I’m thinking about getting a new card with 0% interest for x months that can do a balance transfer. My question is about balance transfer fees. Do they get charged to that card and added to the balance or are they expected to be paid up front? I have some credit card debt I’d like to spread out and pay with less interest but I’m not familiar with how it works. My other options would be credit counseling or a debt negotiation place like Beyond Finance but I don’t want to go that route if I don’t have to… Covid really kicked our asses financially and now we are having trouble getting out of this hole.

I’ve been reading this board for hours and see many common threads here so gonna post this bit of wisdom; some should help if you read and take to heart.
1/ Men are not complex creatures; we need love, food, sex, and respect. Admiration will come through as love to us.
2/ Men are often not emotionally aware to the level women are. MOST, haven’t been to counseling, haven’t been trained well on emotional intelligence, and don’t have a clue how you feel day to day; you may have to tell him basic things like “rubbing my feet like that makes me feel awesome” or “playing golf every weekend drains the emotional bank account”
3/ Men telegraph their issues in obvious ways. If they are digging through your phone or accusing you, it’s a sign they feel guilty about something.
4/ Men don’t lose interest in sex… they are hard wired to get thirstier for sex by the day. The more they wait, the thirstier they get. If they aren’t showing interest, it’s because they are likely turned off by you (some emotional resentment), they have gotten overweight around 40, or some hormone imbalance due to health.
5/ Because of emotional ignorance, men often build resentments over time. They don’t know how to express issues, and shit builds. Ladies you may need to ask some probing questions to discover why distance grows… my advice, do this after a good meal and he’s feeling some peace.
6/ Marriage requires steady investment. By both parties. Making money isn’t enough. Taking care of kids isn’t enough. So sit down and outline what a successful marriage looks like, and how often you’re investing in it. This will help the man by knowing, not guessing. Take the guesswork out. If he knows fishing every other weekend keeps things healthy, but every weekend drains the marriage, that is important to know.. . He won’t know this by default.
7/ Building secrets in marriage is a slippery slope. Don’t keep your vibrator time to yourself and upset if you catch him looking at porn. I would work hard to bring your intimate needs to one another, not alone. Warning signs here are rejection… if you feel rejection or rejecting him, then you guys need to pause and have a talk.
8/ it takes a lot of energy to talk about issues, change or emotion. Pick one Sunday evening a month to chat about “things” for an hour or two. Make it known, and don’t overburden time in between fretting… you cannot work out complex problems in short windows or forced windows.
9/ Money is always tied to underlying emotion for a man, especially if he works superbly hard for it. Often times a job takes 50%+ of his emotional energy and that’s often a reality. Plan carefully the for other 50% across kids, intimacy, setting expectations, etc. Not setting financial expectations is a leading cause for divorce.
10/ When marriage gets fully burdened, (kids, mortgage, jobs, money, debt, stress, etc), then it’s very easy to forget all about your partner. If you want a good marriage, you have to keep your partner above all this… same for men and women.
Hopefully some of these words helps at least one of you. Welcome to ask addl.

My 19M BF and I 19F have been togther for a little over 8 months and we've been friends since we were 12. For the last couple of weeks we've been in a rut because he thought I didn't love him anymore one morning before I left for 4 days. I work 2 hours away from home so my job pays me to stay near the job site so it's not like I avoided seeing him it's just my job. I cried so much that day and in the moment it felt like I was grieving a loss of the love of my life. I thought we were ending.
In the past if we had problems we would try to work through it but if he thought we were just going in circles, he'd get frustrated and leave me standing there feeling defeated. I thought for sure that when I came back home he'd be moved out and gone.
After work I went to the hotel bar to eat and just talk to anyone who'd listen when a guy came up to me and was making me feel heard and validated. We talked for over two hours and I had to get going to bed and before we split ways, the guy asked for my number. Yes I know I should of said "sorry I have a bf" but I wasn't thinking and next thing I know I was putting my number in his phone. We would text quite a bit the following weekend and that next morning he asked to grab a bite to eat. We eventually made it back to the hotel and somehow convinced me to go up to his room. We had sex, I was lost in the moment but as soon as it was over I got out of there.
I think I resent him for not having his high school diploma, and for not doing what he needs to do for us to build a life togther. He would call in to his job a few times a month while I never call in even when I'm super sick. I know it's no excuse for what I did.
This morning he heard my phone go off and he'd seen the text between the other guy and I, I woke up to him crying on the floor and he was incredibly heartbroken. I tried to make him feel validated and I explain everything and anwsered any questions he had. He said he's willing to give me a second chance but he keeps apologizing and I tell him "No please don't say that, I fucked up. I am so so sorry" I suggested couple counseling or even taking a step back but he has no interest in that. He wants me and I didn't realized how much I wanted him till I almost lost him.
How do I repair us? How can I help him realized I'm at fault and not him? I know it'll be a long time for him to ever forgive me but what can I do to make things better? Before you tell me I fucked up, I know I did and I will live with that decision forever. I will be making it up to him everyday. I don't deserve a second chance or a good guy but he's still here and I'll forever be in his debt.

Washington Post article said investors want lawmakers to have to disclose their stock market trades, that way average Americans can follow the money and what they know. Article below:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/06/01/congress-stock-trading-trackers-pelosi/
Members of Congress hear a lot of secrets: classified briefings, confidential previews of pending legislation and the private opinions of constituents, regulators, corporate executives and world leaders.
Watchdog groups have long believed that some lawmakers use that information to make money in the stock market. Now a loose alliance of traders, analysts and advocates is trying to let Americans mimic the trades elected officials make, offering tongue-in-cheek financial products — including one named for former House speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and another that refers to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) — that track purchases and sales after lawmakers disclose them.
Collectively, these investment vehicles have attracted hundreds of millions of dollars. At times, congressional investigators have used them to keep tabs on suspicious trading activity, according to people familiar with these investigations who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the media.
“Our mission isn’t to make everyone millionaires — it’s actually to highlight the hypocrisy of congressional trading in an effort to bring more transparency and trust back into our government,” said Christopher Josephs, the founder of Autopilot, an app that allows ordinary investors to mimic the trades of leading politicians, top hedge funders and other famous traders. “Hopefully it’s helping, but our slogan is, if you can’t beat them, join them.”
Members of Congress are permitted to trade on the markets, but a 2012 law, the Stock Act, clarified insider trading restrictions for lawmakers and ramped up reporting requirements. Lawmakers are banned from trading based on material and nonpublic information they learn through their jobs and have 45 days to disclose any trades they or their immediate family members make.
Because the trackers rely on lawmakers’ legally mandated (and delayed) disclosures, they don’t allow the average American to make identical, same-day trades.
Those delays likely cut into users’ returns. That’s not the point, tracker boosters say. Their goal is to shine a light on congressional stock trading.
But the rise of these platforms is an alarming sign of distrust constituents have for their elected representatives, said Delaney Marsco, the director of ethics at the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan government watchdog group.
“A lot more people than we would like” believe lawmakers use information gained from their positions to “make significant gains to their stock portfolios,” Marsco said. “That’s incredibly damaging to the public’s trust.”

A whole new product category

The push to allow ordinary investors to mimic lawmakers’ stock trading began in 2019, when an anonymous social media account called Unusual Whales began publishing reports analyzing politicians’ financial disclosures.
The account spotlighted trades it deemed suspicious, including some lawmakers’ decisions to sell large portions of their portfolios as the coronavirus spread across the globe.
Around the same time, James Kardatzke, an undergraduate at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, started scraping up congressional data. In 2020, he launched one of the first websites that tracked trades disclosed by Pelosi, whose venture capitalist husband, Paul, is a successful investor. (The former speaker has long maintained that she does not personally own any stock and has no knowledge of or involvement with her husband’s investments.)
Quiver Quantitative, the company Kardatzke co-founded that year with his twin brother, Chris, offers a data platform that highlights congressional trades and potential conflicts of interest, including lawmakers’ corporate donors, proposed legislation and net worth.
Josephs’s Autopilot originated as a social investment app called Iris that aimed to make it easier for ordinary investors to mimic their friends’ trades. But after copying famous investors’ trades proved more popular, the company pivoted.
According to Josephs, investors have so far routed some $130 million through Autopilot — $60 million of which has gone toward copying Pelosi, whose portfolio ranks as one of the app’s most popular, alongside Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffett.
The Autopilot portfolio that mimics trades disclosed by Pelosi posted a 45 percent gain in 2023, above the S&P 500’s 24 percent gain that year.
Quiver and Autopilot allow ordinary investors to follow lawmakers’ trades and copy them if they choose. But last year, Christian Cooper, a derivatives trader and portfolio manager at Subversive Capital Advisor, partnered with Unusual Whales to launch products to make the process even simpler.
They launched two exchange-traded funds, or ETFs — investment funds that trade like stocks — that allow everyday investors to mimic lawmakers’ investment strategies. Unusual Whales Subversive Democratic ETF (NANC) and the Unusual Whales Subversive Republican ETF (KRUZ) — whose tickers nod to Pelosi and Cruz, a member who is not a prolific stock trader but has high name recognition — hit the market in February 2023.
NANC, which invests in stocks purchased by Democratic members of Congress, outperformed the overall U.S. stock market from its inception through April 30 of this year, according to an independent analysis by Elisabeth Kashner, director of global funds research and analytics at FactSet, a financial data and technology company. KRUZ, which invests in stocks purchased by Republican members, hasn’t done as well, underperforming the overall market. KRUZ ended April with $16 million of assets versus NANC’s $78 million. But Kashner argues that those outcomes should come with a caveat.
“While NANC’s run-up has been impressive, it’s statistically insignificant, meaning that there’s a decent chance that the outperformance to date has been random,” Kashner said. “Ditto for KRUZ’s underperformance.”

A push for further change

The trackers have proved popular. But without quicker, more up-to-the-minute disclosures, investors won’t ever be able to perfectly copy lawmakers’ trades — and anti-corruption advocates will have a harder time pinning down whether a trade was problematic, James Kardatzke said.
Because of this, some members of Congress have come to believe that the decade-old Stock Act is insufficient to restore Americans’ trust that lawmakers aren’t using their access to information for profit.
The penalties for those who violate the law are minimal: Members who are late to disclose stock activity, or sales and purchases of cryptocurrencies, generally face a $200 fine prescribed by the Stock Act. Rep. Pat Fallon (R-Tex.), who failed to disclose 122 transactions valued between $9 million and $21 million in 2021 in a timely manner, paid $600 in late filing fees and corrected the record though he refused to cooperate with the review conducted by the Office of Congressional Ethics.
More problematic, in the view of ethics watchdogs and people familiar with the ethics process in Congress, is that enforcement of the Stock Act lacks teeth and relies entirely on self-reporting.
“There does not seem to be much evidence of the Stock Act being violated, but on the other hand, anyone who truly wanted to violate the Stock Act with any degree of sophistication would be able to do it simply by not reporting it on your financial disclosures,” said a person involved with ethics investigations in Congress who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive and ongoing matter.
An effort to ban lawmakers and their families from owning individual stocks stalled out after Pelosi declined to bring a bipartisan change proposal to the floor at the end of her House speakership in 2022, claiming that she didn’t have the votes to pass it.
“It’s already hard for many members to raise a family and maintain homes in two cities on their salaries,” a senior congressional aide explained of member opposition to a ban, speaking on the condition of anonymity to talk candidly. “If you make it impossible for a member’s spouse to take a job that includes stock-based compensation, that is another burden that can drive talented people away from public service.”
That has not deterred a string of unusual pairings of politicians, including Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) in the House and Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) in the Senate, from introducing bills that would place stricter limits on congressional trading.
Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.), who is leaving Congress in January to run for governor, has been working closely with Rep. Chip Roy (R-Tex.) on another bill, the Trust in Congress Act, which would require members, their spouses and dependent children to put certain investment assets into a blind trust during their term.
Spanberger and Roy are strategizing how best to advance the bill and have discussed the possibility of trying to force a vote on the House floor before the end of this Congress.
“Transparency has created more questions than answers,” Spanberger said, referring to disclosures mandated by the Stock Act. “So now we have a situation where it actually looks like maybe there’s bad behavior when maybe there isn’t — or maybe there is.”
Interest in the bill ebbs and flows “based on the bad or quizzical behavior of our colleagues,” Spanberger said.
Banning lawmakers from owning stock is popular: Eighty percent of voters support a ban on stock ownership by members of Congress, the president, vice president, Supreme Court justices and their families, a poll released last year by the University of Maryland’s Program for Public Consultation found.
“There’s no reason we can’t address it,” Roy said in an interview. “It’s not going to be partisan. It’ll be split, and there will be Republicans who are for or against it and Democrats for it or against it.”
Spanberger lobbied House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), the rare member who disclosed no assets in his most recent financial disclosure report, to address the issue at the start of his speakership.
Johnson did not respond to a request for comment. “Mike understands that there’s a problem,” Roy said. “We’re just trying to work through on a bipartisan basis how we can address it.”

Insider-ish trading

Under current law, members rarely pay a real price for trading-related scandals.
The Office of Congressional Ethics concluded in 2021 that there was “substantial reason to believe” that the wife of Rep. Mike Kelly (R-Pa.) used nonpublic information obtained through her husband’s official duties to purchase stock in an Ohio steelmaker. OCE investigators found that Victoria Kelly purchased stock in Cleveland-Cliffs a day after her husband learned that Donald Trump’s Department of Commerce was set to grant trade protections to the company.
Then-Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross informed the Cleveland-Cliffs CEO on April 28, 2020, that the department’s actions would potentially help his company, prompting Cleveland-Cliffs to keep its operations in Mike Kelly’s district open. On April 29, Victoria Kelly made her first individual stock purchase in almost a year, buying between $15,001 and $50,000 in Cleveland-Cliffs stock.
But three years after the ethics office referred what some legal experts deemed a “textbook” case of trading off nonpublic information to the House Ethics Committee — the entity with the power to hold a lawmaker accountable for wrongdoing — the committee has yet to issue a determination as to whether a violation occurred. Tom Rust, the chief counsel and staff director of the committee, declined to comment on the status of the investigation. Mike Kelly’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
In a hyperpartisan environment with threadbare majorities in both chambers, the members of the House Ethics Committee have little incentive to hold other members accountable. The Senate faces even less pressure to investigate its members: It lacks an independent ethics enforcement body like the Office of Congressional Ethics, which has jurisdiction only over the House.
The Senate Ethics Committee has not issued a disciplinary sanction against a senator in over 15 years, even after a stock-trading scandal roiled the upper chamber. Sens. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.) came under scrutiny at the start of 2020 after they dumped vast stock holdings ahead of the coronavirus-induced market plunge. Neither the Senate Ethics Committee nor the Justice Department, whose investigators launched probes into the stock sales, pursued charges.
The “clear exoneration by the Department of Justice affirms what Sen. Loeffler has said all along — she did nothing wrong,” a spokesperson for Loeffler said at the conclusion of the investigation, adding that “she and her husband acted entirely appropriately and observed both the letter and the spirit of the law.”
But ethics experts have argued that the problem with lawmakers’ stock trading habits goes beyond the legal issue of insider trading, noting that even the appearance of improper trading can damage the public’s already record-low trust in lawmakers and government.
Members of Congress might not clear the high legal bar for insider trading, which would require making a trade based on material, nonpublic information. But they might still trade on information that the rest of the public doesn’t have meaningful access to, said Marsco of the Campaign Legal Center.
Some members routinely engage in trades that critics see as posing actual or potential conflicts with their committee assignments, where members often are privy to nonpublic — or even classified, sensitive, privileged or otherwise restricted — information. And some have gotten a lot richer — in part due to the gains made through the stock market — during their time in office.
Several trackers have noted that Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) has in recent months disclosed trades of companies that have business before the committees he sits on. Mullin’s net worth has increased from roughly $5.9 million when he was elected to Congress in 2012 to an estimated $63.66 million today.
But Mullin’s case highlights the complexity of the issue. “Over 2 years ago, Sen. Mullin sold several of his companies,” a spokesperson for Mullin wrote in an email. “Any attempts to link an increase in net worth purely to investments outcomes, which are independently managed by a third-party operator, are completely inaccurate.”
Ideally, Mullin and other members of Congress who own stocks would put them in a blind trust, said Kedric Payne, former deputy chief counsel of the Office of Congressional Ethics, who now serves as the vice president of the Campaign Legal Center.
“That way, there’s no way for you to direct your broker to sell that defense contractor stock because you don’t even know you own it,” Payne said.
But the public’s perception of members’ conflicts of interest is the most important issue, Payne added.
“We are now at a new level where the members no longer have to be insider traders to profit — we are at a point where merely publishing what trades a member buys means the price of that stock goes up because other people are following their lead,” he said. “You have a problem that’s very hard to erase.”

My 12 year old son has described himself as being a therian/furry. He states that he does not believe he is an animal but he is infatuated with the idea with wearing costumes and role playing as someone/something else.
He currently attends a private Christian school and has only 30 other students in his grade. The past two years have been tough on him emotionally. He is sensitive and any kind of teasing just tore him up. At the beginning of 2023, he had gotten to the point where he contemplated suicide and praying others got hurt just because they called him a name. He is in counseling and seeing psychiatrist to help with these depressed feelings. These were feelings that were wounded by being called fat or too slow, and he is still suffering from it. I need him to know that just being himself is enough and worthy of friendship and love even if he is bigger and without pretending to be someone/something else
Now, he has these furry feelings and I'm just lost. I couldn't give a flying monkey about it and just want him to be him and happy. But the world he lives in will not agree with this. Small school, small town, small minds will not understand. It's so hard to say to just let him do what he wants but I believe the backlash and repercussions will be forever scarring. A kid shouldn't spend every day defending themselves and constantly trying to explain why he is what he is. It would be exhausting and this title of being a furry would be forever engraved on his forehead for the rest of his school years. And some might say, well just switch schools but I'm sure 350 kids of that class would give him crap much worse. Or just home school him....but how is that helping???? Keeping him away from everyone so no one finds out, sounds counterproductive.
On top of this, my husband won't have any of this. He said it's probably just a phase and he'll be over it in 2 months...and here we are almost 6 months into this growing furry fascination. My husband's solution is to take away all links or exposure to this furry stuff and that's that. Don't talk about, don't think about it and it never happened
But I know that this is not the solution and will not allow my son to be suppressed but at what cost? My marriage, our family? I've always been respectful of other's opinions even when they don't align with mine because it doesn't effect my family but when my husband and I share such drastic views and solutions, it's a cluster f.
So, if anyone has thoughts or experiences or insights or even a prayer on what the heck to do, I would greatly appreciate it.

Hey everyone, my wife left our son and I just last night and this is the fourth time within the last 2 years (we've been married for 6 years). I don't really know where to begin but I guess I'll start from the beginning of when the issues started.
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About 2 years ago my wife started to change, it was very subtle but she began to cut off people, including her own mother and siblings. She started to claim she was an independent woman and didn't need anyone as she began hanging out with her co-worker (female) often and showing up at home 5-6 hours after work (usually drunk). After I confronted her about not being there and causing me to do all of the housework after I got off of work she got defensive and left to stay the night at her co-workers house and showed back up two days later without even saying sorry.
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On the second occurrence she just randomly started bringing up the past while we were talking about how life was going well and we could pay off our mortgage loan in two years. She started to break down out of nowhere and brought up her past and how she was raped at 13 years-old by her guidance councilor, how her mother and siblings abused her, and how she had nobody. I comforted her and she pushed me away and no matter what I said to calm things down she twisted everything I said to make it sound like I was attacking her. She then stormed off without even wearing shoes, or grabbing her phone and went to the ER at midnight. She came back three days later after staying at an old friends.
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Afterwards she started counselling and got on medications and was diagnosed with CPTSD and bipolar depression.
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On the third occurrence it was Christmas Eve and everything was going well (or so I thought) as it had been 5 months since her last episode and again, out of NOWHERE she started bringing up her past and said some awful things. She told me that she was a horrible wife and mother and that she was broken and not good enough to be with anyone. She went off on my mother who was present and when my mother asked what was going on my wife pushed her to the ground and stormed out the back door and ended up going to the ER again and was committed to a mental health center where she spent 5 days. She came back home afterwards and things went well for quite a while, until yesterday.
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On this latest occurrence she came home drunk as hell (she rarely drinks) and was straight-up looking for a fight with me, she baited me into getting mad at her by verbally attacking me and twisted everything I said negatively and when she couldn't do that she just cried while telling me she was worthless and in all honesty, she had her mind set on leaving no matter what I did. She ended up leaving again to go to the ER and was committed yet again for about a week and when I called her after 3 days she said she was doing well and couldn't wait to come home and things seemed to be doing better.
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Fast forward two days after she got out and she left AGAIN and blocked my number despite me doing nothing wrong and trying to be supportive.
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I am not perfect by any means, I am too down to earth and lack ambition I guess you could say. I'm content with just being financially stable and providing a decent life for us and our son but my wife has always had very lofty goals. She wants to move to a different state and cut off everyone and has her mind set on acquiring a house well beyond our means and has hinted that she would go there on her own and leave our son and I behind if need be and that she didn't need us and could get whatever she wanted on her own.
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The thing is, when I met my wife she was homeless and did ANYTHING it took to get by and hung around a lot of unsavory types because she just didn't care and lived day to day not caring what happened. She broke free from that life when she met me and was doing well for years until for some reason her past caught up to her. I blame a lot of what has happened on her getting back in contact with her old best friend who is heavily into meth who used to also be her old FWB. He is homeless and gets by through robbery and stealing and has been in jail a few times.
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I feel like maybe I'm not street smart enough for my wife, there are many times where she tried to convince me to steal items or even hit her and I feel like I wasn't abusive enough for her to be happy (it doesn't make sense to me but that's all I can come up with). I feel like my wife enjoys the struggle of losing control while high, not knowing where she will sleep, not knowing where her next meal will come from, and in all honesty she has never cared about our son.
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There are times when she'd just bend over naked in front of our son and ask me to have sex with her then and there for instance.
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I have truly wanted this marriage to work but I feel like it's just pointless even bothering anymore. The first three times I was heartbroken but this time I just feel indifferent honestly. To the point that I feel so disillusioned that I could literally divorce her tommorow and get into a new relationship with somebody who is the polar opposite of my wife and not even miss a step or look back whatsoever.
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When my wife introduced me to her mother early on in our relationship (before we got married obviously) her mother pulled me to the side and warned me that her daughter was a severe hypochondriac, I ignored it at the time but as each day passed I feel like this was the truth. There were many times when my wife was just experiencing a cold or was on her period and would whine constantly until I took her to the ER where we got nothing but a bill.
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I can honestly say that my wife has been to the ER at least a dozen times in just the past two years and we've accumulated a lot of debt due to this which has led to getting loans and taking out more loans to pay off loans in an endless cycle where we went from financially secure to living paycheck to paycheck at best.
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I'm not trying to sound insensitive by any means, I am just calling it as I see it and I feel like I was abused but worse yet... that our son was abused due to having to go through all of this and witness his mother in states he should never have to witness.
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I guess that about covers things though, I would like to say I'm hurt over all of this but I'm not whatsoever. All of my sympathy/empathy for her ended after what I've been through while being with her. The sad thing is that without my wifes income and the amount of debt I now have there is no possible way that I can afford the house so I'm either moving back in with my parents or going to be homeless, at 34 years-old.... yeah...
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If anything I'm just angry because I did everything right and it didn't matter because I never had a say in anything despite paying most of the bills, preparing 99% of meals, cleaning the house 99% of the time, taking our son to school 99% of the time, and pulling 99% of the weight in the relationship overall. All my wife ever did for me was provide sex often and spontaneously and when it comes to our son... she gave birth to him?
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At least when my time comes decades from now I can die knowing I tried my best and I was a DAMN good father, better than even my own father who was excellent and raised my brother and I the best he could manage.
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I honestly pity my wife because she is incapable of knowing love and just fakes it to make it when it comes to everything. I get that her past was rough but I feel as though she blew everything out of proportion and from her stories she told me through the years, she always had a thing for older guys and was masturbating multiple times a day from a young age and called me "daddy" during sex so I honestly just don't know what to believe anymore when it comes to her.
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I know that she isn't genuine when it comes to a lot of things and fabricates issues and has a kink for abuse and enjoys suffering, none of which I understood as it was irrational to me but I played along just to placate her.
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Sorry, I guess I am rambling at his point but I had to get all of that off of my chest before the shellshock wears off. Thank you all for your time and I appreciate any replies that bear fruit because this basket is empty right now and I can't tell apples from oranges because I don't have any.

Hello, everyone! I'm seeking a meaningful relationship that will lead to marriage. I've never been married and have no kids, but I hope to have some (biological and/or adopted). Abstinence until marriage is important to me.
I'm happy to share photos through DMs. I am 5'-6" and a bit curvy. Caucasian. Long dark curly hair that is mid-back length. I wear modest clothing and dresses.
I'm finishing up my master's in creative writing. I have worked as a writeeditor most of my career. I'm financially responsible and have no debt.
Traditional, conservative, and believe in biblical gender roles.
Pet-free and looking for the same.
Prefer someone close to my age, but I'm open.
Willing to relocate within the USA. Open to LDR for the right person.
My faith is very important to me. I consider myself a Bible-believing Christian who is non-denominational. I can be open to theological differences, but my partner must agree on salvation. We are saved 100% by grace through faith in Christ's finished work on the cross. Good works, repentance from sins, sorrow for sins, lifestyle changes, saying a prayer, etc. are not required for salvation, nor do they prove that we are saved. Once we are saved, we are eternally secure and cannot lose our salvation.
If you're interested, feel free to send me a message and tell me a bit about yourself. God bless.

Hi everyone!
American here, no dual citizenship anywhere or anything like that. When I did an estimate of my points for express entry I got a score that was a lot higher than I expected, which I'm confused about. I'm 31, speak English at a native level, have a bachelor's in psychology, have no debt and a decent amount of retirement savings, and worked at the same place for six years (although I'm not sure what counts as "skilled" - I was a research assistant, which required a bachelor's, that was all.) I haven't taken the official French test yet but based on the informational documents, I think I would score high (I minored in French). I feel like I'm missing something here though, because a ton of other people also have those things.
If you are selected for Express Entry, does it cost more money for employers to hire you than it does for them to hire a Canadian? Is that the catch? Also, can you get any job, or does it have to be in your field and/or make more than a certain amount or something like that?
I'm thinking about getting my master's (probably in counseling psychology) but I'm worried about spending a lot of time and money to get a degree if it's not going to make a difference. How much would being licensed as a counselor w/ a province help? (If I get licensed, does the fact that counseling is one of the jobs in the new healthcare professions stream help? Would I be better off going with the French stream? Can you really get that much of a boost just from knowing French even if you don't have any other particularly sought-after qualifications?)
Thank you so much! :))

I don’t know what else to do. I am muslim but i have no mosque near me brothers . I am broke , hungry, sold almost everything I could, in debt , and I have nobody to ask for help. , I live alone and I had one of the worst year of my life . My father passed on in January, I lost my job 2 months ago due to severe depression and I found something else to work but I get paid in 3 weeks and all I have left is 0.2 euro cents . I’m not from the USA, I don’t have any charities in my small town, no food pantries , I asked even at a church for help but all the priest could help me with were prayers and words of encouragement. I’m very tired and sick and honestly extremely scared . I can’t get a cash advance at work and have nobody to borrow from. I had a panic attack just writing this . I don’t know what to do. I honestly have no physical way to survive 3 weeks on nothing . I even asked a priest for help at a christian chuech explaining things , but besides prayers he couldn’t help me in any way . I’m crying now I’m truly afraid

My(37M) wife (33F), together 9 years, married 4, is struggling, and it’s a bit complex. Divorce is a real possibility for us, and will taint anything I say to her. I want to make sure whatever treatment actions she takes are protected.
About a year ago, she (a nurse in a psych hospital) was attacked by a patient and kicked in the head. She received a concussion and her work handled it horribly. Long story short, she ended up with considerable time off and poor follow up treatment, before finally leaving and getting a new job.
While off on worker’s comp, we racked up a considerable amount of CC debt, and were already working on a previously built up debt that we had gotten out of control.
She has always been a little bipolar (1pt away from a full blown diagnosis by a licensed doctor) and struggled with anxiety and impulse control, not bad, but it was there. However, since the attack, it has been almost crippling for her. She was bawling hysterically frequently about returning to work and even confided she was very depressed. She finally spoke to our doctor who started to treat her with some meds. She was horrible about following through and taking as prescribed, often missing or (I believe) increasing dosage. Nothing she was on was prone to abuse though. She had also missed her period several months in a row and failed both self and prescribed pregnancy tests.
Then we found out she was pregnant. It was a surprise, as we were actually getting diagnostics done where they had prepared us to possibly expect cancer. Through pregnancy, she was actually very good. I thought things were getting better. Certainly a little anxiety about finances, but it was actually a good thing, as it really woke her up to her spending habits and we were able to drastically cut our spend.
The pregnancy wasn’t unwanted, but was unexpected. We had began to think we couldn’t have kids, though never really considered fertility treatment. We had previously discussed her staying home until school-age if we had a kid and it was financially viable. However, in our current state, we would be unable to make ends meet without her working. I thought we were in agreement on this, both worked from home, and would attempt to avoid day care. We are both high earners, but have a lot of debt.
Then about three months ago our son was born. My wife’s labor was a mess, riddled with with preeclampsia, extended labor inducement, and ending with a c section. She was exhausted and had post partem preeclampsia too.
We got out of the hospital finally, and have basically had family staying with us since, between her parents or my dad.
As soon as her mom got here, she started pressuring me to agree for her to stay home and quit her job. I said if she could figure out a budget I would, but I don’t see a way. She through out bankruptcy, credit counseling, going to 1 car. I already had liquidated 401k to get out of her highest interest rate cards and like I said, her spend was now under control. But I just don’t see a way to make that happen.
She has been really irradic lately and has unilaterally extended her maternity leave without pay. She went ahead and took a new job that is weekends only and pays a little less, so that she can spend more time with the kid.
As part of our reduced spending, we moved to a much cheaper rent in the county. It’s in the worst school district/crime area, but still in a HCOLA area and above average, just the worst in the county.
During the move, her mom has been up to help watch the kid. In reality, my wife and her hang out most of the time. She will unpack a box here or there, but it’s been a month and still a mess. No cleaning is happening.
I have been doing all of the groceries, cooking, errands, moving the boxes, yard work. I understand she has issues going on, but I just can’t do this solo anymore. I am also taking the kid when he wakes up around 530a until her mom or her gets up, usually around 1000. My wife does take his midnight-0200 feeding and lay him down. I am also working full time, it’s WFH and I am fortunate to have pushed off a lot of projects, but it’s soon crunch time for me. I have avg 4 hours of sleep.
I am concerned, because things just are continuing to get worse. She takes great care of the kid, but I feel like she is neglecting so much responsibility. She thinks I am the AH for not blindly agreeing for her to not work. She has told me she has suicidal ideation and recently admitted to being fully suicidal prior to the pregnancy, then said with the kid, she would never go that route now, but just the other day when faced with her return to work date, made a reference about potentially killing herself. She denies that now.
She says she has post partem and the only thing that will work is her not worki. I have told her we can’t afford it but if she is getting treatment by a pro, and following their advice and that advice is to stay home while she continues treatment, I’ll figure out how to make it work.
The problem is, she isn’t pursuing any sort of treatment. She is incredibly smart, and will tell people what they want to hear. With the attack, she had a legitimate big lawsuit to pursue, got a lawyer, but really didn’t follow any treatment plans from the psychiatrist or lawyer. I let it go, as they were admittedly playing things up for a lawsuit, but they weren’t all wrong either.
Her mom is all sort of diagnosed mental illnesses and also a master at manipulating diagnosis to get whatever pill she wants. I fear her influence on my wife. She also encourages her to not work and the impulsive spending. I am terrified my wife will go down this path.
My wife has been threatening divorce and says me wanting to get her help is just to get out of child support . Prior to the injury, we were struggling already but working through it. The aforementioned debt, stale sex life, porn- normalish things for 9-yr relationship. I won’t say they were perfect, but they weren’t impending doom and we worked the problem.
I need her to understand that I think a lot of this is unhealthy and she is ill. If she I truly getting treatment, we may be able to save the relationship, don’t even know if we would want to honestly, but things are to the point I am not convinced that with out me there to pick up the slack, she would be able to fully take care of the kid. When she is sleepy, she just shuts down. We made it one night with breast feeding before she said it was too tiring. If she has slept less than 5 hours, she will wait until I get the baby, even if I had like an hour. I have chalked a lot of it up to birth recovery, but it’s only getting worse.
If I knew she was stable and getting real treatment, I wouldn’t ever use that against her. At the same time, current state, I don’t trust my son to the care if I am not there. I think a child needs his mom more than his dad at this age and want him to have both, but not like this.
Her mom I think is part of the problem too, because she will comment about how much I do and is complimentary, but also doesn’t curb my wife when she is neglecting things. She is in a tough spot, but I think we are to the point where wife needs a reality check.
I am open to feedback on my actions, but don’t need any disparaging commentary on her or her family please. My sole interest is getting her into a mental state that I can trust to do what it takes for our kid.
The only thing I can think of is a 72 hold and force to her to get cleared by a doctor, but i am 1) not confident we are there, 2) not confident she wouldn’t mask it with her background, and 3) it would absolutely kill any chance at fixing things. 4) I’d prefer there to not be a legal record of her treatment, for her sake. Things could well end in divorce, we both see it as at least a possibility, and she is smart enough to understand potential implications.

I, 26 F and my fiancé, 30 M have been together for 1 year and a half and engaged for two months. A little before we got engaged, I began introducing sermons and Bible study lives on YouTube into our regular media and I have noticed that it has been bringing us closer to God. I can admit that I have strayed away from my relationship with God but I have been feeling called to get closer to him and to bring my fiancé with me. Earlier in our relationship, he told me that he was once atheist at a young age and that he slowly started to understand as he got older. He would share these stories of seeing spirits of people passed on and having interactions with the unseen world, telling me that these all went away when I came into his life.
We were having a conversation last night involving spiritual warfare. Around the same time I wanted to start becoming closer to God, I felt like we have been having heightened spiritual activity in our home. I would have dreams of ghosts and aliens and he would see them in the corner of his eye or hear them. I became vulnerable with him and told him that I need his advice. He was telling me to seek God. I asked him if he could show me and be my guide but he just kept telling me to seek God.
I was raised Christian but have strayed away from the faith for a while. I have been getting closer to God and he seemed like he has a closer relationship with him from the stories he has told me about his walk with Christ. I was asking him if he would read the Bible with me and he said that he doesn’t need to read the Bible to have a relationship with God. I said I understand but with him telling me to seek God, I just thought it would make sense for us to read together.
He started getting really angry the more questions I was trying to asking and I was telling him not to be deceived. I am only trying to learn from him. He pulled out his phone and started searching on the internet (not the Bible) to try to prove his point which is easy because the internet is filled with people that talk about the Bible but don’t read it. I just started praying because I am tired of arguing and going in circles trying to prove egotistical points that lead to no solution. I offered for him to pray with me but he said no multiple times but when I stopped praying, he said Amen after me.
Afterwards, I asked what he had found and he said that the posts were saying that you don’t need the Bible to have a relationship with God but in order to seek him you have to read the Bible. I thought that is what I had been saying the whole time… at that point, it was clear that he just wanted to argue with me so I tried to withdraw.
I tried to end the conversation because I felt like we weren’t coming to a solution. He kept cutting me off and antagonizing me by saying “no we’re not going to end this because you brought this up so this is how you intended for it to go!” I said “I understand I did bring it up and I’m sorry it’s not going the way we expected but can you help me get back on the right track?” He kept interrupting and telling me that I was the cause of this. He was not seeing, hearing, or feeling me. It just felt like he was being a bully.
I am starting to have a lot of second thoughts about marriage and I have not been able to find a church home with wise counsel. Ephesians 6 tells us that we wrestle not with flesh and blood, so I know this is a spiritual attack on us. Is there any advice or insight anyone can offer on this? Thank you and God bless you.

Welcome once again to ContraDiction Corner! Today's Dic in the Corner is none other than governing body member Stephen Lett!
Critical Thinker: Hello Stephen
GBSL: Hellooo Brotherrrr
Critical Thinker: < chuckels> that's an interesting way of speaking you have Stephen
GBSL: Proper e•nun•ci•a•tion is key to helping the listener fully understand the meaning of the words and phrases one is trying to convey dear brotherrrr
Critical Thinker: umm, ok.
Critical Thinker: So, anyway. The topic for today's episode is the Superior Authorities. Are you familiar with who your organization teaches who that is and What they do?
GBSL: Yes, I am welll aware of who it is our God Jehovah has put in place to govern mankind. In fact, in the October 2022 Watchtower study article p14 par 6, we've written, I mean, Holy Spirit has directed us to write, "In this verse, the term "superior authorities" refers to human rulers who have power and control over others. Christians are subject to these secular authorities. These rulers maintain public order, enforce the law, and at times even come to the defense of Jehovah's people. (Rev. 12:16) Thus, we are commanded to render them the taxes, tributes, fear, and honor that they demand. (Rom. 13:7) However, those secular governments have authority only because Jehovah allows them to have it."
GBSL: So, you seee, our God Jehovah has put these human rulers in place to do notable things, foremost among those being to enforce the laws of the land.
Critical Thinker: Wow, thank you for that Stephen. I was actually planning on using that reference you quoted. I did want to also focus on the following paragraph, paragraph 7. It starts by saying, "Christians submit to human governments when secular laws do not contradict God's laws." Are Jehovah's Witnesses to abide by that statement in all aspects of life?
GBSL: Why, yes! Jehovah's people must always remember that their Heavenly Father is connnnstantly watching them, making sure they're taking everyyyy opportunity to make His heart glad. So, if a human law is in opposition to God's law, then we must never obey the rule of man.
Critical Thinker: Stephen, may I read to you a human law and get your opinion on it?
GBSL: Why yes!!
Critical Thinker: Since your organization is based in the United States. I'll read to vou a law regarding this topic for your country.
Critical Thinker: "It is illegal under federal law (18 U.S.C. §2252) to produce, distribute, receive or possess any child pornography. It is also illegal under federal law to knowingly search for and view child pornography even if the images are subsequently destroyed or deleted."
Critical Thinker: That human law seems to be pretty clear in its intent, that of punishing individuals who produce, distribute, receive, possess, search for AND view the subject matter mentioned therein, wouldn't you agree?
GBSL: Yes, I certainly would agree with that and EVIDENTLY Jehovah's hand was backing the humans that established such a law.
Critical Thinker: That's a very affirmative response, thank you.
Critical Thinker: I would like to take a second and refer to a statement you made in the early part of 2015 in an appearance you made which I believe was a February JW broadcast episode. In that appearance you stated, ""If anybody takes action against someone who would threaten our young ones, and takes action to protect our young ones, it's Jehovah's organization," and you continued, "We reject outright such lies."
Critical Thinker: I do believe the "lies" you were referring to are as you stated, "apostate-driven lies and dishonesties that Jehovah's organization is permissive toward pedophiles", things of which you said were "ridiculous". You said this, correct?
GBSL: In the past, there may have been statements made that could be attributed to all of us.
Critical Thinker: True, but Stephen I'm asking you. Are those your words?
GBSL: May I ask why you're inquiring about this? (uncomfortable smiling)
Critical Thinker: Oh, that's the premise of the show we have here. We have on a guest, such as yourself, and present to them things they've said and see whether or not it contradicts with either something they've said or believe.
GBSL: I see. I wasn't completely informed as to the premise of the show by the brothers who are tasked with the responsibilityyyy of doing that.
Critical Thinker: Once again, if I may, are those your words Stephen?
GBSL: Yes
Critical Thinker: Thank you. I hope you don't feel attacked here. In doing research for this interview I read that you and 8 other men serve as the spokesperson for God, so I'm doing my best to maintain a modicum of respect. But I do feel it necessary you afford me the same thing if you would.
GBSL: Sir, this is a Wendy's
Critical Thinker: 😂 I see you and Jeff Winder read from the same joke book!
GBSL:
Critical Thinker: In all seriousness though, l'd like to focus on the portion of the statement where you stated that it's a lie that the organization is "permissive towards pedophiles".
Critical Thinker: Would you agree that being permissive could be defined as "granting or tending to grant" or being "deficient in firmness or control"?
GBSL: Yes, I would agree that could accurately define what permissive means.
Critical Thinker: Ok, but does that definition fit what you referred to in the aforementioned statement?
GBSL: Yes...
Critical Thinker: Stephen, we'd like for you to read an excerpt from one of your publications, the Shepard the Flock of God book.
GBSL: OK
Critical Thinker: Here, please read what it says in Chapter 14, Child Abuse, subheading "Congregation Considerations" under the highlighted section.
GBSL:
GBSL:"Althoughhhh viewwwwing child pornography is not considered to be child sexual abuse from a congregation standpoint, it is still a serious violation of Jehovah's standards. (cadence slows considerably, noticeable discomfort now shown on face) A person involved in viewing child pornography should be strongly counseled. Depending on the frequency and the extent of his viewing, he could be subject to congregation judicial action."
Critical Thinker: Thank you Stephen.
Critical Thinker: If we could, l'd like to refer back to the human law you stated was EVIDENTLY backed by Jehovah. In part it stated that it's ILLEGAL to search AND view child pornography even if the images are destroyed or deleted.
Critical Thinker: So, if Jehovah put the superior authorities in place and those authorities established a law stating what I just read you, yet the publication from your organization that the Shepards/Elders use to care for the flock doesn't echo that law, doesn't that make vou permissive towards pedophiles since those are the individuals that watch, produce and or distribute child pornography? A contraDiction even?
GBSL: What you need to understand is, at Matthew 24:45, Jesus said there would be a faithful slave that would feed the sheep spiritual food at the proper time.
Critical Thinker: With respect Stephen, that has nothing to do with the question.
GBSL: I've enjoyed my time here but it seems as though we ve come to your last question; undoubtedly the last question shortly before the very last question on this show!
GBSL: *takes off mic, scurries away to handlers *
Critical Thinker: Well, it seems as though Stephen had to leave in a hurrv folks. Maybe there was an incoming message from the upper deck about land that's coming available or maybe even, gasp, new light! 😱
Critical Thinker: Thank you all for joining today's episode! We didn't directly get an answer but if you're a critical thinker, the answer was plain as day. Until next time, have fun out there, be careful and we look forward to seeing you next time on the ContraDiction Corner! 🤣🤣🤣🤣
EDIT: I do want to mention, even though the flair I’ve used is “humor”, I do not find the way in which that organization devalues human lives funny at ALL, and especially those of children.

[Christianity] The Removing Barriers podcast Episode 166: Alistair Begg: LGBTQIA Unions and Dealing with Sin Alistair Begg is a well-known and well-respected pastor and Bible teacher who inadvertently set the world of Christian netizens ablaze when he revealed that he encouraged a Christian grandmother to not only attend an LGBTQ wedding, but to also bring a gift. While he had some supporters in this matter, the majority were shocked and appalled by this stance so uncharacteristic of a man who had proven himself to be a faithful man of God for well over 40 years. Responding to the critics, Begg doubled down, rejected calls for repentance, and dismissed them as Pharisaical legalists incapable of nuance and lacking compassion.
​
In this episode of the Removing Barriers podcast, we will address the obvious questions as to whether or not his counsel was biblically sound and whether his response to criticism was right. However, there is another question to ponder: does social media use complicate obedience to Matthew 18:15-20? Join us on this episode to discuss these questions and more. SFW https://removingbarriers.net/rbp_166
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Disclaimer: My goal with this thread is not to belittle or take a side on today's issues. The goal is to showcase a specific celebration as well as Christianity's role in it. These kinds of things are difficult to stay completely neutral on while still making a point relevant to the topic at hand, but I have attempted to do so.
You are more than welcome to use this thread as a jumping off point for discussion. You are also welcome to use this thread as a simple means of learning some history.
This month's banner represents Juneteenth. Although the Emancipation Proclamation was issued in the US in 1863, the 13th Amendment was not ratified until December 6th, 1865. Even then, the last slaves were not told they were free until June 19th, 1865. Juneteenth has evolved to become more than just a day of remembering a scar that plagued the United States, but it has become a month to reflect on what it means to be "free".
Christianity played a very unique role in the days of slavery as well as the push leading to end it. One of the first names given to June 19th was Jubilee Day. This was in reference to Leviticus 25:8-54. What is described was a festival dedicated to the Lord. The Israelites were to forgive debts, release others from bondage, and even restore some tribal lands. The freed slaves saw this as a perfect representation to their newfound freedoms.
During the time of slavery, many slaves throughout the Caribbean islands of Jamaica, Barbados, and Antigua were given a "Slave Bible" as to not give them anything that might lead to rebellion. This version of the Bible left out most of the Old Testament. What was left were passages aimed at telling slaves to be subservient. This says something about the strength Christianity holds on those who read Scripture. Slaveholders did not want slaves to muster enough spiritual or mental strength to recognize the strength they had to escape their captivity.
Even then, The Haitian Revolution happened.
This obfuscation of the Bible is one of the several aspects of slavery that Christianity has had to wrestle with since the Emancipation Proclamation was signed.
While it is clear the main push to continue slavery was for economic gain, a main source used to justify this push was God's word, at least what was presented as His word. This greed was not found only within the political institutions that ran the governments attempting to call for the continuation of slavery. This greed made its way into the hearts of some churches as well.
In 1838, Theodore Clapp, Unitarian minister of the Independent Unitarian Society, New Orleans wrote:

I would say to every slave in the United States, 'You should realize that a wise, kind, and merciful Providence has appointed for you your condition in life; and, all things considered, you could not be more eligibly situated. The burden of your care, toils and responsibilities is much lighter than that, which God has imposed on your Master. The most enlightened philanthropists, with unlimited resources, could not place you in a situation more favorable to your present and everlasting welfare than that which you now occupy...

At the same time, Scripture was a driving force in the Abolitionist Movement.
Theodore Weld was one of the leading figures in the push to end slavery. Unlike his counterparts who were using God's word to push for the continuation of slavery, he saw God's word as overwhelming in favor of a freed people:

No condition of birth, no shade of color, no mere misfortune of circumstances, can annul that birth-right charter, which God has bequeathed to every being upon whom he has stamped his own image, by making him a free moral agent," Weld stated. "He who robs his fellow man of this tramples upon right, subverts justice, outrages humanity, unsettles the foundations of human safety, and sacrilegiously assumes the prerogative of God.

Since the Emancipation Proclamation, Christianity has had to come to terms with the role it played in slavery. As we see in this subreddit, the "clarity" surrounding God's word and slavery is still debated.
I hope this look at Christianity's role in all aspects of slavery brings to light the importance of Juneteenth, and why I chose it to be represented this month. Yes, on the surface, Juneteenth is a day to celebrate the freeing of the last slave in the United States, but it has become much more than that. It is a time to reflect on the values we hold as human beings and to question where we are moving. It is also a time to reflect on the word of God and to take a hard look at those who use it as a means to an end.
Juneteenth is a stark reminder that even the holiest of things can be used as a tool for subjugation. It is also a reminder that, in the right hands, the Word can be used to bring good back to the world.

Hello
I did my first two years of college and finished an associate's degree about 10 years ago with a good GPA (3.75). I paid for it with Pell grants at that point and did not have much money.
I was stumped at how to pay for a bachelor's degree without getting into student loan debt so I just stopped at that point. I also did not have anything I was particularly interested in or have much faith in me finishing.
Currently I'm split between two potential careers and on paper one seems a lot more logical than the other. Either to become a counselor or to become a journalist. Honestly I'll probably be doing a combination of both not one or the other because I don't see myself as a person who would be satisfied just seeing clients. I would want to have a podcast or write etc. I'll also want to be in private practice eventually.
I don't necessarily hope to get a good paying job from a bachelor's degree I think that's pretty much a known fallacy at this point.
My main question is does it matter what undergraduate degree I get if I want to pursue a counseling master's degree? Is there any instance in which it is required to have an undergraduate in psychology?
Is there any advantage in getting a BA in psychology instead of another degree?
I recently had a friend go back to school in the same area as I live here in the Dallas area. He went to a school that was pretty low cost compared to most programs and he got his master's degree in his in the process of getting his full license as an LPC. His undergraduate was totally unrelated in music. So it seems like it doesn't really matter.
But I wanted to see what other people's opinions are.
Thanks

Hi everyone!
I am starting the process of applying to programs to become a licensed professional counselor. One of the programs I'm looking at is Liberty U Online. It would be one of the best options for me financially. However, I am wondering whether their "Christian counseling" program teaches legitimate mental health counseling and would be able to teach skills like cultural competence and so forth. I'm Christian (though not fundamentalist), but I'm also queer, so I'm a bit worried about that aspect. I know their undergrad is atrocious for LGBTQ+ acceptance, but maybe it's different in grad school / if you're not actually there in person living on-campus and so forth?
I know it's CACREP-accredited, but I'm wondering whether employers would look askance at it, especially in Canada, since they are not as weirdly religious as we are in the States. I plan to apply to emigrate to Canada after I graduate, and I don't want to do anything that will hurt my chances. (I know the odds of getting in as a counselor are slim, but I want to try. And yes I've looked at Canadian programs, but due to family reasons, I'd like to stay close to home for the next 2-3 years.)
Also, are they good about helping find placements? Do they have connections outside the immediate area? I wouldn't mind living in Lynchburg for a few months if necessary, but probably not for a whole year or more, if I can avoid it.
Any thoughts / input people have to share would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you so much!

I am an agnostic and don’t understand Christianity very much despite having grown up in a Christian society and having gone to church when I was younger. What confuses me is that so many believe that Trump is chosen by God to rule our country, that he is some kind of Christlike figure. I hope those people who believe Trump is Christ-like can answer this simple questionnaire about the Christ and Antichrist. Question is, which statements would you attribute to a Christ-like figure and which would you attribute to the Antichrist?
Christ or Antichrist:
“Happy Memorial Day to All, including the Human Scum that is working so hard to destroy our Once Great Country, & to the Radical Left, Trump Hating Federal Judge in New York that presided over, get this, TWO separate trials, that awarded a woman, who I never met before (a quick handshake at a celebrity event, 25 years ago, doesn’t count!), 91 MILLION DOLLARS for ‘DEFAMATION,’”
Christ or Antichrist:
"Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near."
Christ or Antichrist:
"Do not judge, or you too will be judged."
Christ or Antichrist:
“Bring back the death penalty and bring back our police!”
Christ or Antichrist:
"Watch out that no one deceives you. For many will come in my name, claiming 'I am the Christ', and will deceive many."
Christ or Antichrist? :
"I'm being indicted for you." And “I am the chosen one”
Christ or Antichrist? :
"It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God"
Christ or the Antichrist? :
“I have a lot of money ... I don’t need to borrow money. I have a lot of money. … I have a lot of cash. … I have a lot of cash and a great company. … I have very low debt. … I built a phenomenal company that’s very low leverage, unbelievably low leverage with a lot of cash, a lot of everything else.”
Christ or Antichrist? :
“Do to others as you would have them do to you”
Christ or Antichrist? :
“root out … the radical-left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country.”
“I am your warrior, I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution.”

I had a dream.
First me and my wife lived in a building that resembled my old home with my parents. The upstairs portion with my two old dogs. One has not lived with me for years the other has been dead for over two years. They had their own room and it smelled like urine very harshly. Then we decided that we would go with a car ride with some of my friends from high school, this was sneaking out from their supervision. My wanted to go with them for some reason and when we got into the car she didn’t look like my wife anymore but she looked like a guy I used to go to high school with but I could tell it was her. I don’t really understand why I felt this but i did. While we were on this drive I instantly regretted getting in the car with them because I figured they just wanted to go smoke and asked my wife (who looked like my childhood friend as a man) if this was really what we should be doing since she was pregnant. My wife agreed and asked them to drop us back by the house and we would sneak back in. When we turned around our car battery died and I carried my wife back to the house. When we got there she looked like my childhood best friend and I remember that something felt really off but we walked into the house. This man? Or my wife? Sat at the table and made her hold this book. It looked like some Christian book but I can’t remember the name of it and she had to hold a paper behind it that said I swear and the rest of the words were covered. It looked like this was there way of punishing their kids when they made mistakes. The parents of the kid I went to school with were there and dropped this cube shaped things filled with water on her hands to punish her by pinching her fingers. Then asked me why I didn’t stop him. I said because you are the father of this household and he said fair enough. Then he made me hold them and dropped it on my hands 3 times. It really hurt but I tried to hold it in. Then he told me to read the spine of the book and I don’t remember the words and when I was reading them a supernatural experience Happened inside of my dream. It looked like he split into two people and choked the other one and made him vanish and I pointed and my wife saw none of it and I was overcome with fear and thought it was Jesus and called out to him. I did multiple times and this thing said to me. You think I belong to Allah or and I could not make out the other word but said another name. I feel like it said jehovah but I can not promise to it. Then it ran up fast to me and told me his name was the blood collector and he always collects on his debts and started to shred me apart. I then woke up very hot. I have had nightmares before but this to me at least felt very different. I had never had a nightmare where things were so real yet also so original. The part where I met this blood collector did not seem that thought came from me. This person after I said these words did not resemble a movie or tv show I have ever seen or book that I have ever read for that matter.
This happened the same night a man prayed over us at a beach shop in real life not the dream. He made us take off our shoes and put oil on our hands and feet and our foreheads used a prayer shawl. He prayed for us as a protector for our home. I don’t know how that plays in if it does at all.

Summarizing a long story, my (33F) wife and I (34M) have been together for almost 6 years now. We moved in very quickly, got married very quickly, and both made many dumb mistakes very quickly and very frequently. We've never gone to therapy or counseling to specifically address any of these.
The chain of blame begins with me confiding in my family that I think she had a drinking problem. She was so unhappy with this, that she became an alcoholic with pancreatitis for the next several years. Every time we argued about it, she said that it was because of my lack of romance and my indifference to the situation, that she would continue. I would of course argue is that my lack of romances because of this, and because of all the financial issues that we are now having, on top of my own poor coping mechanisms of addiction to gaming and weed.
She's in her home country right now, has been for 2 months, and while we keep talking as if we're still planning things together, she has been building up walls and almost specifically ignoring my text messages, her response being that I'm not trying hard enough. That I'm not badgering her enough, despite that being a specific way to accomplish the opposite of whatever you want her to do. If you wanted her to take her medicine, just keep asking her to do it and you can guarantee she'll never take her medicine.
To me, this is preposterous. When somebody communicates to you, you can see it, you know it's there, and you know to return the communication. My wife is one of those kid at heart because she was pushed into too many classes as a child and not giving enough play time, she's all about that Disney life. She has a verbal love language, whereas I have a kinetic one.
I have one of those connections with her, where we just kind of feel each other no matter the distance. I'm a pretty sciencey person, so I don't really have a way to explain this. I treasure this connection, even though some of her behaviors do really bother me, like the fact that in America she still doesn't want to tip waiters. I don't want to separate from her, but I can't tell if I'm the one that's doing something wrong or not here, because this has been going on for several weeks.
When we left to her home country, it was because her health was failing quite thoroughly due to her decisions. I came back after two week and it's been 2 months since then. When we left, we were approximately 4K in debt. Utilities, landlord, car loan, credit cards. Admittedly, I have been kind of a man child and not doordashing everyday after work. I've been smoking tons of weed and playing video games, and we've been fighting everyday almost, or she'll just be ignoring me. If I were to finance my wife's return to me, it would be about 700, or 2K if I went there and we took a small short vacation nearby before returning. I've been eating for about three to five dollars a meal, and I've sent almost 1k a month, while making 4K and spending 2k on utilities and bills without paying for debts.

Summarizing a long story, my (33F) wife and I (34M) have been together for almost 6 years now. We moved in very quickly, got married very quickly, and both made many dumb mistakes very quickly and very frequently. We've never gone to therapy or counseling to specifically address any of these.
The chain of blame begins with me confiding in my family that I think she had a drinking problem. She was so unhappy with this, that she became an alcoholic with pancreatitis for the next several years. Every time we argued about it, she said that it was because of my lack of romance and my indifference to the situation, that she would continue. I would of course argue is that my lack of romances because of this, and because of all the financial issues that we are now having, on top of my own poor coping mechanisms of addiction to gaming and weed.
She's in her home country right now, has been for 2 months, and while we keep talking as if we're still planning things together, she has been building up walls and almost specifically ignoring my text messages, her response being that I'm not trying hard enough. That I'm not badgering her enough, despite that being a specific way to accomplish the opposite of whatever you want her to do. If you wanted her to take her medicine, just keep asking her to do it and you can guarantee she'll never take her medicine.
To me, this is preposterous. When somebody communicates to you, you can see it, you know it's there, and you know to return the communication. My wife is one of those kid at heart because she was pushed into too many classes as a child and not giving enough play time, she's all about that Disney life. She has a verbal love language, whereas I have a kinetic one.
I have one of those connections with her, where we just kind of feel each other no matter the distance. I'm a pretty sciencey person, so I don't really have a way to explain this. I treasure this connection, even though some of her behaviors do really bother me, like the fact that in America she still doesn't want to tip waiters. I don't want to separate from her, but I can't tell if I'm the one that's doing something wrong or not here, because this has been going on for several weeks.
When we left to her home country, it was because her health was failing quite thoroughly due to her decisions. I came back after two week and it's been 2 months since then. When we left, we were approximately 4K in debt. Utilities, landlord, car loan, credit cards. Admittedly, I have been kind of a man child and not doordashing everyday after work. I've been smoking tons of weed and playing video games, and we've been fighting everyday almost, or she'll just be ignoring me. If I were to finance my wife's return to me, it would be about 700, or 2K if I went there and we took a small short vacation nearby before returning. I've been eating for about three to five dollars a meal, and I've sent almost 1k a month, while making 4K and spending 2k on utilities and bills without paying for debts.

Today I was thinking about what I would do as president and this is what I come up with. Would you guys vote for me?
"Progress for All: Health, Home, and Happiness"

Key Campaign Promises:

Affordable Health Care:

1. Universal Health Coverage: Implement a single-payer system ensuring that every American has access to quality health care without financial hardship.
2. Affordable Prescription Drugs: Negotiate drug prices to reduce costs and make essential medications affordable for all.

Affordable Housing & Rent Control:

1. Rent Control Legislation: Enforce rent control policies to prevent skyrocketing rents and ensure affordable housing for everyone.
2. Affordable Housing Development: Increase funding for the construction of affordable housing units and provide incentives for developers to build low-income housing.

Education:

1. Tuition-Free Public Colleges and Universities: Make public higher education tuition-free to ensure every student has access to quality education without the burden of debt.
2. Student Loan Forgiveness: Implement a comprehensive student loan forgiveness program to relieve existing debt for millions of Americans.
3. Teacher Compensation: Elevate the status of teachers by making them federal employees with a starting wage of $80,000 a year, recognizing their vital role in shaping our future.

Paid Family Leave:

1. Six Months of Paid Parental Leave: Ensure all parents receive six months of paid leave to care for their newborns or newly adopted children.

Healthy Food Campaign:

1. Junk Food Tax: Impose higher taxes on junk food companies to discourage unhealthy eating habits and fund health initiatives.
2. Subsidies for Healthy Foods: Provide subsidies for fruits, vegetables, and other healthy food options to make them more affordable and accessible.

Mental Health Care:

1. Comprehensive Mental Health Coverage: Expand mental health care services under the universal health care plan to include therapy, counseling, and psychiatric services.
2. Increased Funding for Mental Health Programs: Invest in mental health research, awareness programs, and community-based mental health services.

Gun Safety:

1. Better Background Checks: Implement comprehensive background checks for all gun purchases to ensure firearms do not fall into the wrong hands.
2. Mandatory Gun Licensing: Require all gun buyers to obtain a license by completing a 12-hour class on gun laws and rights to promote responsible gun ownership.

Additional Progressive Initiatives:

1. Green New Deal: Implement policies to combat climate change, create green jobs, and transition to renewable energy sources.
2. Criminal Justice Reform: End mass incarceration, reform the prison system, and implement restorative justice practices.
3. Workers' Rights: Raise the minimum wage to a living wage, ensure workplace safety, and support labor unions.
4. Gender Equality: Enforce equal pay for equal work, protect reproductive rights, and combat gender-based violence.

Campaign Vision:

Our campaign is dedicated to building a society where every individual has access to basic human rights: affordable health care, housing, education, and a healthy lifestyle. We believe in a future where families are supported, mental health is prioritized, and every citizen has the opportunity to thrive. By ensuring comprehensive background checks and mandatory licensing for gun owners, we aim to create a safer environment for all. Elevating the status and compensation of teachers as federal employees will ensure a brighter future for our children. Together, we can create a nation that works for everyone, not just the wealthy few. Join us in our mission for progress for all!