rSlash - r/Relationships My Boyfriend Bought Bitcoins For $300, Should I Dump Him?

Episode Date: March 5, 2021

r/Relationships_Advice Today's episode is a blast from the past! Almost a decade ago, a concerned wife posted on Reddit because her husband became obsessed with bitcoins and was purchasing every bitcoin he could get his hands on. Back then, bitcoins only cost $300 each, and OP's husband was buying dozens of them. OP thought that her husband was going crazy and she wondered if she should divorce him. Well, today bitcoins are worth about $50,000 each! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Make every moment a little more magical this season with a Starbucks red cup in your hands. Wrap yourself in the warmth of one of our familiar faves, like a peppermint mocha or a caramel brule latte. Find your festive with the Starbucks app. Welcome to R-Slash, a podcast where we read the best post from across Reddit. Today's subreddit is R-Slash Relationship Advice, where OPs husband manages to buy a bunch of Bitcoin at 500 bucks a pop. I think I got reverse catfish last night. I matched with this girl on Tinder. She was significantly bigger than girls that I normally date.

But we have literally everything in common, so I forget I give it a shot. So after talking for a few days, we decided to meet up at a nerd bar last night. I get there and pick a table. After waiting a few minutes, this beautiful woman comes over and starts trying to flirt with me. That's very strange, so I assume that she must be after something. Free drinks, drugs, my kidneys, I don't know. So I explained to her that I'm actually waiting for someone and I don't want to give a bad

first impression by chatting up some other woman when she walks in. That's when she springs it on me that she's actually the one I'm waiting for. She told me she lost about 130 pounds over the last couple years and she wants to make sure guys are actually interested in her and not just her body. And she was also testing me to see if I would ditch the fat girl of someone hotter showed up. So here's the thing. I don't know how I feel about being tested.

I don't want to live my life questioning every decision I make like she might jump out from behind a corner at any minute. But she's also really attractive and very cool otherwise, I'm not sure how to proceed. Well, the pictures were of her, they were just old pictures, so you didn't really get catfished more like fishcatted. The comments in this thread are super mixed. Some people are saying that it's not a big deal, that OP basically hit the lottery with an even hotter version of the girl that he wanted to go out with in the first place. Other people are saying that she straight

up lied and manipulated him, like what if OP preferred bigger girls? OP, I think my assessment is that I would call her behavior a solid pink flag. Not enough of a red flag that I would say she's a terrible person, but enough of a warning sign that I would say proceed with caution. My mom had an affair 18 years ago. I, an 18 year old guy, am the product of that. My dad just informed me of this and told me that he will not pay for my college while my siblings got their college experiences paid for by our dad.

Pretty much the title. I have no idea how to process all this and I'm completely unprepared for what lies ahead. Both my older brother and sister went to the same college. My brother graduated two years ago. My sister is set to graduate in two years. Both had their college paid for by our dad. My dad paid all of their college expenses, including rent, food, cars, pocket money, you name it. My brother has a job now, his own place, lives together with his fiance and has his life together. My sister already has a good paying job,

and my dad still pays for almost everything for her. I got accepted to the same college, which was always the plan, and I was looking forward to talk with my parents about the next steps, and asked them to help me the same way they did for my siblings. I always assumed they had money put aside for my college the way they had for my siblings. Instead, I was met with a story about my mom's cheating, how I'm the result of her cheating, and how my dad is not willing to support me anymore moving forward. Dad told me that mom had 18 years to let me know and prepare for the future, but obviously she never did.

He said it wasn't his place to say anything since I'm not his son, but didn't want to interfere with my mom's parenting. Apparently, my grandparents also know that I'm not my dad's biological son, but they haven't bothered to tell me anything either. My siblings had no idea, and they're just as surprised as I am because there was never any hint of anything being off. I might be naive, but I always thought that I had a great relationship with my dad. We go to sports games together, we go fishing together, he tutored me when I had difficulties with math, he's an engineer, and he taught me to drive.

I never got any hint that he harbors resentment towards me. I mean, he gave me my name, explained to me what my name means, and he was very proud of it. It's a story that he tells often from time to time. He likes to talk about stuff like that with me. My mom has never said a word about anything, and apparently she was supposed to have the talk with me, but she never did. I feel abandoned and unprepared for what lies ahead. I'm not even sure I'll be able to go to college anymore. I always assume my parents would pay

for it. I never had a job, and I'm not sure what job I can get to even support me through college. I have no idea how to even apply for loans. All my mom has done is cry and apologize, but nothing of substance. She has no idea how to help me. I don't even know if I'm welcoming my home anymore. It's all up in the air. I feel shame leaving my room, and if they ask me to move out, I don't know where to go. I don't even have any savings, maybe 400 bucks. I'm angry at my

mom, and I'm confused about where I stand with my dad. There's a man out there who's my father that never wanted to have anything to do with me. I feel rejected, and I have no idea what to do to fix the situation. Does anybody have any idea what to do here? Do I apologize to my dad? What do I say to him? I don't know. I've been stuck in my room these past few days, reading and browsing Reddit. I have no idea what to do.

And then OP posted an update. Unfortunately, my grandpa died at the beginning of this week and I'm still processing it. I did manage to talk with both my mom and my dad and I know where I now stand in relation with them as well as my siblings. I think it's safe to say that both my parents love me and what happened two weeks ago was an overreaction to a fight between my parents. The conclusion is that I'm definitely going to college. It will be the college I've always wanted to go to and I'll have the same experiences

my siblings. The money to pay for all this already exists. My family isn't going bankrupt as suggested. Even if my dad would have stood by his decision, my grandma let me know that my grandpa left me and my siblings in a amount that we would split between us, but it was enough to put me through college. What started this entire scandal was just poor timing on my part. My parents just had a fight, and then I showed up like, hey, pay for my college. My parents were talking about us, their kids, and mom said something along the lines of, to think you wanted to split up when I became pregnant or something like that. I guess dad was talking about how proud he was of his kids and mom wanted to express

her gratitude for dad raising me as his own. And my dad took that message as, that affair was the best decision I ever made, or something like that. Then their fight escalated from there, and mom told dad something like, what makes you think any of them are yours? Yeah, it went downhill from there, fast. Shortly after that, my dumb face showed up, and here I am. Dad and mom have since made up. Mom is still a mess. Dad isn't handling my grandpa's passing away too

well either. I did talk with my siblings and my sister raised a storm and wrote it here while blasting my parents on the phone. My brother was calmer but made his feelings known in no uncertain terms as well once he got back home. My grandpa passing away sort of kept spirits calm, I guess, and shifted the focus to dealing with that. My dad is very sorry and apologetic about his reaction and behavior. I understand his reaction, but I still feel hurt by it. I understand that he wasn't in the best place of mine, but I can't control my feelings either.

We'll be alright, and this hasn't irreparably damaged our relationship. My mom hasn't handled everything that well, but she's coming around and she answered some more questions for me. When mom had an affair 18 years ago and got pregnant with me, my parents started divorce proceedings. Mom moved in with the man that she had an affair with, but after a few months that guy decided that he wanted nothing to do with it. He kicked mom out, and she

had nowhere to go. So, my grandparents took her in because she was still the mother of their grandkids. Mom and Dad got back together after a lot of work, and Dad took me as his own, and that's been my life since then. The man who's my biological father isn't in the picture anymore. Dad didn't really know who he is, and Mom hasn't heard or seen him ever since. He was fully aware that mom was pregnant with his kid. I guess he just had more important things to do, but it doesn't sound like he was about to cure World Hunger, she met him in a bar, not at a fundraiser. And I don't feel a need to know anymore about who he is.

I thought about the matters the last two weeks since I've been aware of everything and I haven't really felt a desire to know who he is, where he is, if he's still alive or if I have any other siblings out there. My mom admits that I've been babyed way more than my siblings, and that they should have prepared me more for what's coming next. I did learn where I stand with my family, and it's safe to say that I'm loved and I have options. I thought that I'm isolated, but my world is much bigger than I thought.

Grandparent siblings, my aunt, my cousins all have my back. I think my parents are human and they made mistakes. And even though this wasn't their greatest moment, I think I'll look at everything as nothing more than a soup salad and garlic home. Oh, I'm going to move on up. At Salesforce, we're all about asking more of AI. Questions like where's the data going?

Is it secure? Are you sure? Are you sure you're sure? Get answers you can trust from Salesforce at askmorevei.com. Man, OP, that update transformed the way that we look at your dad from a complete and Get answers you can trust from Salesforce at AskMoreVi.com. She cheated on your dad and then kept that secret from you for 18 years. Then, after inflicting an incredibly deep emotional wound on your father, she uses that in fights with your father. I mean, cheating on a guy is harsh enough, but then later when you fight with him to go,

well, maybe I cheated with your other kids too. I mean, I'm glad that everything worked out in the end and that you got a good relationship with your family, but your mom seems like a real piece of work. Alright, so this next post is about 8 years old, and when it was first posted, it kind of flew under the radar. But now that we're in the year 2021, someone sent this to me, and it's really funny to go back and read. I've been married to my husband, John, for a little over 5 years now, and everything's

been going well up until a year or so ago. We were planning on having children and everything. Now my life feels like it's at a complete standstill. John and I are both avid redditors, so when we find a new subreddit that we love, we get excited and start sending each other links to see if we can get the other one interested. Recently, he found R-slash Bitcoin and has been sending me links constantly about it. It went from, check out this cool technology to absolute, cultish behavior in a very brief period.

I would say 0-100 in probably 2 months. He started taking every dime we have and buying them as quickly as he can. He actually set up a feature that buys more bitcoins on a weekly basis after our paychecks come through. The worst part is, he didn't even tell me that he did this. He gave me this arrogant response about doing what's best for us and our future kids. Overall, and I'm not exaggerating, I would say that he bought over $22,000 in bitcoins. I kept telling him to sell because the price was rising and he promised me a big year

in 2014. But the price kept falling and he continued to buy more. He makes more money than I do, but we're building a future together and we have a shared bank account. He kept telling me this was for our kids college fun, to buy a house, etc. I can get over him spending the money because people spend money on other stupid stuff like both that they never use. But that's not even the beginning of this absolute craziness I've seen out of him this

past year. My husband started bringing up effing Bitcoin at these events. My events for my job. People at my work have a lot of money and he knows this. He saw this as some kind of opportunity. He goes on and on about how taxes are theft and Bitcoin is a way out. The dollar is about to collapse, banks are destroying the world, etc. At work events, you're supposed to make lighthearted jokes about how your football team

is doing, not get into these political discussions. He knows this too, since he's been coming to these events with me for years. It starts off small where I laugh it off and say, oh John, he's in a technology and gets a little too excited. He saw this as me being condescending. During these car rides home, we have full-on fights about how I don't get it and I'm gonna be left behind. I felt like I was fighting with some type of evangelical Christian. He ironically rips into religion in any chance he gets, but he is absolutely part of a cult full of insane people.

Keep in mind that as this is going on, he's still buying more of the price goes down, telling me that we have a great opportunity on our hands. He ignores long term trends and focuses on these specific timelines to show me how stupid I am. Yes, my husband is calling me stupid because he thinks that I don't understand this. I feel like I've read more about Bitcoin than he has because he won't discuss any downsides with me. He tells me that all of our problems will be fixed because we're in on the ground

floor. He seems to be in a constant good news bubble about this when no one else actually cares. Most of the responses he gets from people in public are fanned interest until they can get away from him. Or they just tell him that they don't care if the conversation lasts more than two minutes. I am embarrassed to be around him. After a recent price crash, he actually bought more using our vacation fund that I've been saving away for and planning. All of it's gone into Bitcoin, it never to be seen again. I'm sorry for the long rant, but this is my life now.

I've tried everything. I've tried reasoning with him. I've tried explaining to him that he shouldn't have soul control over our money. He is so confident in Bitcoin that he's slightly brought up selling one of our cars to buy more bitcoins. He didn't come right out and say that was what it was for, He is so confident in Bitcoin that he slightly brought up selling one of our cars to buy more bitcoins. He didn't come right out and say that was what it was for, but I can guarantee you it was to buy more bitcoins.

He's ruining my job and robbing me of happiness. I used to consider John a smart guy, and I never ever thought that he would succumb to basically being brainwashed by a bunch of clueless idiots on the internet, who seemed to know absolutely nothing about finance or the real world. I don't know how familiar people are here with Bitcoin, but if you go to their sub-reddit, you'll see exactly what I'm talking about. I started crying after reading my husband's comments, worded slightly differently, repeated a hundred times over. It was like I married a parrot.

What do I do? I'm not religious in any way, but my family most certainly is. I feel like I couldn't even bring up divorce and I wanna save my husband. I want him back to the way he was. It seems like he's addicted to a drug, but since he doesn't realize it,

everyone else is wrong. I don't know if I should have an intervention or just walk away and hope he comes to a senses after I stay in a hotel for a few weeks. Again, I apologize for the length of this post, but I want you to feel the way I feel so you can understand the advice you're giving. I really need help here." And down in the comments, the most downvoted comment in the entire thread comes from why are you afraid. He says, man, I am so glad I'm not married. You're gonna want your husband when those bitcoins are worth fortunes. Hopefully he's gonna divorce

you before that because you don't deserve any of it. To your husband, I say, keep holding those coins, brother. And this guy's comic got 66 downvotes, so clearly everyone disagreed with him. So I'm sure everyone's curious about the math on this. I looked it up, and back in 2013, 2014, the price of Bitcoin was close to about 500 bucks. So assuming that this guy spent $22,000 to buy Bitcoins at 500 bucks a pop, then he could afford approximately 44 Bitcoins. Today, 44 Bitcoins are worth approximately $2,185,000. Now don't get me wrong, the guy in this story was kind of a jerk about it. Spinning his

girlfriend's paycheck and taking the vacation money they had planned together to buy bitcoin without OP's knowledge is definitely a dick move. That being said, if my wife took like $5,000 of my money and turned it into $2 million, then I think I'd find a way to forgive her. So overall, I think I would say that this guy is 100% right about Bitcoin, but completely wrong about how he handled his wife's emotions. Though, wouldn't you just love to hear them getting a divorce? You're on air. When we divide up our assets, I'd like all the furniture in the T.E.B.s, and you can let him keep all those stupid bitcoins.

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