The Viall Files - E747 Ask Nick - Dating My Boyfriend’s Mom

Episode Date: May 13, 2024

Welcome back to another episode of The Viall Files: Ask Nick Edition! We start off by keeping  the wedding mood going, and play a game of ‘I do, or I object’. Then we get to our callers…  Our first caller is recently single and is struggling to get over her ex’s comments about her body. She knows her ex was in the wrong, but it's easier said than done to forget without closure. Our second caller feels like she’s in a love triangle with her boyfriend’s mom. After a complicated work situation and weird comments from her boyfriend’s mom… it's clear that she is unwanted. Our final caller is struggling from a past relationship, where he was cheated on. He has a new found love interest, so how should he go about being vulnerable without pushing himself away.  “How do you feel about yourself, you’ve got to remember that… That’s really all that matters.” Start your 7 Day Free Trial of Viall Files + here: https://viallfiles.supportingcast.fm/  Please make sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode and as always send in your relationship questions to [e-mail] to be a part of our Monday episodes.  To Order Nick’s Book Go To: https://www.viallfiles.com  If you would like to get some texting advice, send an email to [e-mail] with “Texting Office Hours” in the subject line!  To advertise on the show, contact [e-mail] or visit https://www.advertisecast.com/TheViallFiles  THANK YOU TO OUR SPONSORS: Altoids - Find Altoids in the check-out aisle! Grab a tin today!  BetterHelp - Get it off your chest, with BetterHelp. Visit https://www.BetterHelp.com/VIALL  today to get 10% off your first month. SportingSmiles - SportingSmiles serves the entire United States and they've got a sale going on right now where you can save 10 percent on all orders with promo code: Viall10. ASPCA- To explore coverage, visit https://www.ASPCAPetInsurance.com/VIALL  Episode Socials: @viallfiles @nickviall @justinkaphillips @leahgsilberstein @alison.vandam @dereklanerussell

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mints, they're curiously strong mints. Find Altoids in the checkout aisles. Grab your tin today. What's going on everybody? Welcome back to another ridiculously awesome episode of the Vile Files Ask Nick edition. I am your host Nick joined by the household of Leia, also known as Scooter by the way, for Leia, sweet boy Justin, Allie, what's going on everybody? Not too much. Doing good. Okay.

What's going on with you? How's it being a husband? Being a husband's awesome, being a dad's awesome. Little bit of wedding drama with our vendors. It's just disappointing. It's really amazing how some people in the wedding industry, they're just hell bent on how they do business regardless of how it impacts your wedding.

I mean, I will say something you said in our GD episode with Ava Max was wedding vendors, most of them aren't focused on having you come back. They're just focused on that one-off. And that spoke a lot. Yeah, I also feel like with weddings, you get to a point where you're just like, whatever, I don't care how much it costs,

I just need this to be done. Well, yeah, and they know that. And they know that and they take advantage of it. They take advantage of you. It's like an industry that has, you know, I think a lot of vendors get notes from each other, you know, in terms of how to do things. And it's just like, the mentality always like,

they're always demanding the money. Pay me now. They have all these outs. It's like, you gotta pay so much in advance, they can like cancel it any time. And you always hear like, this is how it is, and this is how it is. And like, it's only that way because like,

they learn from other vendors in that space. They're always protecting themselves. And I mean, I get it, like, but they, so much so that it affects your wedding. Some of the vendors have like a great impact But they, so much so that it affects your wedding. Some of the vendors have a great impact on your memories of your wedding and things like that. So it was wild to me.

I'm not yet sure I'm willing to call out the certain other vendors yet. And it's frustrating too because, especially on our end, I think people look for us for recommendations. What was our experience. At the same time, I think we have to be careful with those recommendations, you know, because I think they come with a lot of weight and power. Sometimes I think now that I feel like we almost can't defend ourselves because of like, well, should we really say anything or not? Like when we

talked about the hairstylist, we obviously didn't mention their name because we felt like that was a bridge too far. Yeah. Other people were like, fucking tell us the mother fucker's name or whatever. And it's just like, I don't know. But other, like our photographer, Sarah,

we've mentioned that the ladies at SYNC who did Nellie's wedding dress, I can't say enough good things about them. I mean, because not only are they excellent at what they do, like they make it feel like it is your wedding and they understand the value of relationships as opposed to vendors acting like this is about making sure

that their business operates the way their business should operate and it's just like fucking crazy. And entertainment's a trade business. A lot of people come in LA and like before they they make anything, it's just like fucking crazy. And entertainment's a trade business. A lot of people come in LA and before they make anything, it's just they work on trade. People who do facials might give a facial to someone who can do their hair for them.

It's like, well, I'll help you and you help me and let's trade. And so now we're planning our wedding. Obviously we're in a position to be like, well, we're trying to save weddings. We spent a decent amount of money. We made an investment in our relationship. We're happy we did.

But we were trying to, obviously, like everyone else, reduce those costs. And we are in a position to sometimes trade for opportunities. Because obviously we do have the platform that we have and people do look to us for recommendations and and and we have a huge reach and so when we went about this process it was always like well listen if you know I don't know how you guys work or with certain vendors it's

like you know what we're just gonna pay for this because it's too hard to explain I don't think they fully appreciate the value we can bring or maybe they're so niche that despite our reach, honestly, I don't think it's gonna help them that way. What was interesting is always being told, you know, it was like a respectful like, you know what, we need our money. It's like, okay, cool, we'll pay you, no problem. But after, then it was like, but we need credit, oh but but we want credit. Like, oh, but you need to tag us. And it's like, well, wait, no, we paid you.

Like, thank you for your money. Yeah, it was like, it was telling us that we added no value while simultaneously insisting that we do the thing that they act like as no value, but made it, and we were just like, again, you know me, I'm big on upfront expectations. What do you want to do you know what either one works for us but yeah I was very fresh it's been very frustrating was for some of them yeah I mean I agree like if it's up to them if they would rather get paid or do it for

like in if it were me I would probably go the credit route because it's like this is a stepping stone to like a whole other world of, you guys have a huge reach, but then they can't, then after the fact demand that you give them. Or just obnoxiously bug you about it. That's the thing too, because you would think as a vendor that you want the positive to end with the wedding, but then to attach after like negatives of like demands.

Not to mention like, yeah, the- It rewrites the perspective that- Oh yeah, there are some of Not to mention like, yeah, the. It rewrites the perspective that. Oh yeah, there are some of the vendors where like I was really impressed with their work and their talents, but my lasting impression is I would never work with them again and I would never recommend them

because despite their talents, I found them unprofessional or diminished the value of relationships. And so it's just like, yeah, you could work with this person, but they're going to be a giant pain in the ass. They're going to be difficult to work with. The feeling they will give you is that they are hell bent on making sure that their policies and rules are followed, regardless of how it impacts you or your specific needs as a

couple or your wedding that you want or your specific needs. I think eventually we'll probably, you know, this is the people we recommend and these are the people who we would never work with again. It seems fair. I feel like more just like the people, the people that we recommend and then, you know, See, there you go. Do you think it's a bridge too far by pointing out the people we wouldn't recommend? I don't know.

I mean, I did on Vile Files Plus call out a certain bridal salon that fucked me over. But I'm also- Leia was pissed. But I'm- But to be fair, Leia didn't have a dress three days before her wedding. So I would've been pissed too.

Yeah, I had a whole nightmare with my wedding dress where the seamstress at the salon messed it up and I found out three days before my wedding, and then they just gave me a sample rack dress to wear three days before my wedding. Yeah, it was fucking crazy. So yeah, I called them out, but that's a store, and also I'm me and not you, so it's a little different.

But like- But is that interesting though? It is very interesting. I'm not, not you, so it's like a little different. But like. But is that interesting though? It is very interesting. I'm not, like, it's almost like. It's so interesting because it's like, I don't have a massive following, so like for me to say that is like, whatever. But for you, it like holds so much weight.

I also think it's the way you phrase it. Like if you're like naming the person and saying that they like fucked you over and saying nobody should go to them, like you should make their business hurt. That's different than being like, I will never go back to them. I don't recommend them. Right. Like I wonder if that's a little different too. Like you could still name them and still be like not crossing that bridge at the same time. Yeah. Like I wonder if the way to go would be to be like, okay, these are the people I absolutely recommend. And those people get on that list, and that's great for them because they did right by you,

they were incredible vendors, and they made your day so special. And then to your friends and family, off air, you would say, yeah, don't go see so-and-so, but rather than say it on a large public platform where it could potentially ruin their business. More to tell them as a learning opportunity, like, by the way, this wasn't cool, this wasn't professional. I'm not going to put you on blast, but I would hope that you wouldn't do this to someone in the future.

I also think that you recognizing that there's a bridge means that you wouldn't want to name somebody with the intentions of harm. You know what I mean? Like you're recognizing that maybe we shouldn't say it cause there might be a bridge. Or my name. Sure, but it's like, it's so frustrating cause like in this particular situation

that it has negatively impacted our wedding experience. Yeah, which is sad. And our ability to share our experience with our audience, which for us is a big deal. Yeah, I mean, it's an interesting dilemma to have that I can't relate to because for me, with what happened with my dress, like I told all my friends about it.

I was just like, yeah, don't go to this bridal salon to get your dress. Like I had a horrible experience there. Yeah. But like. But like are we not allowed to share our experiences? Right, exactly, it's hard. We had to hear so much about their business and well I'm just running a business and I'm just blah blah blah and it's just like

yeah so are we, you know? And then they wanted access to the things that we could offer without any acknowledgement to the value it could bring. Yeah well I think too like with brand deals and stuff like they pay you a lot of money to promote certain products. Yeah, that we believe in, yeah. Yeah, exactly. And when it comes to our wedding, this could have been the most personal thing. Yeah, exactly.

So it's like, this is your business, and then in that sense, like you're giving them free. On the flip side too, like right now, that's what I'm thinking about when it comes to our wedding. And I don't wanna be thinking about it. And since we haven't spoken on it negatively or positively, people can make their own determinations. And again, their work is outstanding.

So I'm then indirectly setting up my, anyone from my audience to assume that this is, well, Nick and Nellie worked with them yeah I should work with them I don't know the right answer I'm just kind of blown away just by the industry it's so I think and I think it's if nothing else it's an acknowledgement this particular offender they don't ever have to budge and yet people still will hire them and they'll still pay them because of because it's their wedding and because they don't want to sacrifice their wedding

that they, like people like me and Natalie or just people getting married, put up with so much bullshit from these vendors, some of which are amazing and some of which are just like, fuck you, no, fuck you, no, fuck you. That's how it feels. It's always like, nope, can't budge, no, can't budge.

There's so much that goes into planning a wedding and you want it to be so perfect and you want everything to go so smoothly. And there's so much that goes into planning a wedding that once it gets closer and closer, you're just like, they know that they can take advantage of you because it's like, I'll do whatever, I'll sign whatever, I've already paid so much money

that it's like whatever you need at this point. It's so infuriating. And they know that. And then Nellie and I are stuck with this, like well, do we say something? Do we not say something? Like what's the right thing to do? But I feel strongly that this vendor

has impacted this moment for us so deeply that I don't want anyone who listens to this show or follows us on social media to have to deal with this person for what we had to experience. You kind of feel like you owe it to everyone to not fall into the same situation. Because like, yeah, I don't know, to be honest, I mean, I got married three years ago at this point.

So like time has passed and I've healed, but like I don't know what I would have done like fresh off that experience had I had a massive following to like tell the story to. It's funny, because when we talked about on GD, when I said, well, you know, they have no incentive to earn your business back, I had a couple of wedding vendors say,

that's what reviews are for. So that's how we are held accountable. Right, that's what I was gonna say. Your situation's different. Like there is that thing where it's like in the wedding industry in general, like, well, they don't care. Like this wedding dress place, they're like, well, you already bought I was gonna say. Your situation's different. There is that thing where it's like in the wedding industry in general, well they don't care, this wedding dress place, they're like, well you already bought your wedding dress

here, I don't care to wrong you at this point because you're not coming back for another wedding dress. But with you it's different because it's like your referral and your review means more than a returning customer. Yeah, this's just crazy. At the end of the day, your truth could be someone else's sign

or like someone else's reason or protection to not do that. So. Yeah, I don't know. Name them. Name them. Name them. They might come to that, but we'll see. The thing about it that sucks the most that you said

is that this is what you're thinking about now instead of like just relishing in the excitement and the positives of it. The fact that you're like still dealing with this is frustrating. Well, I mean, on the topic of weddings, we thought it could be fun to do a little game of, I do or I object.

We're gonna talk about some wedding traditions and whether or not we think that they're- Outdated. Outdated. Are still good to go. We like them. did you do them? This will be really easy, because I'll tell you exactly what we did or didn't do.

Garters, no. And, pfft. Right, so that's on the list. Yeah. Cross that off. As Natalie said respectfully, that tradition should die. Like, let's just call it every single fucking person there, and why do we need to see the fucking groom do something

like a sexual... Where does it originate from? Where does that tradition come from? Cause a couple of weeks ago. I think it comes from old school, the fact that the wedding was the first time you're gonna have sex and. It goes back to medieval times. Oh, yeah, there you go.

They all do by the way. I feel like we all grew up. A lot of them go back to Roman times. I mean, we'll go through a lot more of these. No, it says from medieval superstition that the wedding guests should take a piece of the bride's dress as good luck. A garter was a simple item a bride could give as a good luck charm instead of the guests

tearing apart her wedding dress. Whoa. So it was a compromise. My God. Jeez. Okay, so we say, I do not to that one. I object. We object to the garter? Object.

Okay, something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue. I mean... Did you guys do that? I don't. I don't even know what that is. Is Natalie supposed to have worn something new, something old, something blue, something true,

blah, blah, blah, blah? Yes, essentially. There is reasoning behind it. Well, it comes from an old English rhyme that lists objects that would give a bride good luck on their wedding day. So I guess it's just the bride. I mean, technically she had her grandma's ring, which is her something old. Her dress would have been something new, but does she borrow anything? She borrows something.

Or something blue? No, she borrowed her grandmother's. No, but that's like hers now. You know what I mean? I don't think she's giving it back. Oh, she definitely borrowed something. What? Her veil is not hers, there you go. Yeah, but nothing blue.

God, thank God we have good luck now. I'm not a superstitious person, so. I guess River's eyes are blue. I didn't have anything blue. Yeah, River's eyes are blue. Yeah, there you go. There you go. The sky was blue.

Well, because it says that something new symbolizes happy future. Something borrowed was typically like you'd borrow it from a couple that's had like marital success. And then that gives you love. And then they get divorced six months later and you're fucked. She's here, Debbie and John had a threesome.

It's like, oh fuck, we're doomed. And now they got. And then the blue represents fidelity and love. So interesting. That makes sense, river's eyes. Yeah, river's eyes. Okay, having bridesmaids and groomsmen. We did it.

I like it. Yeah, it's nice. I did it too. We didn't have our wedding party stand up with us. If you noticed, they just walked up, sat down. I like that because I did make my bridesmaids and groomsmen stand. And it's not because I made them,

it's just because there were no, I didn't have anything to do with the decision. We wanted to be the center of attention. Well, it's also hot, they're wearing heels. They don't want to stand the whole time. Yeah, sit down. Well, does bridesmaids and groomsmen imply gender? Because for me, it's like I want like a wedding party,

but like I would want my side to be people I know, so like of all genders. I think it just depends. I mean, I've to be people I know, so of all genders. I think it just depends. I've been to so many weddings where I've known women who have had best men, and not even a gay best friend. I've been to weddings where her best friend was a straight male.

So is he a bridesmaid at that point? I don't know how it worked, but he was on her side. Did he go to the bachelorette party? I don't remember, but yeah, I think that's pretty common now. Okay, I was ensuring. That's true. Yeah, I mean, I like the idea of having,

of just, you know, giving your best friends that honor, like, or, you know, having them get ready with you, get to walk down the aisle, be like close to you on your special day. So I do. Saving the top tier of your wedding cake. Saving forever? So I did this.

I love my wedding cake. And honestly, I'm like... Did you save it? I don't think so. I don't know. But I did at the end of the night, I was like, oh, wedding cake! And I had like two pieces.

Did you guys smash it in each other's faces? Fuck no. Absolutely, I don't. I don't like when people do. Nellie and I, our wedding cake, we basically got a very small wedding cake for us to cut. We didn't do the whole big thing, because it was like,

and then I think we also got cookies and cupcakes. Like we didn't get a wedding cake for everyone. I find out a lot of people don't eat the wedding cake. No, which is pointless. So it's like, we did the very cost-effective thing of getting a small little cake for us to cut. Some people do save it, and then they take a spoon of it every single anniversary.

That's what we did. So we took a piece- Do you get sick off of that? single anniversary. That's what we did. So we took a piece. Do you get sick off of that? Probably. Forever? Well, we took a piece of the wedding cake. It's just, for us, it was just gonna be first anniversary. I've never heard like every anniversary.

You still have it though? No, so I don't know where the hell it is. I really don't. Like we didn't eat it on our first anniversary. I don't know where we put it. I know we froze it in someone's freezer. So if it's in your freezer, let me know. If we did save it, I don't know where we put it. I know we froze it in someone's freezer. So if it's in your freezer, let me know. If we did save it, I am unaware.

Yeah, I'm not a big dessert person, but I do feel like a cute thing my sister did was my dad's cousins who live by our grandma in Iowa took a to-go container of all the different types of dessert and drove it back to Iowa so the 94-year-old could have some of the wedding cake. You know what we did do? What?

We saved a couple of bottles of wine. Okay. Are you ever gonna like, are you just gonna save those for special occasions? Yeah, and I don't think we need to buy the most expensive wine, but it was just the fact that this was the wine we served at our wedding. Sentimental.

Yeah, that makes sense. That ages, so there you go. Yeah, well it's interesting, cause this also is like, traditionally the top tier of the wedding cake was saved and kept frozen to be Enjoyed by the couple at their future child's christening. Oh my god. So I don't know. Oh Okay First dance seems like a lot of work. Absolutely. I do follow-up question to that is a choreographed first dance

Absolutely. I don't We've jacked. I feel like you can put a little thought into it. You guys did the dip and stuff, which I think was great. Yeah, we practiced in the trailer. I've been to weddings where it's full routine and no one's having fun. It's cringe, it's so awkward.

I've seen it with a lift. Yeah, I think it's entertaining. I wouldn't do it, but I'm like, I love to see you turning. Oh, entertaining for sure, but it's not like a laugh with them. It's more of a laugh at them. Sometimes they're good though. I agree with you, Nick. And like their expressions are so serious

because they're trying to remember everything. And I'm like, you are not like even having fun at all. Yeah, do a twirl, do a dip. That's all you need. I also don't wanna like have to stress about anything at my wedding, you know? It's like, you have to think about that then all night. Like, oh my god, am I going to remember the moves to my dance?

Like... Yeah, I've been at a cocktail party, like talking to a groom. Like, how you feeling? He's like, I'm trying to remember all my steps. And I was like, oh my god. It's OK, never mind. And then there are just like a couple fun, like,

cultural traditions we wanted to talk about. So like, at least for me, there's a Jewish tradition where it's called the Yehud Room, where after you get married, your bridesmaids, groomsmen, the whole wedding party, they like dance you into a room where it's just the two of you. And then, you know, it goes back to ancient times

where like technically you're not supposed to touch your significant other until you get married. And one of the things that you have to do to be married is consummate the marriage. So they like- So you're carried into a room to fuck. Exactly. And then they wait outside.

And they wait outside for you to do that. Absolutely, I do not. Yeah. Well, they don't do it anymore. Like we didn't do that. I was like, is this room at your wedding? I ate so much sushi in that room, but like, no, it's like, but yeah. They still do the room.

But no one actually. They still do the room and they're banging on the door while you're in there. So technically people might still do it. You just decided to eat sushi. Yeah, I mean, to be honest, I was like, should we? And I was like, no. Not in this dress.

It was a little cringe, great. But listen, you know, if it's your... I don't think people actually do it. And then there was one, the money dance. Oh yeah, this one's, I've said it on the show before. So in Filipino culture, you have a money dance and this is at the reception and you have like the first dance

and then you have like the money dance where like the bride and the groom will dance individually like in the center of the stage. And then we go up to them and pin money on them. Hell yeah. So like the guys will go to the girls and then the girls will go to the. Sign me up for the money dance.

I wish we would have done the money dance. And it's supposed to be like good fortune and like luck, like pin them. And then some people are like dressed like fully in like. And they get to keep it all? Yeah, they keep it. Yeah, I absolutely. But here's my take.

As a Filipino, I'm like, is that just an alternative version of like. Wedding gifts. Like stripper ones. I don't care, the way you can pay Well, that was fun. Let a wedding talk. I'm sure we'll have more of it Talk in the comments whatever we talked about We have some great calls lined up for you can't wait for you to listen to them before we do don't forget to send

Those questions at ask Nick at the file files comm for all things texting office hour mediation You know the drill also for all those people who call in and ridden and have some, be sure to send in those updates as well. And if you love those updates, remember we have so many episodes of those updates behind Viophiles Plus, just go to Viophiles.com to sign up. It's a seven day free trial, so no excuses people, because there's a lot of updates that you have been dying to hear that are available for you right now. All right, let's get to our callers. What's your time with it? Let's ask Nick your sexy questions. How's it going?

Hi, my name is Brooke. I'm 23 years old and I'm struggling to get over an ex-boyfriend's comments about me and my body post breast reduction. Oh my god. Okay. Tell me more. Where do I start? Well, yeah, that's a good question. Because we're talking about an ex first and foremost, yeah? Yeah, like recent ex. So this happened, we broke up like a month ago. So these comments were made in the conversation

that ended our relationship. Gotcha. All right, so let's talk about how your relationship ended. And let's start there. Okay. So we were on vacation the week prior and everything was fine. I got like really sick. I had a sinus infection.

We got back and we just were sort of in the swing of things. I went back to school, he went back to work. And I don't know, like things seemed distant. Like he had been pushing me away over a period of time. And then, I don't know, like things seem distant. Like he had been pushing me away over a period of time. And then, I don't know, it was like that Thursday, we got back that Saturday and the following Thursday, we were just like having like a normal phone call, or like what I thought was going to be. And it started off like, okay, maybe we're not compatible in certain ways. Like he works to live, I live to work and just different things like that.

But there were certain things that I thought we could work through or that I was just like challenging him on, not to like convince him any other way. But in response to that, he was like- Can you give me just an example of, if you can remember what you said to him and how you said it?

Because like when you say, he works to live, I live to work, like that's a very general phrase, but like, you know. Yeah, so I'm very driven. I'm in law school. I love what I do. I enjoy it and he hates his job and he doesn't really like have any goals in his career. Sure. So we are different in that respect because when we have free time, like. and he doesn't really have any goals in his career.

So we are different in that respect because when we have free time. Understood, so how did you communicate that to him? So that wasn't really, that was more of a comment that I made. He said, the way we spend our free time is differently. We would like to spend Saturdays differently or we would like to spend them differently.

And I said, okay, what would be an ideal Saturday for you and he couldn't answer and Then it turned into Well, like the sex isn't good either Well, you initiated sex three times in the week before this conversation. So I Don't get it. And it was Your body has changed a lot since we have been together. Wow, I think you say.

Yeah. And I was like, I was like really caught off guard by that because he'd never like suggested anything. So here's my question. I guess my question is like, you're talking about a fight you guys had, right? This conversation. But like, I guess my question is,

did it start with you expressing frustrations about like- It did. Okay. Yeah, with like, yeah, I said, I feel like you're pushing me away. Okay, you started with that. And then did you, and then did it come, and did you start talking about your frustrations

about his career choices and things like that? No, because that wasn't a frustration to me. Like, yeah, I don't think that's why we, that's not, I don't think why we broke up. No, that's not what I'm. But it was just a very weird. That's not what I'm getting at. So you started by saying,

your boyfriend made some really hurtful comments to you, right? Okay. And you're struggling trying to process that, I'm imagining. Yeah. You've heard the term hurt people, hurt people, right? So I'm just wondering, you talk to you, basically, you know, you're very driven, you have your, your career, you know, what you want,

your boyfriend seems to be the opposite. I don't know if he's less driven or just isn't as clear terms of what he wants to do. A lot of people have drive and a lot of people have a desire to be successful and be rich and have money but they don't they don't know what they want to do. They don't know what they're good at, they don't know what apply themselves, you know, and it could be very discouraging to do that. And then at the same time, you know, especially men who can easily feel emasculated, they hear they are dating someone who is focused, knows what she wants, you know, and that. And so I'm just trying to understand the possibility of, and I don't give,

this is not justifying what he said. You know, when people say things to us that hurt our feelings, you know, he said these very hurtful things, right? About your body of all things, right? So now you, I'm guessing you've spent the past several weeks thinking about what he said, you know, and how that made you feel. And then judging yourself potentially, because you're like, well, is he right? Has my body changed?

Have I done all these? Yes, I literally fact-checked him. Exactly, right? You're spent all this emotional energy trying to verify whether your asshole of an ex-boyfriend is being an asshole. And I'm just trying to figure out, does this have anything to actually do with you? Or is this guy who feels less than because of the success of his girlfriend and lashed

out because he feels, again, not to justify what he said, but to explain why he said it so that you can spend less energy trying to quantify whether he's talking from a place of truth or, you know, am I making sense? Yeah, no, that does make sense. It's like he didn't say this because he feels this way. He says this because he feels less about himself. And now he is trying to make you feel less about yourself because he is frustrated with the success that you are having as an individual.

Yeah, it's just like how, and like I understand that. And like I can say that to myself, that like he is projecting like his insecurities or whatever it may be. But yeah, I don't know, it's like hard. And also he is the only person I've been with. I met him before my breast reduction, like been with since my breast reduction.

Are you happy with your breast reduction? Well, yeah, I am. I'm like, I never questioned it, but like. Well, that's. Yeah, not that I do. It's just like, he was like, yeah, I'm like gonna get emotional, but he was also with me while my dad died,

which was not long after that And he said in like this conversation like you stopped giving a fuck about everything your dad died Scar care things like that I did I didn't care about my scars. I had bigger priorities. Yeah Yeah, I'm really sorry you're going through this it sucks. I think the best we can try to do you know because I guess you have a choice. Is this, and when's the last time you talked to your ex-boyfriend? So I did. I after this conversation I texted him that night I said I need my apartment

key back and it turned green. So he blocked me and I didn't text him for like three weeks and I reached out to him. How long you with this guy? Saturday a year if you want. Okay So he blocked you. Yeah, but then I did reach out Saturday. Okay, and I don't think it'd go through but I said I said are you busy and so we had a phone conversation and he admitted the part about, because I just said, I said, I'm like struggling to get over the fact that like you said, I like stopped giving a fuck

after my dad died. And I know that's not true. And he like acknowledged that it came from like a place of almost bitterness and resentment. But when it came to the comments about my body, because I was like that came out of left field, he was like, yeah, we don't have to address everything in one conversation. And I was like, so like, you're doubling down? Or what are we doing? Like, and I know I shouldn't care. Like, What do you mean you shouldn't care? Of course you care. You're not allowed to care. You're not a robot. Right. But it's like, you care, you're not allowed to care. You're not a robot. Right, but it's like, yeah. Like I know I shouldn't be seeking closure from him

about that because I shouldn't. Yeah, I mean, it's one thing to know that you're not gonna get closure from him, you know, but this is still new and it's still raw and you are allowed to be upset. You know, you're allowed to feel. You know, the trick is, it's such a fine line, right? And I hope that five minutes ago,

I didn't sound like I was trying to justify what he was saying. I just like, we can't control what people do and say, right? Ever. We can't control how strangers interact with us. We can't even control the people we love, how they interact with us. And when we're in a relationship, we can communicate like, Hey, you said that that upset me. I'm really, you know, and then we can certainly hope that the people we're

in relationships with, whether it's romantic or friendships, that when we express our hurt and frustrations about what they said, they, they listen with an empathetic ear and understanding and not a, not, and not be defensive and just say, I'm really sorry, I didn't mean to do that. How can I make it better? That's obviously the ideal response. In this case, this led to a breakup and now you're no longer in a relationship with this person. So you have a double whammy to deal with. Not to mention your father passed away recently. So you are now dealing with simply just the breakup. Like even if it was a breakup that you didn't wanna be in,

a relationship you're like, I don't know, this isn't working for me. Even if you knew that you were better off, you're still allowed to be sad because breakups suck and they're hard and you're moving on from someone you invested a year and a half of your life in and probably at least for a period of the time, you imagined a future with this person

and yada, yada, yada. And so even if you're the person who's just like, this guy's a loser piece of shit and I don't know why I started dating him, you are still allowed to be sad, right? So you are allowed to feel. But in your case, you were hit with this, like these comments that made you question your self-worth

and your body and things like that. And so you are dealing with his hurtful words and the loss of a relationship you weren't expecting. So you do have to give yourself some grace and it's okay to feel. Now the trick is to not spend more energy and time than you need to. And that's kind of what it's all about. You know? And it's a very fine line between allowing yourself to feel and be sad and be angry and all the normal feelings that come with processing emotion or loss or hurt and things like that. And I'm not here to say when that time is, but like, you know, a lot of things I talk about

on this show are really just about that. It's to not make a bad situation worse, you know? And I remember through a lot of my heartbreaks and a lot of my sorrows and frustrations, and I'm not comparing them to yours, it's different, but I was notorious for making bad situations worse by being obsessing over my thoughts and what people said to me. I can't believe they said, if they said this, why did they do this? I would talk about with anyone and I would analyze every word they did in their actions

and I would have conversations with them in my head and I would argue, literally argue with them in my head. I had the best arguments with ex-girlfriends by myself. All right, yeah, come out with conspiracy theories. Yeah, it's just like I was just being in car rides, arguing with them. It's like, who are you talking to? I, it's a conspiracy theory. Yeah, it's just like I was just being car rides, arguing with them. It's like, who are you talking to? I probably looked like a crazy person.

And so I always remember that. And that really, it drained me again. And so when I talk to people a lot about on the show, a lot is it about it is trying to control your thoughts. It's not obsessing over things. It's not trying to understand things. It's not trying to understand things that honestly, there's nothing to understand. Why did your ex-boyfriend say this?

And we can guess, right? And my guess is he is unhappy with himself. He is unhappy with his career or the fact that he hates his job. He sees how much you are happy with your career. I remember being in my mid to early 20s or late 20s. Well, he's 31. 31, even still. The job I left to do all this bullshit I'm doing was the first time I found

a job that I was like, this is the career for me. It was with a company I liked and I felt like I had the type of upward mobility I was searching for. I had solid jobs before that, but every other job I had before that job, it was just like, I just, ah, there's a big part missing. I just, I was unsatisfied with it. And here I was in my early 30s being like,

I didn't plan on being in my 30s and not knowing if this was the career I wanted. And that's a very unsettling feeling. And I had a lot of frustrations, you know? And then I ended up quitting that job to do all this bullshit. But I guess what I'm saying, it's just like, the fact that he is 31 and hates his job

makes it even worse for him. Yeah, well, he's also doing nothing about it. So it's like, I don't know what to tell you. No, I hear you. but that doesn't stop people from feeling sorry for themselves. No, it doesn't. Yeah, so I guess it does make me question myself, because I also now feel like I wasn't dating

the person that I thought I was, because I never thought I would date anything like that. That is an unhealthy thought, and that is you making a bad situation. Is it? Yeah, because of absurd. You just said to me that you, I don't like that. That is an unhealthy thought, and that is you making a bad situation worse. That's, yeah, because of absurd. You just said to me that you, like, you knew this guy for a year and a half,

and you're basically telling me that you're judging yourself and feeling less about yourself because what, you're not a mind reader, that you didn't know everything about who he was. This is the first time that your relationship with this guy dealt with this type of stress, you know? And now this is how he's handling it.

This is not like a 20 year relationship where you've dealt with tragedy and pain and suffering and money problems and you have worked through as a couple all these super difficult situations and out of nowhere, 20 years later, your husband and your father of your children out of left field is handling another very difficult situation in a way

you've never seen them handling it before. That is not the situation. But that is how, and that statement you just made of you feeling less about yourself because you didn't see this coming, you're acting like you are in your 50s and you've had this like lifetime with this guy. Yeah, but it's like, then how do I like go forward

and not expect that to happen again? What do you mean? You've learned, I don't know. Like I, you know, I hate to break it to you. How old are you again? 23. I hate to break it to you. You're gonna have a lot more people disappoint you.

Right. And the person you end up marrying and loving is gonna also sometimes say things that hurt your feelings, unfortunately, and hopefully you're able to work through it. But this won't be the last time someone that you feel very close with disappoints you in a way that you never imagined them disappointing you.

And unfortunately, that's just part of life. And all we can do is learn from it. What can you learn from this, right? That your next boyfriend, you know, and all we can do is learn from it. What can you learn from this? Right. Now, your next boyfriend, you know that you're very career driven. You know that your career is important to you. Right. So when you meet a guy early in a relationship or you get a sense or a vibe that he is still figuring out what he wants to do with his life, that's a red flag for you because you already know that you being very confident

in what you want for yourself and your career and your drive and that any guy that you meet who hasn't had his shit figured out, that's gonna eventually create conflict in your relationship. And I'm not saying you can't date. That's so annoying. Yeah, that's part of life.

There's a lot of other reasons you're not gonna be compatible with people. It's also, I don't know, are you can't date. Yeah, that's part of life. There's a lot of other reasons you're not gonna be compatible with people. It's also I don't know Are you religious? No. Okay. Well, there you go. Now it also, you know, you know, it might be annoying You go on a first date you meet a guy you think he's so good-looking. He's Respectful he's interested in you. It's the best first date you ever had. He's asking all these questions about you He's interested in what you want to do. He's asking you follow-up questions. You're like, holy shit, this fucking guy, is this guy's too good to be true.

And then on date two, he brings up, hell, he's a devout Buddhist. And you're just like, oh, okay. And he's just like, listen, I want to get married. I want to have kids someday, but it's really important for my partner to be just as devout in my faith as someone who, like you, says you're not very religious, that might be a problem for you. That's a non-negotiable. You know, someone

who says, hey, I want you to change your beliefs, like you might not be able to work through that. And here you are, so excited about this first date. I mean, I'm just preparing you. That's life. And I always not looking you're looking for one Not many and so you got to remember that in your journey to find your one person your person and listen You might have multiple great loves, you know, hopefully you only marry one person Unfortunately, we allow live in a time where marriages aren't super successful and there's a lot of reasons why people break up And so you really have to you know, do your due diligence when you're dating to find out, you know, if this is a relationship that's going to stand the test of time, you know,

and you're going to enter in some relationships where you say, I love you to each other and you make plans and it might not work out. And that's unfortunately part of love and dating and life, but you're not doing yourself any good by beating yourself up emotionally and judging yourself because you couldn't figure out in a year and a half, if, if someone was going to work through certain types of challenges. Sometimes, you know, I always say it's like, you don't really know how compatible you are until you start working through adversity. Or team when you have your first fight

and things like that. And sometimes you can't create adversity, you have to wait for adversity to happen. The sad reality, your father passed. Obviously, if we're lucky enough to outlive our parents, everyone's gonna have to deal with the passing of a parent. And we don't know what that's gonna be like until it happens.

And we don't know who our partners are gonna support us until it happens. It's not like in your first five dates you're just like, hey so like when my parents die are you gonna be you know like you don't have those conversations and even if you did you don't know you know if someone's been lucky enough not to deal with death people only can guess how they're gonna handle those things but then and then it happens and then you find out. Yeah I mean I don't know I thought like he handled it well while it was happening,

but then for it to be thrown at my face. Sure. Well, yeah, so he didn't handle your death. He didn't handle the death. This has nothing to do with how he handled the death of your father. It has to do with, I don't know what he's going through or why he's feeling the way he's feeling,

but he is feeling unhappy with himself. That much is clear. Because you're not crazy and you didn't meet some guy, you didn't meet some monster who's just been faking this whole year and a half about who he is, right? I know it might feel that way. Yeah, I guess. But like, and so instead of the explanation isn't like,

oh, he's some narcissist and some sociopath and he's just. And I don't think that of him. I do like, I don't know. Yeah, it sucks that that's the way it ended because I do. He is being an absolute jerk. He is a jerk. He's an asshole. He's being an asshole.

And I don't really know if he's gonna live to regret it or realize his mistake. I hope he does, but that's his journey. Yeah, I don't really know if he's gonna live to regret it or realize his mistake. I hope he does, but that's his journey. Yeah, I don't need him to, but. Yeah, but I think you just need to, you don't need to understand, I guess that's my big point. You don't need to understand why he said what he said. The only thing you need to understand is that he's a jerk.

And so all these conversations you either have with yourself or your girlfriends or me, and it's just like he just, the answer is he's a jerk. And so all these conversations you either have with yourself or your girlfriends or me and it's just like he just the answer is he's a jerk. He's a jerk. He's a jerk. He's a jerk. He wanted to hurt you. He did. He wanted to hurt you emotionally and that's why he said what he said. And that's the only thing you need to understand. It does suck but that is better than you spending a bunch of emotional energy looking in the mirror and wondering if he's actually right. It is, no, literally, and I know he's not. I fact-checked him, which was probably not healthy,

but I did it. It was like, my doctor said I'm not. Yeah, and I don't mean to laugh, but you need to try to work at not having to fat check him. Right. No, I know. And that was just like, my initial response was like, okay, like, is he right? Like, have I really gotten out of shape? But I'm like, no, I'm 10 pounds lighter than moving that. Like, and also like, even, you know, who gives a shit? There might be a period in your life where, you know, well, I'm like, if I get, like, are you gonna have a family?

Like, your wife gets pregnant and you're like, oh, your body changed. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, and he might, he might handle that way. And that sucks for whoever that person is. But instead of spending this emotional energy fact checking him and feeling less about yourself. And again, I'm not saying you don't have a right to feel sad, but there's that again, that

fine line between being hurt by what someone says to you and then making it worse by obsessing and questioning something you know deep down isn't true. And instead of just recognizing that they're just a jerk is like actually validating what they say by fact-checking. Because you fact-checking and then talking with friends and being like is validating what they say by fact-checking. Because you fact-checking and then talking with friends and being like, is validating. Give it a little power. Exactly.

And what you need to try to do instead of feeling bad about yourself and questioning your own self-worth is gratitude. Oh my God, I really hate that I found this out now, but like you just pointed out, better than finding out after you have a kid that what you thought was your supportive, empathetic husband is now some body shaming prick

who's gonna use his own unhappiness about where he's at to make you feel worse about yourself at your most vulnerable moment as a new mom. Oh my God. And then you're like, this is the father of my child and he's saying the most hurtful things I could imagine him saying to me. Thank God we didn't find that out then. You're only 23 years old. You're not engaged. You're not married. You don't have a kid with this guy. You are free and clear. And I know it sucks and I know it's hurtful but people have a lot of more difficult times leaving relationships

than you have and so there are some there are things that you can choose to be thankful for in this situation and most of getting through life and disappointment is just a matter of perspective. How do we choose to see this situation? Yeah, no, I think I am generally grateful, but I was looking for things to be grateful for the like relationship and not like the way it ended. Like I was like, oh, like, I don't know, it served its purpose. And but I'm guessing like, what did you learn about this? I mean, we could sit there and do this exercise. Well, I learned that I'm not going to respond to messages that comment on my appearance, like the first message. Sure. Yeah, so like in terms of, when you think back about this relationship,

how he handled the situation, were there glimpses of this prior to? Not about my body, but just like towards women. And I did- There you go. How did he talk about other women? Yeah, no, like there were certain times he would just like towards women. And I did- There you go. How did he talk about other women? Yeah, no, like there were certain times he would just like mock women, like in a woman's voice.

And I don't know, like eventually I called it out. I was like, why do you hate women this week? And yeah, he didn't like that. Well, yeah. Yeah, I also, yeah, I don't know. Our values weren't aligned to the way I thought they were initially because- How did you think they were aligned?

Well, he was like that he's like a feminist and he is just like for social justice, inequality, and you're like demeaning and shitting on women and it's like, well, that's not how that works. Yeah. You know. So believing people's or like, I don't know, I mean believing in people's, or like, I don't know, I mean, it was words, but like, behaviors. How did it come up that he was a feminist? I'm just out of curiosity. I was just on like, in Tinder.

Gotcha. He said he was, or you asked him? He said he was. Okay, red flag. I just, I don't know, I've never. Realistically, yeah. I've never offered that I'm a feminist. I mean, I don't even like the label, but do I think I support women?

But I think it's weird for a guy. Who needs to disclaim it. Who needs to point out that he is. Well, yeah, they're just equal equality. But then when it came down to it, it wasn't. We were having conversations, and I was like, equality for people in your situation, and that's not equality.

Yeah, so I guess, again, when we think in your situation, and that's not equality. Yeah, so I guess, again, when we think about what we can learn from it, it's like, clearly this guy pointed out some red flags in the past that you could learn from. And it's normal in relationships to look the other way, to make excuses for our partners, you know? Because you wanna be supportive.

You also wanna think that you wouldn't have chosen to date a man who now you're now suspecting has a grudge against women. So instead of acknowledging it, you look the other way. You know? And I'm not saying this for you to now beat yourself up emotionally about it. I'm just saying you can learn from it in the future.

Right, no hindsight is 20-20. You're only 23 and I don't know how that feels for you on your end but from my end you're only 23 and you didn't get it right with this guy that is okay. And I can't tell you how thankful I am to not have gotten engaged or married specifically to a bunch of women who are wonderful and great and had a lot of great memories with them, but I'm glad I didn't marry them. And if you had told me that at the time,

I wouldn't have believed you. And so I see this as a blessing for you. And while I understand what he said is very upsetting, I just want you to not dwell on it as much as possible. And I want you to not validate what he said by fact checking him and going to your friends and be like, do I look, how do I look? I mean, am I, you know?

You know, and it's a fine line. We're only human. And again, I don't wanna suggest that you didn't have a right to have a response. Of course you were gonna get hurt by what he said. You know? Of course you were gonna be sad. And you knew that.

Yeah. Like, we both knew that. That's why I said it. Yeah. But now, it's been a month and a half, right? You said? About a month and a half. Now is the time to like,

to not let those toxic thoughts control you. And that it's a work in progress. Like you're not gonna do this overnight and controlling your thoughts is, it's a work in progress. I can sit there and say, control your thoughts, control your thoughts, but even not to this day, I have to work to control my thoughts. I have to say, oh shit, I'm doing it again.

I'm ruminating, I'm obsessing over this thing that is, it's taking my mental energy and I have to, stop it Nick, stop it Nick. The things that we obsess over and ruminate the most, the things we'll have to constantly remind ourselves to like, hey, we're doing it again. And so I could sit there and say, don't let him make you think this way,

don't let him make you think this way, control your thoughts. It doesn't mean you're gonna be able to turn it off, you're not gonna get off this call and be like, all right, well, Nick told me to control my thoughts, I'm just gonna stop thinking about it. That's not gonna happen. No, later tonight, you might see something,

you might get triggered by something you see on TV or a conversation you have with your friends and it's gonna trigger you and it's gonna make you think about the very hurtful things that your ex-boyfriend said to you. And that's gonna make you, and then once you get triggered, you're gonna immediately wanna get that validation or you're gonna wanna talk to your friend. And that's gonna make you, and then once you get triggered, you're gonna immediately wanna get that validation or you're gonna wanna talk to your friend.

And that's when you're gonna say to yourself, Brooke, all right, hey, listen, okay, you're doing it again, you're beautiful, you've been crushing life, you have so much to be proud of, you look great, he was a jerk. And then instead of spending the next 30 minutes feeling sorry for yourself, you stop it.

But you know what's gonna happen the next day? The next day you might get triggered again. And the next day minutes feeling sorry for yourself, you stop it. But you know what's gonna happen the next day? The next day you might get triggered again. And the next day you might, you know, and you start rummaging about it and then you say, Brooke, you gotta stop. You know, it's a work in progress, you know? And so you have to give yourself grace to understand that every day you might get triggered for a period of time and every day you might ruminate a little bit. But it's just having that self-awareness to call yourself out in your head to say,

stop, I'm doing this. Maybe having a friend. You say, hey listen, I need your help. You know, when I- I did, I tried that. Yeah, and keep trying it. Again, this is a work in progress. You're not gonna count Mount Everest in a day,

so to speak, you know what I'm saying? So this, you have to give yourself grace to allow yourself to relapse to allow yourself to feel down to allow yourself You know that it's it's normal to do this You know what I'm saying? It's very normal to handle the these types of very hurtful situations in the way that you're handling it So don't judge yourself for obsessing over it, but just say, hey, I caught myself again. What else can I think about? How can I validate myself? Where can I get that self-confidence? And then, you know, what is something that either, all right, let's get busy at school or work or whatever it is that is a positive

thought, you know, you tell yourself, I need to think about this. You know, so when I say control your thoughts, it's not some magic thing where you're just like, all right, turn it off, you actually have, you know, it's like anything else, you have to do the work. You actually have to think of something else to think about. But the thing that you want to obsess over is always gonna creep back in your head. It's just, it's having that self-awareness to say,

wait, you're doing it again. All right, stop. Stop asking myself these questions. Stop arguing with him in my head. Because I bet you've done that a lot. I bet you've had a lot of arguments with him by yourself in your thoughts. Things that you wish you would want to say to him.

Yeah, because I was so respectful when this happened. I was just like, I can't be with somebody who says this. And I hung up and that was it. But like, yeah, now I'm like, oh man, I could've said. Yeah. But I don't regret not being disrespectful. Totally. Because when do you regret that?

And it's normal to wanna have those conversations in your head. I'm just saying, you just have to get, the thing you wanna work on is get good at calling yourself out when you're having these types of conversations with him or about him in your head and instead of going through that whole mental exercise of the fight that doesn't accomplish anything or the conversations about him again that is only going to be a bunch of speculation between you and your girlfriends or your

you know whatever your support system and you're not gonna get any answers you're just gonna get a bunch of speculation it It's saying, hey, you know what? We don't need to do this. This is just giving him too much power. He was a jerk. He obviously is upset with what's going on in his life and he took it out on me. And I don't need to feel less about myself

because he's a jerk. And you just replay that conversation and then you do whatever you can to start thinking about something else. The thing I'm talking about doing is something that takes practice. It doesn't happen overnight. Sometimes I'm good at it and I can't catch myself.

Sometimes, like Saturday, I got in just a cycle of ruminating. And that's, yeah, it ended up in me reaching out. I don't want to do that again. And that's good to acknowledge, but it's like that combination of grace and And holding yourself accountable, you know And so, you know when I was younger I didn't I either I would always have one of the two I'd either be really hard on myself without the grace

You know beat myself up emotionally Oh, you know or I would give myself the grace without holding myself accountable. But that grace turned out to me like just obsessing over it. I gave myself the grace to feel sorry for myself, right? So giving yourself the grace is to not being yourself up for feeling down, to say, you know what, I have the right to feel sad. It's okay to feel sad. This is normal. This was very hurtful to me. I'm a human being. I have feelings. But eventually you have to say, but you know what, Brooke, you're better than this. This is not who you are. Let's not give him the power. And I'm going to start stopping myself from going

down these ruminating rabbit holes. And again, it's a very fine line. It's something you work on every day and it gets a little bit better every day. Then you do a little fake it till you make it. You know, does that make sense? Am I, is this helpful? Yeah, no, I appreciate that. It does make sense. Cause sometimes we're always, it's either one or the other.

We're so black and white, you know, with how we handle our different situations. Yeah, in response to that, I automatically got likecritical of myself. But I know that I deserve praise. Yeah. So how do you feel about yourself? You gotta remember that.

I am. That's hard to do. But whatever you were doing, after your procedure, how did you feel about it? Were you happy with it? And that's really all that matters. Right, and I was, and like, I never, yeah, I never cared about the scarring, and it doesn't look bad anyways.

I did so much research before I did it, and yeah. But. I don't regret it at all. I mean, like, in so much less pain than I was, like, that is what it was about. Yeah, and unfortunately, there are so much less pain than I was. Like that is what it was about. Yeah. And unfortunately there are a lot of jerks out there. I don't mean just men, there's just a lot of jerks. And unfortunately hurt people do hurt people, you know?

Give yourself some grace. I know it's upsetting, but like you have a lot going for you. You have so much ahead of you that I'm so excited for you. Right now, you're dealing with a lot, you have a lot of reasons from your POV to feel down, to be upset, to feel hurt, and they're all valid. I totally get it. But as someone who's lived a little bit more life than you,

and I hope that doesn't sound condescending or whatever but like I know how much and what I'm hearing is that I'm hearing I'm 23 I was able to afford a surgery on my own I know what I want to do I love what I do I know what I want to do I'm excited about what I want to do and as a 23 year old woman as as a 23 year old person, you're leaps and bounds ahead where a lot of people your age are, especially nowadays. I mean, your generation doesn't know what they wanna do with their lives, you know? They're struggling finding work,

they're struggling finding purpose. You have that, you know? There are so many people who are gonna be envious of what you have going, you know, there are so many people who are gonna be envious of what you have going for you. And what you have going for you is really hard to find. That purpose, that drive, that sense of like, why do you wake up as a 23 year old and get out of bed? I struggle with that, I didn't have that at 23.

And I hope that you are super appreciative of that. And I'm not saying this like, oh, you know, I hope you're like, you know, be grateful. But, you know, I want to give you something to wake up instead of feeling sorry for yourself. Look in the mirror and be like, you're fucking crushing it. Because there are a lot of people who would be are very envious of what you got going for you. So much so that someone you thought cared about you was willing to say something so hurtful because that is how envious he is of what you have that he doesn't. He's 31 years old and he's looking at his 23 year old girlfriend being like, fuck.

Yeah, yeah. It just, yeah, I don't know. Like that's sad to me that like someone tells you like what they're so passionate about and shares that and you're just like, hmm It's sad but yeah I mean you can have empathy for them almost. I don't mean I you know within reason. Listen, the more successful you are, the happier you are. Unfortunately that's the world the way the world is. The more the happy you are, the more successful you are, the way the world is. The more the happy you are, the more successful you are, the better the decisions you make for yourself, the more adversity it will create for you. You will really find out who your true friends are. You know, growing up is sometimes can be very

disheartening because the older you get, your circles get smaller. When you're 19, you make friends based off of like having similar interests and a willingness to keep each other's secrets. You know, when you get older and you find love and you have kids and you have responsibility, you really find out who your ride and die people are. And usually it's really just the people you marry and your family and maybe one or two other friends. And realizing that can bring a lot of disappointment. But it shouldn't make you feel bad about yourself and it shouldn't make you disappointed in the world.

The world's always been this way. Yeah, you know, I appreciate that. Misery loves, you know, you've heard the saying misery loves company, right? I said that, yeah, I said that as soon as we got off the phone. So people are, you know, your success is unfortunately going to bring critics and it will, it won't, this won't be the, the more successful you are, this won't be the last time someone you thought was a friend or a confidant or a support system reveals themselves to not be. They'll be adversarial, they'll be jealous, they'll be envious. This will not be the last time. I am not saying this for you to be a skeptic. No, yeah, I've already experienced that.

But I'm saying this so that you don't allow those people to make you feel less than about yourself. Yeah, yeah, and that's an important reminder because, yeah, I don't value their opinions about other things. So, yeah. Was this helpful? I don't know. It was. I do have to leave for class soon. Okay.

But this was helpful. I'm what? So we have to let you go too. Yeah, no, this was helpful. So I'm, I should block him, re-block him. Well, I always say you're blocking, as long as you're helpful. So I should block him, re-block him. Well, I always say, you're blocking, as long as you're not blocking him to get a reaction from you.

I'm not, no, I don't want that. But if, yeah, I hope that you are done with this guy. I hope that you've decided you don't really need him to explain himself. The answer to all your questions is he's a jerk. Right. And him realizing that two years from now and saying maybe two years from now

you get a random email saying, hey, I really hate how I treated you when you redated. That's the best you're gonna get. And if that happens, great. But when it does two years from now, you won't give a fuck. Yeah, and I don't expect that. I don't need that. So yeah, block him.

And then listen, you're gonna have moments where his comments still hurt and that it is okay. You just have to remind yourself to not let it, to not go down the rabbit hole. You just say, yeah, that's, that's a him problem. It's not worth it. It's not worth it. You look great. I'm proud of you.

You're crushing life. There's plenty of people out there who are going to appreciate and love and find what you're doing to be a very attractive thing. I think you just got to find more successful men. Yeah. Oh, yeah. He would be... I don't even know if he felt like I was on here. He said he thought I listened to us. Well, I don't really care what he thinks, but when you get back out there and dating, you know, what, you know, what your partner is doing for a living and their passion for what they're doing

is is it should be something that you are always considering. You know, yeah, I appreciate that. Because, yeah, I didn't. The lovable, funny guy who doesn't know what he wants to do with his life is like who makes you feel good, you know, in the first couple dates because he's just a funny, lovable guy who's just like, yeah, you know, and like, well, I'm career oriented. I could be the breadwinner. Yeah, that may be true. But that fun, lovable, funny guy who doesn't know what he wants to do with his life and kind of, you know, complains about his job, that is a recipe for disaster for someone like yourself who likes to work, who is focused on their career, who loves what they do, is inspired by the work that you're putting into your career.

If they don't have their shit figured out, unfortunately, for someone like yourself, that's going to create conflict in a relationship. So if nothing else you learn that at a very early age. Yeah, no that's good to know because I wouldn't go into something thinking like that. I don't know, I just don't live like that, like resenting people who are more successful. That's because you're a winner, you're not a loser. because you are focused at what you have. You do have the benefit of knowing what you want and you are inspired by that. So you just have a different approach.

The reason why you're attracted to success because you're successful, you're not intimidated by success, when you see successful people, I imagine that you ask them questions, that you're curious. I am, I'm like, I can learn from you. You're like, how did you do what you did? You're not like jealous of them.

You don't, you know, there's a lot, and when people start, and when you see other people have success, pay attention to how other people respond to that success. Are those people cutting them down? Are they making excuses for the success or are they complimenting them? Are they being like, that's really cool what they did.

I wonder how they did that. Did they become curious or did they become critical? And the ones who are critical of other people's success, pay attention to that, because they're gonna be critical of you too. Yeah, I know that is, yeah. That's like really good to know. And the reason you're not is because

you're not threatened by other people's success because you know you're willing to do the work. You know? I love to do that. Yeah. And that is something, if nothing else, you learn that. And that is going to, as someone like yourself with your personality is a very important lesson.

Yeah, no, and like I was oblivious to that. So that's, yeah, that's major. Yeah, all right. Well, I'm glad we got to that big takeaway. All right. Yeah, thank you. All right, let me go to class. Thank you guys so much.

Keep crushing life. Thanks, I'll do my best. Take care. This episode is brought Thank you guys so much. Keep crushing life. Thanks, you're the best. All right, take care. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Life can be stressful, having a kid, not having your honeymoon. There's nothing better than prioritizing your mental health.

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It's going well. I'm Sophie, I'm 27 years old and I feel like I am in a love triangle with my boyfriend's mom. Okay, tell us more. All right, so just from the beginning, me and my boyfriend, we started dating in 2022. We both worked at the same place in TV news

and so we really hit it off. And then kind of mid 2022, he said that his mom wanted to meet me. And so he was moving out of one apartment going to the next. And so then I was like, well, I can help you move. And then his mom was going to be there as well. So I was like, fine, we'll just meet doing that. I thought it was going to be no big deal at all. And I should say like he is a black man. And so I thought 2024 the way be no big deal at all. And I should say like, he is a black man.

And so I thought 2024, the way he was talking as well, it wouldn't really be an issue. But I met her for the first time. And the first thing she says is, sorry, we're meeting under these circumstances. And it's very like holding kind of shut off. What were the circumstances? And like just moving him into a new apartment.

And so then I was like, oh, like this is fine with me. Like, it's so nice to meet you. He's taught a lot about you. I'm excited to meet the family and my family, they're all loud and all over the place and stuff. So they're very loud to him and like make yourself a, all that. I was kind of caught off guard just the way she treated me

a little bit and so then I went back to his mom's house with him because we had to spend the night with her and she told me she was like you can just stay in the back bedroom and I was like okay that's fine like you want me to sleep there that's fine and then she didn't say anything else like he went onto bed she went onto bed and that was it. That was our whole interaction for the two days. And so I thought it was going to get better as she got to know me, but it hasn't. It's gotten worse. I jotted down just a few things I wouldn't forget, but she has like, I've heard her yelling on the phone to my boyfriend about how I've

taken her son and all this stuff. And he was already like, he's an adult. He's a grown man. How old is he? Moved out, had a full-time job before he even met me. And so no circumstance, like nothing has changed since we started dating other than he has a girlfriend. Well, how old is he? But he's still goes, he's 25. Okay.

And so he still goes home to visit and everything. And so she, basically I was visit and everything. And so she basically I was talking with some of the family members, his other family, like his dad, his step mom, sister, everybody else has been super, super sweet and welcoming to me. And it's literally just his mom, but he's the closest to his mom. And so it's like, I really want us to get along. But his other family members, they're like, well, I'm surprised he's even in a relationship because it was a running joke in our family,

but not really a joke that he would never even have a girlfriend or ever get married because of her. She's really protective. She's really jealous. Have you talked? It's a her thing. Have you talked with your boyfriend about these comments the other family members make?

I have. And? And so he has tried to talk with his mom. And his mom, of course, says, like, she has no reason to text me. We're almost two years into dating now. Has no reason to text me, has no reason to check in with me. It will just be random at this point that she doesn't have an issue. And he was like, mom, you clearly I don't like I'm not accusing you of having an issue. But these are actual like,

these are real concerns. And she'll like yell on the phone, like not to put all of his eggs in one basket with me. She doesn't think it's gonna last like I'm gonna hurt him. And so that I even brought up I was like, is it a race thing? Is it because like I'm white and she's made comments thinking that I'm very white privileged And so he's like I don't want to think my mom's racist But we do need to have those hard conversations and of course she denies that but then based off what you're telling me You know and I don't know what it's like to be in their shoes, but his family, like before this, you told me how there was this running joke between him and

his family that the only woman he's going to have in his life is his mom and yada, yada, yada, and all those things, right? You know, right. I'm aware of a lot of white families and a lot of white sons who have very codependent relations with their mom. The Jewish community is famous for that as well. I mean, a lot of communities are. I think this is across every religion and every race and sexual orientation or whatever,

is that a lot of times the relationship between a mom and a son can be a little toxic and a little unhealthy, right? And I get where your question comes from because you're just grasping at straws here, just trying to figure out like, oh my God, like why does this woman hate me so much? And so without knowing that much, the information you're telling me is that this has to do with his relationship with his mom and has nothing to do with you. You know, so it has nothing to do with what you believe in or what you look like or anything.

This is everything to do with his relationship with his mom and that history, and I don't know their history, you know. I do know based on what you told me that his mom got divorced from his biological father. His father got remarried. Sounds like they're in a somewhat healthy relationship, you know, maybe some healthy boundaries. Is his mom dating? She's married. So they don't live under the same roof, but they have a child together and they're still married. And so his stepmom, my boyfriend's stepmom, actually, she was asking how our

relationship was and stuff like that. And then I got to know her more, I did feel comfortable. I was like, I just like kind of had a question just kind of navigating his mom and a relationship like that, since you also know her. And she was like, oh, for some reason, like, she's jealous of me, and what I have with their biological father. And this has been 20 years. She's like, it's not a you thing, but it is a conversation like you and your boyfriend need to have. And a couple comments that caught me off guard was I was talking with my boyfriend about his little brother coming over to visit us and hanging out.

And then my boyfriend was like, well, I don't think my mom would be okay with that. I'm already living with you. I don't think she wants another son to come into a white family's picture. And so then I was like, if we're gonna like, this is very hard to navigate. And then I think we were having a really, really deep conversation. I think it was just last week. So recently I was talking to him just about some of the concerns and I was like, I feel like now that I like met your biological father and your stepmom, it's kind of made me fall in love with you even more. And he was like, why? And I was talking to him just about some of the concerns and I was like, I feel like now that I like met your biological father and your stepmoms kind of made me fall in love with you even more. And he was like, why? And I was like, well, it's kind of like a safe place. Like I know I have somebody in your family to go to other than just like

your sister and my family. And so I was like, I really enjoy meeting them. And so we were kind of like throwing it all out on the table. And so last year I was involved in a sexual assault incident. And it was a night that my boyfriend went home for his birthday. And then I was on my night side shift. It was still happening while I was on the clock. So then the next morning,

cause it was, I was held all night. So then the next morning I was talking to my boyfriend about it. And then some boyfriend recently told me, he was like, well, during that conversation when I was at home night. So then the next morning I was talking to my boyfriend about it. And then some boyfriend recently told me he was like, well, during that conversation, when I was at home with my mom, she was like, oh, of course this would happen. Of course you would do this on the first night you're home. So it distracts you from me having you off to myself. Do what? What is she accusing you of doing?

Just talking to him and let him know like this happened. So communicating to the boyfriend that you were a victim of SA Yeah, okay. Well, I'm sorry you had a deal with that And so that was kind of like... This is like there's a there's a through line here Is that again she is willing to use anything against you it has nothing to do with you You've even heard this through other people who've had an interaction who have nothing to do with you. You've even heard this through

other people who have a deeper history with you. And so this mom is hell-bent at controlling her son's relationships. And he's even told her, he's like, the way you're acting towards my girlfriend, like there's gonna be clear bound, like this isn't helping you. It's not going to make me leave her. It's going to make me draw farther away from you. Good for him for saying that. And so, and he's like really stood his ground because in the beginning of the relationship, he was kind of like, well, I don't know, like this is going to go far enough. So he was completely like 100% mama's boy. But now he is like, I am completely committed to you. I don't want you to go anywhere. So I'll stand my ground with her. And so she just keeps bringing

up like the sexual assault thing that it doesn't make sense to her if he goes with me to a court date or anything like that, that will bring his attention more on me. And so it's just weird things. And like he, I think he talked to her, I think it was yesterday, he had like a very serious conversation, because it just seems like it's getting worse and worse. So he had a really like deep conversation with her about it. And he was like, you've had her number for two years, you know nothing about her, you don't know anything about her life, what she's been through. You haven't even cared to pick up the phone, and just say like, hey, thinking about you, hope your week goes well, anything like that. And she's like,

because it's just going to be random. I don't want to text when it's just going to be random. And he's like, everybody else has done it. You can't keep making these excuses. Sure. And she just keeps, and so then she's just like, well, I like her style. I know that about her. And it's like, I like a lot of people's style that I have no clue who they are. Like that doesn't mean anything. So I am in therapy and it was something that I brought up to my therapist about how to navigate it. And she's like, you have so much trauma and other stuff you're going through with like grief of a job over my butt off for and friendships. And then this whole thing that I'm still going to court for. She's like, we're going to put his mom on

a back burner for a little bit. But he keeps saying, he feels like he's in the middle and he doesn't, we don't really know how to navigate it. It's up, he's just like, it's up to her. She just needs to prove herself. And I feel like he's gonna be completely destroyed if she never does anything to make steps with me. And I'm afraid it could like.

What have you said to him about that? I've told him, I was like, I don't want it to be like, you're in the middle of us, and it's, I'm pulling you away from your mom, or your mom's pulling me away from the Earth. Like, he said she said stuff, like a weird. Have you ever asked him to not talk to his mom? Have you ever asked him to... have you ever tried to come in between him and his mom? No, the only thing they

were brought up, everybody is still in the religion that he was in, but since he has stepped out of that religion and so he's not really a part of it, he's holding on to his past because that's what made him him, but he's not really a part of it. He's holding on to his past because that's what made him him. But he's not active in it anymore. And so I think that's where a little bit of her like, you changed my son, I can't get him back. That type of thing. And it's almost like that kind of.

But we all know that you didn't. And most importantly, it sounds like your boyfriend knows. Right. And then I guess my question, like what were you hoping that we could help you out with I think Navigating the situation because with my boyfriend with him saying he feels like he's in the middle of this I don't want him to feel like he's in the middle and I want him to have you asked him what he means by that Yeah, he just says that he wants our worlds to collide and he's like

I don't know why and what have you said to him in response to that and I told I was like I would love our world to collide too. I want nothing more than like a future mother-in-law for me to do stuff with. If it's just hanging out, go grabbing coffee. And I said, but I can't make her talk to me. I can't make her do anything. And what does he say?

Like I'm here. And he's like, I feel like you may just owe her a conversation or you need to come around more. Come around, how can to come around more. How can you come around more on what? And that's what I tell him. I was like, well, I don't feel like visiting or coming around when I've completely been told. Like when you come, stay in the back room or like I actually didn't want to meet you last year. It was too soon.

And I was like, I just don't feel like meeting her right now. And so I don't know if it's kind of like an ego thing. I just need to push aside. So that's the one. Because like, OK, so that's the one note I have for you. Because honestly, a lot of what you're talking about, it seems like this could be worse, because in these all these situations, when you have this kind of unhealthy relationship between

a parent and a child that you're kind of caught up in. As you've realized, you're kind of helpless because it really has nothing to do with you. You could be literally anyone. Like your boyfriend's straight, he dates women, so it could be literally any woman. If your boyfriend was gay, he would have the same problem with his boyfriend.

Doesn't matter the color of his skin. This has everything to do with his mom having very little control in her life, you know, and her life not working out in a way that she probably hoped. And when it comes to being a parent, as we talk about a lot on this show, like the definition of being a parent

is it kind of having total control over your child's life, you know? It's like their responsibility, you get to raise them and it's very rewarding and all those things. But for some people, they unfortunately like lean into that power and control they have over their kids because they feel very powerless in other aspects of their life. Even if they have the best intentions, they kind of lose sight on what it is to be a parent. And so you really have to remember, there is literally nothing, this is not about you.

It is not a reflection of you or anything you've done or who you are or your past or who your family is, the color of your skin, your religious beliefs. From what I can tell, this woman was going to have a problem with literally anyone. And then she was going to figure out the more she learned about whoever her son was going to date, because everyone has their shit, everyone has a family, everyone comes from somewhere, and as soon as she figure out where her values don't align with

yours or vice versa, she was going to weaponize that against you. It really doesn't matter what it was. And so it's just really important for you to know that. And once you know that, that's where you can, the only thing you can try to do is to not do that last part, to not do things out of spite or stubbornness, you know, to not give her what she wants. What she wants, she wants there to be confrontation between the two of you.

She wants it to be adversarial. She wants to accuse you of something and she wants you to react. She wants to create a love triangle between you two, right? She wants her son to feel like he has to pick between you and her. And she wants her son to make him feel like it's you making him choose, right?

So you have to do whatever you can to not take the bait. Right? So the only thing, and it sounds like your boyfriend, which it sounds good for you, is that for the most part, he's kind of saying a lot of the right things. Like he's realizing that this is his mom. He's realizing it's not you. So you just have to not give her, you know, again, you have to not take the bait. And the bait is saying things like, well, I just don't want to meet her right now, because that's what his mom would say, you know. The bait is saying things like, well, I just don't wanna meet her right now. Cause that's what his mom would say.

You know, the bait is getting so frustrated with how she's handling it that you fight fire with fire. You can't fight fire with fire with this person. Cause that's what she wants. Between you and him, all you can say to him is, babe, I love you. And obviously, you know, when it comes to the things that you are appreciative about the relationship,

to always remind him, I love, you know appreciative about the relationship, to always remind him. Obviously your relationship with your mom is important and I love that you love your mom but obviously, like you said, I want to have a relationship with your mom and I'll do whatever I can because he can't pick his mom. So there's nothing he can do about that. So all you can do is be just as empathetic and understanding about his mom. You're going to have to put up with her bullshit, in a sense. But you know what I'm saying?

To a degree, and I guess I wanna articulate that, but putting up with her bullshit is just not taking the bait. Because you can still set a boundary and stand your ground with him about how his mom treats you, and you can still expect your boyfriend to, at the appropriate time, to stand up for you in his relationship.

Because it comes down to him and how he handles and how he stands up for his mom. You know? But you never wanna give him the bait. You know, you just say, I love you and I hope that I will do whatever I can to have a relationship with your mom. I hope she gives me the chance

and I will give her almost unlimited chances to allow me to have a relationship with her because I love you. And just know that whenever your mom is willing to come around, I'll be there to do my part to try to have the best relationship I can with your mom, but I can only do so much. I can't make her like me. I can't make her want to hang out with me. I can't make her reach out.

If you want me to reach out, I will. Tell me to reach out to your mom, but just, you know, up until this point, it hasn't gone very well. But whatever you want me to do, I'll do. I'll do it because I love you. But at the end of the day, your boyfriend needs to understand. And what you can say to him is, I can't fix this relationship with your mom. And like the reality is when it comes to the relationship with his mom, it's just like, you know, it's like someone dealing in a situation with a fuck boy. His mom is not going to change until she has to and she's not gonna have to change until your boyfriend makes her So it's not you making him pick you're never gonna make him pick but it comes down to like him realizing that Like your mom's never gonna respect your decisions until you make her respect your decisions

And that is not allowing her to think that she can manipulate and say some of these hurtful things and make you feel bad about your choices. That's what it comes down to. And then when he does stand up to his mom, be appreciative, I'm proud of you. I'm sorry that you have to deal with this. I'm sorry you have to deal with your mom making you feel bad

about these choices and I'm really sorry that like, I hate that I'm a part of it. It's not you, it has nothing to do with you, but you can still, you know what I'm saying? You can still try to, because it must be very frustrating for him, right? He must be very frustrated. He doesn't wanna disappoint his mom,

but he knows what his mom is doing is wrong. And it's a very challenging position he is in. So the more you can do to just be that supportive person, as long as he's not willing to throw you under the bus. You know, does that make sense? Yeah. And so then I have another question. So his sister is getting married in a couple of months and hopefully we're off on, hopefully we're on better terms than we are right now, me and my boyfriend's mom. But for an example, like at his sister's baby shower a couple

months ago, me and my boyfriend, we were dancing on the dance floor and everything. There was a DJ and it was really, really fun. And so we're both big dancers. So we were like the last ones standing out there dancing. And then like she saw that and went and like literally got in the middle of us dancing. So then I just kind of acted like I was high, I was burnt out, I was worn out, I was just going to go sit down and get some water. And so I just let it go and just sat down at a chair and I'm kind of like afraid, like it was very awkward. And I'm kind of afraid like what if, like a wedding in front of more people?

Kind of what would be the appropriate and mature response for me to handle this? When it's like, I wanna dance with my boyfriend, but not with his mom too. I mean, unfortunately, probably the best response is to not react, especially in public settings. Again, you just can't fight fire with fire. My solution is a very frustrating one,

you know what I'm saying? Because I'm telling you to basically always take the high road, to turn the other cheek, to bite your upper lip type of thing, and then talk to your boyfriend in private, offline, not at these events, to never make a scene. His mom makes a scene, you know what I'm saying? So fighting fire with fire would be to, at this wedding or whatever, to like pull, like start yelling at him to

be like, why are you letting your mom do this? This is like, you know, emasculate him. And like, I can't believe you're, you're, you're letting your mom, you know, that would be the worst thing you could do. Cause he's already dealing with that from his mom, you know? So show him through your actions of how, you know, because I promise the more, the less you act like his mom, the more he's going to appreciate. The last thing he wants is another controlling woman in his life who makes him feel like he's not making good choices for himself. So, you know, you can say, hey, that, you know, obviously that was upsetting and see what he says, but don't make him feel like it's his fault. And he didn't, whatever his mom's going through,

he didn't create, you know, he wasn't leaving alive when his mom experienced whatever childhood trauma that she experienced that's causing her to act the way she did today. Right. So, you know, hey, I'm really sorry that happened, you know? And then hopefully he says, yeah, well, I'm sorry that happened to you.

And then you can say, yeah, it's frustrating. I know we're both, you got to share in his frustration. Because you do, right? It sucks that we have to deal with this, but I'm glad we have each other. And every time you can appreciate something about what he does to protect your relationship with him, show that appreciation.

In that particular instance, when you guys get home and you're not around other people, you can say, you know, because he's gonna be expecting you to be really pissed about your, his mom doing that. And again, you have every right to be pissed. But you saying, hey, I'm really sorry that you had to deal with that. Because again, imagine how he must feel.

That's fucking embarrassing. I couldn't imagine my mom doing that in public. That's fucking crazy, you know? Yeah. And so the last thing he wants is his girlfriend yelling about him about how his mom acted. And a lot of people in your shoes would act that way.

They would yell at him and be like, how the f- you know, blah, blah, blah. But instead you're just like, hey, I'm sorry that happened. And then that will give him an opportunity to say, well, yeah, well, I'm sorry you had to deal with that too. And then you could say, listen, we can't choose our parents, but I just, I just want to say, I am grateful for you being willing to stand up to your mom. I just want you to know I will never make you choose between me and your mom.

But I do appreciate you protecting our relationship and you standing up for me. But I'm never going to ask you not to have a relationship with your mom. I'm never going to ask you not to talk to her. I'm never going to come between you as long as you're willing to defend our relationship to her. And as long as he're willing to defend our relationship to her. And as long as he's willing to do that, you have no reason to come in between him. And you'll never do what his mom's doing.

And the more you show that you're not his mom in that way, I feel like as long as he's, you know, one or two things are gonna happen. Either he's gonna choose his mom or he's gonna appreciate that you're not his mom. And if he chooses his mom, then you kind of have his answer. Then there's kind of no hope for him. You know what I'm saying?

Like if all you are is understanding and through your actions, you're always willing to like, all right, if you want me to do this, like if he comes to say, can you just call me mom? Can you just do that? Instead of saying, well, she wouldn't do that to me or she, you know, blah, blah, blah, instead of letting your pride and frustrations get the best of you, being willing't do that to me, or she, you know, blah, blah, blah, instead of letting your pride

and frustrations get the best of you, being willing to do those things so that at any point, he can never look at you and be like, you're just, you know, you did this. You're giving your boyfriend no reason to get mad at you and every reason to be frustrated at his mom. And if he is capable of standing up to his mom, he will. And if he's not, you need to know that sooner than later.

Right, yeah, that makes sense. But your therapist is right. You have so much going on. Like, there's nothing you can do to control this woman. You can't change this woman. All you can do is make sure that you and your boyfriend continue to be on the same page and not give his mom any ammunition

for her to say, see, I told you so. She's trying to tear us apart. And you're like, no, I'm not. I mean, what do you want? We don't come over for potluck. You want to sleep over? You're willing to take the punches from his mom, so to speak. Because it never gives him... You're going to show through actions that you're never willing to come in between his mom, because we can't choose our parents. Right. Like he's mentioned before, he's like, she just says that in order for her

to be okay with us together, she just needs proof. And I'm like, what proof does she need? Like, what proof does she need? I was like, I can't do anything more than- Well, how does your boyfriend say that? Does your boyfriend agree with her? No, so he says all the proof she needs is how happy I am with you.

There you go I think that's what's frustrating her and then you say to him Well, I just want to say thank you because I know how difficult it can be to have a very controlling parent So it really makes me feel good that you are willing to fight for our relationship and and thank you and just so, you know I will always go out of my way, no matter what your mom says or does, I will always try to have a relationship with your mom. And I promise you that I, I will never make you choose between you and your mom. If your mom makes you choose between me and her, I will be always appreciative of

you, of, of, of you choosing me and you choosing us, but I will never make you do that. And, and then you follow through with your actions. And the best we can hope for is your boyfriend realizing what he has with you, being appreciative of, and finally saying, mom, I'm sorry you're disappointed. I don't care what you think about her. I love her.

She's a good person. And you need to start treating my girlfriend and maybe future wife or fiance or however your relationship advances, you need to treat her with respect. And if you can't, mom, then that's going to affect our relationship. And mom, she is not making me have this decision. This is coming from me. And like the moment you respect my decisions, we can have a healthier relationship. And someday, hopefully he says that to his mom.

But as long as he is willing to show you with his actions that he's willing to protect you and your relationship and stand up to anyone, including his mom, you will never make him choose his mom. You will always put up with her bullshit as long as he's willing to stand up for you. Yeah, that makes complete sense. Is that helpful? Yeah, that is helpful because now I just

know how to like kind of navigate it a little bit more and be there for him. Yeah. Because he is exhausted and burnt out and frustrated. And that's the thing because like you don't play into it. You're not in a love triangle. So get that narrative out of your head. What you are is dealing with a very kind of controlling parent who only can feel validated and powerful through controlling her son. And be thankful that your son, for the most part, you know, handles a lot better than other people do. Because a lot of people aren't willing to say

some of the things he's been already saying to you and to his mom. Yeah. So as long as you don't fight fire with fire, and as long as you don't fight fire with fire and as long as you don't say, when your boyfriend says, hey, I know my mom's being X, Y, or Z, but could you do this?

You say, for sure, I'm happy to do it. I don't know if it's gonna go the way you hope, but I'm more than happy to do it. And I'm more than happy to go out of your way because I want you to feel like I'm there to help you. Because I know you're there to help me. That makes sense, and I think that's where my ego, I need to push that aside,

because it's so much like, if she doesn't respect me, why should I do this? Yeah, well, you know, this is right up there that says do you want to be right or do you want to be happy, you know? And so you have the right to be mad at her. You have the right to say, you know what, if you're not gonna treat me with respect,

why should I treat you with respect? That is your right. But it might not get you to be happy, because what, if you're not gonna treat me with respect, why should I treat you with respect? That is your right. But it might not get you to be happy, because what you want is a happy relationship with your partner, and honestly, this woman has nothing really to do with that. And as long as he chooses you, you have a chance to be happy with your partner.

Mm-hmm. All right, well thank you so, so much. This helped a lot. I'm really sorry you are having to go through it, especially when it comes to the essay stuff, because obviously that must, the victim blaming on her end, despite, you know, we can think,

we can make sense of why she's doing what she's doing, but it obviously is still very hurtful to have someone weaponize that against you. Yeah, and it's like going through that is a nightmare in itself, when I have my friend's mom even say things like that. It's like, come on. Yeah, no, it's terrible, it's terrible. And so it must make it even more difficult That is a nightmare in itself when I have my boyfriend's mom even say things like this. Yeah, no, it's terrible. It's terrible.

And so it must make it even more difficult for you to take the high road. But this is not a you versus her. This is all about you trying to protect the relationship you have with your boyfriend. And it sounds like despite all these issues, it sounds like you have a pretty good thing with him. And it sounds like, you know, I've heard a lot of worse situations with sons and their moms, and it sounds like he understands he might need to make some tough decisions with his mom and set some boundaries. And so there's a lot of potential here and I'm optimistic for you. Yeah, he's great, especially just listening, because I probably do vent to him too much

about my thoughts about her sometimes when I hear things she says. But he's really great at, well, let me just try to do what I can since I am her son. So yeah, the best thing you can do is find other people to vent about his mom to other than him. And just as far as he concerned, you're like, I'm really sorry you have to deal with this. And I promise you, if he's the guy we think he is, when you're like, hey man, I'm sorry your mom does this

to you, he will be like, well I'm sorry she does it to you and you guys can bond over being frustrated with his mom rather than making it adversarial. Rather than him being like, well why does your mom fucking do this? He doesn't have an answer to this. He wishes he could change his mom. I don't know what it's like to have a parent like that,

but I imagine it must be very defeating because you can't pick your parents and you can't sit there and give them therapy, you know? Like you're their kid. And it's a very helpless feeling trying to deal with parents who use their kids to make them feel better about themselves. And so your boyfriend's in a very helpless situation.

So the best thing you can do is empathize with him and then take your frustrations and find more productive ways to express them. Yeah, that makes sense. Thank you guys so, so much. I appreciate it. All right, take care. Well, please keep us posted how this goes.

We have a lot of people listening who have problems with in-laws. So, you know, if this goes, you know, whether you take our advice or not, we'd love to see how it plays out. And maybe there's something you'll learn from this experience that you can share with our audience in the future.

Absolutely, I'll let you know how the wedding dancing goes at sister's wedding. Hopefully his mom doesn't come in between. Well, expect the worst and hope for the best. That's all you can do. And again, use this as an opportunity to bond with your boyfriend. Without trying to talk shit about his mom.

Let him talk shit and you're just like, yeah, well, we'll see what happens. But just, I think one thing you do wanna say at some point is to say, you know, when you get off the call with us, sometime this week, you just say, hey, can I just say, you know, thanks for always standing up for us

when it comes to your mom. And I'm sorry if I've ever made you feel like you have to choose between us. You know, yeah, I'm frustrated with the way your mom handles it, but I know that's not your fault. And just know that you have my back. You can count on me to do anything I can to help have a relationship with your mom.

And I will always take the high road, and I'll never make you feel like you have to choose between us. And that's my promise to you. As long as you are always willing to protect us and stand up to me, I will do that. Stand up for me, rather. And I think that'll go a long way.

Definitely, I will do that. Thank you. All right, well take care. Thanks. All right, bye guys. Bye guys. Listen, we love our dogs. And we even love Steve, even though he's a bit of a terror.

They always say your first child's gonna be well behaved and if that's the case, your second child is gonna be a maniac and Steve is a maniac. Unfortunately, he eats everything. So he swallowed an entire shirt once and thankfully he puked it back up but that immediately, we thought to ourselves, we need to get some pen insurance

because at some point, Steve might eat something that might require surgery and that could cost thousands and thousands of dollars. And that's why today's episode is sponsored by the ASPCA Health Insurance Program. It's always smart to hope for the best, but prepare for the worst. The ASPCA Pet Health Insurance Program

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Fire Insurance Company and produced by PTZ Insurance Agency Limited. The ASPCA is not an insurance and it is not engaged in the business of insurance. What happens when 20 extremely athletic Canadians who thrive on competition and won't settle for less than number one find themselves on a team? Taking on jaw, dropping obstacles all across Canada is one thing. Working together on a team with some pretty big personalities is another. It's a new season of Canada's Ultimate Challenge, and sparks are gonna fly. New episode Sundays, watch free on CBC Gem. How's it going?

I am Chad, I'm 34, and I have a guy that is obsessed with me, but I keep blowing him off. Okay. What can we help you with? What's the problem? Because like, listen, you know, it sucks to be awesome and desirable, but you don't have to like everyone who likes you.

So in terms of like blowing him off, are you feeling guilty? Like what is the problem other than being so hot that you have guys coming for you? Right. Yeah, it's, I think, because I haven't really dated like a lot in like the last, oh my God, like 10 years.

The last like real serious relationship that I had, he cheated and ended up giving me HIV. And I only found out because I went to just randomly get tested, was found out, confronted the guy and he was like, oh yeah, I had known for quite some time, I was going to tell you just a know how type of thing. So that's like really kind of put a damper on trust, I feel. And the guy that texts me a lot and stuff, he knows all of this. It didn't scare him away. Thank God. But it's like I it's like I'm always trying to figure out an exit plan, if that makes sense, to avoid, you know, if anything does or to happen, I'm the one to kind of cut it

off before, if that makes sense. Yeah, that makes sense. Well, first of all, I'm very sorry that happened to you. That must have been a very traumatic experience. Yes, thank you. How long ago were you diagnosed? When I was 22. How old are you again? 34.

Okay, so you've had a while to process this, but it's been something you've been dealing with for a long time. Right. So it almost sounds like, we should probably change his headline at the end of the call. To me, it sounds like your real problem is

your fear of being accepted now that you have this diagnosis. And he does check off a lot of the boxes that I would look for in a partner and stuff. He is very intelligent. He is always asking me out to do things and stuff. He is very intelligent. He is always asking me out to like do things and stuff and I will like I'll respond but like not give like a definite like date to do something because we've only really been on one date. And which was really nice, but like I lied and said I had to

pick up my sister from the airport to like kind of end it a lot earlier than it was supposed to be. And he just keeps like, he keeps trying, he keeps trying and I do appreciate it. I'm just trying to find out like why I'm not, I guess, accepting of a lot of like his very honest. Are you attracted to him? I am.

Do you like him? I do. He's like, because he's a lot of things, like, like I said, he's very intelligent. Like, he will send me all these like books and stuff that he's reading and wants me to read them. And he wants to know a lot about like, me and like, he's interested and getting to know me like, you know, deeply, which I appreciate. It's just there's I feel like there's just this barrier of me trying to break through, I guess, past trauma

and thinking that while things, and he's really great, but it's like I'm fearing the possibility of something happening, I don't know. Yeah, I mean, I literally can only imagine. So have you had any serious relationships between now and the past? the possibility of something happening, I don't know. Yeah, I mean, I literally can only imagine. So have you had any serious relationships between now and when you found out that you were HIV positive? I've had one, but that was years, years, years ago,

but we were just kinda talking, and then that kinda fizzled out, but I hadn't been like in a relationship relationship since then. Have you been in therapy? Have you been to therapy? I am. You are? Okay. Do you talk with your therapist about that very traumatic experience about being... it's one thing to be cheated on that's traumatic in itself but then to have that cost you so much you know. Thankfully there's been so much obviously advancements

when it comes to treating HIV and my understanding it's no longer a death sentence, which is amazing. Undetectable, yeah. So that's awesome, but nevertheless, that is a very traumatic thing. Herpes never killed you, but when people contracted herpes through sex, especially when they get cheated

on, it feels like a death sentence to some people. Because it may not actually kill you, but as you know, now it's like no matter what, every person you're ever gonna date for the rest of your life, you're gonna have to have a very difficult conversation with them. I'm HIV positive, or I have herpes, you know, and things like that for people who are, and to be contracted through someone, you know,

not because you made a poor, you know, not because you didn't practice safe sex or you were, you know, you were reckless with some of your decisions. And even then, like, you know, it's not like anyone's deserving of catching something, but when you can track something because someone misled you or lied to you,

and there was nothing you can do other than, your only defense to not getting HIV back then, I'm guessing in your subconscious brain, was to not trust your partner. Like that's the, in that moment, the only thing you could have done when your partner either did or didn't tell you, I don't know if he was guilty by admission or he lied about not having it,

but either way, you chose to trust that man. And you chose to engage in sex with this man, a person who was HIV positive, who knew they were HIV positive and didn't tell you about it. And so then after you found out, you kept thinking, wow, if all I did was not trust them, I wouldn't have had that. So you have to deal with that thought.

For the past, your only protection was to not trust. And so of course you have trust issues, right? Because in your brain, like one plus one equals two, it was like, well, all I could do is, that was my only defense. So like when people contract these things, because people lie to them, I can understand why it really fucks them up.

Right, yeah. And even speaking with my therapist, he told me that I need to not look at myself as the person that deserve for this to happen to, that it's not my fault, because through all of the years, I always carried that it was my fault that I ended up with this and that I was the one to blame.

So I never like really, that I was the one to blame. So I never like really, while I was like super upset, I took on a lot of the blame and guilt for it. And so that's like my trust and, you know, and people has been very limited. And it was a good, it was like a light bulb. And I was like, I have put a lot of blame on myself and trying to kind of disassociate myself from that. It's definitely going to

take some work, but it's like, I don't want to pass up at the same time a great opportunity because of my, I I guess current mindset. Yeah, yeah well it's good that you're working on it with your therapist you know they're the expert but yeah and that makes a lot of sense you know and even like you but you know again blaming yourself is it's so helpless to have something happen to you that you had no control over and I got to, like you blame yourself in some ways, you trying to take your power back, you know? Yeah.

This might be a bad analogy because I'm not trying to compare a heartbreak with being diagnosed with HIV positive, or you know, that trauma. But like, I just go back to like one of my really hard breakups, my girlfriend broke up with me and in the reality is she just liked another guy. We were young, you know, we were each other's first boyfriend and girlfriend. So like,

you know, she broke up with me and she didn't really tell me there's another guy, but that was the truth. But instead of just like being sad and hurt and accepting that my girlfriend at the time didn't want to be with anymore, I was just like, well, how can I blame myself? How can I figure out something I did wrong in this relationship so that I could fix the problem? And that was a way of trying to have some sort of control over my heartbreak.

And so you being like, well, yeah, this is, I could have done this, I could have done that, I could have done this, again, is like, you trying to figure out how you can protect yourself in the future by taking control of the choices you wish you would have made in the past. Right. You know. So, right. You know, this is all about understanding it, but how are we gonna go about giving yourself a chance to find love? I definitely want to, I want to give myself more credit, if that makes sense,

and just realize that through the traumatic experience that I did have that I'm not going, I shouldn't remain in the mode of like, what was me? Because even like my best friends and stuff, I've talked to them at Infinitum about this, and they agree that while the experience was traumatic, that I have to figure out when to, you know, let it go in that sense.

And I feel as though with this guy that I need to just, like, step outside of myself and realize that this is somebody who through me blowing him off, I can't even tell you how many times, and he continues to text me, if not every day, almost every day. Can I ask you a question? Yeah. Have you sat him down, man to man, adult to adult,

to just say, listen, I've told you about my diagnosis. Does he know that you were cheated on and how you were, and how? Yeah. Okay. And have you said to him, listen, I may not surprise you, but I have some trust issues given what happened.

I did. And? I did, I did tell him that. You did, okay. And he was like, I will, he's like, that's okay, I'm patient. I'll wait. Okay, great.

Well, and that's fine if you're comfortable with it, but also you can say, listen, I appreciate your patience, but I need to take things slow because I, you know, and that's the thing, the only thing you can do is try to go at a very slow pace. You know, you got to tip your toes in the water, you know, okay, I dipped my toes in the water, it was cold, but it didn't kill me, so to speak.

All right, now, you know, you go in a little bit more and every guy knows once they get to the waist part You know, there's that whoo, you know that that plunge but you you go in You know, you kind of go in right and then if it's too much you come you you pull out a little bit, right? And so you got to approach your love life a little bit, you know Communicate to them your reluctance your you know, hey, you got some trust issues, I need to go slow. You say the words that this guy's obsessed with you. Okay, well, maybe he's used to, like, you know, winning people over by, like, oh, I'm gonna call you

every day, I'm gonna send all these gifts, I'm gonna do all X, Y, and Z. Well, for someone who has trust issues, sometimes people being over the top and trying too hard can make you feel uncomfortable. It can feel disingenuous, it can feel like too much too soon. So you can say, listen, I really appreciate your patience, but also like I need you to pull back a little bit

on all the things that you're doing. You know, you're not giving him anything, so you're playing a little bit of a game a little bit, so he's probably misreading what your actions, so to speak. So I think you need to try as much as you can to just communicate how you feel. Not play the game, not blow them off, not ghost them, you know.

And just say, hey, you know, you saying, listen, I like you, and I like you a lot more than I have in the past. Isn't you saying I love you, it's not you saying you wanna get married, it's not you committing your life to them. You know, you can say to a past, isn't you saying I love you, it's not you saying you wanna get married, it's not you committing your life to them. You can say to a guy, I like you. It's a little scary to like you,

it makes me feel a little uncomfortable because the last time I really liked someone, I was really hurt. But if you're willing to go slow with me, I'm willing to keep trying, but I'm gonna need your patience. And also, and then you can say, if he puts on too much, he sends you a bunch of gifts,

he's a call, you can say, hey listen, I really appreciate all the things you're doing and I really wanna get to a place for all this generosity, I'm able to like fully appreciate, but like right now, I need you to slow it down, you know? Because being patient with someone is also kind of a willingness to go at their pace. I don't think he realizes, but like all these efforts he's making, isn't him being patient with someone is also kind of a willingness to go at their pace. I don't think he realizes,

but like all these efforts he's making, isn't him being patient, it's him trying to, you know, win you over by being more proactive. And his proactiveness is probably making you feel a little bit more uncomfortable and a little more uneasy. Because like nothing in life is free, you know? People don't give gifts to expect nothing in return. You know, people aren't generous for no reason.

And so, and I'm not saying he's deliberately being disingenuous and he has alternative motives, but like this is how human nature works, right? So my guess is all his generosity subconsciously makes you a little nervous because you're always thinking, what is this gonna cost me? What does he want from me? I don't know if I'm there yet. I don't know if he feels the same way I feel about him. So I'm reluctant to validate his generosity. So you probably

handle it by blowing him off or ignoring him or things like that. Instead, just try to adult, adult, man to man to say, hey, listen, I appreciate it. I really do. I'm just not there yet. So can we slow down? But I do like you and I don't wanna, I wanna explore this and if you're willing to work with me and my trust issues and if you're willing to go slow with me I'm definitely willing to keep trying. I like that, I like that actually. That's really good, solid, honest advice.

And I'll definitely tell that to him because I think that's what I was kind of missing. Like, how do I like tell him without seeming that I don't know? But I like how you phrase that. So I'm definitely going to take that and I'm going to tell him that and see how that goes. I think you just have to, more than anything, I want you to realize that you, saying you like someone, it's okay.

I would imagine you even have a lot of fear around validating anyone's feelings for fear that, like, what is that gonna cost me? What am I gonna have to do? What are they gonna expect from me? I don't know if I'm there yet, you know? I can literally only imagine what that traumatic experience did to you

and how it affects you dating in the future. So I have all the empathy in the world for you, but you are allowed to like people. You are allowed to date and give someone a chance. You are allowed to like this guy and in six months from now, realize he's not your guy. And he might hurt your feelings too. He might decide he doesn't like you,

and that could be a scary thing too. But just work on giving him a little bit of trust and seeing what he does with that trust. You know, like anything else, you just, but you're gonna have to really, you know, you need to be a little bit vulnerable because, and I get it why it's so scary for you to be vulnerable,

because the last time you were vulnerable, something terrible fucking happened. So you're just gonna have to practice giving him a little bit of vulnerability and see what he does with that. And so a little bit of vulnerability in this situation is you just saying, hey listen, can I be honest with you? I do like you.

And honestly, it scares me a little bit because I'm afraid to like someone because of my trust issues. And I really appreciate your willingness to go slow with me. But what can I do to make sure that you feel validated, but at the same time, like go at my pace because I, you know, and I do appreciate all the generous things you're willing to do for me. Know that they're appreciated, but it does, it makes me a little uneasy because again, I'm just, I'm working through this. So you gotta over communicate.

You really have to try to just talk through with these people. And the more you communicate with people that you like, the more you give them an opportunity to show you that they can handle these tough conversations that they can communicate. Because, you know, with something like, with this happening to you, you're going to need to be in a relationship with someone who is a good communicator. You're going to have to be able from time to time to say, hey, time out. I'm feeling triggered.

I'm feeling uneasy. I'm not trying to handle this, is it okay if we talk about this? And you're gonna need someone who says, hey, yeah, listen, it's okay, let's talk about it. Let's sit down, what are you feeling? Let's get it out. You're gonna need someone like that. But you're gonna have to figure out who those people are, you're gonna have to try to communicate.

You're gonna have to try to share your vulnerabilities, you're gonna have to try to share your expectations, a little bit at a time, see how they handle it, you know, and give them an opportunity to say, you know, that's okay, I'm here, let's talk, I'm here to listen, thanks for the feedback, I'll try to adjust, you know, and just see where it goes. I agree with that. You don't have to do everything all at once, you know, you don't have to, you don't have to, you know, when someone says, I like you, I think you're hot,

you're great, I would do anything for you. You don't have to promise the world to them. You don't have to give your heart to these people, you know? And it can be scary to, you know, have someone tell you how strong they feel for you and knowing what happened last time that happened. So. I agree So I agree. I think I think it's also important to like know that vulnerability is a strength.

I know that's like a simple statement, but like if there's any sort of like insecurity with just being vulnerable in general, that that's like your voice is your power, especially with your experience with your voice and your life path. And I think it's an amazing thing that he's accepting you for what you've experienced. And I think you can maybe play into that as a way of like putting more strength into your vulnerability

and feeling more comfortable expressing that. I think that's a good point as well. I agree with that. And your willingness to tell this guy, I mean, clearly you being honest about your HIV is, you know, bare minimum. That is literally the right thing to do you can still be proud of yourself for having the strength to do it you know what I'm

saying because clearly whoever did it the person who did this to you didn't you know and I'm not saying pat yourself on the back for doing the bare minimum but it's still very difficult to sit anyone down and say I'm HIV positive right now and it's always gonna be scary. And even though it's the bare minimum and it's your moral obligation to be honest about that, you can still give yourself credit. And to Justin's point,

you can still recognize your vulnerability. You can still be proud of yourself for having the courage to say this to people. Because the other option is to just, you know, live under a rock, not date at all, because you never want to admit to anyone that this happened to you and you never want to tell anyone you're HIV positive.

So you can just avoid romantic relationships altogether. And that's obviously not sustainable, but I would imagine there's people out there who do make that choice and do kind of self-isolate. And that sucks. So yeah, to Justin's point, yeah, it takes a lot to be vulnerable, it takes a lot to have the courage to tell these people

what happened to you and hope that they accept you. That's very scary, but you should give yourself a lot of credit for that. Thank you, I appreciate that. It's definitely, it's a day-by-day type of thing, and I've now been doing therapy for like seven, eight weeks. So I've been able to- Oh my God, yeah.

You just started? That's, first of all, awesome for going in it, but temper your expectations of what therapy is going to bring overnight. The fact that I actually, I'm actually glad to hear you just started it because that tells me you probably have a lot of progress to make in a short period of time. So keep going, keep talking, keep working through that trauma, keep talking with your therapist about being vulnerable

with men that you date and how to handle feeling triggered. If this man, if you end up dating this guy and this relationship evolves, things are gonna come up you know there you're gonna get triggered you're gonna get scared you know like you might go through a honeymoon phase with this guy and then you know and then all of a sudden things get a little real you get into a normal the normal kind of relationship and all of a sudden you went from feeling like oh my god I'm actually happy with this man to all of a sudden feeling like scared

to be truthful with him, or worried that he might do the same thing. You don't know when you're gonna be triggered. So, you know, working through this with your therapist and knowing that like things might come up is great. You know, so good for you for getting in there and just stick with it, man. And keep working through this stuff.

Thank you, thank you. I appreciate both of y'all's input. It's good to hear, you know, different perspectives and stuff. And so I'm gonna take what y'all said into account and definitely apply that ASAP. Yeah, just talk with them. Sit them down and be like, you know what, maybe ask them out on a date. I could do that. To be like, hey, you can ask them on a date, you get some drinks and you just say, thanks for coming out. And then also I want to say like, I do appreciate everything you've done and say, be vulnerable. This was a lot for me to ask you out. I'm really working through some trust issues as you know, I jumped into

therapy, but like I see a lot of potential in you and I think you're a great person and you've done a lot of things that I'm not even used to. And I wanna acknowledge that and I think you're great and I wanna thank you for doing that. But, and I'm sorry if I've been blowing you off, but again, I do wanna reiterate that like, I just, I am a very slow burn and I, you know,

you acknowledging that you're just injured in the therapy and this is new for you, like you're just setting the expectation with him that like, hey, listen, just, you know, I might not be ready for what you're ready for, you know? But I am working on it and, you know, if you're willing to go at my pace and I'm willing to try, but I just need to, I need to take it slow

because this is all very new for me. I've been kind of closed off to love and relationships for a very long time. So I'm a work in progress. I'll do that. Thank you so much, Nick. I appreciate that. All right.

Well, thanks for the call. Very sorry you had to go through this. And thanks for calling. This is obviously a very challenging situation for you. Please keep us posted if you're willing. We'd love an update on how you're working through this and hopefully this is a step in the right direction for you. Good on you for getting back out there.

You deserve love as much as anyone else and you're certainly capable of finding it. You just have to work through these some of these these past traumas that obviously are very difficult to work through. I agree. Yes I'll definitely keep you all updated. Thank you so much for your for your time and words of advice. I appreciate it. Alright buddy, take care. Alright thanks. Thanks for listening. Don't forget to send those questions at asknick at thevalvehiles.com. See you tomorrow. Bye.