Don't Blame Me! - S8E13: Fake Vaccination Card

Episode Date: August 23, 2021

This week we're sharing advice on:    Dealing with a “friend” who bought a fake vaccination card DBT: Party vs. Funeral Update: Getting dumped after you say I love you/Staying in a relationship with a lot of red flags   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 @dontblamemepod   https://www.instagram.com/dontblamemepod/ Listen to ad-free on Stitcher Premium! For a free month of Stitcher Premium, go to stitcherpremium.com and use promo code 'BLAME.”   Affordable Therapy By State (Curated by Crissy Milazzo): www.tinyurl.com/y64kwdnf    Need Advice?  www.dontblameme.show  Domestic Listeners Call: [phone]   International Listeners Send a Voice Memo To: [e-mail]    … with as much detail as possible under 3 minutes! WeI'll do our best to share our wonderful words of wisdom. If you're under 18, please get your parent's permission. Advice is for entertainment purposes only, so you can't blame us if we screw up your life. I kid! Our advice IS AMAZING. - Want to WATCH this episode as well? Become a patron! https://www.patreon.com/dontblameme   Join the Facebook Group! https://www.facebook.com/groups/dbmsecretgroup Support the show: https://www.patreon.com/join/dontblameme See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Visit ancestry.ca for details. Terms apply. hello everybody and welcome back to another episode of don't blame me i'm doing the entire intro no i'm not because melissa's chewing i never say this part anyway that is true welcome back to don't blame me we're an advice podcast i am megan hey hello and i'm joined by my co-host producer and the mayor of hot girl summer hey melissa i mean i wish we could show like a full like a full runway look for you well it's not it doesn't it's not hidden the way it was hidden earlier because i have like tie-dye socks now but i mean to be fair socks are with like like some slides yeah i was like that's like a thing that people wear now but like not in like a

hot girl summer way i would also think you might just slip out of them it seems a little dangerous no for you maybe because you're with the socks on i know i do it all the time you because you are a clumsy person maybe but i do it all the time with my slides that i have oh yeah i'm i'm a mess i am just a sack of bones tied together i feel like you're a sack of meat thanks thanks so much as a person with the body type of a grasshopper that means a lot i don't have a lot of meat uh i have boobs though just small ones i'm telling you about the way that you i know glide around the room yeah no i feel like i'm a burlap sack like i'm like i'm you hoisted over your back and like you don't or like the exact opposite of a pregnant person who has

spatial awareness of like their pregnant belly like i'm the exact opposite i'm a bull in a china shop i don't i don't know where all my limbs go and i only have four this is true i think the last time we recorded or the the time before the last time we recorded you fell like six times yes and i'm just letting the people know because they didn't know yeah i have a fat bruise on my leg today i didn't even know where i got it from and like it was like it was way worse like i think three or four days ago it was like the peak of it and i like was like oh my god where did this come from it's like oh you hit your leg on the coffee table and i was like you always you need a ottoman coffee table yeah i think when i need a baby for myself i'm not joking because this

thing is heavy and it has no gifts so you're just knocking right into it yeah yeah it's not good yeah you need an i have one if you want to switch it out maybe anything just like that's rounded too well this is an advice podcast i didn't really say that we give wonderful advice about what coffee tables you should have imagine if that was like the mundane ass advice we gave coffee tables they're just like us hard or soft the multitude of shapes you put your feet on it you can put things inside of them or on top yeah i don't want you to put anything on top of me like well if you're laying horizontal yeah you can't put something on top of you yeah i know but i'm like i don't need to just like throw i'm just picturing it flop a flop a dick on you i just meant a body

as a whole oh a whole body that makes more sense in my mind i was like just an unattached limp penis get your mind out of the gutter i'm so pure and innocent well i'm not gonna say we're an advice podcast again even though i just did advice podcast if you need advice you can call into 310-694-0976 and international listeners you can send us an audio message email it to us at meganpodcast at gmail.com did you forget your name there a little bit it's having adhd is hard maybe i shouldn't be the one facing the window maybe you know i mean but that's your side it is my good side i just need to not look out the window good thing i don't have my glasses on you did open the windows they were closed when i

arrived oh that is true but we need the light so whatever moving on so what you need to do for your calls this is a shit show of an intro um make sure 18 over have your parents permission to call in and write it down practice make sure you know exactly what you're going to say you have all of your details and then we say practice because you can like time it on your phone because it has to be under three minutes and then you won't forget anything. You won't leave out any important info and you potentially could get a gold star. No, if I changed it. Oh yeah. Yeah. To a sparkly diamond, a sparkly diamond. So just know that you could have that insane accolade. So do your homework accordingly. Let us know your pronouns in the call. And I haven't said this one in a while.

we give advice the way that we like to receive advice we're the friends that you go to when you're like okay i already went to becky and i already went to susan who are your friends how old are your friends i was what i meant to i meant to say sharon who was a character on love island but i still can't she i think she's my age i'm like there is someone my age walking around with the name sharon might as well be gertrude that's what i well no gertrude i would tell you i think trendier now i know the names have such like do you think about the fact that like we're gonna have a bunch of grandmas named britney and chloe i know how weird is that normal that's what i mean like so it is so odd that like oh yeah but there's like so many that like now i think those names

that we consider old people names like those are becoming younger people again and like it's just cycling through and it's it's an odd time yeah that's true and this is my grandfather phoenix chad i saw someone tweet the other day and they're like i can't believe that i'm gonna be 40 years old and named chad and then i'm going to be a 90 year old man named chad that is that that's like one of those things you need the psa on tv if you are named chad you serve financial compensation like that is that's a lot yeah wow so yeah we give tough love advice but it always comes from a good place and we care about everybody who's calling in we also have a video version on patreon if you are wanting to see our facial expressions

or you just want to you're like a related jeff bezos or you have his like pin number and you like really want to like stick it to the man in that case i would like you don't just do the dollar in my throat you have to give it all to me because megan doesn't like money no i do like money i just don't like i get overwhelmed with the concept of responsibility i know so if you give it all to me yeah then melissa can give me what i can you get a little allowance that would be perfect see like a sugar baby allowance and see i love looking at money i love looking at my bank account i love looking at dollar amounts it makes me happy that's you and mods like it makes me so anxious i can't hey i can't okay um what's with you this week i am directing an

audiobook in germany i'm working my hours i wake up at 12 o'clock like i'm going to sleep at four and going to and waking up at 12 in the morning to work till you know i'm done until next monday holy shit so i've been up for hours like i can't complain about being tired i want to right now it's like the equivalent of me at like 11 o'clock at night on my usual day holy fuck that's a lot well i'm happy for you i'm not happy for the logistics for you yeah i mean it's like a biology fun biology book which only like i could say it's like a sorry i thought it was for children no that's on friday i will be doing two on friday is that one based in the united states okay well that's a lot better for you i mean but i will already been up because i will be directing

from 1 a.m to 8 a.m and that's at 1 p.m and they have other work to do in between wow i'm angry with myself for being tired because like pegan you stayed up way too late watching love island and then i watched fuck boy island which first of all love island i've always said perfect television it's so great it's fantastic i recommend everyone to watch it but the hard part about love island it's a very large commitment and it's not that like oh i don't want to do it it's like you're gonna have a really hard time doing anything else it's a lot but fuck boy island not sponsored but hey if you guys want to throw an ad our way very ready to do it because i know the creator of it one of the eps it's on hbo max and the concept is genius

it is three girls and then i forget how many guys but a fuck ton of guys and then the girls kind of pick which guys that they like the guys pick which girls they like and half of them are self-proclaimed nice guys and the other half of them are self-proclaimed fuck boys who are just in it and have said that they're just in it for the money like the prize money to like win at the end of this and they like go on dates and like do challenges and like talk with them and then they get to at the end they like pick their like bottom three or bottom two at the end of every episode and then those people after they've been eliminated or whatever are revealed if they are a nice guy or a fuck boy so that fuck boys when they get eliminated they go to limbro which is

like trash and like let's be honest they're not actually living there but like they make it look like they are like it is like the hybrid of a reality show and then like a scripted comedy show like there are bits about it and like that's like one of the bits is like they like bring them to this shack and the fuckboys have to live there and like nikki glaser does like i was about to say wait nikki laser's involved so she's i watched she hosts it there's only like eight or ten episodes or something like that but so she hosts it and she's also an ep on it and so then they go to limbro and she like we check in with them periodically so the guys who have left we check with them at the nice guy grotto is what it's called and then limbro is where the fuck boys go

and so i think what's going to happen is that there's going to be some sort of like redemption arc like can these fuck boys get reformed or whatever but like she sits around with them and does these like therapy sessions but like again it's like really funny and the guys are like pretending that they haven't eaten in days and they haven't like slept and there was one where um he's like one of the guys is saying like he's like learned from it and like he's sort of saying like so is it safe to say that you smash the pussy and then you break their hearts and like it's just like all of the one-liners are really fucking funny and then the nice guy grotto it's like these guys just like living lavishly like waving from their balcony like hello boys and

it is just so insanely entertaining and i think the part that is like the most hilarious to me personally is i was telling this to mods that i would rather pick a self-proclaimed fuck boy than a self-proclaimed nice guy yeah they're one in the same but i think like a self-proclaimed nice guy like they try too hard it's so easy to tell who's a fuck boy but it's easy to tell before they open their mouths it is like so fucking entertaining but like yeah the nice guys i trust them so much less because i'm like you're gonna gaslight me way harder than a fuck boy who's gonna like i'm just gonna like fucking shoot my shot you're gonna be like more often than not like pretty transparent you can see what they're up to like you get it versus a nice guy it's like

i'm going to weasel my way in and i'm gonna make you think you owe me fucking something and then i'm gonna throw it in your face like but i'm a nice guy but i will say the couple of nice guys that they've gotten there's like one that i'm like i could see you actually being a nice guy but they in the last episode that i watched they everyone had to reveal if they were a nice guy or a fuck boy and so now the girls know and a lot of them are into the fuck boys i was gonna say i was like come on but you can tell but it's also interesting too because it's not like the bachelor it's not like to get married or anything like that so like that's what makes it like kind of more like are you the one where it makes it like just so much messier like there is no engagement

at the end of this and so like a lot of them are just being like yeah I want to take a fuck boy like I want to do this and it is so entertaining and Nikki Glaser is so funny and she roasts these boys so hard and none of them know what to do with it cool I'm in now it's great okay so this ad for okay please have us do an ad like this is like it really is it fits but more importantly you should watch love island so we just recorded our update for this episode and it's like kind of an update but it's mostly like a live call with asking like advice for what to do about a current situation that's like not from the other episode that they were on so we're gonna just treat the second half of this episode like a live yeah call yeah so it's long so it's just going to be the

second half and we're just going to do a call and don't blame them up here at the top should we get into the call let's do it hi megan and melissa i'm calling in because i really need some advice um so i'm 25 years old my pronouns are she her and i'm calling in because my friend who's those by the pronouns of he him well we well here's what happened so i'm i've been fully vaccinated since the end of april and i lonely got it i never got it because of school or because of work i got it because i wanted to get it um so my friend he is not vaccinated he is refusing to get the vaccine he's also doesn't really care to wear masks which we're opposite on that because i just don't you know he's really like careless about it which I don't like um so I got an email from school the

other day and in order to be back on campus starting on the 16th you have to send in your records that you are fully vaccinated and you have to send in your um online vaccine records so my friend ended up telling me that he was going to go ahead and get the vaccine so he can be back on campus and I was really proud of him and I never forced him or anything he said it on his own, and I supported him. And then he ended up asking him today when he was going to get it, and he said he doesn't care about COVID, he's not going to get it, he already paid for his classes online, so he's just going to go anyway. And to me, that kind of rubbed me the wrong way, because it's kind of dishonesty for one, the people who are fully vaccinated and on campus,

and then two, other people who don't want to get vaccinated, but are at least being honest and doing their part by doing school from home. He does have a fake vaccine card, which I am not surprised. But he has that. He basically was like, how is the school going to know? And I don't know. I kind of just don't like that he's, like, getting away with it and being dishonest. I need your guys' opinions because I know how you guys stand.

I know where you guys stand on the vaccine, where I'm completely on your guys' side. And, yeah, I just need advice because I don't know where to go from here with him. it really rubbed me the wrong way how do i handle the situation what would you guys do because he's one of my close friends but i don't really like that um so yeah i could just use any advice i can get um yeah well i love you guys thank you so much bye i'm snitching i'm telling everybody i'm telling everybody what's that rapper that was like telling he went to whatever the 50 cent thing no oh he had a whole bunch of like tattoos on his face whatever i'm that dude i'm him oh uh yeah something like that i am i'm calling i'm sending whoever's checking vaccines i'm

telling them i'm sending uh finding out what college he's in i'm gonna send it to that school i'm gonna uh send it to all the advisors that are in that school i'm sending it to the freaking school newspaper i'm telling everybody i'm also telling the government because that's illegal like that's like really illegal yeah here's the thing if you don't feel comfortable writing him out email his information i'll write him out i'll write him out i'm i'm ready yeah no i we this is what we were designed for this is what we were built for like if you do not feel comfortable like and then also then you're not lying when it's like oh my god how did this happen how do they know yeah and you're like i didn't i didn't tell them because you won't have

you will have told us yes and then we can do that no this is like it's illegal so illegal yeah like jail illegal i don't know who has been making you downplay your feelings because like you're pissed about this but you're like well i don't know what to do no no you know how you feel fuck this dude this dude is not your friend and i think you know that but i don't know why you're not like saying that shit with your whole chest yeah i'm for real like tell everybody uh-huh make a fake gmail account if you don't want to tell us make a fake gmail account and tell everybody yep email the school newspaper they're gonna do an expose because he's probably not the only one that's doing this anyway tell the dean of his school tell the dean of the the chancellor

of the university tell all the advisors tell everyone well because yeah then they're going to figure out where the fuck did he get this and then they're going to take down the whole shebang yep also i'm going to let him know that he's a fucking idiot like you have vaccine records exist if you have a fake one no one created a fake vaccine record in the data like in the database right so like if they're checking them which that's the other thing like and when i say that it's not like oh well then they will be the ones to figure it out no sadly a lot of places will just take it at face value they're not going to like check and like enter in your number and don't have like a database like we have in california oh true i didn't even think about that that arts

is california-based yeah so you have to rat him out whether that's to them directly or to us and then we will rat him out but yeah he is being an absolute asshole like he is this is when people are like this i'm like oh so you are plotting murder like to me i'm like this is like you are what is it called when you are premeditated this is premeditated mass murder jail straight to jail i don't even believe in jail but i don't believe in the popos but i'd call him on it same literally same we reserve it for the especially heinous and this fucker because there's like there's even like cops that are getting fired from their jobs because they're not getting vaccinated as they should be because then that means we're starting to leave those honestly i'm like we just have to

come up with more of these things that slowly whack them away whack them away but yeah i just fuck him like this is like i don't like people are just like such selfish idiots and like this is one of those things that i'm like this is like a case in point like he's not a good person like this is not something that you can overlook as like oh well this is a difference in opinion like no no this is like hi i am a bad person i am okay if like i'm doing something that could potentially cause like my classmate's little sister who has leukemia to die i'm okay with murdering a child i'm okay with murdering people that i know and love or the people who in my life who i care about their relatives and family i am cool with that i'm signing up for that i am

planning to do that and it's not like he doesn't have the option to stay home yeah that's what i'm saying this is like creepy like why very much yeah why are you trying to kill people you fucking psycho oh i just can picture what he looks like too oh i didn't picture what he smells like he definitely wears like multiple multiple chains and he's like very scrawny so they're like really heavy on his like thin i don't even think i'm like that i see him like as like very pretentious like still pops his collar boat shoe wearing like wears a little tiny docker shorts oh i i see all of that but i see like the tiktok kind of chains where it's like the they're popping out from like underneath but it's like these scrawny boys were like i listen to kanye and it's like talk like

this uh-huh uh-huh oh yeah fuck him fuck him he is not your fucking friend not your fucking friend so i'm looking forward to either receiving your email or receiving an email with an update letting us know to send us your school newspaper yes clipping expose they'd eat this up i'll write it for free but i'm just saying like school reporters are very like tenacious and they would eat it up and they do a whole did you see those like high school students that figured out that their principal didn't actually have a degree wow why did i why was i on yearbook i should i should know because all my friends did journalism wow yeah how did they find that out they were just like something's not adding up they like wanted to write something about her in the paper and

she wasn't giving like a clear like she said she had a phd she like wasn't giving a clear answer to like what school she went to and stuff and so then they start digging it's like six high school students and exposed her ass and that's what i want for this because if he's doing it that means he knows somebody else that did it yeah and so there's gonna be a whole expose and i can't wait and i want to see the article do you think it's the same people who are doing fake ids yeah they've seen someone walk into a store on tiktok because they were showing how easy it is to get one and it's like it's like a store that does like they make passports too like it they actually do like do the picture for the passport that you send in and so like that's

kind of their clean part of the business and like you can easily get like fake ids and fake immunization records and it was like fake like documents that you're a citizen like wow yeah some olivia pope shit i did some investigative journalism i'm a teacher i had middle school and i he hates me to to this day what do you do i mean looking back on it now he like it was one of those teachers that like he like just picked on me and hated me but like it was like in a pervy teacher way you know what i mean yeah he was so weird and so weirdly obsessed with me it was insane i'm disgusted i'm never surprised when a teacher is like i don't like you but i do really respect teachers who are like i gotta kick out of you but i'm like

thank you so much. Oh, middle school. So we're gonna go into Don't Blame Them. And this is where a listener will call in with their own advice that they have they thought of in their noggins after listening to an episode. Hi, Megan and Melissa, this is a Don't Blame Them on the funeral and birthday episode. I was in the same situation, maybe two years ago. I am now 23. And, you know, I picked a social event rather than a friend's funeral. Of course, they weren't like a very close friend of mine. I only knew them for like two months. I wasn't really in the loop on the plans as the caller was as well.

And just one thing that I had that social event, I had planned for like months in advance as well. And I know other people were involved and they couldn't really do it without me because a lot of things were under my name. And I was the only one of age that could do stuff. so I feel really guilty about it um but I didn't go and like a lot of people held it over me but you know looking back on it I could have put it in my head like this social event I'm going to it's going to happen again like this birthday like sure it's your 21st but also your friend is going to have other birthdays there's not going to be another funeral and you said that he doesn't have any like a lot of family so who else is going to be there and so you just

I would just back that into the situation, but, again, like, it's definitely your choice, but I would think of all the pros and cons about it, and as Megan and Alyssa said, like, definitely, you know, talk to them and let them know that you're there for them and send flowers, and if you want to try to do both, maybe ask your friend, like, are there any, like, docs that you aren't, like, actually boarding at that you all could pick me up at so they could, like, you know, meet you at, like, midday or, like, in the evening so you could still make an appearance to both of the things i don't know but like good luck don't feel as guilty as i did but i just want to make sure that you know the caller really factors in all her options and the pros and cons of everything bye it's a great call i think the best decision making process in most decisions is what will make you feel less shitty you know i still stand by what i said i i think it's it's interesting though because we talked about it on we posted about it on our instagram and uh did it in the facebook group as well but it is like very very split the same kind of way obviously like every situation is different it's not like a

blanket statement that like all yes always or no always yeah it's just varies person to person person making the decision and then also who you're making the decision regarding but yeah i've been thinking about that one a lot more too i keep wondering i'm like am i gonna change my mind i guess it just depends on all the information that you have yeah but yeah if you haven't said your two cents scroll on our instagram and we have a post about it yeah well so we are going to take a quick break and then we'll be right back with the rest of the show yes we're just back uh we're back from our break so now we're gonna get into the update slash basically a live call friend intervention like friend therapy i had called because

i was the girl who called in with the her closer in his closet um shut the fuck up you are an icon oh my god you said that so goddamn casually yeah i have i didn't know i didn't know either if i would have known i would have told you and i just my nipples are hard i'm dying shut the fuck up and also like i don't know if you're in the facebook group but you're you're like part of your call is is like questions to get into facebook group yeah so I I called in with an update in December and then yeah and you guys told me about the Facebook oh yeah so I had called with that call like a year and a half ago I was dating this guy and it was very casual especially because like I wanted it to be casual because he had just

broken up with his girlfriend and in all of that she lived down the street from him and this is all like townhomes. Um, she lived on the street from him and I lived across the street from him. So we were all on the same street and he and I were dating casually. And you know, we didn't really tell anyone because it was very casual. I don't know if she knew she probably did knowing girls like we always know, but like, as far as I knew at the time, I was like, Oh, she doesn't know. There's no way that she knows. But I noticed one day her clothes were in his closet. And then I was like okay maybe this isn't a great thing for us to be doing while he still has like some of his stuff they're still kind of going through this breakup so I was like okay I think that it's best

that we stop seeing each other we stop doing everything that we're doing and then a week later he was like I'm going to to California I'm going across the country um will you drive me to the airport I was like okay sure he was going with his family right that's what he told you yeah so he was going on a family vacation for his birthday and he asked me to drive him to the airport and I was like yeah sure because there was an airport in town I thought that's what he meant he meant an airport two hours away at three in the morning and so I said no um and he then asked his ex girlfriend to drive him and when he got back and she had she drove him to the airport and back at three in the morning and then picked him up from the airport and took him back home um so

that was a total of eight hours of driving for him to the airport and he comes to my house and sits on my bed and says yeah she's crazy though and so you know I was upset because I was like oh well her clothes are in his closet and her car was in his driveway at one point and then and then I think Cammie Crawford's the one who said his dick is in her vagina yeah and so we just stopped seeing each other because I was like I can't do this anymore it was all very toxic and then COVID happened and he would come over all the time and ask for anything like a charger, a jar of pickles, just random stuff. And I was like, why are you coming over here? No mask, uninvited, unannounced. What are you doing? But I moved out of there over a year ago.

So we're all good. And so did he. And I haven't talked to him since. So I had called, I think it had to have been late February, early March, because I remember saying it's been two months. but I had called, uh, because I was broken up with the, um, day after I told my boyfriend that I loved him. And, you know, a couple of months later I called for advice on how to move on because I was at a point where I did not think I would be able to move on at all. Like I was very emotionally paralyzed. I was in the semester of school. I was like, I can't like, I, I need to figure out how to actually like move on because this is like taking hold on my life in a way that I don't want it to and then something that I didn't include in the call and I can't remember

if it was something I couldn't fit in or if it's something that happened after I had called in so I had called him and I was on the phone with him I think sometime in February so maybe this did happen and I just like didn't include it in the call so on the phone we talked about a lot of things and I told him that I wanted him to be miserable with the next girl he was with And he did immediately hang up on me. Understandably. Yes. And I was in my car parked, of course, when I called him and I was like, Bollie. And I was like, Oh, no, what did I do? Like, this is terrible. All this different stuff. I did text him the next day and apologize. But you know, when it's the next day, it's more like

I just want to feel good. I don't want to like, I don't know if this is an actual apology. But then i reached out to him sometime around june and we reconciled and and i did like apologize again and and i did mean it i you know i don't know if i really meant it when i apologize next day but i i did mean it um in june now we're friends so since then since around june we've been in contact with each other mostly to like send pictures of our cats back and forth and also to complain about like conservatives and share means and you know just random stuff nothing like too deep. And I do have my guard up with him because I'm not someone who wants to let people in just for them to kind of leave. And it's one of those things that I'm not the best at understanding

social cues or understanding the implications behind people's words. And I mentioned in my call that I was going to go to therapy and talk about it there, which I did. So I went to therapy virtually and I had just started seeing this therapist and I don't think that I would have seen her if my boyfriend hadn't broken up with me because I was, I was therapist shopping while we were dating, but I kind of gave up when all I could find were therapists who didn't have virtual options. And the one that I did see in person refused to wear a mask. So yeah, I don't think that like, if he didn't break up with me in January, I would not have kept looking for a therapist. And so this therapist helped a lot with me getting through those paralyzing emotions.

I felt for months following the breakup. She also made me realize something about myself. I kind of knew, but didn't really want to admit, which is that I am on the autism spectrum. And this is something that three other medical professionals told me that I should look into an autism diagnosis as well as ADHD, which I also have. And I'm 20 years old, like no one ever noticed this.

And so it's kind of like, this is really nice. like, I know something about me that I never knew before. The sad part is that my insurance didn't cover telehealth. So I stopped seeing that therapist, which really broke me. I like balled in my car again. I do that a lot. I ball in my car. Yeah. Because I finally found a counselor that was like really good for me. So since March and my diagnosis, I have been fully immersed in the autistic community online more specifically the autistic women community online and I have never felt more seen or understood with these struggles that I thought was just because I'm I took on a parental role when I was eight years old or because I'm the oldest daughter with a

neglectful father like you know I thought a lot of these things were just like because of the way that my life was but it it's more than that and that's kind it's really nice to know it's also one of those things where for the first time in my life, I feel like a priority. Of course, I am prioritizing myself, but I and my needs are still a priority to someone, even if that someone is me. So that's the good part of the update there. But I do have a bit of an issue relating to my ex. So this past semester, I was in a creative writing or creative nonfiction writing workshop um I am a creative writing major and there was this one guy in the class who he wrote about this town in my state that is like a second hometown to me I have lots of memories there I

have family friends there and then in his second piece he like had a character that was the same name as my family friend so I was like I emailed him and I was like are we connected in like some weird way like do we both know these people we don't um but we started talking like a lot and now he is my boyfriend and i know that i sound like a serial dater i promise these are like the only two boyfriends that i've like really had besides like one in high school you also don't have to justify your dating date whoever the fuck you want whenever the fuck you want um yeah so for kind of a while i thought that i was getting over my ex like like in april and may i was like i'm getting over it like i'm doing really well and as the semester went on and

the classes became more demanding I think that I just had too much on my mind to think of him I wasn't really over it and then throughout May I thought about him a lot but I was starting to like this guy from my class so then in June I moved six hours away for school because there are no online classes anymore so yeah me and my ex have become friends again in June and I'm progressing in this relationship with this new guy and my boyfriend now knows that I've been in communication with my ex he knows the full extent he knows like everything because I respect him and I don't want him to feel like blindsided by anything yeah so for the past two months I've been growing in this relationship and then keep thinking about my ex more and more and this new

guy and I were going at a really good speed until a few weeks ago he told me that he loves me oh my god this is so full circle holy shit and then i was like i didn't say it back i mean like we've been talking since the beginning of april so like that's that's been about four months now and like he's so sweet and he puts me first and it's one of those relationships where it's like my whole life i've like wanted to be treated well in a relationship and here i am and i'm not question his feelings I'm questioning mine which I don't think is a bad thing considering that we're only a few months in and we're really young and all this different stuff but I think that the constant thoughts about my ex and the fact that we are still like somewhat in contact

are kind of getting in the way of me focusing on this new relationship but yeah so since we're we're both creative writing majors and instead of saying I love you back I just wrote poems and I gave them to him because I was like I don't know how to express myself in any way like when I was younger I would like remember quotes from movies and just like say those because I didn't know how to have a conversation with people and so I just liked it like I wrote him poems and I was like here you go and like he really appreciated the poems um and he understands that there are a lot of difficulties that I have in social situations so he understood why I felt it easier to express my feelings not through the spoken word but the written one and you know he he does a lot of other

stuff that like like I really don't like physical touch that like is like soft it's like I need a lot of pressure and he like it's not second nature to him to like do that and so he's like but he's like learned like little stuff like that I'm like oh I need you to do this or I need you to do that because it makes me a lot more comfortable and he understands that and he's really good with that but it's like this like I love you thing I'm like I don't know I'm not there and I don't know what I'm going to be and I feel bad for it you shouldn't feel bad do you like him yes okay you like him and you like spending time with him yeah that's another thing is that he has really bad anxiety and he's kind of at this point where he's like I need to be with someone like I

meet someone else in the house while I'm at night because and so he spends a lot of time with me and I'm like I don't want to spend all this time with you because it's a lot yeah I mean are you do you find yourself typically to be someone who is like focus on like one thing one lane kind of person like do you or are you someone who like lots of little things at a time or do you kind of like to focus and when you're into something you're into like one thing because in relation to like I mean, our advice always can't be friends with your ex when there's feelings there. And part of me wonders if like your, um, and I had, I had like when I, I couldn't be friends with exes for this reason, because I'm very, I'm like an all over the place kind of person.

But when it comes to like emotions and feelings, like I'm like very fucking linear. Like I, and like, I had to go out of my way. Like when I would date someone, I'd have to go out of my way to date multiple people at the same time because I would get tunnel vision with one person and not necessarily get in over my head but like end up being like shit I don't actually like this person like I have to consciously diversify in that kind of way and I wonder if part of you like your I love you is living with your ex and like your that I love you is there and you can see that because you still talk to him like he's still like by proxy in your life and so I don't for me I would have a hard time

even recognizing if I could be in love or like if this like would grow into love with some other person because that other person has that and I still have a connection to them through that you know yeah no that that is it like I I do get very in over my head and I think that my thing is that when my ex and i broke up i was like i can't do that like i can't get so into it because i don't want to be broken up with again the day after i say i love you to someone that's scary and it was really hard and it's still really hard to think that that like happened i think that's also a traumatizing thing that like saying those words again to somebody that can be like a a triggering thing it's like this is like I said that to this other person and that person left and so like I'm

having to rationalize with my psyche that like I can say this this other person this other person won't leave but I think it's like a two-fold thing that you've been on the other end of it so I would assume you'd probably get in your head of being like well shit I've been on the other side of like I'm not going to dump my boyfriend because I do really like him but like I know how it feels to say I love you and not hear that back and like it can kind of become that whole circle like over and over and over again and I think that like as much as you can try and like try and compartmentalize and think about everything in like different little boxes like think about your relationship like Melissa said like do you like him like do you see yourself moving forward if you take your

you put blinders onto everything else in that situation do you like him do you see him moving forward because I would say I think like the spending a lot of time together like four months in and like having anxiety with that kind of stuff that would be really overwhelming to me at the beginning of a relationship and i think that like regardless of the reason why that it's like a mental health thing it's an anxiety thing that's for him that's a hundred percent valid but it's also a hundred percent valid if you're like i know where this is coming from but like the outcome of this is spending a lot of time together is not something that like spending like all of this time together is not something that i i need in a relationship regardless of why that the origin

of that is do what I mean like and I don't think that's like a a fucked up thing at all but there's like a level of compromise in there with that and then with the with the ex that I also wonder if maybe there's a part of you that is like maintaining a friendship because a that there might be something there that like he would then reignite that because those feelings obviously like that hurt is still there and even if it's not like he says like he made a mistake and like you're suddenly going to want to be with him again but it can also be like the he said he made a mistake and then you can be like yeah fuck you like and like you have that like big like moment afterwards or if it's like feeling guilty about how you talk to him after the breakup and all of that like it

just feels like there's a lot of loose ends here that like I would if it was me I would feel pretty overwhelmed on being able to focus on a new relationship without comparing it to the other one because he's still somewhat there and then not knowing like do you want to be in this relationship with your current boyfriend if you take out every other factor into this and like do you feel like it's too fast to say i love you because that also can be like a turnoff in general how long were you and your ex dating when you said i love you to him four months in so it's just a month difference but first time i ever like had a one-on-one conversation with this guy was three months before he said that. And the first time I had

had a conversation with my ex was about a year and a half before I said it. It is different situations. And I think that I really empathize with my boyfriend now because I'm like, I know that it sucks to say I love you and not hear it back, whether that is the person breaking up with you or them just not saying it so how did you feel when your current boyfriend told you that he loved you it felt good to hear but it also was like oh this is going really fast and we had a lot of conversations at the beginning where we were like I told him I was like I don't want to move too fast like I'm not in the place where I want to move super fast and he was like yeah me neither and then all of a sudden it's going really fast and i'm like okay we're going 65 and a 35 like

what are we doing here yeah i'll be honest i don't love that like i think that like setting boundaries ahead of time of like i don't want to move too fast is like a really important and very valid thing to kind of say we always preach on the podcast like when you say i love you to someone you should be saying it because like that's how you feel and you really want to let that person know and you don't want it to be reciprocated that being said there's also you don't say it if you know that you're going to put your partner in an uncomfortable position or if they're not ready to hear that don't say that to your friend who's in a relationship like there are like those certain boundaries and i think that is kind of one of them i have a friend who has been had one

of her exes had a kind of similar trajectory like she really wanted to take it super slow and he was all on board but then like he said that but like every other action was not really that so do you feel like besides from the I love you how you perceive taking a relationship slow do you feel like he has honored that and that has been the rest of your relationship kind of not really you know he is staying here a lot and next week is the first week of classes and he's in between apartments and so he's living at home right now an hour away and I think like my thing is I keep setting these boundaries of like I need you to do this and he listens most of the time but I was like yeah like I don't want to spend half the week together we are sleeping in the same bed when

we shouldn't be at that point yet and you know he's living at home right now and he was like can I like stay for the first week of classes so I don't have to like commute because one of his big things with anxiety is that he he has a really hard time driving on the highway and so like he called me the other day and he was like pulled over 30 minutes into his route but I told him I was like if you're going to come up here and stay I need you to have a COVID test before you come because his sister and mom are not vaccinated and he's wearing double mask in the house like he's as safe as he can be with the situation so I don't like put any blame on him I his sister and mom work at a daycare which I think is wow yeah but it's like a rural town in the south like

I get it but I don't you know yeah and I told him I was like you need to have a COVID test before you come up here and I've told him that like like my parents are coming up here probably this weekend so that they can bring me a dryer we're all gonna wear masks we're all vaccinated but there are two new variants that are affecting people and my brother has Down syndrome and it's very high risk I don't care like I'm protecting the people that I love the people who I don't love and who are strangers I'm protecting myself and so like there's that where I'm like I feel a little uncomfortable you coming up here and staying I understand your need to do that and to make it all okay I need you to have this COVID test a good thing is that like if

I'm like okay can you sleep on the couch instead of sleeping in the bed he's like yeah sure like he's he's okay with that which is like good for me to know but it's also like I feel guilty when I ask him you shouldn't feel guilty can so he he's like stepped over a few boundaries with you now and so let's say that he hadn't said I love you would you have stayed with him probably because I am a pushover but do you want to be with him I do but it's also like there are a lot of things where I'm like I have these complaints like this morning I was sending voice messages back and forth from one of my friends like being like I need help with this situation like talking about more like his anxiety and like me having to be his like girlfriend slash therapist when I only

signed up to be a girlfriend okay is he in therapy he is but he's doing it through the school and so it's like not an every week thing but he is going to therapy and and he is trying and that's the thing too that like is hard for me it's like he's doing all that he can to get better but it's also like he's still relying on me for a lot of stuff and I'm like I don't feel like I need to be the one that you are relying on for all this stuff why hasn't he got his own apartment so he is moving into an apartment August like 25th 26th like sometime that week so in like two weeks I think he was going to live an hour away. And he decided that like, a while ago before he started having all this anxiety about driving, he decided that like, I can do the commute. And now he's like,

he doesn't think that he can do that. And so he was trying to find an apartment very quickly. And another thing too, is that like, his family isn't helping him out financially at all. So he's going to be paying over $1,000 a month. And so he's like stressed out about that. One thing that I've been thinking and don't really know if this is me being really anxious and jumping to conclusions or if it's me being intuitive but I have thought at some points I'm like what if he is love bombing me and I'm not recognizing it now because he talks about gaslighting from a previous relationship every time it's brought up we were watching because I've been making him watch Bachelorette because I really like Katie but they talked about gaslighting on the last two episodes

of the bachelorette and we'll talk about it i'm like i don't think that anyone necessarily gaslighted i think that it was just very manipulative and everyone was just very human in these interactions and it was very it was not good but i don't know if i would consider it gaslighting because both parties were at fault and like if you watched it you understand kind of where i'm coming from with that and he was like well no i was gaslit for a while and i'm like i don't know sometimes i'm like what if he's like really manipulating me and i just don't see it like I don't recognize that like I was being manipulated by the guy whose ex-girlfriend's clothes were in his closet and I didn't recognize that until like a year and a half later I don't

know kind of if I'm like taking a lot of past experiences that have not been great into this relationship or if I am like right on the money and correct about it all I think you're right on the money I've seen a lot of red flags this is going to be my final question I was going to ask are you staying with him because you feel like you're you were holding on to like when you were in that last relationship and you told him I love you and then he dumped you the next day and then do you are you carrying some of those emotions on with you like you feel like that you need to stay with him because he told you that he loved you yes I think just the answer to your question is yes and also I was going to school in my hometown for the first year of college

COVID hit in March and I don't have any friends in town I'm living in a one-bedroom apartment it's the best thing that I've ever done to live alone but it's like I'm also living alone because I don't know anyone else so I think that that's also part of it is that like I don't know anyone here and so it's kind of just like here's a friend so what he's doing which i think is a really clear distinction we need to make and part of the reason why you're saying that you feel guilty asking for things so what he's doing is he's making you compromise your boundaries and boundaries aren't compromises that's like a firm line and that's where the kind of like emotional kind of manipulation comes into play whether it's conscious or completely subconscious but when your

thing is i don't want to spend a lot of time together and that's a boundary that's like a line in the sand and he's like erasing half line going we'll all sleep on the couch theoretically when that is proposed to you it's like okay well he's respecting this boundary he's not he's creating a different one for you and saying i see your boundary i don't like that so i'm gonna make a new one and i'm gonna put it in a package that makes it seem like i'm doing a solid and like this is what you want and like that's where that kind of feeling afterwards comes in and the same way that you're saying that like you feel guilty asking for that kind of stuff this reminds me i don't know if there's a specific term for this but like it's like a love bombing in like a i am so

broken i have so much trauma i have like i'm trauma dumping on you and all of this and like i am opening up about it can kind of be disguised as like i'm really great with communication like I'm opening up about my mental health. I'm opening up about all of this stuff. And then that becomes my burden very early on in our relationship that everything I am saying and everything I'm doing, I'm factoring in these things about you that I wouldn't feel comfortable sharing with someone this early into a relationship. It can also be like, well, then if you're sharing, if this person sharing this much about themselves and like opening up this much, it can make me feel like I also have to open up this much. And then when they're somewhat kind of like listening and

respecting this sort of thing it makes me feel like it can feel like that gets working in that sense but do you feel like you kind of had to open yourself up in a way that makes you a lot more vulnerable because he did that at first with like I have all this anxiety I have all of this did you feel do you feel like you opened up the same kind of timeline you would have if he hadn't done that yeah no I don't think that we would be moving or like I don't think that like we would be moving so fast if if he didn't do that and I think that the thing too is that I kind of and I saw a TikTok where this girl like said that she did the same thing where it's like and she's autistic and like where she would see things in movies and like the way that relationships went

in movies and tv shows and she thought that that's how people really lived real life and that's the way that it is for me and so like I'm kind of unlearning all this stuff that I thought was how real life was like, I know that this is fiction, but real people are writing this. So it must be true. And it's not. And that's like a big thing with autistic people is that it is, there's this really hard distinction between reality and fantasy. But yeah, I don't think that it would have moved that quickly. If he didn't open up about his anxiety. And this is also the first relationship that I've been in where I have been diagnosed, you know, I always thought, Oh, well, like guys love to just like rub my back and like I hate it but I should like it so this is the first

time where I'm like you need to give me a lot of pressure when you touch me or don't touch me at all kind of thing or like usually I'm like oh well guys love helping me out in the kitchen but I cannot have anyone in my kitchen because I really like to cook and I really like to bake and I know that that's like a well gender equality I want to help you out too kind of like that's his whole thing he's like I want to help you out too because I don't want you to think that you have to cook for me just because you're the girl I'm like no I like cooking and I have my kitchen and I know where everything is and one time he I like put the microwave on and I told him that that's the one thing that he could do is turn on the microwave because he really wanted to help and I was like

and I forgot that I told him that until I turned on the microwave and he like opened it up at like four minutes and 51 seconds and I had to add another nine seconds to it because I was like it needs to be at five minutes and 15 seconds it cannot be at this five minutes and six seconds like it can't be i know i did that math really wrong don't worry yeah but yeah like at that point i'm like oh i feel like i'm the one who is not good in this situation like i feel like i'm like when i guess in reality i'm just expressing my needs and if you can't meet my needs then i guess we shouldn't be together kind of a thing that's a him problem like you expressing your needs and all of that and like being so direct like like a therapist would be like that is the

ideal communication you want to have in a relationship and those like feelings of is it my fault am i the like whatever anything like that like that's on him like it shouldn't have those kinds of feelings and that stuff and also the distinction between movies i've never heard that like how unlearning the whole like oh well this is in movies like separating the movie from fantasy because i've always compared love bombing i'm like think of a fucking patrick dempsey movie and think of like the hot hunk character that's like if it seems like it's a movie that's what that is because it's mimicking these things that they have seen and that's kind of what that is but it's impossibly hard until you've been in a relationship or seen a really and it's honestly

easier once you've been in a relationship where you recognize like oh my gosh it's not like that this is what the healthy version looks like but when we only have the unhealthy like love-bombing movie version to reference it's really really fucking hard to figure out what that is and i think the thing that my like i always tell my friends we say on the podcast all the time four months in but especially early on in a relationship you should be guarding yourself still on both parties and like unveiling like all of these really intimate details about yourself or doing all of that that's not what a health the start of a healthy relationship looks like and like the first couple months of it it's like i mean half the time you're not even fucking

farting in front of someone like it's like all of that best stuff but when someone tries to like skip the dating kind of process and get into like we're basically roommates who like live together and like we're like in like a deep relationship relationship boyfriend girlfriend all of that when the when the pedal is like hits the fucking gas on those things that is like an automatic red flag and like i i mean i think we both agree that this is like lots of red flags here and i don't think that like he necessarily knows it but i think melissa's right in the sense that this and like you said before like you really wanted a boyfriend who like really cared about you and really loved you and all of that and like this sounds super great on paper and even if you

take out like the red flags or whatever that's how every relationship kind of is like we have this idea of like what we want and what we want and our needs aren't crazy and drastic but like when you go from having dated like really fucking shitty people it feels like I'm asking for a lot and like really all we're asking for is like date someone who in my case someone who great sexual chemistry with makes me laugh and is like a fun person to hang around and is like really nice to me and that's like four that's like four things like that's not that much it's not that hard and there's a fifth thing there that's just i want to love them and i obviously want them to like love me back and all of that but there has to be that other thing there and i think that like

for with him i think it's like an on paper and then like melissa said shit i went through this before i feel like i kind of got everything i was asking for and i don't really like it you order something at a restaurant turns out you don't actually like how it tastes and like you what i mean like it's a recipe like a fucking recipe you make it and it doesn't end up being as good as you thought it would be that's like the non-toxic version of him but i think he's toxic i think so too and i kind of want to go back to the movie thing too because you said that he said that he loved you and then you've been writing poems and you've been expressing yourself that way so in your poems are they actually how you feel or are they a fictionalized version that

you can show him so that it doesn't break his heart well they are actually how i feel like and one i was basically like i'm not there yet these are like communicating poems okay this makes sense yeah it's well and then also like as a creative writing major like poems are just like fictionalized versions of the truth yeah but yeah all of it is like very much actually how i feel and just like a way for me to be able to like communicate with him because i i don't know how to say i'm not there yet and I don't know when I'm going to be there and I might not never be there another thing is I say a lot of very rude things and I don't know that they're rude and or like very blunt until they are said and then someone is offended and then I feel bad so it was a little easier for

me to like sugarcoat it with a fruity poem yeah that makes sense I think that you deep down kind of know how you feel and I think you like need to go based on like your emotions with this you are correct you should be his girlfriend you shouldn't be his therapist and I say this as somebody who deals like a lot of mental health shit like I didn't open up to mods about that kind of stuff until like way longer into our relationship and like that was never my therapist always been like yeah like protect protect yourself and like protect that kind of a thing and he's not doing that and if you're not like protecting your mental well-being and your health and this is maybe a very black and white way of kind of thinking about it. I think if you are not

really protecting it, you tend to weaponize it. Having someone say something about like my mental health or like if I've confided in them about something and then having them like use it against me or like that's the most hurtful and painful thing that anyone could ever fucking do. And so I go out of my way to like really try for that not to happen. And I think people who are really comfortable sharing those intimate things very quickly on and then really relying on other people like that's a means of control and that's like that is what this is because you are factoring in his anxiety to change your boundaries and to make decisions that you would not have done otherwise none of that has anything to do with his anxiety he has just he's made it about his

anxiety and that's one of those things that i'm like my mental health shit is my fucking problem and like i can let the people in my life know like what i need and how they can help and like how best to support me on that but i can't put that on other people and i would never dream of doing that that's what he's doing and it makes it really really hard to end a relationship with someone like that because they use it they make they make you think about it they make you really think about like, well, he has anxiety. I don't want to do this. I'd like, I want to make sure that your playlist might get you through the workday, but have you ever wondered how your ancestors spent theirs? What work helped them build a life? How did they adapt as the world

around them changed with ancestry? You can search select historical occupational records for free for a limited time and discover the stories behind the jobs in your family tree. You've got questions we've got ancestors search free until august 31st visit ancestry.ca for details terms apply this this and this that is a means of control versus of oh he has anxiety this is the best way i can communicate with him about this thing that we're already talking about or this thing that we're already doing but when it factors into how you the choices you make and like your boundaries that's just manipulation right and like with that anxiety too he's very insecure because he is trans and so there's like this whole other layer of like i've never been with

someone who's trans he's insecure that he can't give me enough there's a lot to it he needs therapy not a girlfriend and at a certain point yeah we've all been there and sometimes it happens while you're in relationships but he is not equipped emotionally to be in a relationship until he's worked out the stuff. And a lot of people think if they've got anxiety regarding relationships, the best way to work on that is being in a relationship.

And it's not because there's casualties besides yourself. There's being like honest and open. And then there is being recklessly honest and open, which is just ends up being manipulation. Yeah. I hate, I hate that that's like what we're saying with this. But like, I think, you know,

like everything you're saying, you, I think you really understand, you really know. And I think you are being pragmatic and so thinking with pure intentions because you have pure intentions that like you don't want to hurt him or do any of this kind of stuff but like you have to focus on you and like you are a good person there's nothing that you're going to say or do also especially since like how the last relationship ended that you felt very guilty about how you talk to your ex no matter if you want to

end it which is what my our recommendation no one's saying to i'm whispering the cards are on the table we've given our thoughts about it i think you know where we stand but the decision at the end of the day is your decision yeah and you have to do it for you and how you would do it and if you decide to end the relationship it's you're never going to do anything because you're a good person that is like going to like be mean to them or like purposely trigger their anxiety or anything like that so you just have to be incredibly steadfast in your choices and your words and what you say to protect your own mental health because I think it has yeah I think it's been weaponized towards you yeah yeah everything that you guys are saying are like things that I

do need to hear and like I was on the phone with my mom about a week ago and I was like talking about like a few things with him and she was like oh that sounds like a lot of baggage my parents are together but she was like that sounds like a lot of baggage and I said well dad has a lot of baggage and she said exactly so yeah yeah I'm like hearing this from other people in my life too and I think that like one of my biggest fears is to be stuck in a relationship that you know that is very abusive and that I can't get out of because I'm too far into it you can always get out you can always get out always no matter what no matter how there's never you're never in too deep right ever well I mean like just like you know how there's like that statistic that is

people try to leave eight times before they like actually leave I think that that's like one of my biggest fears is being one of those people that like has to take eight times yeah before I can actually leave and so that's like a big fear with this relationship where I'm like oh maybe yeah yeah I will say it's better safe than sorry and like when you are with someone then it's like a healthy kind of relationship I know you're not in like with that other therapist before but if you're able to get back into therapy too like when I tell you that like you will recognize if you are in a good and healthy relationship there's not a part of you that continues to worry if you're being gaslit or anything like that like you can carry that kind

of old trauma and see it and like like am I seeing this in this relationship but like that there are some very clear black and white things in that way and I think if you are in therapy when getting into new relationships and that kind of stuff you will be able to once you have a good standpoint of like a point of a really good point of reference of a healthy relationship it's going to be a lot clearer to what are the signs that this is not going well and you can always ask your friends to be like be so brutally honest with me like i even have friends who have like really like have had like a really hard time like deciphering people with good intentions that they and you can't necessarily do this as much now and you don't have like a solid group of friends at

school but like when like group dates that was like a big thing it's like i've only seen this guy three times i can't get it i don't have a good read on people like i'm gonna bring him around and see this or even if it's like you're gonna have like a family member or like a something like that where it's like or you go in public or this is all like covid unrelated things but seeing how other people react to someone and how they treat other people and all of that kind of stuff can be really helpful especially if you find that you have a hard time deciphering if someone's like intentions are true or not you know right yeah that would be really helpful i think that like also my thing is like you know just scared about covid but yeah i i will try to do some of that

stuff and i am going to therapy on thursday i have the first appointment on thursday so congratulations thursday is a good therapy day i've had thursdays it's one of my days before i think that was my day with my last therapist actually oh love it well wow you have lived so much life this is wild yeah well I hope we weren't too harsh no not at all everything that you guys said was like stuff that I needed to hear and I also like you guys can be harsh but like it's always like stuff that I need to hear like I've been listening since I was 16 years old like this like yeah I've been listening since the first episode so it's like I'm like yeah well I hope this was helpful and also I think you said you're in the Facebook group um I know you don't have a

now I don't know how much you utilize like talking to people within the Facebook group but a lot of people are in very similar boats there's lots of like group chats of people who like talk and hang out maybe they can find out like a virtual way to like help like suss out like future potential partners and being like hey everybody like what do we think like what's this this it's like a very good collective like hive mind kind of thing if you have utilized that thank you guys this was really helpful and yeah i can't wait to keep listening i'm glad thank you so much all right bye guys bye have a good one damn what a life yeah she's 20 right i think so and she's already taking like the test for her to be a teacher yeah i don't know when you're supposed to take

i don't know either but she's listening since episode one season one since you're 16 16 i can't believe that we neither of us knew that this was going to be so much so much so so so so so much and it's also like it kind of reminds me of like um you know those reality shows that it's like where are they now and like i love that we do the updates with this kind of stuff especially when it's like fuck boy situation because it's like there's always something else that happens whether it's like good or bad but like especially when you're young in your 20s and dating and all of that like you you go through fuck boy after fuck boy and like different iterations and they like wear different outfits and different costumes you can't totally tell and it's it's a time but i hope

that was helpful for anyone else who might have been listening to it we have we talk about love bombing on here a lot but we haven't talked about like like it's showering someone with like love get your tickets now for the dog stars it's no surprise how fast civilization can disappear Go! A therapist. Kill or be killed. Jacob Elordi.

There are people out there. They need our help. Josh Brolin. Shoot first and inquire afterwards. Margaret Qualley. Ow! Okay, tough guy. And Guy Pearce.

Arm up! The Dog Stars, directed by Ridley Scott, in theaters Friday. Get tickets now. But also, half of it fits into love-bombing, but there's a different layer there. And like I said, I've I have been there with like people who are like actively dealing with addiction. It's just a very similar thing. And like it's like manipulative as as fuck. It fucks you up, especially because I find a lot of time those people end up going for people who are like very big mental health advocates that praise on that.

You're more susceptible. Love bombing in itself can be like a very intentional tactic from like abusive people. but this to me is one of those like hurt people hurt people kind of a thing where it's like sometimes when you have like unresolved mental health stuff and you're not working on it and not doing all of that like you are just a fucking tornado and drag everyone down or i guess tornadoes go up and down have you ever lived through a tornado no i feel like every all those they're not tornadoes in all those places you live like warnings and they've touched down near i've never been in one well that's it for our episode we hope you all enjoyed if you want to

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