Good afternoon, I have a problem with a black screen when I turn on my computer. When you start the pc, the video card coolers are spinning and the rgb is illuminated, all other components also give signs of life, also I can hear characteristic sound of the start of Windows, that is, everything starts, but there is no image. ( doesn't show bios post. Аbsolute blackness from beginning to end) This happens not only when you completely turn on and turn off the pc, it happens when you exit sleep mode and rebooting. The strangest thing is that this does not always happen, out of 10 attempts to start the pc, about half of the time it starts without problems (the image is displayed). When the image is displayed, it works perfectly, no crashes, overheating, artifacts, noises, etc, in fact, I have it on for months and I restart it only if I need to update the Windows. Actually I've been with this problem for a year and the boiling point was the fact that before the next update I had to restart it a dozen times to display the image. This problem appeared over time, originally I had a ryzen 3700x processor installed, then I replaced it with a 5700x and honestly I don't remember when it appeared, either when I had a 3700x processor or later with a 5700x. Since the problem appears randomly, I probably just replaced the processor and everything started up fine and I didn't pay attention that something could be wrong, this under the condition that the replacement of the processor is to blame.
PC specs:
motherboard - b450 tomahawk max (bios version I think is not important, because I tried absolutely all bios versions compatible with my CPU)
processor - ryzen 5700x (no integrated card)
Video card - palit rtx 2070 super jetstream (there is a bios switch on it, tried switching them, it doesn't help either)
power supply - be quiet! PURE POWER 11-CM 700W Gold
RAM - G.Skill tridentz neo f4-3600c18d-32gtzn (two 16gb cards) (tried turning off xmp profile, also doesn't help)
os - windows 11 23h2
I have not overclocked any of the system components
What I tried to do to solve this problem:
-Changed dp and hdmi cables. Plugged them into different ports on the video card and on the displays
-Connected to different displays, via hdmi and dp.
-Tried running with one RAM card, tried plugging it into different slots (tried different xmp profiles and with xmp turned off)
-Reinstalled windows
-Tried all versions of motherboard bios
-Switched the version of the bios on the video card
-Tried to run with only the cable connected to the display, disconnecting all unnecessary things.
-Replaced the power cables connected to the video card.
-Disconnected the cmos battery.
-Disconnected the case fans from the motherboard.
-Wiped the contacts of the video card and the RAM with alcohol, blew everything out and cleaned off dust.
-Checked to make sure everything was tightly seated.
I have no extra power supplies, video cards and processors for diagnostics.
Sorry for the broken English, it's not my native language and I used deepl for the translation

I was thinking for my 18th birthday (end of June) I wanna go to build a bear. It may sound weird to most people, but personally it’s an ideal situation.
Thing is, I haven’t been to a BaB since I was like 6 (so 12 years ago).
Apparently, the store layout/design I remember is considered VINTAGE now. (This is the first time I have felt old lol)
I have no idea what to expect anymore. Everything I have memories of is apparently gone and I have no clue what replaced them.
Also, are the fur textures better now???? Please say yes lol. Last time I went there (reminder it’s 12 years ago), the only fur I could remotely tolerate was this Elsa bear. But even that one wasn’t good, because the fur was crimped and stiff.
I’m probably more picky than the average person cause I’m autistic, but I lowkey feel like I’m not being ridiculous on this one (who crimps the fur of a plushie???? That’s just wrong)

So this is my first time posting and I think I’m just looking more for a way to write about how I am feeling and get some of these emotions out. I’m not sure how all this works so here we go.
Back in January I started dating this guy ( Let’s call him JW ) anyways things were honestly amazing from the start. I felt like I had found my better half and someone that made me feel complete. He always made me smile and treated me like a Queen. Which honestly was a nice change of pace because I was previously married and my ex-husband was less than kind.
So things moved pretty quick, fast than I anticipated. We even started talking about a future and marriage which I fully realized that we were in the Honeymoon phase. That honestly that kind of when things started to unravel. JW made a comment about us being in the “honeymoon phase “ and I swear it seems like right after that things started to come undone.
So flash forward to a couple weeks later and I happen to come across a bottle of medicine and being Dr. Google over here I searched it up and it came up being for Herpes. So I took a breath and went to him and asked him to explain what is was/ why he had it.
He told me that he had a “scare” 2 years ago with an ex and his doctor put him on it proactively. He said when it came back negative he stopped talking it and he had just forgotten to throw away the bottle. Based on the age of the Rx in my (love sick head) it made sense at the moment.
Flash forward about 2 weeks and we’re at the weekend after Valentines Day 2024. In my mind he did it really well. He was out of town on work ( and no there was 0% chance being out of town was cheating - just FYI )
So he sent me flowers and called and texted he made me feel so loved. No man had ever made me feel so special. Anyways once he got back in town he came over to my house. I had spent literally the whole day making a surprise dinner us . After dinner we exchanged gifts and it was all really sweet.
I could tell something was weighing on his mind and I asked what was up? He said we needed to talk. And I instantly started to worry. I sat beside him and he told me he loved me very much but that he had lied to me. I was like Say What? and he went on to explain that he was ashamed but that when I originally asked if he had Herpes he was embarrassed and didn’t want to say. I was definitely in shock.
A lot of emotions happened from there, I was definitely upset he lied but I also understood where he was coming from. It’s not like you walk up and shake there hand and then be like OHHHH BTW I have Herpes. So I get the nerves, what I was upset about was him lying about it. My ex-husband was a narcissist compulsive liar and that was definitely not something I was going to put up with again.
So where I messed things up got our relationship and looking back now I know that If I ever had the chance to go back and fix things the first thing I would do is NOT Do the following. So after JW told me about the medical condition I was upset, my mind was going at a million miles an hour. He asked that until we figured things out, let’s keep our business, our business.
Well my parents happen to live next door to me and my mom had been calling me wanting to see the necklace that JW got me for Valentine’s Day. So I stepped away and went to show my mom. She could see that I was upset about something and I BLABBED pretty much everything. I did exactly what he asked me not to do. But honestly I was hurt and I really wasn’t thinking about His feelings in that moment. I was reacting.
Looking back now I have definitely learned there is some stuff you keep your business, at least until you figure it out.
So by me telling my mom about his condition she got this mental image of Him that he was somehow a bad person, I believe it was mostly about the lie and him lying in NO Way Ok, he had plenty of opportunities to fess up. Before we ever got intimate in any manner shape or form I asked him are you sure you don’t have anything (std/sti’s) and every time he always said No.
So now that I gave you the introduction to things…
JW and I ended up breaking up, but it wasn’t because we didn’t love each other. I loved his man like Crazy and I was willing to look past the medical condition. In my mind and heart I felt like he was my person . Anyways the reason that we ultimately broke up was my mother. As much as I love here she drives me b@sh1t crazy at times. (We are also a lot alike so we tend to butt heads ) my mom basically gave me an ultimatum that it was her or Him and I couldn’t have both. And seeing as how I’ve always had a close relationship with my parents and I do live next door I ended up caving after almost a week of hard core fighting with my mom and I just couldn’t take it anymore. I broke up with JW.
That was so painful and sickening and I didn’t want to do it but I felt like if I didn’t I would lose my relationship with my mother and possibly even my father, it was too much stress.
Flash forward about a month and I haven’t spoken with JW but I get a message from his mom on FB asking me some questions about him. It was kind of strange but I went with it. I got this ominous feeling like something bad was going on. I asked what happened and she said he had passed away. ****WHAT?!?!?!?!????******
I was just thinking about him last night, I hadn’t stopped thinking about him and or loving him . I was just literally stuck between a rock and a hard(headed mother) . I still snuggle under the blanket every night that smells like him.
So the night before I found out he had passed I actually thought about reaching out. I thought maybe if I give things a little time my mom will cool down. I really wanted everything to play out perfectly. But at the point it was already far too late, he was gone.
JW was only in his late 20s and died from a massive heart attack, it still isn’t real. My heart is so broken and I don’t know what to do or how to deal with all of this.
How do you get over something like this?
I know there are a bunch of different facets to things here but this is what I’ve been living the past couple months.

It has been almost five months. Yes, we were together for four years, but why can’t I accept the failed relationship and move on? He has he is happily living life with his co-worker while I am here reading books about healing and feeling like there is no way out of this pain. Every day, I wake up with the unhappy feeling of why he had to do this to us, to me, to a partner who was kind, loyal, empathic, supportive, communicative, and loving. Yes, I know I am not perfect; I don’t have many hobbies, don’t cook, etc. Really why? How can he consciously be happy knowing he hurt me? And why do I keep dwelling if his behavior was so trashy the last two months of our relationship? Why can’t I just fucking move on? It is annoying, and it is frustrating. For the record I do therapy, I have gone on trips, I have read, I have read love books, and I have started working out. I don't know what is wrong with me. Why can't I move on like other people do?

DISCLAIMER: Sorry this is a day late. I ended up having to rewrite half of this. Still, I hope you enjoy. After this, I'll be going on my hiatus. So I hope you like this last little bit of Roo-family cuteness. Thank you all and keep on keepin' on!
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Special thanks to u/SpacePaladin15 for creating the NoP universe.
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I'd also like to thank u/xskipy10 for their awesome fanart of the main cast as well as their recent Tohba meme and their fanart of Michael baysitting. You're work is a treasure!
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Thank you as well to u/Accomplished-Golf-59 for his take on Michael, Teylim, and Tohba in his submission for the Banner Art Contest, and u/Spacer_Catgirl4969 for their awesome music video featuring a pixel-art Dohkar in his bar. Be sure to give ALL of these awesome creators your love and support.
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And let's not forget u/Guywhoexists2812 who has been an awesome source of memes as well as sick pixel art, such as THIS and THIS!!!! And even THIS!!!!!! And how could I forget THIS!!!!!!!!!! Thank you so much!
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Today, we see all the reasons Teylim has to keep going in the face of adversity. For when all is said and done, love truly does conquer all. LETTUCE...begin...
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Original Story
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[Accessing Camera Function…]
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[Accessing Saved Recordings Function…]
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[Play Selected Recording?: Y/N…]
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[Playing Recording!]
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[The camera opens up on a female Yotul with a satchel over her shoulder. She is walking backwards down a paved walkway while looking up at the person holding the camera…]
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“Alright! Soooo…here we are in… Michael tell us where we are!”
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[The person holding the camera gives an audible sigh…]
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“Do I have to, Tey?”
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“Yes! Come on, it’ll be fun!”
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[Another audible sigh is heard before the person begins panning the camera around the surrounding cityscape…]
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“We are in the beautiful, literally ALWAYS sunny capital of Dayside City!”
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“And what would you say we’re doing here in Dayside City?”
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“We were just at the Public Records building getting our paperwork verified.”
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[The Yotul woman is seen reaching into her satchel and pulling out a leaflet of documents…]
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“Oh! You mean THIS paperwork? Hmmm… I wonder what these might say… Mind helping me here?”
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“Seriously?”
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[The Yotul doesn’t answer, instead shoving the documents directly into the camera. Another, more amused-sounding sigh is heard…]
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“It says that your name has been officially changed to ‘Teylim Andrews.’”
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“Mmmmhmmm. And what about this one?”
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“That one says that Tohba’s name has been officially changed to ‘Tohba Andrews.’”
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“Aaaand why do you suppose that is?”
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[A shuffling sound is heard and the camera shifts as the person holding it pulls out their own papers…]
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“Probably because according to MY paperwork, while we’re still waiting for my Application of Citizenship to go through, I, Michael Ruiz Andrews, am now the full, legal, son of one, Teylim Andrews-”
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“EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEE!!!!!!”
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[The Yotul woman darts forward, wrapping the person holding the camera in a hug. The camera is set on the ground and the face of the person is now visible. The two hold their embrace, rocking back and forth…]
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“I love you so much, my joey…”
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“Love you too, Ma…”
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[Recording Ceases…]
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[Play Next Recording?: Y/N…]
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[Playing Recording!]
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[The camera opens on a small kitchen area where two beings are sat eating. On the left, a male Yotul infant in a high chair is munching away at a human food identified as “Cheerios” spread across his tray. On the right, a male human idly stirs at a bowl of cereal while tapping away at a datapad…]
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[Eventually, after munching down another “Cheerio”, the infant catches a glimpse at the human and stares for approximately one second before his tail begins wagging…]
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“Mikey?”
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[The humans attention is broken away from their datapad and immediately focuses on the infant…]
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“Yeah, Bud?”
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“I WUV YOOOUUU.”
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[The infant’s sing-song voice seems to make the human smile before he leans forward, planting a “kiss” on top of the infant’s head…]
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“MmmMUAH! Te amo, mi hermanito.”
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“Whaz dat mean?”
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“It means, ‘I love you, Little Brother’. Want me to teach you?”
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“Hmmmmm… OKAY!”
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“Okay.”
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[The human chuckles slightly before scooting his chair in…]
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“Okay, so when you want to tell someone you love them, you say, ‘Te amo.’ Okay?”
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[The infant gives a curious ear flick…]
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“Teeeh…Mo?”
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“Close! Here. Repeat after me. Te…”
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“Teeh…”
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“Ah…”
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“Aaahh…”
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“Mo…”
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“Moh!”
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“Te…ah…mo…”
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“Teeh…aaahh…mo!”
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“Okay! All together now. Te amo.”
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“¡TE AMO!”
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[The human excitedly gets up from his seat and embraces the infant…]
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“YES!!! You did it! Awesome job, Bud!”
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“YAAAAYYY!!!! ¡TE AMO, MIKEY!”
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“MMMUAH!! ¡Te amo, precioso hermanito!”
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[The camera jitters slightly and a muffled giggling is heard. The human turns to face the camera…]
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“Ma? What are you- Have you been recording this whole time?”
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“Just a little!”
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“Must you record everything?”
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“As a matter of fact, yes!”
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“MAMA!!”
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[The camera zooms in on the excited infant…]
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“Hello, Precious! Is your big brother teaching you Spanish?”
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“UH-HUH!! ¡TE AMO, MAMA!”
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“Ooooh, that is just ADORABLE! Can you teach him to say ‘Mama’ in Spanish, too?”
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[The camera pans over to the human, who raises an eyebrow. After a moment, the human smirks and gives an exaggerated shrug while shaking his head…]
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“No tengo que hacerlo. Él ya lo sabe, mamá.”
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“Pffft! Smart aleck.”
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[Recording Ceases…]
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[Play Next Recording?: Y/N…]
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[Playing Recording!]
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[The camera opens up facing a pair of beds in a small room. On one bed, a female Yotul is sat with her infant in her lap as a male human walks into frame carrying a brightly wrapped gift box…]
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“Merry Late Christmas, guys!”
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“Merry Christmas, Michael!”
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“Mewwy Kwizmuz, Mikey!”
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[The human kneels down and hands the infant the gift box…]
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“Sorry this gift is a bit last minute, but I managed to grab it while I was out with ‘Nel the other day.”
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“I’m sure it’ll be perfect, Michael.”
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“I hope so. Go on, Bud. Open it! It’s for you!”
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“OKAY!!!”
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[The infant rips away at the brightly-colored paper, and with help from his mother, lifts off the lid. The infant then excitedly starts bouncing up and down and reaches into the box, pulling out a bright-red plush…]
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“WED TIWFISH!!!!!!”
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“Oh, Michael! How? When?”
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“I had to ask around online if anyone else had plushies from the aquarium ship, and I managed to find a guy here in Dayside. There’s…still a lot of things we lost at the house that need to be replaced, but I figured this would be a good start…”
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“It’s perfect.”
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[The three embrace and hold it for several seconds before pulling back…]
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“BUT! I’m not done with gifts just yet.”
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“What?”
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“Here. Mind handing me your pad?”
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“Sure?”
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[The Yotul hands the human her datapad as he pulls a small drive from his pocket and plugs it in. After a moment, he smiles and sits down on the bed next to the Yotul. She is then seen gasping and covering her mouth with her paws…]
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“Michael…”
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“I overheard you on the phone with Aunty Triv, talking about how you wish you had some pictures of me when I was younger…”
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“How on Liern-”
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“It’s…a long story. When I was first taken into foster care after getting rescued, I was assigned a social worker to help me adjust. And after I got situated with Dad, he stayed and helped us out from time to time. He basically became like an uncle to me after a while. And since Dad didn’t really have any other family, whenever he wanted to share pictures of me growing up, he’d send a copy to my social worker. I’ve…been back in contact with him for a little while now, and it turns out he kept them.”
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“Oh, Michael…”
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[The Yotul and human lean against each other and embrace…]
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“I love you, Ma.”
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“I love you too, my joey.
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[Still leaning against each other, they begin to swipe at the pad, presumably looking through pictures. After a few swipes, The Yotul begins chuckling hysterically…]
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“Aaaawwweee…”
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“Crap, I forgot about that one!”
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“Who’z dat?”
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“That’s…me, Bud.”
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[The infant looks at the image for a while, still holding the bright red plush…]
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“Teeheehee!! Fuzzy Mikey!”
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“Can we please just swipe to the next one?”
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“Wait. I’ve seen those kinds of human garments before! Aren’t those for…LITTLE…little joeys?”
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“Look, I was a very emotionally stunted kid and I just thought they were comfy, alright?”
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“This is SO going on the desk.”
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“Please no. Any of them but that one.”
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“Nope! It’s already decided!”
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“YAAYYY! FUZZY MIKEY!”
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“God, ‘Nel’s never gonna let me live this down…”
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[Recording Ceases…]
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Memory Transcript Subject: Teylim Andrews, Yotul Accountant And Loving Mother Of Two
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Date:[Standardized Human Time] February 1, 2137
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[Warning: REM Sleep Detected: Transcript May Be Fragmented Or Incomplete…]
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Crrreeeeaak…
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My eyes slowly squint open as the noise rouses me from sleep. I let out a yawn before looking for the source of the noise. I’m…back in my house… Sitting upright, I see that my door’s been opened, beaming The Dayside’s permanent daylight into my room. I was confused for a moment. The only other person here that would be here is-
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“Uuuuhhmm… M-Mrs. Teylim?”
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I looked down, and spotted the culprit.
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Standing in the doorway was a small human child, cradling my Tohba in his arms. He was silhouetted from the daylight behind him, the light beaming past his adorable onesie pajamas creating a small blue outline around him, matching his eyes.
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Strange. For some reason, I thought he was taller…
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“Michael, sweetie? What’s the matter?”
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Still carrying Tohba, Michael made his way over to the bed.
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“Uuuhhhmmm… Tohba h-had a n-nightmare…”
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“Ooohh, is that so?”
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Something definitely didn’t add up. As he gently handed Tohba over to me, he certainly didn’t seem to be having a nightmare. In fact, even now he was still sleeping peacefully.
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Michael, on the other paw, was DEFINITELY out of sorts. He was nervous, fidgeting, wrapped up in a self-hug, and even now, refused to even look at me. Whether that was because of his nervousness or if he was still convinced I was afraid of him had yet to be seen.
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Stupid, ridiculous, Federation dogma…
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I could tell he wasn’t being honest with me. Ordinarily, I would’ve been upset about him lying, and even more so about him disturbing Tohba, but looking at him now, I knew what he needed now wasn’t a scolding.
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“Michael, you know you can be honest with me. Was it really Tohba who had the nightmare?”
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I heard him nervously gulp as he tightened the self-hug around himself. After a moment, he shook his head.
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“Mm’mm…”
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I gave a tired, but loving sigh before holding out my free arm.
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“Come here.”
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With some hesitation, he stepped closer, allowing me to pull him into a hug. Michael had a lot of issues. From what I learned from his social worker, he’d been terribly abused by his previous mother and he’d lost his father only a few years after moving in with him. And now, with Earth under attack, he simply didn’t have anywhere else to go.
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It will take a long time before he’s fully comfortable living here, I know that. I’m still not even entirely sure if I’m what he needs. I still wonder if I know what I’m doing when it comes to just raising Tohba. Even so, I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t try. He deserves a home, and a mother who loves him. All children do.
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“I'm sorry for lying…”
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“Ssshhh… It’s alright. Do you want to talk about it?”
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“It was…the one with the scary fire people…”
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Oh…THAT dream…
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Exterminators.
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“I don’t want them to come… I don’t want them to-“
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“It’s okay, joey. They won’t get you here.”
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“No! That’s not… That’s not what I’m scared of…”
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I pulled back slightly, allowing myself to look directly at him. He sniffles and sobbed while trying to wipe away tears.
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“You’re all so nice to me… \sniff** I…I-I don’t want the fire people to hurt you… I sh-shouldn’t be here…”
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My heart broke in two. This poor child had already lost so much. It only made sense that he’d be afraid of losing us too.
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I cupped his face in my paw, wiping away his tears.
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“Michael Ruiz Andrews, I don’t care what you might have heard, but you have every RIGHT to be here. And if those scary people out there think they can come and take us away from you, they’re wrong. I will never let us be separated. You hear me?”
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“. . .P-promise?”
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“With all my heart. You’re MY joey now, and I won’t let anyone take you away from me.”
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At last, Michael finally unwrapped himself from his self-hug and instead wrapped his arms around me, burying his face in my fur.
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After a while of holding him, he’d finally calmed down enough to speak again.
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“C-can I…sleep here tonight?”
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Your joey needs you.
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Yes.
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“Of course.”
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With some effort, he climbed up onto the bed and curled up next to me. I knew I most likely wouldn’t be getting anymore sleep, but that was fine. Just laying here, holding my boys in my arms. That was enough.
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One after the other, I gave both my joeys a lick on the forehead.
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“Goodnight my joeys. I love you.”
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“Wuv…you…Ma…ma…”
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“. . .Love you too...Mom…”
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I love my boys. I love my family. I love…my life…
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[Transcript Time Progression: 4 hours…]
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Beebeebeebeep! Beebeebeebeep! Beebeebeebeep!
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[Warning: Subject Regaining Consciousness…]
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My entire body protested as I twisted and turned over to tap the alarm on my nightstand. My claw slapped blindly at it until finally, the agitating alarm was silenced. My eyes squinted open, revealing…I was back in our motel room…
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Well…a girl can dream, can’t she?
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It was a pleasant dream, I’ll give it that. As I sat up, I let my legs dangle off the side of the bed as I stretched myself out and let out a yawn. Once my eyes had fully opened, and the fog had been blinked away, I was immediately met with a sight that warmed my heart to no end. My still fast asleep, and back to being tall, new son, curled up with his baby brother on the other bed.
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Precious boys. MY precious boys.
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I did my best to remember if Michael had anything scheduled with Khornel for this paw, but nothing came to mind. He’d been working so hard lately, helping to keep us above water. Now that he wasn’t a refugee anymore, we were no longer receiving stipends from the program, which meant from here on out, keeping the bills paid was much more difficult. And that’s not even mentioning having to put aside anything we can to be able to eventually have the house rebuilt.
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I kept trying for a while, I still couldn’t remember anything. For the first time in a decent while, he had a paw off.
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Good. I’ll leave him be then. He’s earned some rest.
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I let out one more yawn, before getting up. Unfortunately, while Michael didn’t have to work this paw, I wasn’t so fortunate. Thankfully, my recent injuries allowed me to continue to work from home instead of going out to the physical office. After one last stretch, I let myself slide off the bed.
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I had to give myself a moment once I was upright. While my previously broken leg had healed for the most part, I still needed to be careful of how much weight I put on it. Once I was ready, I began walking to our small kitchen area. The fridge was nearly empty. I’d need to go to the store soon.
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Thank goodness we’re staying in Soulroot, where literally EVERYTHING is expensive…
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After cutting up some leftover fruit and strayu for myself, I went back to my desk. It was impossible to not notice the small stack of colorful books on the ground next to it. They were human kid’s books donated from the embassy here in Soulroot. Tohba would be ready to start going to school in just a few short cycles…
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Will we be able to get out of here and back into our house before then?
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Sitting down at my desk and booting up my pad, I found it hard to stay focused. There was still so much to do, so much to worry about. Before, when I was feeling overwhelmed, I’d have Loh, Dohkar, or Trivah there for me. With them around, it always helped things feel more manageable. But now…now I was alone again. Loh was gone. Dohkar and Trivah were stuck on the other side of that damned fence…
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What are we going to do?
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My head lowered. I stared blankly at the desk, partly wishing I could look through it at ANYTHING other than my work.
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But then, there was a glint, just out of the corner of my eye…
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I looked up, and saw something that I couldn’t help but smile at, something that even when I’m feeling low, reminds me why I have to keep going.
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I reach out…and grab the two small frames off the corner of my desk and hold them in front of me. In my left paw, wass a framed picture of Tohba, the paw he was born. So small. So precious. So perfect. And in my right, was another picture. It was my new favorite picture.
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A small, human child…in fuzzy, blue, onesie pajamas that matched his eyes.
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My Michael. Still so small.
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These two pictures. My boys. The villains outside could take everything else. So long as I have my boys, I will always have a reason to keep going.
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I love my boys… I love my family… I love my life…
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The End

I'm alone. All my life I've been able to make friends. But I always lose them, in third grade, I lost my two best friends because they switched schools and we just fell out of touch, in fifth grade I lost all my friends except for three, though this was also because of them moving, I made more friends in sixth grade and we remained friends for a good while. Freshman year my best friend from kindergarten and I stopped talking, she texted me one day saying that she didn't actually like me, and she never wanted to talk to me again. That hurt a lot, I got over it in about eight months and eventually was able to stop thinking about her everyday, and seeing her at school didn't bother me as much.
February the next year came, one year since my previous best friend and I stopped talking, maybe it got in my head, and I had been starting to feel suffocated by my current best friend at the time, I loved her, but she kept hurting me by not acknowledging my presence when we were in groups, no matter how hard I tried to contribute to the conversation, she kept leaving me and I just wanted a break from feeling like I was nothing to her. I just wanted some space. But I totally went about it in the wrong way. I picked a fight for no reason and said some awful things that I regret with every fiber of my being. At first, we stopped talking for a couple weeks, and I made two new friends, but soon after my best friend sent me an email telling me everything that was wrong with me, overbearing, pushy, and more I can't remember well, and I agree with her now, I've grown a lot and if she had said those thing recently, I could have come to terms with what she was saying, the things she pointed out were valid points that I should have looked into more, but I got defensive, this was when I thought she didn't want to be friends anymore because it sounded like she hated so many things about me... then what was there to like?
She had texted me a night before and said that she wanted to talk to me, with a specific teacher as a mediator, I refused, I am a very very private person and I do not like to share my feelings with anyone I'm not used to being around, and I wasn't yet familiar with this teacher. I told my friend that if she really didn't want to be friends anymore, that I would respect her decision. I was trying to protect myself, trying to make sure I broke it off before she did, I hate that my brain went there immediately. I wish I had tried to fight for her. She screamed at me while I sat there in a sort of calm daze, which completely gave off the impression that I didn't care... but I cared so much, she told me that I was self-sabotaging and was throwing away something that hadn't gone bad, she was screaming so loud, a teacher came in and told he she was disrupting classes, she was escorted out of the room and I heard her crying, and as soon as she left the room I burst out in tears too.
Our mutual friends, which was only two people, but they were my only other friends, stopped talking to me, and only hung out with her, but we were never on bad terms. I am beginning to resent them though. We stopped talking completely and soon summer vacation came. My cat died, I moved out of my narcissistic mother's house to my Dad's house, and his girlfriend accused me of stealing money, which I didn't, but my father took her side anyway and the entire time I was there they kept trying to blame things on me, and continuously scorned me for being antisocial, so eventually I moved out again when my father and I got in a huge fight, and I haven't talked to him since. I worked 80 hour weeks during the summer at two jobs, trying to keep my mind off my friend, my dad, and stay away from my mom, but it was okay because I had three friends who were from Mongolia, and two friends who were from Turkey working the same exact hours as me. But near the end of the summer, my two Turkish friends and I decided to plan a trip to go to Florida, I asked my mom and after some convincing she finally agreed, we got plane tickets, booked hotels, got car rental stuff, but the night before I left, my mom told me I wasn't allowed to go anymore, she has done this multiple times, but not of this magnitude, I told her that we had already paid for everything, but she told me that if I left, she would call the cops on me.
So I texted my Turkish friends and I told them what happened, but they wouldn't believe me... they blamed me and said "did you tell your mom?" I told them that I did, but they swore that I was lying, they told everyone, including my three Mongolian friends, so in the last month that my foreign friends were in the country, they all hated me, treated me terribly, constantly gave me dirty looks, and were scornful. It broke my heart, especially because they were so kind before, if I can make the kindest person hate me... then what kind of monster am I?
Finally, I came back to school, and it was so much harder than I thought it would be, seeing her everyday, happy with her friends while I sat there, alone and in misery, I had a couple friends, but they weren't in many of my classes. I was able to hold out for so long. One day I just couldn't take it anymore. I just completely gave up, seeing her was too much to bear, she didn't care about me anymore, I didn't have any close friends, just people who wouldn't really care if I lived or died. Everyday was a struggle. I stopped going to school, stopped going to work, and just curled up in my bed and decided that I had enough. I was on a course to graduate that year, a whole year early which got screwed up as well, ruining my chances of doing so.
I skipped work for almost three weeks, but I eventually came back because my boss said she missed me and reassured me that no body was mad. I haven't been to school in about two months, I don't know how I could go back anymore, it would be humiliating... like, what would I say? What if people asked questions? I'd just come off as so pathetic. I've ruined my life, I have little chance of a diploma, and no chance if I don't go back, I've been labeled as "truancy" or whatever. I was also supposed to go to Spain and Italy for a school trip, but I wasn't able to go because of my lack of attendance, so I ended up wasting 4,000 dollars.
My two friends that I made after my last best friend and I broke up called the cops on me because she thought I was going to kill myself, and I was so mad and embarrassed I cried the whole way to the hospital with my mom in the car and was able to go back home after some tests, after I got home, I went off on them, I was so so upset, and I honestly still am, I know they were only doing what they thought best, but I told her that I didn't want to talk to her until she would apologize, because all she kept saying was "I'm sorry you feel that way" so I told her to stop apologizing for how I felt, and apologize for what she did. She didn't, so I told her that I wasn't going to talk to her until she apologized. And the other friend who was in on it too, I texted her angrily and she said "womp womp" I immediately blocked her, I was so mad, words cannot describe my level of fury at that moment. It wasn't funny, that was not the time for jokes.
I have no friends, only my narcissistic mother, I don't even have a father anymore, my oldest sister isn't in contact with him either, for a different reason... I've just been working, and trying not to think. But I can't take it anymore. Have I really screwed everything up? Is my life worth anything anymore? Friendship is dead. Family is overrated, and I have never been able to keep a friend, I do not want the pain of loosing another one, I have people who I enjoy being around, I have coworkers, I have my sisters, and I have two people I hang out with sometimes, but really, none of them are my friends. I never want to make another friend, I refuse, I know they consider me their friends, but if I put a real label on it, it'll hurt too much when they leave and begin to hate me. What do I do? Am I destined for failure? Why do I always end up alone? Not only does everyone hate me, but I'm hating myself more and more by the passing day. I don't know what to do... can somebody, anybody help me? I'm just so lost.

Good afternoon, I have a problem with a black screen when I turn on my computer. When you start the pc, the video card coolers are spinning and the rgb is illuminated, all other components also give signs of life, also I can hear characteristic sound of the start of Windows, that is, everything starts, but there is no image. ( doesn't show bios post. Аbsolute blackness from beginning to end) This happens not only when you completely turn on and turn off the pc, it happens when you exit sleep mode and rebooting. The strangest thing is that this does not always happen, out of 10 attempts to start the pc, about half of the time it starts without problems (the image is displayed). When the image is displayed, it works perfectly, no crashes, overheating, artifacts, noises, etc, in fact, I have it on for months and I restart it only if I need to update the Windows. Actually I've been with this problem for a year and the boiling point was the fact that before the next update I had to restart it a dozen times to display the image. This problem appeared over time, originally I had a ryzen 3700x processor installed, then I replaced it with a 5700x and honestly I don't remember when it appeared, either when I had a 3700x processor or later with a 5700x. Since the problem appears randomly, I probably just replaced the processor and everything started up fine and I didn't pay attention that something could be wrong, this under the condition that the replacement of the processor is to blame.
PC specs:
motherboard - b450 tomahawk max (bios version I think is not important, because I tried absolutely all bios versions compatible with my CPU)
processor - ryzen 5700x (no integrated card)
Video card - palit rtx 2070 super jetstream (there is a bios switch on it, tried switching them, it doesn't help either)
power supply - be quiet! PURE POWER 11-CM 700W Gold
RAM - G.Skill tridentz neo f4-3600c18d-32gtzn (two 16gb cards) (tried turning off xmp profile, also doesn't help)
os - windows 11 23h2
I have not overclocked any of the system components
What I tried to do to solve this problem:
-Changed dp and hdmi cables. Plugged them into different ports on the video card and on the displays
-Connected to different displays, via hdmi and dp.
-Tried running with one RAM card, tried plugging it into different slots (tried different xmp profiles and with xmp turned off)
-Reinstalled windows
-Tried all versions of motherboard bios
-Switched the version of the bios on the video card
-Tried to run with only the cable connected to the display, disconnecting all unnecessary things.
-Replaced the power cables connected to the video card.
-Disconnected the cmos battery.
-Disconnected the case fans from the motherboard.
-Wiped the contacts of the video card and the RAM with alcohol, blew everything out and cleaned off dust.
-Checked to make sure everything was tightly seated.
I have no extra power supplies, video cards and processors for diagnostics.
Sorry for the broken English, it's not my native language and I used deepl for the translation

I'm alone. All my life I've been able to make friends. But I always lose them, in third grade, I lost my two best friends because they switched schools and we just fell out of touch, in fifth grade I lost all my friends except for three, though this was also because of them moving, I made more friends in sixth grade and we remained friends for a good while. Freshman year my best friend from kindergarten and I stopped talking, she texted me one day saying that she didn't actually like me, and she never wanted to talk to me again. That hurt a lot, I got over it in about eight months and eventually was able to stop thinking about her everyday, and seeing her at school didn't bother me as much.
February the next year came, one year since my previous best friend and I stopped talking, maybe it got in my head, and I had been starting to feel suffocated by my current best friend at the time, I loved her, but she kept hurting me by not acknowledging my presence when we were in groups, no matter how hard I tried to contribute to the conversation, she kept leaving me and I just wanted a break from feeling like I was nothing to her. I just wanted some space. But I totally went about it in the wrong way. I picked a fight for no reason and said some awful things that I regret with every fiber of my being. At first, we stopped talking for a couple weeks, and I made two new friends, but soon after my best friend sent me an email telling me everything that was wrong with me, overbearing, pushy, and more I can't remember well, and I agree with her now, I've grown a lot and if she had said those thing recently, I could have come to terms with what she was saying, the things she pointed out were valid points that I should have looked into more, but I got defensive, this was when I thought she didn't want to be friends anymore because it sounded like she hated so many things about me... then what was there to like?
She had texted me a night before and said that she wanted to talk to me, with a specific teacher as a mediator, I refused, I am a very very private person and I do not like to share my feelings with anyone I'm not used to being around, and I wasn't yet familiar with this teacher. I told my friend that if she really didn't want to be friends anymore, that I would respect her decision. I was trying to protect myself, trying to make sure I broke it off before she did, I hate that my brain went there immediately. I wish I had tried to fight for her. She screamed at me while I sat there in a sort of calm daze, which completely gave off the impression that I didn't care... but I cared so much, she told me that I was self-sabotaging and was throwing away something that hadn't gone bad, she was screaming so loud, a teacher came in and told he she was disrupting classes, she was escorted out of the room and I heard her crying, and as soon as she left the room I burst out in tears too.
Our mutual friends, which was only two people, but they were my only other friends, stopped talking to me, and only hung out with her, but we were never on bad terms. I am beginning to resent them though. We stopped talking completely and soon summer vacation came. My cat died, I moved out of my narcissistic mother's house to my Dad's house, and his girlfriend accused me of stealing money, which I didn't, but my father took her side anyway and the entire time I was there they kept trying to blame things on me, and continuously scorned me for being antisocial, so eventually I moved out again when my father and I got in a huge fight, and I haven't talked to him since. I worked 80 hour weeks during the summer at two jobs, trying to keep my mind off my friend, my dad, and stay away from my mom, but it was okay because I had three friends who were from Mongolia, and two friends who were from Turkey working the same exact hours as me. But near the end of the summer, my two Turkish friends and I decided to plan a trip to go to Florida, I asked my mom and after some convincing she finally agreed, we got plane tickets, booked hotels, got car rental stuff, but the night before I left, my mom told me I wasn't allowed to go anymore, she has done this multiple times, but not of this magnitude, I told her that we had already paid for everything, but she told me that if I left, she would call the cops on me.
So I texted my Turkish friends and I told them what happened, but they wouldn't believe me... they blamed me and said "did you tell your mom?" I told them that I did, but they swore that I was lying, they told everyone, including my three Mongolian friends, so in the last month that my foreign friends were in the country, they all hated me, treated me terribly, constantly gave me dirty looks, and were scornful. It broke my heart, especially because they were so kind before, if I can make the kindest person hate me... then what kind of monster am I?
Finally, I came back to school, and it was so much harder than I thought it would be, seeing her everyday, happy with her friends while I sat there, alone and in misery, I had a couple friends, but they weren't in many of my classes. I was able to hold out for so long. One day I just couldn't take it anymore. I just completely gave up, seeing her was too much to bear, she didn't care about me anymore, I didn't have any close friends, just people who wouldn't really care if I lived or died. Everyday was a struggle. I stopped going to school, stopped going to work, and just curled up in my bed and decided that I had enough. I was on a course to graduate that year, a whole year early which got screwed up as well, ruining my chances of doing so.
I skipped work for almost three weeks, but I eventually came back because my boss said she missed me and reassured me that no body was mad. I haven't been to school in about two months, I don't know how I could go back anymore, it would be humiliating... like, what would I say? What if people asked questions? I'd just come off as so pathetic. I've ruined my life, I have little chance of a diploma, and no chance if I don't go back, I've been labeled as "truancy" or whatever. I was also supposed to go to Spain and Italy for a school trip, but I wasn't able to go because of my lack of attendance, so I ended up wasting 4,000 dollars.
My two friends that I made after my last best friend and I broke up called the cops on me because she thought I was going to kill myself, and I was so mad and embarrassed I cried the whole way to the hospital with my mom in the car and was able to go back home after some tests, after I got home, I went off on them, I was so so upset, and I honestly still am, I know they were only doing what they thought best, but I told her that I didn't want to talk to her until she would apologize, because all she kept saying was "I'm sorry you feel that way" so I told her to stop apologizing for how I felt, and apologize for what she did. She didn't, so I told her that I wasn't going to talk to her until she apologized. And the other friend who was in on it too, I texted her angrily and she said "womp womp" I immediately blocked her, I was so mad, words cannot describe my level of fury at that moment. It wasn't funny, that was not the time for jokes.
I have no friends, only my narcissistic mother, I don't even have a father anymore, my oldest sister isn't in contact with him either, for a different reason... I've just been working, and trying not to think. But I can't take it anymore. Have I really screwed everything up? Is my life worth anything anymore? Friendship is dead. Family is overrated, and I have never been able to keep a friend, I do not want the pain of loosing another one, I have people who I enjoy being around, I have coworkers, I have my sisters, and I have two people I hang out with sometimes, but really, none of them are my friends. I never want to make another friend, I refuse, I know they consider me their friends, but if I put a real label on it, it'll hurt too much when they leave and begin to hate me. What do I do? Am I destined for failure? Why do I always end up alone? Not only does everyone hate me, but I'm hating myself more and more by the passing day. I don't know what to do... can somebody, anybody help me? I'm just so lost.

I'm walking through a bustling underground train station. I push and shove my way through all the other commuters onto the platform. As I look around, there seems to be endless rows of platforms in both directions, stretching well into a dense fog. Further ahead, neat lines of railway tracks extend out from the fog and through the platforms. I instinctually look up at the info screen
Next train in ### minutes
I furrow my brow, squint to try and focus on the numbers but they're heavily pixelated and illegible. I look around at the other commuters, who stream onto the platform completely unaware of the anomaly. Most people are on their phone, or wearing headphones while some are talking to each other. No one seems to notice the malfunction with the screen.
That's when the absurdity of the situation clicks for me. Endless platforms, a wall of fog, unreadable numbers and people that don't care. It's all a dream. I bring my hand up to my face and pinch my nose, trying to breathe through it. An old reality check I remembered from back when I was trying to learn to lucid dream.
My heart rate jumped when I realised, that I couldn't breathe through my nose. Before I could even process this, another problem presented itself. I didn't know why I was here. I didn't know where I was going and I definitely did not know how I even got here. It seems as if reality ceased to exist right before I walked onto this platform. Just like it typically feels in a dream, you spawn in out of nowhere and don't really know what happened prior - except this wasn't a dream.
I knew I was sure of it because deep inside my bones I felt this anxious urgent message. I need to catch this train. It was a primal feeling.
At this point, my head is spinning and I need to sit down somewhere. I choose a silver bench with a middle aged woman sitting on it. She shuffles further to the left as I sit down next to her clutching my head and racking my brain to try and figure out what it is happening. This is what amnesia feels like, I thought to my self as I gnawed at scraps of messy muddled memories. Each image that came into my mind was just a fragment - A school, a library, sickeningly white walls. It hit me that I didn't even know my name. I was starting to hyperventilate but then my body kicked into autopilot. I started to take deep breaths, focusing on my diaphragm and calming myself down. It felt like I was trained to do this. I started to focus on the current situation.
Where was my ticket? Instinctually, I knew I had to have gotten one on my entry to the train station. I reached into my pockets and pulled out a scrap of paper. Scrawled in very familiar cursive:
*In case of memory loss, read the journal in your backpack*
Strange message but I didn't have any choice then to at least give the instructions a try. I removed my backpack and rummaged through it for the journal. I wouldn't really call it a backpack - more a tattered and frayed bundle of cloth that was reminiscent of a backpack. I finally found a series of small thick journals, bundled in cloth with their leather covers on the verge of disintegration. The pages still seemed in good condition though. Each cover was sequentially labelled which I'm guessing corresponded to the chronological order of the writings within.
The lady next to me was weirdly getting agitated. She kept stealing glances, her body shaking and eyes burning with a fierce rage. I slowly got up from the bench and began to step backwards. My backpack bumped into a pillar. The dull thud it made seemed to cause a drastic change to everyone around me though. They all snapped their heads, locking eyes on me and staring through my very soul. I felt exposed.
The rumble of an arriving train stole away their attention and within a split second everyone was ignoring me again, going back to their usual activities. It seriously felt like I had just imagined it and it was becoming more and more clear that I was having some sort of mental breakdown. Nevertheless, as the train slowed to a stop on the platform, I walked into it and found a seat. The train seemed to be old and new at the same time. Typical blue seats with abstract dirty patterns complete with a modern sleek interior of gentle curves clashing with a boxy dull metallic exterior and doors that looked like they belonged on a rusty submarine.
I opened the first of the journals and began to read. I soon realised that the handwriting was mine and within the next few moments I was attacked by a barrage of memories that had remained repressed and buried in the back of my mind.
*
My name is Jacob and I have been stuck here in this place called *The Limbo* for an eternity. When I say 'eternity', I don't mean it lightly. Back when I used to keep track I counted over 500 years through my wristwatch that never seemed to run out of battery. Now I know counting is meaningless. There have been periods like this where my mind falls into a deep trance and I lose my whole identity as I mindlessly wander in this place much like the entities that inhabit it. Occasional periods of lucidity breach this trance and then I find myself lost and confused. It's why I keep the journals with me. I think its some sort of psychological survival mechanism that human brains develop when faced with the infinite vastness of The Limbo.
Speaking of The Limbo, I've come to learn a few things about its nature through my stay here. Some of its been through people that I've come across (Yes others are also stuck here) and some has been through my own experiences. Perhaps the most important is the question of where I get my food and water. The answer is weird. I have never felt hungry or thirsty. The sensation of having cool water slide down my throat remains a memory so distant that it feels like the snippet of a childhood dream.
I guess the next natural topic about this place would be time. Through various experiences of mine (that you'll get to read about) and discussions with others, the leading theory of mine is that The Limbo exists outside of time itself. While I myself have fallen here sometime during 2001, I've met many others from various years like the 80s, 90s and even one recent fellow from 2043.
Most people in The Limbo eventually fall into a trance, withering away until they become one of the entities or become mere tools for them. It's probably naive but I keep going through this place with only two hopes. The first is to somehow get out of here at the right time point and see my son, who I never got to see. The second is to come out of this place and die so that I no longer have to live out the empty agony of eternity (I'll explain how you can't age or die in The Limbo later). Perhaps my hopes will dwindle as the centuries pile and I will become just like those who I look upon in pity now.
I am writing this consolidated diary of my experiences for several reasons. I'd like someone to know of my unending journey in this place. To be aware of the capacity of the human spirit to keep going in the worst of situations. I have never had a long term friend in The Limbo, but know that I consider you the reader a dear friend even if I never get to meet you because you will know my story. I'm also sharing this in hopes that there is more awareness of The Limbo. Perhaps the military and scientists can actually figure out what it is. Perhaps all of us can be brought home. Or maybe this can serve as a survival guide to those who may be unfortunate enough to fall through.
There are small holes in The Limbo. Most of them are barely large enough for a pinkie finger to fit in let alone a person, but sometimes I've come across one large enough for this journal to go through. I'm not sure what time or place these holes lead to, so the safe passage of this book into a person capable of reading it has about the same chances as me ever leaving this place.
The train I'm on supposedly leads to the edge of The Limbo, where the holes are large enough for humans to fit through. It's really more of a legend amongst the poor souls that are trapped here and I've followed trails and clues for a long time to even find this train.
There are only two ways this goes. Both outcomes would lead to you reading this book in your hands. I'll either find my way out of this hell or give up hope and slip this journal through a Hole. You will find my fate at the end.
I should stop rambling now though. It would be best to start at the very beginning.
*
I was rushing out of work in pure ecstasy. My wife had gone into labor while I was at work and been rushed to hospital. I needed to get there fast. People were glancing over at me over their cubicles in confusion as I packed up my work bag and rushed out to the elevators. I couldn't stop thinking about seeing my first son as the elevator made its way down. The elevator doors finally opened and I rushed out.
The ground entrance of the building I worked at, particularly near the lobby, is an intersection of various hallways. I was already walking to close to the wall when someone came rushing around the corner and bumped me right into the wall. I was only able to hear half their apology when I fell *through* the wall like it was just a holographic projection. In hindsight, I find it oddly funny how easy it is for a life to get ruined. Just when you think you've got it all, when everything is going smoothly, a small incident like that is enough to take it all away.
I found myself in a room that resembled a classroom. It looked as if someone who had never stepped inside a classroom was asked to imagine the space. Desks were arranged in messy uneven rows with the chairs facing various directions. The board at the front of the room was a seamless patchy mixture of both chalk and modern whiteboard and mounted way too low on the wall, nearly hugging the floor. A large teachers desk sat in the front of the room. The walls were filled with posters of absolute gibberish along with diagrams and pictures that seemed like they showed something tangible but no matter how close you looked you could never identify anything in the picture.
The initial confusion was replaced by an immense panic. My heart was drumming against my chest as I searched the room for a doorway to exit it. My mind was trying to rationalise the situation. I was trying to convince myself that this was just some old part of the building and I had fallen into a hallway instead of the wall.
I ran through the doorway at the far end of the room and found myself in a large hallway that seemed to extend forever in both directions. The walls were a muted grey and the floors were that typical dirty linoleum. Soon I would find out that the regularly spaced doorways on either side of the hall led to other nonsensical classrooms.
I ran down the hallway screaming for help in pure panic, which was a terrible mistake in hindsight. I stopped running down the hallway when I suddenly heard the distinct scratch of chalk against board. In this large empty space, the sound echoed and boomed. Since I was still refusing to buy in to the reality of the situation, my hopes were momentarily increased by the supposed presence of another person here.
I slowly walked over to the doorway that the sounds were coming from. My stomach filled with an uneasy dread. This deep primal instinct within me urged me to hold back. I peeked carefully in the classroom and saw a woman with their back turned to me drawing something on the chalkboard.
It took me a few moments to notice that it was a very realistic portrait of my face.
She was drawing lines across my throat, her long dark hair swaying as she drew in the details. The drawing was completed with a terrible slash across the throat, blood gurgling out. I was frozen in place, transfixed on the hauntingly beautiful realism of the picture.
She began to turn around slowly while humming a high pitched tune. To this day I can't describe the face I saw. It is still etched into my mind. A face full of so much hatred, so much anger that I don't think its possible for a human to make that face. It expressed an emotion beyond human understanding. No artist in the world could ever render the expression on the paper. No words could describe the pure fear that coursed through my veins as she stared at me and began to approach.
I turned around to run, only to realise that a bunch of school children had gathered around me. They were headless, the bleeding stumps dripping thick blood onto the floor in a rhythmic patter. Somehow they were laughing.
I shoved through the group and ran down the hallway. I wasn't sure where I was going. My whole world had shattered and now I was completely aimless in some nonsense dimension with horrors beyond imagination that wanted me dead.
*
The extract above is from this journal I found at the foot of a large tree on a hiking trail. It's a miracle that I spotted its faded leather cover given that it was almost buried under rotting leaves. I really don't know what to make of what I'm reading, so I'll be slowly transcribing bits of it in separate posts over the next few days.
I know this subreddit is good for this sort of stuff. I'd love if someone else could share anything they know about The Limbo. This whole journal feels like some sort of prank, but the words and memories within feel way too real.
I can't help but feel a connection to this story. My mum doesn't speak much of my Dad, who I know left before I was born. No one ever found out where he went.
I was born in 2001
X

Holy priests are arguably one of the more boring healers in Warcraft to the point that people often refer to them as the ‘default’ healer. I’m sure there are more deep, underlying issues that Holy has but I wanted to try tackling them on a purely thematic level with some minor thoughts on a more gameplay-oriented level.
I aim to make more interesting spells that interact in a fun way that gives the holy spec a little more flavor than, “The default RPG healer”.
Quick preemptive self-defense though. This is all in good fun and purely theoretical. It’s always been interesting for me to speculate what a class or spec could be and rather than hoarding it all to myself, I thought it would be more interesting to see some other people's opinions and possibly inspire others to do the same. With that said...

• Make the Holy Priest a little more bard-inspired

Some of Holy’s biggest cooldowns are Divine Hymn and Hymn of Hope (Renamed to Symbol of Hope now). Singing to help your allies. You’ll notice other spells in the toolkit like shadow WORD pain and power WORD shield. Shadow has a spell called SILENCE for god’s sake. Basically, the implication is that priests are using their voices to channel their spells somehow. Why not...do more of that? Because I can’t lie, having several spells named “Heal” with different variations is killing me inside.
Plus, a bunch of the talent node names already lean into this! A few notable examples are:
Voice of Harmony
Healing Chorus
Gales of Song
Divine Word
Resonant Words
All the Holy Word Spells
Let’s make it so Holy is all about literally singing the Light’s praises. After all, if Shadow and Holy are canonically on two ends of the spectrum with Discipline being the proverbial middle ground, let’s really have Holy Priest’s be truly ‘Devout Feeling’ with their spell names. Double points if the spells end with a sung note or maybe a little arpeggio of a harp or something.
Let’s go through a few examples I’ve thought of and any non-obvious reasons behind each decision.
“Heal” -> “Holy Solo”
“Flash Heal” -> “Divine Etude” (An Etude is a short music piece)
“Prayer of Healing” -> “Holy Motet” (A motet is mainly a vocal musical composition, the name describes the movement of the different voices against one another)
“Circle of Healing” -> “Sacred Cantata” (A Cantata, (from Italian cantare, “to sing”), originally, a musical composition intended to be sung, as opposed to a sonata, a composition played instrumentally)
“Renew” -> “Grace Note” (An extra note added as an embellishment and not essential to the harmony or melody)
And now, I’ve saved my favorite for last. Its effect is decent but the name is so uninspired…
“Trail of Light”? More like... “Light Motif”!
A light Motif is a dominant recurring theme and what’s more dominant and recurring than spam healing?
The point is that there are so many possibilities with having the Holy priest being the spec that heals with singing, and unlike trying to shoehorn bards in as a new class, it makes some sense here.

• Holy’s New Groove

Ok, so all this stuff so far is just replacing words for other words and I know what you’re thinking…
“This doesn’t do anything to fix the fact that Holy is still quite dull compared to other healers!”
You’re dead right. The Priest’s Discipline spec currently rewards thinking ahead of what the encounter you’re facing will bring while Holy just sits back and collects red solo cups after the party is over. Let’s change that.
My main problem is with its mastery. Don’t get me wrong, it’s very “Good” when you’re thinking about the throughput and the pure numbers but it’s also a very “set it and forget it” style of gameplay and reminds me of the Shaman’s sometimes similarly maligned mastery that dishes out healing depending on how much health is missing. There’s no thinking required and frankly, Shaman have a much more interesting toolkit to justify it.
I think we would all prefer it to be more interesting like how Paladins generate more healing based on how close they are to the action which allows them to get in close with their other melee abilities anyway and encourages them to help out with the DPS. Excellent design decision. Win win win.
So the first thing is to fix the mastery and the new system I am proposing is…
“Mastery: Chord Progression”
To start, your basic heal will apply an effect to a targeted party member. This effect will have a very long uptime which can stack called Holy Note. (I’m personally imagining a buff that has a golden crotchet note with a little wing instead of the tail). Now your first Holy Note merely exists on top of the target and does a small heal over time in a similar being to how the mastery currently works, increasing with how much mastery you have.
A second heal to the target will apply a second stack and increase the stacked effect. This will change the buff icon to be two crotchets, stacked on top of one another. This will, again, increase the heal over time effect.
A 3rd heal to the target will complete the stack and heal the target with an effect called “Holy Chord” that heals more depending upon your mastery stat. Instead of just spamming heals over and over again mindlessly to get that powerful Holy Word spell you want back in case you need it, you instead work up chords on friendly targets. Targets that don’t require constant spamming will have heal over time effects up near constantly whereas targets that are dying and in need of healing will receive direct heals instead!
The effect is largely the same but with a little more thought and interactivity involved. If a target has two Holy Notes ready but is only at, say, 70% health, you can wait and focus on other party members until they drop a little more, and then you complete the chord.
So that’s the base outline of the spec. The long uptime of the buff rewards not finishing off the chord until you actually need it and still makes it usable in PvP.
The best part about it is that if we don’t want to be rid of the cooldown reduction mechanic that Holy is currently working with, it can fit very neatly over the top without changing anything too fundamental. The Holy Words might need some very slight tweaking to work but I don’t see any immediate problems with this system.

• New and Reworked Spells

Now, Holy needs some new cooldowns. Over the years, Holy has gone from having one of the most well-rounded toolkits to one that looks very limited in comparison. Shaman's can heal by sharing health percentages. Paladin’s have all their auras, Glimmers, and immunities. Evokers can fly and bombard people with healing, heal through stuns and other CC, and reverse recent damage taken. Monks are dashing around like no one's business and healing by punching them in the face. Let’s find some good stuff to give the Holy Priest.
Guardian Spirit stays right where it is. It’s extremely thematic to the spec identity by this point and I think it works well with the Holy Note system since you can leave a target with Guardian Spirit to die while you work on other targets with Holy Notes in the meantime.
Hymn of Hope (Not Symbol, change it back) can also stay because its raid and PvP utility is interesting and works collaboratively with other healers and DPS. A good singer should strengthen and work off those around them, right? It works thematically with this Bard theming we’ve got going on. Plus, having to drop it isn’t nearly as painful as having to quit Divine Hymn early. Speaking of which.
The first thing to change is Divine Hymn itself! Sure, on paper it feels very Holyish and it’s certainly quite powerful but ask any Holy Priest what its main flaw is and they won’t hesitate to tell you. You can’t move and nothing is stopping it from being interrupted from an interrupt, a knockback, a stun, or a pull, etc. There are so many instances I can think of where I wanted to press it so badly but I knew it would do more harm than good. Added that it’s often a dead button for me if I ever decide to try using Holy for PvP since in the rare event that I’m not being trained or chain CC’d, it’s so AOE-focused that it often isn’t strong enough to help anyone outside of a Battleground from behind a rock. It requires a PvP talent to make it more worthwhile which is very seldomly picked anyway.
I had a thought after playing Discipline for a while and having Ultimate Penitence available to me. It’s an incredibly fun spell that does a boatload of healing and/or damage while making you immune to CC effects and giving you a huge absorb shield to delay damage to yourself. It’s balanced by having a long cooldown that you can reduce but only by talenting into the following nodes in the tree.
I can’t be the only one who’s noticed that Divine Hymn is basically Ultimate Penitence but drastically weakened and less cool looking to boot.
My idea was to give it the same ‘un-crowd-controllable’ effect as Ultimate Penitence and make it do generally increased healing instead of a stacking effect to increase further healing afterward. The new ‘gimmick’ of it would either be that it would either expel enemies from within a certain radius once, like Anduin’s big bubble of light from the cinematic, or gently push enemies back from the priest as the center point. This would not completely negate adds or an enemy player’s walking speed having any forward momentum, but it would definitely aid in players trying to kite adds when they’re dying or from enemy players in PvP where that little extra distance would make the difference, and would also reward the priests choice in a central location. You could inadvertently push enemies INTO players, after all.
To top all of this off, I would prefer to have this ability further down in the tree to make it feel a bit more impactful of a choice rather than ‘almost’ mandatory’ where it is smack bang in the middle. A lot of spells in talent trees that are sat dead center in the tree feel like they're meant to be picked and I feel like Guardian Spirit should be where Divine Hymn is at the moment, not as close to the level 10 talents as it is currently. For example, Soul Swap for Affliction Warlocks, Invoke Yu’lon/Chi’ji for Mistweaver, Dancing Rune Weapon for Blood Death Knights, and Pillar of Frost for Frost Death Knights. I could go on but the list is pretty exhaustive.
Another thing I would like to change is very synonymous with Holy Priests but something that I think, overall, doesn’t see as much use as we’d like. Primarily because it relies on the priest dying.
Spirit of Redemption is a cool spell, the problem is that unless you take the capstone talent to make you revive afterward or you take the PVP talent to make it into a cooldown in PvP, you don’t really ‘want’ to trigger its activation requirements or have a reliable way of doing so in PvE when you want its effects. I do enjoy that now it allows you to resurrect an ally if you die so someone else can continue the fight but it’s more of a consolation prize or at worst, a reward for bad skill expression. It is also basically a required talent in Solo Shuffle as, if the priest dies, your teammates have 15 seconds to get a kill of their own to win the match or you take the PvP talent as a way more powerful cooldown.
What I would like to do is make the Spirit of Redemption a bigger cooldown spell but give it an obscenely long cooldown so you cannot feasibly use it more than once per fight. Like the Holy Word: Salvation spell without the possibility of cooldown reduction. Because you are losing it upon death, the gimmick here would be that it would last the full 15 seconds, you don’t use mana while casting and you can resurrect a party member instantly in that form(Outside of PvP). This would make the spell more central to the spec rather than as an add-on, free up a PvP talent choice node, and make the battle resurrection more readily available rather than having to wait for your death to use it.
Another such spell we could make SO much more interesting is Divine Star. The one people don’t like taking because who the hell doesn’t WANT to take Halo, right? Whether it’s effective in whatever format you’re playing in, it’s much more visually interesting and it just FEELS powerful, y’know?
Now to fix this, I’m going to do none of the work and instead do what Blizzard should have done by taking an idea from their own IP…Anduin’s Divine Star in Heroes of the Storm!
Yeah, I know they’ve stopped doing anything with HoTS but still…
In HoTS, it has had a bunch of effects over its tenure depending on the talents you take and most of them would make the spell more interesting in WoW. Maybe when it comes back to the priest, it could explode and heal party members or deal damage as Shadow near the priest since you’re already in close range due to the nature of the spell. Maybe it doesn’t even buff up the healing of the actual spell itself and instead interacts with your other heals by producing a stacking buff per enemy/ally you hit that increases the power of your next Flash Heal or Mind Blast?
We can also improve the lackluster mobility of the Holy Priest outside of always picking Angelic Feather by giving them the reverse Leap of Faith Glyph back as a choice node between the normal Leap of Faith.
The ability to jump to your allies was a worthwhile drawback to not being able to troll people as hard with the Leap of Faith ability when Glyphs were a thing and frankly, I miss it. I find that sometimes I’d rather be able to jump into the fray, especially as a class with an AoE fear effect, and the regular leap of faith doesn’t reward that playstyle as much. I remember back in Shadowlands that having Door of Shadows to jump in, disorient them with the covenant effect, and then Psychic Scream before running back out was actually really interesting and it’s one of the only things I miss from that expansion.
In terms of a new name instead of being a glyph, our new ability “Light Transposition“ will cause you to fly to your friend’s location just like old times. Stick it on a choice node with Leap of Faith and you have two differing playstyles almost immediately.
Now a major problem all healers have to contend with, especially to compete with the Meta of Discipline Priests and Holy Paladins, is providing some level of damage.
Not gonna lie, this is where I’m not sure about this idea since I already don’t ‘love’ the idea of healer’s DPSing and having to work around the base spells of the class now that they’ve been reintroduced has made this a little clunky so I’d love some other suggestions for this part. I’d prefer that healers offered utility that DPS do not have access to rather than extra damage but that seems to be the direction Blizzard is rolling in. Frankly, at the moment, Smite and Holy Fire interact with very little of the Holy toolkit outside of Chastise and Empyreal Blaze and we also have Shadow Word: Pain and Mind Blast. I fear that they will all just be tacked on to the toolbar with no thought and we’ll just have this myriad of spells to randomly fire off when we’re bored.
Personally, as a basic idea, I would consider removing Holy Fire as a button as, in the theme of removing bloat that War Within seems to be addressing, I think having Holy Fire as an add-on effect in the same way as the Monk’s Chi Wave is being remade would be ideal. It could function in the same way as Holy Note in that every three casts of smite would bring down a blast of Holy Fire which would give way to being justified in making Holy Fire feel a bit more impactful. Mind Blast could be used within this to ‘erupt’ the Holy Fire DoT, causing an effect I think I’d like to call “Discordant Notes” on account of mixing the void with the light which would either do additional damage or perhaps cause an extra effect like a slow or AoE damage around the target.
With this in mind, Empyreal Blaze could remain as a talent and cause Smite to proc Holy Fire two additional times when it next triggers its chord effect. Shadow Word: Pain would likely exist as just an extra DoT you can throw on as it is now or it could be applied through Mind Blast to clear up more bar space.
Anyway, those are just some thoughts I’ve had. I’m sure there are flaws in them and I’m looking forward to hearing them but I hope you found them fun to theorise around!

Morning everyone,
I posted previously asking the question about a failover solution for my EPL layer 2, BGP was recommended.
I'm reaching out to vendors to ask the question as well, and the feedback I'm getting is that I'm using legacy technology being on an EPL, and everyone uses the newer SD-WAN technology. I was honestly shocked to hear this! What is your take on using SD-WAN vs. EPL services?
I have run SD-WAN previously, we have 3 sites, all our infrastructure exists in 1 site so the resources my remote sites needs are either in the cloud or in the corporate office. My issue with SD-WAN was that the latency would at random be very high, 90-120ms response times. Other times the speeds would be inconsistent. It wasn't this way all the time, but it happened enough that it was frustrating for the end users. We used to have Peplink routers at each location, with fibemetro-E shared with coax. Years ago, installing an MPLS or EPL was very very expensive and something we couldn't pursue/afford. In the last 5-7 years, the costs have gone down and continue to drop.
Our EPL services cost around $2,400/month to connect our 3 sites via 1GB at one site, and 100MB at the other. Speed is based on the # of employees we have at each site. The speed is excellent, and latency is low. It allows me to have a DR site to replicate our corporate infrastructure to in a reasonable amount of time. The drawback is, it relies on the Comcast fiber - if that's down, I'm down. In the last 5 years, it's been down for 6 hours and it wasn't even their fault.
I'm open to being wrong, it wouldn't be the first time. Is SD-WAN the way to go? or is my vendor just trying to sell me on $30k worth of equipment + implementation?

I’m looking to have tummy tuck, breast lift and implants and possibly lipo. I can go anywhere for this, however I am really struggling to know how to go about it. I am originally from UK which I understand to have high standards of care, but I’m currently in SE Asia so anywhere is a possibility and I can stay for longer than the operation to receive the after care etc. I have looked at Turkey, Bali, thailand and UK so far, the language barrier and potential to be ‘scammed/botched’ worries me and I’d rather pay more for peace of mind. How can I find a surgeon who specialises in mommy make overs? Any help or advice regarding countries or even surgeons would be much appreciated!

A little plot convinient coincidence never hurt anyone.
First
You know the drill: credit to SpacePaladin15 for the universe.
Thank you JulianSkies for proofreading.
Memory Transcription Subject: Gillab, Gojid Citizen, Husband and Father
Date [Standardized Human Time]: March 27, 2142
It was early in the morning, birds were chirping, and the air was still chilled from the night. It was a comfortable morning, especially considering what had happened yesterday. I could still feel the leftovers of a hangover in the back of my head, but it was more than manageable for me. A small headache like that wouldn’t stop me from visiting the memorial.
I still had a ways to walk before I got there, but I didn’t mind. It just let me take in the beauty of the new New York City that had been built. Even if I wasn’t a Human, I felt a sense of pride at the sight of the glistening towers and the clean streets. Despite only playing a minor role in the clean-up and reconstruction, it was certainly enough for me to feel that I had contributed enough to take pride in it.
I still cannot believe I ever even thought of hating Humans, the fact that I did still disgust me to this day. I wasn’t alone in that mindset either, billions of former soldiers, exterminators, or Human-phobes had woken up to the reality, with tens of thousands of them moving to Earth and trying to repay the Humans what they had taken. Many of them still struggled with coming to terms with their past.
It was because of them that I could become a husband to the most beautiful Gojid in the universe and father to the most rambunctious one. Without their help on the Cradle, I would have died long ago and never have been able to even see the love of my life. They inspired me to become more than just a father and husband, I was going to become just like them.
In my free time, I often worked for charities, volunteered for clean-ups, and tried my hand as a substitute teacher. Even if I wasn’t the best at it, I still enjoyed doing them. It let me feel like I was making a difference in the world, continuing the legacy that the Humans had set up. I would save as many people as I could, just like the person who saved me.
I had lost track of Billy ever since the Cradle, and the one time I had heard about him was from Naeriu telling me how Billy ended up surviving in a cabin in Alaska. It wasn’t like I didn’t try to find him, but it was a big universe, and finding one soldier seemingly determined not to be found made it frustratingly difficult.
After six years of on-and-off searching, I had finally given up on him. I had searched for his name several times on every memorial I could find, desperately hoping to find some sort of closure on his life, but in the end I was left clueless as to the fate of the man who did so much for me.
I sighed the thoughts out of my head, not wanting to have such a negative mindset when I was trying to visit some friends.
I passed under the familiar arch, taking a deep breath of the salty air as I did. After the bombs fell, the crater left behind quickly flooded with ocean water. The near-perfect bowl had become a new habitat for all manner of sea life, a symbol of how even the worst tragedy could be overcome. Surrounding the crater was a ring of stone walls, divided into sections corresponding to when and where a soldier was killed or went missing.
I navigated the massive monument with familiarity, having visited it many times before. I’ve always preferred to visit the day after the holiday, it was always almost empty as people had their fill the day before. Every year or so someone would have a similar idea to me, but it never drew from the experience.
And speaking of, a single man was standing in the exact spot I preferred to stand in. In one of his hands was a bag with the top of a bottle poking out and his other was clenched into a tight fist, his eyes were clenched tightly, his face was strained in pain and profound sadness. You didn’t need to be a detective to know that this man was hurting, whether for lost brethren in arms, lost biological brethren, or simply overwhelming sadness from the loss of life, this man was hurting.
I considered leaving the disheveled man to his devices, but some deep part of my mind told me to talk to him. He didn’t turn to face me as I got closer, he didn’t even open his eyes. It was as if nothing outside of his mind was real to him and it could all be ignored.
“Excuse me? Sir? Are you visiting someone you know?”
He still ignored me, but he loosened the death grip he had on his fist.
“It’s fine if you don’t tell me, but I find that it helps to talk about your feelings with someone else. Even if that someone else is an alien.”
Slowly the man opened his eyes and sluggishly turned to face me. Still, he refused to speak.
“It’s fine if you don’t want to speak, I can stay quiet. But if you won’t stop me, I’d like to speak at you. You don’t have to respond, sometimes it’s better to just listen anyway.”
To my surprise, the man actually spoke. His voice was rough and sad, matching the image in front of me. “Why are you here?”
I smiled and turned to face the wall of names. “I’m visiting some old friends, people who saved my life.”
I pointed a claw at the names. “Owen Oak and James Kle are the ones that I know here, but I know more at other points along the wall. Who did you know?”
The man was silent for a moment. “The same people.”
“Really? How did you know them?”
“I was a soldier. I worked with them.”
I started to nod when a thought flashed through my mind. If he knew the soldiers who worked with Billy, maybe he knew Billy himself. It didn’t seem like a stretch in my eyes, they were all part of the same squad after all.
So, despite having given up on actively searching for Billy, I decided to ask the question. “If you don’t mind me asking, do you maybe know a soldier named Billy Marsh?”
“That’s me.”
I blinked. “W-what?”
“I’m Billy Marsh.”
I stepped back and looked the man up and down. As I did, he finally looked me in the eyes. Once I saw his eyes, the color and shape, I knew with all my heart that this man was Billy Marsh. Even with the scraggly hair, patchy beard, dirty clothes, and brown-bagged drink in hand, there was no mistaking the eyes of the man who saved my life.
“Holy shit… It really is you.”
Billy took a deep drink of his liquor, barely flinching from what I could now see was Venlilian alcohol. He must have been drinking it frequently to be so used to the burning, and judging from his appearance that was no stretch.
“Yeah, it’s me. Billy Marsh, Human trash and parasite to the world.”
My mind tumbled at the words, causing me to stutter and hold out a claw in surprise. “N-now wait a second. You are anything but Human trash or a parasite. You’re a hero Billy, I know for a fact. You saved my life!”
“I’m no hero. I’ve killed so many others. It would have been better off if I never joined the military, maybe more lives could have been saved. Maybe Owen’s life could have been saved.”
He took another gulp of his drink as I spoke. “Now hold on, you saved plenty of-”
Alcohol spilled onto his shirt as he yelled. “I didn’t save anyone! Someone else could have saved so many more lives than I could! At the end of it all, when all was said and done, I was an idealistic fool and a failure and a horrible person. I’ve ended up killing more people than I’ve saved, and I’ve ruined so many lives.”
I took a stand. “Now that’s blatantly not true. Who’s telling you this? Billy, you are one of the kindest, most caring people I have ever met.”
“Was. I was one of the kindest and most caring. And you want to know why? It was because I hadn’t been woken up to just how terrible the universe really was. I mean, what could one young, dumb soldier do in the grand scheme, right? If I really wanted to help, I should have become a doctor or a fucking politician, right? But I chose to be a soldier, a useless fucking pawn that wasn’t even good at its job.”
He took another drink as I stood stunned at who Billy had become. I never could have expected the valiant, patient, caring soldier to become so volatile and angry. I had to help him. I don’t care if I have to miss a few classes, I’m rescuing this man from himself.
“Billy, can I visit sometime soon?”
He spilled a little alcohol as he pulled the bottle away quickly. “Fuck no. I don’t need to ruin your life too. Stay the hell away from me, I’m like a fucking bomb. You are just going to get hurt, it’s a miracle you didn’t the first time.”
“Well if you’re a bomb, then I’m going to disarm you. I don’t know how long you have been like this, but I’m going to heal you.”
He pointed a finger at my chest. “Then I’m just going to fight back. I’m not letting you anywhere near me.”
I pointed right back. “You don’t get to make that decision. It’s my life, and I am choosing to help you.”
“You are going to regret it. I say that with one hundred percent absolute certainty.”
“We won't know until we try.”
Billy took a step back, placed a hand on his head and growled. “You know what? Fine. Try your luck. It’s your life, right? But when you see just how helpless you are to help me, don’t expect to get your wasted time back. I don’t know what you think you can do, but give it a try! It’s still early in the morning, so why don’t we head on back to my place so you can work whatever magic you think you have.”
Billy didn’t wait for a response and stormed off to the exit without another word. I watched him for a long moment before sighing deeply. I don’t know the exact details of what happened to him, but with what Naeriu told me and the names on the memorial I could piece together some vague details. It sounded like Billy had gone through hell, and now he thinks he deserves it.
I clenched my claw in determination before jogging to catch up to Billy. I had some calls to make on the way over to his house knowing just how much work I was going to have to do to help the man who saved me.

So our 7-year old bulldog died Monday while my wife and I were in NYC for our 20th. George was an athletic breed English bulldog, with a less smushed face, not lethargic and overweight. We previously had a bulldog like him and he lived 12 years. George was very energetic for a bulldog from a young age though he had slowed a little at 7. Since November he started having a lot of skin issues. Then last month he started skipping meals and losing weight. We took him to our longtime vet multiple times and they were testing him, trying things. We changed to home cooked chicken and rice and he ate that vigorously. Whole new bunch of medication including steroids. He seemed to be improving with this regimen. Then later this Sunday night he was panting a fair amount and the kids and my mom (watching them) called us. Panting was somewhat normal for him and that was the only issue so we waited to call the vet in the morning. Overnight he threw up near his bed. He’s always been a sometime puker so this alone was no that alarming. But we called the vet office and no vet was available, all booked and too busy to talk to us. The phone tech supposedly checked with the vet and they said they would call us back with an appointment time later in the day. Then 30 minutes or so later George threw up again this time with some blood in it and he was panting. Not a lot of blood but some. We called the vet again. Same response - vets too busy to talk to us but the phone tech supposedly interrupted and checked with a vet. The tech said a vet will call us back later. They did not say bring him in now. They did not say take him to another vet or a vet ER. In my estimation now, they were too busy to give us the time of day. But we relied on their “judgment” that waiting was OK. 45 minutes passed and nobody from the vet called us back. Then as my son was cleaning up the puke and with George he seized and died. They did rush him to the vet at that point but he was gone. I feel like we made a mistake in not taking him sooner. But we relied on our vets to some degree. I feel like they should have advised we bring him in immediately. I feel they failed us. Part of the problem was we were out of town. Our normal vet also was not there. So we had two vets on duty that didn’t know him. I feel like they were too busy and brushed off the situation and now George is dead maybe because of this. Am I wrong?

Hello all,
31F, London UK. Have had life-long back issues but sciatica in right leg and inability to walk/sleep lying down has plagued me since my back 'went' back in March this year.
I'm due to have surgery this Friday on a "large caudally extruded disc herniation at L3/4".
I also have broad based disc protrusion and moderate spinal stenosis at L4/5, but I was booked in for just an endoscopic discectomy upon being referred to another surgeon (I requested this simply because my original surgeon couldn't operate on me for over 7 weeks, and I am in too much pain and concerned about my job).
My new surgeon wanted to decompress L4/5 too, but as mentioned, the theatre booking this Friday was made simply for one under sedation and he said to do both would require longer and general anaesthetic (which he would only be able to do in late June - meaning I might have been better sticking with original surgeon who was gonna do it all in one go in the non-endoscopic way)
I asked him to just do the L3/4 to alleviate some of the pain, so that's what is happening. He said we can do the L4/5 to help the stenosis (?) later on.
Questions!

1. How is it with sedation? I almost think I would prefer general anaesthetic... will I be aware of what's going on? Or asleep?
2. Has anyone else 'split' these surgeries up?
3. Bit worried that endoscopic is less effective?

Apologies if any of this is medically wrong and I sound stupid - feel like I've been all over the place with different advice. Just want this agony gone and to be able to walk again :(

I made this chart to keep my sanity. Anyone notice similar with their NPD parent? Anyone track her moods or how she impacts your day? ——
THE BAD MOMMY MOOD CHART
😇 GOOD MOMMY Seemingly happy, quasi supportive. Must want something.
😗 NEUTRAL. Not angry or ingratiating. Keeping to herself, but when we come together she is not too negative.
😠 BASELINE Bitching about the world and cranky. Speaking in nasally monotone. No inflection. SIGHING. and blowing nose.
😡 LEVEL 1 AGITATION Tone has escalated. Something has triggered her. Some minor stressor, like I moved her cheese. Dropping the f-bomb, but not consistently.
🤬 LEVEL 2 ANGER Tone has gone up two notches. Every other word is, “fuck” or “fucking.” Lasts 5-10 min.
🤬🤯 RAGE EPISODE No control over her anger. She is in a full-on rage episode. She is pacing and screaming at the top of her lungs. She is cursing her life. She is cursing me and everything I do. She might cry. She is melting down. Lasts for at least 10 minutes.
——-
TYPE OF DAY CHART
⛅️ GOOD Laughs, smiles
☁️ GREY BASELINE General irritability and assured pessimism. Has made some critical comment directed at me or my behavior. She has shamed me, or shut me down, but it was an isolated incident that didn’t escalate.
🌨️ BAD Some type of argument. Critical, baiting, some problem with some service or person. She doesn’t want the neighbors to (hear me defend myself). She will contradict everything I say or suggest. She will do or say something to undermine my self-confidence and self-efficacy.
🌨️🌪️🌨️ KNOCKDOWN I have gotten an email or lecture about how wrong, difficult or mentally ill I am. She won’t take it anymore. I must have attempted to defend myself against her abuse. I am being shamed and excoriated. She’s probably already told one of the neighbors the yelling was about how troubled I am.
❄️ AWFUL I am being shut out, punished. Silent treatment. Seething anger. This chill sometimes lasts 3 days.
🌚 UNBEARABLE She is RAGING. She might threaten to kill me.

He told me how a hostel mafia incited the people around him and his acquaintances in that area against him to satisfy his ego and prove him wrong. Tell me, how will a student who has gone to study from his home handle the politics of these hostel mafias? So my friend left that area after some time.

I 21F have been dating my boyfriend 21M for just under 2 years
I want to start this by saying I know snooping through phones is wrong and I feel really guilty for it but here’s kind of my explanation of why I did it
Me and my boyfriend have quite a large Friend group. There’s one girl in this group that quite often makes little comments like how attractive my boyfriend is and how I shouldn’t worry about her and his relationship because they’re just really really close friends. There was also one instance where we slept together and she just happened to sleepwalk into the room while we were doing it but it just sounded like a big coincidence how time it was.
I’ve brought the fact up that I’m uncomfortable with him speaking to her a few times, but I’ve never said that I want him to stop speaking to her because I don’t want to be that controlling kind of person but my brain got the best of me so he was at the gym to see if there was anything that she had been saying that was kind of crossing the lines a bit I looked on Snapchat and there wasn’t too much to find. There was one video where she sent a photo of her ass and said oh my God remember how small my bum used to be what she just kind of shot down and said that he wasn’t looking there and it was kind of brushed off and but apart from that there’s only one or two small little things that like friends would send to each other. I wasn’t too concerned although I would prefer he didn’t send them to her, then but when I was on there, I found something else that has upset me
So the girl in the friend group really isn’t as much of an issue that was all resolved but while on text I saw a message from a girl he was speaking to while me and him were still speaking.
(to fill in on the history at this point I had known him for six months three of those I’ve been actively flirting and admitting my feelings and he was reciprocating that that’s what it’s kind of the speaking phase)
I looked through some of their messages and a lot of the flirting he was doing with her sounded very similar to the flirting he was doing with with me at that time I know we weren’t dating so it’s not that big of a deal that he was speaking to someone else test all your options But the bit that upset me as well we were away on a group holiday. There was about 20 of us away me and him slept together (I was his first) and and after that seven of them continued travelling while the rest of us went home once he got back to the UK he then messaged this girl saying that he had got back and hope she was doing well with a x on the end
Fast forward nearly 2 years I’ve gone on to look on his phone and saw this messages. There’s been no contact after that message he had said after we slept together, but I’m still the fact that he had her after we had slept together and the fact that she didn’t reply I don’t know if he , chose not to speak to her or he just chose me because she didn’t reply
So my question is should I tell him that on his phone so should I bring up the fact that the girl in her friend group has been a bit flurry and I don’t like it or should I bring up the fact that he was still speaking to a girl when we were sleeping together before we got together or should I just let bygones be bygones since it was two years ago even though knowing this information is driving me a bit crazy
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TL; DR my boyfriend was flirting with another girl after we slept together for the first time (he was a virgin and we weren’t dating yet) but hurt as he told me he wasn’t speaking to anyone
Should I tell him I know ?

I had my MA 3 months ago and my period is not the same. I wonder if anyone else is going through this. Every time i get it now it’s so bad. My mental health is horrible the pain is insane and so is the bleeding & bloating. i feel like there is something wrong with me. What is bugging me the most is how depressed I feel kind of the same way I felt when I was pregnant. I’ve had sleepless nights, feeling hopeless like nothing will change. which is strange because in my day to day life i tend to be a happy and calm person. this is my second period and these feelings just intensify. If anyone else has gone or is going through a similar issue what have you taken to help fix it or did you go see a doctor?