gives you pleasure? Can you have pleasure when you want it, or do you have to earn it?

I rarely feel pleasure, because as soon as I’ve done something I’ve been seeking to do, I’m always looking towards the next thing. However, I have no problems in taking breaks/procrastinating etc. before all my tasks are done

1. What’s your relationship with authority? Think both abstractly and with specific authorities in your life, possibly your parents, boss, religious leader, doctor, or government figures? Are you an authority?

I hate that i seek te respect of authorities, almost no matter the situation. Despite hating everything they stand for, some part of me will always want to try to impress and seek validation from authorities/authority figures. Its either completely comply, or completely rebel for me. I do hate when authority figures try to impose themselves on me and what I think. If their reasoning isn’t logical, I won’t comply.

1. When your mind wanders, what are you thinking about?

Its normally going 1000 miles an hour, or completely empty so its very hard to identify my thoughts. However, my mind tends to go to quite dark places, which makes me want to be anywhere else/externally communicate with others to distract myself from my head

1. You have a big decision to make. Describe how you decide what to do.

I normally am pretty torn, and have a hard time committing to a singular path

1. What’s your biggest flaw?

Overestimating my need for help, and how hard it is for me to seek help from others

1. What makes you special? (Or, if you don't feel special, what at least makes you different from other people?)

I’d say my ability to convince others via my speaking. I’m good at debating and convincing others.

1. How much of your mental energy is spent on thinking about each of the past, the present, and the future?

Rather not focus on the past, i hate being in the moment, so my head and thoughts are very much furture focused

1. You unexpectedly find yourself with a whole weekend with no obligations, and everyone else is busy. How do you feel about it? What do you do?

Pretty ambivalent, as i’d get bored extremely quickly and have a hard time being alone for a whole day with no activities planned. I’d probably take a lot of walks and catch up on work/series I’ve been dying to watch

1. What’s your personal vibe/style/aesthetic? How cultivated vs natural is it, and how much time do you spend on it? Do you turn it on and off?

I have no specific vibe/style, and what I do have comes from society lol

1. Which of the following is the most like you? Explain. A) I know what I want, I go out and make it happen, and people won't stop me. B) I am content to be on my own and not draw too much attention to myself. C) I have to be responsible and dedicated, and I put others’ needs first.

A + B, as it depends on the situation

1. Which of the following is most like you? Explain. A) I dislike stress and negative vibes, and I may try to distract myself from my problems. B) I have strong feelings, get worked up easily, and am not afraid to show it. C) I don’t like to let my feelings show; they get in the way of being efficient and logical.

B + A

1. Which of the following is most like you? Explain. A) I look to others for feedback and guidance and am willing to be flexible when needed. B) I am always aware of how things could be better, and I’m disappointed that they are not. C) Deep down, I am afraid people won’t give me what I need unless I make it worth their while.

C + A

My [34F] partner [28M] and I got married last summer. In retrospect, I should have considered at much greater lengths if I could handle our differences, asked more questions about his anxieties, and I think he should have been more forthcoming about some habits and anxieties as well.
My partner has a lot of anxieties and insecurities related to body image, sex, change, instability, responsibilities, etc. Some of them seem less unusual, others are very personal and deep rooted (with some related to past traumas).
My partner loves me so much but has a lot of trouble working on his anxieties. He is going to therapy, not always consistently but more so lately, and has plans to see a psychiatrist and explore whether medication might be worth a try.
I have my own anxieties, mostly related to health (although this is mostly under control) and my living situation, quality of life. I also go to therapy, but not very consistently, as my anxieties haven’t posed much of an issue in a long time.
I care about my partner a lot but do not feel equipped to deal with some of our differences. He lacks consistent routine hygiene (showering - previously as little as less than once a week, brushing his teeth - previously as little as once or twice a month, although these have been improving with my consistent advice and reframing that it’s good for his health).
We often barely have sex. Sometimes as little as once every 3 or 4 months. He has a lot of anxiety around this due to past traumas he says, but he also had multiple sexual partners he saw occasionally during the same period of time for months before we met, so I’m somewhat confused by this. His poor hygiene also makes sex feel pretty gross to me. His breath, his genitals, and his feet all often have odors that leave me feeling quite repulsed.
Our standards on cleanliness around our living space and our overall style is quite different. He loves having a lot of things he likes around him (posters and other decor taking up entire walls with very little space between any of them), string lights in just about every room, all of these being stapled into the walls, his work area in disarray, drinking right out of bottles or the juice out of condiment jars, stapling rugs into the carpeted flooring, the list can go on and on.
For perspective, I like a fairly minimal and thoughtfully curated environment for myself. I am not obsessively tidy, but I like to stay on top of things and rarely leave much of a mess around. I get overwhelmed very easily when my home is cluttered and disorganized and has messes that feel out of hand.
I knew we were different but I feel like I was a bit blinded by romance and not nearly as diligent with myself as I should have been in really understanding our differences and what I could handle. For his part, he goes between telling me things like he is working on it and wants to be more like how I am in some ways and saying this is just how he is.
I felt like I was happier before we were together, sadly. I feel like he’s a very loving person who cares deeply for those close to him but that we just don’t align in some key ways and I’m struggling to see if we ever will. He has made improvements, but the progress feels slow for my standards (I recognize it probably isn’t slow by his own standards), and I worry that the only way he’ll consistently make these improvements is when I tell him about them and why I feel they are healthier for him. I don’t want to be with someone who is changing, even if for the positive, because of me. I think people should change because they want to for themselves. I don’t feel like that’s the case for him unfortunately.
He does do a lot of good for me. He is affectionate and gives me small gifts by surprise and cooks meals for us regularly. He’s not great at handling his work or his finances or not constantly owing me money because of this. He’s not very motivated, and I’m sure it has something to do with anxiety or depression or both. He’s constantly worried about his body image, has a past of eating disorders and still seems to struggle with some disordered eating habits. He’s overweight but struggles to stick to healthy habits to improve this despite talking about it for sometimes hours a day to nearly everyone he comes in contact with.
I could keep going. There is a lot I haven’t mentioned, but I’ll leave it at this. I just feel at my wits end but nervous to leave. I know he’s a great person in many ways but I worry what my future will look like 5, 10, 20 years down the road if I stay.
How do I determine what’s best for me? I see his many strengths but his shortcomings are giving me a lot of anxiety.
TLDR; My [34F] spouse [28M] has deep-rooted anxieties and habits that have led to poor hygiene, difficulty with sex, poor lifestyle choices, etc. I don’t know how much more I can take.

Looking for an omegaverse or sweetverse smutty book with no mpreg/parenting and preferably fated pair. Eh on angst but can handle it if it's there, no for rape. Do you have this on your shelves or does it ring a bell? Does this even exist at all? All the recommendations I am reading thru are either fluff, heavy angst, gang or hetero. If you got something that fits this, Im all ears. Open to fanfic recs as well!

so this card has an advertised boost clock of 2491mhz, but as i enter radeon the max frequency is acutally 2724 by default. why is that? are these 2 different frequencies?
by default radeon adrenalin settings the system crashes/shutdown instantly after starting unengine superposition at 1080p extreme. in games it crashes as well, as it shutdown after a few minutes or even seconds. i've tried loading default bios settings and same thing
i have to go to manual tuning - custom, advanced control enabled and set the clock from 2724 which is the default setting (in adrenalin performance gpu manual tunning) to 2450mhz and from 1150mv to 1080mv, so that the system doesn't shut down imediately. so i run unengine superposition and it runs untill the end scores around 4300 points which is somehow below average but judging by the frequncy underclock it is still fine, temps looks normal, games doesn't crash anymore.
is the psu at fault here? setting the max clock speed to 2491 from adrenalin manual tuning(which is the default specs of the card) causes shutdowns again, so it can't runt at that clock
this card has 120/123 average/max power consumption with 249w 20ms spikes as reviewd by techpowerup yet this 450w psu should handle it yet it shutdowns
i know it's an old PSU but still this is not a high wattage card. the psu has the needed 6+2 connecter
other parts are a 5600g a ssd and ram, cpu cooler and no other devices that uses power from the psu so the total system power consumption should be under 250w under load

Greetings. I’m Manny. When I’m not in front of a tv screen playing video games, my nose is probably in a book. I’m a huge language geek, as well as a foodie. I love trying different cuisines. I studied religion in my undergrad, so it’s something I enjoy discussing and learning more about. I’m currently trying my hand at learning Japanese. I’m very loyal, caring, nerdy, a big fan of cuddles, family-oriented, and always up for new experiences. I’m definitely interested in getting to know a guy and settling down eventually. I’m autistic, and don’t do well with huge groups or people or loud noises. I can become non-verbal at times if i’m feeling overwhelmed, so if that’s not something you think you can handle on occasion, I totally understand. So, if you’ve made it to the end and still would like to get to know me, let’s get a coffee, or whatever your beverage of choice may be and chat. I’m open to long distance, voice chat, and virtual dates. Pictures of my dog available upon request. And if you wanna see pics of what I look like, too. I look forward to hearing from you.

This is a long one! I had the worst day ever at work last week and I would love advice on how to handle an ultra defiant 4yo when she gets into that headspace. I’ve been with my NF for 3 years and nk has always been a lot to handle. I am normally a super patient and understanding person with firm boundaries but the other grownups at home are not always this way. They respect my ways but I feel like I’ve had to do a lot of the heavy lifting when it comes to holding boundaries with her.
So, me, nk4 and nk19mo go to the park Saturday morning and have a great time. No major meltdowns. We get to the parking lot and nk4 is walking way ahead, so I tell her to wait for me so we can be safe around the cars. This triggers her shutdown. I’m guessing in her brain I’m doubting her ability to be safe so she got angry? She runs away from the cars back from where we came, and hides from me, refuses to come. When I tried to explain that cars can’t see her since she’s short she plugs her ears. Approaching her made her run away farther. She looks at me as if she’s trying to get a reaction out of me. The only way I get her to come to the car is by waving goodbye and walking away (I hate doing this but there was literally no other way).
Thankfully she is self aware enough that she doesn’t act unsafe in the parking lot and stays by the car. I get her sister buckled in and move in to get nk4 in the car. As I’m trying to get her inside, a car goes by she said look, that car is going to hit you (as if she wanted it to hit me). This whole time she says things like, ‘I don’t love you’ (that’s a common one for her lately), and other mean things. I can feel my patience wearing thin at this point but we carry on.
Eventually she gets in the car (it’s been at least 20 mins of defying at this point) but refuses to sit properly in her car seat. She finally does and I buckle her in but then sticks her arm out of the strap. I try and try to get her to keep her arm in, I tell her the car won’t move until she’s seated safely, this whole time I’m emphasizing that I love and care for her. But she won’t let it in. Finally I lose it and say FINE, I DONT CARE, LETS JUST LEAVE. I hate that I willingly started to drive while she was not entirely in her seat safely but I had zero patience left and that’s never happened to me on this job. I had no more to give.
She told me I was mean (she put her arm back in the seatbelt) and then started berating me. I yelled again IM DONE TALKING TO YOU. I was LIVID. She kept going and said things like ‘I love only my family and you’re the only one I don’t love.’ I ignored her and put on music to semi drown her out but I could hear her going on and on the whole way home. Insidious insults. I know not to take those personally, but I could not calm myself down while she was going off on me. I knew I couldn’t talk without yelling again which I did not want to do so I stayed quiet. This whole time I’m feeling so bad for nk19mo that has to just keep quiet and small since her older sister takes up so much space in these moments.
We get home for lunch and I am done. No emotional energy left. I cried in front of her mom telling her what happened, about how it takes so much for me to get to that point of yelling at her and how I hated doing that. She assured me it was okay, it happens. And agrees that nk’s behavior has been a real issue. The day goes on, both parents know we had a very rough morning, they try to help but just make things harder by getting in the way. It’s my responsibility to do nk4’s hair before I leave and I try to for hours but either np’s say something to get us off track, or nk runs off to them and nps don’t redirect her back to me. I go lay down for a bit, i was also on my period so im very frustrated and crying to myself a lot at this point.
Finally an hour before I leave I get the chance to do her hair but I pull it a bit on accident (not unusual, anyone who does kids hair knows) she screams and runs to her parents. I think they have the mindset that they can take her off my hands since we’d been having a hard time. Well MB walks in and sees me crying and I break down to her. I tell her I’ve been trying for so long to do her hair and it’s not working out, I can’t handle her being defiant right now, etc etc. I was sobbing. She asks if I want to go home early and I accept. It felt so awful to grab my things and leave before I was supposed to, because I couldn’t handle it. I don’t blame myself, i definitely hit my breaking point that day, but it felt like shit.
The parents think something might be going on at preschool because there’s been a case of bullying recently. Something has definitely changed with nk, either developmental or external, but she has never been this extreme. It’s her mission to make our lives hell when she gets like this. I try to keep it light and give her an ‘out’ so I don’t trigger her behavior further. The most random things will trigger it, the night before I asked her to go pee before dinner and something similar happened. She ended up peeing her pants. I feel like when I try and talk to her about hard things I don’t say them in the way she wants to hear them. So if anyone has advice on what to say and do in these situations, and also how to keep myself calm, how to model emotional regulation, I welcome it! Thank you!

For context, my son had a dance recital this weekend, as well as his 9th birthday party. So this weekend was jam packed.
So part of the things we were looking forward to this weekend was grandma coming into town (my mom). However, grandma has traditionally always had an issue with keeping promises. For me, this manifested itself during my childhood when she would promise that she would leave our abusive step dad but didn’t, for 20 years. This lead to my sister and I to grow up heavily abused by my stepdad, both physically and sexually.
As a result, I am extremely apathetic as a person and very little can actually phase me. From a parenting perspective, this trait was always a net positive, because when ever an emergency would happen, I was always calm and collected and very rarely got stressed and was able to handle these issues effortlessly while my wife was the one who would panic.
However, what happened this weekend was different and I was not prepared for. Grandma flaked again, as I expected she would, but what I didn’t expect was just how much it would affect my son. He broke down crying, saying that he practiced his dance routine for months and she didn’t even make it to his recital, or his birthday party. She also promised to make it for Christmas and cancelled at the last minute. I told him that sometimes certain people just aren’t as reliable as others, but that did very little to actually console him.
Later that day, we had a conversation about what kind of activities the kids wanted to do this summer and my son said “I want to see grandma because whenever she says she’ll come see us she doesn’t, so can we just go to her? Mind you, grandma is a ten hour drive away and funds are a bit tight when it comes to buying plane tickets.
I’m mad at my mom for hurting me again, but I’ve learned to take it. But I am extremely angry that now she’s emotionally impacting my kids in a way that I have specifically protected them from. I always tell my kids that I will never make a promise I can’t keep, in an effort to break the cycle that I dealt with with my mom and step dad.
Sorry for the rambling but I’m just lost at how to properly deal with this situation.

The Meeting With the Contact
In one of Unity’s darker and less maintained districts, several miles down an unassuming maintenance tunnel, Aster knocked on a rusty steel hatch. The moment her knuckles finished rapping on the metal door hidden mechanisms squeaked as an internal bolt was undone and the door swung open. She heard the soft ween of servos as they struggled against the bulk of the door.
Without a moment of hesitation Astarte strode through the door knowing full well that the dark corners of the room could have held a waiting ambush. It did not do to show any fear when dealing with the mysterious shadow league. She had heard from Greyson how the contacts valued confidence above everything else. She wasn’t sure why, but had followed the advice anyway.
The contacts never worked through proxies. They had no known dead drops. And were notorious for handling everything in person.
It was a strange practice since logic dictated that information brokers as influential as the Shadow league should act with much more caution. But that same flaunting disregard for common convention was the trait that unnerved Astarte the most.
It unnerved her because it proved that the powerful brokers had nothing to fear.
Maybe it was arrogance, but her instincts said otherwise.
The door closed behind her, the harsh clunk telling her that she was now locked in. Soft lights in the room flicked of a slowly grew brighter to a level comfortable to human eyes. Aster’s cybernetic eye went red and flickered through several different spectrums of light as it scanned the room.
“An interesting piece of hardware.” A soft murmuring voice said from behind the desk in the center.
Astarte momentarily ignored the voice as she finished her scan. Her eye picked out only a single camera behind a fake patch of wall that looked completely normal from the outside. She focused on the camera, telling the rooms only other occupant that she was fully aware of the device.
Her scan complete she turned her head to focus of the short fuchsia froglike person within a bubble-like excursion suit. No word in the Union’s common tongue, or her own could pronounce the name of the person before her. Instead the Union had simply labeled them as Toxoid amphibians. A rather cold, but concise name.
There were many defense mechanisms used by prey species to ward off predators. Some opted to be big, strong, and move in large herds like the Trikes. Some just flew away. Others hid. But very few instead went for the survival strategy of being very visible and toxic as hell.
The creature before Astarte was one of only three Toxoid species in the Union. While safe to members of their own species, their skin could instantly paralyzed and kill any non-deathworld species on Femeri. And if Astarte had touched that bright purple skin she would be instantly floored with the worst pain imaginable. Not dead, but really wishing she was.
The Union definition of Toxoid was any highly toxic species, regardless of the atmospheric conditions. Though this particular species did in fact come from a world with high methane and ammonia content, less then Venus, but still deadly to Terrans. The only reason they weren’t classified as deathworlders was because the low gravity and gentle nature of their star made the claim seem a little absurd compared to your average Deathworlder.
The Toxoid met her gaze and held it without fear. Knowing that Astarte wouldn’t/couldn’t do anything to harm them. There face was pulled into a constant smile. Though this was a factor of their facial structure and not any sort of actual pleasure. This, matched with their small colorful appearance gave off the vibes of something small and harmless. An instinct she would have to actively suppress.
“Surprising, most of your kind are overwhelmed with nurturing instincts upon first seeing me. Especially females of your age.” The creature commented. The internal translator of her suit taking the creature’s hypersonic humming and giving it a squeaky, almost cartoonish, tone in galactic common.
“I’ve encountered your kind before, and the pain I felt that day from just one touch is enough to wipe away any cute impressions.”
The creature made a sounding like birds chirping “So its true, humans really can touch us without dying?”
Astarte grimaced at the memory “Yeah, but I sure wished I was dead. Only touched them with my hand, but in seconds my whole body was wracked with the worst pain my nerves could conjure. Couldn’t black out either.”
The Contact looked amused “And yet you survived.” They said pointedly. “We are in our own ways more dangerous than deathworlders. Even the Kruhur leave our few ships alone. As do most pirates. So why would you attack that particular merchant ship six of your Terran years ago?”
Aster wasn’t surprised by their knowledge, the sources of the shadow league stretched far and wide. “They had something I wanted, so I took it.”
The big eyelids of the Toxoid closed slowly. “Yes, weapons grade plutonium. I heard you made good use of it. Such inventive weapons too. Most think fusion weapons are pointless in space compared to pulse cannons and conventional missiles. Leave it to a human to find a way to make good use of an underutilized weapon.”
Astarte kept her face placid, but on the inside she was roiling at the knowledge that the Shadow League knew about the shield breaker cannon.
“You needn’t worry” the Contact continued “the Union doesn’t know, and even if we stole the plans we would be troubled to find crews with the nerve to detonate a super critical mass of plutonium within their own ship. My kind are quite cowardly compared to your people.”
“Fools rush in where angles fear to tread.” Astarte remarked absently. Downplaying their achievements.
The Toxoid leaned forward “and yet those who dare to fail miserably can achieve greatly.”
This time Astarte couldn’t hide her surprise. “Kennedy? Really?”
More bird chirps “Yes, I am quite amused by human history and the words of your past leaders. Your people strove for the stars long before they had the proper technology to reach them like every other species, on a high gravity world no less. And despite these hurdles you made it to your moon in record time, had stable colonies on a barren world like Mars, and launched one of the most interesting if a bit crude ships. A ship you recently purchased. Had you not met the Union so soon then I believe your people would have continued to shock the galaxy. In some ways your people were cut short, and yet in other ways they were given the opportunity to leap into the future. You are most intriguing, and it would be folly to not keep an eye on you. The Union believes your people to be on the decline, soon to be no longer a threat to their might. I am of a different opinion.”
It was surprising to meet a person who had her completely figured out. From just the subtext Astarte was sure this contact knew all her plans and secrets, or had at least a few very good guesses. And seemed to want to help her out.
Astarte gave the Contact a shrewd glare. “What are you playing at?”
Their heavy eyelids dropped into a lazy half blink before opening back up. She thought the gesture was either one of annoyance or amusement. “A favor, given to the right person, can pay dividends in the future.”
“And what kind of returns are you looking for?”
Another half blink. It probably meant amusement. “That isn’t for me to say. You’ve had a very positive relationship with our agents in Femeri, or Orion as you Terrans call it. it is the League desire to continue nourishing that relationship.”
Suspicious, but one didn’t deal with the galaxy’s most powerful info brokers without some ominous undertones. “Then I take it you know why I’m here.”
Another long blink, this time fully closing their lids. “Yes.”
“Can you tell us where it is?”
“No. Amaterasu was thorough in covering their trail. I can only say that its still on Unity.”
Fuck. Why can’t things ever be easy? “Can you narrow down our search?” Astarte asked changing directions.
“Yes. Property info, delivery schedules, informant reports. And much more. It’ll take time to narrow things down.”
“I’m not short on manpower. Or patience.”
“Good. Now there is just the matter of the price.”
“I get the sinking feeling that you’re not talking credits.” Astarte stated dryly.
“An accurate feeling.” The Contact retorted. “We are an organization of information brokers and middle men, but even we need our own middle men. We cast a wide net to pull in much, but sometimes our needs require a more direct approach.”
“Spies?” Astarte guessed.
“Yes, or simple muscle to get what we need. Lately that muscle has been disappearing, I’m sure you noticed the aggressive way the Station Security treats your kind.”
“Yeah, the charges they tried to stick my men with were downright asinine, never would have stuck.”
Another long blink. “Yes, but the Union doesn’t need to make them stick. You more than most should know that the Union will imprison individuals on suspect of a crime before an investigation can be done to assure innocence.”
Astarte almost heard a click in her head as she connected the dots. The charges had seemed absurd and unfounded, and she had wondered why they bothered. But the Union could, in cases of an extreme crime, arrest and imprison without a trial or evidence. It was one of the major ways the Unions legal system differed from the local laws of the Sol system.
Guilty until proven innocent. It was the precedent that had gotten her mother imprisoned when Aster was four. While they had arrested a terrorist responsible for thousands of deaths and billions in property damage, they didn’t actually have the evidence. And once the lack of evidence had been undeniably proven in a court room Lucile’s sentence was ended and her record expunged of the black mark after spending ten months in the prison on Parox.
Asters throat was tight “How many have been…”
“Thousands. Tens of thousands. I would like to give you a better number, but someone has done a remarkable job at obfuscating that information. People are arrested on petty misdemeanors, if any, and then prosecutors from the central office apply some grander crime. They’re taken to a holding facility, where they stay for a short time before a ship comes to take them to parts unknown.”
“And no one’s done anything about this?”
“Oh, no. There were plenty of riots. But shouting, screaming Deathworlders committing acts of arson and clashing Station Security did little to sway the public. And after the ADCU was born things got even worse for the Terrans.”
“Motherfuckers” Astarte growled through her teeth. She didn’t know where all those people went, but everything so far pointed to some sort of genocide. Unity was purging itself of its Deathworlder nuisance.
“Yes, as effective as the ADCU has been at rooting out actual criminal organizations they have also been a highly effective at smother discontent.”
“And what do you want me to do about it.”
Their head tilted to the side. “You already have an in road with one of their top Officers, one who is the personal protégé of Chief Gin.”
“Do you want me to see where they’re taking people, or figure out why?”
“Both if possible. This has all the odious whiffs of politics, and the League needs to know why the Union is making such bold moves. Any and all information you dig up will be appreciated.”
Astarte drummed her fingers on the desk as she worked through the problems. Something dangerous was happening in the heart of the Union. Something that threatened her own plans. She had idly wondered why Amaterasu had been so bold in making their terraforming equipment disappear, why openly slaughter an entire office of insurance investigators? But now she saw it was par for the course her, and she was only now noticing the rot.
The contacts request was also in her own best interest. She needed to know where this all led.
But you never took the first offer. That was just good business. “It seems to me that our own investigations might help you in yours. I don’t see why we can’t do both at once.”
Another long blink. “You won’t be overextending yourself?”
Aster scoffed “of course not.”
The amphibian’s permanent smile became a little wider, “good. Its always a pleasure working with a professional.”
The contact then reached under their desk to retrieve a small flash drive, preloaded with all the info Aster needed.
“Just a heads up” Aster said as she retrieved the flash drive. “Our plans usually end in chaos and bloodshed.”
“Oh, I know. I’m looking forward to it.” the contact said with a self-amused giggle like gurgling water.
Their business concluded Astarte stood to leave. But the door she entered through didn’t unlock itself. Instead a hidden panel Astarte hadn’t noticed during her scan slid open and revealed a hidden stairway.
Astarte blinked in surprise before shaking her head. never underestimate the Shadow League.
She walked through the door, and ascended several flight of stairs until she exited into the reception room of a small law firm. The Drohodron attendant nodded their furry rabbit like head and gestured towards the exit.
The ride home was mostly uneventful. A group of SS tried to tail her, but some speed walking and a sudden turn down an alley was all it took to shake them.
She left the tram station and entered the industrial district where her ship was moored. She had been so relaxed on her walk back that she even began to whistle a jaunty little tune. She almost mixed the gentle thump behind and slight rush of wind as a blade swept from behind her, nearly taking her head off.
She had only an instant to lean forward to avoid the strike. With the strike barely avoided she took one step forward before drawing Tenken in swinging overhead chop.
Two green tinted blades strapped to her attackers wrists rose into a crossed guard to catch her sword the two of them struggled against each other’s strength. Aster was surprised at the strength the assassin possessed.
They struggled for a few seconds before breaking apart just as swiftly as they had met.
They both took several steps back and began to size each other up.
The assassin was short, standing at maybe 160cm. Their tight-fitting clothes marked the assassin as both human and female. Two curved blades were attached to the assassins wrists, looking like the curved pincers of a praying mantis, which matched the mantis-like mask she wore.
The assassin despite her failed sneak attack, and their inconclusive clash, had the gall to look smug. “Glad to see you haven’t grown weak in our time apart, Daisey.” The assassin gurgled through a heavy voice filter.
Previous/Patreon/Next

I’ll get straight to the point. I am a 27F and I’m in what feels like a shit load of debt and looking for some outside perspectives on the most logical next move. I am engaged getting married this fall and will include relevant spouse financial info. Excuse format as I am on mobile.
Income: $82,500 10% to 401k 2% stock After benefits and the above, take home is $1800 biweekly
Second job @ $17/hr 6-8 hours a week now increase to 20 hours a week during peak season in winter
Spouse makes $50k annual at full time job and $10-15k at second job. No debts aside from a recent 36 month personal loan of $25k at 8%. $800 monthly payment. Take home is $1400 biweekly from full time job, other job is seasonal with no income in summer months
Credit cards: $20k Cap One - ~$650 min payment - 29.99 % APR ($20k limit)
$12k Wells Fargo - ~$300 min payment - 15% APR ($15k limit)
$1800 Discover - $40 min payment - 0% APR until December 2023 ($2k limit)
Loans: $9,800 Best Egg - $520 monthly payment - 11.15 % APR (Feb 2025 pay off)
Car loan $6200 left - $150 monthly payment - will be paid off in 2026 - pay $100 month for insurance. Selling is not an option
~$70k in federal student loans (avg 4%) $12k private student loans (8%)
Other relevant info: Wedding is paid for Currently in school working on MBA reimbursed by company
Paying $130/month in medical debt, $600 left
Rent is $1575 total we split 50/50 + utilities/etc totals $2200 a month
I contribute $2k annual to Roth IRA currently sitting at $30k
Save $70/week to rainy day but I pull my Roth money from her each year I currently have $3k saved. Fiancé has $10k rainy day.
I’ve cancelled all frivolous expenses. We have the opportunity to move in with parents next year (summer) and with all bills and rent that should save us $2200 monthly minimum. With all my payments and expenses I use nearly $3500 of my $3600 monthly income not including second job income (starting this week)
Getting $5900 net bonus next week planned on paying off medical debt then throwing at capital one.
Thoughts? I will likely get a $8-10k raise by mid 2024 and fiancé will be getting $5-10 k raise this summer.
Edit to add I would love to have a child in 2025 but I’m worried about how to handle it all. Spouses parents are significantly older and we want to have kids before they’re too old. We would like to wait to buy a house until we have most of this under control and understand that means upwards of 5+ years

Hello all,
Hope everyone is doing well! I was curious what experiences you guys have had with applying for returns on Sugargoo post-website update. I submitted a refund request for a jacket I ordered that had a rip in the fabric on one of the sleeves on April 22, 2023, but it has still not even began processing yet. I know there were some issues handling customer questions since there were issues in the transition to the new website, but now I get the feeling that I won't be eligible for a refund anymore since my item has been sitting around for so long. I applied for the refund as soon as the QC photos came in because the agent flagged the quality defect and I know the seller accepts returns for this jacket.
Hopefully someone from Sugargoo could help escalate this, but have you guys run into similar problems?

So, I am just genuinely curious if I'm being fair with the request I make of my husband. It's not like a serious point of contention between us right now or anything. I just want other people's perspectives.
​
The context: My husband and I both work pretty high stress corporate jobs and share two very young, very energetic kids. Both kids require us to lay next to them until they fall asleep and this process usually takes well over an hour. The kids sleep in different rooms so I handle one kid, he handles the other. Because of all the work and kid responsibilities, pretty much the only time we ever have to just relax our brains is after the kids go to sleep. However, because it all takes so long, my husband usually falls asleep next to the kid he's putting down — I'd say this happens at least 5 days a week. I almost never fall asleep during this process because I'm more of a night person.
What this means is that I have at least two hours of chill time every night and my husband only gets those hours maybe once or twice a week. It also means that for the majority of my chill time, I don't have to compromise with anyone on what to watch (or do, in general). However, when my husband is up, I'm up as well so he has to contend with my opinions.
The issue: Pretty much every show or movie he ever wants to watch involves gruesome violence. War movies, cartel movies, sniper movies .... just everything where the default Netflix image is a muddied man holding a huge gun. I can not handle watching violence. It makes me feel horrible. I don't care how amazing the plot around it is. I don't find watching people bleed to death before bed relaxing. On the nights when he doesn't fall asleep and comes downstairs in search of the remote, I always tell him he can pick anything he wants as long as there's no more than one death per hour in whatever he's watching. This is apparently so constricting for him that it rules out pretty much everything he ever wants to watch.
Am I being unfair? Since he gets so little time to veg out, should i just let him watch whatever the hell he wants and leave the room? I'll be honest, I don't love the idea of giving up 1:1 time with my husband. However, I also understand that for most of the week, I watch Seinfeld reruns until 2am without anyone stopping me.
AITA for telling him he has to choose entertainment within my parameters when he's up?

Faraway Town

GRAAAAHHH...
Disappear!
In the ordinarily quiet small town of Faraway Town, a fierce battle was underway. Although the town was normally a mundane place free from such things, a pair with otherworldly powers had found themselves in fierce combat. Most couldn't see exactly what was going on, but there was one observer on the sidelines watching the battle with a casual calm.
you almost done there, math man?
Don't undervalue me! I can solve this equation on my own.
hey, no problem. if you wanna do the work, that's fine with me.
i'm "counting" on you, heh.
CRUNCH!!!
Gah!
Huff... Huff... You're... not bad.
Shoulda stayed asleep, Yoctogram. You were better off that way.
Why are you even here, anyway? This isn't your world. Why do you even care?
your kind are causing a lotta messes. somebody had to start cleaning after you all.
Normally, I would have a negative value of caring about what you all do. But you're messing with the Multiverse and I live there. So you're gonna have to get subtracted.
I see... But I'm afraid I'm not going to let it be that easy... Isn't that right, guys?
That's right... Goblin...
Right... We'll stop them...
They must die...
For the glory of the Po...
...
heh. guess she's been busy since she showed up here.
Whatever. She can add as many variables to this equation as she wants. It's not going to stop me.
We'll see. You guys can handle the big guy, right? I'll take the skeleton.
you sure you wanna try that? because if you really insist on picking a fight with me…
you're gonna have a bad time.

Hope’s Peak Academy…

Sheesh. That was a long game.
Yet another game of Blood on the Clocktower had come to an end. After some non-disclosure agreements were signed, the various players had all gone their separate ways. Though one, in particular, had lingered around the halls.
Not sure why they felt the need to trick us into thinking that our lives were in danger. What is up with this school?
Turururu... Hello, Hatsune Miku. Aoi has been waiting.
Eh? Have we met?
Considering how many collabs you do, we probably have. You just wouldn't know it.
But that's a very long, very obscure, and very spoilable story.
Ooookay... Who are you?
Aoi is Aoi. Been waiting for you.
Did you need an autograph or something? It's been a long day but I wouldn't mind. Anything for a fan.
Aoi's not really into Vocaloids. God is a big fan though. But Aoi actually here for other things.
Not here because you're an Idol. Aoi here because you're a Traveller.
A traveller?
Miku's been to a lot of worlds, right? Many, many worlds.
Oh? That kind of traveller. Well, an Idol's work is never done.
It'd be a shame not to spread my music as far as I can, right?
Aoi wants help. The multiverse has been flagged for a bad end. This world in particular is being invaded by very bad things. Very bad things.
Um... bad things? Can you be a bit more specific about it? What do you mean by bad things?
Aoi's not great at exposition. Maybe Miku should just come with. Others can explain it better.
I probably shouldn't but, aw, what the heck? You seem like a weird girl. I can spare the time to see where you're going with this.
Neat. Aoi's set off Miku's flags. Let's go. Aoi's new friends will want to meet Miku.
Just as calculated.
The battle in Faraway Town had come to a decisive end. Five teenagers laid sprawled out unconscious on the ground. Whatever dark force had taken them over had dissipated, leaving only five ordinary and somewhat battered kids i
looks like the goblin girl managed to get away, though.
Well, we'll track her down soon enough. For now, t we better go solve any other problems that her kind left behind here.
C'mon... Let's split...
With that, the pair left. One of the fallen kids began to stir awake.
Where... am I? What happened?
Mari... Where did you go, Mari...?
If you’re interested in playing, please sign-up with the form below. Given the Multiverse-heavy lore of these game, I will be accepting Non-Danganronpa characters in this particular game. As long as they have acceptable sprite sets that you can provide for me.
I do reserve the right to reject characters if necessary. But I will only do so if I have a very good reason to do so, such as if the sprites are too limited, too low quality, or potentially offensive in some way.
Sign-ups will end on June 4th, five days from now. The game will start properly on June 6th. I hope to see as many of you as possible when the game begins.
https://forms.gle/MaJM3FE3KrtbMDPd8

As a newbie to Kislev, and after having tried both Kostaltyn and Katarin to around turn 90-100 and struggling the entire time, I decided to try some Boris Campaigns (H/N and VH/N), and it was so fun and comfortable relatively compared to the other 2 LLs (challenging but not a slog) that it turned into a full map completion. In my opinion Boris' campaign effects lead him to be the best of the Kislev LL's, and I highly recommend anyone that enjoys/wants to try Kislev's roster but hates Kostaltyn/Katarin's difficult starting situations to try Boris!
Starting as Boris/Ursun Revivalists has a lot of advantages: - Chaotic wasteland is unpleasant climate rather than uninhabitable: This is a major advantage of Boris' faction compared to Kost/Kat; Kostaltyn/Katarin have to contend with the fact that their enemies all hold red/uninhabitable territory, meaning expansion is especially slow/difficult (growth, replenishment, construction cost penalties are crippling in the early game), whereas Boris can easily convert enemy settlements into useful territory, and a lot faster. The bonus Devotion is nothing to sneeze at either and makes it so Boris can spam his Invocations as needed to suit your campaign situation.
- Kislev Confederations: Boris is in the best position to confederate the other Kislev LLs by far. Kostaltyn/Katarin have to play the supporter game, and it takes ages to get to 600 supporters without a lot of territory/church buildings (Even by turn 80 as Katarin I was no where close to confederating Kostaltyn, if he manages to survive at all). In addition, AI Boris starts in the Chaos Wastes and tends to be wiped out quickly by Archaon and his vassal squad, making it hard to save him as Kost/Kat. Meanwhile, Boris can confederate through diplomacy, and seeing as Kislev is surrounded by common foes, it is very easy to get a military alliance with both of them, especially if you trade them some oblast territories that are not very useful anyway. In my campaign, I managed to get both of them by around turn 30-40.
- Supporters race: As above, Boris doesn't really care about supporters as supporting Kost or Kat doesn't really matter, unless you really want the global control and Kislev relations bonuses from reaching the supporter thresholds. In my opinion its worth the trade off to confederate Kost/Kat quickly and just ignore the supporter system entirely.
General Campaign observations/tips: From the perspective of an IE Boris campaign but applicable to IE Kislev in general!
- As per Legend of Total War, migrating down to Frozen Landing in Goromadny Mountains and abandoning his starting settlement is the way to go; it puts you a lot closer to the Kislev homeland/potential allies, and delays meeting Archaon and his many vassals. You can either stay and hold Frozen landing, or migrate directly to Praag, which I prefer to do.
- Securing Praag as fast as possible is key (I prefer conquering Ropesmenn clan for extra EXP and loot, and you don't care about losing supporters anyway)! Not only will holding one of the 3 Kislev cities boost your economy by a ton, Praag has a landmark building that decreases Global Recruitment duration by 1 turn which you can build at Tier 3, and at Tier 5 reduces Global Recruitment duration by 2 turns! If you combine this with the research under the Praag section of the research tree that further reduces Global Recruit duration by 1 turn, you are able to recruit War Bear Riders in 1 turn through Global Recruitment, meaning you can start seriously pumping out doomstacks once you get to Tier 5 (this took me around turn 60). Even before then at Tier 3, you can make a full stack/close to a full stack of Kossars as an emergency defensive army in 1-2 turns, which is very very useful!
- Oblast territories are useless (in the early/mid game); Kislev is surrounded by foes and the oblast regions are always the first regions to be sieged/attacked/destroyed. Don't bother building them up too much and focus your money in building up Praag in the early game, and later Erengrad and Kislev once you confederate Kost/Kat. Alternatively, you can always trade away the oblast regions to Kost/Kat; not only will they defend the settlement and build it up for you, it will generate a ton of positive relations and they most likely will offer a military alliance in exchange, which will make confederations a lot easier.
- Economy: Kislev's economy is mediocre early game, relying on post-battle loot and the main Kislev cities. It's not uncommon to be in the red especially if you don't have Erengrad/Kislev yet. Turtling around Praag/Hell Pit and relying on sacking and ambushing your enemies can be a good way of getting the money to upgrade Praag to Tier 3, at which point you can really snowball. Look out for regions with trade resources; Kislev is one of the factions most dependent on trade resources, as they provide stackable global bonuses to your economy and upkeep, for example tier 3 Iron buildings will reduce all upkeep by 3% for all armies! Other trade resources will do things like increase market/farm incomes percentage wise, so as you take more territory, your economy will compound more and more as you stack resource building bonuses and more farms/markets.
- Tech Tree: Kislev has several gems in the tech tree (Global Recruitment Time Reduction!), but most bonuses from tech are small/unimpactful. I tend to rush for Ice court training slots, Local recruitment slots, Casualty replenishment, and some combat bonuses to Kossars (in no particular order) in the early game, and then focus on the Praag technologies so that I can get reduction in Global recruit time by the time I get to Tier 5 Praag. Getting Student followers can make this process a lot faster too.
- Buildings: Kislev actually has excellent growth; once you get out of the oblasts and into the Chaos wastelands/Norsca/Empire with 3-4 settlements in a province, you can start getting Tier 5 settlements quite quickly, as Kislev has 2 growth buildings you can build in each settlement, getting upwards of ~250 - 300 growth or more in each province. Other useful buildings to build are Markets/Farms for money, Hero capacity buildings (Patriarch buildings in minor settlements, Frost Maiden buildings in major settlements), and the War Sled building, as it increases Global Recruitment capacity by 1 at Tier 4. Stacking these buildings allows you to recruit full stacks of elites instantly in the late game.
- Early game (turn 1-40): If you decide to migrate to Frozen Landing/Praag, then your first major enemy is likely to be Throt; by the time you secure Praag, Katarin may or may not have already dealt with him and taken Hell Pit; if not, then you can do it yourself by baiting him to leave Hell Pit in an ambush, or wait until he leaves the settlement undefended and taking it yourself. Once Hell Pit is taken, Throt is basically a non-threat and will not recruit much else besides stacks of skavenslaves/low tier units. After that, focusing on Throgg and Azazel is likely your next goal; it may be useful to save wiping out Azazel until after you confederate Kostaltyn, as he might have a Mark of Slaanesh that you can get rid of by using Azazel as a punching bag.
- Mid game (turn 40-70): By this time you can already snowball with several Kossar stacks once Praag is Tier 3-4 (see above). I also had Kostaltyn and Katarin in my faction by this time too, which means with Erengrad/Kislev your economy starts to really grow. I found that its quite common for Astragoth to conquer up to the Goromadny Mountains and become adjacent to your territory; something unorthodox I tried was actually gifting a territory to Astragoth in exchange for a defensive alliance; this is possible because you actually start off as neutral relations/minimal aversion with each other. This works out well for you because it covers your eastern flank, allowing you to focus entirely on securing all of Norsca; it will also give you a nice buffer region for when Archaon inevitably declares war on you, meaning you have time to finish off Throgg/Wulfric/Azazel, then come back to the east to handle Archaon when he is fighting Astragoth. If you confederated Katarin, you may be exposed to Azhag/Vlad/Drycha/Festus; in my experience AI Katarin does a good job of holding her capital and weakening these factions on her own. Once you confederate her, you likely have access to War Sleds/Frost Guard/War bear Riders, so you can fill her army up with elite units and roll over their weakened armies.
- Late game (turn 70 and beyond): With Praag at Tier 5 and the right tech, the world is your oyster and you can go wherever you want, as your economy should allow you to spam out full stacks of War bear Riders in 1-2 turns, and you can handle anything Chaos can throw at you. By this time you can start making your way North and clearing out the Chaos wastes - it may take you all the way to Cathay to completely wipe out Archaon for your victory condition depending on how many territories he has taken. Malus, Daniel/Demon Prince, Belakor and Sigvald should also be very easy to wipe out now.
What do you guys think? Do you prefer Kostaltyn, Katarin or Boris for the best Kislev Experience in IE?

I am struggling with my 6 year old. He’s a healthy and active boy, however, his behavior are not at best. I don’t expect him to behave well all the time, but he will constantly talk back for every little thing, he believes he is not responsible for helping/cleaning if doesn’t belong to him (if you ask him for help, he’ll have a come back), he will slam the door of the room when I say “no” for something, and it’s now starting to have problems with his friends… at some point I thought it was developmental but now I’m thinking it’s a problem and I’m blaming myself terribly for it.
This morning, he told me “why doesn’t everyone just do what I want?”, and I’ve explained to him that this is not how the world works, talked and he said “mommy does everything I want, only you and my friends tell me what to do”. I thought in my head he’s either figuring it out that he won’t always get what he wants or we’re at point that he’s already a brat. I don’t like these terms and wouldn’t call him that, but honestly, there is no other word.
For parents who do parallel parenting, how do you handle having completely two different settings of parenting? I have my son 50/50, so I get that consistency would be ideal in his parenting but there is nothing I can do about my ex. I feel like I’m failing my role and lost.

Context:
I’ve been with my (26F) boyfriend (32M) for 2 years now and things have been incredible besides my jealousy and RJ.
My ex was my only previous sexual experience. High school sweethearts that stayed together way too long, deadbeat of all deadbeats, very “meh” sex life.
My current boyfriend is way more attractive and a better person overall. We met in college and are both healthcare workers now. He so hot, funny, kind, and charismatic, which is fantastic and I love having a confident partner. But him having these qualities plus 6 more years of life experience compared to me also comes with having more previous sexual experiences - hookups from old jobs and music fests, another relationship, women who have sent him nudes (which he of course deleted when we started dating), etc. He also followed a lot of half-naked women on instagram when he was single but promptly unfollowed them when I told him I was uncomfortable with it at the beginning of our relationship.
I am in therapy and have mostly accepted this part of his past. He makes it very clear that I am the one for him even when I’m not asking for reassurance. I believe him when he tells me I am the best sex/relationship/romantic experience he has ever had, that no one else even comes close, he has never been in so love like this with anyone before (I didn’t ask him to say any of this). And he is set on marrying me which I never got from my ex that I was with for 7 years. He also told me that while it might have been fun living the single life, it also could get really lonely and he felt like he was being used sometimes.
The current issue:
What’s weird is that my most intense RJ isn’t even about a past sexual experience or an ex of his. It’s about an old coworker of his (from a veeeery long time ago) that went to nursing school but instead went on to be a half-naked fitness influencer. Naturally this was one of the girls he used to follow. No romantic or sexual past with her though.
He used to like all of her photos and would comment on some of them too. Nothing wildly thirsty or graphic. But things like her name in all caps and fire emojis. I guess it just seemed to me like he used to be obsessed with her.
Now, I don’t feel unattractive by any means; I hated how I looked for a lot of my life because I got bullied for my race, but I now really take care of my appearance and consider myself a conventionally very pretty Asian girl. My boyfriend makes it clear that he thinks I’m super hot and desirable, talks about me all the time to coworkers and friends, and shows me off, so I know he isn’t just with me because he wanted to settle down with any willing girl after being tired of the hookup lifestyle. And we’re also just a very good match outside of looks as well.
But my ROCD brain still makes me feel like I can’t compete with a blonde fitness influencer with giant fake boobs, lip filler, and the biggest butt ever lol (and who was already the American standard of beauty before she got work done).
This is gonna sound crazy, but sadly this is what my brain tells me. I always had this irrational fear that if she happened to come into his life again, like if she decided to follow through with becoming a nurse and she happened to work at the hospital he works at, that he would drop me so fast just to drool over her again or try to cheat on me with her. So my paranoid brain would always just tell me that as long as he never saw her again then this relationship that is so precious to me is safe.
Well the “worst” happened. She walked by us at this beachside bar we were at while we were hanging out with friends there. I froze. She’s been the big reason for my insecurities throughout this entire relationship (rational or irrational) and the fact that she was there in person just made me freeze up. Eventually I asked if he wanted to say hi to them and introduce us, because I thought that maybe facing my trigger would confirm to me that I’m “scared” of this person for really no reason.
My boyfriend handled the situation very well; he had no desire to go say hi to her. He reminded me that it’s just me and him there together on this beach trip with friends for our 2 year anniversary, that he’s in love with me, and that he just wants me to be happy with him. And to try to get out of my head and that he didn’t need to say hi to her because it wouldn’t do anything for him, and he knows how I feel. I was a mess then but thankfully we went back to that beachside bar again the next night and had a fantastic time together so that our anniversary trip ended on a great note.
Still can’t get rid of this nagging feeling though. I was severely gaslit in my previous relationship so unfortunately my trust issues are still persistent and alive in this one which isn’t fair to my current boyfriend.
I unfortunately still give into my compulsions and check her social media sometimes. Do you think this will ever get better with enough time and therapy? Can anyone relate to this? It feels like such a weird situation I can’t talk about to anyone else because it feels unique.

Names have been changed to maintain anonymity. Also, my bad if the formatting is off, I don't really post on Reddit all that much, but I really needed to get this particular story off my chest.
​
So over a year ago, I met some people in a VTM 20th Anniversary game, which eventually fizzled out due to some stuff that's not super relevant right now. But long story short, a group they had been longtime players in had recently hit the reset button on their game and a campaign that had been going on for about three years, mostly due to losing one of their two Storytellers.
I was invited to join in this new game, as one of the previous players had stepped up to be one of the Co-STs for the game, their names were Mark and John, with John being ten years older than I am and having a huge amount of RPG experience under his belt. Mark eventually started flying solo in the ST seat due to some Storyteller burnout with John eventually hopping into a player's seat. Mark was a first-timer when it came to Storytelling, and to this day you can very much see it, but we've all been there to help him along the way, since most of the players have done more than a few rounds in the ST seat.
When I joined, there were a few things they did differently to other games I have previously been a part of, mostly these were limited to a few homebrews as well as stuff to make use of the flexibility of two STs. A hallmark of their previous game was sending in emailed 'Downtime Actions' which continued in this game, but if not used, would often mean consequences. Such as being down seven blood points (RAW you need to spend one to rise every evening) if an action wasn't used to feed. Another hallmark was the Storytellers handling stuff like side scenes in different voice channels during game time. One ST could go off with a small group in-session to have a private convo and another would keep the main scene going with usually zero issue. At first, it was jarring to me because firstly I'm used to not having to write so much on the weekly with the Downtime Actions stuff, and secondly, I didn't enjoy the abnormal amount of secrecy at the table. Both of which I kinda grew to not mind, because the side scenes wouldn't really disrupt the momentum of the game, but I still do find it a tiny bit odd, cause it felt like we weren't trusted to not metagame.
However, when John stepped down, these hallmarks didn't really go away. Mark still tried to maintain the workload of two people with Downtimes between five players as well as balancing side scenes, despite us as a group wanting to move away from all the secrecy. But these would often leave the game dead in the water mid-session and disrupt the momentum of a Court assembling or a social event happening in-game since 90% of this game was very politically focussed. And Mark was still trying to juggle two scenes at once. Since it would be him chatting with one or two players and the rest of us just sitting in silence for upwards of five minutes at a time. At first, it didn't really matter too much to us as players, since we were sorta just vibing with it, and we were under the impression John would come back to the ST seat eventually.
For a while, we were very much fine with it. But often the conversations with the ST or an NPC would drag on, or he'd spend ages trying to type out what was basically an essay in DMs at the start of a session. It kinda wore on my patience quite a bit, because, for one, it felt a little distrustful of us as players and our ability to adhere to general table etiquette, such as not metagaming. I understand wanting to be secretive in VTM, because the system encourages backstabbing and whatnot. And two, it started to get very tiresome after a while because, due to timezones, I would often have to wake up at like 3am to make it on time to games, since I'm over in Australia and the group is mostly over in Europe. So I'd wake up, and sit in a session where I would basically be doing nothing but fighting off drowsiness whenever the ST left with another player. Especially when the side scenes began to grow more and more frequent and tended to grow longer. At one point, an entire action sequence played out off screen for most of us players, so we had no damn clue out of game what was happening
Along with the side scene shenanigans as well as the Downtime Action emails, we have another homebrew that makes 10s count as two successes and skill specialties grant an extra die. Eventually, stuff came to a head with this particular rule which ended up being the nail in the coffin for my run in Mark's game. Mark started growing more and more frustrated as the game went on due to us getting lucky on dice rolls, and us having pretty sizeable dice pools because we'd earned a pretty huge amount of exp over the course of the game. Most notably, his aggression went towards a player named Nikola, who was essentially dubbed a 'problem player' and was called out for being a min-maxer by Mark. His character at the time was a Nagaraja necromancer, pretending to be a Malkavian.
There were multiple DMs that were exchanged via Discord to Nikola by Mark about his character being overpowered because he'd gotten a lucky shot on a boss fight that had been set up, or Mark hadn't accounted for a power like Telepathy being used in a murder investigation. Snide comments were made out of game about Nikola using a ritual to solve every problem, which really drove me up the wall as a player. For the most part, it just didn't sit right with me hearing Nikola just get absolutely dragged behind his back by Mark. But Nikola had barely done anything to optimize dice pools, for one, he'd dumped most of his experience points into necromancy.
Mind you, most Necromancy in VTM is not only horrendously costly but nine times out of ten it had a very specific niche regarding dead stuff and ghosts, this specific instance being limited to wraiths which were incredibly hard to encounter in the wild. Nikola's character took a bunch of levels in the Vitreous Path, having a total of one ability that directly did damage to anything. A lot of the rituals he had were incredibly situational, with him even having to work with Mark to homebrew in rituals from other editions, as well as copying some things from Thaumaturgy just to make it the slightest bit viable. All of this was stuff Mark okayed and said yes to. At any point, he could've pulled the plug.
There were often times were Nikola would wake up to rants from Mark, which would either be walls of text in DM's or a mashup of voice messages and texts, and Nikola would also have to sit through the shade that was thrown in-game at the playecharacter. This was after he would stonewall Nikola in furthering a plotline, by either forcing him to roll dice for a menial task like jumping out a window, or by even introducing Mages and Fey and trying to screw his character with death magic. Nikola isn't a very confrontational person, and let a lot of this slide since this was basically Mark's second proper game of VTM.
This entire ordeal sent Mark down a path of trying to reinvent how we rolled dice, as well as nerf/alter several discipline powers despite them being costly as hell to use in the right circumstances or incredibly niche. All because one player had been getting lucky and Mark hadn't accounted for powers such as Auspex being good for investigating crime scenes and its particular power of telepathy being quite strong at getting info from mortals. One of the main homebrews I was vehemently against was solely because Mark's reasoning behind it was "you all roll too well" or something along the lines of us not botching for a good amount of sessions. In spite of the fact that several players had been on a very unlucky streak for the past few sessions. The rules we used up to that point are just the RAW ones from the corebook, with 1's cancelling out successes, and if you roll more 1's than what's considered a success, it's just a failure. A botch only occurs when you have no successes and any amount of 1's were rolled. This with our other homebrews apparently made us roll too well, with us at the time having 10's always count as two successes and specialties adding a bonus die to our roll.
Mark's homebrew was to change the RAW stuff to try and nerf the double tens homebrew rather than simply going back to RAW. His changes were as follows: If we go below zero successes with 1's it's a botch, even if successes were rolled. The severity of a botch would change depending on how many 1's were rolled. A lot of powers and dice rolls in this game have a lot of bad consequences if we botch already, with some aura reading/emotion focussed powers straight up knocking out a character for an entire scene on a botch. Which could be anywhere up to an hour of in-game time, or quite literally the next 'scene'. I honestly just didn't see the point of increasing the chances of stuff like that happening, especially when it has the potential to just flat-out stop a player from doing anything whatsoever
Many of us suggested going back to the RAW rules for specialties, as 10's only counted as two successes when a specialty was present, but this was ignored, and he started shoehorning in extra maths for other suggestions that confused the hell out of our less numbers focussed players. His other homebrews were very much specifically targeted, as he had tried to nerf Telepathy limiting it only to surface thoughts, no matter how many successes were rolled on the dice as well as changing how the entire Celerity discipline worked. Trying to add a huge amount of limitations to what could and could not be done using a celerity action. The only player that had used the Telepathy power even somewhat often was Nikola, as 90% of the players either didn't bother having Auspex or weren't high enough level to use Telepathy.
This all sort of came to a head during a sit down to discuss the homebrews, where practically nobody could agree on a suitable dice rolling mechanic, with Mark once again, barely even acknowledging my suggestion of just ditching the double 10's homebrew altogether. The energy in the voice channel was tense as hell, with Mark backpedalling on his reasoning for the botch changes. It went from him feeling like we roll too well, to him not feeling enough interesting storytelling was occurring with the current dice-rolling system. John ended up poking his head in and very specifically asked Mark why he felt the need to increase the chance of botches and ended the comment with something along the lines of "Isn't it your job to make failures interesting as an ST?". John also bringing up the fact that we all usually tend to roll for things our characters are good at. Everyone has a niche and to an extent, our characters are built to fill that niche.
Most of that discussion went in one ear and out the other because it was a lot of arguing and going in circles, and in the end, we stuck a pin in the dice rolling system because no one agreed. And i was too exhausted to pay attention because I'd only gotten back home from work an hour or so before the discussion started. This took about three hours to resolve, by which time it was 5am for me and I was incredibly mentally exhausted listening to grown adults being unable to settle on rules for a plethora of their own reasons.
A few days after, I left the game, sending a message to the ST that getting up early/staying up late after work was way too exhausting to do every week when we basically do nothing in game, and I didn't like that a lot of the homebrews felt targeted and very adversarial towards us as players. I reminded Mark that it wasn't anything personal. But his response was mostly sweet, but he tried to shift the blame onto Nikola who allegedly expressed a need for these changes and didn't even bother to acknowledge the fact that I mentioned how I was feeling about the game itself. Mark essentially tried to make an adjustment and re-invent how VTM dice rolling works, which honestly wasn't really called for by anyone but him, and then tried to pawn it off and make it another player's fault.
I'm kinda sad this ended like it did, mostly because I did enjoy vibing with the players, and I really loved my character. I consider many of the people at the table pretty close friends, and I feel like my thoughts and feelings may have burned some bridges. But the game was essentially taking a nose dive, and I didn't want to waste my early mornings/late nights feeling like we were basically doing nothing when I could be getting some much needed sleep.

“So, what, I'm just supposed to sit in my car by the train tracks until you call?” I ask, as my car rolls to a stop. I regret the words as soon as they come out of my mouth.
“I thought you said this kid was smart?” Connor asks Johnny, from the back seat.
“I thought he was, too. Yes, obviously. Wait here – and cut the headlights, goddammit,” Johnny says, looking at me from the front seat of my Monte Carlo and shaking his head. He looks furious. He is sweaty, despite Old Man Winter starting to get his grip on Maryland. I look away from him and cut the headlights off.
The freezing rain that is coming down is a perfect match for Johnny’s mood and our plan tonight. Johnny is dopesick. Besides the sweat on his face, his visible irritation, and his obvious anxiety, his wide eyes and pupils are a dead giveaway to a fellow junkie. He no longer looks like the healthy and decent-looking kid that I saw when he got out of jail.
He looks absolutely skeletal, his cheeks sunken in from his heroin habit. He has bags under his eyes, and they somehow look equally terrible during both the over-stimulation of withdrawal and the extreme sedation of a dose of heroin. He is sick now, but he was incredibly high last night. So was I.
I still am. Despite how high on heroin I am, I am not high enough to think that I look better. I would never want anybody that I know to see me right now. I don’t even want to see myself.
Johnny gets out of the car. Connor, a blonde haired, blue-eyed, Irish-looking kid, follows suit. I push the ‘trunk’ button to open the trunk and hear it pop open. I cringe at how loud the sound is. I watch my side view mirror.
I see Johnny and Connor pull two shirts out of the trunk and wrap them around their faces, while they are illuminated by the surreal red color of my brake lights. I have extra shirts that I keep in the trunk in case I soak mine through with sweat while playing ball, and now they are being used in a robbery.
I can see the gravel road that is underneath us stretching out behind us. The gravel road is surrounded by huge, old trees. We are deep in the sticks. About a half mile back are the train tracks where I will wait. Connor and Johnny move out, towards a very small and well concealed driveway.
I start to pull off, slowly, not turning on my headlights yet, even though I can’t see anything at all. I listen to the gravel crunching underneath my car, my entire body clenched as I drive, hoping that I don’t hit a tree. These properties are huge. I couldn’t even see most of the houses from the road, even when it was daylight outside. These are double digit-acre properties.
Johnny is probably right. This is going to be one hell of a come-up. I manage to drive only a little further down the road before I turn my headlights back on, too scared to keep driving into the pitch-black dead of night. I go half a mile and then turn around in somebodies’ driveway, careful to back in, conscious of where I shine my headlights.
Ok, now back to the train tracks until Johnny calls. My heart starts to beat faster.
How did this happen? I was clean. I was so happy. I thought I wasn’t an alcoholic. I drank, and drank again, and drank again. It doesn’t matter if it was just on the weekends for a while. I should’ve known I was going to smoke, too, eventually. I started to smoke, I stopped playing ball, and I started hanging out with Johnny all the time.
Alcohol gave me a hangover. Weed took it away. I became a stoner again, and adderall helped me get through the lazy fog of the weed burnout and force myself to play ball again – until it made me too anxious. The anxiety led me back to oxy. It was only supposed to be one time; one 30mg pill.
Now, I’m doing heroin again.
Of course. With heroin comes robbery. The cycle is complete – well, it will be once I get arrested again, and I definitely will.
I park at the train tracks and turn my car off. The car that I paid off with money that I worked for while I was clean and happy.
Didn’t matter. Never does. Nothing matters, Lonnie.
Not the ‘nothing matters’ thought loop. Please. Anything but this.
I reach into the inside of my left sock and pull the last of my heroin out. The 3 of us bought some last night. They have no self-control or hustle, which is why they are broke and dopesick right now.
I pour some of it onto the ‘Illmatic’ CD case I keep in my car. I use the same CD case to sniff my drugs, every time.
The heroin is a chunky tan powder. It is Baltimore’s ‘raw’ heroin. It’s good, but I know I can find better. I am generous in my self-prescription. After all, robbery anxiety can’t be good for my health. I sniff the dope slowly, hoping to ease the burn that always ensues upon insufflation. It doesn’t burn too bad this time.
I put everything away and recline the driver’s seat. That ought to do the trick. I lean back as far as I can, and then tilt my head back. I sit and wait for the God of dreams, Morpheus, to say hello. The warmth, the muscle relaxation, the dreamy euphoria. The itch, even.
I can’t wait. I hate waiting.
I wait. A minute, then two. Then, I start to feel an extremely pleasant tingle in the back of my neck. All of my limbs become comfortable and warm.
Ah, there it is. Like the tickle of an angel. My whole body relaxes with pleasure. Parts of my body that I didn’t even know I could relax wind up relaxing. All of my needs are satisfied. I have not one worry in the world.
Why am I trying to keep my eyes open? They don’t even need to be open.
A loud, frantic, continuous series of knocks startles me awake. I can hear Johnny's voice before my eyes adjust to my environment.
"-the fucking door"
I semi-spring into action, fumbling for the handle only to find the door locked. I see Johnny running around the hood of my car, over to the passenger side. I hear Connor hitting his fist loudly, aggressively, and repeatedly against the trunk of the car. I unlock the doors, pop the trunk, and then glance in the mirror just in time to see Connor put something in my trunk.
The passenger door opens a millisecond after it is unlocked. It remains open for a few seconds. The trunk slams, and Connor appears, diving smoothly into the back seat.
“Go-go-go,” Johnny says, as he locks the passenger seat back into place, sits down, and slams the door in one motion. He almost closes it on his own leg. The interior of the car plunges into darkness as I start it, put it in drive, and pull off as quickly as I can. I can maintain silence for less than a second of driving.
“What did we get?” I ask. My nose itches. I itch it.
“We?” Connor asks from the back seat.
“Yeah, WE,” I say, unable to keep anger from edging into my voice. “The only reason I didn't come in with you guys is cuz you told me not to,” I add.
“Yeah, because you don't need the money,” Johnny says. I glance over at him. Even through the darkness, I can tell he is sweating even more than before, though he no longer seems angry. They must have made out good, for Johnny to suddenly be able to control his rage and tolerate his sickness like this.
“Bullshit. I need the money,” I say, looking back to the gravel road in front of us. I have to take us back to Johnny’s grandmas’ place. It is at least a 30-minute drive.
“You aren't even sick, Lambo,” Johnny says, softly, like a parent trying to calm their kid down.
“What did you come up on in there?” I ask. I have to know.
“Don't worry about it. You'll get your weed,” Connor interjects quickly. I say nothing. I look back over at Johnny. He's staring at the road. I keep staring at him, waiting for him to look back at me, but he never does.
“Fuck you, Connor,” I say. He chuckles, the way he might at a kid.
45 minutes later.
Johnny gave me extra hashish to assuage his guilt. I know they found a LOT of money in that house. Johnny knew it was loaded. He knew there were pounds of hash, pounds of weed, and fat stacks of cash. That's why we hit it. Fuck them for not even letting me see the inside of the cooler.
My mind takes me back to something Connor said, yet again.
“That's all you get. Unless you're a dope boy in disguise,” he sneered at me, before giving me only half of the ounce of hashish that he was supposed to give me. Dope fiends are the lowest of the low, but dope boys...
I'm off probation. I can make a run at selling heroin. I have thousands of dollars saved from being clean and working my ass off. In our city, heroin sells for quadruple what it does in Baltimore. Go to Baltimore, buy heroin, bring it back here, sell it, quadruple my money. Easy.
I drive and scheme as to how I am going to do it. No way that motherfucker Connor will be involved. I get back to my parents’ house, sniff more dope, and lay in bed. As the dope hits me, it becomes easier and easier to see myself as a heroin kingpin. I have much greater resources now than in my old oxy dealing days. I could really pull it off – especially with Johnny’s help. I can see myself in that Benz I wanted so badly in high school.
I float and drift further into my fantasy, and my waking dream becomes a dreamless nothing.

My High school barred me and 3 of my friends from participating in the national exam (Bac) due to excessive absences, including absences related to mental health struggles (Im seeing a therapist). Seeking advice on how to handle the situation with consideration for mental well-being and exploring possible solutions or appeals.

"Okay," Sookie called out. "That's a wrap!"
A ragged cheer went up from the cast and crew. Deacon walked around, clapping his hands and cheering loudly, making sure everyone else was cheering, too. Sookie walked over to her chair and sank into it, her feet throbbing in time to the cheering people around her. She smiled at anyone who caught her eye and just relaxed.
This was the end of a grueling, forty-five day shooting schedule that had been supposed to be ten hour days, but had ended up being more like thirteen to eighteen hour days for her. They weren't done filming the season. Far from it, in fact. But these were the worst shots, and the cast and crew involved had all agreed to push through hard until it was done. After this, they had about two more months of shooting on a more normal schedule, and then editing could begin.
Deacon, despite his enthusiasm for the end of the push, had not had to attend most of the shots they got, and had instead, been spending 'quality' time with a couple of local groupies and the White Lady. Sookie didn't begrudge him this, of course. She worried a little about the amount of booger sugar going up his nose at times, but his agent had repeatedly assured her that he was using far more often during shoots than during his off time.
Besides, it was only fitting that the star of the show should enjoy the fruits of his fame. Sookie herself had picked up a bisexual couple a week or two ago, when they had a shoot end 'early' (at nine PM) and the next's day's shoot wasn't scheduled to begin until eight AM. She had left set almost immediately and headed to a local gay bar, where someone had recognized her from her OnlyFans days and insisted upon introducing his boyfriend.
She sighed, remembering the sensation of two well-endowed men thrusting into her, and how she'd simply melted when the one behind her leaned forward and around to kiss the other. Bi men were soooo hawt...
She promised herself she'd try to find another bisexual 'gay' couple, now that she had the time.
Deacon had finally got everyone sufficiently enthusiastic -which was a credit to his charisma, really, as everybody was exhausted- and came over to sit next to her in his own chair.
"I am so ready for a couple weeks off," he said.
"It's one week," Sookie reminded him. "And then you need to be ready for the fight scenes. Have you been working with your choreographer?"
"I haven't really had the time..." Deacon whined, causing Sookie to sigh.
"Deek," she said, sitting up in her chair and turning to face him. "You haven't needed to be on set for the past two weeks. You've been coming to, in your own words, 'help keep morale up'. And while I do appreciate your efforts in that regards, it is far more important for you to be ready to shoot your fight scenes in a week. I'm serious here. You need to get with your choreographer and get your moves nailed down tight. We don't have time to push those shoots back any further."
Deacon held up his hands in surrender. "I'll be down at the dojo tomorrow, I swear."
"Tomorrow morning," Sookie insisted.
"Tomorrow morning," Deacon agreed. "In fact, I'm going to get the playbook and go over it tonight, to try to get a head start."
Sookie smiled and patted him on the knee as she rose. She didn't want to be here anymore. The PAs and crew could finish cleaning everything up so the teardown crews could get started tomorrow.
She found her personal assistant and instructed her to make sure everyone knew to do their own breakdowns, then left. Filming on set had certain advantages, including the fact that she was within walking distance of her hotel.
The security guard that Julie had insisted she maintain since that incident a few years ago with the psycho stan peeled herself off the wall she'd been holding up and fell into step behind her. Sookie wouldn't have minded so much, except Julie had carefully picked married, monogamous men and women to fill her security schedule with, to avoid any 'conflicts of interest'.
This gal, Linda Gottlieb, was probably the worst of all. She had a girlfriend and a boyfriend, and yet refused to sleep with anyone else. On top of that, she was as slender as Sookie, flat chested (which Sookie found to be a major turn on) and hard as a rock, with veiny arms and shoulders and even a few visible on her belly.
Sookie was a woman of many tastes, but skinny girls with visible veins and no tits were one of her more notable favorites, and so Linda's categorical refusal to so much as let Sookie slip a hand down her pants was grating.
Linda wasn't wearing a uniform. She wore a tight tank top and a loose flannel with the sleeves rolled up and the front unbuttoned over a pair of blue jeans and hiking boots. Sookie knew she had a gun on her somewhere, but couldn't speculate as to where.
Well, that's not true. Sookie imagined the handle sticking of her ass, riding up between the cheeks of that ass that all flat-chested women seemed to have that was categorically unfair to better-if-still-modestly endowed women like Sookie. She slowed down to get a peek at it.
"Looking at my ass again?" Linda asked.
"Yes," Sookie said. "I was wondering if you keep your gun there. The handle could fit between those cheeks and nobody would be the wiser."
Linda laughed and lifted her flannel to show a handgun tucked into her belt on her hip. "Sorry to disappoint," she said. "But I kinda need to keep it where I could easily get at it."
Sookie sighed, her pleasant illusion ruined.
They turned left out of the studio gates and walked up the road. Despite the presence of the studio, this was kind of a rough area, so Sookie appreciated having some security as she made the walk. Not that she couldn't handle herself, but she'd learned the hard way that being taken by surprise left her as vulnerable as anyone.
They hadn't gotten more than a half a block before a ragged looking man approached them, reeking of booze and shit. His clothes were filthy and torn and he had a scraggly beard that ranged from a centimeter to three inches long, seemingly at random.
"Spare a dollar?" he asked.
"No," Linda said, stepping forward to catch his attention so Sookie could slip past.
"S'just a dollar, lady. I'll lick your pussy for it!" The man leered at Linda, who didn't blink or flinch, but rather gave him a hard shove back.
"Don't you fucking crowd me, talking shit like that," she said menacingly, taking another step forward to keep him off balance.
"Be respectful," she added with force. The man looked like he wanted to argue, but something in the way she looked or held herself made it clear to him that Linda was not to be trifled with. He stepped back until his back was to the wall of the building behind him and watched as Linda turned and caught back up to Sookie, who was watching the whole thing over her shoulder.
"Fucking Dykes!" the man shouted. "Suck my dick!"
"You'd think that at least one of them would figure out that being aggressive like that doesn't work," Sookie mused.
"It doesn't work on you or me, but that's because we know we could take his head off if he tried to get violent," Linda said. "Most women aren't fighters. They'll give him cash just to get him to stop harassing them."
"Fair enough," Sookie said.
This was a common occurrence. Almost every time Sookie walked to her hotel, at least one homeless person would try to panhandle her. Sometimes, if she had any cash, she'd give them some. Once in a blue moon, one would engender enough sympathy for a good payout, a hundred bucks or so. But most of the time, they struck her as entitled ruffians, living on the street thanks to their own bad decisions and trying to get by on other people's labor.
She knew that was an old-fashioned mindset. She knew a lot of these people would, if they got clean of whatever they were using, sort out their lives and take care of business. She knew that the DCM Group even had a charitable arm who straight up gave condos and large sums of money to many homeless people, who immediately used that gift to get back on their feet. She knew the stats, too.
But this particular area seemed to attract the sort of homeless people whom right-wing motards used as an archetype for all homeless people. Twice, someone from the crew had been assaulted, causing Sookie to declare that she and the stunt coordinator were the only ones allowed to walk to and from the studio.
"I wonder if they're actually even homeless," Linda said, her thoughts echoing Sookie's.
"Me too," Sookie said. "I mean, it's a very poor neighborhood, adjacent to a place where very wealthy people work. There's no rule that says you have to be homeless to panhandle."
Linda nodded. Sookie wondered idly if she'd been following her own logic, or seeking out a belief that made her feel better about judging the people here. She wasn't sure which, really.
The area they moved through got progressively nicer as they continued. They turned the last corner, with three blocks still to go when Sookie saw the next one.
This one was older. he only had about a week's worth of beard on his face, though Sookie could see that it was mostly gray. He wore similar clothes to the other one, the once-vibrant colors having long since faded towards a muted gray tone. His clothes, however, looked cleaner and the holes had all been neatly stitched. As they drew close, Sookie could read his sign.
Please helpLeave a dollar or take a resumeWill work for food
Sure enough, he had a stack of resumes weighted down with a rock next to him. Sookie stopped, intrigued and bent down to retrieve one. She handed the man a folded ten dollar bill at the same time. A reward for creativity in his panhandling, she thought.
She looked at it. The man had a pair of enlistments in the Marine Corps at the top of his work experience. It was back in the early 2000s, and it mentioned Helmand Province, which Sookie recalled had been at the center of a lot of the fighting in Afghanistan.
The next few lines were security companies, starting with a high-end competitor to the Group, and then a long sequence of construction and day-labor work, ending on his current work, which was "Self Employed - Private Investigations". Below that, he had a string of qualifications, including armed security, close protection and bail enforcement.
"This is actually quite a good resume," Sookie told him. She glanced up at the top to get his name, Eric Stephens.
"I'll work," he said hopefully. "I can swing a hammer and do plumbing. I'll do a full day's work for lunch and dinner, or a hundred bucks, whichever you prefer."
Sookie handed the resume to Linda, who looked down at it.
"Ain't much different than mine," she said. "Oorah."
"Oorah," Eric muttered back, seemingly on pure instinct.
"So why are you out here, Eric?" Sookie asked. "Your resume says you're self-employed as a private eye."
Eric shrugged. Sookie noted the redness and swelling of his nose. "Work's been scarce," he said. "Been getting fewer jobs for the last few years. Fewer jobs means less money, less money means losing my office, not being able to afford nice clothes, which leads to fewer jobs."
Sookie looked a question at Linda, who shrugged. "We're always looking for investigators. It can be hard to recruit former cops, and those we do are often old enough not to stay on for more than a few years before retiring."
Sookie smiled and nodded, turning back to Eric. "You want an interview?"
"Hell yeah," he said with some enthusiasm. "As long as they don't mind me looking a little rough around the edges."
"Where do you live?" Sookie asked. Eric gestured around. "Lost my apartment last month," he said. Sookie pursed her lips and then nodded and held out a hand to him.
"Come on, Eric. I'm Sookie, and this is Linda. I'll make you a deal. I'll get you a nice outfit to wear and arrange an interview at the LA office tomorrow. I'll put you up on my couch for the night, too. That way, you can shower and shave and look presentable for it. What do you think?"
Eric took her hand and let her help him up. "Are you serious?" he asked. Sookie nodded.
"Holy crap, thank you, lady. Sookie, I mean. Thank you." His eyes began to get watery. "I don't... I don't even know what to say. That would be amazing."
Sookie smiled, her heart wrenching for the guy. She knew he had a drinking problem, but she also remembered all those people the Group's charities helped. Get someone on their feet, and there was a good chance they'd stay there.
"Do you have stuff to get?"
"I uh... I have a storage shed. It's paid up through the end of the year," he said. "My stuff is safe there, I just need to go get my toiletries."
"Don't worry about that," Sookie said, stepping to the edge of the sidewalk and waiting for the traffic to clear enough to cross the road. "We can stop by a drug store, too."
----
Sookie and Linda took Eric shopping and got him everything he needed. Which wasn't much, really. Sookie had a spare toothbrush, razors, shaving cream and cologne at her hotel room. It was all stuff she kept on hand to be the best slut she could be, and make her dishes du jour feel welcome. They bought him deodorant and an electric beard trimmer, and decided to take a pit stop at a hair and nails salon next to the pharmacy.
The girls there had cooed and gooed over Sookie and Linda helping this man out, and refused to accept any money for the trim he got. Unfortunately, they weren't set up to shave a man (all of the other clients inside were women), but Eric protested that he was perfectly capable of shaving himself, so it all worked out.
The next stop was, at Sookie's insistence, one of the ultra-high-end men's clothing stores near her hotel. Linda had protested that simply taking a car to Walmart would be good enough, but Sookie would have none of that.
"Linda, it's been over six years since I've seen a person in Walmart that I'd be willing to give a handy to. It's been even longer since I've seen any clothing there that looked like it didn't come from Walmart, especially the suits. We're not going to Walmart."
As a result, Eric got fitted for a custom-tailored suit and outfitted with a tie that was a pleasant, deep blue, bespeckled with tiny, god-embroidered Marine Corps logos. He seemed pleased with it, and had to keep wiping his eyes as he repeatedly and profusely thanked her.
When all was done, they finally went to the hotel. Sookie had a full suite on the top floor. It wasn't the biggest suite, but it was close, with two spare bedrooms, a living room and a full kitchen, in addition to a balcony that afforded her a great view of the city (so long as the smog wasn't too bad) and a private elevator to the rooftop pool.
Linda took her usual spot at the door to await her relief for the evening while Sookie showed Eric the large bathroom and made sure he had everything he needed. While he showered and shaved, she decided to review the script.
She walked over to the safe in the living room and carefully punched in her combination on the keypad.
The scripts for The Legend of Jimmy were like solid gold. Every studio out there wanted to get their hands on one, to steal ideas from. Every fan wanted to get one, just for the thrill of knowing what was going to happen next. During the second season's filming, they'd had multiple scripts stolen and leaked, and Sookie had learned to crack down on that. As a result, she was the only one who ever had a full set of scripts for any given season. She kept them safely under lock and key at all times.
She pulled out her working copy, which was different from the 'archive' copy she also kept in the safe. The working copy had all of her handwritten notes on it. She pulled it out, closed the safe back up and locked it, then sat down at the table and flipped open to the scenes they would be filming after the break. Using a red pen, she made notes for herself, things to remember during shooting, like camera angles and notes on the VFX.
She heard the shower turn off, but she was engrossed in her work when the door opened.
"Thanks again," Eric said, causing her to look up. He had a towel around his waist, but Sookie noted that he had a lean torso, with some muscle still there, despite a rough life. Clean shaven now, he looked much better. He'd never get a gig as a model, but he was handsome enough in his own way. Sookie smiled at him.
"You don't have to keep thanking me," she said. "I'm happy to help."
She closed her script and stood, walking it over to the safe. Obscuring her hands with her body, she punched in the code again and placed the script inside. She hadn't yet closed the door when she heard Eric mutter "Oh shit."
She turned to look and froze. He'd turned back towards the bathroom, and then dropped his towel by accident. He was currently in the process of picking it up, affording Sookie a great view of his ass and what might well have been considered a third leg hanging from between the other two.
It came almost to his knees.
A flush of heat went through her, washing away all thoughts of largess and generosity, and kindling a very selfish desire. She heard the spattering on the hardwood floor where she crouched as her usual over-the-top wetness kicked into high gear and soaked through her pants in seconds. She could feel herself throbbing as she eyed Eric's enormous member.
Her disguise slipped and the horns erupted from her head, her tail curled up painfully inside her pants and her skin turned red, with large patches of scales. Operating purely on instinct, she magicked up a veil of mundanity. She didn't want Eric to freak out, and this would keep him from registering her appearance as anything out of the ordinary.
He retrieved his towel and made to wrap it back around his waist, but Sookie shot to her feet and spun, already ripping her shirt off.
"Wait," she said. Eric froze, then turned to look at her over one shoulder. She tossed her shirt on the couch and peeled off her pants. She wasn't wearing any underwear or bra, of course. She never did.
"I just thought of a way you could thank me," she purred, taking a languid step forward. Eric reacted immediately to the sight of her naked, turning, his hog's leg stiffening and rising from its vertical hang slightly.
"Are you, uh... I mean... I'm not..." Eric stammered. Sookie stepped closer to him and put her hands on his shoulder, then ran them down his chest.
"I am damn sure I want to do this, if that's what you're asking," she said, her hands reaching lower as she stepped close enough to press her breasts into his ribs. She took hold of him and felt him grow almost immediately rock hard as he gasped.
"Wow," he said. "This is... This is like something from a porno with a bad script..." he said.
"Uh huh," Sookie said. "And we're about to do the fun parts of it." She pressed her lips into his, and then squealed in delight as he grabbed her by the ass and hoisted her up.
"Where?" he asked into her mouth.
"Pussy, mouth and ass," she replied. She felt the heat rush through his cheeks.
"I meant where in this room," he said.
"I don't fucking care," Sookie responded, lining his huge cock up with her most convenient hole and squirming down onto it with a loud gasp.
----
Sookie awoke the next morning and rolled over to see if Eric was up for a little wake-and-shake. Her hands slapped the empty bed and she pouted.
"Eric?" she called, a wonderful aroma meeting her nose as she did. "Are you making coffee already? I'll fall in love with you, or deepthroat you, your choice, if you are!"
He didn't answer.
She opened her eyes and saw that his new suit was missing. An empty hanger was hooked to the coathanger next to the closet. She climbed out of bed, frowning, and walked out into the living room.
It was empty. She could smell the coffee even stronger, and she walked into the kitchen to find the coffee pot full and a business card sitting next to it. She picked it up and peered at it with sleep-bleary eyes.
"Eric Stephens, Private Investigations, Corporate Espionage, Bail Bonds, Security Consultation," she read out loud. There was a QR code on it, so she picked up her phone from where it had been flung to the floor last night and scanned it. While the page loaded, she glanced in the bathroom to see Eric's old clothes still piled there.
She glanced at her phone to see a very clean-shaven and well-dressed Eric smiling at the camera at the top of a very tastefully designed web page. She scrolled through it for a moment, confused.
That was, until she looked to her own pile of clothes by the safe and saw the door still hanging open. With a gasp, she rushed over only to find the safe empty. Both of her scripts were gone!
"Shit!" she shouted.
The door opened and a large, muscular man dressed like a lawyer rushed in, a gun in hand.
"Miss Ohma, is everything all right?" he asked after scanning the room and peering through the open doors.
"No," Sookie wailed. "I just got my scripts stolen!"
"The gentleman who left this morning?" her guard asked. She nodded. "I'm so sorry, Miss Ohma. I would have stopped him if I knew."
"No, you did fine," Sookie said as her eyes filled with frustrated tears. "You're used to men heading out in the morning. Usually they do it after I wake up and we can get another good fuck in, but still... You didn't do anything wrong."
"He left a note," the guard said. "I saw it taped to the inside of the door." Sookie looked over and saw a folded piece of paper taped there. She stalked over and ripped it down, sniffling angrily and wiping at her eyes to read it.

Dear Sookie, 

Last night was probably the best night I've had in my life. It's certainly the best night I can remember. If you ever want to do it again, just let me know. I left you a card by the coffee machine, and there's a full pot for you, as well. If you don't ever want to see me again, well, I guess I understand. I'm sorry to have left the way I did, but I'm a man of my word, and my client was willing to pay a lot of money for that script. I hope this doesn't hurt you too much. For what it's worth, I'm sorry if I upset you. Wishing you all the best, Eric
Sookie crumbled up the paper and angrily threw it across the room.
"Motherfucker!" she shouted. The guard winced, but said nothing.
"He scammed me," Sookie said. "Got a nice new suit out of me, seduced me with that redwood growing between his legs and then ran off with my fucking scripts!"
She let her claws form and dug them into her thighs, carving bloody furrows that healed almost as fast as she made them. The guard started and rushed over.
"Ma'am, please," he said. "I'm not supposed to let you hurt yourself."
Sookie let him pull her hands up to her chest. She leaned into him for a moment. "You're married, aren't you?" she said.
"Uh, no," he said. Sookie turned her head to regard him. She didn't recognize him. "What's your name?"
"Devin, Ma'am," he said. "Devin Iglesias. This is my first shift on your detail."
"Who put you on this shift?"
"Uhh, Missus Williams. She said I'd enjoy this detail, and I agreed. I'm a huge fan of your show, Miss Ohma."
"Are you gay?" Sookie asked. Devin blinked. "Uh, no, Ma'am."
Sookie smiled. "I need you to do two things," she said.
"The second, and most important thing, I need you to call the office and ask for any information they have on a private investigator named Eric Stephens who works out of LA."
Devin nodded. "Yes, ma'am. And the first thing?"
Sookie smiled wider. "I need you to find out the real reason why Inanna thought you'd enjoy this posting."

Hello,
Adult experienced team here looking for more players to join us this wipe and for future wipes if it goes well, we mainly play US Eastern 2x Vanilla. 95% of the group is over 25, most over 30 with jobs, married, kids etc. We usually go hard from Thursday-Monday, and then take a few days off to recharge. Good amount of work from home in this group, helps defend the base from offlines. We can achieve up to 15 players, but usually we average 4-8 on at a time. Most of us have been playing together 1-2 years or more.
Just be productive and easy to get along with is all we ask. You can bring your friends, but you must vouch for them. If you specialize in building/farming/pvping/electrical those are pluses, but not req. Pvping means you play the rest of the game, and not just lose kits you didn't farm. No game bans or vac bans here.
We will take new players and teach you the game, so don’t feel like you can’t contribute. You may experience constructive criticism, so if you can’t handle that, this isn’t for you, we are here for fun, not drama. Yes I have had to remove 40 year old men from the group.
Add me on discord Gunster#1334 and we can chat. Send me a message referencing this post, I get a lot of spam. If you just add me as a friend without context, I will not respond.
Thanks

As the title states- Broke up with my GF after 3 years. I think I regret it.
I (26m) dated my girlfriend (26f) for slightly over 3 years. I broke up with her a few days ago, but I think I regret it.
For context: her and I started dating very soon after a break up I had with my ex. Right as we made it official, she moved back home which was about 2.5 hours away from where I live currently. Essentially, we’d been long distance ever since day 1. This was a burden on our relationship, but we made it work very well by going back and forth between cities, essentially every weekend. Also, I am looking for a new position in my company, which would actually require me to move to the city she is located (hopefully within a year), helping alleviate all the concerns/ headache of being in a long distance relationship.
Other than distance being a burden, there are a couple of major topics we weren’t in line with— marriage and kids. I had never wanted either of them, especially kids, and had always been up-front and honest about it when discussed. Even from the beginning, I was transparent, but we fell in love so hard and fast where we had a “figure it out later” mentality. When it comes to marriage, I’ve really grown to consider the idea more and more as our relationship evolved, and could confidently say that in a couple years time, I would marry her. The only reason it wasn’t sooner was because I’d like to live together or in close vicinity before doing so (which she understood).
Now for the reason of the breakup: children. I’ve never wanted kids as noted below, and wholeheartedly feel as if I would deeply regret having them for the sake of a relationship. She’s always made me feel comfortable and confident about how we could accomplish it together, but I still have my worries. For the last few months, we’ve talked more and more about “our” future. Living in the same city, buying land to build a house, traveling more. But as these conversations came up, I always found a dead end because what comes next after all of that- Kids. Conversations would either die there, or result in us talking about our differences when it comes to children, making a happy conversation turn depressing really quick.
Now, in the last couple of months, I’ve had panic attacks while laying in bed regarding our difference on the topic. I’d stress about wasting her time, or whether or not I do actually not want kids, or if we stay together and just figure it out later as we always have done. Typically, I can handle stress and internal conflict by myself and really well, but this time I couldn’t. I met up with her a few nights ago and broke it off. I was really transparent on the reason and the internal struggle I was going through. She took it as expected; hard. During the break up, I was more calm than expected. Afterwards, though, I was a complete mess for hours.
Now, I feel like I regret my decision. Some of my thoughts:
-I may change my mind on wanting children. I’m only 26 for gods sake. My strong feelings of not wanting them could just be because I’m young and want to explore other aspects of life first. I’d love to hear of other peoples experiences who have felt this same way.
-I’m worried I ruined a good thing rather than let us figure things out later.
-she really is my biggest fan and biggest supporter. Not even my family shows the excitement and support for my accomplishments. I love everything about her in that way, and it’s meant more to me than I can ever explain.
-everything feels like it has less of a purpose now. Work, travel, summers, food, buying a house- it all feels like nothing without her. I don’t have any motivation to accomplish anything.
Overall, I just miss her. I miss us. I just don’t know what to do at this point, and do not want to go back to her without full confidence of wanting to be together with this difference, but don’t know if I’ll ever have that until I figure out whether I truly do or do not want children. I’m so torn.
I need advise: do I wait to figure out whether I truly do not want kids before trying to go back to her?
Anyways. Just wanted to vent. Sorry for any format errors- I’m typing this on my iphone slumped on my desk at work…

Hello there! I am a remote worker offering my services as a Virtual Assistant. With my skills and experience, I can assist you with various tasks to lighten your workload. Here is a list of tasks I can help you with:

• Data entry: I can efficiently handle data entry tasks, ensuring accuracy and attention to detail.
• Transcribing: I am proficient in transcribing audio and video files into written documents.
• Translating (English <-> Spanish): I am fluent in both English and Spanish and can assist with translations between these languages.
• QA Testing: I have experience in quality assurance testing to help ensure your products or services meet high standards.
• Social Media Management: I can manage your social media accounts, create content, schedule posts, and engage with your audience.
• Email Management: I can handle your email correspondence, organize your inbox, and respond to inquiries.
• Live Chat Support: I am skilled in providing real-time customer support through live chat platforms.
• Web Research: I can conduct thorough research on various topics and provide you with well-organized summaries.
• SEO: I have knowledge of search engine optimization techniques to help improve your website's visibility.
• Technical and Customer Support: I can assist your customers with technical issues or general inquiries.
• Dropshipping Knowledge: I am familiar with dropshipping and can help you manage your dropshipping business.
• Any other work: If you have any other tasks not mentioned above, feel free to discuss them with me.

Here is a list of software I am proficient in:

• Shopify, Aliexpress, Oberlo: I can assist you with managing your online store, product sourcing, and order fulfillment.
• Zendesk: I can efficiently handle customer support tickets and provide excellent service.
• WordPress, WooCommerce: I have experience in managing WordPress websites and setting up online stores using WooCommerce.
• Slack, Skype: I am comfortable using these communication tools to collaborate with you and your team.
• Word, Excel: I can create and edit documents, spreadsheets, and reports using these Microsoft Office tools.
• Google Docs, Sheets: I am familiar with Google's productivity suite and can work on documents and spreadsheets online.
• Asana, Harvest: I can use these project management tools to stay organized and track tasks.
• Zopim: I have experience using Zopim live chat software to provide real-time support.

If you are interested in any of the services I offer or have any questions, please send me a personal message. My rate is $15 USD per hour, and I am dedicated to delivering high-quality work to help you succeed.
Thank you, and I look forward to working with you!
CV: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KbHH7s-0W9TppG9H3ilXi0-vCcdSU201/view?usp=sharing