How do you do smiley faces on samsung phones

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my boyfriend (18m) and i (17f) dated for a little over 5 months and we’ve been have the same constant issues over and over again. he believes that a girl with no past is the best woman to date, however i have my own past (i never had bodies) that happened along the way. he has never dated in his life btw
he lets his obsession take over the fact that i had ex boyfriends or talking stages. i had a couple guy friends that i’ve known for a long time before him i met him but he didn’t like them so i blocked them. i cleaned my contacts list so there wouldn’t be any guy issues anymore. but there was one problem from my side: i tend to hide or sugarcoat too much stuff where it became a lie. so whenever he asked about, i didn’t want to hurt his feelings because he would get very sad over it and i hid things from him. i lied thinking about the short term relief when i knew for a fact that it was going to get found out. he kept looking through my phone (im not saying that it’s wrong for him to do so), and i don’t cheat. i never cheated on my man, but just my past really gets in between us. he says that he was saving himself up for me because he just knew that i was going to appear in his life (..?) but i would’ve also done that if i knew that he was going to too.
we got in a extremely large fight a couple days ago and it was really bad. especially because he asked for my social passwords, he dug up everything about my past that he could find. he called me names, said how i ruined him and i didn’t know what to do but be overly devastated, starve, and sob on the floor until i passed out with numerous panic attacks. i knew that he didn’t mean those things and i did something that was wrong by lying so we decided to apologize and avoid any problems. but today, he asked for my socials password (i changed it from before) but i couldn’t reject so i gave it to him. but he found two screenshots with a “friend” that liked me (it’s in quotations because he was a stalker). back then i was very friendly with everyone and i just accepted it until i found out that he liked me and was stalking me. i did sometimes laugh about the texts that we give and took because they were nice, but i didn’t have feelings for him whatsoever. but what he would’ve been most upset about was the fact that it was around two weeks before he texted me first and started talking.
he always emphasized on me that he never believes anything that i said about my past (which i understand) and that he’ll never trust me completely after we both leaves for college (long distance). however after finding that out, he blocked me on everything you can imagine without letting me able to explain (insta, tiktok, messages) i downloaded snap jst for him yesterday but he blocked me on that too. i don’t know what to do, or how i should do things. i know im being selfish for wanting this relationship to work but i have a feeling that it’s really going to end and im scared. i really want him to not leave me because of a stalker i didn’t like back. i was in the process of holding down my ego and telling him the truth on everything about my past because i couldn’t do it overnight. i really wanted to change just for him and our relationship but i don’t even know how to contact him.
its his birthday today and i was supposed to go over.. he said not to come but i feel like we should be talking this out face to face. i really don’t know what to do, do i need to just let the breakup happen and let him go or do i need to go over to him to try to talk it out one last time? is this even right?

Context: Website, html/js/css, React to help format/interface html+js, Express backend (should be completely irrelevant)
Devices: Win10 laptop w/standard 5-button mouse (MS Edge latest), samsung phone (android 12, google chrome mobile latest)
Event: When you scroll, it isn't an instantaneous event, it scrolls for half a second to a few seconds depending how fast the scroll is (and how long the focused elements scrollable content is). This is actually represented by several onscroll events of varying distance, usually farther distances towards the middle of the scroll event sequence.
Goal: I have a title bar on my site; when a user scrolls down I want to hide it, when they scroll up I want to show it. This part works fine. I also want to cancel the event so its easier to hide the menu on scroll without actually pushing any content off the top of the screen. This works fine in 2 conditions: I set the disable timer to be very long (undesirable as it makes me impatient quite quickly), or the disable timer is short, but I only do a small scroll for the start (realistically fine, if they do a big scroll they clearly want to go down, but it flickers a lot during the transition period between the top and bottom of the scroll event).
Is there a way to clear all queued scroll events caused by a single swipe or push of the scroll wheel? I'm realizing the feasible option may be to just show it when scrolled all the way up and otherwise hide it.

I had Xiaomi and Poco in almost all my phones but I feel with the F6 everything "different".
Some examples are that I have to be careful on how I scroll down the notifications to not enter the settings, the ways to look for apps, not being able to reduce blue light...
Maybe It is because I come from a Samsung but my Poco X3 was a total beast without any problems.
I'm sure i'm no the only one Who feels that everything is different.
What customizations did Poco F6 users to enjoy a better experience? Do you find any things that could be better just as I think?
Hoping for your answers.
Thanks

On another rewatch and I'm up to episode 5 called "Reality Bites Me." I originally started watching as an adult so I never understood the Ezria appeal. I always thought they were boring and ridiculous. That's how they were written so that alone tells me the writers weren't saying their relationship was good. But it wasn't until my latest rewatch of this episode that I saw the writers really did write Ezra as a grooming creepy asshole. This is the one after Harvey talks to Ezra about how inappropriate the relationship is and then Ezra and Aria "argue," with how right they are for each other and age is just a number and let's just go on what we feel. This is why I found the relationship so boring because this was pretty much every conversation between the two. But it really struck me here, how Ezra was basically playing Aria in away that made her beg for the relationship. His acting so conflicted was just a big manipulation to get her ( a sixteen year old) to beg for their relationship, nvm the consequences. And then when she returns for her phone, the writers, are very clear with Ezra’s manipulations "I thought you were mature enough to handle this. Do you know what would happen to me if YOU let this get out?" And he was so effing creepy when saying these lines. So to me, the writers did not condone their relationship with how they wrote Ezria. They just did not have consequences viewers would expect (jail for Ezra, counseling or at least acknowledged victimhood by Aria). But that was no different than the rest of PLL. There were rarely typical consequences for the characters' actions. It was one of my favorite things about the show. It made it stand out from what I grew up watching where everything was tied up in a nice bow by the end of the episodes, the moral of the story was clearly spelled out, and the bad guys always lost. Its ironic because this messiness is so much truer to real life than shows I've seen, yet this same show has teenagers defusing bombs, coming back from the dead, evil twins, masks of their faces in ceramic and Mission Impossible material. I love it!

I, F(16), and my mother, F(60) treats me + my brother, M(25) like a punching bag. Not physically, but mentally.
My mom has been going through a lot, such as having 3k stolen from her, and her aunt wanting to kill herself due to how old she's getting. (Recently, she broke her pelvis and her hip, and broke something again while my mom and her are in Ireland.) My mom, over the phone, gripes at me and my boyfriend for a HICKEY ON MY FUCKING FACE. Sure, I'd be mad at my daughter, too, but it's a lot worse than that. She told him that she's sending me to my father's (she threatens that a lot.) and she knows that I don't like it there. (For instance, my father's side of the family forgot my birthday almost entirely, and my father treats me like a literal prisoner due to him being a cop.) And she didn't even mention that she was mad at me, she only called my boyfriend about it. Oh, and not to mention that it was a FUCKING TOY that gave me the hickey on my cheek. On accident. I swear to God lol.
A few days prior, my mother got into an argument with my brother about something that happened years ago, before or just after he was an adult. To add detail, my mom was low on salt (from what she says), and had a seizure on the couch when he was home. He called 911, and she went to the hospital. Now, apparently, my brother said rude things to her while she was in the hospital that he doesn't remember. She called him, from Ireland, to talk about it because she had nothing else to get onto him about. (My brother has been watching me since she went on that trip.) My brother didn't remember that happening, and he asked her to "Just remember. You were in the room, weren't you?" (She has memory issues, and sometimes I think that she creates false memories in her head.) My brother also mentioned that he thought it was unfair for her to tell himself to remember, but she can't do it for herself.
I'm just like, at a loss on what to do atp. Like she just keeps doing ts. First, she puts my life in danger (read my other reddit posts for more info, but tldr, she tried to kill me as her car was catching fire w us inside when she was drunk) and then ontop of that she makes me feel like shit all of the time?
I just wanted to vent. Ik nothing can really help my case atp, lol.

My hands are trembling to the point where I've had to restart this several times. I'm a guy who doesn't scare easily, but this encounter has me shaking like a hit dog. I'm still sitting in my work truck, trying to work up the courage to step outside again. Worse, I'm trying to figure out how I'm going to tell my boss what happened. I was already on thin ice with him, and this shit might cause me to break through to the freezing water below.
But fuck it, because this was weird.
I install cable for a living. I didn't have dreams of stringing cable when I was a little kid, but my previous life choices left me with few options. In high school, I fell in with the wrong crowd. It started with skipping school, sneaking alcohol at weekend parties, and some petty theft, but it didn't stay that way for long. Soon, I dropped out and dedicated my life to committing robberies to pay for my pill addiction. I wasn't living as much as I was running on a treadmill. I did whatever I could to stay on my feet but constantly felt myself slipping.
My bottom came when I was jumped by two guys who sold me pills. I had bought from them before and trusted them, but the feeling was not mutual. Someone had dimed a buddy of theirs out to the police, and he was looking at real jail time. They assumed it was me and beat me senseless.
I was greeted at the door with a punch to the jaw that sent me reeling. My brain, already addled and slowed by Oxi, was in the middle of putting together what was happening when the next punch caught me in the temple. I collapsed to the ground and covered my neck and face as best as I could. The next few minutes were a flurry of punches, kicks, and stomps. When it was all over, I had a broken jaw, a shattered wrist, several wounds that required fifty total stitches, and a concussion.
That's how I kicked my painkiller addiction.
I can joke now, but the next six months were the hardest in my life. The withdrawals I had were the worst thing I've ever experienced. Having them while I was recuperating from my injuries was a circle of hell I didn't think existed. I wanted to die most days and felt lost in the darkness. But sobriety was the beacon on the horizon. Even during my darkest moments, I could still see the fuzzy spark of white light off in the distance. It kept me going. Six months from my beat-down day, I came out the other side healthier but weaker.
I needed a job but had limited skills. Thankfully, I had a former pill buddy who managed to keep steady employment with the cable company. We always got along, and he called in a few favors and hooked me up. I got hired, but it was a struggle. Not the work, which was easy to learn, but dealing with the public without telling them to fuck off. Worse, was trying to avoid the flood of illegal substances that are around you at all times. Customers will offer you weed or pills for all the channels, or bored co-workers will have something to "make the day pass by." It's a lot to dodge, especially if you're in recovery. Whenever I felt the itch again, I'd feel the scar tissue from my wrist surgery, and the itch would pass.
The last week has been one of those "Shit, is it Friday yet?" weeks that seem to be growing in frequency these days. I don't want to bore you with the details, but needless to say, most nights, I needed to reach out to my sponsor and have them talk me off the ledge. We recently had a turnover at the executive level, and my new boss Rory was a tremendous cock. A rager at levels science hasn't ever seen before. Just the worst dude imaginable.
Part of Rory's new crusade was coming in and firing a bunch of guys. The company called it "checking for redundancies in the labor force," but we all knew what it was. He was picking off two classes of people: high earners and guys with spotty pasts. I was in the latter group and imagined it was just a matter of time before my number got pulled. I was on pins and needles all week. I made sure I was the greatest cable installer you'd ever meet. So far, I was getting high marks but the forced joviality was wearing thin.
It's safe to say my joy had left on a one-way ticket. I have no clue when—or if—she'd return.
Back to this shit. I had just finished up my last job of the day when my work phone started buzzing. I cursed and thought about not answering, but the threat of unemployment loomed too large for me to do that. I picked up and knew from the jump my day was far from over. Denise from dispatch asked if I could cover a job left hanging because of "scheduling conflicts" (see: the original installer had been let go). It was near where I was and was a simple install.
I gritted my teeth and agreed. I liked Denise and knew she was worried about the hammer falling on her, too. She thanked me profusely, and promised to bring me cookies tomorrow. Since she's a hellcat in the kitchen and getting close to a dispatcher never hurts, I said no worries. I hung up, balled up my jacket, and screamed into it. I felt better after that.
981 Maple Street was about five minutes away, but it felt like a world away. Maple Street was at the end of the neighborhood where large swaths of grass fields faded into a thicket of woods. The woods rose up into the foothills until they graduated to mountains. To borrow a phrase from Shel Silverstein, the house resided where the sidewalk ends.
The house, an off-white birdhouse ranch type, was a little run-down but no worse than any of the others that populated this neighborhood. This place had been hit hard by economic times, and property values had plummeted. It was slowly recovering. In five years, this would be a place most current residents wouldn’t be able to afford. The front yard had a large oak tree that looked amazing but had killed the grass under its canopy. The rest of the yard looked well cared for.
I knocked and heard a few voices talking on the other side of the door. It opened, and a man in his late 40s stood there with a steaming cup of coffee in one hand. He was tall and thin, save for a middle-aged paunch. His face was starting to crinkle at the edges, but he was southern California middle-aged, which meant he was holding up pretty well. He did look tired, though—the bags under his eyes were full-on steamer trunks.
"You with the cable company?" he asked, knowing I was.
I nodded. "You requested an install, right?"
"Yes, I did. Please, come in."
He opened the door wide, and I walked in. The house was pretty bare with a bachelor pad aesthetic. That didn't make much sense since I heard a female voice talking to him. I assumed it was his wife. I believe in a lot of wild shit, but to think that a wife would be fine with their house decorated like a 23-year-old bachelor lived there was a bridge too far.
"I'm Tom," the guy said, extending his hand. I shook it. "What did you need from my end?"
"Do you know if there was a previous hookup here?"
"Ugh, yeah. There is one in this room and another in the back bedroom."
"Okay. I should put the modem in a spot that'll hit the whole house. The signal can get wonky if it's in a room behind a wall or bricks or anything."
"This room is probably the best spot then," he said.
"Perfect. I have to get under the house, check the old connections, and replace some parts. Where's your hatch to get under the house?"
"Oh, it's around back. You can exit out this side door and walk through the backyard. It's on the eastern side. You might need a screwdriver to remove the grate. Do you need one?"
I pulled a screwdriver from my pocket and showed him. "I should be good. Thank you, though."
"I should've guessed you'd have one."
"I appreciate your concern. Is there anything in the backyard I should be worried about? Dogs? Kids? Wild dogs? Wild kids?"
It was standard banter, and it always got a chuckle out of people. Same thing happened here. "Nothing to worry about," he said. "You should be good."
"Alright. I'll get started so you can get online as soon as possible."
"Great! If you need anything, I'll be doing some work in the back bedroom."
I nodded and headed for the side door. The dining room door led to the pie wedge-shaped backyard, which was larger in the back than the front made it look. The grass was as cooked as its kin in the front, but islands of green weeds seemed to be thriving. In the corner of the lot, an old metal shed stood, rusted to the point where I assumed divine intervention kept it standing. It seemed to have been there since the house had been built – or maybe several decades before.
When I turned the corner of the house, I spotted a woman and child staring into the corner of the yard, their backs facing me. The Woman wore a faded blue dress that fit her well. Tom had, it seemed, out-kicked his coverage with her. I didn't want to startle them, so I offered a friendly "hello" to the pair. The kid started to turn, but the mother placed a hand on their shoulder and kept their heads facing away from me. I squinted along the treeline, trying to see what they were concentrating on, but I didn't see anything unusual.
Just wanting to be done with the job, I let them be and moved on. I turned another corner to the house's short side and spotted the grate leading to the crawlspace. The grate looked as old as the shed, and I wasn't sure I would even need the screwdriver to open it. Hell, I was sure the thing would disintegrate in my hands as soon as I touched it.
I crouched and was about to pull it off when I heard something rustling near me. I glanced back to where I had seen the mom and kid, but they were gone. I assumed I had heard them leaving. I pulled the grate off – I was right, no screwdriver necessary – and as I set it aside, something caught my attention out of the corner of my eye.
It was the kid. A boy around eight or so. But they weren't staring at me exactly. They were looking away from me, staring up at the roof line. I found it odd. Clearly, the kid wanted to talk to me but had turned their back on me. I coughed to let them know that I knew they were there, but they didn't respond.
"Hey man, what's up there?" I said.
"Nothing nice," he said, still keeping their gaze away from me.
"Oh," I said, "Not going to hurt me, is it?"
"Maybe," he said.
Not the answer I was expecting. "What is it?"
"They told me you'd know soon enough."
As he said that, I felt something crawling across my hand. I pulled my hand away from the house and shook it. I saw a spider land in a pile of leaves and scurry away. I let out a nervous laugh. I'm not scared of spiders or anything, but the shock of being told some unseen thing was watching me and didn't look pleased, coupled with the sensation of something on my skin, was enough to justify a quickened heartbeat.
I looked back at where the kid had been standing, but he was gone. I chalked it up to kids being little weirdos and went back to work. The faster I could get this installation done, the quicker I could go home and smoke a bowl. I let Kush be my guide. I put up my hood, turned on my small flashlight, and shimmied through the opening under the house.
I know guys who've worked for the company for years and still dread going into a crawl space. Granted, it's not my favorite thing to do, but I don't mind either. The bugs can be a nuisance but if you don't bother them, they tend to not bother you. Same with rats and mice. Raccoons, though? I crawl out and call animal control. Those little dudes are cute but nasty as all get out. My path today was nothing but cobwebs, so I was okay.
I flashed my light around and saw where the cable line went up into the living room floor. My job here was to ensure the coaxial line's integrity was still good. If it had been chewed on or anything, I'd replace it. Sometimes, I just replaced it anyway—saving myself a potential job later down the line.
I crawled over to where the line came in from the pedestal and started my once-over. I not only looked for any damage but also ran the line through my hands to make sure my eyes didn't miss anything. I was under the dining room area when I heard that side door close.
I stopped. Tom said something, but it was muffled. I wanted to be nosy, so I waited a beat to hear if anyone spoke back to him. Someone did. It was soft and quiet – I assumed it was the Boy – and I didn't make out what they asked, but I did hear Tom's response. In a firm voice, he said, "No, not right now. Run along."
There were footsteps over me that faded into another section of the home. Tom said, "He always wants to jump the gun. How many times do I have to tell him?"
I suppressed a laugh at the last line. It's the official father's lament. I kept moving my hand down the line and didn't feel nicks along the cable. In fact, on closer inspection, the line looked almost new. I was planning to change it, but this looked like it had been installed last week.
I could hear someone walk into the living room as I reached the spot where the line went through the house. Another pair of footsteps followed the first, and I heard a breathy but detached woman's voice ask, "Can we show our faces now?"
"I just told the boy 'no.' What makes you any different?" Tom said, an edge to his voice.
A chill raced through my body. I knew those words, but this conversation made me feel like I spoke another language. Can we show our faces? Why would you not?
"Do you think he'll see us?"
"If I have my way," he said, not finishing that thought. "Leave me be. I must try to get some things done before he leaves, and you two keep bothering me."
What did Tom mean to get some things done before I left? What did he have in mind? While trying to process all this, I heard something shuffle in the darkness just beyond my flashlight beam. I moved it around, trying to see the telltale glowing eyes of varmints, but nothing flashed back at me.
I heard something shuffling again, this time down by my feet. I cocked my head as best as I could and shone the flashlight into that corner of the house but, again, there wasn't anything else down here but me and a thousand spiders. I sighed and finished my inspection of the wire.
As I turned to crawl back out from under the house, I heard somebody sneaking around on the floor above me. The wood groaned as the person moved slowly. I wasn't sure what they were doing, but they wanted to keep it a secret. A shadow fell over the pinprick of light from where the cable went into the house. Someone was standing over it.
"Can you hear them down there? Moving in the dark?" It was the Boy. “They like the dark.”
"What are you saying?"
"The little shadows," he said, "They live down there. Do you hear them?"
This kid was creepy as hell. "I, ugh, I can't hear you, dude," I said, inching my body away from the wire, "We can talk inside."
"They're going to get you, but that's okay," he said, "It only hurts for a little bit, and then you're fine."
Fuck. That. I had no desire to respond to that nightmare of a statement. I hastened my inch-worming, heading back towards the open hatch. As I did, I heard more movement in the darkness around me. I tried to ignore it, but it was a fool's gambit. It was impossible to ignore.
I was getting closer to the opening when I saw a pair of tiny legs walk in front of the hatch. It was the Boy. How did he get there so quickly and without me hearing him run on the floor? I didn't have time to run through the scientific method because the Boy leaned down and placed the metal grate back over the hatch.
"Hey! Hey!" I yelled. "I'm still under here!"
The Boy didn't stop. Instead, he placed a trashcan in front of the grate, enshrouding the entire crawlspace in darkness and trapping me inside.
"Hey! I need you to move that!" I screamed. No response. I raised my fist as high as possible and punched the floor above me to hopefully get Tom’s attention. That was a mistake, as I managed to punch straight into an old nail. I felt it puncture in between my knuckles. The pain was instant, and I let out a howl.
I shook my hand and swore a blue streak. I reached up with my other hand, felt the tip of the nail I had managed to punch, and found a flat spot next to it. I banged hard on the floor and yelled again for some help. Nobody responded. Not at first.
Then I heard someone chuckle under the house.
I couldn't locate where it had come from because it sounded like it was all around me. I swung my light around as best as I could but didn't see anything. No glowing eyes, nothing. I inched forward a bit, and someone laughed again – this time, it was to my right. I turned my light in that direction and saw a sudden flood of light fill the space under the house.
"What the hell?" I said, my desire to leave overtaken by a desire to know what was unfolding next to me.
A pair of kid legs dropped down from the hole in the floor. I realized then that the hole must be an interior crawlspace. The kid had blocked off the metal grate and opened this hatch for some reason. While he dropped his legs down, he didn't move any further.
"Hey, you have to open that metal grate," I yelled. "I don't want to be trapped down here."
"They told me they needed you," he said, followed by a slight chuckle.
"What the fuck are you talking about?" I said, not caring that I was talking to a child. "Open the goddamn grate!"
"The shadows are approaching," he said, pulling himself back into the house. He placed the lid back on the hole, and I was trapped in the dark again. I cursed to myself and started pounding on the floor again.
"Hey! Someone come help me!"
That's when I felt something run across my legs. I nearly jumped out of my skin. It didn't feel like the tiny claws of a passing rat. It was cold to the touch, but as it hit my skin, I felt a burn in my bones. It's hard to explain, but I felt both extremes simultaneously. Whatever it was skittered off into the darkness of the other side of the crawl space.
The kid started laughing again, which brought me back to reality. I army crawled as fast as I could to the grate. I balled up my fist and punched in the middle of the metal. The blow knocked the old nails out of the wall, and the grate broke up. I was about to push away the garbage can when it suddenly wheeled out of the way.
I saw Tom's legs standing there.
"You okay?" he asked, concern in his voice.
I got out from under the house so fast that I left a me-sized dirt cloud in my place. Once out, I shook my body loose as if I had things crawling all over me. Tom watched but didn't say anything at first. We finally locked eyes, and he could see the rage, fear, and confusion on my face. He wisely waited until I spoke first.
"What the hell is wrong with your kid? He blocked me under there and taunted me from the indoor crawlspace."
"What are you talking about?"
"He told me the shadow people or something were watching, and then he blocked me under the house!"
Tom's face twisted up into confusion. "I...I don't understand."
"I can't make it any simpler, Tom!" I screamed, letting unprofessionalism take root.
"I don't have a kid."
It hit me like an Ali right cross. My vision got dizzy, and I struggled to catch my breath. I stared at his face, looking for the sign of a lie or a joke, but he was as stone-faced as an Easter Island statue. After a beat, I found my sense again. "I heard you talking to him in the living room when I was under the house."
"One, I was on a phone call. Two, are you spying on me? What the hell, man?"
"I wasn't spying, and you weren't on the phone," I said. I also heard you talking to your wife. She asked you if she could show her face or something."
"I don't have a wife either."
I shook my head. "I fucking saw them in the backyard! They were staring at the fence!"
Tom paused and cocked his head to the side. When he spoke, it was softly, trying to calm me down. "Are you...did you have a few drinks before the appointment? Or a pill or something? No judging – I know pill heads. I won't report you or anything, but I understand if you need to come back tomorrow with a clearer head."
"I'm sober," I said, gritting my teeth. "But I know what I saw. What I heard."
"As the tree said to the lumberjack, I'm stumped," Tom said. "You look a little flush. You want a bottle of water or something? I can show you I'm here all alone."
My adrenaline had seeped out of my body, and I was starting to feel like myself again. I nodded at Tom, and he smiled. "I'll go grab you one. Do you want to come into the AC?"
"No, I'm okay. I need to double-check the connection to the pedestal."
"Sure. Be bright back," Tom said as he walked off.
But I had no intention of checking the connections. I was going to check on Tom. I didn't believe him at all. Something weird was going on, and I needed to know what. As soon as he turned the corner around the house, I broke out my flashlight and headed back to the crawlspace.
I dropped to the ground and shone my beam into the darkness. Something had crawled on me, and I wanted to see what it was. I moved my light into every section of the crawlspace but saw no eyes glowing back at me.
"If you're under there, call back."
There was nothing. I was starting to feel like a paranoid idiot. I called out once again just to be sure, but again, nothing called back. I shut off my light and sighed. I started pushing myself back to my feet when I heard a faint woman's voice call out, "Can we show our faces now?"
"Not yet," someone hissed from the trees above me. I snapped my head up, expecting to see someone hanging on a branch over my head, but I just saw green leaves.
"Can we show our faces now?" It was the Boy. It sounded like he was on the roof. I shielded my eyes and glanced at the roof but didn't see him.
"No. He's not ready yet," someone whispered in my ear. I snapped around, throwing a punch as I did, only to slam my fist into the fence. I felt one of my knuckles crack as it hit the wood, and the pain shot up my arm like lightning. Within seconds, my hand started to puff up, and blood dripped out the wounds.
The Boy chuckled again. It came from under the house. I looked down at the grate and saw his legs disappear into the darkness.
"Hey!" I called and dropped to the ground. I pulled out my flashlight and shone into the darkness again. I was confident I'd see him, but he wasn't there. Nobody was.
I sat up and felt goosebumps turn my arms into braille. I glanced over to the corner of the house and was surprised to see the disappearing hemline of the faded blue dress. I rushed over to the corner and didn't see the Woman. I saw Tom with a bottle of water.
"You okay?"
"Where did that woman go?" I asked, my voice panicking. "She was just here."
"Sir, do you need me to call your boss for you? You're starting to scare me."
"What's up with this house? Is it haunted?"
Tom started laughing. "I hope not. I just moved in. I'd hate to have roommates again, especially ones who leave ectoplasm all over the place."
As I stared at him, I saw the Woman and the Boy emerge from the other corner of the house. They looked up on the roof, their faces obscured by their hands and the sun. I pointed a finger at them and screamed, "They're right there!"
Tom spun around and looked, but there wasn't anything there. He turned back to me, not sure what to say. Instead, he handed me the bottle of water. "I gotta be honest. I didn't see anything. Drink the water...you might have heat stroke."
I threw the bottle on the ground. "I don't have fucking heat stroke. I have a man that's lying about these things." I got close to him. "What did you have planned for me? Why do they keep asking to show their faces?"
"I don't," he said, but I didn't stay to hear him finish his thought. I walked right past him and turned the corner of the house. As I did, I saw the blue hem disappear through the door that led to the kitchen. I followed right behind her.
I walked into the house, which was as silent as a corpse. The Woman and Boy were nowhere to be seen. "Hello?" I called out. "I just saw you guys walk in here. Where are you?"
The door behind me opened up. Tom walked in, his face reddening with anger. "You can't just walk into my house."
"I saw them walk in. Where are they?"
"I keep telling you, it's just me and you here. Now, if you want to finish your work…."
I walked away from him and headed toward the bedroom where I had seen the Boy standing. I wanted to check that crawl space. The room was empty, not even a moving box in there, so finding the hatch that led under the house was easy. I went into the closet and pried the hatch open.
Tom entered the room behind me, more confused now than angry. "I don't want a line run through here."
"The Boy was standing in this spot. I saw his legs. I spoke to him. He told me the shadows needed me for something." I glared down into the darkness under the house. Despite Tom's feigned declarations that there wasn't another person in the house, I knew he wasn't being honest.
"Okay, I'm pretty sure you're back on pills and in the middle of a delusion," he said.
"How did you know I had a pill addiction?"
"The way you're acting, it wasn't a hard guess."
"I'm sober, but I did have a problem with pills. I never told you. I don't tell anyone."
Tom stood there, confused about how to answer. I stood up and stared him down. He looked away, but I didn't move my gaze. "Who are you? Who put you up to this? Was it Rory? He trying to get me fired?"
Tom's shoulders sagged. "You got me," he said. "Rory hired me to get you in trouble. I'm... I'm sorry. He offered me free cable for a year and assured me you were a bad guy and, well…. I'm weak."
"That's really fuc…," I stopped. "You're lying. Right now. You're lying. Why?"
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something dash past the open crawlspace hatch. I turned to the hatch opening and then back to Tom.
"Are you trying to stop me from looking in there?"
He didn't respond.
"What's under there?"
"He is," he said. "The Boy. He hides under there all the time. He has...friends down there."
"The shadow people?"
Tom shrugged, "What he calls them. I call them a menace. Impossible to get my work done with them causing a racket."
"What work?"
"Things you'd never understand in a million years," he said, "Things beyond your brain's capacity to imagine. Things that will help usher in a new world. Your kind's time is coming to a close. My work represents the new order."
I stared at him. I wasn't sure if I should run away or punch his lights out. Instead, I just spat out, "Bro, what the fuck?"
"Can we show our faces now?" the Boy called out from under the house.
I looked down at the hatch and then back at Tom. He nodded toward the opening. "Do you want to see your future?"
"Fuck it," I said. I got down, grabbed the sides of the opening, and lowered my head under the house.
I kept my eyes closed for a second, assuming I'd either see something horrifying or something would hit me in the face. When nothing struck me, I opened my eyes. It was dark, and I couldn't make out anything.
"There's nothing under here," I said.
"Can we show our faces now?" said the Boy from somewhere under the house.
"Show him," Tom said.
I sat back up, grabbed my flashlight from my pocket, and flipped it on. I looked at Tom, "If you try anything, so help me, God."
Tom just smiled. I looked back down at the hatch and sighed. I was suddenly hit with a bolt of common sense. What was I doing? My internal alarms were going off and I was ignoring them. Curiosity had gotten me this far, but my fight instincts were starting to lose to my flight. No job was worth this.
"Man, fuck this," I said, reversing course and standing. I turned to confront Tom, but he was gone. I hadn't heard him leave, but there wasn't a trace of him there. "Tom? Where the hell are you?"
He didn't respond, and I decided that I had hit my "weird shit" quota for the day. I closed the closet door and headed back into the living room to grab my gear. I'd call dispatch and tell them someone else had to come out and finish the….
The wood floor cracked, splintered, and gave way when I put my weight on it. I fell through the floor and landed with a thud on the dirt in the crawl space. On the way down, I hit my ribs on a crossbeam and heard them crack and knock the wind out of me. As I lay on the dirt, writhing in pain, my lungs did their damnedest to find a breath. It couldn't, and my vision started to blur at the edges. For a fleeting few seconds, I envisioned my death on a dirty crawlspace floor. It wasn’t comforting.
I rolled onto my back and finally took in a massive gulp of life-saving air. The blurring vision subsided, and all that remained was the aching pain of a busted rib. My muscles around my rib cage spasmed and pulled tight against my lungs. After the initial big breath, I could only take shallow gulps because the pain was searing.
I lay there for a few seconds, collecting my thoughts, when I felt something skitter across my legs again. I kicked out of instinct but didn't hit anything. Instead, I heard the chuckling again. My flashlight had fallen out of my hand. I found it and turned it on.
This time, I did see something. Pairs of eyes—dozens of them—watched me from the darkness that surrounded me. These weren't possums or rats. I never hoped to find a raccoon under the house more than I did at that moment. I knew whatever these things were, they weren't natural and they wanted to harm me.
"Still want to know what they plan to do to you?" the Boy asked from behind me.
I turned around and shone the light where I heard the voice. The Boy was lying on his stomach, his face looking down at the ground. All I could see at the moment was the top of his head.
"Wha-what's going on?" I said, the light bouncing from my trembling hand.
"I can show you my face now," he said. He raised his head and….
The Boy didn't have a face.
He had the space for a face, but there were no features whatsoever—nothing but pale pink skin pulled tight across the front of his head. At that moment, the image of a wooden art figure came to me.
“What the ever-loving fuck?"
"Want to see something really scary?" the Boy said, his lack of a mouth not stopping him from speaking. He raised himself onto the tips of his fingers and toes and started skittering toward me, laughing as he did.
I clambered out of the crawlspace as fast as my battered body could carry me. I got out of the hole and onto my feet and let out an ear-splitting scream.
The Woman in the blue dress was standing next to the hole in the floor. Like the Boy, she didn't have a face either. But I could feel her eyes on me. Looking into my mind. Into my soul. She stepped toward me, and I bolted for the front door.
I whipped it open and was greeted by Tom standing there, blocking me. He grinned. "Leaving so soon?"
"What the hell is going on?" I asked, checking behind me to see if the Woman was still coming toward me. She was, and she was gaining quickly.
"Can we show our faces now?" he asked with a laugh.
I turned back to Tom and nearly had a heart attack. His face was gone. I could feel my heart beating in my ears. My legs were jelly, but I kept myself propped up. The human desire to survive can perform miracles.
Tom reached out and pointed at a spot on the far side of the living room wall. I turned and saw three skinned human faces hanging from old nails: a man, a woman, and a boy.
"You're turn to join us," Tom whispered. But the voice wasn't said out loud. It came from inside my own head. "We can always use another body around here."
My brain clicked into action and sent an all-points bulletin to my limbs. The message was simple and actionable – "Get the fuck going, you dope."
I felt my hand ball into a fist and spun. It landed where Tom's nose would've been. It should've knocked him back, causing him to stumble and giving me time to run. But that didn't happen. Instead, his face pulled apart, letting my fist slide right through. It closed on my arm, trapping me.
I yanked and yanked, but my arm would not dislodge from his face. I glanced back and saw the Woman nearly next to me. The Boy was climbing out of the hole, moving like a cockroach. I looked back at the wall and saw Tom's hanging face silently laughing.
Something about those silent laughs cut me to my core. They were laughing because Tom thought he had outsmarted me. He had beat me. That my face would soon be hanging on the wall next to theirs. I wasn't going to let that happen.
I saw a loose brick on the walkway, and a plan flashed in my mind. I yanked hard, sending Tom stuttering forward enough for me to wrap my finger around the brick. I brought it up and sent it towards his face. As expected, the face parted again, and the brick flew through easily.
But as soon as the face curtains pulled aside, I yanked my arm free. With my limb free, I took off in a mad sprint for my truck. I got inside and fumbled my keys as I tried to start the engine. Tom, the Woman, and the Boy stood together at the front door and watched as I got the van going and rocketed down the street.
I drove like a madman for ten minutes, trying to put as much space between me and the house as possible. I finally stopped at a gas station to collect my thoughts. I was jittery, and my mind was swimming, but I was also relieved. I had gotten out.
I collected myself and called Denise to tell her I couldn't finish the installation at 981 Maple Street. I was going to suggest we cancel the order and not send another installer there. That's when the conversation took a turn I wasn't expecting.
"Where have you been? You were supposed to be off an hour ago," Denise said when I called her.
"I was trying to finish the install at 981 Maple, the one you sent me to."
"I didn't send you anywhere," she said. "With how insane Rory is being about overtime hours, I'm trying to keep everyone below the threshold."
"What are you talking about? You called and asked me. You don't remember," I said, a bad feeling growing in the pit of my stomach.
She gave me a nervous chuckle, "I swear I didn't. Are you feeling okay? You gotta come back. People are waiting for the van."
"I can prove it. I have a record of you calling me on my phone," I said. I opened my call log, and my jaw dropped. There was no call from Denise. She was telling me the truth. But if she didn't call me, who did?
"Rory wants to talk to you when you get in. I wouldn't mess around, he seems pissed" she said before hanging up.
I haven't moved since. I wanted to write this down because I felt like it needed to be recorded. Something supremely fucked up is happening at 981 Maple Street. It nearly got me. It still might. To think, on any other typical day, a surprise conversation with my boss would be the scariest thing that could happen to me. Funny how seeing a faceless ghoul can prioritize your problems. If you're hired to do work there, turn it down. Trust me, it's not worth it.
"Can we show our faces now?" they asked. "Fuck no," should be the only response.

Sorry for the long post. Thanks for your patience and I appreciate all comments.
Even though it was an arranged marriage, I loved him from the moment I spoke with him over the phone. However, something inside me hesitated. I noticed things starting to go wrong, and there were several obstacles leading up to the fateful day of our marriage. On our wedding day, I told everyone he was charming, proclaiming my love for him in public, unaware of what was coming.
Long story short, I wasted 5 good years of my life with this person and lost five more years trying to recover. I was married to a narcissist and became a victim of his abuse under the guise of marriage. Ex-husband managed to isolate me from my own family and made sure I cut all ties with my friends, leaving me available only for him and nobody else. As a result, there was no one supporting me when I broke ties with him and finally came out of that toxic relationship.
There were days when I woke up wondering why I was still alive. Growing up, I was reliant on my family, and my introverted nature didn't help me overcome my insecurities. I let others decide what was best for me. My narcissistic father, abusive mother, and sister abandoned me, offering no help when I finally left my narcissistic ex-husband. They did not believe a word of what I said. The most they did was call me crazy for trying to leave a "perfect" husband and suggest I seek psychiatric help.
Heartbroken and weak after another surgery, unable to comprehend my situation, and refusing to take medication for undiagnosed bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, I flew back home abroad. My ex-husband left our daughter at his house without asking me. When he returned, he informed me he would take our daughter back in a month, or his parents would come for her during their visit. But COVID struck, and my daughter ended up spending nearly 10 months without me.
When my dd finally came back, she refused to let me come close. She shut the door in my face, asking me to leave the bedroom. I saw my ex-husband grinning as he coerced our two-year-old to say and do these things. My daughter is extremely intelligent. From the next day after she was born, I knew my daughter was her daddy's girl. She weaned just after seven months old. Following my father's advice, I left my own house (for which I had paid a quarter of the deposit, yet it was entirely under my ex-husband's ownership), leaving my two-year-old daughter with him—a terrible mistake, I admit.
I struggled to find places to live, hopping from one rental to another, begging to see my daughter at least once a week. Without a car, my ex-husband would drop her off and pick her up the same day because she wouldn't stay with me. I can't explain my mental state as I couldn't process what was happening. I had no help then. Finally, I found a flat to rent with some privacy for me and my daughter (an attached kitchen area and a shower toilet). Seeing I had moved to a better place, my ex-husband stopped bringing my daughter over, and I had to pick her up from his house, which I didn't mind as the bus stop wasn't far. Later, my ex-husband asked me to pick her up from the bus stop instead.
We celebrated our daughter's third birthday at home after announcing our separation, which was long overdue. Her fourth and fifth birthdays were at my new flat, and her sixth was at my current place, where I happily live with my partner of three years. I probably wouldn't have gotten my life back if I hadn't met my partner. He made me feel normal again and gave me hope. I became more attentive and present with my daughter, and we had lots of fun, taking goofy pictures and dancing to her favourite songs. But her character would change in an instant (much like her father's). Out of nowhere, she would start screaming for her dad as if reminded she needed to go back.
Initially, I understood her frustration as I struggled to make a living and moved from place to place. Despite her cries to go back to her dad, which added to my depression, I found solace in the fact that she was with me—until she wasn't. As she grows, it's becoming apparent she might be like her father. Today, my daughter is six years and six months old. Her last visit was yesterday, even though my ex-husband had agreed she could stay with me over the weekend. This year, she has stayed with me for only two nights in the past six months. My ex-husband hurls abuses at me whenever things don't go his way, often in front of our daughter. She seems to support and enjoy it when he does.
I've tried to make my daughter understand it's not okay to hurt others, but she doesn't seem to grasp this. She asks me to stop talking, sometimes screams, covers her ears, or asks, "What did you say?" I'm not forcing her to do anything, just asking her to call me "Mama," but even that seems to fade each week I see her. She acts as if she doesn't know me or harbours pure hatred. I'm screaming inside every night she's not with me. Although my partner makes me feel safe and loved, I'm dying inside a little every moment thinking of my daughter.
I grew up as a church-going Catholic, saying prayers daily, but now I feel null and numb, unsure where to turn. I don't think I'm bipolar or schizophrenic today, but I fear I might develop these conditions. At nearly 34 years old, my career is at a halt. I had to leave a job I didn't like, and it didn't align with my current skillset. I'm applying for jobs that suit my skills, but with no success. I dreamed of revenge against my ex-husband by becoming better than him. I spent countless hours studying and preparing for a new career, but it feels like a long-lost dream. While I did manage to finish my university degree, I'm still waiting to start my career and prove myself. All I want is to make life better for my daughter, to give her the space and comfort she experiences with her dad.
Even though my current place is safe and comfortable, however small, I try my best to make my daughter happy and enjoy the little time we have together. But she makes it difficult every time with hurtful words, damaging our relationship. I don't have the money to go to court, and my ex-husband threatens that any action against him will be in vain. I'm already in debt, repaying loans.
When my daughter pointed to the TV and told me she wished I was like that (we were watching "Goodbye" on Netflix, where the mother's dead body was often shown), I asked her to confirm, "Do you wish me to die _?" She nodded with hope on her face. This was when she was just five years old. I don't take anything she says seriously, but it hurts when it happens. I will never fault my daughter for our situation. But it is really sad. I hope she knows I am there for her and feels loved and connected with me emotionally. I'm waiting for that moment. I feel guilty for giving my ex-husband my daughter as a new victim after he lost me. It was more about my daughter wanting to be closer to her dad than me. I didn't expect my ex-husband to manipulate his own child to his advantage.
I know my daughter not living with me and that I'm not her main parent is not justified. As much as it hurts, I have to accept she may never live with me and may even disown me someday. I didn't want to drag her into court fights, making things more unstable, as my ex-husband would likely win. He has zero conscience. My only hope is that my daughter won't turn out exactly like him, and I can persuade her to leave him and stay with me.
As a mother, I took care of my daughter beautifully from the moment she was born until she was 18 months old, with some help from a postpartum doula after my C-section. I've gone through psychosis, anxiety, depression, self-doubt, suicidal thoughts, and many other unknown phases ever since, to have the courage to write about my situation here. I'm genuinely trying to build a positive and healthy relationship with my daughter, but it feels like a distant dream.
I recently heard he has a new victim and married her this year, which slightly relieves me that his influence on my daughter might lessen. When my daughter told me about this lady, I immediately recognized her as one of his close friends. I recall my ex-husband and his family talking about her before, as she did indeed attend my marriage with ex-husband.
I hope my daughter will understand someday how much I love her and how hard I fought for our relationship. After all, it was the birth of my daughter that gave me strength and courage. It was also the realization of the continued abuse by my ex-husband that made me come out of my situation, although things did not happen as I had hoped. Additionally, I did not realize I was going through victim withdrawal syndrome of narcissistic abuse, and I realize now I should have dealt with things more tactically and logically. I am extremely sorry that I could not be there for you, my daughter, when you were stuck at ex-family's house during the pandemic.

Please Help Me Make a Decision. URGENT.
Hey guys! Please ignore anything on my account. I’m aware that it says 31M, this is a burner account so that my mom or friends can’t figure out my identity. Every server I go to flags my post because the story is just so ridiculous that they think it’s rage bait or trolling.
I’m 17/F, with two jobs and an online business. I do pretty well in school also and help around the house significantly. My mom is a single mom with two kids and I help with them as well.
It’s entirety my fault. I snuck my boyfriend in out of fear because me and my mom aren’t that close and I didn’t want her to know that we got back together after we broke up some time ago. I feared she wouldn’t let me see him especially after she found out I was sexually active. I told her a while ago that I felt like I couldn’t talk to her and she said “Okay, well if that’s how you feel then don’t talk to me.”
My mom took my doors of the hinges, threatened to show up to both of my jobs and yell at my managers until I quit, split my work computer in half (that I paid for and also helps me run my online business), woke me up and punched me in the face for putting the door back on its hinges (I couldn’t sleep with the door off, it made me nervous), threatened to knock me out with a piano, told my entire family what was happening to avoid them giving me money or helping me out in any way, texted my best friends mom and threatened to tell her the things that she found in my phone, including regarding my best friend, called me a piece of shit, a whore, and a bitch, said she was going to install cameras around the house and that I can’t go or drive anywhere, sent me a Life 360 and forced me to join it, and told me not to ask her for anything because she will no longer be helping me out.
I understand her frustration and her anger. She does a lot for me, we’ve had some relationship issues lately but once upon a time we were close. But I fear that if i stay here and make one wrong move, we will either get into a physical fight, or she will make me quit my only sources of income, making me completely reliant on her. Mind you, she’s not financially stable and I won’t be able to go anywhere. She seems to have kind of shifted away from making me quit my jobs but I’m scared that if i make her mad again she’ll go the extra mile.
I’m afraid she’s going to ruin my life if I stay. I know for a fact I won’t be able to focus on anything if I stay in her house and it will only drag me down. Please help me figure out what to do. I want to leave ASAP.
EDIT: I would also like to give my mom some credit. She’s an amazing sacrificing mom who does a lot for me, but she’s struggled to accept my behaviors as a teenager. I’ve been kind of moody lately and have really been striving for independence.

TLDR at the bottom
Yesterday after working a double I decided for dinner to make some Reuben’s for my wife and I. I swing by Krog’s, get all the fixins, and head to the deli for some pastrami and swiss.
I approach and there’s a stereotypical boomer man there. New balances, boat dealership hat, wrap around shades, cell phone clip, you know the type. In typical oblivious boomer fashion he’s standing right up on the counter so there’s a whole section you can’t see. But whatever. I grab my number and that’s when he feels the need to talk to me.
Now before I go any further let me set the scene. You got boomer douche doing boomer douche things, me, and a younger woman with her kid and a cart of groceries who walks up maybe 30 secs after me. Behind the counter is a very young lady. I’m talking kid. She could’ve been maybe 18, but looked 12. Probably first job. And it’s just her.
Boom in a voice loud enough for the kid behind the counter to hear: total bullshit. Not only does no one want to work but look at how slow she’s going.
Me: spins in a circle to look for who he’s talking to. I know it’s me but I did it for the effect. Hoping this fuck would get the hint. He did not. I then stare blankly at him for about 5 secs then turn to face the meat.
Boom: begins to talk some more bullshit to me
Me: mid Boom sentence I turn to woman with the kid and say, “That’s a really awesome top. It’s so cool. My wife would love that!” It was a dope TMNT shirt this lady was wearing. Now I could tell that she could see the despair in my eyes. I wanted saved. I needed it. But for reasons known only to her she wasn’t haven’t it. In a moment of pure millennial non verbal communication she said “sorry bro, I’m exhausted. Leave me be. You’re on your own with him.” Fair enough sister. I got this.
I turn back to the counter to start blankly at the meat. This is when Boom decides to flex
Boom: you know it’s rude to turn away and talk to someone else when someone is trying to speak to you.
Me: you know it’s douche move to talk shit on someone that’s trying to help you loud enough for them to hear. Probably makes them awful. It also really sucks when you have to speak to someone you really don’t want to talk to in the first place.
Boom: what did you say? You got some balls talking like that.
Me: rule one in life—when you act like an asshole don’t be surprised when you’re treated like an asshole. Now are we going to keep doing this or are you going to fuck off away from me and leave me alone?
It was at this moment when boomer.exe failed. This jabronis brain damn near melted and leaked out of his ear. Old boy stood there and stared at me for like 5 seconds, rebooted, huffed and walked away. And when I say away, like left. Dude didn’t even get his shitty old baloney or whatever fucked up thing he ordered. Probably olive loaf or some garbage like that.
I look to my left and the woman with the kid is smiling and giggling. Kid behind the counter appears and asks about boomer. I told he left. She breathed a sigh of relief and took my order. I felt like I did my good deed for the day.
Tldr: boomer tries to talk to me about some dumb shit, I tell him to fuck off, his brain melts, he fucks off.

Hello all,
I apologize this is a lot but I feel like this is important to me so if anyone wants to read it and chime in based on personal experiences, that would be great.
I've recently been experiencing some problems within my head which I'm going to be getting looked at by a neurologist just to be safe but it's mainly been visual snow, tension headaches (specifically on top of my head/neck tension) & pressure in my forehead, trouble concentrating/focusing, sleep issues, and short term memory issues.
When I explained this to my Therapist, she recommended a psychiatrist because I may be dealing with DP/DR. While this may be true, I decided to see a lady my girlfriend's family has been going to all their life who has spiritual connections and prays over people who need prayer. This lady knew nothing about me beforehand and began praying over me. She told me to sit and immediately told me that she can feel that I'm suffering internally because I haven't had the chance to talk properly about whatever trauma I recently experienced, that it's okay to cry because I need to let it all out as it's causing me to constantly be in my head.
What she said feels true, I began to question if CBT Therapy is doing good for me or if it's caused the issues I'm facing now. My CBT Therapy started the first week of March and have been on a weekly basis around 30 mins each session, over the phone. The average session is her asking me how I'm doing, what I did during the week, and what I'm doing over the weekend. If I tell her odd sensations I've experienced out and about, she gives me methods to overcome them (mainly breathing techniques or like, typical therapeutic/mindful thinking techniques). Then, we're done and when we get off the phone, I don't feel like anything was accomplished... it's like general conversation you have with someone you've never met before.
I'm wondering if this has caused my brain to repress a lot of memories and timelines from the incident until now. I can recall the event, but, the flashbacks I was having are gone and the overall thought of the event are pretty much nonexistent. It's like it was shoved in the back of my head because the talk therapy is heavily focused on putting it behind and moving forward - which I think could be why I'm experiencing those symptoms mentioned in the first part of this thread. Should it not have been more focus on talking about the incident, allow me to be emotional and talk about it, then give me support on navigating through it going forward? Not immediately driving the focus of the future with general social conversations to make me forget about it immediately?
Timeline of everything: 1/29/24 the incident happened, 2/15-2/18 I went to CO to visit friends, 2/19-2/22 I had the flu or something, 2/23-2/26 My birthday weekend, was in bed that entire time unable to eat and felt out of it, 2/29-3/4 I felt better and my parents came to visit. 3/5 I started therapy. About 3 sessions later on forward, everything has just been progressively getting worse for me in my head. I recently had a severe panic attack, 2 days later, my mind is now blank and I feel like I'm living on autopilot with no real thought process behind anything.

My father always wanted me to become a police officer. Who could blame him? His dad, who also happened to be my grandfather, was shot by a random man one day when my father was just 12 years old. He saw everything with his own eyes. It must’ve been traumatizing to him.
“My dad was just watering the plants.” He would often say, “Then a masked man in a white van rolled down his window and shot him out of nowhere.”
“His body fell to the ground and I quickly ran outside.” He’d continue, “Blood started coming out of the gunshot wound. I shouted as loud as I can until my mom arrived. My mom broke down in tears. My dad, with his last, dying breaths told me ‘Avenge my death, become a police officer, so no one else would have to endure the pain you’re feeling’.”
My father eventually did not become a police officer due to financial constraints. He ended up dropping out of high school a few years after my grandfather’s death. He started working in McDonald’s just to be able to have enough money to feed my grandmother. My grandmother at the time had dementia and had to resign from her job as an accountant because of it.
My father then met his future wife, who also happened to be my mother, in McDonald’s. No, my mother was not a McDonald’s employee, but they started talking when my mom lined up in front of the cashier my dad was stationed in to order a Big Mac and some fries. My father never told me what happened next. He always just told me that it was love at first sight and they started going out the following day. After a week, my dad left McDonald’s to apply for a job in the same place where my mom was working at the time, the KFC across the street.
My father’s dream to become a police officer was then transferred onto me. Even when I was still barely able to walk or talk, he would often tell me that I should become a police officer. At the time, I didn’t know what he meant. I don’t think newborns are familiar with the concept of a police officer. Despite that, I didn’t ask any questions. I eventually took up a Criminology program in college and graduated a year ago.
Sadly, before I graduated, my father developed dementia, just like my grandmother. He eventually forgot that I was taking up Criminology and for some reason thought I was a Formula One driver. He also forgot that he wanted me to become a police officer but my mom still encouraged me to become one. She kept telling me: “Your dad may not show it, but deep inside his original aspirations for you are still there.”
He passed away from Leukemia a few months ago. It’s such a shame that he’s not here today to hear this speech but I’m pretty sure he’s listening from wherever he is right now. Sorry dad, I am not a Formula One driver, but I just finished police academy and now I’m a legitimate police officer. Thank you.
“Nice speech, Ethan, congrats!” Carlisle, one of my closest friends, told me while I was going down the stage.
“Thanks, man.” I replied to him, “Not gonna lie, I was kinda nervous even if I practiced this speech for a month, but at least it’s done now”
“I would still be nervous if I were you. I heard you’ll be assigned to the Memphis Police Department.”
“Why would I be nervous?”
“Memphis has the highest crime rate in the country. It’s dangerous out there.”
“I’m literally the best young police officer the country has to offer. If I can’t do it then who can?”
“Well, that’s true. Just be safe out there, okay?” He said as he patted me on the back.
“I will don’t worry.”
After two days, I finally arrived in Memphis. I was greeted by the chief of the Memphis Police Department, Ryan McGruder.
“Mr. Ethan Blight?” He asked me.
“Yes, I am.” I replied as I shook his hand, “You must be Chief McGruder?”
“That’s correct. Come with me, let’s head to the station.”
The main headquarters of the Memphis Police Department was around 20 minutes away from the airport. I took this time to look around as it was my first time in Memphis.
“Are you scared?” Chief McGruder asked me.
“Scared of what?” I asked in return.
“I’m sure you know how dangerous Memphis is.”
“That doesn’t scare me too much. I know what I signed up for.”
“That’s good to hear.”
Once I arrived at the headquarters, I was greeted by a man and a woman who both seem to be in their mid-30s.
“This is Corporal Tommy Allen and Lieutenant Nesty Garland.” Chief McGruder said.
“I’m Ethan Blight.” I said as I shook their hands.
“You’ll be under Lieutenant Garland’s supervision for a few months” Chief McGruder followed, “She’s also supervising another fresh grad so I hope you all get along well.”
I followed Lieutenant Garland into her workstation. As soon as we got there, she introduced me to the other fresh grad she was supervising.
“This is Ryan Chambers. You’ll both be under my supervision for some time.” Lieutenant Garland said, “And I prefer to keep it casual here in my unit so there’s no need to say each other’s titles. That means you can just call me Nesty.”
Ryan stood up from his chair and shook my hand.
“I look forward to working with you, Ethan.” He said.
“Me too!”
After a few days of settling in, Ryan and I finally got to work on our first ever case. We were asked to investigate a robbery that occurred at a local appliance store. While on the way to the appliance store, he told me about a contest the police department has every year. It’s a contest which determines who the best police officer for the year is. The winner is chosen based off performance, effectiveness, and number of cases solved.
“Who are the frontrunners?” I asked.
“I heard Nesty has been good this year but I don’t think she’ll win.” Ryan replied, “I think Corporal Allen might win, he really wants that promotion.”
“You’re not supporting our own supervisor?”
“It’s not that I don’t like her, it’s just that Corporal Allen seems better.”
“In my opinion, I think Nesty would win. I’ve seen Corporal Allen a lot but Nesty just has different aura, you know? She’s very passionate and assertive especially in the office place.”
“Corporal Allen has solved more cases this year than her. I think the number is twice as more.”
“It’s not always about the quantity.” I replied, “I think whoever solves the current case with the wanted drug dealer gets the award.”
“I heard that Corporal Allen is already preparing to take on that case. Haven’t heard anything from Nesty’s side yet.”
“We’ll see, I still feel like Nesty should win.”
After a few minutes of driving, we got to the appliance store. Outside the store was the manager who was waiting for us.
“Can you tell us what happened here?” I asked the manager.
“A man just suddenly entered the store and pointed a gun towards one of our employees.” The manager said, “He asked for all the money in the cash register and we had no choice but to comply.”
“How much did he get?”
“Around $8000.”
“Do you have a recording of the incident?” Ryan asked.
“Yes, come with me.”
The manager led us to the back and showed us the recording of the robbery. The suspect wasn’t wearing a mask which is kinda stupid if you ask me but it makes our jobs easier.
“Can you zoom in on his face?” I asked.
The manager then proceeded to pause the recording to zoom in.
“Doesn’t that look like that drug dealer we were talking about earlier?” Ryan asked me.
“You know what, I think you’re right.” I replied, “So do you think these cases are connected?”
“Maybe he needed the money to buy more drugs.” Ryan said, “Wait, I have an idea. What if we solve this case ourselves and maybe, just maybe, they give us the award.”
“I just started this week, no way they give me the award.”
“I guess it’s gonna be me then.” Ryan chuckled.
“I doubt it, and besides, I’m pretty sure Nesty is already on her way to solve the case.”
“What do you mean Nesty? I’m sure it’s Corporal Allen who’s on the way.”
“Fine, how about let’s just find out ourselves. Sir, do you know which way the suspect went?” I asked the manager.
“Aside from the money, he also happened to steal one of our high-end laptops. That laptop was just used in a live demo earlier today and it conveniently has GPS that we’re tracking right now.” The manager said, as he pulled out his phone, “He’s about 5 kilometers east of us right now and it seems that he isn’t moving.”
Ryan and I both rushed into the car and drove to his location as fast as we can. We asked the manager if we could borrow the phone that he was using to track the laptop so we can find the suspect easier. After a few minutes of driving, we arrived at a warehouse where we think the suspect is hiding. Outside the warehouse was a car which we think belongs to the suspect. We busted open the car’s trunk and saw a bag full of cash and a brand-new laptop.
“Yup, I think this is his.” I said, “He must be inside the warehouse then.”
“So, what are we waiting for?” Ryan replied.
We rushed towards the warehouse and tried to find a way in. The front door was locked so we went around to look for any open windows. We found one window which we think we can fit through but as soon as we were climbing up to reach it, we heard gunshots. We climbed up faster to see what was going on and once we got inside, we saw a man whose legs were bleeding from a gunshot wound.
“That looks like the suspect, right?” I asked.
“I think so.” Ryan answered, “But who shot him?”
We looked around then suddenly I saw a figure holding a gun at the suspect.
“There!” I shouted, “It’s a police officer.”
The figure slowly walked towards the wounded suspect. As it walked closer, sunlight coming down from the ceiling revealed who their true identity.
“I don’t believe it.” Ryan said, “Is that Nesty?”
I took a closer look and he was right. It was Nesty. I looked towards Ryan and shouted: “Ha! Nesty is the best police, see?”

I've been neglecting to really ask for this advice because I'm pretty sure I just don't want to face a lot of the answers, including my role and responsibility in all this.
Context: I (29F) live with my dad and have lived with him basically since I was born (I briefly lived away from my family for 4 years while I was in college). I came back to help my ill mother. Unfortunately, she passed away 5 years ago. My now-husband moved in about 3 years go so it's been us 3 ever since.
A lot of cutesy words have been used to talk about my father (stubborn, hard-to-deal with, challenging, bizarre). It's really hard to pin down who he is and I never know if my perception of him is accurate, but I'll try to describe him as best as I can.
It feels like he feels entitled to my time and energy despite any boundaries I place with him. He always asks for help with things at the last minute or without any planning. For example, a few weekends ago, he needed a haircut and asked me to do it. I reminded him that my back was killing me so standing was painful. He said he has back pain everyday to which I reminded him that he usually rests on days where his back is bad. I offered to give him money and call to make him an appointment (not that he needs the money or anyone to call but usually if I take away his excuses he gives up on asking me). Now, I should've picked up the phone and made an appointment just to make my point clear, but I was getting anxious from his constant complaining and bothering me even when I went back upstairs to rest. The pain was just getting so much worse with the anxiety so I caved and did it.
That's just one example, but there's times that feel a little more subtle than this. Like he'll bring projects home (a new desk, gardening stuff, etc.) and even if he doesn't ask for help, he'll tear rooms apart, slam things loudly: basicially makes it not only clear that he's struggling but also inconveniences people from using the space until the task is done. I notice this also suspiciously occurs around times where people would be hungry or tired.
Now, my dad has ADHD and I can see some of my struggles in him. Sometimes I start projects thinking they'll be easy and end up taking up an entire space. But I usually do it when no one is around and at least clear the space before meal times or before bed.
I also notice he gets very angry and starts blaming others if people ignore him. Suddenly, we're all lazy, nobody helps him, we're the reason he can't finish any of the other stuff he has to do, etc. Now, that could be just generally venting (I know I've irrationally blamed others for my shortcomings), but he never apologizes nor feels that he was in the wrong after. I apologize immediately and feel awful if I act like that even if I had a point (but you know saying things like that in the heat of the moment doesn't solve anything).
I guess it's really difficult to tell if the things he does are intentional or result from a lack of awareness of his own emotions, needs, etc. We've had honest conversations a few times about how he struggles to acheive the things he wants to do, feels overwhelmed, and feels self-concious about getting old and not being able to the same things he was able to. We've even talked about how we were both feeling and he actually cried and seemed remourseful.
But, I'm not going to lie, and this is just a gut feeling I have, I sometimes feel like those displays of emotions are planned out. It just seems like we only have those talks when he's been drinking (and he'll say he doesn't remember or laugh about how alcohol can make you say crazy stuff) and when I've been doing well with maintaining boundaries. I don't know, I feel like I sound crazy when I say it like that.
I guess, it's hard to make decisions about leaving or staying and keeping or maintaining a relationship with him without knowing if he really cares about me. If he's just a narcissist, then I know that all I could ever be is a pawn to him and his ego (which hurts in a different way and is still hard). But if all of this could be a combination of stress, ADHD, PTSD, and anxiety, then I'd feel like abandoning him would be like abandoning myself. At my lowest point, I was a violent asshole too and it took a lot of therapy to figure my shit out. At the same time, I know I have a tendency to try to emphathize and see the best in people, and I'm afraid that maybe I'm just doing what my mom did and making excuses.
Do you think he's a lost cause? Should I bother trying to help him change or should I be running for the hills? Is this what you all experienced? For the stories here, narcissistic parents sound so much worse and obvious, but maybe it just looks that way to an outside perspective.
I don't know. A part of me just also doesn't want to have the only parent I have left be an unavailable narcissist. Or to realize that maybe I've been just stupid and enabling him. Or I worry that maybe I'm just a narcissist myself.

Hi All, I am M(27), I am currently in Banglore and my girl ( 24 ) is in Allahabad, We were in a long-distance relationship
We had been dating for last 9 months and it was going great as well but in January end my family members started looking for a girl for me in an AM setup and I used to refuse every girl as I wanted to marry her and she was also kinda ready but never told me directly. Initially, my girl only initiated the idea of getting married as my Family members had started looking for someone and they were quite active. She told me she wanted to marry me and asked me to talk to my parents first as my parents are a bit strict about these things .
During Holi time we had a fight and it got sorted as well, After Holi, she went to her Mausi's Home for a couple of weeks with her Mummy, And she shared about me with her mausi in the hope that once the time comes she will help her to convince her family specially her mummy and papa about me as we both are from different castes ( She is OBC & I am ST ) .
I also shared about her with My Family members (Bhaiya, Didi, Jija & Bhabhi ) except Papa & Mummy ( as their thinking is still a bit old about all these especially Papa ), as they will understand and help to convince Papa, Mummy for our weddings.
But Once she came from Mausis Home She started behaving differently and things started turning bad , she starts ignoring me my texts and call I had to convince her then she told me that Mausi is saying your papa won't agree for all these and all , Intially the girl only said to me that caste won't be an issue at her home , everyone one is chill and multiple people have gone through Love Marriage setup and also she said if you are such a good guy earning enough and from a Tier-1 Enginnering college , then it would be easy to convince her family not an issue , After listening to all these , then I only got into a relationship with her then only I became serious as I never wanted anything short term or anything.
But after coming from Mausis home, after every 2 days, she was getting changed her behavior and all and she starts ignoring me and every day saying breakup again and again.
I used to do a lot of things her, I am Literally in love with her, This is the first time I fell for someone before that I was focused on my career and family responsibilities so I always avoided dating anyone. Once our family got stable then only I started dating so basically last year only I started dating and she is my first Love, She had a relationship in past for 3 or 4 years.
She was trying to break up with me again and again and I was convincing her again and again
Last month she broke up with me and cut me off fully, The Last time I cried in front of anyone was when I was in class 3 or 4th after that I never cried in front of anyone, even my grandfather whom I loved so much when he died ( I was in class 10th ), I didn't cry, I stopped my tears coming down, now after all these years I cried for her I cried in front of her on phone multiple times to not leave me alone, I was shattered, I was crying all night alone in my room no one was there to tell me or stop me, I live here in Banglore alone in a flat with my flatmates, I was in my room for 3 days straight, didn't drink water for 2 days and hadn't food for straight 3 days, I was shaking and shivering and I was getting sudden panic attacks and sudden burst of emotions, I never cried this much in my life, I was getting suicidal. after 3 or 4 days I got up and went to her hometown to convince her.
Reaching Allahabad was also painful, I wasn't getting any direct flight to Allahabad so booked for Varanasi flight from there took a bus to Allahabad and stayed there for 2 days to convince her. It was such a harsh weather that I puked multiple times in Allahabad in such a hot and sunny weather, as a person who hadn't had food for 3 or 4 days it was hard for me.
I gave her a handwritten note and a flower bouquet we had dinner and she got convinced as well and that night I accompanied her to home and I was happy, but deep down I was afraid, as again coming to Allahabad when you are not mentally and stable and a bit ill as well and you hadn't had food, sleep and all and coming all alone In hope that I will convince her, I even didn't know how to find her as she had blocked me and whether she will reply me on insta or not ? But I was happy that she was okay after meeting me and she was happy and things will be okay, next day I gave her chocolates that I had bought specially for her during my trip to Bali and we talked and had lunch together and things were fine I had plan to go on Monday but since I was not feeling well so I left on Sunday only and left for my Hometown ( Varanasi ) instead of going to banglore .
But after few days she again started behaving the same and within few days it was again came back to normal and 3 days before I came back to banlgore , she totally ignored me like I never existed at all because of that I lost my senses like I couldn't believe and had an minor accident as well because while riding the bike I was so in grief that I couldnt' control my self on a highway I almost had a near to death experience , nothing happened to me just got a minor injury nothing . I stayed for 10 days at home that time , and in last 3 days she totally cut me off and I was shattered and since I am home I couldn't cry as well 24*7 everyone used to be with me only as I was home after a long time ..
I thought before going to banglore Ill go and meet her once again but I had one important project going on so I had to leave for banglore, I was holding my tears for so long that the day I again came back , the moment I sat in the cab for my flat I started crying in the cab I was crying for straight 1.5 hours while way back to my flat , this is also a kind of first time for me crying in front of a random guy . this time I couldn't control my self I cried like a baby in front the driver , I was trying hard to hold my tears and hiding my face, the cab guy understood and he was also behaving like he is not seeing me. once I reached home I cried and cried whole night , I called here msged her she didn't picked my call didn't reply .
So for 7 days I didn't call or text her I was trying my best to be first a stable person , one day one of my friend , she said , jab itna mehant kiye hi ho to ek bar last time try kar hi lo, So I tried again and called her msgd her and but rat ko bat huyi us din to but she was same like earlier stone cold and , she is saying she lost interest in me , ab wo vibes nahi aati we are different and all , also why should I settle for less If I can get better ( her mausi's world I guess ) , she saying mummy bol rahi this kuch Acche riste hai don't worry and all and blah blah , and she in past while breaking up time also said once I was trying and I thinks its not working anymore .
that day I got devasted more, as earlier I thought because of family pressure and caste issue she is backing but this time I got her different side , I still couldn't believe I thought these are her Mummy or Mausi's word not her because the girl whom I know cannot do all these to me she is open minded and a good person and she was the one who iniated the idea for marriage and opening up to our family.
that time meri didi ka ek bat mujhe yad aaya , Didi ne mujhse bola that, ki tum usse pyar karte ho aur Shaadi karna chahte ho , kya wo bhi tumse pyaar karti hai na ?
that night again I cried and again started getting headache and panic attacks and started shivering and again suicidal thoughts started coming.
Now last week one of my friends she told me about one new caffe in Banglore to try out , so we went and we did shopping together , while coming from there she was forcing me hard to go to her flat and was saying she is alone at her place her flatmate she is not there and she was trying hard to convince me for watching Netflix series together and she was breaking the touch barrier again and again I can sense what she was implying so I kept denying not in mood and all so that I can go to my place.
so I came back to my place, and became emotional and sad as I never ever even thought of touching a girl other than her , Since the day I meet her It became so different for me, I lost interest in every girl except her I stopped talking to all other girls from my circle so that she never feel insecure and also I lost interest as well, She is the only girl whom I can think of spending my life or anything . So next day I again tried to contact her , maine call ya msg nahi kiya hota but I coudln't control this time, I cannot think of another girl anymore except her.
I wanted to talk to her , msged her in morning on Whatsapp did some texting but we couldn't talk on phone as she was busy , then again I tried to call in afternoon but no luck then again in evening and again at night time , this time I also lost my patience and maine bhi bhala bura keh diya aur gusse me as a slang gali nikal gaya ( gali uske liye nahi that wo as a slang hi nikla tha ) within a seconds we cut the call she blocked me again and I texted her use bhala bura bola and all usne bola, aaj tumne gali dekar dikha diya and I am proud of my decision and all I also said you used me to get over your ex. and blah blah some random things like you were depressed I helped you overcome this and I also don't want jo har 2 din me palat jata ho apni bat se.
the line that she said na ki, I am proud of my decision , it hurt me , sari rat yahi line meri dimag me chalta raha, I am a overthinker guy, so ye thoda jyad hi hurt kar gaya. Agle din subah maine use snapchat me msg kiya ki mere sath kuch hua tha I felt bad I thought only you would understand isliye tumko ping kiya tha convince karne nahi aaya tha. and sorry for my kal ke behaviour ke liye. bye take care. its been a week and she hasn't read that msg and and I guess unfriend bhi kar diya hai ( waise snapachat usi ke wajah se hi install kiya tha warna I hate snap )
In Past I used to write shayari and poems for her and used to tel her the lines that I used to write for her. I also used practice her favourite songs and used to sing and record and send her. In past she used to to say to me you are a perfect package, anyone would be lucky to have you , she used to say tum gym bhi jate ho , daru waru, ciggrete wagairah kuch nahi karte ho ghumne phirne ka shauk hai family responsibilities handle karte ha , itna kamane ke bad bhi attitude nahi hai , tumse aadha kamane wale ladke bhi udane lagte hai , tum perfect ho and all she used to be very happy with me , rat bhar bat karna and other plannings and everything , I was happy being single but once she came to my life I became more focussed, I still cannot belive she got changed yahi sab sochta hu to lagta hai ki ek bar phir try karu.. I love her.
Now today while talking to my sister she again asked me about her, I told her ki Didi aisa kuch nahi hai bhool jao , Did bolne lagi ki Papa mummy ko humlog mana lenge bas tum ready ho to bata do. maine saf mana to kar diya
but after that I got emotional, I thought I will write a letter and post it and will try to convince again I wrote a long 5 page letter lying right now on my bed but I don't know what to do. Please help me what should I do ?

Am I the only one that has a very disconnected MIL? She seems to only reach out to me personally if there’s an issue or topic to talk about. My son has a bad diaper rash, my husband told her about it and she randomly texted me saying “I’ve been worried! How’s he doing?” And when I responded, she didn’t reply and then the next morning sends another text saying “how’s my baby doing today?”
Am I the only that cannot stand when someone, especially a MIL, says "MY baby" like no thats your grandson. Is it out of line to ask her to stop referring him as “my baby?”
i also feel really annoyed to never be asked how I am personally doing, or greeted in a text saying hi, how are you etc… and in this example recently, to not respond and then text again the next day saying "hows my baby doing" is on my nerves!
I’ve also noticed how she doesn’t ever interact with photos I post on Facebook, and only comments on my husbands photos. If I’m in the photo, doesn’t comment or like it. It’s super apparent that even my own mom is noticing.
And also seems like a competition between love for her son? He received an award at work and she asked if I cried at the ceremony banquet, because she cried on the phone when he told her the news a few weeks later… saying “how could you just NOT cry at that”
Also asks me to send her videos and photos of my son because she wants to see it and show everyone she knows on how smart he is…
This is a woman that lives in another state and barely calls/never FaceTimes. Makes zero effort it seems but wants a ton of credit.
How should I address this? Or am I just overreacting here lol
More historical context: to add…. I have always had a problem with her since my son was born. To give more context… she has gossiped about my mom and dads personal health to my sister in law, she’s made comments about the skin tone of my son when I am half Filipino and she is white, and once questioned how my son has blue eyes when no one in the family on her side has blue eyes — just to give more glimpse of her past behavior. Additionally, this prior December - my husband and I experienced a miscarriage. We told her not to tell anyone. But got on the phone with me one night and started talking about how she told her neighbors about the loss. Because she was hurting just as bad as the kids grandma. Then the next day, told my brother in law that she prefers — she — not to tell her sisters and brothers etc, the news until after the holidays because she doesn’t want to make them sad. When that isn’t news to make a decision of telling on mine and my husbands behalf. Not only this, but has made comments to me about her coworkers… one about how an autistic coworker got on her nerves when her grand daughter from her other son’s family is actually autistic.
To add — am I overreacting here? I don’t know what is wrong and right anymore. I feel like these things and comments that have happened are so strange, there’s more to the story for sure but can’t add everything or we would be reading a novel — but I can expect her to tell my husband that I am not communicating to her either so trying to get a game plan to explain myself and just advice if I’m the problem

I was isolated as a child/teen. I faced racism alone and did not have supportive/loving parents. It was so severe that I self harmed and attempted suicide multiples times. I don't know how to cope with it and looking for any advice/support from anyone who was able to overcome it.
Childhood
I had an older half brother and sister that were 20+ years older. I grew up in my household as a single child. I was close with my family and hung out with friends everyday. Although I was not able to stay for dinner, attend sleepovers, or go on trips with friends I was still content. I was involved in activities such as violin, piano, and writing. I wasn't allowed to join sports although I desperately wanted to join basketball or softball. If i asked, it resulted in a fight. I found it weird that I did not have my own bedroom when friends came over and asked where my room was. I had slept in my parents bedroom up until 4th grade. One day I just started sleeping in the spare room which aggravated my parents. They assumed I wanted my own space to hide secrets from them. I still find this disturbing and strange to this day.
Junior Year
My mom began to lash out on me. I was expected to immediately shower, change into pajamas, and begin studying after school. I was not allowed to see friends or even speak to them on the phone. If i wasn't studying I was expected to clean. If I asked where the vacuum was, pass the salt, or even ask what the weather was I would get screamed at. I was told at a young age how stupid I was, not smart enough, ugly, too fat, and how my priorities were wrong that I don't need friends. They began to go through my belongings including my journal and trash. They threw out pictures of friends or anything they did not approve of. I cried everyday. My brother tried to help by taking me out of the house to see movies or go to the mall. Even that was a battle to convince them to go out with my brother. We would secretly bring a friend so I could spent some time with them out of school. Even under my brothers supervision we were timed. I was never out for more than 2-3 hours.I tried out for Cheerleading secretly and forged their signature to join. I was terrified to break the news that I had made the team. I was punished and even physically abused. I would try to cover the bruises by covering my face with my hair or buying cheap foundation. I had to lie and say that it would go against me if I quit the team. I went as far as printing a fake letter stating that if I quit the team it would go against my record. That was the only way they allowed me to stay on the team. I began cutting by the end of 7th grade. They were aware and ignored it.
High School - My darkest days
This was it for me. I was not allowed to join cheerleading again. No friends at all. A junior took interest in me and would call me after school. That was destroyed immediately and strict rules were set in place where I could not speak to any boys. They considered everyone an enemy. I would tell them I wanted a normal life like other students. They would scream and tell me not to compare myself to the way white people live. I began to fall behind in classes, I quit violin, and stopped taking care of myself. I had lost interest in everything that made me happy including writing, art, and music. Like a caged animal I started spiraling out. Drinking, partaking in sexual activities, experimenting with drugs, developing an eating disorder, and sneaking out of school. I was so isolated that the only way I could do all of this was by sneaking out of the house.
They loosened up in my junior year and let me see friends but they were never allowed at the house. Same rules applied where I could not attend sleepovers and be home by sundown. They were never happy with me seeing friends though. Sometimes I debated staying home instead of seeing friends to avoid an argument. Once they found marijuana it was the end for me. I was beaten, thrown to the ground and strangled. They called the police on me stating I was on drugs and hitting them. I was arrested and drug tested. Results were clean. I was brought to the courthouse where DCF spoke to me and told me my parents were willing to forgive me and take me home. In this moment I said I would not go home. What changed my mind was that they said I would be taken to a foster home where I would not be allowed to have contact with anyone including my brother and sister. I was ready to leave all my belongings behind if it meant getting away from my parents but it scared me that I would lose contact with my siblings. Ultimately I went home but my mom was not allowed to be in the house or contact me for 3 months.
My mom returned home and I thought things would be better. She had called everyone in my phone book and told my friends parents I was on drugs and confronted them for selling it to me. Some of the people in my phone book I wasn't even close with but they literally called EVERYONE. Ultimately every parent cut the cord with me along with their kids. Gossip spread and I was labeled the bad kid by parents and the snitch/traitor by all students. I was now labeled the crazy chink with the psycho parents. People would leave me hate messages telling me to go back to China even though i'm filipino. They told everyone in the family including other states/countries that I was a terrible teen who has a drug and alcohol addict. They went as far to say that I abuse them. It was my darkest time. I had no friends in a predominantly white neighborhood facing racism, parents who wanted to destroy my life, and now an entire family that hated me. They had accomplished their goal of isolating me and making everyone hate me. I was truly alone. To this day it haunts me.
Things became progressively worse. I was uncomfortable at school and at home. I did not feel safe anywhere. My suicidal thoughts grew stronger everyday. My weight plummeted to 88 lbs where I was still called fat. The only thing that kept me alive was my dog which they ended up placing in a shelter while I was at school. I cried holding a knife to my neck screaming that they had ripped everything away from me and that I would rather be dead. This was the only time they let me seek help. We went to 7 different therapists. Each one only lasted 2 sessions. 1st session was me alone. 2nd session would include my parents which always ended in the same result. Therapists telling them there was nothing wrong with me, that I needed to remain being social, avoid isolation, keep active/exercise, and that there needed to be better communication within the family. My parents never agreed with the end result and kept passing me around hoping to get a different answer. The answer they wanted is that it was all my fault and I was a bad person.
I was placed in a mental ward with other troubled teens when I tried to run away. They threw my in the car and had me put there. I was in and out after one night. I will never forget the people who worked there. They all agreed that I did not belong there and what happened was a mistake. They shed some light and told me that one day this was all be behind me and to move forward the best I can by flying under my parents radar.
I ended up going to a Christian school my senior year due to bullying at school (including my old friends). Even teachers looked at me differently because everyone thought I was a terrible human in some way. One teacher actually approached me asking if I told my parents he sold me drugs (did my parents contact teachers too?). Moving to a Christian school ended up appeasing my parents but once I turned 18 I left the house for good.
Current
In my 30s I still face mental and manipulative abuse. I am straight edge and try to live life normal. I've had terrible relationships which lasted longer than they should have. I stayed with them knowing if I didn't I would have to run back to my abusive parents. Ultimately I've had too and I was blamed for my ex boyfriends flaws. It was always my fault and not theirs even if they abused me. They always side with men. I have tried to talk to them but the result is always the same. Yelling and scapegoating. They will branch and change the subject stating "I am tired", "I fell today", "you are killing me", "you are ungrateful" "you are crazy". I became a psych RN to help people because I don’t want people who suffer with mental illness to go through it alone like I did.
Due to my past I have trouble socializing, a bad temper, trusting others, and expressing my feelings. I also still deal with body dysmorphia. I feel like I was robbed of any potential in life. To this day I wonder if my AP truly ever cared. What confuses me is that I was spoiled growing up but it was always used against me. I would've rather been poor and had friends/family.

I’m 16, been in foster care/ living with family for a year now. I’ve run away or been kicked out of every family member’s house except for my cousin’s, where I am rn. My mom severely physically and psychologically abused me for my entire life. Was already in the foster system once, but some idiot gave us back. She used to find any excuse to belt whip, sometimes in the face, usually with the metal end. She beat me buddy with her bare hands multiple times. I had no phone(couldn’t ask for help that way). I had no internet. I never got to go to school and am in 9th grade now as a result. I was isolated from everything and everyone except her cult church that encouraged all these behaviors. The things she said to me, I’d rather not say. The somehow it seems the only escape I can find from my pain, which I’m guessing is a result of being trapped with her for so long, is to get high. Anything I can get my hands on, meth, painkillers, weed and alcohol, psychedelics, cocaine, adhd pills, etc. I’ve done them all and they fill that hole, that longing to not be in reality any more. I feel so free when I’m high, like a little bird resting on a cloud. How do you all cope?
TL;DR: I use drugs to cope. What do you do?

To start of, I would like to acknowledge that I am a bad person, evil maybe. Second, if I could do it a second time, I would.
I, 33M did something which caused my wife(32F) to have a mental breakdown and perform certain actions which sent her to the emergency ward of the hospital.
People usually have "a second spouse" but in my case, she is my "spouse for a second time". We had been dating since last year of highschool and actually got married while attending university, at the age of (21M,20F). Why? Because being the only child and successor to my parents business, the only reason I aimed for a university degree (business one) was for the sake of that title. Wife on the other hand, got a technical degree but still wanted to be a SAHW, eventually SAHM, as it would work out for us in the long run financially speaking.
After university, we still did not plan to have children so I actively asked her to get a job or a part time one in the meantime to get out of the house atleast. The second reason being to prove her sister (31F) wrong.
You see, ever since they were little , my in laws pitted them against each other. Academically, socially and , as bad as it sounds, appearance wise. Yes, my sister in law is what one would consider a "conventional beauty" which was a sore point for my wife but, as they say, beauty is in the eyes of the beholder. I tried to always see what she failed to about herself. I always tried to affirm that she is indeed very beautiful, pretty and a fundamentally nice person and I would always love her unconditionally. It still could not overcome that fact that only I found her attractive like that and sister in law attracted and got hit on by men swarming like flies around... waste material.
The second point being that my in laws never showed much familial love towards my wife and so my wife wanted to be a SAHW/SAHM because she wanted to be there for family always, I respected that. However, with sister in law calling her a "leach" for choosing that path in life, angered me and thus I wanted her to try using her technical degree to work and gain experience. She opted to work outside my family business which was fine and understandable. This happened when we were 25M,,24F respectively.
Now, coming from a country which has few women in technical roles, my wife was the only woman in a team of 10. Those guys started hitting on her and her attitude completely changed. I was happy until I understood where that newfound confidence came from and then sat her down and explained the situation. For the first time in years, the way she responded back was something I will never be able to forget. The malice, the anger, that coldness. It was like I was talking to a completely different person. She accused me of being insecure, not trusting her and being jealous for the attention she is getting now. Then I did the stupidity of apologizing to her. Things were never the same.
I knew what role she worked in but for some surprising reason, within months of her joining the role, she had to stay late at nights frequently and was nominated for frequent business trips (something not part of her role but I never questioned). However, it kept eating me inside and I decided to spy on her. I looked through her phone and found texts between a colleague of hers. His name had a heart next to it but the texts were not found (deleted maybe). However, she forgot to delete her gallery and I saw provocative images, which obviously, I never received.
I tailed her to her office the next day and I saw she greeted a colleague of hers with a kiss (I had not been kissed or been shown any affection for the past 5 months at that point). It angered me but I got a lead. I hired a private investigator to tail them and waited for opportunities to catch any messages from her phone. Eventually I succeeded. I arranged all that evidence and invited both sets of parents, presented the evidence and intended to divorce. It was a terrible time in my life all around. And the reason she cheated.
"She got the attention from others, understood her worth and thought she did not have to be pinned down by me." Nothing I did, could do, could ever do, would ever matter. From me, the attention was a given, from others, it means they saw something I could not in her. And what was the point? Her sister , for all her faults, never acted like that. The guy she cheated on me with refused a committed relationship with her and moved away. Wife got fired. The efforts by her at that point and her in laws to consider forgiveness were relentless then on.
We still got divorced and I got my parents to take charge of the business for a while because I wanted to get away from all that mess. I went abroad, enrolled myself in a masters program, eventually got a job there because why not, and then quit said job to just travel around (yes, i'm your stereotypical spoiled rich brat so whatever).
2 years back, I returned home to take charge of the business (had to stop being a brat sometimes, love you mom and dad). During this while, I ran into my wife again. She looked changed, wanted to catch up and reminisce about the "good times". I don't know why, I was and still am attracted to her (will be much stranger when you hear what I actually did). I never dated anyone after the divorce and my wife did look like a changed person. With my parents and in laws being the intermediatory again, they urged me to reconsider a relationship with her. She had been to countless therapy sessions. Her parents , albeit late, understood their part in making her mental state a mess and it seemed like I would be in the wrong to not "forget a silly mistake made in youth". And you know what, being the sucker I am, I did date her again and got married a year back, (on the same date as my last marriage, to make it seem like the past never happened.
On to D-day, the anniversary date. A month prior, I was laying around and suddenly, I recalled the incident where she accused me of being insecure. I don't know why, it started to bother me. It angered me. I scared myself thinking how much malice I hold. I wanted to cause her pain. These vile thoughts took over me so badly that I eventually came to terms with them. I am a bad person. I am evil. I think anytime I acted nicely, I was merely putting up a face. And how did I get back at my wife? I got in bed with my sister in law in a compromising position (no , we did not do the deed), on the anniversary event at my place and made sure wife, in laws would catch us. Why did sister in law agree to this? She believed the change in my wife was superficial and given the right conditions, she will go back to her old self. No, I do not blame sister in law for anything. It was my plan, all the way.
And well, wife caught us in that position, we had to act surprised and she started wailing, having a panic attack, screaming, calling in laws and my parents who were also shocked at what they saw. In that craze , wife ran to the medicine cabinet and downed a whole bottle of aspirin.
She was rushed to the emergency room and my sister in law and I received abuses, slaps, curses etc from our parents but in all honesty, that was the worst they could do. I am an only child so my parents can't/won't disinherit me. My sister in law already lives independent from her family so she is not in trouble either.
I held a poker face throughout but inside, I had the most evil grin imaginable. I hurt my wife in the worst way I knew was possible. The worst part, If I could do it again I would. The worst part, I still love her. I am bad, I am crazy, I know I need therapy. But that is all.

I woke up at 2 a.m., feeling ravenous. The hunger I was feeling was powerful, I couldn’t sleep I just had to get something to eat.
I went downstairs to my disgusting kitchen and opened the fridge.
“Damn,” I thought
The only thing I had in my fridge was a bottle of expired milk. At that time I didn’t know it was expired, so I drank it.
The dreadful feeling of extreme hunger tortured me, I just had to get some food.
I unlocked my phone and ordered a cab. The driver swiftly arrived at my house which did not surprise me, since it was the middle of the night. I walked up to the car and saw a man. Almost everything about this individual was boring and average, but the one thing that stood out was his eyes. They looked dead and were red, he looked like he had just smoked weed.
At first, I was reluctant about getting in, but I ignored that feeling and got inside the car.
“Take me anywhere they food,” I said to the creepy man
“Well, what are you looking for?” he answered.
“Anything,” I said
“What about getting something exotic” the man uttered in a terrifying voice
That sentence horrified me. It was the way he said it that erected that grim feeling in me. After a second I realized that it was probably nothing and that I was making stuff up.
“Yeah, sure” I answered unenthusiastically.
“Great!” The man yelled
That blaring yell almost made me faint, it was all because I got drunk last night playing a drinking game with my friends. The man accelerated and reached a great speed in seconds, I was terrified.
We got about 5 miles from my house before I started getting even more creeped out. Why did we have to drive so far to get to this restaurant? I kept asking the guy about the ETA of this ride, but he kept saying the same thing
“We’ll be there soon” the creep kept on saying
I was beginning to spiral. It only took me a few minutes to start thinking that he was going to kill me. That’s when I got a phone call. It was a private number, I usually don’t answer calls from these types of numbers, but I had to do something to get this situation off my mind.
I answered the call.
“Where the fuck are you! I’ve been waiting for you for 30 minutes. You better believe I'm going to be charging you for this!“ The unknown man screamed
“What are you talking about, I got into a car, like 40 minutes ago” I replied
“I don’t know what the hell you’re on about, but I'm out of here!” he yelled
He hung up.
“Can we please pull over??” I asked the driver
“No” he answered formidably
“What’s going on here? I just got a call from an unknown number insisting that he was my driver” I replied
“Well, he probably was,” said the impostor
That sentence sent shivers down my spine. I completely forgot about my esurient state; the only thing on my mind was getting out of this vehicle.
The only possible resolution at that moment was to attack the man and take control of the car.
I punched him in the head, he didn’t take it well. He lost control of the car and we hit a tree. Thankfully I was fully conscious and I wasn’t injured. I looked at where the driver was sitting and thought he passed out. I was ecstatic and I thought that I was finally free, but that’s when he suddenly woke up and stabbed me in the neck with a syringe.
I passed out almost immediately.

After I woke up I started puking profusely, it was probably caused by either the expired milk I drank earlier or the mixture of chemicals in the syringe. I started panicking, thinking I was going to die, but then the lights came on.
“I know you wanted to try something exotic, so I made you something I knew you would love,” said a familiar voice.
Suddenly the lights turned on, I looked down and screamed with horror.
“My legs! They’re fucking gone!”
The sadistic monster laughed with glee.
“Exactly, they're gone and that’s what you’re going to eat tonight”
“You disgusting creep, how dare you!”
He didn’t respond. He just left.
I sat there, stuck for hours, crying thinking about stuff I could never do again because of this psychopath.
After hours of mental torture, he came back
‘I am going to love this” said the sadist
He walked over to me and put a blindfold around my eyes. He then unblocked the wheels on the wheelchair I was sitting on and rolled me over to a different room.
The man took off the blindfold and what I saw deeply disgusted me. I saw a table full of different dishes that mainly consisted of meat from my legs. I was surprised that I didn’t hurl.
I was frightened, but that was only the beginning.
I started yelling, telling the guy I wasn’t going to eat my legs, but in that moment he whipped out a pistol and told me that if I didn’t eat it he was going to kill me and my entire family.
I reluctantly started eating one of the dishes and ate until I finally saw the look of satisfaction on his face. I told him I was done eating, he seemed pleased with what he had accomplished.
After he put all the dishes back in a different room he walked up to me, put a knife on the table, put a gun in his mouth, and killed himself. The sound of the gun and the sight of a man's brain being splattered all over the wall scarred me for life.
I then remembered that he had left a knife on the table. I pulled myself to the edge of the surface, turned myself around, and grabbed the knife. I was lucky that he had only tied my chest to the chair, but thinking about it now I am pretty sure he did it on purpose.
After I escaped from the chair I crawled over to the exit. After I got out the door I saw that this place was in the middle of a city, the second I came out there was a swarm of people surrounding me.
The one thing that I wasn’t expecting was that I deeply enjoyed eating human flesh. It was more like love. I was obsessed instantly. I never considered myself a bad person and I still don’t think I am, I just have needs that most people don’t and I think that is fine. Sure, most people would think I am a monster, but all of them have never tried the beauty that is human flesh. I want to end this by thanking my unexpected driver, for introducing me to this wonderful world of cannibalism.

Warning ‼️ long drama-filled post
I (32F) and my boyfriend (27M) have struggled creating boundaries with his baby mama (27f). We’ve been dating for a year now. My boyfriend is more willing to be flexible than his baby mama in order to make coparenting easy for the children (8M, 4M).
For example, we made an agreement i wouldn’t post her children on my social media. I used to be a stripper and a lot of my followers come from that period in my life. One day, I was making a collage on Instagram (the pictures are minimized); well I couldn’t tell if it was my hand or one of the kids’ hand in the photo and I used it anyway. She messaged me about it and I ignored it because 1. I didn’t think a hand was a tell-tale sign of who the specific person was 2. I didn’t want it to spiral into something worst. Well she told my boyfriend’s mom(48F) and by the end of the day it was a catastrophe in its own for a week. The baby mama kept trying to aggressively talk to me in person. I kept avoiding it because I don’t see a point of talking to her under those circumstances. She started threatening that my boyfriend couldn’t see his kids if I didn’t speak to her so I gave in. As soon as we addressed the issue, she jumped into issues between my boyfriend’s and I relationship like us having had a lie detector test done because in the beginning I had a hard time believing the baby mama was that vindictive. At that point in her argument, I walked away because I think it’s none of her business; I shouldn’t have to explain our problems to her.
2 weeks after that, we started discussing what was going to happen for Easter. The kids are used to them hanging out, eat, the mom reads them the Bible story of Jesus’ coming, kids go to sleep, the parents create muddy bunny tracks and put the Easter baskets at the end of the tracks. I’m not allowed at baby mama’s house and I’m not comfortable with my boyfriend going there by himself so she asked if we could do it as his house and if she could be apart of it. I reluctantly obliged. I was very uncomfortable with it but we agreed to suck it up for the kids. She came over, we went through all the rituals together, the tension was high but the kids couldn’t tell so they enjoyed it. After the kids went to sleep and everything was set up, the baby mama said she had to talk to us. I was thinking things went well, we all held ourselves together and weren’t rude. Well she chose this moment to attack my relationship with my boyfriend and addressed a couple situations me and him had been through (anytime my boyfriend vents to his mom, she informs his baby mama). Here I am trying to defend my relationship, telling her my boyfriend and I resolved this and that and even explaining why certain things happened between me and him. It went on for 25min, she was getting heated so I started telling her I didn’t want to discuss anything with her further and that infuriated her even more. My boyfriend had to maneuver her out the house as she is saying she doesn’t want me around her kids. Come Easter, I was upset because after insulting me in the house I live in, she came back to see the kids open up the Easter baskets because it was still part of the original agreement. Actual Easter hunting was held at a park and afterwards her house with all the cousins. of course I couldn’t go because the baby mama wouldn’t allow it and the rest of the family sides with the baby mama. I was pissed about the day before and I’m uncomfortable with the situation but my boyfriend and I agreed he would go to be apart of those memories with his kids. After I had a talk with him saying we needed to create firmer boundaries. We aren’t doing holidays or events together because she isn’t cordial. She doesn’t have a real reason to dislike me other than him choosing to move on with me. I told him I no longer want to try to make things work with her and if he still wanted to try to do coparenting her way, we needed to go separate ways. He quickly agreed and said it was fine, we could do what I wanted. I thought it was weird because his kids’ birthdays are in June (6th and 8th). I had previously expressed I’d prefer each parent do separate celebrations for each child. He didn’t think that would fly with the baby mama and he would have to miss their bdays, something he wasn’t comfortable with doing initially. So I thought it was weird he agreed so quickly.
Well come June and baby mama wants to do the bdays together without me or my boyfriend can forfeit participation. I got upset because my boyfriend had made that agreement with me on Easter and it felt like he deviated from it so we could still be together until we had to face the issue again. I’m soft, it’s so hard to say “no, don’t be apart of your kid’s bday because you made this agreement”, and I know it’s so easy to use the sake of the kids as an excuse because I can’t fault the kids for their mom being a difficult person. So I gave in again. My boyfriend did the 8year olds celebration with the baby mom at urban air while I stayed home. I was pissed. I said I can’t do the next one. I hate nobody acknowledges our relationship, it’s so disrespectful we allow others to create restrictions on our relationship. He discussed it with baby mama and she told him she wasn’t budging and he was a bad dad if he didn’t show up for his kids on the bday. He tried to see where they could meet halfways like split the days in half. Instead she got pissed, showed up to the house, grabbed the spare key from outside and intruded into the house. When I told her it was rude, she sat after shouting none sense. My boyfriend ushered her outside. She ended up leaving and blocked my boyfriend’s phone number and kept the kids for my boyfriend’s scheduled visitation days. After a day or so, we gave in again and had the most uncomfortable dinner with her and the kids and even agreed to go to sea world together. My boyfriend said we didn’t have to do sea world but I felt like we did because if not, there was going to be conflict. My boyfriend said we would only be there for 2 hours then leave. When we started reaching the 2 hours I was expecting to prep to depart. The situation was so uncomfortable so as soon as we could go I wanted to leave! I’m ashamed I feel like that because their bdays should be met with excitement but for me it was dreadful. We ended up being there a total of 4 hours, the last hour, I was slow roasting in defeat. How could I do this to myself? Do I hate myself? Is my self esteem that low? Is this love? How could he say he loves me? Is this what I want? Im so lost on this
TL;DR! I need advice. I need to know other people’s experience with vindictive baby mamas/dads and whether or not things get better. I need to know where on the spectrum does this drama land, low to medium will take a lot of work or above average run for the hills!

Hi all,
Considering getting a Jelly Star soon (or if not soon- whatever is the newest model of Jelly when I buy)
At the moment I use a budget samsung, A14 which is HUGE. I quite like it though because it's cheap, does everything I need it to do, functions for Whatsapp, Discord, BBC Sounds, and music. It's just massive and I want to significantly downsize so I use my phone less and also so it fits in my POCKETS and also because I like small things and the jelly is a similar price to what my samsung was so seems very reasonable
My samsung has better battery specs than Jelly but not a problem as a day's use of this samsung only drains about 35% for how much I use it and I would have no problem charging my phone more regularly if needed with the Jelly.
My only truly crucial thing when buying a phone is this: When I listen to offline music on my samsung (by which I mean not spotify, I don't use, I mean the downloaded music library I access with samsung music) my battery does not drain more than a couple percent over several hours if I have the screen off. Music is very important to me. The most important bit about carrying a smartphone.
Does the Jelly battery run down when you are listening to music offline with the screen off? And if so, is it really bad? Can someone describe their experience with this? How much battery would you lose when doing this for say, a significant amount of the day (if you were travelling for example)
I just listen with wired headphones so not worried about bluetooth (I love that the jellies have headphone jacks which is another reason why I want to switch)

I took the plunge and pre-ordered the Ace, and I’ve been putting it through its paces for the last couple of days. I’m pretty deep in the Sonos ecosystem, and I’m a big headphone collector, so I’m tossing in my thoughts here for those thinking about taking the plunge on these $450 cans.
TL:DR - the Aces come in at a high price point in the market at $450. At that price, these may be a tough sell for many. The overall sound is very good - but not definitively better than the category leaders in the market, many of which cost substantially less. Early/Gen1 bugs will leave some thinking that the product is half baked or leaves them out entirely, especially Android users. All that said, this is still a Sonos product, so there are enough things done well about the Ace that it could be a decent proposition - especially if you catch a sale and/or after upcoming software updates. Hard to hate, hard to love.
Now to give some context and get into the deeper review. As mentioned, I am pretty deep in the Sonos ecosystem because I’ve steadily added to my setups over the years. I started with a 5.1 system, Playbar + Sub + two Play 1s about 10 years ago (now in my kid’s playroom) and now I have Sonos in my whole home - another Arc-based 5.1 setup (media room), a Playbase 5.1 setup (living room), a Beam (bedroom), Move (outdoor patio) and a Roam (travel).
I am also a headphone collector and have 22 pairs, ranging from “consumer” stuff like the Ace, AirPods Pro/Max - and all the way up to high-end reference gear from the likes of Audeze, Sennheiser, Meze, Focal, etc. I listen to many types of music, from hip-hop to classical, and I also do quite a bit of gaming. I have a young kiddo so have the need to use headphones for TV viewing pretty often.
Starting with the overall design, comfort, control and included accessories - Sonos does a mostly solid job. The design isn’t overly striking in any way, but it is a well-refined “standard headphone” type of design with clean lines. The Aces are light while still feeling solidly built, have a smooth but appropriately firm sliding hinge for headband fit, have easily removable pads, and while they don’t completely collapse, they get compact enough to fit in the included zip-up hard shell carrying case.
The respectable carrying case isn’t the only included accessory. A USB-C cable is included for both charging and USB-C audio (no included wall charger), and a USB-C to 3.5mm cable is included as well for plugging into analog sources. The inclusion of these cables and capabilities gives the Aces a lot of general versatility and are good things at this price point.
The design lends itself to an overall very comfortable headphone. The band has a very soft cushion and connects to the cups in a way that distributes the weight very well. The cushions of the cups are a well-padded and very comfortable faux leather situation with a firm but not too imposing pressure on the head. These are easy to wear for hours without discomfort for me. I will note that while everything is fine for me, the cups are not particularly large, and the pads are angled, so people with large ears may find their ears touching the cups a bit.
The controls are also well designed. Sonos chose to avoid any type of touch controls with the Aces and has just three buttons - one for power and Bluetooth pairing, one for ANC/transparency/on-device voice assistant, and one for volume and track/audio source/phone call control. It reads more complicated than it is for the controls to become second nature. It is a very good overall control scheme. It’s not quite as good as the Digital Crown design of the AirPods Max, but I’d give it a strong second to that.
When it comes to hardware design and general ease of use, Sonos has always done well across its product range, and that continues here. Grade: A
Sound is one of the most subjective/difficult things to review, and I’m going to try and be as neutral as possible and use some good points of comparison. Overall, the Aces perform fairly well for the product category, and while they bring their own approach to the table, it is very much debatable whether what they bring in terms of sound is worth the fairly high $450 entry point versus $450 for the AirPods Max, $299 for the Sennheiser Momentum 4, $328 for the Sony WH-1000XM5 or $379 for the Bose Quiet Comfort Ultra - all very mature and respectable market leaders with similar product features in this category. There are wireless headphones out there that are priced higher like the Focal Bathys ($799) or the Bowers and Wilkins Px8 ($529), though one could argue that those are catering to the luxury and/or audiophile market (all Amazon US prices as of this writing), where the sound expectations have a higher hurdle to overcome.
Let’s first talk about tonal balance. The general tuning of the Aces is very similar to all of the other products I mentioned above, which is a version of a “V-Shaped” tune; bass is boosted, and treble is boosted, creating what has become commonly known as a “fun” type of tuning that I call warm and sparkly. While all of the products I mentioned do this in some way, each does it slightly differently, resulting in a slightly different overall sound presentation, the Aces are no exception. Let’s dive in.
The bass on the Aces is very noticeably boosted throughout the entire band, and the biggest boost is in the sub-bass region. This means the Aces bring slam, boom and rumble to the listen. It could be argued that these get into bass head territory, and I believe those that like bass would be happy with the Aces in that department. While the bass is certainly very prominent, it is not overly loose and still maintains a decent level of control. It is a thick but fairly clean bass. It hits thicker than the AirPods Max but less so than the Momentums and XM5s. If you like to feel those big explosions and soundtrack moments in your TV viewing and gaming, the Aces will fit the bill, as the depth the bass can reach is impressive. The downside to the bass tuning is that since the entire bass band is boosted, if you are listening to a track that has a lot of action in the bass region, it can be overwhelming and lack detail. It can also lead to some bleed into the lower midrange on certain tracks.
It is the midrange on the Aces that surprised me the most, though when I think about how Sonos likely dedicated as much thought to how these sound for TV as to how they sound for music, it makes sense. In a usual “V-shaped” tuning, it is the midrange that is the least present or gets a bit left out of the mix. This often results in vocals and many common core instruments and pieces of the mix somewhat veiled, and is the reason many audiophiles don’t like the V-shaped tuning. The Aces mostly avoid this. The midrange balance is pretty on-target with the exception of a bit of a dip in the upper mids. This means that you get a very full-bodied core sound when listening to the Aces, and that’s a very good thing. Male vocals are very often put on full display because of the added warmth of the bass boost. Female vocals can sometimes take a bit of a back seat, along with instruments like guitar, as a result of the dip in the upper mids, but to notice either of these, you’d really have to be a focused listener (more on why later). The story of the midrange is that it’s better executed than many in the category. This translates well to TV/gaming as well, as dialogue is typically easy to make out, even when there’s lots of other action going on.
The treble on the Ace, as mentioned, is definitely boosted, but in a targeted way that overall, works. I mentioned that the upper midrange where female vocals and some higher instruments live is a bit de-emphasized. Well, the treble is boosted in the “sparkle” region, where sounds like symbols reside - as well as the “s” and “t” sounds in vocals. This boost makes details shine a bit more, and it also hides the under-emphasis of the upper midrange a bit because it still pulls forward the sparkle of all vocals. This upper midrange and treble boost combination is also seen in some well-regarded higher end headphones from the likes of Sennheiser and Meze Audio, just to name a few, so kudos to Sonos for pretty solid execution on the treble. The downside to boosting this region is that some people’s ears are sensitive to this frequency range, and can find sounds like snare drums, loud symbols and the like in this region to be grating to listen to for long periods of time. I don’t find the boost to be extreme, but it is there, so those that are treble-sensitive, just something to note.
This is a good point to make note that this has all been related to the default tonal balance of the Aces right out of the box. Connecting to the Sonos app does allow you to adjust the frequency response - though it is a very basic EQ just like other Sonos products - a simple treble/bass slider. Most of the options at this price point offer greater level of control with a at least a 3-5 band EQ, but it’s better than nothing.
Last in the sound department is a bit about the staging and technical performance. Again, the Aces do what they do fairly well for the category, but whether what they do is definitively better than their peers is debatable. The sound that comes from the Aces is crisp and clear, and one of the most immediately noticeable aspects of the presentation is the good horizontal spread of the pieces of the mix - everything is placed very well with pretty good separation. The sound stage isn’t overly wide by any means, and we aren’t talking about a 3D/holographic sound stage (unless you’re using Dolby Atmos, which I’ll come back to), but the sound does indeed go ear-to-ear horizontally. Even so, the focus of the Aces is always front and center. The stage is very center-focused and intimate, with the edges of the left and right channel wrapping around to the ears. It is a pretty in your face presentation that works well. The center position also has a small but distinct depth and separation from the mix, which is impressive for a wireless headphone (I had to wonder if the fact that the inside of the pads of the Aces are angled contributes to this). The fact that the stage is so center-focused also keeps the vocals and heart of the mix emphasized, and this pairs well with its midrange tuning. This presentation also is another testament to being well-designed for both music and TV listening.
I am not always a fan of Dolby Atmos for headphones, as what the technology can do is often overhyped, but the Aces do handle Atmos mixed sources (or multichannel sources when using TV Swap) very well. It essentially makes the sound stage a bit bigger, along with more precise positioning of the pieces of the mix. I find it best for video content and hit or miss for music.
The overall sound package that the Aces deliver is solid, well-executed, V-shaped listen. The sound is warm, crisp, clean, dynamic/lively and is presented very well, in a way that will work for many genres of music, TV and gaming. The aces definitely deserve to be in the conversation among the market leaders, but each of these market leaders also have strong overall presentations that are arguably just as good, if not better - and allow for a bit more control with more EQ personalization options. The Ace’s premium price relative to this competition has to be taken into consideration as a point of comparison in evaluating overall sound. Grade: B+ / A-
I realize that when evaluating a pair of wireless headphones nowadays, the technology feature set is a big factor as well, and that’s where things get even more interesting for the Aces. This is because depending on your particular Sonos setup, mobile device setup, and general home listening setup, the technological features of the Aces are various levels of either lacking or unfinished.
Let’s start with the good. Regardless of the device you’re using to connect, you get to experience the active noise cancellation and transparency modes of the Aces, and both are very good. The noice cancelling mode isn’t quite as good as Bose, and the transparency mode isn’t quite as good as Apple, but both are respectable compared to anything else, a good showing. You can also enable head tracking in the Sonos app when connected to any device audio via Bluetooth, which for Android users may be an added convenience, depending on your device (for Apple users, this is a feature built in option at the system level between any iOS device and AirPods). You also get a fairly good mix of codec support, including some lossless options if your device supports it.
Now, the not so good. When Sonos announced the Aces, the company very accurately talked about how headphones were one of the most requested products of the community, and everyone in this sub can probably attest to that. But what has been released, at this point in time especially, IMO misses the mark by not doing the thing we want the headphones to do most - connect seamlessly to our larger Sonos systems. On top of this, it highlights the challenge of forced obsolescence when dealing with home theater speakers and advanced technology in the same package.
The best way to illustrate this is to state plainly that the Aces are first and foremost Bluetooth headphones. They connect to your Sonos system indirectly via the app on your Bluetooth device, not directly to the system itself via WiFi (mostly). This means a few things. If you’re envisioning using the Sonos app as a main hub for navigating your music library across sources and handing it off between your Sonos speakers and headphones, that’s not in the cards with the Ace (ha). As a matter of fact, you can only use the Sonos app to play and pause media playing on the Ace, not select and navigate.
If your goal is using the Aces to listen to your TV, it can be done via a feature called TV Swap, but the situation isn’t exactly pretty for a lot of people. You can press a button on the Aces or within the Sonos app to trigger a direct WiFi connection between a TV-connected Sonos speaker, but at launch and of this writing, it only works on the top-of-the-line Sonos Arc soundbar. This support is coming via software update to the Beam and Ray at an unannounced date. This means that for folks like me that have been building a Sonos ecosystem for years, arguably the most loyal and valuable customers of Sonos (and the ones requesting this product for years), the usefulness of the Aces may be substantially reduced. Out of the four rooms that have Sonos sound bars in my home, again, all purchased within the last ten years or less, only two will ever work with the Aces. My Playbase and Playbar are forever excluded, and if you’re using something like the Sonos Amp to connect a turntable or other device to your Sonos system, you’re also out of luck. If you are an Android user, the picture is even uglier, as the TV Swap feature doesn’t work AT ALL, meaning that until an update arrives, also at an as yet unannounced date, the Aces are essentially a regular pair of Bluetooth headphones for Android users.
For me, this is the most disappointing thing about the Aces. Unless you are a fairly recent inductee to the Sonos ecosystem, the Aces probably are really more general Bluetooth headphones that can connect to a Sonos speakeTV than Sonos headphones that also connect to Bluetooth devices. This is in a world where there are certainly other options for connecting headphones to your TV’s audio. Many smart TV’s and set top boxes now offer a direct Bluetooth connection, and if you have an Apple TV, using AirPods via AirPlay is a much more seamless experience. All of these things, combined with the recent revamp of the Sonos app that took away features and left many unhappy in the name of updating the app for future products (including the Ace), should make you think twice about if the Aces are the best way to get TV audio via headphones for you and your setup - and about the longevity of your particular Sonos setup in general. I realize there are technical challenges that make better Sonos system integration a challenge, and that for some, the issue about older products isn’t an issue at all, but it is worth bringing to light for those making a long-term purchase decision.
The second most disappointing thing about the launch of the Aces is the continued trend of companies releasing products at full price that are essentially unfinished. I already discussed that for Android users at launch, there is no TV Swap at all, so these are effectively just regular Bluetooth headphones with no Sonos system integration at all. I also touched on the fact that TV swap support for the Beam and Ray is missing for all platforms. There is also a very cool-sounding form of TruePlay that Sonos is calling TrueTune. This will calibrate the room, so that when using TV Swap to listen to audio, you’ll get an even more “immersive” listening experience that takes Spatial Audio and head tracking to the next level by trying to actually mirror the acoustics of the room as if you had no headphones on at all. I can’t report on that because, you guessed it…the feature is coming at a yet unannounced date. On top of this, there are bugs out of the gate. Sometimes my Aces don’t show up in the Sonos app, and TV Swap sometimes doesn’t trigger or glitches out.
All of this makes judging the technological features of the Aces difficult. On the side of being Bluetooth headphones - the ANC, connection possibilities/versatility, multi-device connection, head tracking/spatial audio support, and battery life, the Aces are a strong showing. On the Sonos side, your experience will be highly dependent on your current Sonos setup, source setup, how you like to navigate your music library, your level of patience to receive updates, and your trust/level of care for when/if Sonos will release an update that breaks something between your Aces and your existing setup or releases a new speaker that doesn’t work with the Aces. These are all considerations that again make the $450 asking price seem steep when there are other options in the market with equal or greater capabilities for a substantially lesser price. Grade: C-
Overall, I view the Aces as a solid pair of Bluetooth headphones, and as Bluetooth headphones for day-to-day needs, they are worth considering, though arguably not the best value in terms of overall sound quality and features. The AirPods Max, Sennheiser Momentum 4 Wireless, Sony WH-1000XM5 and Bose Quiet Comfort Ultra all bring comparatively good sound and feature sets at the same or a substantially lower price. Whether that premium is worth it because of the Sonos interplay, well, your mileage may vary, depending on your setup. They have the potential to be pretty great for some, while at the same time being annoying for some - hard to hate, hard to love. I hope this review was helpful for those taking a look at these or building a Sonos ecosystem in general. Happy listening!