Don't Blame Me! - Loving Your Own Company

Episode Date: May 15, 2023

This week Meghan and Melisa give advice on: Teased about your friend with benefits Learning to enjoy you Annoying room mate Stop being so critical Don't Blame Them Girlfriend doesn't love me like she loved her ex Buy our merch: https://store.dftba.com/collections/don-t-blame-me Follow Us! @meghanrienks www.instagram.com/meghanrienks https://twitter.com/meghanrienks @sheisnotmelissa www.instagram.com/sheisnotmelissa https://twitter.com/sheisnotmelissa @by.meghan.and.melisa https://www.instagram.com/meghanandmelisa Affordable Therapy By State (Curated by Crissy Milazzo): www.tinyurl.com/y64kwdnf Need Advice? www.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 oh my gosh we're together in person physically so close so close i could touch you if i wanted to i'm good thanks i said if i wanted to i had no desire to it's okay wow i don't think i'm so hard against it um welcome back to another episode of don't blame me like we said we are together in person and you should head on over to watch us be together physically on the patreon you can see melissa's gorgeous hot pink shirt thank you us sitting on the yellow couch together reunited you look great thank you i did shower good thank you it was probably the longest i've gone in a while don't share that with me i had an olive oil hair mask in for my i looked like one of those people who does like synchronized swimming on tiktok where they make their hair that like shiny

they dunk their head in essentially jello and it's like hard and shiny and then it just doesn't move my hair was down and just like wasn't moving well it looks good now thank you that's what matters pretty feeling very hydrated um i did shampoo like five times in a row i needed to it was helpful but does that counter the work that you put in no the ends of my hair were okay they're feeling a lot better than they were the top needed some loving so welcome back we're gonna give you wonderful amazing advice this is don't blame me if you are brand new here hi if you're not new here hello bitches and whores and i don't know what's like a like a chummy word chumps what are we we used to call them little fuckers we haven't done that hey little fuckers

also if it's your first time and you're like you hear us saying little fuckers and you're like you know what i might be the first timer but like i do self-identify as a little fucker it's a state of mind you can whenever you're ready to become a little fucker the community is here open arms but if we decide that we don't want you here then we will kick you out oh yeah we run a tight ship a toy ship because we like to have a community where people can talk about wild things that's what the face group is for that's what our patreon is for but we're bitches yeah that's what we've been told yeah recently also are you trying to tell you think we i know when we're bitches i know when we're not bitches

and i'm but you're still listening i'm always curious and people are like you're just like so mean i'm like set your sources like tell me when you thought i was being mean because like was i was it when i was unintentional and i'm like oh i should have changed my word choice there was there anything constructive here or is it like my just whole demeanor and then it's like well no i chose my words carefully there so what's the show megan it's a show where we're going to give you wonderful amazing life-changing advice because in the middle of the night when we are both we little babies these little fairies came to us and they cast these magical spells that we would be hot gorgeous funny smart intelligent hilarious and also fantastic giving advice

and it's a burden we've both been caring for it's tiring to be honest that's why we're always tired it is like you might think you have the world on your shoulders I would say I've got the world in Pluto that's my favorite planet slash planet adjacent you

I have the universe the entire intergalactic universe she carries the weight of the fact that also you know that you've got ties to aliens in space i know but i still just haven't got fucked by a ghost which is upsetting the aliens and ghosts

they're fighting and they're keeping you from each other to live your full potential you know what that makes no that makes there's like an age-old rivalry between the ghosts and the aliens that makes so much sense it's like they're both having like we both have equal ancestral claim and we can't cross each other wow look at you coming to the right conclusion if you want to call in for an upcoming episode. You can leave us a voicemail at 310-694-0976. International listeners, you can send us an audio message at meganpodcasts at gmail.com. We do have some requirements before you call in slash send us a voice memo. Both iterations have to be under three minutes. We do recommend slash require slash plead slash desperately request, beg of you to

write everything down that you want to say. Read it out loud. Time it. Practice a couple times. Make sure you have all the information in there. You have to be 18 or over. Have your parents permission. I don't know if I already said that. We want you to include your ages. It's all anonymous. You can use fake names, pseudonyms.

But if it's about like a relationship, how long you've been together, all those important details that factor in when you when you need to give advice, you know, like you're telling us for the first time. We don't have the backstory. If you're like, oh, you know, but then all this other stuff happened. But like, I can't get into that. We need to know, like think it's trial, like character witness, like we not character witness testimony.

Yeah. whatever it is i got a little lost but testimony i believe yeah something but like we need to know the backstory we need to get a good sense of the characters the roles everybody involved so we can give you the best advice because we want to give you the best advice we don't want to give you bad advice if we accidentally give you bad advice we didn't because you can't blame me impossible impossible i want to watch that now again i love that movie and if you do a wonderful job also you can listen to those previous episodes to get a sense of how people do it um and then just read it on your call and then you won't have to do it again usually and most of the time actually all

the time when people call and then they stumble up they call again and they go i didn't read it that was my bad i should have done it correct no lies told there megan surprise i love lying anyway should we get into the episode let's do it hi megan and melissa i'm 24 pronouns she her And the guy in the story is Tom, 23 pronouns he, him. And my friends in the story are both 22 pronouns she, her. That's called one Jennifer and the other Tess. So I've been hanging out with Tom since the end of January and we get along great. We love going to the gym together, hanging out, and then we sleep with each other exclusively.

I've talked about this in therapy and my therapist thinks this arrangement is good for me as long as it's not causing me anxiety, which it hasn't and I'm really happy about that. Also as a note I have ADHD and have difficulties with understanding why people do certain things and was diagnosed almost one and a half years ago and have only recently been getting help for the ADHD. Straight in the beginning me and Tom agreed upon the fact that we won't become a couple or anything since neither of us are ready for a relationship, him not having gotten over his ex who dumped him last summer and me being emotionally unavailable. I've discussed this in therapy and with friends as well as with Tom of course and that I've never felt the feeling of romantic love and that I don't know if it is even possible for

me to ever feel since when reflecting back on all of my relationships it has always been about my ego and not if I'm actually interested in the other person. I've been very open with my friends Jennifer and Tess and Tom about our situation but people still keep on teasing us about it which I don't understand. Both Jennifer and Tess as well as Tom's friends. I also have to keep on telling my friends after all of these months that this isn't a relationship and won't become one and it's getting exhausting this was previously with a guy for one and a half years and she kept the same kind of agreement with the guy and i never questioned her about it but now she keeps on asking me what i'm going to do if i catch feelings for tom and the likelihood for that

happening is almost negative since i'm not emotionally available at the moment for anything serious and i don't think i'm suddenly going to experience feelings which i've never experienced before do you think she's projecting her past experience on me how do i get them to stop commenting about it and doubting that we are just friends and won't become anything it makes me him uncomfortable when hanging out with my friends they can't just be chill with our situation but has to constantly comment on it i mean why is it other people's business if we are friends with benefits or in a relationship as long as I'm happy I'd assume my friends should be as well but they seem to be doubting me thank you for your advice in beforehand I literally wrote

projecting when I was typing my notes this would be a situation where I would personally just address it in front of everybody with him there and then leave it there and if people don't get it then that's it's not for them to get and just be like ignore them it's not their business like you said they don't have any say in your relationship they're just being annoying they're just a nuisance they're a little gnat and they're projecting their own feelings yeah I think that you're probably in the case of people who they've have encountered her experience of catching feelings is relatively common. So, you know, I don't think it's ridiculous for a friend to bring it up one time, but the continuation of it, the issue is, is once you bring them in and

talk about it, you can't control how then they talk about it afterwards. Like it's not their business. And I think at this point, like you just, if you want to keep talking, I don't know how much you're still talking about it but you're like i've been open with them that this was like the situation i think like a one-time establishing it but if you continue to talk about him and like you guys like hooking up and doing all of this stuff for them at this point they're seeing that as an invitation for them to then comment on it and it's like well it isn't any of their like business in that way and like it's just i don't think like i think you guys have a good thing going on and do you need your friends to be like a sounding board because it doesn't seem like

these are the friends you go to if you need advice to talk about him like they've shown you those colors that like you've been open with them and like i don't think there's anything wrong with that but i think you've now seen that like oh okay now you've taken this as an invitation to totally not listen to anything i've said and like project and cast your own thing onto this like okay you're actually not someone i'm going to talk to about this anymore look why are they bringing it up in front of him too i feel like that's like a i think they think they're doing you if like they think yeah like that that's like an unspoken rule no i'm here like so mad like with your friends it's like you don't bring up the things that you talk about with the with your partner

and whenever since your partner is but like you don't say things like that no i guess because y'all are all friends and but like you liked them and you wanted them to do that like and you did have feelings that's not how you do that you know what I mean like so I think they think they're doing you a like that they know better than you but that's it's not the case I think you need to cut off their information source and like you said like draw the line have a sit-down conversation like this is I'm letting you know this is like where we're at like this makes me really uncomfortable it makes him uncomfortable and I'm not going to talk about this anymore and if this comes up again like i will physically remove we will physically remove ourselves from the situation

i will physically remove myself from the situation like that's setting up a boundary and i think that's just like at this point what it is because they're they're projecting she's projecting so much that she's not she's not seeing it for anything other than her own situation and i think in her head she thinks if maybe someone else had said something that it would have ended her thing would have ended up differently and again even if you wanted that her doing that is breaking code like that's already bad she's super super super she she's not seeing the situation for what it is or even what she wants it to like it's this is all projection to the point like there's no actual like logic or like real care and thought put into it and you don't

have to be a casualty of that just because like she hasn't processed her breakup right but I'm happy that you have somebody that like understands you and just work out and fuck that sounds like a great relationship to me yeah I also think that like you have a very like logical and valid reaction to like you know what if you develop feelings you're like well I haven't before so Like, why won't like, I don't know that yet. And also, there's not like, there's not really a right answer to that question. It's like, I don't know, regardless of what you want out of something, you don't know that you're going to want that the next day or the day after that, like it is just kind

of all up in the air. So I would, I don't want to, I'm not trying to say that, like, when she's asking you is not a good faith question, but that you shouldn't second guess your answer to that, because there's no real answer to that kind of question. and like any of the things about like questioning about like well what happens if this and like what happens with this like it's just like who the fuck knows even in committed relationships like nothing is guaranteed like people's feelings changes people have different actions like there's all of these things that are you can't predict or have be concise or really like cut and

dry so i i would stand by your statements and how you feel like you're not reacting in any different way than anyone else would no one can predict how they're gonna feel and like you're doing what feels right for you right now and they're just not the people to talk about it with shut up jennifer and tess yeah that's also the perks of friends with benefits though like i will say if you are having issues and you need friends to like vent to to me that is a high maintenance friend with benefits i need something that is or not a lot of issues like saying how good it oh yeah that's without a doubt but like if it's like if you have like complaints and there's like oh well there's this this and this to me that's that's a lot of effort for something that should be a text message

and in my preference of penetration you know yeah in my eyes i see they go work out get all those endorphins and hormones and what's it called uh pheromones all the pheromones are spraying in the gym they go to the first cafe they go to the separate locker rooms shower you know how i'm feeling about this and then they leave they're gonna fuck in the car and then they like i just want you to yeah thank you i can't tell a sex story without finishing what's the point then they get home they fuck some more and then tess and jennifer and the other friends like come over and hang out and then she's like on the high from that and then they're like oh i see some glowy tension here and she's like shut

the fuck up but jennifer and tess just keep going it's like no we're just post-coital you know that glow i am not here to yuck anyone's yums but like i know that it's a big thing for people that's like gym people date gym people and like you're like oh it's like so sexy and like we're so sweaty i cannot express how like nobody fucking touch me nobody look at me this is not a story of no no i know but i'm saying like even like if i came home like after i go work out i was like oh my god you i'm like literally don't even like i'm like until i like scrub my entire body anew sensory wise the feeling of dried sweat on my body i added that they showered in their separate locker rooms did you not hear that part no i did hear that part you haven't ever gone to play golf with

mott and then you're like give me that armpit like so no anyways happy for you keep doing what you're doing just tell less people yeah all right well we're gonna take a break we're back hi look we can say things in unison again are we ready for the second one i'm ready hi megan and melissa i'm 21 years old she her pronouns and i just finished university and moved back to my hometown with my parents for the summer before i move away for grad school in the fall. I'm calling in for advice about learning to enjoy your own company and keeping yourself busy. I don't really have any friends in my hometown because not many of my friends from high school stayed here and I do have a couple of really close long-distance friends. We FaceTime

here and there but I've been feeling more bored and lonely than usual back at home. For some extra context, I've been calling this my healing era because I've decided I need a break from dating in boys and really need to focus on not seeking external validation for my own happiness. I'm about to start a new full-time job for the summer, but it's in the customer service industry in an area that is very touristy in the summer, so it's going to be very socially draining. I'm hoping I'll make some friends at work because I usually do, but I wanted to ask if you have any tips on not getting too down on yourself or how to better enjoy time alone. I love the podcast and look forward to listening every week thank you you've come to two professionals i literally

monson golfing um what day is today tuesday he went golfing on sunday and he was like talking like it was so great to get out of the house and like you know do the hobby like hang out with people and like as he was talking i was like i don't think i've ever had that and i was like maybe i maybe i need one of those yeah i mean you know i was all revved up about going to play tennis and things but then it rained and then all that got washed away because I was because it's a monthly thing so I was like I can't just pay for a month and then I don't know if you know that was gonna but that was gonna be my out of the house activities but I really enjoy being with myself a lot and I think what you need to do is kind of just like set your home or wherever you're

going to be as a place of enjoyment because when i didn't enjoy my surroundings at home i did not like being at home yeah but i've now created like a very comfortable place for myself you know smart house it's smart ish i wouldn't give it brilliant level but it's smart ish you know give her two years and she's gonna be living in like disney child original movie smart home yeah but just like like even i got a new toy i don't know you see the box right there did you get abyssal it is yeah the ones that clean things like like did you watch my last vlog no did you get one too bitch i got first of all i was gonna text you saying you need to buy this and then i saw you have like a green little thing over there and i literally won like when i one

hour ago i was like oh damn i think she already got it i wonder if i told her already about mine no melissa i'm gonna show you this clip i haven't i was gonna promote on my instagram but you're gonna see what is this who your brand deal was with no oh god i wish look what came out of the couch yes watch me empty it so we're talking about creating a healthy like a comfortable place cleaning couches cleaning couches i have two couches too and one of them is suede so we have upholstery cleaners we both have thistles um i got the other the one that's like the next one because you know i'm a little a little more particular about things but i mean this sat for a year like six months i didn't use it yet so okay i finally did so i just wanted like i was

like i need to bring some more freshness into the home and so i got this and i did the couches because you allison and gabe all regularly sit on these couches and so i was like i need to do this one and then my other couch is velvet my other couch is velvet and that just holds stuff and i was like i need to do i need to do that one actually that was surprisingly not that bad yeah well i think the stuffing is a little bit different it's yeah it's a very firm one um and then i did my mattress oh my god have you done your mattress i've spilled first of all there's of course blood stains yes and then i've also spilled two full cups of coffee on either side because then i had to flip the mattress over and then i was not allowed to drink coffee in bed

anymore that was a self-imposed rule and then once i've been doing it again recently because we're like we will need a new mattress soon and i'm a sweater too oh yeah and so i did it and then i was like i need to get they have the other one that has oxy stuff in it and so i ordered it good because i went to so many fucking targets looking for it and they don't sell it in any of the stores and they say that they do yes they say that they say it's in stock no it's not it's not i went to like i ordered it it'll be here on thursday i'm really i'm really excited about it i have a good spot treatment that i bought that i then used the bissel with just hot water afterwards to kind of suck up the rest of it that worked really well so i'll tell me how that one works i'll send you a

picture of my other one i did sprinkle some i tried to put some oxy cleaner in yeah it's too thick it doesn't dissolve fast enough so i couldn't do it's like i gotta get the cleaner yep very excited about that but that all to say is that creating a clean comfortable place brings me joy yeah being amongst my things that i like brings me joy having like items in my home that are just like comfortable like all that makes me happy and that all came from like the pandemic i was in a place where that did not bring me joy and i had to be there by myself so fine activities you know i have a light bright i cook i you brought candles i've got candles i different rooms and a massage chair i've got massage okay she's bought she's tried to get

rid of that so many times and now you're in your but no you've actually you've been in your embracing your massage chair embraced it if i put a little um like cushion underneath me it boosts me up so now it's better but then i don't get the full like butt massage oh yeah the foot thing adjusts so i'm fine with the foot the butt thing doesn't get it but i'm like i can just take then yeah get off of it yeah separate time longer massage what else do i like to do i right i makes almond milk make almond milk i was including that with the cooking but i get technically it's not cooking other endeavor uh baking too that's your plants my plant well they don't need to know that they're not too into hot they only do good when i send them outside so i'm like these plants

are meant to be outside so to have activities and you can also you can be home by yourself but also have friends online you can talk to people you can facetime people um you can find communities that you enjoy like reddit we're both very active on reddit good side yeah the good side of reddit i don't even i don't even know you're the one who fucking taught me you're like megan you will never see the bad side of reddit and i was like what are you talking about and i was like never gonna get out i was like i can't believe you're on reddit and then you were like get your ass on there i spend so much time on there and you're right unless i accidentally swipe left and go to the trending page i'm never on the it's all good yes it's a fantastic algorithm they like really only

show you kind of like tiktok you know yeah no it's it's very similar you're right it's very very very true so i'm like someone i'm not an introvert like i get my energy from like being around people spending time with people but like i have a hard time like social i have really bad social anxiety but i also like you know it will use a lot of energy if i'm in social interactions that i don't have i'm not totally prepared for i don't have like the control in so i opt for alone time a lot of of the time but i don't like like moth is someone who like he likes just like reading a book peace and quiet like I don't like that I don't like that so I have a podcast playing all the fucking time like I don't get the same level of like comfort from scripted things

like I if I'm watching something funny I don't like watching something funny by myself like I want to watch it with someone else and then like oh my god like see the other person laugh like there's just something about that that's different for me so I am playing podcasts on my phone the video versions of podcasts constantly and then I'm doing other things and you said that you moved in back home and even though it's only temporary before you go to grad school i would take the time and maybe a little like money if there if it's needed to change up your room a bit so it's not like you're moving back into your high school room and then you're also inadvertently comparing and feeling like you're back in high school but then you said most of your friends aren't there

anymore and so like it's just kind of a mind fuck so it can be something as simple as like moving your bed to the other side of the room like changing like switching the sheet colors dyeing the sheets that you have you can use avocado pits to like dye they you know they're gorgeous it makes it sound like oh god yeah if you want that yellow color what is avocado piss no avocado pits and changing the layout of your room if you're not going to spend any money all the time yeah i oh my god when i was in in high school or even kid wise i'm reinventing myself every i'm constantly rebranding and like i have to do that sometimes i would even just like sleep backwards on my bed like i would sleep where my feet normally are my bed and not move my bed like

i will not do that of course not but like you know you just have to like change up you're it's so easy to get back into where you used to be and do a lot of comparisons so you switch up that because you're not you're living where you used to be but you can't you're not that person anymore when i went home from college I'd painted my room yeah there's so many got a new comforter and stuff and it just felt it gave a little refresh yeah and like you I'm sure you could even ask like you know whoever's at home living there with you like oh if there's any like old quilts that you can just like trade out it doesn't have to be like your favorite thing ever but just something that feels different something that doesn't have like totally remind you of everything and it can feel

like a little bit new so between that like changing your environment to not feel like you're you're regressing or comparing it to a previous like life stage of yours and having like podcasts be like playing and doing like Melissa said like involving in like communities like social kind of stuff like online I think is really important but then starting hobbies and just trying new things things that you've never tried before whether like oh I'm gonna do a puzzle like I'm gonna do like i'm some don't be like me don't unless you have a hdm which you're already like this you decide you're going to start something new and you like a lot of money and overhead and something then you never actually do it but like a lot of things like they're not too expensive

like there are puzzle trading groups where you can like buy a puzzle and then you find a group on facebook or something and people are exchanging puzzles that they've already done and doing things like that where starting and completing tasks i find when i'm trying to figure out what i want to do or have some sort of structure to my life or feel good about something, I start a project that I know I can finish. It might not be the number one thing that I want to do, but I can enjoy it from start to finish and see the whole end result. And then I'm more inclined to start something that might be longer or be more intricate or take more time that will not be done so quickly, but I will enjoy the process of it more. And also, this is my closing statement,

are you ready deliver it get you a towel roll it up on the door best time it's the best way to spend your time when you're just bored nothing masturbate oh my god i was like smoking weed no no that's terrible i mean some people it's good but paranoid it's yeah no that's for me it's a social day ender like it's a it's got to be like a social activity that i'm going to sleep yeah no not don't leave me alone with my thoughts i will lose my mind i'll shave my head like i will i have to rip all my skin off like it can't sound good no i see things that aren't there hear things that are not there swear up and down there's somebody knocking on my door oh my god sirens following me everywhere i go and then when i get to a point where i start seeing my thoughts

nope nope i'm under the covers and my head is there fun when you're around other people totally and like you're out in the sun you're not trapping your home where you're then you're like i can't trust my home yeah yeah no yeah masturbating is a great idea it's a great way to pass time it really is makes you feel better yeah if you want to take a nap it's a great way to knock you out if you want some energy is great great way to pump you up so nature's candy okay so i live in a three-bedroom apartment and one of my roommates we'll call her allison recently moved out of the city for another job the three of us chatted about what we wanted in a new roommate and decided that allison should be the first line of defense in finding someone

to take over her lease and after looking for a while she told us that she wanted us to meet two potential roommates the first one seemed really lovely and she ended up pulling out of the conversation when she found other housing. The other potential roommate, Emma, was fine when we met on the phone, and even though she seemed nice enough, I couldn't help but feel like she didn't really fit the vibe of our apartment. But since Allison needed to move out within the week, I felt badly suggesting that I didn't want her to move in just because despite not exhibiting any clear red flags, she seemed kind of annoying. Emma moved in about two weeks ago, and I feel like I'm going crazy. I work as a casting assistant, and so much of my job is just

monitoring auditions all day and being super front-facing with actors which I love but it can be really exhausting since I am definitely not an extrovert so when I come home all I really want to do is spend time alone and decompress but Emma and I are on a really similar work schedule and every day when I get in she's sitting in the living room like waiting for me and I feel really badly because I can tell that she wants to be friends but my room opens into a common area so she just waits in the living room for me to come out so that she can ask me a bunch of questions about my day and the specifics of my job. I convinced myself for a while that I was being insane and that she actually just likes to be in our living space. But yesterday when she was in

her room, I opened my door to go to the bathroom and she shouted for me to hold on. And then she came and stood in the doorway to the bathroom to initiate a conversation when I was trying to take a shower. I'm also kind of a neat freak and she leaves every room that she's been in like a sticky, crummy mess, which makes me want to hang out with her even less. She technically follows all of our house rules. Like she cleans her dishes within 24 hours, but she'll like leave them on the coffee table instead of putting them in the sink, just little weird things like that. And it makes me crazy. I'm always polite in conversation, but I feel like I'm going nuts and I'm hiding out in my room and ordering Uber Eats like every day just to avoid conversations

and our gross living space and kitchen. And it's really hard because I want her to feel comfortable in our apartment and not like I'm policing her, but I also want to feel comfortable and I don't know how to strike a balance without making her feel bad. It also feels important to say that Lily practically lives with her partner, our other roommate, and she's never here. So she I've not had to deal with any of this. I feel awful, but I'm also like going crazy. Uh, any advice? And my initial advice would be anytime that you, and this is like your next living situation. Anytime that somebody else is moving out, I think that you should take the initiative to be the one that's conducting that, that's getting the people and conducting the interviews

because you're going to be the one that's left with the person the person that's leaving is more concerned about filling their space as opposed to getting somebody that will gel with you yeah yeah i think it's time to instill some additional house rules and boundaries yeah and i think that like it needs to be approached in the sense of like hey so you know we've been living together for a bit now and obviously like we've never lived together before we had our previous house rules and I'm realizing that like it wasn't totally fair for us to just assume that you know you would have nothing to add to this list so like you know we've been living together for a while like I definitely think there are things we should like update and change and I want you to be able

to have to have a say in that as well and you know we obviously all agreed on this stuff before you agreed to the ones that we have established here before but open up the floor to her to hear house rules that she would like to implement and then you can add some of your own as well and the first thing i would do is i would make i think i i mean not i think like one thing for me that's really important i want to add is quiet hours for me i've never had to deal with this before but like my work schedule like obviously our work schedules are pretty similar and i'm like so drained by the end of it. And I am really worried that I'm coming across as rude and I don't want to be at all. But my other roommates, I've never actually had a roommate that had had a similar work

schedule to me. So I've been able to kind of decompress from work. And by the time that my other roommates get home, socializing in that way is much more doable for me. And I'm in the space where I have the energy and the capacity to do that. So for me, that's really where I'm at. like and then saying things that like you know you have the 24-hour dish rule but it's that the dishes within 24 hours are back in the kitchen and they're not like left other places and that it's vacuuming sticky messes and those things so i think that you you're like you're saying you don't want to police her at all and she's driving you crazy this would drive me crazy i have a really hard time with like i can't even do guests for that long like i i love being social and then

I love coming home and being quiet when I want to be quiet, like talking when I want to talk. So this would, I would have a really, really, really hard time with this. But I also know that like, I've had issues with roommates. And when they've brought it up, they've also had issues with me too. But I have a really hard time seeing my own behavior when someone else is like driving me crazy. And a lot of the things that I might be doing, I have no idea that they're bothering someone else. And then I'm like, oh, you might have no idea what you're doing is bothering me. I don't need to treat this as something personal or something that I'm really going to hurt your feelings because there are stuff you're going to tell me that I'm doing

that is not really working for you. And I'm not doing it maliciously or it's not going to hurt my feelings to change this kind of behavior of mine. So I think that as long as I would strategically i would give her the floor first then i would share yours but i would also be like you know what and like if you've got anything else that like you want to add like add more like rules like anything that you're open to to that because it will build resentment because no matter right now you're hiding in your room and she knows you're hiding in the room and she's going to think it's about her and it is about her. But for a lot of people, it's like, oh, maybe the response usually for people, if you're retreating into that, it's like, oh, I need

to be nicer. I need to try harder. So I think it's will backfire. The more you pull away without expressing it, I think the more she's going to come to you because she thinks you're mad at her for something and she's trying to make up for it with time and talking to you until that's like really established. I think it's going to get a lot fucking worse. I don't think because there's no cue to pick up on that you want some alone time unless you say it yeah you have to let her know you can't just retreat and in a nice way say that i i we were looking for a roommate not a friend but like in in like like this is like when i come home i need time to decompress yeah i when i shower like that's time for me do you act like do you want to be friends with her

I it doesn't seem like it but like if you do then like say like we can hang out like have specific times where you can hang out and maybe they're outside of home but like home is the place where you live and that's it I also wonder how the other roommates sold you guys to Emma like are you really close with the roommate who's moving away because then it might have felt like oh my god like we're all really good friends like Emma might have felt like she was stepping into that and also emma that might not even be what she really wanted it might have been like what she was told the situation was like and she's trying to fill a position of the friend who's moved out so like there's just a lot of expectations that other people have and like i

know for me the second that someone tells me that like oh like hold on i'm gonna i'm doing something right now like give me one second or whatever like i have an innate need to like fill conversation space and listen to us and like you'll just like give me a second i go oh my god perfect like the second that someone gives me the go-ahead to be like you know i'm like oh my god great like the weights off my shoulders like i'm i'm not like a nervous talker but like i'm just like you know i'm i want i feel the need to entertain everybody and so for her it might not even be like that's who she truly it it can be like the sense like that's what she feels like she's supposed to do but the the when you go to the bathroom and you've both been in your room and she opens the door and then

stands there and talks that's a little much no it's definitely a little much and like i agree with you that like this girl's probably annoying but when you pull away from someone without telling them the response is usually i need to spend more time with them because they don't like me and i need to get closer to them yes communication is key like you have to you have to let them know yeah and you don't know how much of this is her character who she is versus who she thinks she's supposed to be being in this situation but when you all have the right expectations of each other then you can all be yourself more and you can kind of drop the the act and know that it's like a learning it's a learning curve and i will say like bad roommates are kind of just

like par for the course like they're just like an unavoidable situation that happens i'm guessing you're in la if you're casting and my list of roommates is i i've had to have that conversation I had a roommate who was like, oh, we really don't know each other. Well, like, what are your parents like? And I was like, leave the guy out of this. I was like, yeah, I just I just said, yeah, we don't. And that was it. Yeah, I have a question.

Is she an actor? If they have similar hours, unless she has like a day job, probably not. Yeah, I wonder if she's if she has even if she's not doing it right now, if she has a little bit of a performance based thing. because like I find her behavior incredibly annoying sadly I relate immensely to that not in the sense that like that's not even really what I want to do but like there's a level of like some people feel like they have to perform to get people to like them and then when someone's not liking them and that you can you're trying a little bit harder and it's usually not even authentic to to you but some people are just annoying exactly yeah and that's the whole thing

that it's like at that point i think you really want to be kind to her find out if this is really her give each other you both work these things out and then if she's still like that then fucking do what you need to do but then you don't have to feel any guilt behind like oh i don't want to hurt her feelings how much time's left on the lease i know i this might it just might be the end of this yeah that's what i'm like how much time's left on the lease because then that also determines how you handle this if you got a whole year left yeah do you like this apartment is she did she just take over allison did she just take over allison's lease and then in the next lease she would have to resign does she have equal rights to the apartment at this point

yeah if you are in la though and you are in the same industry do what you can to not completely burn bridges right she might be a big time producer next week Mm hmm. With that personality. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. She's getting money from people to make things. All right. Well, we're going to take another break. all right we're back hi next call hi there i'm the person with the very bad sound quality uh calling in again i have no idea what happened i'm so sorry it sounded awful to me too on the podcast okay so i'm looking for advice on how to be not necessarily less critical but nicer in my critique i i know that i'm a critical person and i'm kind of okay being that way because I don't feel that I'm wrong in my critique and I do control myself like at work

if it's not my job and I'm not in charge of you I leave it alone but it's kind of more in like my personal life and not really so much with my friends but with my family more specifically my father so as an example most recently I was over at his house we were family cooking dinner sunday evening and we're following a new recipe this man brings out green onions instead of white onions and thinks that's an okay substitute and then not much longer after that incident he also brings out italian sausage instead of chorizo and both instances i was just like very bluntly and like but why that's not correct why would you think that's okay that's not a one-to-one those are different things this is not like and he didn't say anything to me but

there was a vibe and I felt mean afterwards because like he wasn't trying to be malicious and I'm just trying to be accurate and get a good end result for a meal that I am going to eat myself and especially just being the very first time making this and following a recipe and it's like let's stick to what it's supposed to be like and then we can vamp another time but there are other instances where I do want to just like look at people and be like why where was the logic in that why are you doing it like this and I know I can't but I would love to still correct people when they're doing something just horribly wrong and so I'm just wondering if there's a nicer way of doing it and or if i should just you know keep my mouth shut but specifically for family i'm not

going to keep my mouth shut because well at least that that shit has failed a long time ago would love the advice love both of y'all y'all are amazing thank you this is what you do you find a friend that is like-minded and then you start a podcast but am i wrong i love that you asked us about this specifically because there's nobody else that would understand this in my life like you do yeah this is this this this I could have made this phone call in the past because this is me and like this exact call could have been made but I have made a new rule where I do not allow anybody else in the kitchen with me for the same reason and I'm more easygoing with friends but with family, I have a strong mallet, I shall say. I've sent you screenshots.

Which one do you think I'm laughing? I know, I know. What I've learned to do is just to remove myself from the situation. And that's because I also feel that I am right. And why are you making these decisions? Why are you doing these things? and so I've just simply removed myself from the situation if like with the cooking thing if you want it done right you have to do it yourself and so you know I'm sure that person had the best intentions Megan's sitting here saying depends on the sausage it's a one-to-one to me I'm like no chorizo has a different texture without a doubt and it's not a it's not a substitute for me to me those green onions different flavor than a white well also you

can't cook with them the same way right a shallot sure like go for it no i so because my thing with like the food substitutes because you said it's not just this so i would say for like the food substitutes i know it's your dad but like i think i'm gonna tell a little story so this has happened twice in the last week and i'm not happy about it and this is why i'm saying like i'm not trying to say like, well, it could be this. So for me, when I think of like repurposing things for food where it's like, oh, one to one, like I'm thinking that I'm coming at it from two frames of mind of what was available at the grocery store. I already thought ahead with this and I'm just going to swap it. If it doesn't turn out well, I'll swap for something else. And it's not enough that I'm

going to then pivot what I'm making. Like I'm not going to like I'll lean and change the flavors up a little bit or it's a this is what we have i'm repurposing it that's what i mean so like those are things that i'm like okay those are two very different things and then there is the i'm not putting any thought into this and by proxy i'm not putting any thought into the your experience with this thing and that feels like negligence and like fucked up and like you're not even thinking about me and so this is my story i wanted to have mac we were coming up with some dinner plans for this past couple weeks and one of them was uh i had recently tried the bonza dairy-free macaroni and cheese and i had told you about it i was like really good great and so we bought well we bought

a box and then realized that it wasn't the dairy-free version then he bought another box of the dairy-free version and i was gonna make it and he was like no no totally i got it and i was like okay and he made it and i put it in my mouth and i go what did you do and he goes what and i go this is not right and he goes what do you mean I smell it and I said did you put vanilla almond milk in this oh and he went well yeah it's the almond milk we have and it said you needed a liquid and I was like and did you think that that would taste good and he takes a bite and goes it tastes fine I can see in his eyes he thinks it's disgusting but he's like trying not to and I was like here no like the logic of cooking is it's for the texture so we've got dairy-free butter

in there that's what to add or if you need it like do the water like and if you first of all if you don't have to ask me 100 points if you have to ask me okay i'd still rather you asking than just like roll with it and i was like i can't eat it like i can't stomach it and then we were doing a redo like two nights later and he made some more and then he like just poured in like almost a cup of water and it was like macaroni soup and i was like what like what why did you give him a second chance was that because i'm trying to be nicer like and i hear the thing like i'm very much the same when it comes to like in the kitchen cooking food stuff and the phrasing that is i've heard that like very much rings true and that i remind myself

as like do you want to be happy or do you want to be right and in the situation of having fucking vanilla almond milk in my macaroni and cheese i want to be right because i am happy then but i'm not it's not always with everything so my biggest advice is get a friend to vent once you remove yourself from the situation where you can't be nice yep i'm gesturing to melissa and i because like that's the thing like i've had times like friends like people where i don't agree with what they're doing or they're like it's not good and like my you know what's that word like that they got the there's there's a thing in adhd where it's like a sense of like justice or rightness or like when something's like when something's wrong that you can't not like it becomes it's like an

over an overt sense of justice like not being able to like stomach something and like you can put yourself in situations that are like either not safe or you go far too fucking hard on something so there are things for me where i'm like is the person am i saying this are they going to be receptive to this because the issue is if they aren't going to see that i'm right i will be more mad and i will start to get more mad so i weigh the situations of okay i know that i'm right are they is there are they going to know that i'm right like is there any fucking chance and hope because at that point i will i will lose myself trying to prove that i'm right me too and i start getting belligerent exactly to the point where nobody understands and i'm not and i get so angry

and it loses my argument and then i don't and then i'm not liking how i'm behaving so for me i'm like if i won't if you won't if i know from the first thing that i say or from our long-standing relationship if this a is not fucking worth it like happy versus right or um are you gonna see are you going to change your perspective to then see that i'm right if not fucking abandoned shit and i just hop off and if it's something that's like if it's something that like i truly find egregious or horrible i i will remove myself from the situation immediately if it's something that i'm like whatever i will listen i will nod i'll be like okay i will say here but i will not listen Yeah, I will. I will. I will make it clear my my stance and just be like, I you know, I don't I don't totally a phrase that I've used with friends before when I can't physically remove myself from the situation.

I'm like, I don't think I'm exactly the right audience for this conversation. We see this very differently. I don't think I'm going to give you the kind of sounding board you want for it. i stomach it and then i come home i complain i text melissa i like like vent about it to and then i i move on but when you're someone who like has a sense of like i know that i'm i'm right in these instances there are times when when you when you actually truly know you're right all that it needs to matter is that you know you're right yeah but when you're trying to to convince other people that you're right people will build up walls against that so like here's what i think about food things if it's edible and it's not done in like it's it's not done like with if it's done in like a convenience or a need base not like a negligence like whatever i don't care

like it's fine and then it's like well you should be considerate of your guests because i care versus like you know things are expensive and i'm trying to like make things work and like do what I can do with them there's a learning curve there and all of that if you can if you push push too much on people like that people stop trying and they start standing their ground in something that they might not really care that much about because they feel attacked so everybody's learning figuring things out at like different speeds different paces and like Melissa said if you want something done right in that sense I don't think that's the same thing in the with like you know cleaning and relationships and partners because that's how weaponizing competence happens

but for certain things that are not that aren't like inedible they aren't life or death or they aren't things like that you have to you you relinquish control when you involve other people and you just have to weigh the situations where you're okay with that sometimes we're not okay with I'm not okay with that if there's people whose I don't want to eat the stuff that I will eat ahead of time and I will be like I'm I'm totally good like whatever else I can have is like bonus but like I can't control everyone and everything to do what I want to do because it might not be what they want for them and then again like you said like I'm not gonna be proud of how I act in that way when I'm trying to convince you because for the things I really

know that i'm right i don't feel the need yeah to convince you you know even um i've had friends like for holidays they're like let's get together and cook but they're not like some friends don't actually cook they're just bringing things and so i know the specific dishes that i want to enjoy and those are the dishes i'm going to bring they're like well we can buy a turkey absolutely not you were not playing turkey it never tastes good like macaroni things like like their thing like you could buy a costco pie go for that yes yeah but certain things if you want them done right you have to do it yourself or like in this instance with your dad you set the ingredient if you want to like have this experience of y'all cooking together you get the ingredients and set

them out first yeah and then that way it's more of them just handing you things that are already there yeah that's what I do with the little kids when they want to help cook you know because I have no control over how they're what's going to go on so I just simply put things out control what you can and then let them hand me things or like if it's something like I want to do this already measure it out and they're just essentially dumping it and then I'll let them stir a little bit but then I'll take control yeah and I've definitely been guilty of like doing this to monson cooking and he's like i love you but like this does not make me feel like good about learning this and i realized that because to me a lot of this i've had a lot more experience of a lot of

it's more innate to me that like if i'm critiquing the way that he's doing something that's again not putting vanilla almond milk in this but it's like you know dicing things if it's as long as things are happening if it's safe and like as long as you're looking at it you're using the sharp knives and if they're not the dice that I would do if you're you know slicing not dicing and all of those things like I used to be like oh well why would you this like wouldn't you do this this if it's not harming anyone in anything like then I'm just critiquing someone who's learning and who doesn't have as much experience and then that's how I feel if we're doing something and it involves like spelling or something and I'm like confused about how to spell something like

well it's this and I'm like well that made me feel dumb because you made it sound really obvious and it's like my brain just doesn't work that way and my experience and your experience will we will always have a different level of that like there's a difference between like weaponized incompetence and someone who's at a different part of like the learning curve and when you can kind of push too hard people yeah they they dig their feet into something that then they aren't going to grow and they aren't going to change in that way like there's people might realize that you're right at different levels like different times down the line I love that too yeah when I can come back and be like see I was right and I've had friends who before like you know they've talked to lots

of our friends about a situation and then they talked to me about it and after I said like what I thought they were like oh and I was like what they're like no like I kind of thought that's what you're like no one else said that and like I wondered if like I think you might be right but like no one else had that to me. And I was like, yeah, like, you know, I don't know what you're going to do with that information. But like, I'm just going to say that that that piece there and that feels when someone like can then loop back to you and circle back and like, yeah, you were definitely right. That is far more gratifying than trying to convince someone in the moment that you're right when they're never going to realize that. And there are different ways to do

lots of different things i think it's categorizing things into safety enjoyment and that's kind of really it you know what i mean yeah like is it safe is it enjoyable then it is what it is you can do it differently when you're gonna do it but as long as no one's being harmed there's no point to cause harm by hurting people's feelings that's why you vent to it to a friend who has a similar viewpoint is you yeah you know all right well now it's time for don't blame them don't blame them is where a listener calls in one of you they don't call one of you hi it's me um they call in with their own advice pertaining to a call we aired on a previous episode so maybe they have personal experience maybe they have professional experience it could be about

relationships they've been through something similar they have a close friend who has they've got a degree in it or they love the sound of their own voice which cannot fault them for all right let's do it hi i'm melissa i am calling about the episode girlfriend doesn't love me like she loves my ex for some advice uh about a year ago i had an ex-boyfriend who basically would talk about his one of his ex-girlfriends all the time and about how like if she didn't move away like they would still be together that sort of thing and like he like admitted to me several times but like he's still in love with her and stuff like that and I just remember like it really

hurting my feelings and it made me question myself like okay am I like not good enough for him and the way that the caller at least seems to phrase it isn't i don't want to like compare situations or like minimize the caller's feelings at all but i feel like it's different saying like it doesn't feel like your first love because i still remember my first love um and like i still have like a certain amount of love for her from like our past like she made me kind of who I was who I am now like I definitely faced a lot of my relationships now off of those experiences on what I did and I didn't like but I think saying like it isn't like your first love it isn't her telling you call it that she doesn't have a love for you

it's just different I don't know if that makes any sense but I definitely think you should talk to her about it open and honestly because if you're still questioning that and if she ever brings up her ex a lot like that is a red flag and I just don't want you to be put in the same situation as I was with my ex when he was like I'm still in love with my ex-girlfriend so it's really good that you're self-aware and I'm thinking about you and hope it all works out thanks again guys love the podcast bye I think there's just two different kinds of people in the world people who look at their ex and go I will always have love for you and people who are like what was your name again there's three oh and like fuck them i will always have love for you

or i will always love you or fuck them or or like what's your name again like just what you know it and i think that that is kind of one of those things that like you you kind of have to perfectly match up with who you're going to be dating afterwards with that like you gotta have similar or relatable or respecting each other's origin stories with that because if you have like a really contentious first love and like it was like really bad and toxic like you know might might not be paired really well with someone who's like i will always love them in a way yeah like i think two people who are like i will always love my ex in a way that makes sense to me that you know it's just you got to match it up in a certain way it's like i was gonna say go fish

except that's not a matching game isn't it i don't know i don't remember all right well let's close this out rounding it out hope you all enjoyed this episode leave us reviews if you did on apple podcast and you can also review spotify and the individual episodes on spotify which we appreciate on spotify uh someone said the only positive thing about mondays is new content from megan and melissa universe oh my god it's so nice do you also think we're raging bitches undeserved that's like the real caveat that people need to be like do you think i'm a bitch when it's not deserved and then cite yourself like when why i like improving do what i mean some things when people are like you interrupt too much i go i'm working on it so hard so so hard and

there are certain adhd things i'm like i promise you they piss me piss me off more than they piss anybody else off but then there are other times that i'm like just let me know because if i'm I like constructive criticism if I'm being awful tell me because sometimes I'm being awful on purpose sometimes I'm not you know correct so all right thank you for listening thanks call us for upcoming episodes um and stay tuned for the rest of the slate of content that we're giving you this week and as always you can join our patreon and I really appreciate after we did like ask people to call in a lot of people called in so I think sometimes people just get too comfortable with listening and forget that you actually have to contribute to the show again as someone who's

accidentally built her entire platform on a bunch of neurodivergent people listening it makes perfect sense to me that like sometimes i forget i'm like oh i have to actually participate in this thing let me call you so we've got some great calls coming up but keep them coming we love it see you tomorrow okay goodbye bye Don't Blame Me is a production by me, Megan Rinks. And me, Melissa Demonts. When WestJet first took flight in 1996, the vibes were a bit different. People thought denim on denim was peak fashion.

Inline skates were everywhere. And two out of three women rocked the Rachel. While those things stayed in the 90s, one thing that hasn't is that fuzzy feeling you get when WestJet welcomes you on board. Here's to WestJetting since 96. Travel back in time with us and actually travel with us at westjet.com slash 30 years.