Don't Blame Me! - DBM: Too Wet

Episode Date: October 23, 2025

This Week, Meghan and Melisa are giving advice on: - Husband stopping sex - Winning a man back - Defining a relationship - Fiancé winning arguements Join our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/dontblameme Buy Our Merch https://crowdmade.com/collections/sister-sign Call In for DBM - 310-694-0976 (3 minutes or less) Write In for DBM - [e-mail] (300 words or less) Write in for BAIW - [e-mail] DBM Submission Form BAIW Submission Form Follow Us! instagram.com/meghanandmelisa @meghanrienks instagram.com/meghanrienks https://twitter.com/meghanrienks @sheisnotmelissa instagram.com/sheisnotmelissa instagram.com/diamondmprint.productions Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

hello and welcome to a brand new episode of don't blame me podcast where we give you wonderful amazing life-changing advice to change your life hopefully for the better sometimes for the worse or it'll stay the same but hey life is full of surprises embrace the change speaking of this will be our last episode of this iteration of don't blame me we'll be making some changes if you were in our patreon you heard about it first so you know you hear about exciting things when you're part of the team so join us but uh the show it'll be revamped those will still be giving advice but uh it'll be a refresh a little plumping oh yeah a little a little a little pluck tweeze a little lift a little a little glow up yeah all positive don't stress

don't worry about it it's gonna be great um but yeah if you want to hear about first up join the patreon but for now we are we are still giving you the advice that will hopefully change your life and that's what this whole podcast is about so if you want to call in you can write in that is call in write in and fill in a form we as of now do not take handwritten letters maybe we will one day dearest megan and melissa you can send them in i we rarely check the mail no melissa did i was willing to open that didn't care kira sent us like birthday cards right so care i haven't even gotten them yet melissa has them both right now thank you so much thank you so much my birthday was in february i don't know when you actually sent it because you did say this is late yeah

we forgot we had a po box mostly because we did have to open the po box just for like a different business matter and i think we both forgot about i didn't forget i've scheduled numerous times for me to go pick it up i just never went because it's out of the way totally that i tried to make it's so essential for us so that one of us could go pick it up but like it's still it's out of it would have been better if i just would have got a place close to me and then yeah just and then moves well it is in general i do avoid the post office and postal related activities i do too there is a fee that we can pay where they'll just send it to us but you know it's fine yeah as it is now okay eventually but thank you kira sorry about that i opened mine lovely i've been waiting to

see you in the live stream to thank you but you haven't showed up to the last few ones but thank you karen not to accuse you of anything but we appreciate it yeah so we do you know what if they did send it because there is an option to open the mail and scan it so we could see it it's just sometimes i'm like i don't know what this is i don't want them to see it so yeah true yeah well as of now the only way you can do the podcast maybe we'll open up to those letters, but we will have to get better at checking it. So if you want to call in, you can leave us a voicemail at 310-694-0976. And international listeners, you can send us an audio message at meganpodcasts at gmail.com. You can also type out what you need advice on

and send it to that same email or send us a DM over on Instagram or fill out the form that is listed in the show notes that's also listed in our social bios. And for all of those, you have to be over 18 years old and you have to tell us how old you are not just that you're over 18 we need to know how old you are because even if you're in like a unique life circumstance that is like different than people your age we still need to know your age and the life circumstance like it is helpful in us giving the best possible advice and you've got 300 words to write it out you also have three minutes to record your voice before you get cut off those are hard and fast rules. And I will also add that for the written version, we've done this before, but just to

reiterate, if there's like something that is like important context that will, you know, for the advice that is given or something, but you don't want that part public, you can always write that down at the bottom and say that. But if you do that in like the audio version, we're just going to play it. So if you need to tell us something, a little side note, like if you date someone famous and you were like this person is worse i hate them what should i whatever we want to know who that person is we won't share it with the class but like we want to know yeah we need to know because it'll give us better context and we might have other information exactly so we won't share with everybody but like you can include that in the footnote yeah like the person that

wrote in last week with the uh fabric stuff for but am i wrong yes they included the place so we could go look at it but we didn't say what it was in the episode yeah they include the specific cult the cult of the loom i think i'm bleeding i bit my tongue megan you can't bleed from the top and bottom i'll tell that to my body anyways shall we get into some advice yeah let's get into the advice This one I'm so excited to read. I'm not.

I literally am making Melissa read this because I opened our document that has them written out and I just read the first fucking sentence and I'm scared about where this is going. Hi, y'all. I'm 29 female. I'm writing in because recently my husband, 29 of three years,

told me that I get too wet during sex. We've been together for eight years in total and I feel like we've always had great sex so this so this really feels like it came out of nowhere and the way he told me also really caught me off guard he stopped sex and when I asked him if he wanted to keep going he said I guess drop that on me and added that it makes him lose sensation naturally I was no longer in the mood so we just stopped completely He tried to make me feel better by saying he's glad he can make me feel good, but it also really didn't help. I grew up in a pretty mean family, so it takes a lot to hurt my feelings, but this really cut deep.

How do I talk about this with him? How do I feel confident during sex again? Any advice would help. Well, first you have to divorce Ben Shapiro. i looked this up to see for we're not doctors i want to say that but i did look this up and it says that there's no such thing no um also they're saying if like you do have a lot of discharge when you're not having sex you know there could be an issue there but this like people are lauded on how wet they can get and that's supposed to be like a compliment as well to a man i don't know why he would want to have dry sex we used to say all the time good wet sex that was a a staple of this show so like because we learned from a caller that you can if you're

not wet enough you can quite literally rip a dick yes have your fluids changed a lot in recent times because that's the whole thing that i'm like we know our bodies better than like like quite literally anyone so if something was up like you wouldn't you would know like in general when there are things like up with you know specifically genit like specifically like vagina genitalia and that person is not aware of it that is like a that would be out of like you're you're dealing with like a really intense level of depression and like you're not taking care of your body or listening or under like paying attention to the rest of your body in general you've got you're in crisis mode but like it is not just a thing to be like oh this this thing

about my body that i have no trouble with only in sex is there something happening that is only it is it is now deemed wrong by my partner but there's nothing wrong there is nothing like fundamentally there is nothing wrong there's something wrong with him um and i mean a this really does he sounds like ben shapiro after like his reaction to wop but not to like i hate that like i don't i don't say i hate this but like it it pains me to hear you ask like the what you're asking for advice on is like how do i feel confident during sex again and like how do i talk about this with him because like to me this is so not your problem to fix because it's not a fucking problem and like i don't want to put something else in your head but like to me this

sounds like someone who is like trying to hurt your feelings and trying to pick a fight and it's about something else and as opposed to thinking about like hey is my something fundamentally changed with my body because like if something had changed with your body like if you look on like um i ended up remember that woman on tiktok who was like i shower like once a week is a good time if i shower once a week like people are doing this all the time and everybody was like that's disgusting and so then she challenged herself to shower every day and she was like wow this is great i love this so because of that that went so viral on tiktok it also went viral in like the hygiene subreddit so like i'll see posts on my feed from like the hygiene subreddit and so

many of them are people being like how do i talk to my partner i think they're dealing with some sort of issue with like a infection or something like that but like if someone's like genuinely concerned about something specifically someone who loves you they like they're so careful about how they say it they're so careful about how it comes across it is not done in the middle of fucking sex like so to me i'm like there's not knowing that he there sometimes it's unavoidable to hurt someone's feelings this to me was an active choice to hurt your feelings so like i think you need to come at it from that spot of being like why did my husband want to hurt me like why did he want to do like why what was the point of that because this yeah he wants to be

upset with you and wants to be mad at you and he wants you to feel bad about yourself for whatever fucking reason and i think that's what the conversation needs to be about not like hey you doing this really hurt my feelings because duh it fucking hurt my feelings it's more like why would you fucking say this like what what is where is this coming from and like what else is he doing and like where where is this because this again in general picking a fight like this where you've done truly nothing wrong is you know usually an indicator of something else from your partner that they need to be able to come forward and tell you and all this kind of shit and that might be an uncomfortable conversation but like certainly do not fucking

have sex until then and like i don't i wouldn't be able to like move on with the rest of our life until we had that conversation yeah like we're not i'm not cooking you did i'm not doing any like we're not you know cancel your plans like we're fucking getting down to the bottom of this because i think in intentionally being malicious and hurting and hurting someone's feelings is that to me that's like the lowest of the low because like when we do that when we're like younger and like you know you you feel hurt because you don't have the capacity to like explain how you feel so you hurt somebody else again when you're a child and then you grow up and you learn to not do that anymore because you realize that that makes you feel fucking worse

and it does not help the situation at all that like i will hem and haw and stress over interactions i've had with strangers that i'm like oh my god what if they took that the wrong fucking way and let alone to someone who i love and care about and so to me that's like the biggest level of disrespect and like there's i would not be able to move forward with like any aspect of the relationship until that is we've gotten we figured that shit out and it usually involved like you would need to like like what what the fuck is going on yeah also there might be something medically there might be a medical issue that he has yeah that he may need to look into or he's being red billed isn't a thing no and like i would be very curious about about his political

affiliation because they're the rhetoric of of this comes from like a specific sect of the right that like claim to like be want to have a say in so much in women's bodies but also know absolutely nothing about women's bodies and like feel this ownership over women but also hate women like this to me like is a really scary indicator of like how his feelings about women are and like sometimes people get into relationships people that you're like okay i know he's a little bit misogynistic but he loves me and like eventually without a doubt if that person hates women you you will be at the receiving end of that at some point even if you've been an exception for a while oh my god i'm so mad at him though did you not i mean you don't have to tell us because

like i by the way i think you'd be in the right and like we would not rat you out but like like he he walked away from that unscathed you know i think that she was hurt in shock too yeah and if if this conversation goes i mean like let us know what happens but if the conversation like does not go well I promise you your most confrontational friend is so ready for this moment yeah sorry I'm so mad for you all right we're gonna take a break and when we get back we'll get into the next one we are back and it's time for the next hi megan and melissa i'm 22 she her and this feels like my first real heartbreak i've had a few relationships before but none where i genuinely

saw a future this one was different i met my ex after moving here for college we dated for almost a year and everything felt right comfortable happy easy then out of nowhere he ended things no warning no real explanation just done it completely blindsided me i still love him and part of me keeps replaying every moment trying to figure out what went wrong to make things worse we're in the same friend group so not every group hangout is painfully awkward he's polite but distant and when i've tried to talk about why he ended it he just shuts down this is his first real relationship so i keep wondering if maybe he just got scared or overwhelmed i'm in therapy which helps but healing feels impossible i also deal with depression and anxiety and this breakup has

made both flare up in ways i didn't expect it's like i not only lost him but also the version of myself exist that existed when I was with him. So here's my question. Is there any healthy way to try and win him back? Or should I accept that it's over and focus on moving on? How do I find closure when he refuses to talk about what happened? You two have been such a comforting part of my week for so long. And I'd really appreciate your thoughts on how to move through this. Thank you so much. I say this with like so much love. This is this is like an unfortunate canon event and like everybody has been through this everybody has had like a horrific heartbreak between the ages of 18 and 23 that has like fundamentally like can't get off the fucking

floor like you are inconsolable it is like your friend flies in from out of town because they're worried about you like this is and i say that to like let you know that like none of those people ended up with those the person who made them be hysterical on the bathroom floor this is something that everybody goes through and it is awful and horrible but it's also simultaneously like not only a rite of passage it is a necessity to become an adult like you have to go through this level of heartbreak and i think like we can view exceptions to the rule of like oh this person never experienced this level of like you know this person ends up whatever everybody i would say like some people are front loaded in their life with like a bunch of shitty stuff to get to the good

part other people get to be on easy mode and then shit hits the fan at a certain point in time like nobody can avoid turmoil in their life and in their interpersonal relationships so if you're looking at your friends and being like why haven't they gone they will go through this and you have to understand that when you look at happy couples and relationships, they are not those people. They are not the people who made you feel like this in this way. And it's awful and it's really hard and it really sucks because it is. It's not how you're handling it. It's not how you're dealing with it. And I say this to hopefully make you feel better. It's not because your relationship was so much more special or so much more different than everybody else who's been

through this like your heartbreak is not unique and that should feel comforting it should feel comforting to know that like the reason why you feel this way is not because you are the only person who's ever experienced this you feel this way because and everybody has felt this way at some point like or they will and it and it sucks but closure we've said forever closure like does not exist. And the only real closure you ever get is when you're over it. And when you have finally moved on, closure cannot come from another person. And the reason why I think you're finding this to be so you're like living in the past of this, I think is the friend group aspect which I know you can feel like so adult and so grown up at like 22 but if you're going

through like a big awful horrible breakup and like you're so sad and like you're in a friend group with this guy and you see a future I guess I would also ask you like do you see a future with these friends because like I could never imagine being a friend knowing my friend is going through a awful breakup and then being like yeah invite him to the group hangout yeah um i co-signed everything that megan said with the friend groups maybe they were friends before and then became a couple which that's always a risk you take when you start hooking up with people in your friend group and you see these as a long-time friends i like i said i co-signed everything megan says so i just want to move into the next aspect you should not be trying to win some man

back he left you with no explanation even though he sees you all the time he should be comfortable you were in a relationship he should be comfortable talking to you this man is not emotionally mature he is not the prize you are and i want you to see yourself as the prize he should be groveling at you i don't know what's going on in his life but at the bare minimum he owed you an explanation especially because he knew that he was going to continuously see you like you can't ghost somebody when you're still in their same friend group if that's what he was going to do he needed to disappear off the face of the earth you shouldn't see him again i'm wondering though like you're 22 hopefully you're graduating soon

so you won't see or you know I don't know when you started school so you might be a senior this year and then you won't have to see him anymore but I need you to remember this man hurt your

heart with no explanation so let's stop seeing it as I need to get him back because you don't know like if there was anything that y'all could have done together to strengthen your relationship this man does not respect you enough to give you an explanation there's times where I didn't I didn't respect a man enough to

give him an explanation and I don't try to see him ever again yeah so if you can't I know you're in a part a point now where you're hurt and you're like I just want to be with him I see him all the time but I can't be with him the same way that I was before blah blah blah you will get over this you will be better your next relationship might also suck but like you can't dwell on one relationship where your heart was broken by a man that did not respect you yeah and if it's any solace nobody at like 80 years old after they've lived a whole full life is like damn i really wish i would have gotten back together with that guy who broke my heart at 22 yeah like it's it's just it's not and like perspective is everything looking at it from that

situation it's because you broke their heart and you're like damn i wish that i hadn't done x y and z and i would have been a better communicator and we could have made things work no you don't do this over the guy that does not have the common decency to tell you what happened yeah if you are in an emotion because you didn't say if you were like if you were in like a heightened emotional state and you're feeling very sensitive then shut this part off and come back to it when you i need you to take this hurt and change it to anger like i need in general i need women to get more mad like i need you to get a little bit more mad when you are there play this part you will get over this relationship but if you continue to tolerate this level of disrespect which is hanging out with

a man who ghosted you who has zero respect for you and like just walks away or flees when you try to have a conversation as well as friends who are okay with you being in this heightened situation that will stick with you that behavior and that level of having zero self-respect for you and your feelings and all of that that unfortunately you'll get over the breakup that will stick with you if you do not change if you do not put yourself first and put yourself number one and be like well i'm so much fucking better than this like i deserve better than this like you think you can ghost me and then see me he you should be so fucking he should be so fucking embarrassed and the fact that he feels comfortable with this is because you're also letting this happen like

you are also still going and you're still doing these things and looking for like it's just that pattern of behavior unfortunately will not expire with your feelings for him you will take that into other relationships and other feelings and to me that is that is the thing that's much harder to break that is the thing that's like much harder to to get over because if you if you let that behavior into your life you will let poor behavior into every aspect of your life and that's a lot harder to unpack yeah next time y'all are hanging out may go to a bar and make out with another dude yeah and like do it in front of him flirt with other men in front of him or whoever you're interested in and i also have so many questions for like your friends like nobody knows what

happened nobody else is questioning it like y'all haven't been around each other drunk and somebody's like what the fuck happened and like nobody knows none of nobody's friend knows and like when nobody else is dating in the group and you know he confided in one of these other dudes and then that dude didn't tell his girlfriend and that girlfriend isn't telling you i don't trust this no and i also really don't trust the fact that like you're still your friends are still like oh it's no they can still be are you just like keeping all like this is not a non-tumultuous breakup and so like someone knows something but also if nobody cares enough about how you feel yeah then out with all of them yeah because like my friendship group from college

some people fooled around but nobody was in like a full-blown relationship with anybody in the group because that's weird it's not weird it just like it makes the situation messy so proceed with caution if you're doing this yeah and i just the fact that he thought that he could get away with ghosting you while being in the friend group is crazy it's even crazier that you're letting him do that yeah like it's he should be so embarrassed that he's doing this asterisk it's the fact that it is more it is embarrassing that this is we have now switched where that embarrassment level is. I remember when this happened

in high school with somebody, which, you know, high school age makes more sense for this to be happening. But we did lock two people, very sitcom-like. Oh my God, yes. Closing two people off so they can talk it out.

Yeah, figure your shit out. Yeah, because like we don't, like everybody else in the group isn't like, this is fucking weird. Like we don't want to be around y'all because this is a weird situation. Everybody's just going on with their everyday life.

No. No. fix it i need i need your friends to be better friends yes i need your friends to be better friends like so much and like i dated within the friend group so much in high school my friends still my friends when we go whatever breakup all of that shit like that was i had people pick sides who like i wasn't even that close to friends with but pick sides the level of being like yeah we're not inviting him to this he wants like we're having there's like a big party all the seniors and they're like well Megan's coming so this person's not invited normalize picking sides

yeah because someone is right and someone is wrong and if both people both people can't be right both people can be wrong and then stop being friends with those people then right this aggravated me me too you know how I feel when people are like well I don't have an issue with this person so like but no no they're showing their character and you're okay with that okay cool cool cool cool cool i don't like how anybody's treating you in this uh all right we're gonna take a break when we get back we'll get into the next one we're back and it is time for the next all right this person is 23 she her I met this guy on Tinder about six weeks ago.

To be honest, I originally downloaded the app for the ego boost. I like the tension and the little rush you get when someone swipes right. But then this guy super liked me and I thought, okay, he's cute. Why not? He's 25, really attractive, funny, and genuinely easy to be around. We've gone out several times now and every date ends with us laughing until we can't breathe. I have a great time with him and I can tell he likes me too. But here's where I start to spiral.

I know we haven't been seeing each other for long. Keep in mind, this is six weeks, y'all. And I do not want to come across as a crazy girl who needs to label after a few days. Still, I like to know where I stand. So the other day I tried to bring it up casually. I said, hey, I don't want to rush anything, but what are you looking for right now? He didn't blow me off exactly, but his response was basically, I'm just getting to know you, not sure yet. I totally get it, but part of me still feels uneasy. I'm not dating anyone else, and I want to know if he's seen other people. I know he's still on Tinder, but technically so am I, even though I haven't talked to anyone since meeting him. So here's my question. Am I crazy

for wanting some kind of clarity this early on or should I just relax keep having fun and let things unfold naturally he's sweet funny and honestly amazing but I also don't want to end up blindsided what do you think thanks love your show I think if you're looking for a relationship that's not too much to ask somebody on the first date even before you get off the apps if you want to be in a serious relationship this is something that you should if you don't want to play pay the premium price because sometimes i don't know how tinder works i'm not on tinder but on some of the apps like if you want the specific thing for what you're looking for you have to pay the premium price but you could put like i'm looking for a relationship in your bio or

before you even go on the date like this should have been a conversation early on and if you both have something like i don't know or um still trying to figure that out again i don't think this is too early to be asking i honestly think it's a little late in the game you've been dating for six weeks and you've gone on several dates seems like you're pretty solid are y'all just laughing like he he ha ha and there's no romantic things because you say you end the dates laughing i like to end the dates a little more sensual yeah yeah are you having sex i don't think this is rushing though you asked if this is rushing i don't think it's rushing i hear i i i agree i do think we need to work on how we ask questions because the question

you asked is actually not the question you were looking for like you asked him what is he looking for and you told us you just want to know if he's seeing other people that's not the same question true like you have to be specific and explicit and i think that like there is this dichotomy between like wanting to be in a relationship and like wanting to wanting to be straightforward and knowing what you want but then also diluting that to when you talk to a man to like also to not completely rule them out as if they're gonna get spooked by what you say a guy who like men are not that fundamentally different than like men are also looking for relationships but they are and so this thing that it's like well this is my crazy girl brain like how do I

say it in a way that like makes it so this man won't want to run away the man's gonna run away regardless if you have a commitment or not if he's interested or not like that's just what that man will do if that's what he is going to do but like diluting it down to being like are you seeing other people to saying what are you looking for i don't think his response is like crazy because that is such a vague question where it's like hey are i'm what you need to do is because again the same way that you're asking him an open-ended question because you don't want to necessarily reveal your cards that would make him be like oh i gotta run away he's doing the same thing of being like well this person's not telling me how they feel so i'm not going to be that explicit of what i'm

looking for because what if that's not what they're looking for and in general the only way you're going to avoid this kind of thing is if like like melissa like literally like from the fucking first date from the app of being like yeah i'm looking for a serious relationship and if someone else is also looking for a serious relationship that doesn't spook them if someone is literally looking to hit it and quit it that will spook them it will not but and it's not like a well maybe in six months they'll feel differently nope they will feel the same from day one to six months if they are not looking for that you will never change someone who's being like well i'm not looking for that right now but now suddenly now suddenly i've totally changed my way and now i

see and now i want now i want to be in a relationship with you that's book talk shit like that's not real life level shit and knowing what you want from the start and like having that confidence and like having that discernment and that those boundaries like that's sexy that's hot like go for that from the start because if you water down the questions you're asking you're not you're gonna get watered down answers like this and like i do think that if you wanted to ask him if he see if he because right now his response does not tell me if he's seeing other people it doesn't tell me if he is or is not seeing other people equally likely from both sides it also doesn't tell me if he's sleeping with other people is that also important to you are you still are you dating

other people you didn't say that i think she said she's not but you said that to us did you say that to him right like and then like you're like i'm technically on tinder just because you have a tinder profile doesn't mean that you're active on tinder but also you're still on tinder like Like, I think that, like, we need to stop thinking this as, like, I mean, I hate men just as much as an ex-broad. But, like, I think if we keep treating men as this foreign entity that is, like, so that we have to handle with kid gloves, you're going to end up in a really shitty fucking relationship. like if if you set the precedent early on that it's like i'm going to kind of formulate and mold things as not to like scare him as if he's like a a woodland creature who like can't be spooked but i'm like my god this is a fully grown adult this is a fully grown adult

man like you should be able to tell him hey this is what i'm looking for you should lead with what you are what what you are doing and then letting this person know that for you this is what you want and then you have to follow through with that and if that's not what they're doing then then you walk away but i think i think crushes are dangerous and once you start talking to someone you start developing a little crush i do think it's like i'm not trying to single you out and make you sound like like everyone does this i've done this but where we we have this little crush And so therefore we can find ways to mold ourselves and like justify things or like prolong things of being like, I don't want to ask a direct question because sometimes

you know the answer and you don't want that to be the answer because you're still having fun. And I think like you're allowed to shift and change what you are looking for if you're still having fun with this person. But if your fun that you're having with them and your feelings, them are conditional on a set of parameters that have not been established in this relationship, you are setting yourself up for failure. like it will blow up in your face like if you find out that he's sleeping with somebody else

if that's going to devastate you the more you develop these feelings it's just going to hurt you more and more because it's going to lead to the same end and I think like defining the relationship at six weeks of being like boyfriend girlfriend that's a lot for me personally but I would when I was dating I was very like I was very like forthcoming with like you know the pacing of how I was with dating and like I'm definitely someone who takes it slow I never I didn't warn people that hey two months three months I wake up and I'm like never want this person again but like I I wasn't trying to sell you on a dream and then completely rip the rug out from underneath you but I think that you are well within your right to want to

know if this person is seeing other people and then I would ask yourself because like that's what you say you want to know but like I would get even to more nitty-gritty of that like if I want to know that what that means to me personally me Megan I want to know if you're having sex with other people I want to know that part I want to know right yeah and I want to know if you are if you are dating other people I want to know are you going on first dates with people or are you dating other people to the same amount that you are dating me or have you been dating somebody before like before we even started talking because there could be somebody else yeah and so like these are all very valid and fair questions to ask and like at any time it

doesn't have to be six weeks it can be at any time whatever comfortable like whatever your comfortability is but i think in general if you don't feel comfortable being forthcoming with what you want you can't expect somebody else to be forthcoming with what they are looking for with what they want you have to lead by example and i think that is again like a very attractive quality and it only rules out the duds which we're already going to rule themselves out eventually yeah and it's easier said than done i will acknowledge that all right we're going to take a break when we get back we'll get into the final one all right we're back i'm 26 she her and i've been with my fiance for almost five years and

we're getting married in may of 2026 congratulations honestly everything with him is wonderful this is how i know everything with him is actually not wonderful when you start like exactly he's kind funny dependable and my family absolutely loves him here's the thing he's an axe murderer i'm kidding i added that part i love his family too he's my best friend and my person here's the part that i need advice on my fiance is seven years older than me 33 um my fiance is seven years older than me 33 and while that usually isn't an issue i started noticing a pattern whenever we have serious conversations we don't fight or yell ever but when it comes to important topics like finances wedding planning or long-term decisions i feel

like he always has the upper hand. He's more experienced, more confident, and usually speaks in a way that makes me feel like he's right, even when my gut tells me that I am. Sometimes I just go quiet and agree to whatever he says because it feels easier than trying to keep up. I end up feeling small, like my opinions don't carry the same weight. It's not that he's mean or controlling, he's incredibly sweet. It's just that I find myself shutting down during these conversations and I don't know how to stop. I've tried being more assertive a few times, but somehow he still wins the discussion, and I hate that it feels like a competition. I want us to be equals, especially as we plan our future together but i don't know how to stand my ground without turning

every conversation into an argument do you have any advice on how to hold my own in these serious discussions without creating tension i love him deeply but i also want to feel like my voice matters too so your fiance is kind funny dependable and like lovely and wonderful and not controlling and not mean and super sweet because you keep completely shutting down in these conversations and avoiding fights you can be sweet and still be controlling yeah but i'm saying like in this specific instance like you're saying that like he's not mean about this because you're shutting down if you don't then you're saying you end everything with tension and an argument like the only reason his like behavior in specifically in these things is not becoming volatile because

of you because you're mitigating it not him but i also just want people to know just because somebody's nice and sweet doesn't mean that they can't be controlling totally i just mean specifically in these conversations when you're saying that these conversations like you know like he's not trying he's not going at it he's not doing any of this because you're stopping it he's not stopping it manipulative and she doesn't recognize the behavior and like in general the fact that you're the one who has to walk you're the one who has to pull this back and has to stop this guess what that is not fucking mature no not mature at all and the fact that even you you phrasing this like a winning thing like that tells me that's the energy he's fucking bringing

to this this is like beyond a red flag this is a stop sign like this is a it's not even a yield it's not a slow down this is a mayday mayday drop that plane out of the sky like this is a halt everything immediately and tell your bitchiest friend about it and tell your like meanest sibling or your meanest cousin about that like tell someone in your family who is not be like oh my gosh so no he's so warm and wonderful and lovely like tell someone who tell the black sheep of the family tell someone who like has been the one who like has strong opinions and don't necessarily agree with everyone because you specifically saying that your family loves him and the fact that you are you've automatically assumed this role of keeping the peace makes me think that

that's a learned behavior in other parts of your life um do you and i'm i'm reading into this because i feel like this is exactly what you were saying to us do you feel like that because he's older and he's lived longer that he's always right he thinks he's always right i think that she also believes that because she doesn't push back on things that she actually feels passionately about too why aren't you pushing back do you not feel safe in this relationship enough that you can say and think and give your own opinion and you're afraid that he's going to walk away because you have an opinion about something yeah I really like I have to ask about your family situation whether it's like religious upbringing whether your parents age difference

culturally any of that because if you got together at like 21 22 and he was 28 he's older than you now and your family has like loved him from the start that to me is like a bit of a a bit of an indicator that that there might have been similar dynamics at play at in your home growing up or within your culture of that being a norm that like I want you to be really careful who you talk to about this because I think like you're not saying you have any qualms with your family and if you share this with your family like let's say like your parents have a massive age gap and they like love that and they're you know old school Christian and like this is very normal in your like in just culture where you are I fear that you're going to tell them something and it's

like well he is older he probably does no more like he is the head of the house and i think like the worst thing for anybody ever is to like lose trust in your own instincts and like no longer being able to trust your own gut because it's first of all that like it fucks you up like mentally and physically when you go against that like innate feeling that you have in yourself and you it it fucks up your decision making in general and like you can't live with that that horrible feeling in your gut that something's gonna go wrong and inevitably things will because you're not listening to yourself but this is this is like the big fucking reason why i'm like pretty adamantly against 99.999 of age gap relationships because like this is in fact

the dynamic and like it does only show up in instances where there is conflict and one person the older person will always win that conflict and it will always be a competition because the older person also knows that going into this like this is newer information for you this is like you're discovering this your fiance knows this like this is and being with someone who's younger that is an advantage is that this is something that they get to call those shots yeah because we've seen it and heard it time again where an older person is like i i get to teach them i get to teach them how to become a woman i get to teach them like i get to help them grow up like they'll say things like that because they want you to be malleable yeah and they're like i don't like

dating women my age because they're so headstrong they're so bossy and most of the time it's because they can't women their age won't date them because they're not malleable in that same way and they don't tolerate that and when i say like i'm not for 99 of them the age gap relationships that i'm like i have no personal issue with and again like everybody's relationships their own whatever but like i just i would never promote that the only time it works is when there is an additional power dynamic at play it is either and a self-awareness it's either a hey i had to grow up way too fucking fast i had to raise all of my siblings and i needed to be in a relationship i like couldn't date someone in their in their 20s while i was in my 20s because i had to like i had to fund my

entire family i need to date someone who's financially like there has to be an awareness of i had to seek out someone who was older who was more established in their career because i could not have that level of uncertainty because i needed to provide and support x y and z that totally like makes total sense totally fine i i had to grow up way too fucking fast that was an aspect of this there's a self-awareness of it there and then there's another dynamic at play like i i am very very very fucking wealthy i'm very successful i have spent my entire life around adults and i have reached points in my career that people my peers have not and therefore i have a financial upper hand or a success upper hand in my relationship that it offsets the age

aspect of it like there will always still be aspects yes and i just want to clarify because someone has used this before that before when their sibling was underage and then said that they they had to date like somebody in their 20s i'm talking about kylie when chloe said that about her when she was like 16 dating people in their 20s not that we're talking about after you've become yeah of age i'm talking about like i'm talking like a horrible terrible story of like someone who has had to raise their siblings does not have parents in the like there are things that like it's like a life and death situation like i if i'm gonna be with a partner i need someone who can financially contribute in a way that my peers can't and like there's a there's a

like a cognitive level of awareness to that and like so i don't even watch this show but like to me this is an example but I might be getting some like details of it wrong but Bronwyn from Real Housewives of Salt Lake City got pregnant really young in Mormonism the family was upset like super shamed all of this kind of stuff and there was all the shame that she ended up she married a much older man who was very wealthy and she was able to provide a wonderful life for her kid and her and her husband like she really loves him they get along really well but like yeah without a doubt there's a fucking thought process in there that you are actively seeking that like I don't think she would be like no I if I if I had not had a kid and like also had a horribly toxic family

situation and circumstance that it's like the age becomes a factor because the age is attached to a money which is a factor which is a security factor like there are ways that that works but I think saying like age is just a number to me is not like a an answer to that there has to be an awareness of like how you end up in this situation and it has to be you're actively seeking that situation because like there's a need base there's a need base and a financial security aspect base but it's either that or there's another power dynamic there and like so to me i think i'm so much less interested and that's why it's so fucking ironic that like all of the age gap content is made by the younger women in these relationships i'm not interested in hearing from the younger

women about why they're dating older men i'm not i'm really interested in what the older men want to say about that why they are dating the younger women because it's not the same fucking reason of any of that and like it is the malleable aspect it is the control aspect and and i think like there's a lot of people who will phrase it in a way that does not sound like that where it's like I you know I love being able to lead I love being able to take care of you there are different meanings of the people who say that and like wanting a partner who takes care of you and supports you is like lovely and wonderful when that partner is seven years older and like you can't have like any sort of like really say in important conversations and discussions

because they know better saying that I want to I want to take care of you is I want to control you and i really like and i'm so lovely and wonderful when you're doing everything exactly how i want and when you're not i'm gonna be i'm gonna be awful and i cannot stress how much you need to not marry this man because when you are married he's he will make he will be able to make all these decisions without your input because he is your husband yeah like financial kids religion everything all right well thank you so much for listening thank you for joining us all right bye this is a sister sign production hosted by me megan rinks and me melissa d montz plus diamond

imprint productions post-production by coco lorenz production assistance by melanie d watson and music by ryan hunter and giacomo picasso