Don't Blame Me! - I'm Forgettable

Episode Date: September 11, 2023

Meghan and Melisa give advice on: Update: Dad is delusional about home repairs People don't remember what I saw Friend thinks I'm going to hell Suppressing romantic feelings Obsessing over hookups Buy our merch: https://store.dftba.com/collections/don-t-blame-me Follow Us! @meghanrienks instagram.com/meghanrienks https://twitter.com/meghanrienks @sheisnotmelissa instagram.com/sheisnotmelissa https://twitter.com/sheisnotmelissa @meghanandmelisa https://www.instagram.com/meghanandmelisa Affordable Therapy By State (Curated by Crissy Milazzo): tinyurl.com/y64kwdnf Need Advice? dontblameme.show Domestic Listeners Call: [phone] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

hi here we are this is don't blame me a podcast brought to you by me melissa diamond months and she oh that too megan ranks and let this um be known uh let's give a good precursor this podcast might get racy it might get sexual it might get raunchy it might get dirty and we say that because if you know us in real life you know maybe you've been hurt you've heard from a close friend about how proud they are of what we're doing here and you're like let me go support you know leave a review you don't have to listen if you are not ready or feel like you were the appropriate person to hear us talk about doing the nasty and we might not talk about doing the nasty here but we might talk about reference that like one time we did do the nasty we got a

lot of new followers from reels i don't know if they're listening but they're following on us on instagram and if you have decided to listen welcome i'm not sure how i feel about this yet because i don't know what walk of life you're coming from but this is us we're being more open we said that weeks ago we're being more open and uh here we are letting more people in welcome to the fold you'll either like us or not and also um thank you everyone for writing in and calling in i think some people have forgotten though that you gotta actually ask for advice so a lot of people that have been writing and have been writing stories but not asking for what they want from this so make sure that you're asking for advice and so i say maybe write your when

you're composing your message right at top this is what i want advice for and then tell your story and that can help yeah like in like when you're writing an essay like your thesis i didn't graduate college so if that's not like totally correct it's like just roll with it we did that that's how you write yeah yeah yeah i think that works i don't want to infer that you want advice on the wrong thing because like that's actually like god so mean like you're saying something and someone's like oh maybe you should do this and you're like hold up that's like not what i'm worried about at all like i'm in my fucking head like what the fuck like there's been that before where like someone's misconstrued what i've said and they're like oh well like yeah

no maybe like don't do that then i was like what like no no that was i'm totally fine on that but like why what do you mean let's go back to that like let's circle back like okay what so um yeah be specific because we if i'm if i'm being a bitch i would prefer for it to be intentional i don't want to accidentally be an asshole and like it still happens but if i can avoid it i would i prefer to be a bitch on purpose of course who wouldn't want that for themselves so if you haven't figured it out yet this is an advice show you can call in and write in and if you want to call in here's the information to do so you can give us a ring a ding at 310-694-0976 and you can leave us a voicemail there or if you are an international listener you can record a voice

memo and then just email it to meganpodcast at gmail.com for both of those they have to be under three minutes. And we do ask that you write everything down before you record. So you're not just doing it off the top of your head because that's like an impossible ask. It's just fucking hard to remember everything you want to say. So we don't want you to have to panic. We don't want you to feel stressed. You were talking to two anxious, anxious girls. We get it. We totally get it. I can't call the doctor. I get so nervous. So write everything down. Maybe this is the hack for when I make phone calls. This is what I should be doing. Except the issue is that they're the answer. I love, I would so much rather leave a voicemail. I'd rather play phone tag for

so long. So they, so we do this, you, we don't answer unless you call while we're recording. And then we answer for fun. And then every time everyone panics and hangs up and we're like, sorry for trolling you. So we would like to know your ages. If you're talking about multiple people in your story, if you can let us know your pronouns, if you'd like, but it's important for us to know how old you are. And if it's about a relationship, even if it's a friendship, how long you have been friends or how long you've been together if dating how long you've lived together like all of those things add a lot of context because despite being bitches on purpose on occasion when the situation calls for it we would like to give you the best advice and like

we want to help you out and in order to do so we need the most pertinent and like factual accurate and important information. Otherwise, we have to fill in the blanks. And that worst case scenario hurts your feelings. And then kind of in the best case scenario, just like then doesn't the advice doesn't apply at all. So give us as many details as possible. And I don't know if I said already, but you have to be 18 or over. Have your parents permission? Yes, please. And if you write in, you can send us a DM or you can email meganpodcasts at gmail.com. Please keep it to 300 words or less and again make sure you're including all the information that megan just said as well as asking for advice wonderful amazing shall we get into um just completely

saving people's lives or wrecking them but before we get right into that i would like to read an update all right here's an update totally forgot to give y'all an update on episode of don't blame me dating standards february 7 2022 on dad who's the same age as madonna and how he's bad at diy stuff like fixing the tub we had a tree that needed to be cut down because here in my state we have tornadoes and didn't want the tree to fall on us but instead of calling an arborist my dad did it himself and they sent a picture of huge trees with a ladder in it and a lot of branches that are on the ground and the picture says and this is why i told my dad to hire an arborist but does he listen and then those little frowny faces and then it said my mom finally took y'all's

advice on taking his credit card i still don't know if he understands that he's not an arb that he's not arborist barbie or mechanic barbie and then upside down smiley face i'm glad none of those trees hit him also is that oh no that's the lawn chair i thought it was an office chair because as someone who is on arborist reddit as well as tree law reddit and like is so and we have to get arteries cut like literally 90 of my day is looking at photos of poorly cut and trimmed trees so i would like to see where this falls and i have to say that this is a man who is a little too delusional like we need to bring him back down to earth a little bit but if you could let us know how you think your dad got like that because i would like to give him a sprinkle oh wait i even

noticed that it appears that the fence broke because the tree fell on top of the fence it does appear that way yeah that that that tree is not safe i mean that ladder is not safely attached to that tree no no no no that's a fully leaning ladder on a tree these are some skinny ass trees too yeah there's a bunch of them but they're tall and skinny i would like to know the background of the office chair or is that a lawn chair because i'm just picturing your mother sitting there and being like i'm that's a death wish you're sitting there that is a death wish it is true it is true because you could easily get knocked over like that fenced it in the head i love that like just absolute like i can do this myself can do attitude i have that but it yeah it doesn't

usually end up well anyways love that thank you for the update and wishing all of us a little bit of delusion but not too much because that's way too much but i'm glad that your mom is taking the credit card. Me too. All right. And let's take a break. and we're back it's time to hop on in or dive in cannonball in slide in slither into the rest yeah let's slither into the rest of our calls mind if i slither in that is the wind i'm doing i know i'm giving you a does your snake not want to be in a where's your snake that there's no inside of a it's inside of a perfectly sealed non-drafty home that's a morning morning snake morning sausage morning disgusting straight to jail straight

to jail. If you want to hear the origin of that, listen to Fisting Friday that came out last Friday. I'll write you in jail. Hi, Megan and Melissa. I'm 20 years old and my pronouns are she, her. I wanted to give you guys a call because I've started recognizing a pattern in my relationship that's really frustrating and I don't know if I should just let it go. To put it simply, all of the people that I am closest to are really forgetful. Don't get me wrong, I forget things, I'm not perfect, but it's what they're forgetful about that's hurtful. For example, I have multiple friends in my life that will start telling me a story and I'll have to stop them to remind them that I was right next to them when it happened. There have also been times when they've started

telling me a story and I've had to stop them and tell them they've already told me. You can also flip it where I've told them a story and they hear about the situation later from me or someone else and insist I never told them, or they'll start telling you something that someone told them like a fun fact, but I was the one that told them. It's gotten to the point where my closest friends have started asking me beforehand, hey, were you there when this happened? Or did I tell you that this happened? Or was it you that told me about XYZ? They started doing this because I've communicated how frustrating it is to be so easily forgotten. So you can imagine why I feel a little stupid when I'm praised for remembering something like my friend having a job interview because

they casually mentioned to me it to me earlier in the week. Feels like I care about them more than they care about me and I'm not even intentionally trying to remember what they say to me. I think what I'm asking you guys is, is it valid for me to feel hurt by my friend's inability to remember our conversations? Again, I don't expect perfection and I know a lot of people struggle to keep things straight. I'm also trying to consider if maybe I'm feeling entitled to something that they don't owe me. But at the end of the day, because it's a pattern I've recognized over the years, over the course of multiple different relationships, I've started to become a little resentful because I can't help but take their forgetfulness personally.

It's not fun to internalize the idea that maybe I'm not so memorable. Just in case it changes your opinions, I'm referring to about four to five different people. Their ages range from 20 to 50, multiple genders, and none of them are romantic relationships. I'd love to hear your thoughts. We could never be friends. Here, I'm going to come at it from a different way. I am somebody that remembers so many things. And when I was younger, I had the same feelings that the caller had. I had the exact same feelings where I was like, why do people not remember these things that seem either so big or so small or like I was literally there and I realized that my brain works in a different way than other

people do when it comes to this. And I had to pull back. Like I had to just realize that I do remember information differently than other people do. And because of that, it is like a blessing and a curse because you'll be like, it's easy for you to have receipts for things. If you put it in messages, I always pull them up. When people don't remember things, I'll have the messages, pull them up, show them. Or I, something even happened with the same person who I know has like, they forget things all the time. And this past week I had said something to them in a text message, in an email and in person. And they didn't remember and asked me about it again. And I asked them, I said, we've talked about this now three times and three different things.

Am I communicating in a way that is not good for you? Can you let me know if there's a better way for me to communicate? And they said, no, I just read the previous email incorrectly. And then someone else that was part of this conversation asked the exact same thing later in the day. And so frustrating. Yeah. It's so frustrating.

and you just have to like kind of just like take the information and just know that everybody does not think the same way that you think even another situation where somebody has started to tell a story and so then I made a joke and I was like I remember and again it's a curse I could remember exactly where everybody was sitting when the information when the story had been told what they were wearing and then I reenacted the whole story like making a joke out of it and pretending to be each of the each person and like one person was like i don't even remember saying that and it was like but that's something i would say and i was like yeah because you said it yeah so you just gotta kind of just realize that not everybody has the same memory that you do some things that you

think are small or big some people it just goes in one and they might have like a recollection of it happening but they just don't remember that it happened so and they don't know remember who said it or who did it again it is very frustrating it's extremely frustrating and i feel you because this is me but it just is what it is i thought i was when i especially in high school things would happen that i would do or say and i thought that i was just like i was like in the same way if the caller was like you know i'm forgetful i'm forgettable and it's it's not that because then i would once i clocked it and realized that i would notice it was about that they that people do this for everyone yeah so I and I so agree with that like I'm I am like your I am like your

friends and I think you are making it like very personal and if you can take a step back like Melissa said and like look at how they interact with each other so like people when Lily interacts with someone and I interact with someone people could feel this way about us and then they watch Lily and I interact with each other and it's like they do this to each other too like this is like this is just this isn't like exclusively for people who remember like it's just what we it's just what you do and sometimes for you caller if you did this to someone it would be intentional and it would be personal and you'd be doing it to hurt like you would be doing it because you're pissed but that's not the case with everything there are things that you probably do

that we all do unintentionally that someone else would never do unintentionally they would only do on purpose to hurt someone's feelings like we just all operate differently throughout the world and I think like you like it does feel like your friends are in a spot where they can't win because they have adjusted their behavior to accommodate for that and like that's what I would do if you told me that like hey this is making me feel like really forgettable I'd be like oh my god I'm so sorry like let me like have I told you this before did I say this like and that feels like it's still not really good enough because like you're still feeling that and that then like with so much love like that's you like that's on you that's not on them and I don't want to say I think

you're having unrealistic expectations with friends because I think that if you've conveyed your feelings they've adjusted their behavior and you're still feeling that way I think that there might be something else there like do you feel like do you not like have you moved away from them recently like do you not feel as close with them before like are there things like do you feel like you said before, I feel like I think about them and I'm a better friend to them like than they are to me. I don't know if the exact words were. It feels like you care more about them than they care about you. What other examples are there of that? Because like this might feel like a symptom of that. And then if they're fixing this symptom and they're working on this symptom and

they're accommodating of being like, OK, cool. People can't just change how their brains work, but they can a lot for that of like hey tell me if i had have i told you this before like tell me if i did this like that's something that i would do if someone had told me that like hey this is like really hurtful to me i'm like that's how my brain works like let me like let me do what i can do but if you're still feeling that way i would unpack like what else is what what else is going on there like what else is going on like you're not feeling close in these relationships because if this all changed and went away would you be able to get past it or like are you going to think about how this happened before like and you're not able to kind of move past all of this

but like it has absolutely nothing to do with you and i don't know if this reframing this will help but like when people want to tell you like a funny story or like like they want to talk to you and all of that like that's because they care about you and that's not because they forgot about you they forgot that you were there it's like I've dealt with Melissa where I'm like oh my god I heard the funniest and I'm like I have to tell you this and you're like bitch I told you that I go oh my god but like here I am so excited to share something that was so funny with like my best friend and it's like oh shit like you're the one who told me but like I'm not looking at this it's not a slight like or like I do it to Maz all the time where I'm like so excited to tell

him something he's like you've already told me like this before but I'll be like oh shit I did I'm sorry and like I'll get embarrassed he's like no no tell me it again like I love this story And it's because it's not coming from a place of malice. It's coming from like the, I'm excited to like either tell this gossip, tell this drama, tell this like fun thing to someone. I'm not excited to tell everybody. I'm excited to probably tell a certain specific set number of people. And that should feel like you should know that like that is a massive compliment, especially for people with shitty fucking memories. because in order for me to remember that I have to tell like to like I have to remember something I'm like in the back it's literally taking up a huge section of my brain like I have to tell this person I have to tell this person and I've already maybe I've already told you you were there you were the person who told me but like just know that like my excitement and my desire to tell you this thing has taken up half of my brain power and that's because I care about you it's

not because like I don't care about you and I think you're forgettable or anything like that So, you know, I think also I recognize that like and I as a neurodivergent person, like I have a lot of friends who are neurodivergent and I also have friends who aren't and both are a wonderful balance. And like that's someone who like I get overstimulated by myself and like my other friends with ADHD. So having like friends who you feel like are on your same wavelength, I don't think that you should be like, I can only be friends with people who are like me, or I can only be friends with people who are opposite from me. But I think like, you know, if you commute and it doesn't even have to be about neurodivergent, like I'm just saying this from like my perspective, but like people you communicate with on the same level, those are important like people to have because it offsets some of the other times where it feels like you're having to either perform or to kind of go through the motions of something that isn't innate to you. You can have the people who the way you communicate is just simple, easy, straightforward, because you do it the exact same way. And I think if you are having all of your relationships like this, it does not mean that you are forgettable at all. It means that you need to meet more people. It means to broaden the circle. like a four to five person sample group is not nearly large enough and again you are not forgettable because they want to tell you these things yeah i like i'll say like i have like friends it's a small group like but my extended friendships there's a lot of people and i've

never like come in contact i'd say one person that i was friends with like in high school and college like that one person but like most of the people that i come in contact with don't think in the same way so yeah like i if you want to find somebody it's going to be hard i don't know where there might be i don't know maybe i just haven't opened my circle big enough but like finding somebody that does have that type of memory is very hard and i've just you just gotta kind of just gotta live with it like you and figure out how to how to adapt to it but it does i i see it like, like I said, like a blessing and a curse because there are things that I remember from when I was like two years old. Like I remember literally sitting at my Fisher prize table,

eating dinner and watching golden girls. Like I remember that. And, but then like, like my new, like some things that are like action items for myself, I don't remember it at all. And so I have like my to-do list every day is like a whole page long. Cause I have to write down everything that I have to do plus like if I do it and then it's not on my to-do list to write it down too so that I have it to reference back later but like you just kind of just have to make allowances for people in your life I'll tell you where it does get aggravating where I do just straight out shut down people is when somebody's telling me a piece of gossip and I know that they forgot they told me because they've told so many people oh yeah now that is just like you're not you're just talking

to whoever wants to talk but otherwise when people don't have any ill will or malice towards it they just don't they just don't get it yeah and like it's not like a skill or like a learned practice like it's literally just how your brain is built and with so much love there are probably certain ways and how you operate and how your brain is built that like are off-putting or unsettling or make other people feel shitty about themselves but they're not saying anything because they know that it's not that's you're not controlling it and they know that it's like for them to deal with and so like i do think when we start to kind of really nitpick and police how other people's brains work and ask them to modify their behavior

that they're unintentional and just like innate way of thinking or behavior in a way to like protect your feelings it just opens up the fact that like that will then happen in reverse and then it's like oh shit like damn this is not so clear black and white because like i actually can't control this other thing that i am doing and like you might not even be able to like rack your brain for something that someone could bring up that you go well i actually can't control that but that's how innate those things are that it's not you like i i forget people i like forget people exist that's an adhd thing like and like this is it's not a trait that i like about myself but there are certain times where i'm like this shit is fucking nice like i'm pretty good at

ignoring if like life gets hard like if there's a uh a really catastrophic event or something like horrible happening you want me around because i can pivot i'm not gonna ruminate on this thing that's happening i am i want to have a better day i want to pivot i'm like okay cool that's it is what it is let's keep like I can easily distract myself because I'm easily distracted and I can forget things and I forget I can forget people but then I can also not process a lot of things because they're not they don't stick at the forefront of my mind I have to really go out of my way to do that so I don't think either I think both both sides are a blessing and a curse and I think recognizing the good parts of it for you for your memory and then recognizing the bad

parts and then even having the conversation with your friends of like being like I feel like I'm taking this really personally and like you said that I'm not like can we just like talk this through and like can I understand how this works for you a little bit more because like I'm having a hard time not taking it personally and then like if that was my friend I'd be like oh my god no I legitimately if I don't like I will let food rot in the refrigerator because if it's not in front of me and my eyes are looking at it I don't know that it's there like I miss appointments and like You can see that it's like, oh, this is something that happens not just to me. And I think your friends would be more than happy to, you know, tell you about that kind of stuff.

But I do think it's hard to set an expectation for a friend. And then I also I also again, like I said, I don't know that if they completely changed everything about this, that you would be happy there. because I do I think that this is it's you've internalized this either based on other things that are happening or you've just internalized this for a long time that I think you need to like unpack it because I think it'll seep into other aspects of your friendship but you're not easily forgotten at all all right next call hey Melissa hey Megan here's the tea so last week I agreed to take care of my friend who was getting her wisdom teeth taken out let's call her London mind you this was a last minute appointment but I'm able to take care of her because my job has

very flexible hours, and there's no other person in town to take care of her except for her brother who works a nine-to-five. Mind you, I canceled my therapy appointment for the second time this month in order to take care of her. Everything goes fine with the procedure. She comes out of surgery, and she's a little loopy from the laughing gas, but she's not that far gone. I was driving here at her medication, and she starts asking me if I go to church and if I pray and yada, yada, yada. But the records show that I am bisexual. After working through a lot of religious trauma, I allowed myself to come to terms with my sexuality. And I told this to her while on a trip in March that I went on with London and a mutual friend of ours, let's call her Mae, who also

does realize she's bisexual and who's dating a girl whom London is obsessed with. While in the car, London says that she gets concerned for me and Mae because we're gay and it's a sin and she basically doesn't want to end up in hell. And I, of course, do not share the same ideology. If she had said anything else, I would have quit it to her being on laughing gas and not knowing what she's saying. But London, May, and I all went to a literacy university where I was traumatized for four and a half years, and London had the best time of her life. For context, London is young compared to May and I. I just turned 24 in August, and London turned 20 in February. She was 15 when she started college.

I always had a feeling she felt this way because I know she comes from a strict, do this as my daddy type of background. But I convinced myself that she was more open-minded because of how excited she was about the girl that May was dating, so I hoped that she had changed her mind. I was dead ass fucking wronged. I should have known this because anytime we talk about someone who I would end up marrying, she always says, your husband this and your husband that. And she clearly knows that I would pick pussy over penis any day of my life. I know it may seem obvious to me to cut her off and not see her anymore, but we work together two nights a week and I really need that job for the extra money.

I know I should talk to her about this, but I fear that the conversation will make the situation worse. I also don't know whether or not I should bring this up to May. I don't want to hurt her, but I also feel like she deserves to know this, especially since London is so ingrained in our lives and knows so much about it. Ultimately, this hurts because London and May were some of the first people that I told I was gay. London wouldn't even joke about it before I actually came out. So now her doing something like this just confirms my fears about coming out to my family,

who I also know would not accept me. At this point, I feel like my back is against the wall and I don't know what to do. If you have any advice on how I should go about this, I would very much appreciate it. I can handle tough love as long as it's delivered very gently. i love you both so much i love this podcast and i love being in the patreon and for anyone who's not yet subscribed literally what the fuck are you doing get your life together and go subscribe bye oh my god gold fucking star i love you i by the way i also love your voice me too this sucks i'm so sorry and like i would never get like i love that people are like i can

you can be like tough if you want i'm like why would we be tough like you've done nothing wrong that's why 15 year olds shouldn't go to college i had a 15 year old in my he was in he was in a science major but i don't know if it was specifically biology but he was in some of my biology classes and he was nice enough he did think differently than like other people like i remember we had this one assignment and everybody was trying to like write things down do blah blah he just took all the data and just put it in a spreadsheet and calculated everything and was done in like a minute i was like duh like i know how to do that but i just wasn't and nobody else in the class had thought to do that but yeah there's a maturity level but i think that this

could have happened at any age though i don't think it's specifically like a 15 year old but there is this sense of like you know you you feel that as the person like that you are like your peers and you are but it's not that you can sometimes feel you're better than your peers because you're doing it quicker faster and smarter but then the issue is that like it's easy then as the peers to then be like oh yes that iq that whatever has men made us now matched and then it's like oh fuck i'm now here and feeling like damn this is someone who like yeah would have hurt me at any point in any time but there can be this kind of this kind of thing that like you might not have been you might be like realizing you've overlooked a lot of things because the

way they carry themselves and perform like play the role the self-performing but then also allowances because they are younger so like so certain things they did they're like oh it's because they were younger yeah and you tend you might accept like behavior that you wouldn't have with any other friend and then you're like oh shit I'm giving you extra like I'm I'm giving you all these accolades because of you're here but I'm also then saying like well I can't these are because you're younger so like it's just it's so much allowance for them which isn't I mean that's the parents fault I think but also the parents think the same way no I yeah but I mean like the putting someone in uh school and I also think that like to change it but like you are also able to

like you unlearned a lot of religious trauma and like i think i actually i really think that going to college from the time that you are 18 to like 26 would be like incredibly transformative but you know that you're able to like learn and grow from this experience like she is still very set in her ways and that's something that like it's not your responsibility as a friend at all but i also think that like you know you bent over backwards to do this for her regardless of like what she like here's the thing if i the only time that i have been like i'm just going to be like i'm going to take other people's word that this is like not what they believe or who they are because i don't know is like my grandma when she had she was at like late stages

of Lewy body dementia and like was saying horrible horrible things like that to me it was like I mean she's a grandmother age like I don't I don't I'm like I don't know if these are beliefs and like I had to trust people in my life to be like that's not what she believes or thinks and like this is not how we want to think of her like this but like that's not like Novocaine that's not laughing gas like it's unless you're it's a degenerative brain thing and it's like a legitimate or like a legitimate neurological trauma to that i don't think you need to factor in oh she said this while under the influence of anything no because she clearly wanted to say it anyway you've said yeah and so i think that you can distance yourself from people as a friend even if you work with them

in a professional setting i've done it where you know you can still be professional at work you're two days a week isn't that big a deal and then like you just keep it professional there and then outside of work you just kind of stop communicating i mean i would tell may i think that like 100 yeah because i think that the way that you kind of all the pieces fell into place when she said that and you were able to kind of like catalog back to like these times that you've been like excusing things that she said and realizing oh shit no that was it may will have the same experience and like a lot of what you said was based on the fact that like may is dating someone who london seemed like very like oh my gosh it's so cool so like i'm sure there are some things

that she said that like may picked up on even about that situation that like probably only looked better and supportive from the outside or from your perspective but i would be curious like what the job is two days a week like is it that you don't want to have a are you the only two people working together like in my mind the worst possible scenario is or two would be like it's her parent or someone's company where she's the one who got you the job and so you have to say in her good graces in order to maintain the job or if you're like tandem babysitting and like you have to you're like you know have to take care of kids together and like you're having to like and it's just you two if it's like shift work and like you're not always on like the same shift or there's

like you're working with a bunch of other people there like i think there's varying levels of keeping things pleasant so depending on how much you have to maintain said relationship like can you just be like you know pull back from the relationship and you don't have to say anything to her at all or you could be like hey just want to give you a heads up like i don't think that like i don't really see a huge future in our friendship like i really didn't like what you said and found it incredibly offensive so I'm gonna like remain civil but I just wanted to give you a heads up because I don't want you to wonder why I really would hope if I didn't say anything you would have realized what it was because it's blatantly obvious but I think this is a good

learning lesson for you I thought we were great friends and it sucks you would yeah want to lose a good friendship and someone who's you know bends over backwards for you for something like this or you pretend everything's totally fine and every time she asks you something you say i'm so sorry i can't i actually i'm going to hell and then you just continually troll her and depends on like what the vibe is for like what's satisfying to you and what is what is satisfying to you what's not going to make you sacrifice your emotional well-being and what will not sacrifice your financial well-being because that's like it is a song and dance like you have to figure out there like there's no correct answer to that because if you have to sacrifice and like pretend everything's

fine in order to maintain this job two days a week i don't like i would spend a lot of time trying to find something else because like that's a huge especially like i don't have any religious trauma and i'm so fucking thankful for that but it's something that i like watch a lot about and read a lot about and I'm very fascinated by. And that shit is awful. It's awful. And it takes people so long. That's why they use the term deconstructing. It's literally like taking down a fucking skyscraper brick by brick. And so if you're feeling like you're having to kind of go back to that, that I don't think is worth much of anything. And I think that there's a lot of brainpower and time and energy that could be spent trying to find another job. But it's hard

to mourn the loss of a friendship. It's hard to be on the receiving end of homophobia from someone who you thought was a friend and then like, worry about losing like not having like there's a lot of factors here for you to process through all of this. And I think that there will be a way that it's the least painful but it might not even be the first way that you try it like you might start being more pleasant and that's not working for you or it works for a couple weeks and it doesn't work for you anymore like you can ebb and flow with this because like this is just you're just trying to get through and there's so many fucking ways to get through something and you can do it petty you can do it being kind and you can do it petty one day kind the next day like literally

whatever you have to do to survive it yeah yeah yeah i've had to cut loose friends because of their beliefs some of them i will say very easy just blocking done with but some of them like i had like deep friendships with where i trusted them with information and then it came out like that they were a bigot in some way and you know i was just like like this hurts but i just know what's best for me in the long term yeah and it can also feel worrying when you've told you've confided in someone that like then when you end the friendship you feel like you have to do it in um a really amicable kind way because you're afraid they'll retaliate and like that's really scary especially when it's something as bigotry is like oh no like this is like you can this is

a weapon like this can be really used to harm me or other people that you know we share in a circle and harm other relationships yeah but yeah this is this hard this is hard and this this this sucks but I also don't wouldn't beat yourself up about that like you should have known because I don't know if I don't know if she's done a video on it but like she's talked about it but Andrea Russett had this friend fucking Sandra fucking hate her who they went through kind of like the same thing where it was like one day it just like came up where it was like well no I mean like your bias you're going to hell and they've been friends for years and andrew's like what like absolutely shocked and it was like well you knew i was like you knew i was religious and

believed in god and she's like but you're friends with me like how like are really all of these things that like you could you could maybe have said that you had these views but like you're not doing any like what the fuck but i'm also like being religious and believing in god none of this hate is in anywhere in the bible yeah people just make up shit well it's one of those things that i'm like you don't think that everyone has friends who are religious and who aren't bigots like it's like this isn't like a go-to obvious thing and you would think that the clearest indicator of it would be that a you would be a loud screaming bigot at all times so we would have you would have never even become friends or you wouldn't be friends with someone who's a part

of some a part of it of sexuality a gender in any case but in this case specifically someone who's bi who you specifically think they're going to hell and so it's like why would I think that you think I don't deserve rights and you think I'm going to hell if you're friends with me like why would I think that so like I wouldn't beat yourself up about that because even if they said all these other things them being friends with you that's a mind fuck because it does feel like that would be the clearest indicator if they felt if you were an exception to the rule and I also do not fault people for being like the exception to the like it's survival and it's also like you have to process that like I don't think that that's inherently bad or a negative flaw to have

unknowingly accepted that or knowingly accepted that with like family members and all of that like that's fucking hard there's so many people like i talk about how i've cut off so many people i went to high school with because they were quietly racist but like made allowances in their brain because i was quote unquote one of the good ones and so like you don't you don't realize it until it actually happens yeah and that's not a fault for anyone except the people who are the people who are bigots like yeah because they're not they're not loud with it until something comes up yeah all right good luck let us know how it goes all right we're gonna take a break And we're back!

However, when we went back home from the dry brunch, like, we were just being funny with each other, dancing, just, you know, typical gay shit. And, however, Michael, for some reason, decides to kiss me. And normally I would jump if my friends would kiss me. However, I kissed him back. And we met out for, like, a good three minutes. And then we just laughed after that, like, what the fuck. And then just continued chilling. I ended up watching the movie after that, but however, something in me, it was like, I don't know if it was the alcohol or anything, and I know alcohol is a truth serum, but, like, it felt good.

And I don't know how he feels about me besides that he also appreciates our friendship that we've had since 2015. The only thing is, this is going to sound horrible for me, but my question is, how do I suppress these emotions? because like again I appreciate my friendship with Michael for so so much and I don't want to ruin our friendship you know and it's scary I never know how to deal with these kinds of emotions mostly because I fear relationships especially since seeing my family with their marital histories and multiple divorces so I don't know like I know I'm not them but it's also like I don't want to ruin this friendship that i have with michael because i appreciate them so much and all they've done so now how do i just not feel these emotions towards him and again i don't know

how he feels about me but still it's going to be horrible i know but anything to help please thank you bye she's fucking cute yeah i think first of all i just want to point out that Michael kissed you. So I do want to point that out, that they might be feeling things that you are feeling too. But I do think that this goes further than just like Michael kissing you and it felt good. I think it's more of your fear of relationships. And like you said, because of examples that have been put in front of you by other family members, then you're scared of what this could mean because you don't want to ruin what you already have but let's say Michael liked you back would you be open to exploring that further because you did

like how it felt when y'all were together or are you just wanting to be friends with Michael because I think if you think of you kind of think of like if I want to explore this and Michael would be open, then where would I fall within that? If you just want to be friends with Michael, then suppress the feelings and just be friends with Michael and leave it there. But if Michael did not just want to be friends, and if you don't just want to be friends, then I think you should look deeper than, you know, I just want to be friends with Michael of I'm scared to actually be in a relationship because of the trauma that I have yeah I think that like this just depends on where you are so I say like I've got a couple of little things to go through but like take

Michael out of the situation where are you with relationships like do you want a serious long-term relationship right now like are you looking for that right now is that your mindset do you feel like that's where your journey is and that's what you want because people talk about it in specifically in heterosexual relationships where it's like people will date someone for all this time and then in this specific reference that it's people talk about it's like women will date men for all of this time and it won't work out they will then date or they won't even date the like these situationships or whatever and then the next woman he dates he marries and it's like well what and it's like it's because it has nothing to do with the other person it just has

to do where you're at and like if you're ready what you want and i'm i am like my two loves and like they're like not even fucking comparable but like i fall for friends like that's just me like i have never had a like really like deep relationship or something with someone uh for long term at all that didn't stem from like oh shit i fell in love with like my best friend so that is something like if you've never experienced that before or even if you have there is a lot of care that goes into it like i don't think you're reading too much into anything and like you to other people it might sound bad to suppress your emotions but like no that's fine like if you need to like you need to like in high school i remember like i similar thing got drunk and

and my best friend and I ended up kissing and I was like oh fuck and I realized I like started to have feelings for him but I was like no no no fuck that fuck that and so I just ignored it ignored it ignored it ignored it and then like finally like I don't know probably like almost a year later months later it got to the point where like it wasn't just one-sided and like neither of us could really ignore it at that point but also we were a lot younger and like we're not friends anymore we don't talk and like that was a really fucking rough breakup but it's just about where you're at because there's always a risk of losing a friendship and it doesn't have to turn romantic to lose a friendship but I would also say and I mean this

like with so much love if Michael has feelings Michael can also be like I need to end this friendship because like this isn't good for me and that's hard like that's really hard because it can feel like you wanted to like salvage and protect that and like you know make sure that that didn't happen but that's like what Melissa said like I think you need to be really honest with yourself about these feelings and are the positive feelings where the positive feelings stemming from and where are the hang-ups stemming from are there any hang-ups because you think you don't actually like michael or are all of the hang-ups because you're either not sure that you're you're not ready for a relationship or you know you're not ready for a relationship you know

you're not a very good partner at this time in your life or you know that like you're in this middle of like a self a self healing or self-realization journey and that getting into a relationship would really like stunt that or would have to take away time from that or you're really focused on your career or you're focused on x y and z there are so many factors that could mean that you are not at this current moment ready to embark on a relationship that have nothing to do with having doubts about michael being the person or having doubts about your feelings about michael so i would do the your best to try and kind of separate all of that and put them all into categories um because being worried about the relationships that have been like maybe mirrored

for you is a very valid thing to worry about and despite not always being like and ending up like the people who we've seen that how they've carried themselves in relationships it does affect it like and like it's i will say from my personal experience like it has affected my attachment style so much and I think if Mott's and I had gotten together like when we are both a lot younger and with like less relationship experience and we were less like committed to figure like to doing this like there would have been like you know you make a lot you make more allowances for that kind of stuff because like it is a learning process and that's like a wonderful thing I think about dating a friend is that there is a level of communication there that you have usually a

lot quicker than someone you meet from a dating app or you meet just in a romantic sense and setting like they tend to know more of your background your history and like you can have those harder conversations but I think you can ignore your feelings to process whatever you need to process that's totally fine I wouldn't if Michael wants to talk about it I would be honest about that I wouldn't shut it down I wouldn't be like oh I don't have feelings it'd be like I think I might have feelings but I need to process this first so I know because I don't want to risk our friendship but no matter what I think there's there's a there's a risk and like not to be so fucking cheesy but like there will be a risk in everything that we there's a risk

in everything we do and like the risk of losing a close friend happens no matter who you date because the person you end up dating you end up being really close to them and that ends up being a huge part of your life and someone that you miss out on. But then also people sometimes move away and people sometimes lose touch or you have a falling out. Like the future of all of our relationships is not guaranteed. I think it's better to put something off than to pack it away to never look at or talk about ever again. And like because suppressing your feelings is not processing them, but you can set them aside to process something else and then come back to processing them because yeah you could be turning away a really good thing but it's only a good

thing if you are in a good spot to take the good thing then it doesn't become a good thing like I don't know if anyone else I mean I know other people I don't know if you color have specifically ever like been in a relationship or had a friendship with someone where you're like damn if we met a fuck ton of years later like I think this could have been something bigger or like someone who you just have like this like I don't know karmic cosmic tie to but it doesn't really feel like it ever fully fleshes out in the way that you think there could be a connection there and I think we meet some people at the wrong time so I think you can put someone off and not back burner them but like you know set it set that those feelings to the side

until you're ready for that but it's also not guaranteed but this is also like very much rom-com like this is sweet and like i you i can tell in your voice that like i can tell in your voice that you really care about them but i can also tell that like i can like hear the butterflies like i can hear that like you look back on this and like you liked this and you know you put those kind of like hazy pinky filter rose-colored glass like not in a bad way rose-colored glasses but like it's like when you talk about someone you're just like waiting for the soundtrack to kind of come in and you're like oh this is one of those moments and like that's sweet and I think you should look at that like that's a really good thing not a lot of people get to have those

moments of people who they like already love as a friend and I think that's like it sounds cheesy but I think that's a really big blessing and like a really wonderful thing and especially when you know someone so well then that is them also conveying how much they care about you too so like it means a lot so I think even if this is all that it was like what a wonderful moment that you got to have yeah sweet if you do want to be in a relationship with them it's scary moving out of the friend zone and then what you have always the thoughts of like if it doesn't work out then like I've lost a friend but then it's also like if I have feelings for them and I'm constantly watching them and maybe watching them get into relationship it's like they're the one that got

away yeah you're slowly losing a friend and like and it hurts I think that hurts more it does but it's also like it's not easy like I I mean I panicked before Mots and I's first date and like hooked up with I mean not first date not first date I didn't panic for our first date but like when Mots and I like first started talking like I hooked up with someone else because I was like panicking panicking panicking like it's not always like good but the best thing to do is like you just have to communicate and like it is like I said it's hard and like it can take a year it can take months it can be like messy and uncomfortable but like as long as you're being honest you have someone who already cares about you so like they tend to understand as long as you're being honest

but it's hard yeah it sounds very sweet though do we get the age of Michael I think when they say 26 I think that's a wonderful age do we have any other calls or is that the real done we've got a write-in hi eminem i would love to get some advice on how not to get attached when i casually hook up with people i 23 she her am out of a four-year relationship as of may and i've seen a couple people since then the first person i was able to not get fully attached to as i wasn't entirely attracted to them and i eventually ended it the second person i was very attracted to and we had a messy situationship due to us being exclusive then he cheated on me i have an anxious attachment style and i get attached very easily i've been going out pretty frequently and i find

myself obsessing over the interactions i have with men two nights ago i felt like i had such a great connection with the guy from a bar and i eventually went home with him before i agreed to go back with him i mentioned to him that i am not one to just hook up with people and he said that he would continue talking afterwards we hooked up and cuddled for a few hours afterwards i felt like it went really well and we've been snap chatting i know the pukey face looking emoji but with no substance i'm sensing that i am more into him than he is with me i'm just looking for advice on how to not obsess over things like this i do enjoy these interactions with these men i am just worried that i'm not cutting i'm not cut out for casual hookups i'm in a lover girl era but i

should mention that i am moving abroad in november so it'd be difficult to find something more meaningful thank you and love the pot i truly think some people aren't meant for casual hookups and i think you might be one of them yep if you're somebody that catches feelings easily then you know casual hookups aren't for you and i and i also don't think like going back to somebody's place who you just met and you're about to hook up with them and being like i want to continue talking after like i don't think that's the time and place to do it you that that's something that you talk about like before that's something you just you talk about like at the bar like that's something you talk about on a date like I don't know it's not like a hookup

conversation because that's not what you want you don't want to hook up you want to be yes you want to be in a relationship with someone that's you're not somebody that does casual hookups so giving like I don't normally do this and it's like then don't do it if don't do it then don't do it so I think this is very easy like don't casually hook up with people because this isn't for you yeah I think you can have a secure attachment style and like not be a casual hookup person I think you can have all attachment styles and not be a casual hookup person but having a an anxious attachment style is it's not not only is it like not ideal it is a problem and like it's a problem that is like it is you're not born with it it is caused by something and it

needs to be fixed because without a secure attachment style you can't be in a relationship like and this is i mean shout out shambu dream who like taught me all about she on the fucking podcast where she was talking and she was like you definitely had this attachment i was like oh wow and i recognized that like you know i didn't heal my attachment style in relationships because of the relationship that I was in it was I was working on that relationship style and fixing the relationships that had those issues in all of my relationships and then the pieces kind of started to fall into place and I was with someone who really like acknowledged and allotted for that like growth and saw that but you can't just be like oh I have an anxious attachment because

to me if someone says I have an anxious attachment style the next thing is so I'm really working on that and I'm not dating like you just need to not like it's because it's it's you're causing yourself and other people a hell of a lot of harm like it's just not it's not fair to anybody there because the actions that you do when you have an when you have any attachment style that's not a secure attachment style they're not kind nor are they healthy to anyone and that's not something that other people it's like you know in the classic fuck boy thing of being like you should just know like i'm not falling in love material like it's like we hate when fucking people say shit like that and so it's like so we can't say the version of our attachment style

in that and expect people to kind of a lot for it when it's a trait and a quality and a circumstance that a we didn't ask for and b we don't like and want to continue to have so like you don't need to It's not about finding things that make this work for you because this attachment style does not work for anybody and it will not work for anybody long term. Like it is a consequence and a result that fucking sucks. And I've been there, but you're no matter no matter who the person is, you will you will end up being so into someone who is an objectively bad person and being having this need to have them pick you and choose you. And even if they do everything right, you're still going to feel that way. So you I would just say that, like, take a break. And like the fact that you know that you're moving abroad and you're still going doing all this and going through all this.

I'm like, you are harming yourself. You're trying to set yourself up to fail. Yeah, because it's punishing yourself. But it feels like when someone else does it, there's this there's this thing about it. And again, I've been there, but like it's unattainable things or things that don't work out. like it can kind of feel like a self-fulfilling prophecy and you can use that because you can say so much shit about yourself but then when you involve someone else and you kind of cast them in this role and then they disappoint you it hurts more than when you disappoint yourself and so it

can feel like it's confirming negative things you believe about yourself or about the world or whatever that is and it's just not fair because you don't have to do that it doesn't you don't have to feel that way and the people who are participating in that they also don't have to do that nor do they maybe even want to do that and participate and make you feel like shit because that also eats away on the other side too so i just think that you might feel like you said you have a four-year relationship you might feel like you maybe you're looking at this like analytically like you feel like you've had enough time to get over it and like you can be over the relationship but still have fucking shit that you've dealt that you're still carrying with you about

love and relationships in yourself. Yeah. And I feel like because you were in that long term relationship, you feel like you have to have like what you love or girl phase. I call it a whole phase. Like you feel like you just need to go through and just hook up with random ass people because like that's what you're supposed to do after being in a relationship for a long time. and then the next time that you're in a relationship that's the person you settle down with it does not have to be like that like you don't have to do this you don't have to do it yeah and not all dating experience is good experience and the only thing you can control is yourself and your experiences and i don't know how this relationship ended and i don't know whether your

attachment style is a result of this relationship either ending poorly or relationships with other people in your life or whatever it was but like something that I learned the hard way is that unless I deal with like my trauma and the results of my trauma which attachment style I'm just walking around with a fucking like I'm a dartboard for other people to be like oh let me throw some trauma on this and it's like oh shit like i have to like actively close myself off from this because right now i'm not a walking red flag i'm a walking like this is a person who i'm gonna be able to manipulate whatever it is like this is someone who is not going to who will tolerate my bullshit who will xyz you do all of these kinds of things like it became like oh shit i'm ending up in these same

relationships in these same circumstances situations the only thing i can control is me so I need to take myself out of this for a bit and it's helpful like I was not I'm like was not a casual dater at all and like that's okay like you can have experience without being someone who goes out all the time and whatever it is like it's it might not be for you and you might be lonely you might be bored like figure out what the driving force behind this is like are you reading too many like romance books and like you're just like oh are you romanticizing this like time that you're trying to kind of get over the relationship quicker or get over the the result of like who you've ended up at the end of this relationship and like

you know whether you've got holes to patch or all those things you're trying to like fast forward to get to this like are you watching you know content that makes you feel like oh I want that like don't like remove yourself from those things figure out why this you're drawn to this and why you're going to this versus working on your attachment style because there could be a lot of fucking reasons I mean I have to deal with like stupid things like skin picking like boredom is one of the biggest reasons why I end up doing it and it's like okay I have to find things that I'm not bored doing and like quick and easy things so unpack that so hopefully you can end up in a situation or in a circumstance where you feel like ready and able to like you know start working on

the attachment style but yeah wishing you the best i have very high hopes for you as somebody who has cycled through this all right well we've reached the end of don't blame me and we hope you enjoyed and i was gonna say i hope it was good for you like it was for me yeah baby and if you're brand new here i hope you stick around i hope you keep listening and if you want a little lowdown uh we upload episodes four days a week so we have today obviously don't blame me tomorrow you can check out see you next tuesday which is really just like a catch-up fun random discussion personal life sometimes you know we'll do a bit what whatever we're in the mood for um and then we skip wednesday we give you some we give you

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but i do want to go over a few house cleaning items one if you don't answer you're not getting it like these you have to give thoughtful answers because this is a thoughtful group people are sharing personal information about their lives and we need to know that like you have thoughts um in a meaningful way yeah two personal two you have to have social media because we need to know we have to verify that you're a real person LinkedIn does not count and if your account is closed like you've we've had a few several people I didn't know we had so many teachers that were listeners but if you have a private account that you don't have open we still need to verify that you are a real person so I will say on Fridays

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sure that this person doesn't get in this is x y and z and like we've had i mean we've had random dudes try and without answering the questions and it's like they'll do it even in a condescending way and i'm just like yeah no so it's a mix of that and then everybody is entitled to privacy when they are within the group but in order to do that we have to make sure that this is like a safe spot for people because we can't monitor the group at all times and like that's why we shut down the group for a long time like we like went through like literally every single member and made sure but like if you are someone who would not be a safe place for our audience and like what we cultivate we need to make sure of that and we also then need to like that's why we also don't

accept fake facebook profiles like then we need to make sure that then we can remove you and like we can remove you from our space entirely so you're not you know harming people and that might seem like wild to and like 90% of you or 99% of you are not that but we just people are very like very very open with the things that they share in the group and they're very vulnerable and we're being extra careful because we have not opened it for so long so people feel very comfortable and safe in that space right now so it's like our responsibility to make sure that the new people we let in will also be the level of safe that the group has been for the last like year and a half two years two years yeah we do it with love and we're happy to accommodate like and figure out

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