Don't Blame Me! - Winning Back an Ex

Episode Date: December 19, 2022

Meghan and Melisa give advice on: Having a crush again Living with boyfriend's mom Being a bad friend First real breakup Don't Blame Them: Movie to LA 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] 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 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

hello everybody welcome back to another episode of one of your favorite podcasts one of the best parts of your day your week your month your year don't blame me i like all that well it is the festive season and it's time to be thankful and jolly. And I think the most important part of that is whatever we can involve ourselves in. And we are the podcast for you during this holiday season. Yeah. Maybe you're listening to us as you're driving to your childhood home. You're back in your hometown. You were just listening to Taylor Swift. Tis the damn season. And you're like look at me i'm driving by my local 7-eleven you're thinking about like the park where you had your first kiss and and your your uh ex hookup who still lives with their parents at home and

you're like am i gonna see them and you're just driving around listening to us if there's one person who that applies to please let me know message us i had a dream like my dream you went to arkansas but turns out that was not a dream yeah because this morning when you texted me you're like are we recording virtually you know I was like are you flying to Arkansas that's not how I phrased it hold on I did it more like you said I inferred no you said I think I said virtually right yeah that's what you said I said virtual right okay so like that was a leading question you saw I was at my niece's birthday party I know so take in mind again I looked and I was like did I dream that because I did recently have a dream that my friend's husband cheated on

her and it was like a whole fucking ordeal and she was like having a baby or whatever and I remember I like was like the next day I was like oh my god I gotta go check her Instagram because I thought it was real life and I looked I was like oh that didn't happen but also like we said I said I was leaving on the 9th or 7th whatever day it was we've been planning on that I think you liked when i said that i had just touched it i think i even told you i think we we've literally we haven't been texting as much as we have because i've been el sicko but i think we had a conversation about me being in arkansas no here's the thing i definitely knew at one point you were in arkansas and then it was in the back of my head i also sent you the children made drawings of me wearing

the don't blame me shirt you look and you looked great but here's what i'm saying though like in my mind i was like oh she was in arkansas but because i had somebody visit from out of town they're supposed to come earlier it threw a wrench in the space time continuum so for me it was like i have someone coming into town we were going to record virtually and then it was like we were going to have one last in-person one and so in my mind even though my timeline for my person I pushed a week and my brain didn't catch up with like the oh we've pushed a week in all facets of your life but also that person wanted to meet me and you told them I was out of town no I know so you have to remember that like I know like it's like in my mind I'm like she's in Arkansas but

then the second that I'm confronted with there's a 99% chance that she's in Arkansas but Megan don't fuck up double check because my in my mind I was like maybe the whole thing was that she was going and then she was like gonna come back and she'd like finish something and then she was like gonna go like later and then in my mind i'm like oh my god megan be a better listener like she probably told you all this stuff and you just can't remember and so i wanted to play it cool i didn't want to be like if you were like megan and you told you i was going for like the weekend and then i'm coming back i'm finishing this thing and then i'm going back and so i was just like virtual right like we're just checking on the segment okay i think it makes total sense

considering I can't even place the civil war on a timeline. I think it is very valid that someone rescheduling their trip by a week would confuse me that that means everything else would also change by a week. But why would I go come and then go back and then come back? Melissa, I had the same question when that part of my brain said maybe she did that. I was like, that's stupid and illogical. She shouldn't have done that. As long as you've known me, when have I stayed like less than two weeks in Arkansas. Again, in my mind, I was arguing with fictitious Melissa being like. That's that's a stupid idea. You shouldn't have done that. And the other part of my brain goes, maybe she didn't do that because that is stupid. And I was like, but maybe she did.

But I thought like, again, it's not like I said in person. Right. That would have been ridiculous. I said virtual right what would I have in LA that I would need to come back and finish well you know what it was you know what the thing that actually made me go because I was like oh no we're definitely recording like yeah she's gone like this is why we pushed it like Thursday like I know we're doing whatever but then it was you reposted someone about the doing the audiobook and I was like yeah but I've never recorded an audiobook in person I've done all of them virtual I know but she said such glowing things about you that I go I feel like maybe they met first I shone through that's how bright my star is that's how much this diamond sparkles

right now I just have to say based on the quality of your streaming video to me you are your personality is shining through she didn't even see me because there's no camera in the booth wait so it's like back in the day of early podcasts when you had your first video on camera and we're like i knew melissa would be beautiful i loved her voice yeah that's really what it was i was just talking i was just talking to her i've most of the people unless they have a home studio the um studios that are like actual studios they don't have cameras in it so i never see the people oh we'll usually like follow each other on on instagram or something but i never actually see okay well welcome to don't blame me we are if you didn't catch mom that recording virtually

so if you are watching on patreon i advise you do because melissa is gracing our presence with a festive accessory she's got a santa sleigh dildo i'm excited her ass as i said i'm excited it's erect heart is a rock and I am modeling Melissa's gift to me a giant wearable blanket which has been my favorite thing in the world and now I have to buy Mott's one I will be coughing my voice as you hear is not all the way there you know maybe this all stems from me trying to change my voice and now you know I almost made that joke and I was like I feel like and then i heard how much you were still coughing i was like it's too soon megan don't yeah i mean now it's even deeper so that was gonna be my joke but i was like the universe you saying you were

getting back to your original voice universe is giving you a fucking elizabeth holmes treatment you're just gonna have the raspiest fuck run so that's you obviously have all been listening to replay episodes and i just have to say i re-listened to the cami one that came out last monday and i was dying because i was like wow even though it's been a year like only a couple years like our voice both of our like all three of our voices mostly her and i sound like we sound younger but our cadence of like how we talk and i was like wow this is like for listeners on the podcast i'm like it's so obvious how quickly we became all three of us became like fast friends like we're all talking the same way we talk now and i was like oh we literally met her

30 seconds before and i was like this is yeah it's so sweet kismet i just knew when i saw her on that screen said she's gonna be your friend so thank you all for being understanding that we were hit one a half of us was hit by the uh trifecta we don't know what it was but you were hit with a subsidiary yeah i don't know what it is some type of infection sinus coughing whatever my friend who i uh received it from i guess her child uh she has the exact same thing doesn't live in california anymore it lives in chicago and was diagnosed and given the exact same medication so whatever it is it's the same thing but they don't know what it is did they call it a sinus infection and they just call it like a that's what i call it yeah because the way that that stuff was backed

up and coming up and I've never done a sinus rinse before have you ever done one I got my nose done so oh yeah you had to they freaked me out for good reason I was like I was at a point where I was like I have to do something and at I'd say three o'clock in the morning I ordered one from CVS through DoorDash it arrived and I did it and the things that came out I was like wow that is in me it was like a colonic for my nose yeah and I was and then the way I could breathe after I was so impressed and I was like I've been living in misery for years when I could have been doing it well the thing about them is what grossed me out is that I had that roommate when I lived in that condo yeah she used to do them like every day but like in the kitchen nope

nope right those are to be done in the shower or the bathtub and that's literally it right and so I was disgusted by them so I was like I'm never doing that shit but now I'm like I'm probably I'm probably gonna do it at least once a week I can't I don't I can't breathe most of the time anyway so you're using distilled sterile distilled water okay good of course no I know I just I really wish they put it on the packaging like you must do this because you can get a brain eating fungus like that's like the it's not just like oh it'll burn or it's not good or whatever it's like no I read the whole packet before I did it okay and it said well I not the whole packet I read on the website about everything to do because I was like I gotta be careful with this

when I read everything on the website I was like okay got it so when I did the order I ordered some distilled water with it too the experience of it afterwards is great but I've never been able to like do it well because it is just like drowning yourself and like that is do you use like the actual neti pot or the squeezy bottle uh I did both and the thing I had to the thing that helped me and my surgeon was like I mean it makes sense but like so it would just especially because I wasn't sick and it was mostly like not to be gross everyone but like yeah I had you know surgery in my nose so there's like clot blood clots there's like skin and a lot of uh like some tissue packing sort of things as well as like i had splints so i didn't have like

dry tissue but also like you don't breathe through your nose for a while and so they shave your nostrils and so that's what catches things and so instead it just becomes they don't harden like you're like your snot doesn't harden it doesn't get any of that so it's just like really like thick i just found that it would so quickly like start to go down my throat even when i would be doing that and so i just found if i keep your mouth open and breathe through your mouth well so i can't that's that's too internal for me to remember to do so i would just yell and then do it and that would help like pushing out from my mouth and going yeah oh then it would go up and then it wouldn't go into my throat yeah so yeah i would just make

sure i was breathing heavily through my mouth and then it went again i read everything in the packet and then watched videos like i was very well researched before i did it but the best is when like it's i mean there are some like i i probably lost five pounds like just out of the shit in my head and there was one that i remember like i got like 80 what i thought was 80 of it out and it was it was a girthy little fucker and so i was like okay let me just pull it and i pull it and it was It was like an orgasm. Like, well, I'm happy that you are on the mend. Thank you.

And everybody is going to send you messages about how sexy your voice sounds and how they're like loving this new raspy, smelly cat voice. Smelly cat. Yeah, I'm going to start doing Dipsy. Oh, this is the time. This is the time for you. You should keep the coughing in there. Do you think that's anyone's king?

Yeah, probably. everything is always king do you think that they're just like constantly aroused in covid then yeah do you think there's like a moral dilemma too of like oh no i'm being aroused and there's a respiratory illness that's killing people and here i am jerking off to it and i feel conflicted i feel aroused i'm guilty conflicted while i'm flicking a guilty boner a remorseful boner wait that sounds like a perverted like like a picture book I feel like we we I feel like we had something about a remorseful boner at some point I don't know we've said this we've said these words I'm telling you right now I'm putting it in my nose happen I'm having no deja vu of ever

doing that before I don't think it was something that we wrote down but I think we talked about it that's an iconic word combination I would have written it down I've definitely used that word combination before because it's like it's like the adult version of like the friendly toaster like it's just like two words they're perfect combining you know what it's it's a reddit saying oh it is it'll somebody will post something weird and they'll be like remorseful boner or the weirdest fap i've ever had i know that faps and confusion boners in it yeah oh that's funny so i guess i can't just uh take over all of this it's fine it's fine anyways we're excited to be back we're excited to hop into

the episode we're also excited for the future of holiday episodes as we're both going embarking on to our respective little holiday locations. We talked about this offline. We've called for calls. The last couple of episodes asking like, hey, everyone send in new calls. Please, we need varying things. We need more things.

But specifically, now that we're heading into the holiday break where people, you might be visiting people, you might be on vacation, spending time with your significant other or their family or whatever that is. I expect, it is your duty, little fuckers, listeners,

it is your duty. Now is the time for you to call us locking yourself in the bathroom at a fucking holiday party. This is the time for the whisper calls of being like, my fucking mother. Like, come on. This is the time for you to call when you're in the thick of it, into the thick of it. And we are seriously looking forward to that. We want to hear all of the mess, the shit show, everything that is happening this holiday season. And again, I think we brought this up last year, but we have vaccines now so you don't need to like you can call us about you know you're you're you're with other people this isn't the same regulations we put up um it wasn't regulations we just weren't picking calls that were being reckless but can you still be reckless while you

are vaccinated yes but morally i am more okay listening to it i just i started to tell it say this before but i had a dream about oh yeah i cut you off this guy i went to high school with never dated him never had any in college never had any interest in dating him ever in life i haven't talked to this man since 2007 for some reason i had a very erotic dream about him do you like i think that like when we die we should be able to get a log of all of the people who have had erotic dreams about us and like yes we should be able to then be like okay click to expand more like i should be able to get more information if i want it like when it was what they thought about it but i should even just be able to know without any further information

just that it happened it's so weird how the fucking psyche works because i guess in dreams you can't like make up faces it like is always going to be either a combination of faces that you've seen before or someone that you know or anything like that so it's like it's as if they just like swap with whatever face and like for some reason that's the face and then you have to deal with the repercussions of having had an erotic dream about that person and I was like of all times why I come to Arkansas haven't thought about this fan in a long ass time is he single No. You already lost hope.

Of course, I immediately looked after I had the dream. Is he cute? Yes, he's cute. But he's married and has children and also very much loves Jesus. Okay, well, I was going to say, so it's a disturbing dream, but it's a little less disturbing if he is attractive. But he wasn't cute when I knew him before. So what version of him was railing you in your dream?

It was a new version. But the thing is, I haven't seen him. so I don't know how I knew this new your brain was clocking Facebook posts I'm not on Facebook I don't even follow him on Instagram I have not how do you know his face I literally have not seen this man I don't maybe maybe I just randomly saw him while I was out and didn't realize it was him and then my brain was remembered that it was him but like I literally have and maybe I like i'm saying like as i was coming in i might have saw him but like i have not been in the same room at this as this man since it was actually his holiday party in 20 in 2007 this is a toxic

hallmark movie yes this or this is like just like do porn like distributors make like like christmas movies because this would be one yeah like i had an erotic dream about you and i didn't like i didn't your holiday party it's like well the holiday party's here again would you like to suck on my candy cane there you go how am i making him sound like santa well it goes with the season well oh i had a sex dream too about who i don't know but that just fucking remembered it because i was just about to ask you like well like did you did the dream end before the good stuff like how did it end and I just remember I was like none of my sex dreams ever like maybe the tip but they never go past that no because I had it I'm literally now

just remembering I had a dream that was like you know when you wake up from a dream when you're falling all the time I had that but I was like having an orgasm in my dream and then I just woke up and I was like well that was that actually sounds kind of hot no it was it was nice but then I woke up and then I was like well I'm clearly not like it was like I I would have liked to dream Megan could have finished because awake Megan I've never finished in a dream it was like falling two stories before you hit the ground it was the same it was the beginning of the crescendo of an organ and then I woke up and I was like first of all yes please wake me up before dream Megan smashes onto the ground but like don't wake me up before dream I can finish it she's just

trying to yeah she's just she's just putting in some honest work let her have real let her have a little reward. I don't sleep well, but we have it. Right. Well, if you are brand new here, hi, welcome. What an episode to kick you off on. So happy to have you here. And this is The Low Down. We give you wonderful, amazing, life-changing advice. And you might be wondering, they're funny. They're clearly sexual. They think they're hilarious and they're hot. How can they also be qualified to give advice and to that i say just listen that stop asking so many questions follow along like a sheep you are a blind sheep see if fox news knew who we were they would have a field day with that clip

just follow welcome to my i'm just pushing my agenda to be on fox news maybe that is my agenda if you want to hear more about my agenda stay tuned for this week's episode of but am i wrong coming out on thursday you probably know just as much as about her agenda right now as you will on thursday i have learned nothing new about my agenda you will learn nothing it is my agenda is my agenda but head on over to our dms and or our comment section and tell me what our agenda is would like to know. So we're going to give some advice by listening to your voice memos and your voicemails. So if you want to call in for an upcoming episode and get advice, you can leave us a voicemail at 310-694-0976. And international listeners, you can send us an audio message at

meganpodcast at gmail.com. You have three minutes on both the voice memo and the voicemail that goes from the time that you start talking like after the beat and you start recording and to make best use of that time we demand strongly encourage recommend asterisk demand beg plead for you to practice write everything down i don't beg anybody anything for anyone not even in your dream you weren't begging to get frailed by your hometown christian husband happily married husband you disrespect for it you sexually he was a sexual deviant in your dream wow i can really see how religious trauma would like really fuck with people like for people who believe that there's like an almighty power who not only knows everything but can see everything

including your dreams and then being like what if he was like that was a a message from god that we should rail each other that would be me as the devil what if you had a dream that you had sex with god but god was like in your iteration of what you were taught it was like very anti like i would combust well as the scripture says we are all made in the image of god so does that not make it god anyway oh i thought the whole i thought you were making a comment about how like then you would only fuck god if god god's only in to like mask for mask like god's only into people who look like him her like it it's like we're all in his image so therefore you're always fucking that feels incestual that feels like if we're all in the same image

then we all got the same dad or mom or whatever it is and that is daddy no mommy do people call god dad no they call him the the they call jesus the son of god but no one's just like i mean you do say father though that's where my mind okay you say father so technically daddy so our father our daddy I'm gonna write the new Melissa version because there's like so many new versions of the

Bible and I'm gonna write the Melissa version and it'll be like it's a dipsy ass make a joyful noise until daddy that's the joyful noise yeah yeah daddy wow oh

anyways i'm getting struck by lightning now hey i am depending on where it hits you so i can make these jokes are you saying that loudly for god to hear you you said that into the mind for god no to our listeners he can he's omnipresent so he already knows what i'm thinking yeah he knows but this is for our listeners that may think that i'm being insensitive to christian i'm not christian and i am being insensitive to christian and that's okay it is what it is the best practice to get the best call is to write everything down that you want to say word for word verbatim literally write a script then pull your phone out or any other form of thing to keep time time yourself make sure it's under three minutes if it's less and you needed to add more things

if it's too much, like cut things out. We do ask that you include your ages. If there's multiple people in the situation that you're telling us about, include their ages as well. If it's a relationship, how long you've been dating, if you're friends, how long you've been friends. All of like the core important info

that can help us give the best possible advice. And if you would like to let us know your pronouns and other people in the story, please do. We do ask that you give full names, fake names, just full fake names because it is way too hard to uh remember things that are a b and the and the numbers yeah no no no this is let's pare it down and you have to be 18 over or have your parents permission yeah let's roll the tapes and give some wonderful advice hi my name is melissa um i called in a

couple months ago i had a really messy breakup with my long-term boyfriend and your advice is really good and very helpful so I ended up having like that situation with pretty nasty but thankfully like I it's all done now I have not talked to my ex for a month so my question is or I guess the situation I'm now in so I have moved to a new city right I'm just trying to break up what's happening and I've been dating a little bit but I recently I think I've kind of had my first real crush since ending that relationship the past like this past couple weeks so essentially what happened is I had a friend from college who invited me to a party one weekend and I wasn't able to go because I was already planning to go to town but I was looking

through like the web page of like who all she invited and there's this guy from college that I didn't really know but we like I knew of him and we had some like classes together and stuff and I was like oh he's like really cute like I wonder what he's up to and I thought about maybe like trying to find him on social media but didn't really do anything with it well then earlier this week I was on a dating app and I was swiping and I ended up coming across him on the dating app and so we ended up matching he messaged me and we like were exchanging messages a little bit and like he you know said that he felt like we had some class together and we were just chatting a bit and then we ended up like it was kind of late when we were having this conversation so I

just assumed he went to sleep but and you know the conversation ended on like I had asked him the question he like asked me something I responded and I asked like you know what about you um and then it's been a few days and I haven't heard back from him which is kind of bummed me out because I don't know he's kind of like the first one I feel like I'd really be interested in it's like part of it is I just like hate digging apps and like hate it takes me a long time to feel like I know if I actually like somebody so I feel like in this situation since we went to the same school so the same thing it's like we already have a lot in common and we have a lot of mutual friends so I assume that like I would potentially like him um and I personally

think he's really cute and I haven't had a guy since I've moved to my new city that I've like just I've really been interested in but it's like a little bit bummed out and like obviously I get people are busy and things and he very well could message me back in a few days and just have been busy with work or something like that but I don't know I just feel like a little bit ridiculous I don't know if I should like reach out to him again um I don't think it's like I get that it's not that big of a deal and if I didn't have as mutual friends I probably just would do that but I don't want to like come across as I don't know just like silly since we have mutual friends I don't know I guess my question is just how should I deal with like having like my first

real crush after having like kind of a traumatic breakup and should I just like shoot my shot reach out if I'm really interested I don't want to put words in your mouth but I don't think you have a crush on this person I think logically this makes a lot of sense emotionally I think that like I think you're misconstruing that logic part of you as like a oh this is like a I really like this is this is the first crush or whatever but like on paper yeah this fucking sounds perfect you have mutual friends you would already been like you saw that he was on like invited to this thing and so you're like oh i should like see what he's doing but then you didn't but he was already on your mind and then he comes across on a dating app it feels like serendipitous and it's like oh wow and

that second encounter of seeing him on a dating app you didn't bother to look him up after the invite even though you were like oh i would have like you know i thought about it but i didn't but the second chance like seeing him or whatever i think that's kind of made heightened these these feelings that weren't initially there and then when you think about it in the sense of like oh wow we have so many mutual friends so we would probably get along well we probably have a lot of the same interests i think like yeah i would probably feel like the exact same way that it's like oh my gosh i really like this would be so perfect and like i don't mean easy in a bad way but like after a tumultuous breakup like this sounds like what rom-coms are made of this sounds

like the perfect kind of relationship that you want afterwards and I I think that like I'm not gonna discourage you from shooting your shot I'm just merely going to like say that if I were you I would just try and massively slow your roll because I have also I'm I am the queen of like building up people in my head and being like well this would be so nice this would be so easy and like this would be perfect like I'm the same way it takes me a long time to like like somebody and if we already have friends we're already in the same social group like that checks off one of those boxes already and then I will put myself out there shoot my shot or whatever and I've done this in the past and then the opportunity comes and I realize I'm like oh shit I don't actually like

you that much and I liked you on paper and so I just don't think that you should shoot your shot because I don't know if I don't know if you want to shoot your shot and you got to do that when you know him present day him you need to know current him from him a little bit more otherwise I think you're gonna it's a slippery slope of continuing to like build him up in your head but I also don't think that there's anything wrong with following up in a message like I don't think that you're not asking him out do you know what I mean yeah I agree because I think what it was was like yeah he seems cool when you saw him in person and then you saw him on a dating app and you're like this is meant to be this is a sign and then you called like when you like think of

something kismet no no no so it's like it's when I keep wanting to say survival survivor's bias it's not that but it's another like two-word combination of a thing of like when you you're like how people suddenly will start seeing the number two two everywhere and it's just because you saw it once and then like it's something confirmation confirmation bias oh no yeah confirmation bias is the 10 cherry pick information that confirms our existing beliefs or ideas so it can be used in the same sort of things if you start to think that you like some like him more in the sense of like this then becomes a sign it's not the most eloquent way to describe it the other one makes more sense yeah also known as the bader meinhof phenomenon or

is or frequency bias frequency but i knew there was one bias sorry continue yeah you had that and now you're building up what could be and you know if you actually have a crush cool you know like explore it but just keep that in mind but I think that's kind of how crushes work sometimes is like you just feel like you have something in common and then you might see that person again and you're like okay I have a crush there's nothing wrong with having a crush or even putting that as the title of what this is because you are thinking about what could be and I think that's part of having a crush yeah I just think the mutual friend aspect is the part where you have to be careful because the way that you're saying like oh I don't want to like come on too

strong because we have mutual friends I think that to be cautious of not that but along the lines of like sometimes friends can be like oh my gosh like let me set you up this is going to be great and then all these other people are invested and you don't necessarily know if you're invested yet or you ask friends and they're going to talk him like so much like oh he's so great it's so amazing like you might not hit it off so I would you know keep the crush close to your chest and yeah and don't do your best to not dwindle in the fantasy of like how convenient and like great this would be because even if he's awesome if you let that build up in your head he will without a doubt disappoint you and it could be a great relationship and he could be totally it but if you build him up

too much it's not gonna be him because it's also not gonna be anyone no one can live up to that but i'm excited for you after like a tumultuous breakup and shit like get out there get out there and you'll probably see him at another party or something soon yeah if you have mutual friends you'll see him again you'll have another chance yeah and i i don't know i think that there's something cool about you've put you've put yourself out there you've messaged or whatever and then kind of like letting him as much as you can like go to the back of your brain and then seeing him in person again I think that would be a great way for you to see like oh am I into him once there's the cool down period so let us know what happens I'm invested me too

we love a holiday hookup hey Megan and Melissa I'm a long-time listener been listening since I was like 16, and now I'm a 20-year-old female. She has her pronouns, and I'm calling in for advice on a living situation. So I'm currently a junior in college. However, I'm starting grad school next year, which is super exciting. Yay, just found out. So my problem is I don't know where to live next year. I've lived on campus all three years of college because we were required to for three years. So I don't really have any experience living off campus. A few terms I have is that I do want to live at home this year. I don't want to live near where my school is because I need to be saving all my money and not using it on rent. I won't be able to work much next year because it's so class heavy in my first year of grad school.

So the second problem is I know a lot of leases are 12 months and not wanting to live on campus this summer. And then the next summer, I'll have to do an internship. That's not going to be where I'm living. So really, I'm not only going to be living in this town for like seven months at a time. So I don't want to sign a 12-month lease, and dealing with a sub-leaser seems stressful. But I do have a few options. So my first option is that my roommate I currently live with has a three-bedroom apartment that we would split with three people. It's a very nice apartment, pretty new. The only problem is $750 per person per month, not including utilities.

This may not seem like a lot, but here in the Midwest area, it's quite a bit to me, especially being a college student. So the thing is, it's technically cheaper month to month than what I pay for campus housing. However, I'm not living on campus year-round, so overall I would be spending less on campus than off campus. And, like, just dealing with a sub loser sounds stressful. My second option is that my boyfriend of three years, male 21, he him, his mom has offered for me to live with her for free. The problem with that plan is that she lives an hour away from campus and I would have to commute. a lot of people think I'm crazy for wanting to do that but I've done a lot in the past so I'm kind of used to it and it would just save a lot of money even though like I would be paying for gas

and wearing hair in the car but the rent is just so unfeasible for me um I work in the long distance he's like 16 hours away so that's why living with him isn't an option like until a few years from now or like a year from now whatever but I do get a while very long very well with his mom and she's also a nurse which I will not be going to nursing school but she could be helpful so I don't know is this going to be a bad idea do you think living with her yeah we get along very well but yeah just let me know do you think this will cause a strain on our relationship I'm very sensitive and I'm nervous because it's my first time calling in I'm a tourist thank you guys bye you really only have two options that you want to consider

because subleasing is not one that you want to consider so what about a good old-fashioned pro-con list yeah i will say though like you said that most leases are 12 months have you looked around the college because a lot of times in college towns they don't do 12-month leases they'll have it where it's flexible they'll have like three six nine twelve months yeah i mean i think so she's saying she wants to live farther doesn't want wants to live a little farther off campus because a potential the and whatever the internship is won't be there i will say though that like a summer internship is like what three months so like i think it would be instead of trying to find something that's kind of like

equal distance from school and like all of the possible locations you would have an internship I think it's better to be closer to school and then I think it's better to commute for three months than seven and so I would do something a little closer and Melissa's like that's right like you have a higher likelihood of getting places that are month-to-month or six-month leases or whatever that is around schools but also even if places aren't listed at um as like a month-to-month or whatever those like leases are you could even if it's listed listed as a 12-month lease you can always ask like would you be open to whatever this lease is especially like a if you are moving if it would be like an apartment complex because like sometimes you can even be like would you be

open to this and then you would have my permission or you'd have my permission to like use my apartment as like the model apartment for people to come tour when like or like a somebody that's like a summer student you know like they could sublease it yeah like when you when you're against subletting because it seems like a headache what is that subletting in general like i think you subletting someone else's place like that would stress me out more but subletting my place for a couple months isn't is not as rough um but 750 a month per room is a lot especially if you're not trying to spend any like you're trying to like save money like it's really hard to save when you're spending 750 a month so I mean

I think that like there is a reality in which you move in with your boyfriend's mom and it's great And there's like no boundary issues and it's kind of just like a pleasant roommate situation and she keeps to herself, you keep to herself. And I also think there's a lot of realities where that's not the case and that like you might feel an obligation to kind of be on and like perform a little bit and like be never really feel to feel relaxed because you feel like not only are you a guest, but you're a guest essentially at your mother-in-law's and or if there's like an issue with your like your boyfriend or something and especially like long distance and he comes to visit so does that mean like you haven't seen each other in like a couple months and he's coming back to his mom's house and that's where you guys are gonna finally have sex for the you know and then she's privy in that sense she's privy to a lot of your like pretty much only your private interactions and like your personal ones and that can be a really not to come to like mother-in-law's

defenses or whatever but that can be a really tempting uh place to then speak on where a lot mother-in-law's like like to infer and you know say their opinions on something but when she will be kind of there for all of your interactions then it it might get in your head a little bit more and it might feel like she has more weight and merit she might feel like she has more agency to say something so I think like maybe you would maybe doing just like um honestly maybe doing a trial run of like I'm gonna stay with her for like if you're starting I don't know about like the summer when you before you go to grad school if you would be looking for an internship at that point.

But I think if you can do the staying with the mom as a temporary summer thing and see how it goes versus a whole school year, because you're going to get hit with a lot more ups and downs within the school year and you're going to be in a high pressure situation in both, but just for a longer period of time. So I think if it's, I think there's a chance it could work out, but I think you should

probably try and make the stakes a little bit lower. Yeah. And I also recommend that if you do move in with her, maybe offer it since you, I, I'm since you were going to pay, if that's an option, pay 750 a month. that means that you do have some money then offer to pay if she's like no i don't want you to pay rent offer to pay some like bills or something because i think that sometimes and i'm not i don't know who this lady is or how she is but some people like treat it like this is my house these are the rules and then like hold that over you but like if you can offer to pay some bill

and that's still significantly cheaper than what you're paying you could be paying for rent and bills then i would do that um just because people just people just get weird even when they don't try to be they do well yeah it's resentment that builds and you don't even realize it you just kind of start it at a level of like i'm doing a good deed and then there's an expect there's a there's a sublime like a unconscious an unconscious expectation of how someone should react to that and you can be so grateful but after a while you can't be full-time grateful you have to like go to school and do all this other stuff and then sometimes that can be hard for someone to recognize that like oh this is just you've gotten used to this and this is whatever it is like I

fully agree like i think like paying some bills maybe buy groceries yeah or even offer to be like you know if she's like you know you can like stay here for free and save money it's like okay well i will contribute x amount of dollars for utilities per month and i would i would do more than your share of utilities and that and um the like i can buy i can i can buy groceries like whether it's i can buy groceries once a week or i can buy groceries once i can buy all my own groceries and then i can buy groceries once a month for you like i can or even just being like i can cook dinner three nights a week i can meal prep food for you for you to bring to work i can i can clean i can reorganize like your bookshelf like i can do some things and like i

would I would make all of that because a then you'll also feel more comfortable because you're contributing so it then becomes right at least somewhat more a shared space and you're not a guest because that's I can't even poop when I'm at somebody else's house like right so like I you need to have a little level of like I I deserve to be here because I am you deserve to be there regardless of what you're bringing to it but like I'm earning psychologically yeah and I I feel like I can stand my ground when I don't want to do something and I don't feel like I'm being a difficult quote-unquote guest and I would do whatever you decide that you're going to do I would get it in writing and I would I would have it be like a like essentially like a like a job

not like a oh I will do this as I see fit but as a goods and services exchange right and something that's done on a regular basis and on a schedule so then you both know you both have expectations of each other and you can both uphold your end of the agreement and it's not so much like a fuzzy gray area because i think that's where the resentment will build and not only between you and her but also between potentially you and him and i think like if you can kind of create a more like somewhat rigid structure, it also will, I think probably prevent some awkward interactions where like you, both of you might feel like, oh, we're both just at the house. Like, what are we going to do? Should we talk? Should we hang out? And like that kind of obligation. And then maybe

you're talking too long and you're like, why can't I shut up? And I'm going to start oversharing about these things. But when you have, when you both know like, oh, she comes home from work on Tuesday, from grad school on Tuesdays and she makes dinner and then she watches her show. Like If you have these kinds of routines, I think like any other interactions you have outside of those, there's just more likely that they will be positive because that's you're not leaving root like really large gaps and spaces for both of you to kind of figure out how to fill that relationship time. and I also just want to put this out there which you know hopefully it won't happen but what happens if you and your boyfriend break up then what happens in that situation do you have I just want you to think about that yeah and that's why you need to have this stuff in in writing and especially I think you need to have I would have like someone

look over or some even if you can pull up like a legal temp like a uh a lease template online something that involves you paying monetary money even if it's a little bit because that's also usually what protects you in eviction stuff so she can like kick you out if you're staying there as a guest with nothing i mean depending on where you are there's squatters rights and that stuff but like if you enter in a formal agreement and you do break up she then can't like kick you out and not give you like you know like they're you're protected more and I think like you're even if even if the relationship is great everything is great it just is that fail safe there so you'll probably be less on edge and yeah nervous and but also not financially or legally like mentally

what kind of hold that'll have on you both you and the uh essentially mother-in-law yeah like i yeah i i just my mom just brought some food in would you like to say hi yes hello oh i'm loving the collar in this this is very cute what's this shirt this is cute what's the shirt hello hello i'm good how are you oh i'm wonderful she's a podcaster now talk with your real voice i am talking with my real voice well melissa's trying to talk with her real voice but she's too sick to do that yeah but I'm so glad she's home oh my baby you get you get all of them under one roof I've got all of them yes that's fun I was showing my dad pictures of all the nieces and nephews and how it's literally like copy paste on everyone's faces

and he was like that family has the strongest genes I've ever seen I was like I know I know yeah well i can't wait to see you i'm coming out either in may or in the summer this is news to me fun can't wait we'll do so many fun things oh great melissa will do disneyland won't we she can't hear me we'll do disneyland we'll make her do it okay okay okay well merry christmas Merry Christmas. Melissa. Oh, you get on your Santa hat. It's so cute.

Of course. I told her that you and I would love to take her to Disneyland. Why would you say that? Because it's funny. Oh, my God. it was so funny and the best part was you're just clueless face being like and i'm like she has no i think you've got options here but i will say revert to a rory gilmore pro con list and then write down everything that could happen and how you're gonna solve it

and if you end up picking the mother-in-law get get a contract and uh thanks for aging with me 16 wow and you're 20 now what a time i like get as a leo i feel proud as if i've done something when i find out that someone listens to the podcast or like is a fan or anything that i've done and they're like oh i'm in grad school and i'm like i did that and i'm like no megan you didn't do anything but here i am claiming credit help with emotional support and i think that's important i think that's very important and that's what i plan to do as a parent you my child will either be tutored by MOTS or they will have a professional tutor

and I'm here to provide emotional support, be a cheerleader and humor that's what I'm here for I like it and fashion support I'm here for that I'll buy you gauchos

if you want them even if they're ugly alright let's take a break and we're back should we play the rest of the tapes let's do it hello i am a 23 year old girl and I have a best friend who is 26 and then another girl who is 32 and we are co-workers and friends close friends and the I know like trio friendships have a very bad reputation in society but one of the girls

is starting to be a bad friend and me and the other girl are trying to decide like if it's our job to teach her how to be a better friend or if it's like tough

shit you're out of luck bye and just like end it there because we've given her multiple chances on stuff she's done before and we just don't know what to do from here because she's messed up so many times and, like, just not tried to be a good friend. And by, like, not trying, I mean, like, not reaching out and not scheduling stuff and it feels like me and the other girl do a lot of the work.

And then she, anytime we do go out with her, like, let's say we go out on a night out of the town and she gets absolutely shit-faced and apologizes, but, I mean, you know, your actions to be clouded in words and she ends up doing it every time anyways and it's a really red flag that she's never had any really close friends before she always says that we're the closest friends she's ever had and she's never really had best friends like like that's always been a red flag in my case but I guess the question I'm asking is like is it our job does it make us bad friends for cutting it off or should we try to be generous kind understanding people by continuously giving her chances but maybe keeping her at arm's distance or should

we continue being her like bff and i guess we're not like bffs because i can't be super super real with her or else this probably wouldn't be happening but any advice would be way more than helpful because she is just a train wreck right now and I don't really know what to do so do you fix your friends or do you just burn the bridge well those are not your only two options um I have so many questions are you still co-workers because if you're still co-workers like you have to go about this in a like much different way than you can in social situations because you could literally like you could be fired for making a hostile work environment and like cutting off a friend even if it's like doesn't happen at work like your friend's outside

of work and she feels ganged up on like you could literally get fired for if you miss if you handle this wrong but I wish you gave more examples on like what this was because like I I don't like when you're saying like she's but you specifically said she's a shit show right now so to me I'm like oh so something has shifted and changed and like the two instances that you gave of like oh she doesn't really reach out as much and she doesn't schedule things like we have to schedule them and then when we hang out and go out like she's getting like absolutely wasted and then apologizes after that sounds like she is like depressed and self-medicating with alcohol like it doesn't sound like she's in a great mental space and especially because she's apologizing

afterwards so like she's embarrassed and she's feeling shame of how she's acted afterwards and then it keeps happening she doesn't want to keep doing that like people don't sometimes like people who like have had like a really bad embarrassing night out and they apologize afterwards like they're like I'm never I'm not going to ever do that again like you don't you don't like make the choice to continue to do that over and over if everything's like going well because you know it's not you don't like the actions you're doing you don't keep doing them because they serve you you keep doing them because you feel like that's the only way to cope or that's the only option that you have or whatever it is. So we've said this before, but like, I would probably

just like reach out and just say like, Hey, I just feel like you've changed recently in like how our relationship has gone. And like, you know, it used to kind of feel a little bit more split with like who was asking who to hang out and stuff. And it feels like you've kind of like pulled back. And I just wanted to like check in on you and see if you're doing okay. And I'm not coming at this from a place of like judgment or stuff, but I do get a little like start have started to feel like a little bit worried and like something might be going on especially when we go out and you are drinking a lot and then it's clear the next day that you're like upset with yourself for doing that and I just if you could like let me in and yeah and I want to touch

on where you said her not having friends before is a red flag I don't think that's necessarily a red flag. Some people, it's just harder for them to bond with others. Maybe they're a person that got picked on. Maybe they just have social anxiety, and that might be why she's coping with alcohol when y'all go out. But if you're her friend and you have used the word BFF and she believes that you're her best friend, then that means that she feels closer to you than she has with other people. And so a real friend would ask why. Yeah. And so ask her why she doesn't reach out so much. Ask her why when y'all go out, does she feel the need to drink so much? It could also be like, because she hasn't had close friends before, she feels like what she's doing is enough

or she's scared that if she does more than she'll lose you as a friend. So again, just getting down to the why of things could answer a lot of questions for you. Yeah, I agree. Like there's a chance that like all of her other friends said that she came on too strong. And so I understand the idea of thinking that someone who doesn't hasn't had maintained friends is like that's a red flag. But I think it's much more nuanced than that. I think it's a red flag if someone has not maintained any friendships and points and doesn't recognize what their parts in different things of that were i think that's a red flag if it's like no it was everyone else in that and even like i've i've had a slew of toxic friends and that wasn't my fault like that's not not

victim blaming myself but i can recognize now i'm like i was in those situations because i I had really low standards for the people I was surrounding myself with. And then it was I was accepting shitty behavior. I had other toxic people in my life. And so I had been conditioned to think that that was OK. And it was that that's what it looks like when someone was caring about me. And I now recognize that that was my own trauma, my own insecurities that were playing a part in how I ended up in those friendships. And I also made the choice to get out of those friendships and now I make the active choice to not get into those friendships again that's if someone can't do that that is a red flag and that doesn't mean someone's a bad person just

that person needs therapy and you don't have to be friends with someone who's a shitty friend who's like not wanting to work on themselves but yeah like you said like if you were best friends at any point you referred to each other as that it's what you're saying is that this has been a shift in how she's been acting i always think that when someone is doing something that is like has is negative as opposite of their character and that is like in the negative side and all of that i don't think we should assume that that is their true colors i i think it's always better like you became friends with a certain person because of certain things how they treated you and i think it's a very fair expectation to continue to expect the person you became friends with to mean to be

that person and if they're not that's not an attack on you that's usually something's up with them and i think that should be met with like just like you said just asking why or being like hey i just want to check in with you and see what's up and that doesn't mean that like regardless of what her answer is like she could have been totally like masquerading as a kind person and it's like the absolute worst at this point but you didn't give enough examples of me think of like her being like a, like a malicious or a mean person, it seems to me like it's kind of like self-destructive behavior. And that's not done from it. That's done maliciously at yourself, not at other people. And I think if you go to this with compassion, it's, you have a high likelihood of getting back

that good friend that you really liked, as opposed to just kind of cutting your losses. And I think it's, like you said, I think it's important to not, I think it's important to like, just have a sit-down conversation with her one-on-one and not just as a response to her behavior that you don't like because that's not helpful in like the broad scheme of the friendship especially if she's still learning how to be a good friend like for me personally like please course correct me in like a day-to-day thing if something pops up but if there's like an overarching thing that's happening i would i would rather know and then be able to have a conversation to address that and work on that versus real not know that I'm failing a test

that I don't know that I'm taking do what I mean because you're saying that you're giving her these chances like should we give her one more like is she aware of that because that I think is a really that's not a fair position to put someone in yeah but if you still work at the company I my my true advice is can keep these relationships as co-workers and be friendly but I would put some distance between you and the other girl as well and I would I would maybe get drinks over the holidays maybe a couple times a year for people's birthdays but like I would not have this be a really core staple friend group because trios are bad trios of co-workers slash friends are even worse yeah a duo of co-worker friends is terrible so all right next call

yes hi megan and melissa i'm a long-term listener and first-time caller i'm calling because i feel like i'm finally having my first real breakup i'm a 20 year old female who uses she her pronouns and my ex-boyfriend is also 20 and uses he him pronouns i'm in therapy but would appreciate your take on my situation. I've had a few relationships prior to this one but never saw a future with them which is why I feel this one is affecting me this much. This one was different. I moved away to the different states for college and met my ex while here. We dated for 11 months and some change and I thought everything was going great and one day without any explanation he broke up with me. This hurt like hell and I had no earning and I truly believe

I love him and still do. To add salt to the wound we are part of the same friend group and now group interactions are awkward. I've tried to talk to him, but he's been very close off about what led to the breakup. I should also mention this was his first relationship. I'm also struggling as I have medical issues that have made my life difficult and diagnosed depression and anxiety as well. To the best of my knowledge, this did not have any impact on the breakup, but has made the healing time harder. I guess my questions are, is there any way to go about winning him back? Or if not, how do I move on from my first big heartbreak and get enclosure? I've grown up watching you Megan and Melissa I'm so glad to have met you through the podcast you really are

such an important part of my week thank you so much that's so kind there is no winning him back because he is not a prize you are a prize I was about to say the exact same thing like we don't fight for I mean like you can give to show that you're still interested in being in a relationship but both people have to be giving the same amount of energy and he's giving you nothing you can go to battle with your partner and you're on the same team, that's what you fight for. You fight for your unit. When you're on the same team against outside forces, you do not go to battle for a boy, a girl. You don't go to battle for anybody. You don't go to battle for someone who's not buying it. You don't go, you don't go to, you don't go to battle for, for, for a crush,

for someone you like, you don't, you don't go to battle alone. Like that's not what this is. that's not what that's for and i think it sucks that he's not giving you an honest answer or like about like what happened and what went down usually what that means is that um the reasoning and the answer is going to make him look pretty bad and you have a mutual friend group and so he would probably he would probably prefer you to stay in this limbo of trying to win him back because it makes him look good and so i would resign from trying to figure out what that is and i would just decide what it is and i think like decide that like he has feelings for uh someone else who's in your friend group or he cheated or he is a closeted trump supporter and

he stormed the capitol and he is going to prison like come up with what it is and that there's no redeeming qualities about that and realize that that's why he hasn't told you because he wants there are some people who are just like that who yeah they want to be even after you've broken up that they want to be admired and they want to be like thought of so positively after and people aren't not telling you what happened to quote-unquote spare your feelings or whatever they're doing it to spare their feelings and their own ego and also he's 20 years old and this is his first relationship means he has poor communication skills obviously and he also might not even know what specifically it is it might just be a feeling but he doesn't have a way to

express that but him say if he said that to you that would be an explanation and he's again giving you nothing so you give him nothing back you don't you don't go to battle for this man no and like you need to talk to your close friends and you need to not be in the same rooms as him you need to not be at these parties and all that stuff like you you need to have some space and if your friends are good friends they're not going to want to pressure you and they're going to be like okay cool like well like let's take some separation in time even when there's no sides to pick in that sense because it for for he's kept it really fucking vague and so people don't really know like it's not like people can take strong stances on sides a me yeah i would i would because it's me

and i'm if if you just dump someone who i cared about and then you offered zero explanation i'd like yeah you can't hang out until you can have some better communication skills this is just not the i we are not the group of people for you to practice that on like you already tried once and it didn't work out but also this is college and this is probably going to happen more than one time yeah so like have enough separation for like a month couple weeks where you're not talking but and even like you're not talking about him like and your friends like don't tell me if you see him like don't bring that up don't be like oh he told me the funniest story just like let's keep him out of the conversation for a chunk of time. And the thing is, is that like, I think in movies

and books and even just our own imagination, we can think of that like, oh, well, there might be a reason that he broke up with me that like, if he told me it would be okay. And it's like a courageous reason that he's like thinking about me and that there's like, and there's still an in and all of that, he broke up with you because regardless of what the crux, the specifics or the intricacies of it is he broke up with you because he was done with the relationship and didn't see it moving further. And you did. And the thing that makes a relationship last is just two people on the same page. And there's a reason why people date and break up and do all of these things over and over and over again until they find that person and they find their person like it's like

a puzzle piece like you have to constantly be searching for it and it's not the first person who you have those feelings for it's the first person that you both have those same feelings at the same time and they move at the same pace that is that is how you end up with somebody and that and you want the same things in your life and you you need all of those like think of it like a treasure hunt. You need to check off all of those things. And that's like, okay, this is it. This is how I know. And you checked off the first one, which was that you saw a future with this person. You really cared about them. That's great. I'm not going to lie to you. I personally think that's the hardest one. I think the hardest one is to find someone that you really like.

There's a lot of people who have similar morals to similar belief systems, similar lifestyles. but I don't like everybody and for me the the thing that like kept me going when it came to dating is every time I liked someone even if it didn't work out I was like there's still more people out there that I like like there's still this is this means that I can I can like somebody else like this is so cool that this happened once because that means it can happen again and then it happens twice and then you're like it can happen again like I'm just I'm building the sample size of the fact that it can happen and it will over and over and over again until the rest of the things start getting checked off. But I think when we're, when we're younger, like there are,

everything is like you said, like same friend group in college, all of these things are kind of a given. So it feels like everything else has been checked off and you're just waiting for you to like somebody. And you're just waiting for that feeling to be there to kind of be like that final thing and it it's it's not like and that's why I think college I honestly think high school breakups and college breakups are some of like the worst because you're so enmeshed and entrenched in every part of your lives and it's like because you're low key more like a divorce yeah because when you're co-parenting when you break up with people after college you don't have to see these people again you know no like I had like one of my more serious relationships as like

an adult like i don't think of him i don't see him we're not we have no mutual friends we don't follow each other on social media none of that but like my high school boyfriend we still have a ton of mutuals and if i went back home i would probably see him there and that was a lot harder to get over also because it's like you've divorced and you're co-parenting and you have to and you're and your roommates you have to see them all the fucking time and so i would just honor that fact that like i not to say like don't date in college but just know that like that is going to be heightened and it's it means it's really convenient when it works and it's really fun when it works and it means it's really fucking heartbreaking when it doesn't so like if you want to try and

like you know date some people who aren't maybe in the friend group if that works better for you but just knowing that if it happened once, it can happen again. And there is no what ifs when someone else isn't on the same page as you because you would never want to sell someone on the idea of you or anything like that. That's doing yourself a disservice. And there's somebody else. There's tons of other people out there who are... I used to say this... I don't even know how you say it, but like an expression of expiration dates. Every relationship has an expiration date. you can keep drinking the milk afterwards but you're gonna get sick or the day has come you toss it out maybe you wasted some milk and you're like shit like oh i wish i would have drank this

fast or paced myself throughout the day i didn't but it's so much better to be a little like oh what if then i'm vomiting for days like it's only going to get painful if you hold on to something like that and you're just doing yourself a disservice but this sucks it does suck try not to date in your friend group. My high school boyfriend and I had the same major. And then we broke up in college. And then the next guy I was with was also in the same major. So it was just a lot going on. So try to date people in a completely different college and not in your friend group. Yeah, my big my most devastating breakup, like my high school breakup was like rough but that was slightly easier for like the length that it was much longer I did someone in

college for not even that long and that was so hard like it was just so fucking hard also because you don't those friends you they don't really necessarily feel like they owe you as much and so you don't really want to ask as much of people so you're you don't have as great of a support system always and then you're forced to be around them all the time like right it's really hard and that's a universal thing and as hard as it is it doesn't mean that like oh someone someone really good got away that's just kind of how college relation it's kind of just how it is and it's it sucks it's like summer camp you know but year round right i was pretty devastated by my camp crush too well I only went to cheer camp and it was either guys that were gay that haven't come

out the closet yet or women and since I'm not into women there was just nothing there for me so I can't relate but imagine if you were into women at cheer camp I feel like they probably had so much fun yeah like so it was when I was in high school there weren't that many guy cheerleaders but when my sister Melanie was in high school she had a lot more and yeah those guys you could tell oh I mean hell yeah especially if in a conservative area and if like your parents are don't know and like you have to keep things like that like and you're with this you get a free that their their ignorance yeah is is to your benefit in that sense it's like on uh bring it on remember yes yes i do all right well we're gonna take another break

yay we're back from our break now it's time for don't blame them don't blame them is where listeners will call in with their own advice pertaining to calls we have aired on previous episodes so maybe they have personal experience maybe it's They're in the profession that the call is in regards to, or maybe they just have some brand new insight that we didn't come to ourselves, or they like the sound of their own voice, to which I say, relatable. I don't even know if I like the sound of my own voice. I just can't stop talking. Clinically, it's called ADHD. It's terminal. Hello, I'm calling in for the call where someone wanted to move to LA and they only have $3,000

to do so. And I want to second what Megan Melissa said and say, do not do that. I moved to the Pacific Northwest about four years ago with about $3,000 and that was barely enough. I had to have someone co-sign for my apartment. Like I wasn't even expecting to get an apartment right away. So I would recommend moving somewhere else on the coast that you like, somewhere else that's liberal, and start there, get a job, get situated, live there for a year or so, and then save up your L.A. money to move down to L.A. And hopefully look for friends that are going to live in L.A. soon, someone you trust, someone you can live with, because you cannot really do that by yourself. My friend just moved here, tried to do that, and she has over $10,000 saved, nearly $15,000. And she spent $1,500 in two weeks at her agency. And if she had like $3,000, she wouldn't have been able to do that.

She's like really good at saving stuff. So she was able to move up here to where I'm at and live with me for the next couple of months to get her plan so that maybe in a couple of months or maybe she can move back down. like once you have higher paychecks, like if you haven't been working in LA and you're from somewhere else where the minimum wage is a lot lower, you are not going to be able to even qualify for the apartment. And when I moved out here three years ago, I started looking for jobs like three or six months before. So definitely like wait it out. Also don't move in January. Like that's probably the worst time to move because that's when a lot of places don't even rent out their apartments because like the new year and Christmas and everything, it just makes

really difficult. So save up a little more money, maybe move somewhere else that's super liberal on the coast and move your weight down. Great advice. I didn't even like specifically the part of the minimum wage. You're going to be paid more in California because the cost of living is higher, but Ohio dollars are going to go farther in Ohio than like L.A. dollars that will take you far in other places but you're not gonna there's not not much comparable unless you're yeah that's great call and also i don't know if i mentioned it before but like that's i not only do i think that's great advice because like conceptually it is like that's literally what i i did and like consciously did when i went to college i was like i want to end up in la i'm gonna go close to la

and then i'm gonna work and i'm gonna save my money and i commuted and traveled and did all of that fucking shit logged that time and as much as gas is expensive if you are like freelancing or doing stuff driving for to work farther to la you can write that off for taxes and so like there are ways to to do that and as somebody who did it it also makes the reward and the payoff all that sweeter because you really not that other people don't work for it or don't earn it but you're battling it every day and working towards it every day and like visually

you're seeing it in the distance as you drive to it and then you're driving back you see it in your rear view mirror and like it's like a tangible goal like it's the best kind of vision board to achieve it. Yeah and like I said

I lived with a friend for the first six months and then I moved in with somebody that was subleasing their place because their sister lived in one of the rooms but it was like a shitty apartment like I've never lived if my parents knew how I was living they would have but I was trying to be more independent and not let them know but they would have you know given

me money or made me come home um and you're like maybe this is what adult life is I've just been sheltered from it uh-huh but I was only at that place um for like three months and I knew that but I knew that I would have a little bit more time to save up a little bit more money and then and I got a job in that time. And then I moved to the condo that I lived in for a while with somebody. So if there are steps, like, but again, $3,000 is not going to get you far at all. No. And it's, it's, it's like just going to Vegas and gambling it all up. Like you're not going to see anything at the end of it. And it took you so long to save up that. And it's always better to save up more than to to try and it's not like a make it work situation like

a cushion is always good I'm like a big saver in general and there is regardless of what your income is there is a sense of security in having in having any any amount of cushion but just even a little cushion. The more cushion you have, the more you can relax and the more you feel secure. And it's built slowly. But I wonder if they are going to move. I wonder if they have looked into it more. Let us know. Let us know, please. We love updates. So if you have called from a previous episode and if you've been on and we've given you advice and you want to give us an update shoot us an email meganpodcast at gmail.com we will coordinate having you either send us in something or if the holidays are coming up and you have some time off we can hop on a on a zoom

and hear from you ask you follow-up questions let us know what happened blah blah blah but i you know i think we're also okay with you sending in something to let us know the update maybe if you didn't look so good and and we kind of we we ripped you apart maybe maybe you don't want to show us your face i get it you could also hop on the zoom without your face or you could just send us a video send or an audio message let us know all right i've got a review though makes me laugh while at work five stars i love this podcast so much it makes the work day go by and i have to keep myself from laughing out loud out loud a billion stars thank you we appreciate i again i love the imagery of people listening to us talking about you know fisting

and you know uh uh god smiting you for having a dream where you get railed like i love the idea of that well my brain goes to like the like how a child thinks of jobs like my brain goes to like someone in a lab just like typing things or like performing open heart surgery with an airpod in and doing these girls or an astronaut going to space like i'm just thinking of like what career do you want in like flashcards like that's how i think a marine biologist training a dolphin or not you guys you don't train dolphins if you're a marine biologist but as a child i was like that's what they do you know working with dolphins all of that so let us know the job maybe don't get specific but i would love to know when people like oh listen it works like what's your field

and what's your media like are you listening to the pot is it one air one headphone in one headphone out like are you is is the video in another tab is it like all small like how do you do you hide the titles from your phone do you like turn your brightness down always curious to hear yeah well that is it for our episode we hope you all enjoyed and if you felt compelled to leave a review after that beautiful one don't fight the urge cave into those feelings and write a five-star review we'll see you tomorrow go comment on our instagram the weirdest sex dream you had either the contents of the dream or who it was involving or just like a weird instance that happened in said dream yeah i like that maybe it'll make

make us feel better okay goodbye bye don't blame me is a production by me executive produced by melissa de monts and diamond and print productions edited by coco lawrence post-production sound by chris henry production assistance by melanie d watson music by ryan hunter and giacomo picasso real canadian super store has everything you need this back-to-school season save on lunchbox savers like ziggy sliced deli meat products for always $3.75 and get Life Brand Pure Vita shampoo or conditioner for $8 each. At Real Canadian Superstore, when you're ready, we're ready with a whole world and more.