Don't Blame Me! - DBM: Moving To Find Love

Episode Date: August 29, 2024

This week Meghan and Melisa are giving advice on: Update: Repairing a friendship (August 8, 2024) Maintaining a friendship with someone who doesn't text you back Feuding with your sister-in-law Dating in a rural area Becoming a guardian to your cousin Don't Blame Them: Bleeding On Your Wedding Day (August 15, 2024) Follow Us! instagram.com/meghanandmelisa @meghanrienks instagram.com/meghanrienks https://twitter.com/meghanrienks @sheisnotmelissa instagram.com/sheisnotmelissa instagram.com/diamondmprint.productions Need Advice? dontblameme.show Domestic Listeners Call: [phone] Affordable Therapy By State (Curated by Crissy Milazzo): tinyurl.com/y64kwdnf Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to a brand new episode of Don't Blame Me, where we, two wonderful, amazing people, give you wonderful, amazing, life-changing advice because we must share the wealth. And you might be wondering how we're qualified to give such advice. And to that I say, what we lack in credentials we make up for big opinions he goes the big oh so we're making it melissa and uh you can also watch the video version of this podcast on patreon you can see melissa deep throating a banana a chocolate covered banana yeah boy yeah you actually can i was kidding before but now you actually can see that so yeah it's a little chode and yeah so we're gonna give you advice uh also on that same

patreon you can join our live streams we have twice a month they are very fun and it's a good old time a great way for you to support the show and you might be like this is my first time here why would i support the show well because we're so confident you don't like to support women period but like women in stim women in media small women-owned business okay that's big hater behavior keep listening maybe just hate watch us through the patreon as well we'll take it we'll take it a dollar is a dollar i don't mean one dollar i just mean money is money big money bags and the price that it's at now probably only lasting a month later you know how every other subscription service that you're on is going up in price if you don't

get in now these prices are gone forever inflation baby so you can call into the show you can also right into the show for writing in you can send us an email to meganpodcast at gmail.com or you can dm us over on our instagram and then for the audio messages you can leave us a voicemail at 310-694-0976 or international listeners you can send us an audio message and just email that to meganpodcast at gmail.com so for everything you have to be 18 or over have your parents permission and we do ask that you include your age it's all anonymous so don't have to include your name you create fake names for everybody involved in the story and just give us as many details as possible for the audio version keep it under three minutes and for the written version under 300 words

and we ask that you either practice if you're nervous if you're like reading it out loud just practice reading out loud a couple times you don't have to do it like off the top of your head you can like plan it out and that's it right that is it megan good job without further ado shall we change some lives let's do it we've got a small little update though this is someone that was uh ghosted by their best friend and this is their friend that They were always had more money, went to, quote unquote, a better school, stuff like that. And then the writer started doing better than them and their friend ghosted them. So they wrote in and said, I wanted to thank you for answering my submission.

Your advice really helped me see this from a different perspective and left me feeling reassured. I'll keep you updated if I make contact with her again. my boyfriend and i are about to get engaged so who knows if i'll invite her to the wedding i say invite her because it really rubs things in and she might send you a good present you don't have to interact with her okay what were you gonna say don't invite her to the wedding i feel like she'll cry in like a not nice way like it's supposed to be me great i love it yeah see i like to revel in people's misery that's that's that's also fair all right let's get into the first one hey megan and melissa how can i maintain a friendship when a person rarely responds to

my text messages for days i 26 female been friends with sarah 26 female since grade 11 i would consider her a close friend over the years i felt like her ability to text back has gotten worse when we were in university she wouldn't text back for weeks after i reached out made me not want to bother even reaching out now i feel like i'm always the one sending texts even just to ask how she is and she doesn't respond for days or when she responds she ignores whatever I said in my texts and focuses on topics related to her. She only starts a conversation with me when she needs something or wants a last minute hangout that same day because she assumes I must be free. My family thinks I should stop talking to her but personally I can't stop

thinking about it. Recently I wished her good luck on her upcoming job interview because she just graduated from grad school and to have a safe flight for an upcoming trip and she never responded. The thing that made me mad about the situation was when she posted on social media a photo from her trip, but couldn't respond to my text. I'm not sure if I should confront her because she got into a fight with a cousin about the same problem and now they aren't talking. When we hang out in person, things are fun, but I feel like she never acknowledges or says sorry for not texting back. So it just feels like she doesn't care. What should I do? Should I just accept that this is how our friendship will always be? Thank you. My answer is kind of simple. That's

like, yeah, like it's, it's one of those things that like, you know, seeing those TikToks about low maintenance versus high maintenance friends i'm not a good texter and sure as not i was gonna say uh i know this from experience yeah but i've also never been a good texter like i'm not like a i'm a better texter with you than other people but like i'm not a good texter and so i think for people when they're on the receiving end of it you assume that it's like oh i'm not that important but it's like unless you were being treated massively differently than other people that is just how she communicates and like I have friends who are like that and like I'm also like that and there are times where you know someone doesn't respond to what I say and I can

be like oh shit is something wrong or whatever but then there's other times where I'm like I forget that I sent that message or whatever but I think like I would without a doubt understand understand if that is like so not how you roll friendship wise that you would not want to have and maintain a friendship like that like that's totally fine same thing for me like if I need to respond to things that aren't necessarily I mean I'll need follow-ups if I need to respond to something that's pressing like there are things I will just like miss but if that is like a prerequisite for us to maintain our relationship I'm not going to be able to to do that and so I think like I I think it would be insane for me to say like don't take

it personally because you either do or you don't and I think if it's how she is with everybody it is factually not personal but that doesn't mean it doesn't hurt your feelings or it doesn't mean that that's like the a friendship you should maintain like you're totally entitled to want to have friendships that feel reciprocated in that same way and I would never fault anybody for like pulling away from me because i'm not a good texter you know i mean like it's like i'm so aware of that about me and like i require you know low maintenance friendships and like even though we talk all the time i would consider our friendship also like low maintenance in the sense that like we're compatible people as just like we don't have to go out of our way

to like you know what I mean like we don't do our way to find things in common or stuff to talk about or whatever like we just like we live life very similarly and so we can exist parallelly together like parallel parallel we can exist parallel together and then I have other friends we're like we're not like so the same but our friendship is still low maintenance because we don't keep up with each other all the time and I think you and I keep with each other the most because we're very similar and like we're watching again watching the same things or whatever it is we obviously work together but i i think like it's totally valid to not want to have a friendship like this but i don't think you can change her yeah i totally agree with this because like

me and avia text like all day long and that's our friendship me and you we send we batch send text messages yep and then it might be a couple days but like there is never anything important it's just like here's something that i saw we'd follow up then we follow up yeah but like we also spend hours together all thursday so like that's when we get our like quality talking time in and then like another friend like samantha like she's probably the person that i see the most in person but we rarely text and then like there's other friends where like Allison will text me but like she goes to bed super early so and then she keeps her phone on just for emergencies and stuff so I know like I can't text her after a certain time and then sometimes I'll forget to text her but

then I respond to all the text messages because I'm trying to be mindful of her you know sleep schedule but then like responding to text messages so I think like there's just different relationships with people but if she's not giving you anything like all the time like she just counts on you as a last minute hang and doesn't check in on you that's a bad friend but like if she if you're just basing that just on text messages like responding to i don't i don't think we're supposed to have this much communication with people that we have now it used to be like you know people were just making a phone call once a week or if that or like before that writing letters and now it's just like instant communication so you expect instant communication

all the time but like people have stuff to do and it's hard to really commit to a full conversation in a text message yeah i would say like if when you guys are together is that time valuable is does it seem like like it actually like feels good to be around her or is it just you putting so much into your friendship and she's giving you nothing that's how I would look at it so yeah those are that's my two cents on that yeah I would just contrast it with how she behaves with other people because even the same thing of like a last minute plan thing if it's about you and she doesn't do that with other people and you are not a priority there then like yeah to me I'm like that's not worth it at all but if it's just like she's not a big communicator she's not a big

planner but when you see each other it's like no time has passed and like you're having so much fun and it's great and like she's a last minute hang kind of person i'm not really a last minute hang kind of person and like i have friends who are like very much like hey we're gonna do something like tonight do you want to come and i'm like uh uh uh uh that stresses me out and then they'll be like okay no then they learn that about me and then we will make better plans in the future so i think like i don't think you necessarily have to just like accept the friendship as is but i think like there are compromises in the sense of like, if you're not someone who likes a last minute hangout, then let her know that and just be like, let's plan ahead. And then you take on

more of like the planning aspect of it. But I think it's very fair to feel some type of way about this. And I think in those circumstances, it's always better to remove yourself from the situation before you just grow to resent that person, because then you're just both gonna end up hurting each other a lot more but if you can like accept it and it's just like who they are and how they are it's very much a big adhd trait it's not always that but like there i have friends who have adhd and then i have friends who don't and like my friendships with them and as i'm with adhd my friendships with them are very different than my friendships with like neurotypical people and that's okay and sometimes i also think when we're kind of going through a friendship with a

fine-tooth comb that we're not sure if we want to end it or not and we really like them or whatever that is but they're not giving us everything we need similarly it's like Melissa said about I don't think we should be in contact like this quick of a communication with everybody all the time I I don't think we can rely on one person as a friend like there we there needs you need to have a well-rounded social friend life and that doesn't have to be hanging out in person that can be like you have a friend who you text with all the time in that I always think of like a friend can't be everything they can't check off every single box for you and the same way that you can can't do that for a friend so sometimes it's incompatibility and sometimes it's just

you need to broaden that circle of people which i'll be the first to admit hard to do if you can't accept it that's okay and if you can't accept it that doesn't mean you're like a pushover anything and you can always reevaluate the situation if like more things come to light or like behaviors turn a certain way or whatever so yeah shall we go on to the next let's take a break we're gonna take a break and we'll be right back All right. We're back from our break. I'm Magna Melissa. I'm writing and seeking advice on spending quality time with people you don't want to. For me, this has to do with my husband's brother's wife, your sister-in-law. We have children who are two months apart and it's

important to me to see my niece and my son to see his cousin. For so many reasons, I do not want to be around my sister-in-law. She has done some objectively hurtful things to me over the years and the single time she apologized, she lied about having a very serious medical condition to justify her behavior. She told us a month later that she definitely did not have that medical condition and under a year later posted on her Instagram story that she actually had no reason to even think she ever could have. We've tried limiting contact in person over the phone and on social media. I still feel icky for not bucking up and dealing with her more for the sake of my niece and my husband's family. I feel like I'm overreacting and holding a grudge. We do see

each other, but it's not very frequent considering we only live 35 minutes away. If I do see her, I feel resentful. And if I don't, I feel guilty. It's like I can't win. Do you have any advice on how to approach this differently p.s my sister-in-law and i are both therapists wow the face you made just made me laugh um my refs not to you but your therapist to her yeah lying about having a medical condition and you're a therapist is wild lying about medical condition period is wild but adding that on here's the thing children can pick up on energy and if she has a bad energy and then also you don't like being around her the children will know the only way i could see that this worked

was if like y'all had play dates where you dropped one off at the other but i don't think you want to drop your kid off to her. So it's going to be unbalanced and unfair either way. But if you do want your kids to have a relationship, then you're just going to have to bite the bullet and be around her and just know that this person isn't a friend. It's just somebody that you're related to through marriage and they're just around. And in order for your kids to have a relationship, then you just have to deal with her and there's really nothing else that can be done because she's a liar and she broke your trust yeah and she apologized and didn't actually mean it yeah I mean I don't know what your family size is or like what your experience with extended family is

but very rarely are cousins incredibly close if they're parents who are siblings or sister-in-law brother-in-law whatever if that is a really like rocky and uh tumultuous relationship so i think that like i don't want to say like it's i kind of i'm saying this that it's kind of like you it might just be a pointless endeavor so i i mean in the sense of like you feeling like guilty like what do you feel why do you feel guilty like what is that guilt serving you for like what is the purpose of it is it that your kid you know he like loves you said son i think yeah son and niece like you know he loves spending time with his cousin or is it that like you feel like a cultural or um a familial obligation that this is how you spent your time that you really loved your cousins

and you love spending time with them so i would ask yourself like where is that coming from like where is that sense of like obligation and like what's that guilt stemming from because really quickly i think we can find that if you're if you are wanting your kid to have a relationship like you had with your cousins I'm gonna bet that the the adults weren't having the same relationship you were having with your sister-in-law and so sometimes like the cards are just you're just dealt a different hand like sometimes like it's just a different shit that you're working with and you're 35 minutes away I don't know how often you see them like because you said like it's not we don't see them as often as like we should but they're gonna be close or they're not and I think

if they're gonna be close it will be in spite of the fact that you don't get along and it's not gonna be because you spent a bunch of time together i think like melissa's right i think you're probably the more time you spend with her like sacrificing your peace i think most likely that will be it'll be detrimental to their relationship as cousins like i don't think it's going to be a net positive for that also because like that affects your mental health And like, that's not a good mindset for you to be a parent. And then I think ultimately, the other question I would have is like, do you trust her as a parent? Like, do you trust her parenting? Because I don't know if, like Melissa said, would you trust her? like you don't drop your kid off and like have like a play date or i don't know if there's any other family members in the picture or if they're going to be going to the same school or whatever

anything like that and like yeah is it something where you could essentially have a third a third place or something like that so it's not you going over there her coming to your home or whatever that is like what's she like on outings like is there a way that there are things that are better for that? Or is she better in larger groups of people? Are you able to diffuse it that way? Because it sounds like this might be like slightly more intimate family gatherings where it's like you and your partner are going over to her and her partner's house for dinner. That might be too fucking much. Maybe it's you take the kids to see a play in the park. Maybe you go to the zoo. Maybe you do stuff out there so you don't really have to focus on that relationship with her.

or you invite her along to something you're doing with your friends and their kids. So like, I think it's really, really hard to suck it up because it sounds like you've wanted to. It doesn't sound like you want to hold this resentment and animosity towards her. And I think if you are still doing that right now and like you can't let that go,

I think you need to be in a different environment with her if you're going to still choose to be with her because like that's not going to change. It's not just like going to grow out of it. you're gonna it's gonna build resentment builds because you also want to have a relationship with your niece too and you can't I don't think you can have a relationship with your niece if you still have that animosity towards her yeah I mean I can say that like confidently that like there are family members that I don't have there are other like but like as a kid I didn't have

much of a relationship with because of how they felt about a parent and like it wasn't even my choice or my call to that but like at a certain point you have to understand too that like your sister-in-law might not suck it up and like deal with it for the sake of the kids so I think you do need to look out for yourself in that situation and your kid by proxy so it's just wallowing it and like to me also it's not really a great lesson to teach a kid that like you should be around somebody who you dislike or who's disrespectful or whatever because you should so that to me is like if you're gonna still see her and spend time with her often i think it needs to be not intimately yeah i'm really curious about how she feels about you

you know like would she be would she feel like completely shocked and taken aback like would she described to like a third party you're not there how would she describe your relationship because to me I would find it exponentially like I don't I could not fucking deal with someone who like I really disliked and clearly they could point to the evidence of all of the shit that we've gone through and like how they've been a bad person someone I don't align with or whatever and if they were fully like no we're awesome like we're totally good we're great that to me there's not much to work on there versus someone who's like we've yeah like you know we kind of have some tension that is like a tangible thing we could actually both agree on and we could then

work on it but if we have completely different ideas of the reality that to me is like a scale it back and like give yourself six months or give yourself a year of scaling back on how often you see them and see how much see how you feel about it and like see if you are in a better mental health space or whatever guilt and resentment shouldn't be your only two options of how you feel eventually one of those things will expire and i think it's usually guilt because you usually you at some point you either change your mind and then you go back on it so you don't feel guilty about it or that guilt goes away because your suspicions are confirmed or whatever like it's a self-fulfilling prophecy that you're like oh no i'm actually relieved so that's probably what i would choose

yeah yeah wait out the guilt okay all right uh let's go to the next one hey megan hey melissa i should start off by saying that i'm 30 and i'm a female cis female and basically i just want some advice on dating in a rural area i'm from like kind of farm town in upstate new york i'm like three hours away from two major cities Boston and New York City but I'm far and it's just hard to find someone who matches my vibe up here in farm town but basically I'm an artist I studied art in college and I pursued art pretty eventually like after my years in college I went to LA for a few years to learn more about art animation and kind of work myself up a little bit to getting an internship with Netflix animation and just doing all these really fun things now I'm

kind of more independent and I'm writing a graphic novel and I teach like some weekends at my local library how to draw and stuff to these kids so yeah I'm pretty entrepreneurial and I'm pretty go-getter especially about things I'm passionate about and I kind of would like to find that in another person as well they don't have to be creative but you know just thinking outside the box is something that I value and I'm just not finding it here I've been trying to do things I like in this area like trying to find more artist groups up here but it's mostly older men and I'm not about that life I go to the gym a lot because that's something I like to do and you know I just try to get out there but it's just hard out here and I'm not really finding what I want I'm wondering

if I should move I like how slow life is but in terms of like dating I just want something more and I want to I want to be able to go to events that I would have fun in you know but does it make sense to move somewhere just to have better dating options i don't know because everything else is going okay you know um i just don't know if it's feasible but what are you guys's thoughts have you ever dealt with this before it's really hard when you're in such a rural area you know thanks i appreciate any advice love the show and can't wait to hear from you bye until you said you're like i don't know like should i move somewhere for this you should know that the first thing i wrote down was have you heard of vermont woodstock and jam yeah like it's olivia

jam exactly just run away to vermont or also like beacon new york are you familiar love that i don't think it's crazy to move to find someone to date at all because i don't think so eliza like especially in I think we've got like a good outlook on that like in Los Angeles the vibe of someone who lives on the east side versus someone who lives on the west side are like two completely different fucking people and so like if that's not you're not finding your type there you know I don't even necessarily think that you have to go far to find that or to like kind of get in that vibe but like there are some places and some cities and specifically some small towns that are next to impossible to date unless you're like cool with incest and like you're not cool with

older men so i'm gonna guess you're also not cool with incest and to that i say here here neither am i me none of the above so like i'm just like you know i think like you've got like a really good thing going and like you seem to be i like having a go-getter attitude and like thinking outside the box and being creative and all of that like you've lived other places you've done a lot of other stuff you can move somewhere to like see what the vibe is like see what dating is like there and you also don't have to settle down there like I don't think it's necessarily a permanent decision or a permanent place but if you are not finding dating to be successful where you are and I don't just mean like oh I went out with a guy and he like didn't or whoever I went with a person

and they didn't like text me back that to me is different than there's no there's no dating pool there's like not really any options not that like oh I've tried these options and I've gone out with a couple people but like you know we broke up or it didn't work out like I think if you've not had success in dating there at all I don't think it's gonna be a hallmark movie and some like random person's gonna show up one day and be like exactly your right type like it takes trial and error and it takes a bit of bad dates and failed dates and like dating people and having there be no connection in order to find your person. And I think if the pool is super fucking small, you probably will end up putting up a lot with a lot more bullshit from someone because it

feels like that's the option. Like it doesn't feel like there's as many there. So I'm a big believer in like, not settling and like casting away wider net. And it doesn't have to be permanent. Like I used to not think I would ever stay in LA for a long period of time, like or permanently, like I used to be like no and like I love LA now like I love it and like that was a big change but I also know people who have like met their partners and wherever they lived and then they left and they moved or you know whatever it's just not things aren't just going to like suddenly appear and if you're putting the work in and you're not seeing the results I think of it like the same way that you would if you're looking on a job search you'd move or you'd like cast a wider

or not yeah I mean dating is hard wherever you are but when your options are severely limited then that just makes it that much harder and I think that there are slower artist communities that you can be a part of that have a younger vibe to it it would just take some research to get out there and figure out where those places are or the places that Megan suggested but I don't think it's weird to move for a better dating pool at all because that just there's different neighborhoods have different vibes and the neighborhood you're in right now it's not your dating vibe also have you considered long distance dating is that something you're interested in because it might it might be like you find somebody that you actually like like like and

then you move to that area but with that then it's like you're moving there just for them and then if y'all break up then what is life like then and you've moved around a lot it's not like this is just like yeah this is the place that you've ended up for now I don't think you said why you were specifically there for right now but if if you have the ability just to to move somewhere else then I say go for it this has this doesn't have to be the place that you are really like settled to it can just be one of the many steps that you've had along the way yeah and you don't have to like get a new lease like you could do something like you're right now you said you're doing a lot of independent work and like if you're three hours away from Boston and New York I'm gonna assume

you're not working in the city in during the week so to me I'm like you might be you could probably like go get an air like do a short-term thing for a month in a place and like see if you like it like right there and like thinking of it as like a creative endeavor of not just is dating better in this city but like right now that aspect of your life might have just outgrown where you are and I would recommend in general for people who are like in their 30s 20s and 30s looking to like date, be at least be, I would say within 30 minutes of a college, like somewhere where it is like a bigger city, not because you're going to date people who are in college, but just in general, you'll around that area, it's not going to be family homes, it's going to be more apartments,

you're going to have more people who are younger, and it's a more affordable area. But if you're in a place where it's like, just mom and pop businesses, just very established workers like that like you need a place that has some turnover you have some people who are moving there for a new job or they've left college and they're like starting out there like that's why LA and New York are such great like places to have a variety of different kinds of people maybe it's not it's not the easiest socially but no place is it's just a bigger pool so I just wouldn't recommend the suburbs to trying to find someone today unless you're like looking to get set up from like nancy next door is gonna set you up with her family member or like there i don't know but

whoever whatever you're into there's also a lot of like artist residency programs where you can go live for a couple months and like go to scotland a community and hang out with like other artists do your art they pay for everything so i would look into stuff like that that could be fun for now yeah I get emails about those all the time and I just I don't work in a way that that is conducive to that stuff but like if I did then I would love to do that yeah like go somewhere where you can like travel when you're also there like I think like your like attitude and like lifestyle and everything like that it leans itself to I'm not going to say like being a nomad or it ever but like you know trying out some other places and not feeling pressured or tied down to

like make a commitment to a place and you can always go back to the place that you're at like if you love it there and like it's amazing and you love it like that's great but sometimes like we can have all these other boxes for our life like checked off and we've got a couple left that we're like I need to get this done and turns out I don't have don't have the supplies to get this done here let me accomplish this and then circle back to like where i am here so yeah things aren't always like as close by or fall into our lap as easily and you as someone who seemed pretty ambitious in um career and creative endeavors wise like dating it can be like writer's block whatever like you just have to get out of your own way and sometimes like the way the issue is

where you're at right so it doesn't be permanent but i'm a big supporter of this and like i'm really seeing you in like scotland i love scotland it's getting very like scotland or ireland very much i don't know where you are though in between three hours from boston three hours from new york because at first i thought you're gonna be in jersey what's three hours each way i'll look it up later so we're not like boxing you even though i don't think it would be i think i think things are gonna look up you seem cool too you're well traveled you're well versed you're an artist like i think things are going to be great for you and my final advice is if you are in a farm in pennsylvania i don't even care where you're gonna have to move you know why specifically

the farmland in pennsylvania it's so vast like i it's someone who grew up going like there's so i also lived in pennsylvania oh i was gonna say you just have like i'm thinking like you're so far from if you're in farmland pennsylvania you're not three hours and they didn't say three hours from philly or three hours from pittsburgh to me they're like so far far far away and like amish no we said older guys so i guess you didn't specifically say amish men but like to me it would be like i'm so close i can taste it like if i'm in vermont and like i'm like oh and that would be a hard place to leave but if you're in like a farm in pennsylvania i'm like okay let's just go come on you can that'll always be there you're not fighting for woodstock real

estate you know yeah I do love the farms though and I love Pennsylvania all right we're gonna take a break. We're back from our break and we're going to get into the last ones. Hi, Megan and Melissa. I'm 24 years old, and I'm cast gender, so any and all pronouns are welcome. The people I'm going to be talking about are my cousin Irene, my Aunt Sarah, Irene's mom, and Ashley, Irene's half-sister and Aunt Sarah's daughter from a previous marriage. My mom made me aware today that aunt sarah is making a will and my name is in the mix for guardianship over irene If something were to happen to her and gave me a heads up that she'll probably call to ask There would be money involved, but that would obviously go towards irene Irene is 14 years old has down syndrome and is developmentally delayed because she has down syndrome

She did get leukemia but is in remission and is fine for now while I do love and adore irene and I know she loves me too. I don't know if I would be the best fit for her and provide her the support that she deserves. If I say no, it's possible she'll be given to Ashley. Ashley is open about her dislike for Irene because Irene was allowed to do all the activities Ashley herself was not allowed to do as a child and she holds resentment towards Irene. There is about a 20 year age gap between them so they were never close. It's most likely Ashley would just put her in a group home and keep any money given to her if you're wondering where my uncle is and all of this he had a stroke about 10 years ago and has been on disability ever since so he's in no

condition to take care of irene i don't know what i should do and how to respond to my aunt i've decided a long time ago to be child free however i'm not opposed to being a godparent or guardian I do have a decent job and I own my own house so I do have the space for her I just want what's best for her any advice would be appreciated thank you sorry this is wild to just be like hey heard through the grapevine family members making a will and they're putting you as a guardian for like that's like not that that's like not something you tell other people that's like a guilt trip where you tell other people before you tell that person so that person feels that's why you're stressing out this was the intention yeah and it's also not

something you just tell somebody something you have a conversation with them about yeah and did you even say that you are the godparent like what was a godparent like established i know there's like more like ceremonial godparents that's not actually if something were to happen to the parents who that kid would necessarily go to but they're the people who might facilitate who that who you would go to if it's not them and like is your aunt not well like where is this coming from because I think truthfully I think like a 24 year old and a 14 year old that's not that's an next to impossible age difference to exert any sort of like parental authority and also like not maybe depends on how you were raised in the sense like that you really feel a sense of

like you're so much older but that's not who i would think of is like a 24 year old to be like oh let me do give them custody of you know i mean like it's just it seems like it you said it maybe i wonder if it is because you have a house and you have a you could i mean i think it ultimately boils down to like what you said you just want what's best for her and like what do you think's best for her and like you're allowed to say that you don't think it's you and also you're allowed to say that you think she would be better in xyz or whatever like it doesn't have to be that you know i also am curious about what's this timeline like are there might be other options but i don't know what the timeline of this is because right now yeah it does seem like those

are your those the options but what's what's coming like what's happening like what why are we dealing with this right now right and then also like what does being her uh guardian entail is that something that you're willing to take on is it like full time where you would this would be your job or is it something that because i mean i'm guessing i mean she's right now she's 14 so of course she's somebody's with her at all times in the day but like what happens when she's older what goes into that because like my mom's sister had cerebral palsy and bipolar and it there's a lot that went into taking care of her and that wasn't something that one person could do there were points in life where she would be at her home which was

um next to my grandmother's house and with her husband who also um had some developmental issues and so like my grandmother was the primary caregiver for both of them but it got to the point where my grandmother was too old that she couldn't really take care of her and then like it was too much for anyone to take care of her on their own so she was in a full-time facility but like it was a great facility there were there were other people that were like her and she was able to like cultivate friendships and things so like is that an option if that's not something that you want not like where she's just put into like a group home but there's a facility that would be better for her to be in that situation also Irene doesn't know the scope

of what she needs into an adulthood so I think like it's a very precarious agreement because like first of all, I don't know if she's sick. It's just like if anything were to happen or, you know, whatever, like that's very up in the air. And also a lot of those contracts are not necessarily like super legally buying. Like it's just shit happens.

Like life happens, things change. And like you might have that guardianship. Like Melissa said, guardianship doesn't... There can be many different definitions, legal definitions of what guardianship is. And you can also outline that in a will of like what you want that to mean and what you want that to be.

But I think that this is a really... wild assumption on your aunt's part to put you on there and I also like to me this is giving friends of mine I have who are like financially well off who once they started making money and doing really well from for themselves they were being asked to be a godmother by everyone and it was like oh you you know you want and even at that moment it wasn't necessarily like oh if something were to happen to me I want my kid to be loaded but it'd be like oh they're gonna give really great gifts they're gonna be like they're gonna do all this kind of stuff and so like if you don't feel like it's coming from a place of you would be the right fit and that's what your

aunt thinks if you're feeling it's coming from a place of oh she's financially stable and secure and she has a house so like she's fine with that that to me is not someone who's doing accurate vetting for like the most important things of it as well as like the half sister as well and like i would yeah i would also be very curious if that half sister still as you said there she's 34 then holds that much resentment to a 14 year old like what is this ridiculous yeah and to me i'm like no good parent would ever to me that seems like they're picking the worst possible person to then tell you if like oh if you don't do it we'll just have them and so yeah i think it's just like a very inappropriate conversation

for your aunt to have with anyone besides you. And this conversation should always go, we would love for you to be, again, a godparent. That's if this was, you can also say, no, it's totally okay. But the fact that you're stressing about this. And no actual conversation has been had with you. Yeah, it makes me feel like that was the intention.

Like it makes me feel like that's how the relationship kind of has been that you're really, you're already jumping to like the stressing about the logistics of it and like trying to problem solve. and I feel like that might be the role that you've been asked to play in a lot of family stuff and this is not like you're not a bad person if this is not something that you can do even if you like

love a family member or you think they're like great and amazing and you don't um resent them or you're not ableist you don't look down upon them for anything like that that doesn't mean And that, to me, that's kind of like the bare minimum. That doesn't mean that you are capable of long-term care, you know? Yep. And I think you can vet places if it is like specialized stuff that can like help people. But also, some people are more equipped than others. And I don't think like, well, if I have to, I will, is always the only option.

Agreed. yeah like does i read of like friends parents you know i mean because to me like that's if i got to pick that's where i would have gone all right well we have a uh don't blame them this is a don't blame them for the episode where we discussed period sex on your wedding day to be specific let us know how that's going uh i have a don't blame them for the period sex agree with Eminem that day three onwards, horny as hell, is due to the extra lubrication down there. For the record, we trust this person, anything medical, science, to just know everyone, okay? Day one and day two, I got cramps. It's typically not good. And typically day two is when the flow is the

heaviest. Also, every time I've tried period sex, we would just throw a bath towel down. It always ended up with a lot less mess outside of our bodies than we thought. Afterwards, there is a bit of an ick feeling. So a shower afterwards helps. And then putting on soft form clean clothes feels really nice just having that comfort but very important but a very important conversation definitely needs to be had first you can at any moment at any time decide it's too ick and you can't process and he needs to be okay with that but having your period on your wedding day is already a huge mental toll so maybe you won't want to do more than cuddle spoon or sleep honestly I think Megan covered everything oh probably stick to missionary with you on bottom nothing to flow

anywhere the way that it never even crossed my mind to have period sex on top I would never to mean that's a wine bottle exploding like no yeah also the closer you are to my cervix on my period the anger I'm gonna get like I'm just like no no no no no no I'm okay with it I mean we also know I definitely have endometriosis there are some things that I do where I go that's wrong there's something causing immense pain for that yeah but it for me it feels better i'm sure everybody's just different hello yeah very different if anyone came near me doggy style i mean no no no no anytime point blank that's it just that hits my body at the that hits my endometriosis right in the face i i yeah doggy style is not

it doesn't work for me but if i'm like reverse cowgirl it's fine but up in the air no down okay yeah that's better I feel you so that's it anyone else if you've had period sex on your wedding let us know I wonder like how common it is because I would some people are the kinds of people where it's like I think of the same thing as like um if you're nervous or you're anxious I'm someone who gets constipated but a lot of people will have nervous shits I'm a nervous shitter and when I get really stressed my period does not come but for some people when they get really stressed their period comes early or twice or whatever that is so I bet it's like pretty fucking common for people to have like a surprise period on their wedding because even if it was

like last year for me I never knew when my period was coming so who knows I could pick any day my period came well I'm currently I'm like spotting but like my period came a couple days ago I was surprised by it so I who knows who knows yeah I used to give myself like a two-week buffer it's gonna start and then it's like half it's a whole month it would be the whole month and then i would finish my period and i would be like i guess it could come and then it would just come like four days later and i go is this a new one or did it not actually catch up or what happened yeah and it's just like i literally would never fucking know and like trying to plan around it everyone's like just plan around your period i go i can't huh

and then sometimes like i have severe cramps this time i had a a cramp that was enough to wake me up out of my sleep but it didn't yeah like it didn't last and i was just like maybe it's gas i don't know but then my period started the next day and it's just like what the fuck was that i've had friends who they've been like had cycles where it's just one cramp and then their period starts but then it's never and they're like was can I have that every time can I just have all my in a I wish I don't like when it wakes me up out of my sleep because then I have to wake up find my heating pad turn it on and then I can only fall asleep like holding the heating pad I hate that but like if it was in the middle of the day great just don't wake me up yeah I wish

I could just have the pain not the pain that I have because I wouldn't survive that in one fell swoop but like i wish i could just have i wish i could just sit on the i wish it could be like diarrhea like i wish i could get it all out of my body in one moment and then once it's all out the cramping stops that'd be so nice i agree anyways that's it for the episode we hope you all enjoy don't forget to write in for upcoming episode send us a dm or write into the email or call in leave a voicemail or send a voice memo to the email address all the same information i said at the top and if you want to write in or call in for a don't blame them where you give advice to a caller from a previous episode you can do the same places for that and yeah we will uh

catch you on the flip side toodaloo bye don't blame me is a production by me megan rinks and me melissa d montz plus diamond imprint productions post-production sound and editing by coco lorenz production assistance by melanie d watson and music by giacomo picasso and ryan hunter