Don't Blame Me! - DBM: Rekindling With An Ex

Episode Date: October 31, 2024

This week Meghan and Melisa are giving advice on: Rebuilding a friendship Telling your ex you still have feelings Interrupting your boyfriend Dealing with an irritating co-worker 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 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by Accenture. When your advertising operations fall out of sync, everything else follows. Spotify and Accenture are working together to reinvent the rhythm of ad sales. Using automation, analytics, and smarter workflows to simplify campaign delivery and access better data across the business. The result? Less time spent on operations, more time connecting brands with the moments and fandoms that matter most. Learn more at Accenture.com slash Spotify. hear that it's your money calling it wants a promotion elevate your savings with the scotia high interest savings account always earn high regular interest rates that grow the more you

save and invest conditions apply visit scotiabank.com slash hisa to learn more scotia bank you're richer than you think it's halloween it is are you feeling spooky melissa i am feeling super spooky so spooked spooky doopie doop come rail me ghost okay i should have known that was coming much like i would like to who knows if the ghost will i don't know what their capacities are you'll have to report back and let us know i feel like it's dusty it's like i was gonna say that i was gonna even use the exact same sound effect i was gonna say it's like a yeah so hire us for your ghost jizz foley sounds we're here for it we're ready for it and welcome to another episode of don't blame me where we two fantastic gorgeous wonderful

creatures an alien and a see i've always referred to myself as a chicken nugget and then trisha paytas started referring herself as a chicken nugget and now it sounds like i'm making a Trisha Paytas joke really haven't we all been a chicken nugget at some point in our life no no because you've been yeah but that's what but we couldn't have a podcast from two aliens or a podcast from two chicken nuggets we have to have diversity of thought thoughts minds and taste and dimensions um yeah we're gonna give you some wonderful amazing life-changing advice and um yeah it's a great time we love giving advice we might not be qualified in the way that you see which i say open your mind don't be so small-minded think bigger think more grand think

obscure and therefore we we do deserve this specifically think about all the men with microphones and podcasts talking out of their ass the way i accidentally interacted with one wasn't wasn't an accident i saved one one sports podcast tiktok clip from a man because he made a very good point i thought about one of the players who there's so many of them but the one who has you know done a lot of really horrible things and has like 20 allegations and paid out 20 people all this kind of stuff and he made a great point about like you know people who are booing for him it's not this great moral grandstanding it's like no people are talking about the football like he's still playing like all this stuff whatever and the way that i knew there were a lot of men who

had sports podcasts i didn't know there were as many as there are started showing my feed they say do you like that one i said no no i literally went back and unliked that video and was like show me less because i didn't know you guys there's so fucking many of you i have been privileged enough never to be on that side of tiktok i'm sorry it was incredibly jarring at first i said who is this man who is this random man talking jump scare yeah boo give me a boo warning hello so yeah anyways that's why we're qualified we because we are and stop asking questions you let men do stupid shit let us have the fun for now so yeah if you want to call in for an upcoming episode you need some advice from us you can leave us a voicemail at 310-694-0976

and international listeners you can send us an audio message and email that to meganpodcast at gmail.com you can also write out your problem that you need help with and send it to that email or you can dms on instagram which is just by megan and melissa nope i said it with confidence hoping it was right but did you say it with you said it with confidence but your face said betrayed you well no i said it i said it with confidence and then as soon as i was done i said so no it is a megan and melissa and it is always excited linked in our show notes so if you need help megan has an h melissa has one s just a reminder don't blame me has its own email address but am i wrong has its own email address please if you're doing things specific for don't blame

me send that to megan podcast at gmail.com we've had that email address for since 2017 yeah if it's for but am i wrong you send that to but am i wrong pot at gmail.com a lot of people have been mixing up the two lately let's keep it clean play fair everybody so yeah and the oh the requirement for everything is you'd be 18 or over or have your parents permission if you are 18 years old and we don't feel like you have your parents permission weird if you're 16 and writing to us about you and your boyfriend having sex at a church we know that you did not get your parents permission yeah and that is an actual call yeah no no and we immediately said no like there you can't lie to us and say you have your parents permission when i just like the subject matter

in itself i go no way we are saying untruths here and i think if you need our advice and you you don't need that criteria you know what our advice would be yeah and the advice is you're a teenager stop stop stop and uh the other requirements are we ask that you let us know your age not just hey i'm over 18 but like let us know how old you are and if it is about a friendship or a relationship or anything like that give us like three strong background points or like things that kind of catch us up on the situation and one should definitely always be like how long if it's romantic relation to how long you've been together if it's friends how long you've been friends those things those factors that go into the follow-up questions that you have so you can

give the best advice because we don't really get to ask you follow-up questions so we want to make sure it is chock full of all the info we need so if we do an update we don't want it to be like oh just like call me if you need more info that we can't do that so give us all the info and then most of the time when we want an update we want like something to have changed something to have shifted like give us the the actual definition of the word of an update and yeah keep under three minutes for the voice memo and the voicemail and 300 words for all of the written versions and let us know if you are sensitive we will keep that in mind we are the person and the people that you go to and the podcast you go to when you're like I either can't ask my friends about this

or I know what my friends will say I need someone who's unbiased and here's the thing we're gonna be unbiased so prepare yourself for that but also tell the story in a way that gives enough background to the situation because like we want to be on your side and if we have to not be on your side we want you to know that you did everything you could to get us on your side and we're still not on your side so if you withhold that information being well if they only knew then they would have been on my side you gotta tell us let us know that's the whole point exactly and we also have a patreon where you can support the show we also do the video versions of the podcast there so we are recording on a different slightly different setup today so

you can see that on the patreon and you can also listen or watch their ad free which is another fun thing and then i think not to be biased the best part about our patreon is we have a tier where you can join to join our live streams we do live streams twice a month we hang out we're there lots of other people are there people have like really formed a bond and a friendship and like we all know each other and like it's a very chill good time some people are cooking dinner some people are doing like arts and crafts some people are like depending on where they are in the world they're opening their small business they're shutting down for the night they're doing cleanup they're doing whatever that is so people are doing tons of different things diana where have you been

show us we haven't seen the inside the lab in a while and she's busy she's like i work all day in the fucking lab i'm tired it's saturday by the time we start it's true because i've been in the lab all day motherfucker i am done i'm tired i'm a doctor i'm a fucking scientist so but yeah we do the live streams twice a month they're very fun there's always new people there so if you're like oh i don't want to join like if you've been doing this for a while i promise you there's pretty much at least one person who is new every single time but i can't recommend it enough especially for people who have like had life changes whether it's like a breakup or you graduated college or you move to a new place we have so many people in the group so even if they're not there you let us

know where you're from and we'll get you friends and i'm gonna say there's a 50 chance that friend will be erica or erica adjacent because somehow somehow erica is near everybody and or is going near everybody and or has another friend who is not a part of the group that says i'm gonna take up on a friend date my friend just moved there so it's great all over the world truly and it's it's it's a very fun time okay yeah erica is our ambassador and our marketing person all right should we get into the first one let's do it dear megan and melissa i am 25 by them and i lived with my close friends three people two of which are a couple from college for two and a half years and i just moved out the two and a couple are 24 and 23 and the other is 21 for context we are all queer

and trans the first year we lived together was my final year of undergrad and it was great we all hung out around the house regularly they helped me through a terrible breakup and we drank together a lot. Since graduating, I now no longer drink, my new partner is sober, and I realized how bad it actually makes me feel. My lifestyle has vastly changed from theirs. I've put a lot of time and energy into my day-to-day happiness and prioritizing my work, health, and relationship. I also love exploring the city and trying new things. Over that year and a half, my roommates all struggled immensely with different mental health issues and feeling lost, unemployment, not wanting to leave the house, etc. During this time, however, the facade of we are one big happy family remained,

which I felt was increasingly not the reality anymore. I also realized that in our entire relationship, the two in a couple never really wanted to open up to me vulnerably. The two of them kept themselves with any challenges they were going through or anything remotely vulnerable, and in turn, I didn't feel a closeness with them because I didn't feel like they ever wanted to let me in. So from there, with all of our vastly different lives, I drifted apart from them all, and I had a really hard time living in that house that was cluttered and maximalist and far messier than I prefer. Also, I'm very introverted and there were always people around, not just the roommates, but many other friends on most days and I felt like I never had the quiet and alone

time that I needed. Now that I've moved out, I feel so much better and more stable being able to take care of my space the way I like to. My question is, how do I maintain and rebuild these friendships? I know time is going to heal a lot, but I have a real deep unresolved feeling about my relationship to all three of them and resentment. Plus, I put in some effort since moving out, inviting them to multiple gatherings, and they've never even shown up. Last week, I went over to the house to hang out and they weren't even there. And I just said, oh, sorry, we aren't going to be home until late and didn't let me know until I'd already gotten there. It's not something I've explicitly brought up, but I feel really sad to have lost the

relationship we had when we were in college. Part of me wants to just ghost and let them be in the past but part of me feels really guilty for not wanting to tell them how I feel and make amends what do you guys think and yes this is a great example of why not to live with your friends thank you I'm a long time listener since the beginning of the pod first time caller thank you for ending it that way exactly don't live with your friends but the thing that you said about the two that are in a relationship and they're intimate they don't share things about their lives with you but they keep to themselves because they're in a relationship that's what people in relationships do i don't know the intimate details of what megan and watts

are talking about though we're all close but like i don't want to know because that's not my business yeah and a lot of time people like that vulnerability there quite often when people are in a long-term partnership that kind of fulfills a lot of those aspects of vulnerability like in the sense that like your friendship doesn't there isn't necessarily like a constant open revolving door of being very vulnerable because it's kind of when you've built that friendship it's like things as they kind of come up similarly in a relationship it's not like therapy where you're like unloading past history and those kinds of things like it comes up organically and oftentimes in friendships like it's hard it doesn't come up as organically as

it does in relationships and also it just seems that you've grown apart too you've got your own partner and you both don't drink but they're drinkers so like there's going to be things that they do that you're not going to feel comfortable around and also things that you do that there may not want to participate in it just i just think that y'all you outgrew each other and that's not necessarily a bad thing but like when you're not living in the same situation with somebody they're just not the you're not just coming home and unloading on or just sharing things that just naturally happen in your day you do have to make a effort for the friendship which it sounds like you're trying to do but you just have to know that the friendship is not going to

be the same that it was before when y'all live together it's going to be different where you have to like make appointments to be to do things together you have to figure out events and different things to go to but it's not going to be the same type of friendship because you're not living together too yeah and I think like your specific use of like the term like it feels like you have built this resentment and it feels unresolved and then the fact that like you're putting in all of this effort of like trying to like make plans and go see them and they're not doing any of it back and you can acknowledge that but then you're like well i'd still feel guilty for ghosting them i think you're doing a lot of this out of like a feeling of obligation

and like i don't say this in a bad way because i think we all do this but like i think you're like looking for them to see that you're putting this effort in and then like you're putting the effort in despite the fact that you feel like you have been like wronged by that like that you've you've had these like you've built this resentment up to them based on their behavior and you're still being the bigger person and I we can applaud you for that and I can say like that's really impressive I don't think they're going to and I think like you're not going to really get the acknowledgement of that or the apology of that because even if you do you're going to have to ask for it and it's not going to feel the same and like there are times where like you have been

I mean I'll go as far to say like there are times in like our lives where we have been like objectively wronged by someone and someone else has done something and they don't see it that way and then if they eventually do see it that way for a lot of people like that's a really hard pill to swallow and you might be ready to be the bigger person and kind of resolve this and get through this but like some people like act out in ways or behave in ways or even like maintain relationships and friendships with people during times of like really shitty times it doesn't sound like everybody was having like a it was a poor mental health time for a lot of people and for some people the people that they were friends with remind them of that and like sometimes people

want to work through that and like move on past that kind of a thing but i think like your worry about ghosting them i would also look at how they're treating you it doesn't seem like that would come out of the blue it seems like you're they're pulling back and i've been in this position before where it's like i'm upset about something and then the person who i'm upset at starts pulling back and then i go no no but i'm upset and then i'm like no no i'll read i'll be the bigger person i'll maintain this friendship because i want us to be able to be close so we can get we can figure this stuff out and then it gets to a point where i'm like you don't care like right and like you're it's not going to happen and also like when eventually push comes to shove and like there

it is no longer something we can't talk about it's going to come from me and i'm going to build even i'm going to have even more resentment because the fact that like it's so blatantly obvious that I'm like, I've told you how I feel or whatever that is. And like, I'm going to have to beg for crumbs of acknowledgement and I'm going to get that. And then they're going to be like, cool, are you good now? And I'm like, well, no, because like, it's this, this isn't, this isn't it. And like, I totally understand the effort you're putting in. And specifically, like when they said things like, oh, we're all a family and all of those things, relationships fundamentally change when you live together. And I think you're viewing this as your friends. And I think you

should try and view this as like oh your old roommates and yeah i i don't think that like i think the resentment and it feeling unresolved will continue to build up and unfortunately i don't know that you'll have a conversation with them at any like in the manner of like how the relationship is right now that will resolve this or feel satisfying to you and make you feel you know heard yeah and also you know if you really do feel like you know there's an adjustment and that these people are actually your family like i have close friends that i met in college that i do consider family but i may not i may talk to them once every couple months and it's just an adjustment that we don't live in the same place our lives are different but like that's still

my close friends those are still my family and but when we get together like it's like no time has passed yeah i just the big you need to stop reaching out and like give them the same effort that they're giving you yeah and then see at that point like do you want what they're able and willing to give you and it's okay if you if you're like okay cool i'm fine with that if we're as long we're on the same page and like i can give you this level of friendship then then energy in energy out or it can be like oh no i'm not comfortable with the shift in the downgrade in this and that's like very very very okay all right we're going to take a break when we get back we'll get into some more

this episode is brought to you by Accenture when your advertising operations fall out of sync everything else follows Spotify and Accenture are working together to reinvent the rhythm of ad sales using automation analytics and smarter workflows to simplify campaign delivery and access better data across the business. The result? Less time spent on operations, more time connecting brands with the moments and fandoms that matter most.

Learn more at Accenture.com slash Spotify. When you're a mid-sized business, you need every competitive advantage you can get. Like an AI solution that works for you, not against you. SAP Grow is built with AI embedded at its core,

working across every system. And it's ready to go from day one. so you can hit the ground running. Bring it with SAP Grow. AI Cloud ERP for any size business. Hear that? It's your money calling. It wants a promotion.

Elevate your savings with the Scotia High Interest Savings Account. Always earn high regular interest rates that grow the more you save and invest. Conditions apply. Visit scotiabank.com slash H-I-S-A to learn more. Scotiabank. You're richer than you think. And we're back, and it's time for the next one. Hello, Megan and Melissa. I want to know if I should tell my ex from high school that I have feelings for them again.

I am 22, she, her, and my ex is 22, they, them. Basically, we dated for a year when we were juniors. Before that, we had been friends for a few years. They were definitely my first love, and there was nothing really wrong with our relationship other than being young and miscommunication, and at the end, they broke up with me because they were just struggling with their mental health. It was hard, and I was angry for a while, but moved on and eventually understood the pain they were in.

They reached out to me later. Oh, they reached out to me years later, and we have been catching up texting here and there for a year now. I've been noticing my feelings coming back, and I wonder if it's worth giving it a shot again. I'm so scared to even bring it up to them because I'd hate to lose their friendship again, but I think we had something good, and it feels like we're in a better place to give it another chance so should i bring it up if so i'd love your advice on how to go about it

thank you in advance i mean if i started texting let's say i'm single and i start texting like my high school boyfriend from junior year or senior like i don't really think they're looking for a friendship do you know what i mean yeah there's an expectation already built into that i think already because you said you you were friends before but you lost the friendship so it's not like to me the implication is there already so do i ship it yes i don't know anything about this person um so i can't say if i ship it or not because they could suck but i do believe that we've already got the ball rolling this is how things go especially cuffing season has just commenced um this is if you're reaching out during this time there's already something going on so

go for it are y'all in the same place that's my big question if you're long distance too much work to do when you're in college just finishing college whatever y'all are doing too much work but if you're in the same place go grab a meal go to the movies do a leg brush we're back in yeah we don't even have to really do that much talking no we've already been here before i'm very familiar with doubling back let's get back rewind play it again yeah i'm with you on that like i think like as someone who would have like long-standing crushes for like a long period of time like i was not i wouldn't i would talk to someone for like the a long period of time and then you know eventually be like oh i hate you this was wasted all that time but the if you find yourself that

you're even somewhat somewhat similar to that the long distance and or the far enough out of reach in the sense that like you can't actually go out yet because you are not near each other and so anyone specifically someone you've already been with before anyone can be fucking flirting on text like those feelings it's so easy to come back to that because like you're literally on a screen so I think like like Melissa said if you are not in person and not like oh we'll be back from winter break we'll see each other in person it's so easy to like fall back in to your first love it's so easy it's so familiar it doesn't sound like from what you've said that like you have been you said they were your first love. I don't know if you've been in love with anybody else since. So I think

like kind of the same advice I would have if you're meeting someone on a dating app, if you are easy to like, you know, fantasize or really like get a couple things of information and then piece together the person behind it or like, you know, write that story or really like go head over heels for that. You have to get it off your phone as quick as possible. So I think that if it's just a winter break oh we'll see each other at winter break kind of a thing i'm like that is just like then we're just stunted this is not this is not us at 22 this is us reminiscing at us at 16 right so if you can if this is 22 year old you 22 year old them then this is you got to approach it as 22 you're going out quickly you're going to arrest you're doing this you're not going to the same

places you went to you're not reliving high school so i think this is like a very i'm not someone who's like very anti getting back together with someone you have dated specifically if there has been years in difference and also like fundamental years like from being a fucking teenager to into your 20s like there are people who are from like my hometown or my high school my middle school area who didn't as far as i know didn't fucking date in high school and now we're like married and i'm like whoa i didn't know but it's like you know there are things that you might have shared with someone that you're very young and you might have been a friendship. It might have been a crush or whatever that is. And then when you're adults, those things and those

fundamentals of like whether it's like the same values or where you were raised or these just commonalities or just like in the Taylor Swift, the invisible string theory, the thing that is just tying you together is like you're both in the same place. You run into each other like that's a very normal, natural kind of thing. But I think in order to get back together with someone you've regardless if it was high school or whatever it has to be done in the manner of which you the age you are at now and the maturity level you are at now and that's not aim or texting yes for example uh last year why don't you do that no go ahead last year um i was newly single and one of my exes who he has a spidey sense i don't know what it is but anytime something happens

he reaches out to me i bet you if you post an instagram story at lunch right now he'll reply to that story before this episode's even out yes like he there's it's just in the air it's just in the air like he there's been times where we've been recording and he will text me something just random off the wall and i'm just like what the fuck he knew for some reason and then you know I was like maybe maybe this is our time maybe this is our time and we dated on and off for years and I was like okay I will have a genuine conversation we got on the phone I was like this dude does not change there's nothing that I nothing that me at my big age like want to be in a relationship with him and you know we talked and then that was it still sends me random text

messages but i'm done forever now it's the door's closed so yeah but you wouldn't have known and i would have known if i didn't move it out of the flirtatious texting to actually having a conversation yeah so i think you go should go for it bring it up how to go about it the most adult mature way of just being like hey want to lay it out on the table like full transparency like can i give you a call and like if you're so afraid of like that or just saying like hey get call up and big hey do you want to get dinner and then be like I'm really interested in you but I think like if I was on the receiving end of it and it was like a text message from an ex who I was flirting with we were talking who was like let me text and say like hey I'd be interested in dating you

that to me is not as grand of a look how much I've look how much like this is a new this is new us gesture than it would be if they called me up or said like hey let's get dinner and like set it to my face like there's something that has a little bit more meaning there and I think if you're worried about like losing the friendship your feelings are already back the friendship was lost when you dated the friendship wasn't lost when you broke up and the friendship now is still this is your ex this is not your friend this is your ex and like when you date that is what happens like that and like even if you break up and you're like oh we're going to be friends again you have feelings there so like therefore like that friendship is they're still your ex

before they are your friend and so you have to be straightforward and honest and like just incredibly forthcoming because I don't think it's fair to either of you because if they are not interested you actually cannot be the friend that they need right now so it's not a matter of like well, I don't want to lose them and say, well, there's only there's only one option in which you don't lose them. And that's if they're also interested in you. But if they're not interested in you, you should lose them. This should not be pursued and continued as a friendship as of right now where you have feelings because it can't be a friendship. It's not fair to you and it's not fair to them. So once you kind of look at it like the not to be harsh, the friendship is already

gone. And also it's a 50 50 chance. And it's only going to hurt the longer you put that off. and the more you fantasize and the more you wait and the more you read into little gestures and like things they say and all of that stuff, prolonging the hurt

is just building your feelings. And when those feelings break down, they are bigger, they are stronger, and it's going to hurt even fucking worse. I feel like this could go really well. And if it doesn't,

then it's not meant to be. It's not meant to be. And better to know that now. Right. To get more invested. Now you got to find somebody else to cope. Yeah.

I don't even know. Maybe you're in part of the country right now where it's like, really like you're in like the crucial time of cuffing season like she's about to get cold and we got to get in early enough to get a good gift uh-huh but not too early where they're like let's spend thanksgiving together too much too much too much like you want to be like making out at a halloween party and then also knowing that you could make out with someone else at that halloween party well that's literally today's halloween so yeah exactly and you want it to be

like so on thanksgiving you're like texting and then like being like showing your cousin being like yeah like this is them and they're like oh my god they're really cute and you're like yeah kind of and then they're texting you and like sending a selfie of them with their family and and then those feelings build and then it's when you get back from thanksgiving you cuff that shit up right all right we have so many opinions this episode is brought to you by Accenture when your advertising operations fall out of sync everything else follows Spotify and Accenture are working together to reinvent the rhythm of ad sales, using automation, analytics, and smarter workflows to simplify campaign delivery and access

better data across the business. The result? Less time spent on operations, more time connecting brands with the moments and fandoms that matter most. Learn more at Accenture.com slash Spotify. When you're a mid-sized business, you need every competitive advantage you can get. Like an AI solution that works for you, not against you. SAP Grow is built with AI embedded at its core, working across every system. And it's ready to go from day one, so you can hit the ground running. Bring it with SAP Grow. AI Cloud ERP for any size business.

Hear that? It's your money calling. It wants a promotion. elevate your savings with the scotia high interest savings account always earn high regular interest rates that grow the more you save and invest conditions apply visit scotiabank.com slash hisa to learn more scotia bank you're richer than you think next one hi eminem i'm colleen for advice on how to stop interrupting my boyfriend my boyfriend is 32 he him and i'm 30 she her we both have adhd but with very different symptoms

and it affects our lives very differently when my boyfriend is speaking or telling a story he takes longer breaks. Maybe they're just a few seconds, but in my ADHD brain, they seem very long. Unfortunately, I tend to interrupt him or very eagerly tell my own story to kind of emphasize how much I relate. And often my stories are always super long with a million stories in one because I simply lose track or just digress. He has expressed to me how it's annoying and a bit hurtful, which I very much understand. I really want to learn to take a deep breath, have patience and make sure he's finished talking before speaking myself. I just, for some reason, always forget. Sometimes I don't even notice that I do it and he will wait for me to finish and then let

me know that I completely interrupted him. And sometimes there'll be a tiny little argument because I would kind of disagree with him that to my understanding he was done and how that the way he spoke made it sound like he was finished speaking but other times I stop myself as it hits me that he was in the middle of a sentence. I've also noticed that I do this a little bit of work and for some reason I am way more aware and careful so it actually doesn't happen that often and honestly maybe it's just that I find this trait very embarrassing and it makes me a bit unlikable and maybe I assume more judgment in a professional situation and I might feel like there's more at stake at least for the short term because I do think that in the long term my

relationship is is more important to me than my job and there is more at stake in my relationship some additional information is that we are both unmedicated as we both reacted very badly to the ADHD medication. We had horrible side effects. I'm currently on antidepressants, but I would just really appreciate some advice and give it to me hard. Give it to me good. That came out wrong. I'm not sensitive. Thank you. Oh, and by the way, I forgot. We've been together for almost five years and we've lived together for three. Okay. Bye. You come to the right place. Is this about us? Yeah. No, I was going to say, so your whole thing of being like trying to like psychoanalyze the like oh is it because i know there's like higher stakes at work maybe i think it's truthfully

it's just where you're most you who you're more comfortable and you mask less so if anyone listens to the podcast i interrupt melissa more now that we are closer than i did when we i first started the podcast like we're early early on oh i i would i think in our social social life like talking talking yes I would like not just on the pod I mean like the social aspect you are more conscious of it now than you used to be so and that's something that like because we have the podcast I can like listen back to that and like the natural thing of being like it's something it's an impulse and something that you hate I hate that I do it is embarrassing and like so I'll validate your feelings of being like I just feel embarrassed by it it is without a doubt embarrassing

and recording on zoom that has been the most helpful for me in terms of interrupting because I'm like I can see myself start and I go take it back or whatever that is that like there's a level of like working on it there's a level of acknowledging that you do it that you have to you have to have so like in the moments where you're like there are certain times where I'm arguing and it's like so I'm not gonna say that I think he's 100% right or you're 100% right like I think that like it can be a mixed bag like I think like if he says something that it's like yeah and so that's yeah that's what happened and then waits 30 seconds and you start talking and then he's upset because you interrupted him that wasn't a question that wasn't like it from the

context of what he said it sounded like he was tying it up and then he waited x amount of time before and then you started talking again so I don't think it's one of those things of being like you should always assume that he is still talking and therefore like anything like that so I don't think it's fair if he's criticizing you for that as well but like I get into the habit because that like saying things of being like I was still talking like or like being like hey can I finish or are you are you are you done is that are you finished with that and then also like the fact of like trying to think ahead to not do it isn't really unfortunately helpful because it's an impulse issue and so for me when I stopped trying to like prevent myself from doing it with like

the little tricks of like oh there's something I want to say so like I'll put my finger down here and I'll like hold my so I'm like that's because the whole thing is like well I don't forget I'm going to say so like I'll do something like physically so I remember or I write down what I want to say or something like that and I'll do my best but also it's just a matter of like okay if I do it I don't have to commit to it I can do it and then go I just interrupted you so sorry continue there's like a you can immediately correct it in the moment and I think like as opposed to being like well I just don't know how I'm gonna not ever interrupt someone ever again it's like I think the aspect of wanting both of you to work at it so I think like for him

you interrupt and then being like just give me one second and then he can get in big so sorry like that aspect of it but I think him just being like silent there in that and then being upset with you that's a fine way to without a doubt a fine way to react if he's trying to help you help him then I think that's a way to do it because also how Lily and I talk because we both have ADHD like that is one where it's like we'll try and help it like it's incredibly loud and like we'll both try and be like wait no no okay you did okay and it's like when other people are around like that's really really hard and so there's I think a huge difference between like someone who doesn't have ADHD and someone who does have ADHD that conversation versus two people who

do have ADHD and the expectations and the standards that I have for how I communicate with my friends who also have ADHD what they expect of me is very different and so I think like both of you need to cut each other some slack and then like while you're not having this argue like this kind of argument being like okay so mas also takes and there are times where i go you're gonna have to speed it up i'm i'm forgetting what you're saying and like those are things where it's like sometimes it doesn't always sound the most polite or doesn't sound like the most things like that but it's like i want to listen to you i'm not going to be able to keep listening if you're taking something this a pause this long yeah but as somebody who does pause in their speech that's just how my brain

works and so that doesn't work for me all the time but what i've learned to do is just also interrupt that's what i do just interrupt and that's what he's gonna have to learn to do and we gotta keep it pushing well because i think i'm like if he takes like a 35 second pause and you start talking he remember he knows what he's gonna say now don't wait until like the 20 minutes after done talking you say what you're gonna say and all of that like i just think that there is a specifically because they both have adhd he he should understand that the interrupting aspect of this like unfortunately conversations are going to look differently when you have when you're communicating with someone with adhd like they're just going to look different but i don't

think it's him like changing how he's processing and saying things it's that she's gotta also it's got to be a give and take like if he's taking long then she can say like hey you're taking long but he has to also like have time because like for me like when I'm thinking it just doesn't come to me in the same way of like you can just like verbally process I've got to think it through and then say it but then also he needs to know that like if he still has things to say then he just needs to say hey hold on I need to say this but let me have time for it to come to my brain. Yeah. I'm just being in the sense of being like, if you are interrupting him, he also needs to be able to interrupt you. And if you started talking and he knows what he,

and he's like, no, no, I'm not done. Here's what I was going to say. This thing of like him being like, well, I'm going to be patient and wait for you to be done talking. And that really hurt my feelings there. That it's, if that's not helping you to not interrupt him, you need to let him know you can interrupt me and you should interrupt me. And just, even if it's not like, I'm ready to say what i'm gonna say but like hey i'm still talking give me a minute and then you get that checked you're like gotcha but like i think if you he doesn't interrupt you and then afterwards then you're defensive being well i thought you were done talking and it's like but you also know he takes he very long pauses and you also know he's not gonna interrupt you if he wasn't done talking

so then if he's waiting until you're done talking to let you know he wasn't done talking you can't be like well how was i supposed to know like because you you said that he doesn't tell you that so I think like the expectation for it has to be both sides so like you should work on not interrupting he should work on interrupting he you should work on listening for his pauses and knowing his case but also not even just being an active listener in the sense of like was that the end of a sentence was it like they was there a conclusion there or did he just take a pause to think about what he was saying and then focus on working on asking if they're done and like are you done i have something that might be able to relate doing that before you start talking as

opposing to just like barging in at full speed that's something that like and i work on this all the time and then catching yourself in the moment because like yes there are sometimes you won't you said you won't even realize you've interrupted but there's other times you said you do realize you've interrupted and that's not a time to just barrel quickly to get through it at the end that's a time to just be like sorry like circle back and then write it down like it requires effort on both sides. And I think you're looking at the work thing as something that like is a subconscious effort. And I don't think that it's comparable because to me, that's masking. Like it is just like you're doing everything in your power to not

be outwardly neurodivergent and have ADHD. And like that is just kind of like how you are, how we're programmed when we're in spaces that are professional or you don't feel as comfortable in. And so the and especially these conversations are on like the weekends or late at night, like after you've kind of done that so I think like it might not feel like you're putting that conscious effort in at work and you're just hoping it's going to click and happen at home too it's not and it's going to be different tactics and different things to work on but the biggest thing I can say about like interrupting is like if you know you do it there's absolutely very very very few instances in which you should be defensive about that

like it's something like I know that I do I will feel like oh my god I'm so sorry I didn't know I interrupted you but like I'm not going to double down and be like angry or upset about that but the longer you're together and you've been together for a while you can't necessarily change people you can start to learn each other's patterns so you learn when he's wrapping something up he might have something else to add and you didn't know he was still talking so you now know that about him it's not like oh I shouldn't interrupt it's like oh this is a fun fact I know about him let me ask about this before I start talking and he should also know that you have a tendency to interrupt and it's not personal it's not malicious and you also will not be

defensive if he cuts you off to let you know he wasn't done speaking like there has to be a you both have learned each other and you also have your own ways of doing things and how you are and neither of you are necessarily going to be able to like fully change that nor should you but it can't just always be about well this is how I communicate it's also like okay this is how they communicate how can I in my way of communicating convey something to them so we can continue to progress forward in this conversation or whatever that is and right now I think you're both being a little stubborn in it yeah it has to be a two-way conversation because if not it's just you talking to yourself and then y'all both being resentful toward each

other yeah and if you have any like feel any type of way about being interrupted that's like you really have to work on that then because like and I'm not saying that you do but if that's the reason why he's not interrupting sometimes some people like it's very much rules for me and not for the or whatever it's it's got to be a thing of like I know you guys are not medicated but there are like lots of other things that you can do to like work on that and ADHD is so different for so many different people that the stubbornness of that or viewing like the you really hate when it happens to you but like you also inadvertently do it to other people detaching like the morality behind the impulse issues like unintertwining those kinds of things I think is really important because

if you feel defensive or you feel upset or any of that kind of stuff like there's a huge shame aspect in that and like that is something you've really got to work on individually because your partner can't help you not feel shame about it but yeah all right um we're gonna take a break when we get back we'll get into the last one this episode is brought to you by accenture when your advertising operations fall out of sync everything else follows. Spotify and Accenture are working together to reinvent the rhythm of ad sales using automation, analytics, and smarter workflows to simplify campaign delivery and access better data across the business. The result? Less time spent on operations, more time connecting

brands with the moments and fandoms that matter most. Learn more at Accenture.com slash Spotify. Hear that? It's your money calling. it wants a promotion elevate your savings with the scotia high interest savings account always earn high regular interest rates that grow the more you save and invest conditions apply visit scotiabank.com hisa to learn more scotia bank you're richer than you think all right we're back and we're gonna get into the last don't blame me so i work for a record label i manage their recording studios okay we have like multiple locations i record their music i mix their music i manage the studio schedule i do all kind of random stuff okay so at one of

our locations in the LA area, we are building a new studio in the back of the property. Now, maybe about two and a half, three weeks ago, I got a text message from my boss's executive assistant. Okay. She's a younger girl. She comes from money. Her dad is already in the industry. She got hired because my boss wanted to be able to have a connection to her dad. This girl, she's been known to kind of like talk bad about people to make herself look good she's just kind of like that type of person is like willing to do anything to kind of like get a foot up so I got a text from her like I said maybe about two or three weeks ago and mind you we never communicate via text we only communicate via professional emails or the business slack okay so she sent

me a text message saying, Hey, uh, just letting you know, I'm going to be overseeing the studio build at the location. Okay. And in my mind, I'm like, bitch, you are in London. How are you going to oversee anything going on here in LA? Like, okay. So I'm already kind of feeling like, why would my boss have you contact me and say, Hey, I'm going to oversee something that's going on in L.A. when I'm in London. OK, I already kind of like feel like calling bullshit. So she continues to tell me, so can you send me photo updates and, you know, detailed updates on what's going on in the build so I can be up to date? And in my mind, I'm already thinking, well, bitch, if you are fucking overseeing it, shouldn't she be

the one telling me what's going on in the build? I let it slide because like whatever needs to be done, like I'm just that person, like I'll get shit done. Like I'm not pressed about it, whatever. Now the contractors are calling me every day. I'm getting to work early because I have to let them into the building. When shit is going down, they call me. If there's issues with the building, I get the phone call. OK, during one of the calls, they called me and there was an issue and they needed a decision to be made. And I said, hey, isn't this something that you should be talking about with Pam is what we'll call her. He was like, who's that? And I was like, haha, hilarious. Okay. So she hasn't been in communication with him. She's not overseeing anything. It's bothering me already. Okay. Anyways, I still let that shit go. And I just do what I'm supposed to do. This chick had the fucking nerve to put me in an email where she has copied and pasted the text message updates that I've given her over the last two and a half weeks.

She copied and pasted them into an email as well as all the photo updates that I've sent to her in an email to my boss as it was her update, as this is all of her information that she's passing on. She basically was saying, just a heads up. This is what's going on with the build right now. We've got da da da da da going on and we've got this and this and this happening and we're going to lay cement tomorrow and blah, blah, blah. That's literally the email. OK, I don't know. she knows that I was in the thread because she added it into a previous email that was already kind of going on.

So I have two issues here. Number one, I want to find out if my boss actually put her up to this or if she's just doing this to make herself look good. OK, number two, I want to find a way to let my boss know like, hey, I'm the one that's doing all the work on the ground. Like I'm the one I'm here. I'm getting calls 24-7 about this stuff. Like, I'm the one doing this.

I need him to know because at the end of the year, when I'm telling him that I want more money and this is why, I need this shit to be valid. Like, and I don't want no fucking like, oh, well, Pam said she did that. I don't want none of that. So I need a way to figure this out and a way to be a little like, it's me. This is the shit I do. I need him to know. Not because I need him to know and because I need a pat on the back because I want more

money. Yep. Thank you. peace well well well i can speak to this from personal experience first i can tell you're in a recording studio because that audio quality was it was stunning so for this first of all don't communicate with anybody about business things outside of how you usually communicate with them so do it through email and do it through slack slack probably number one if that's what your company uses because then you have this is what is getting paid for by the company it's directly

there like use it for what it's supposed to be used for that text message pretty much like i don't know if she's supposed to be in charge if you didn't get anything if somebody that is your subordinate or not even subordinate y'all don't even really work in the same department always check with the higher up to make sure that that is true go to your boss and say hey i got a text from pam that says that she's going to be overseen i just wanted to double check to make sure that was right or like bring it up like yeah pam told me that she was going to be the one that was overseeing so i'm going to let her handle this we need to make sure that we have clarification first and then with her sending these screenshots about things that you've done and she's not doing

anything copy and paste screenshots of the photos yeah copy and paste so even more egregious i would i would respond in this thread and just be like hey pam thank you for sharing the things that i shared with you during our text message conversations just for the record so that everybody knows everything that's going on here's the screenshots from all of our conversations i've been handling things while you've been in london yeah i would probably i think that's i would probably phrase it in like the like um oh thank you for sharing all of this uh pam so sorry i know that i had been sending you all these updates via text but i now see we're on email now moving forward got the message i'll send it all to the email please let me know and then at

your boss please let me know if there's anyone else you want me to cc about the updates from the studio yep from the studio in la because like i would ask your boss i'm assuming is not in la either i'm assuming they're in london because it's an executive assistant that's they're gonna be in the same spot yeah my question is who was doing this before was it you like who was this job assigned to or unfortunately a lot of these things and i also have experienced this um not personally but you know from other people that someone who is someone like you which coco what's your astrological sign i can't remember libra this makes sense i was gonna say libra capricorn are the two guesses i had she just had her birthday so okay yeah libra i was gonna say

libra capricorn or maybe a virgo but i was gonna go the other two is that when you are someone of a personality of even if i've never done it before i'll get it done i'll figure it out like i'm i'm good at that i just like i'll get shit done there's a lot of time that people notice that trait and they don't formally give you responsibilities but they kind of like leave the plate by you knowing that you're going to get it done so like i do wonder if there was never like a formal thing of being like you're overseeing this just because it was expected and assumed from all parties that you would and so like therefore like her taking it over it's kind of like well I guess I wasn't ever officially asked to do that and if she was officially asked I've

never been officially asked even though I've done x y and z so therefore like it goes that way but I understand the thought and the feeling of like I don't want to do anything that could stall this specifically because like construction stuff it's like you do have to make game time decisions you do have to do this stuff like really quickly that like if you pause or halt that also could look bad on you or look bad on whatever so like there is like those things there that I totally understand the continuing of just like powering through but like from this moment on I say respond to the email with like what we said and from that moment on you do all of the updates via email and you cc her if she's on it or you continue on that thread and if she texts you just be like hey

can't be like just email me I'll get to it just like just email me and like not continuing for that aspect of it because like I think there is a equal chance in my mind that she was given this official title so she talks about it to her dad and it looks good and then that makes her dad want to continue to have I don't know something in a relationship with your boss something that is coming along the lines and it's more of a vanity title which if it was you should have been told that you were kind of just going to be like, you know, let her do this. This is more for the image aspect of it. And you should also have been, I would say, I think you should have been given a raise prior to that then. Not for being like someone else is going to take credit for

your work and then we promise we'll give you a raise. Like, I think it should have been prior to that. Or she really did take this upon herself. There is the balls on some of those nephobabies. I have to say, sometimes I admire, I admire the brazenness. But if it's that case, then if your boss doesn't know that she's taken the reins if you then relinquish any sort of control behind the scenes and she does have responsibility for it and it fails it will be on you then because she took this responsibility without anybody else giving it to her but at the same time if you know this personality of her her boss knows this personality of her and you were probably always factored in in the sense of even if she was given this responsibility it was always with the well

she'll be there so like you know can't really screw it up like she won't let her screw it up but that conversation wasn't had with you so i think like i would assume that either one of those could be true so making all of your decisions factoring both of those things in because i think if you go like stalemate and like i'm not going to do anything like let her handle it i think that can blow up in your face but at the same time i think if you continue let her to take full credit for it it will also blow up in your face so like the best thing to do is cease any communication that is not via email send all of the updates via that do that even before she can like do all of that before she can engage in conversation with make sure you're like having conversation with

your boss that aren't just in that email too of being like hey let me know if you need something else in this like do you like or if you prefer the updates to be formatted this way do you want of a call once a week we can go over whatever it is and make sure that it's not just like a paper record but there's also a conversation so if perchance the job was technically given to her you give your boss the opportunity without her on the email to say that to you and to have more of an understanding but i don't think you should change at all how you've been going about this and like how you've been handling handling the actual situation and like the bit like the construction the build and all of that stuff at hand but some jobs are totally thankless and will

remain totally thankless if you are not included from the beginning and like from that part and I think like to kind of hope or assume that they they know and you will be rewarded at the end there's a much higher chance of that if you your name is attached to this from this moment on from that email on yeah yeah when I was in this similar situation I sat down with the contact person and just laid out everything that I had done and they were like I saw that you were doing these things but I just thought the other person had tasked you with them I said no they didn't tasked me with and they just stopped showing up and I took it over and like if you are being tasked to make game time decisions you also need to have a conversation with your boss to be like

hey I just want to go over everything be clear if I'm called and asked to sign off on an increase in budget do you need can I do that do you need me to call you do you need me to call her whatever that is because it's all fine and dandy with you doing everything and carrying all of the work and getting shit done and not being compensated extra for it and not getting the credit for it until you do something that they might go well and now suddenly you are entirely at fault and so there is a lot of assumed responsibility when you are the personality type that gets shit done and so I'm a big believer in like if that's the kind of person you are at work I don't necessarily think we should all bleed out for our work but like do it but you got to make sure that when you are

doing it everybody knows that you are doing it you have the clearance and everything to do everything that you are doing and you have that in writing it's not just because first of all they want you to do it they assumed of you to do it but the second that you do something that maybe somebody else usually not them someone else down the line is like well maybe it should have been like that suddenly you are at fault so i think cover your bases and cover your ass in that sense and just truly don't even reply to her text messages no stop texting her yeah stop texting i don't trust her i don't think she was ever tasked with the with this i think she took it over like it doesn't make sense for somebody that's in london that there's so many hours ahead construction

needs immediate answers it doesn't even make sense for her to be able to do this well it also doesn't makes sense for her to be able to do this and be an executive assistant that is a time a time suck of a job like already and like i think if she was tasked with this i think like it would be a huge fucking asshole move if your boss didn't say anything to you about it like i i just don't think you would be that in the dark that you'd be getting all this information from her yeah because it would be a risk and like you are the one in la so like you are gonna be the one you have to be essentially like then you would have been an official liaison essentially like you would be the communication between that and that's also still a job and also she doesn't understand

because like you have to see to oversee and she's overseas she can't oversee overseas good wordplay it's just the same word but they're not spelled the same oh you're right took me a second for that i said what you're right you're right this would drive me up the fucking wall though you should make sure for the security alarm system that it's programmed to her phone and then she has the responsibility of that because it's programmed to matz's phone and then they were like i mean you know we have someone we have a project manager overseeing it and matz is like so why am i getting the call when the security system is breached and i have to show up with a bat why am i doing that part all right well thank you for participating thank you caller yes thank

your color we hope you all enjoyed thank you so much what a great episode happy halloween and get ready tomorrow for full-blown fall season soup season we're having bakes we're putting things in casserole dishes potatoes what else you got gravy i'm not partial i don't need you to have turkey i want you to have meat i want you to have something warm and yummy to pour on top of it. I was going to make a nasty joke, but I'm going to refrain. I'm going to refrain. Yeah, but

even saying you're going to make a joke is the joke because I wasn't born yesterday. I put the pieces together. I'm refraining. Okay, that is it. We hope you all enjoyed and we will see you tomorrow for Fisting Friday.

Monday for But Am I Wrong. Tuesday for See You Next Tuesday. Then back here on Thursday for Don't Blame Me. join our patreon support the show i hope you have some wonderful days you get and eat your candy yeah stay spooky i want some candy right now we got ring pops that's a ring pop from charmed that was the commercial i'm familiar goodbye this is a sister sign production hosted by me megan rinks and me melissa d months plus diamond imprint productions post-production by coco lorenz production assistance by melanie d watson

and music by ryan hunter and giacomo picasso