My husband (M34) is an alcoholic. He goes through these cycles of being dry for a few months, then deciding to only drink on “special occasions” or “holidays”, which then escalates to a drink or two with dinner, to buying several six packs and getting drunk while being the sole caretaker of our toddler, to lying and insulting me and screaming when being confronted. This has happened 5-6 times now. Last time, I had a doctors appointment to go to so he took off of work to watch our son. In the span bb of 1.5 hrs he drank 4 tall ones and then drove to come get me with our child in the car. I know I shouldn’t have confronted him during but I was so damn angry that he put our son at risk I kept asking what he had to drink. He kept lying and arguing and insulting and finally I’d had enough and said we were leaving for a day or two. He then grabbed me by the neck. He didn’t choke me but later claimed it was because I wouldn’t listen to what he was trying to say. I left anyways and came back several days later after talking. He’s agreed to go fully dry forever. It’s been about 2.5 months since then. I have so much anxiety now. Around drinking. Around being around other people drinking. Sometimes I forget and then I’ll look at him in a loving way and suddenly I’ll remember the way his face looked and the words he said to me. I’d be lying if I said I fully trust him with our son. My 21st birthday is coming up and i can’t even have one drink. How can I trust him again? He won’t go to AA bc he works 60hrs a week and barely has time for us or himself. Idk. I just want my husband back.

Pretty unpopular opinion ig, but hear me out.
EA is def not responsible for majority the reasons on why I enjoy the Sims 4, the prices are pretty ridiculous and selling the base game on console is basically a scam, I would know since that's how I first played the game. Compared to the other games, it's lacking in gameplay features and its launch was pretty disastrous, taking years to add basic things like toddlers or pools. Don't even get me started on the very stupid release of Kits, probably the most useless thing EA has released for this game. The whole game is basically being carried by the modding community, even with all these new packs they're releasing.
BUT..
This isn't me hating on the older games. I absolutely LOVE S2 and can enjoy S3, they both have their own things that make them great games. (S2's interactions and cutscenes and S3's open world). But, honestly, I went to play the older games and there's moments where I appreciate how EASY S4 is. Like, I don't have to add ten different mods to make my game run normal, I don't have to read a guide just to simply add mods to the game, the build mode in S4 is a dream compared to the other two. Besides that, even though I really like S3's CAS, I love how much diversity S4 offers, so my sims won't have to choose between incredibly skinny or average skinny (Sims 2) and not having same face syndrome (Sims 3). This one is pretty biased, but I love the cartoony look S4 has compared to S3's sort of bland-realistic look.
Gameplay wise, I was never really a multiple generations kind of person, I honestly just liked to mess around with my sims, see how many people they can screw around with, make weird supernatural hybrids, start a whole line of vampires, possibly ruin families, have babies with people outside of your household, have families in other worlds without losing my former relationships/friendships. (Again, Sims 2 and Sims 3..)
Basically, I just love how much freedom you have in the Sims 4 compared to the other two. I had fun with S2 but I sort of had to stick with the normal family/generations save in S3 if I didn't want it to lag to hell and back. I feel like some people may feel the same way, but I mostly just see negativity towards the game, though I fully understand why.

My parents are generally caring folks who have admittedly gone above and beyond for their 3 kids, more so than the vast majority of parents I think. But they aren't flawless and refuse to acknowledge their imperfections, some of which I deem as abusive but which they vehemently deny. So tell me, Reddit, based of this list, are my folks actually abusive or not?
Had a small chair smashed over my head by Dad for getting into an argument with my sister.
Woken up in the middle of the night by Mum and had the living shit beaten in me in bed after she went through my phone and saw me exchanging mild terrorist jokes with my friend on WhatsApp.
Belted several times by Mum, such as for talking to two strangers about my personal life due to "Stranger Danger" when I was about 10.
Belted several times by Dad, such as for getting into arguments with my siblings.
Smacked in the head by Mum multiple times, such as for accidentally miswriting something on a homework report or being unable to tell the time in my preteens.
Pinched multiple times by either of my parents for various misdeeds, such as not wanting to take my shirt off during a family outdoor activity in the spring or innocently behaving inappropriately as a kid.
For various other misdeeds, I've been kicked, violently shaken like a rag doll, beaten with a wooden spoon, had something thrown at me, forced to kneel on the floor and raise my arms up in the air until told otherwise, made to stay outside the house in the wind wearing a shirt and shorts and I don't remember who said exactly, but I think I recall one of my folks threatening that they might not be able to control themselves if they're sufficiently pissed off.
If I showed a hint of resistance towards Mum's physical discipline by reflexively protecting myself, she'd guilt-trip me by saying, "So now's come the time when the son does the abusing, eh?" even though I would never and was nowhere to retaliating on Mum, only shielding myself. Even at age 21, when I confronted her about unwarranted physical discipline, she defended herself by claiming that I only focused on the negatives and never the positives of their parenting and she doesn't regret anything she ever did to me and that even if I was aged 24, she would still dole out the physical punishment if she wanted to. When I said I won't let her touch me, she once again asked me if this meant I was going to start beating her back. I said I'd never lay a hand on her nor had I even thought of doing so, it's just that I wouldn't let her touch me, that's it. She asked what if she were to throw a shoe at me, would I throw the shoe back at her and I said no, I'd just keep a distance from her and she lost all control and started berating me for being an ungrateful son, etc
Mum was continually interrupting my conversation with Dad over the phone, causing me to tell her that I'm trying to talk on the phone, but which she misinterpreted as me telling her to shup up or something, resulting in her immediately getting physical with me.
Mum was continuously making fun of something I wrote in a book, causing me to smack the book out of her hand in anger, which she beated me for and locked me up in my room.
Had Dad being angry and yelling at me to stop crying during shower time as he doused me with cold water (which I absolutely hated) when I was about 5-6 after we actually enjoyed a sweaty game of football with some local kids, which soured the experience for me and made me reluctant to play football outside again since the only way I could play was if I had either of my folks with me.
One summer vacation, we were at the beach in the sea, and Dad was trying to take me to the deeper levels despite me being very uncomfortable as I couldn't swim properly yet, resulting in me almost drowning when he left me to it.
In my later teens, Dad would frequently get me to help him out in incredibly strenuous activities which would often completely physically drain me, both at the house refurbishment and our up-and-coming shop, to the point where the neighbouring shopkeepers who saw how tirelessly I worked for him expressed concern by telling him to go a bit easy on me and at least pay me for my efforts, which he addressed by asking me "Don't they know you're my son?" I never once complained or declined his requests to help out since I knew we were tight on money and Dad was making use of all the free help he could get. My only issues were some instances of potential abuse, such as when he got angry and started yelling at me to perform a task that I genuinely didn't understand how to do. I remember pleading with him to help me understand, but he just continued to get frustrated and scaring the shit out of me. Or this other time where after a hard day's work at building our shop, I didn't immediately acknowledge something Dad said to me, leading him to berate me for my supposed social blunder. When he just wouldn't let up, I then proceeded to remind him of a social blunder he once committed, causing him to punch me in the face and berate me more until we got home. When we arrived home, I was offered dinner which I declined solely because I was uncomfortable being around him and so wanted to immediately go to bed, but he forced me to sit right next to me while he shot a death glare at me, which I interpreted as him asserting his dominance over me.
Dad could be very short-tempered and erratic on occasion, to the point where I would feel like I was walking on eggshells around him at times, such as when I woke up one morning and greeted him with a casual "Hellooo" that had a bit of a drawl to it and he suddenly froze up and looked at me with a death glare and I quickly apologised, scolding me for laying my sizeable head back on the sofa while he spoke to me, scolding us if me or my siblings said "Excuse me" if he was in our way in the house since apparently that was too formal and not something you'd say to a family member (especially a father), or if we forgot to say "Good Morning" to him after waking up. I've actually had to appeal to Mum to ask him to control his temper on a couple of occasions and as a result I feel like I can never truly relax around him.
On multiple occasions, I've been forced to eat something even if I didn't want to.
I had a bedwetting problem for most of my life. One time when I was about 5, Dad woke me up in the middle of the night to discover that I'd once again wet the bed. He angrily told me to get up, told me to face the wall and remain in that position in my piss-stained clothes as punishment while he changed my bed and made me go back to bed again.
I have noticeable bumps on my foreheads which I remember where obtained from hitting my head on the ground as a toddler but which Mum claims are just natural or something, which I interpret as gaslighting.
Mum accused Dad of cheating on her, but he proved he wasn't. Years later when I enquired as to what their fight was about she told me the truth (that it was a misunderstanding over his fidelity) which I suspected. When I brought it up again later, however, she totally lied about it for some reason, which I again see as gaslighting.
When Mum caught me watching porn for the first time ever, she berated me by asking whether this also means I would like to see her or my sister naked.
When I was a kid, Dad tried to manipulate me one time when I told him I wanted to make cartoons in the future and he said that job was for a software engineer.
A lot of their advice was to turn myself over to God. Thing is, I no longer believe in God so that advice was falling on deaf ears and I am scared of coming out to them as an atheist.
After deceiving my parents for two years about my online learning, while it was justified to an extent, Dad really let me have it, telling me in no uncertain terms every opportunity he had how extremely let down he was, how he'd never seen anything like this happen anywhere in his entire life (he was 55 at this point) and how my deception and failure were among the two biggest tragedies/disappointments in his life, the other being the civil war raging in our homeland Ethiopia. Mind you this civil war resulted in the genocide of thousands upon thousands of our ethnic tribe the Tigrayans. He would also say that he's so angry but he can't beat me to let it out because I'm an adult now (I was 20 at the time), so he's forced to stew helplessly in his own anger.
They were pretty strict, restrictive and judgmental folks and could be overbearing. Mum would never let me visit another schoolmate's house without them having visited ours first, as she explicitly explained so herself and even that was a moot point because she didn't want any peer of mine coming over anyway, so none of my peers came over to my house (until I was 18 and that was because I showed up home with him unexpected and practically begged her to let him come in) and I'd never been to anyone else's house (apart from this one guy's house and that was without her knowledge or consent). She forbade all social media apart from WhatsApp and even that I always used in secret when texting people since I knew she'd find some way to be judgmental about it. She wouldn't let me go play football with my friends if she didn't drive me over there herself so she would know the location and even that was reluctantly expressed. Throughout our teens, she forbade TV on the weekdays save for Friday, which she would brag about to her friends, and very rarely let me hang out with others after school for a social outing, discounting the after school badminton club on Thursdays in my mid teens which took place at school. Though I guess this could once again be chalked up to being money-conscious, but also being overly distrustful of everyone in the UK. Dad could also get like this, such as making us do school work on Friday after school or insisting on cutting my fingernails even as he was making me bleed.
They both generally either discouraged or outright forbade any interest in fantasy, which included things like Mum eventually forbidding me from reading Harry Potter, berating and almost getting physical with me for watching a Bond film with my siblings when I was about 14 and just when I thought she couldn't possibly find an angle to criticise on me watching My Little Pony she reproached me for a kiss scene that took place. This trait of theirs got completely overblown after my little brother's nervous breakdown, causing Dad to completely ban our former interests in comic books and Naruto, reprimand me for watching 13 Going on 30 and disapprove of us playing FIFA, to the point where I genuinely felt like I couldn't enjoy anything when around them. They would also criticise us a lot for relatively minor things and their lectures could be excruciatingly long, spanning hours. They also had next to no concept of privacy, entering our rooms without ever knocking (unless they knew we were changing) and confiscating our phones a couple times for no real reason whatsoever.
All this has led to me being incredibly sneaky about what I do. I never let them see me with my phone, only ever using it out of their eyesight and I routinely deleted shit stored up on it in case they randomly needed my phone, which they would. I also became adept at lying as well as identifying footsteps. I think due to the sort of parenting they employed, I was very anxious and scared during these particular events:
My primary school teacher once lent me her Harry Potter DVD box set and I didn’t even get past the first film from great fear that Mum would catch me watching it and get angry.
During one summer vacation back to our homeland, the plan was that Dad would remain in the UK for a bit while the rest of us would go to our country before he joined us. I knew that Harry Potter would be running on some of the TV channels in the UK and throughout the portion of the summer holiday where Dad was still in the UK, which was several weeks, I was deathly afraid of him watching the films and finding out that this was what I liked.
If I remember correctly, I also recall being taught how to masturbate by my babysitter when I was about 3-4 (which I've been doing ever since and I'm now 21), which I've never told anyone and would count as sexual abuse, right?
My little brother has also experienced the below, though it's not exclusive:
Got the living shit beaten out of him by Mum after he was tricked by his friends into writing "fuck" on a whiteboard when he was about 8. He didn't even know what it meant, but I could hear his pitiful wails and screams coming from the bedroom where Mum was beating him.
He accidentally tripped and broke a stair pillar while we were organising the shoe room once, causing Mum to lose it and get physical with him. When I brought this up with Dad years later, Mum either lied about the events or didn't recall it well, the former which I interpret as another round of gaslighting.
He's also been pinched and smacked on the head several times.
So... what do you think, Reddit?
EDIT: I've noticed a few posts calling my parents monsters and to get as far away from them as possible. Thing is though, Reddit, even with all the aforementioned in mind, I can't bring myself to fully hate them because of all the good they have also done, which I think I should write out so I can see whether people change their tunes about labelling them as monsters:
I'm currently 21 and living in the UK but I was born in the African country of Ethiopia and Dad anticipated that our country would one day blow to hell (which it did) so he worked his ass off to move his wife and 3 kids to Italy when I was 7, before finally moving us to the UK when I was 8 while he worked abroad. He worked himself to the bone for torturous hours in several different countries, some war-torn and with civil wars raging all around him, potential death, without seeing his children for months on end for 7 years, all so that they could have a better life than he ever had, where he and his dad suffered the aftermath of a devastating civil war that destroyed their livelihood and lost everything when he was our age. And during those 7 years, Mum singlehandedly raised us as a lonely housewife in a totally new and unfamiliar land with virtually no employment while her husband worked abroad trying to make ends meet. She dutifully made us breakfast, lunch and dinner practically every single day for those 7 years and I can admit we barely had to do any household chores in our preteens and early teens as she was basically doing everything for us so you could say we were spoiled to an extent. She never had a problem expressing her love for us and would do her best to emotionally support us if we needed her. Same with Dad, he usually had no problem telling us he loved us and officially quit his job when I was 16 so he could start a business, which he won't get to operate that long anyway since he's in his mid 50s and planned to leave everything in our hands for us to profit from. So, Reddit, can you really call them monsters?

Need to test out some decks? No local scene at all?
Have you tried JoL? https://deckserver.net/jol/main.jsp
Play is slow as players are split over timezones the world over but you will be playing games. Running several games at once “reduces” the wait between turns.
As someone with a toddler that needs putting to bed at night and other demands on weekends I don’t get to play face to face, or even Lackey, very often so JoL works pretty well. Definitely allows me to refine decks so they should perform a lot better in IRL matches. JOL does seem to have its own meta though so you need to bear that in mind.
Give it a shot!

My BF and I are in a LDR, and yes I'm on my throwaway. When we are able to see each other it is only for a few days. I have 3 elementary school aged kids and he has 1 toddler, we both share 50/50 with our ex's, and have our kids opposite weekends, so that is how we work it. I also have pets and a small business so driving to him is sometimes much harder. He usually comes here. We live 8 hours apart from each other. Anyway, this weekend is our anniversary weekend. He was suppose to be here from Thurs-Mon morning because he has to get his son from the babysitter at 4pm on Monday. He tells me today that the babysitter has asked for Monday off. Whenever the babysitter is sick, needs a day off, or something happens - like car troubles, it's always left up to him to pick up his son and figure the day out, his schedule is more flexible, but sometimes he feels like he is being taken advantage of because he always picks up the extra slack without any concern for his time or schedule - which is true. Anyway, that is beside the point. So, babysitter says she wants Monday off, and of course it is up to him to figure something out for that day. He says fine. He tells me he'll have to leave Sunday now instead of Monday morning. This hurts and upsets me because 1 - we don't have much time together as it is, 3 days every 2-3 months. This is my first LDR and lately I've been struggling a bit with how lonesome it can sometimes get. Anway, I personally think he should tell the babysitter who is suppose to watch the child M-F 7-4pm and is paid for those days....sorry, I can't, I have plans, you'll need to watch him as scheduled. But he tries "to keep the peace" with his BM and to do this he just says yes to whatever is needed of him. I tell him that I'm hurt by this because I feel as if though our time is being put off because he is making sure everyone else is not inconvenienced in any way and the babysitter gets this day off that she now wants. But what about our time? I just feel like my feelings are not taken into consideration at all when stuff like this happens because he is too busy "keeping the peace" and catering to others so that others do not get upset with him (his BM and family). He tells me I'm just focusing on the negative, I'm not even taking into consideration that he is driving 8 hours here so we can spend time together and since I am just focusing on the negative that makes him feel defeated and hurt. I tell him I'm not trying to focus on the negative, but this kind of stuff hurts. It feels as if though he always tip toes around others feelings and forgetting about mine while doing that. It's like a few months ago when I told him it's kind of hurtful that we are not connected on social media at all - and for the record we were "friends" on FB for a short period but I deleted him because I didn't want to feel like I couldn't post anything or had to be careful with anything I did on social media in order not to hurt anyones feelings. He says he doesn't want to shove our relationship in anyone's face and once again - trying to keep the peace with his BM. But here my feelings are once again just kind of left out there hanging. So, AITAH here??? Am I being too damn sensitive about him having to now leave early so babysitter can have day off and it is left up to him to figure that whole thing out? Like I get the whole working with the other parent and kids...but I would 100% in this case tell my babysitter that they cannot have the day off, and I would also make sure if things were happening like this, that my BD was also making sacrafices in his schedule and life, and it wasn't just me all of the time. But who knows maybe I'm just an AH.

I am so sorry for how long this is, but there's quite a bit to cover.
I am a 28F mechanic who works for a rather large dealership in my city. I love my job, I love working on cars, and I love the men that I work with. It's like having an army of brothers that would do anything for me, and I have genuinely never had such a wonderful and supportive workplace environment.
Until "Collin" (26M) started about 6 weeks ago.
Before I start with him, I want to tell you about my "superpower." When I was very, very young, my mother noticed that I had this uncanny ability to detect "bad" people. Even as a toddler, there were certain people I didn't want near me or holding me for seemingly no reason. If they tried, I would scream until they left me alone. If said people tried to pick me up anyway, she'd snatch me away from them and tell them that I said no and to leave me alone. When they'd ask why or push that I "didn't know what [I] wanted," she'd shut them down and say that me not wanting that was reason enough. She's never, ever questioned my "ability" and instead leaned into it and helped me nurture it (especially after certain charges came out about a previous church member that I was uncomfortable around).
Back to Collin. Obviously, that's not his real name, but what is real about him is how... creepy he is. It was evident to me the moment I first met him, but I didn't want to come off as judgemental. My "superpower" has never been wrong, but I have a problem setting boundaries when I'm on the clock because I never want to be the "problem child" for a company. As the only female mechanic, I'm even more aware of that, so I tend to walk on eggshells out of fear of being treated differently.
With Collin, it's a little hard to explain, but to start, he's got personal space issues. As in, I have an issue with how little he respects my personal space. An example: I keep snacks in one of my toolbox drawers for when I and my teammates are too busy to stop and eat a proper lunch. A few days ago, I was bent over and fishing around for a protein bar when I felt him walk up behind me. Of all the angles he could've approached me from, he picked directly behind me and got so close that I felt him brush up against my butt. I immediately shot up and told him to back the fuck up. He tried to play it off as an accident, but I told him, quite loudly, that it's not an accident to sneak up on someone like that and touch them. When he saw a few of my coworkers looking over at us, he quietly made a comment about me overreacting, and walked away.
A few days before that, as I was working on a car, he came up to my toolbox and just took an impact gun. It wasn't mine; I was borrowing someone else's because mine was being repaired. So I stopped him and told him to put it back. He asked me why. This was weird to me because, as far as he knew, it was mine and if I said no, he should've just left it at that. So, I said, "Because it's not yours and I said no. Please put it back." "It's not yours either," is what he said. He tried to walk away with it. At this point, I physically stepped in front of him and said "All the more reason for you not to take it. It isn't mine to lend out. Please put it back." He then asked me if he had a problem sharing. I asked him if he had a problem with respecting boundaries.
Y'all... the look Collin gave me sent chills down my spine. At that moment, he glared at me like my ex did right before he put my head through a wall, and I was actually scared. I swallowed that fear and stood my ground, even though I just wanted to curl up and disappear. He must not be used to people standing up to him because he just sighed in annoyance and slammed the impact down on my bench, then walked away. He, thankfully, avoided me for the rest of the day.
Since those two situations have happened, I've asked for my friend/coworker, "Evan," to make a new group chat for that handful of us that hangout after work because I wasn't comfortable with Collin having access to my phone number. Evan had added him, without asking the rest of us, when they'd gone to a theme park together a few weeks prior. I'd opted out because I didn't want to hang out with Collin, but they used the group chat to communicate plans and such. Evan agreed to make a new group chat so that I feel safer.
Now, finally , the reason I am writing this post is because of what happened yesterday. I may have overreacted? My fiancé thinks I acted well within reason, but sometimes my anxiety makes me believe that I go overboard, even if I'm being perfectly rational. I'm not sure if that's the case here or not.
I caught Collin fishing around in my toolbox. Except, this time, it was the drawer that I keep my purse in. It's not a secret that it's there; every morning when I walk in, my coworkers see me put it in that specific drawer. I used to keep it with the snacks, but the men I work with are a little more old fashioned and won't even go near my purse, so they'd get hesitant when they saw it near the snacks. I moved drawers so they could freely grab food when I was too preoccupied to personally hand them something in order to avoid my purse. It was no bother to do so, but boy did it bother me when I saw Collin huddling over that drawer with my purse in it.
I shouted with my whole chest, "What the fuck do you think you're doing?" He immediately stood up and started mumbling about needing a certain tool, to which I bombarded him with questions like, "And you were just going to take it? That's not even where any of them are! Why were you going through my purse, you creep?" He couldn't keep up to answer any of my questions, but as far as I was concerned, he wouldn't have been able to come up with a good enough excuse because it's quite well known that that's the place where I keep my personal belongings. It got to the point where I was just yelling at him, and other coworkers had to come pull me away from Collin because I was getting increasingly aggressive. I was so mad, in fact, that I didn't even realize that he was getting aggressive too, and the reason why Evan and "Peter" had to pull me away is because Collin was getting in my face and calling me names. When I try to think about it now, I don't remember hearing that. I was so angry, that all I could really hear was the blood pumping in my body.
I had to sign a write up this morning. Absolutely fair, seeing as how I lost my shit and all professionalism in the workplace. I'm annoyed because this is my first write up, but management needs something to prove they "punished" me in some way for my behavior. What I'm not okay with is Collin telling people that I flew off the handle for no reason. Then this guy has the nerve to approach me today and tell me he forgave me for the way I treated him yesterday and that he hopes we can be friends in the future. I might be the asshole because I told him, calmly, that "I never want to be friends with someone who is so apathetic and disrespectful when it comes to boundaries and personal space" and that I'd appreciate it if he left me alone in the future. Now he's moping and saying I didn't even give him a chance before being a bitch to him.
Am I the asshole? Did I overreact?

All of our parents are in the elder genX-early boomer age and they are comically awful. I'd laugh but truly this has been the most painful and awful experience watching them absolutely miss the mark.
My parents (divorced one remarried) seem to think it's their duty to constantly correct my kids (both toddlers). Sometimes I want to suggest to them that this is supposed to be fun and that stuff is my job. It's like they have no clue how to interact with children and are completely baffled. They are horrified that we don't expect them to sit silently for meals and even more so that we don't spank. My mother puts on great airs about being "meant to work with children" but can only last about an hour at a time. She also gets irritated with fairly normal behavior (one year old making noises, so on.) All of the parents make snide comments about our lack of discipline and comment on how fun it will be as they grow older and surely become horrible teenagers just like we were. 🙄
My partners parents would only show up for Facebook photo opportunities. During one of these visits my MIL watched my kid hit the corner of the table while I was in another room, as I ran in due to the noise she just dumbly continued on her FaceTime call with her galpal. MIL and FIL are now split and compete with each other. MIL literally mailed 15 presents to one child for Christmas. FIL arranges whole visits with us to send pics to lord over MIL. MIL started using these visits for facebook photo ops AND shit talking FIL. We are now essentially no contact.
Here's what gets me the most: I am so hurt by all parents' insinuation that we are doing a bad job and/or not treating them well as grandparents somehow. However, I shouldn't care about their opinions. They were honestly piss poor parents and aren't who I'd seek feedback from regarding parenting. Why does this impact me? 🥺
On top of that, my partner and I both had very special close relationships with our grandparents and still do. They primarily raised us. My kids will never get to have that and it saddens me. Our parents relied on our grandparents to raise us and then can't even step it up to grandparent. They self centeredness is unreal and they are missing out.
I am just so mad and resentful and hope I can move past this just so the kids can have a surface level relationship with them. But I won't be leaving my kids with any of them for an extended period of time.
/Endrant

We have been together for 11 years Now 26 and he is 29 Out of those 11 years 3 married and we have a toddler. He first put his hands on me when I was about 16 He left no marks on my body but he still hit my face. He had a jealousy episode. I convinced myself it was never going to happen again. It continued to happen almost once or twice in a year. But the yelling and pushing was there every time he got mad. I learned to not make him angry as much as possible. Last year he choked me. And only the second time I have actually noticed my body bruised. I learned he was addicted to cocaine when I was pregnant and we were going to get married. So so many broken promises, never an apology and I married him. Always believing he will be great. He watched porn while using my body.( this completely broke me) I emotionally checked out a long time ago and despite wanting to communicate with him about struggling mentally and how much he has hurt me her never wanted to talk let along listen. He doesn’t communicate and says it is really hard for him to do that just like how he always tells me not to be stubborn but that I continue to be stubborn. A month ago after bringing up that he gives zero attention to our child. He made a scene and left for a week. During that week I decided it was enough. We finally talked a week ago. I told him I needed time for myself, that we needed to separate, that I needed to heal and go to therapy. And that he needed to do the same since he told me that day he was suicidal and argued that he told me during a prior argument/ fight where he got a knife and said he will end his life. I had to run after him and he fell asleep while I watched him all night. He was drunk.
This month has been extremely hard. I have confusing thoughts and I catch myself belittling the abuse and everything else. I want to hug him when I’m around him but I hate him at the same time. I’m mourning our house and the image of him I always wanted and it hurts so much. My words get scrambled when I speak to him but when he isn’t around my thoughts are so clear. There’s a part of me that thinks he will be different . Right now we live in the same home just separate. I start therapy in a week.
How was your transition, how do you get rid of this choking feeling and the dark thoughts? This guilty feeling that is taking over me. I feel so guilty of bringing a child into this mess In the end I just want him and I to be better people and above all better parents.

Writing this to vent. I’ve (m21) been having a lot of trouble getting myself to like my sister (f29) recently. I’ll start off by saying that I don’t actually hate my sister when it comes down to it, it’s just her actions recently are becoming intolerable. i don’t even know where to begin. she is just super toxic. that’s common information within my family. she is super manipulative, into getting others to do things for her own sake and acts like the victim whenever she doesn’t get her way
she doesn’t drive, and instead of trying to save money to buy a car she is constantly spending money recklessly either on food or some other random item. i’m not one to tell her how to use her money, but she often get’s rides which are at the expense of my mom’s health since she’s the one always driving her all the time from work even when my mom is old, injured and tired all the time from work but my sister never seems to take her into consideration. she doesn’t even pay her for gas most of the time, and my mom is obviously becoming really worn out by the situation
She seems to kinda use money to her advantage to get what she wants too. she has a pretty good position at at her work, so she gets paid a lot and takes advantage of just having money all the time, so she ends up always taking advantage of others. She manages to convince others to do things to her bidding in return for money, food or items even when something may inconvenience others, and she plays the victim whenever you tell her no
because my mom’s always picking her up, she’s always showing up to my house and it’s such a bother. I always have to stop whatever i’m doing to give her attention. the aura in the air when she comes over is just so problematic. she’s always bickering with my mom, and she acts like a child all of the time and has no courtesy or regard for any of us. I’m sure she acts responsible enough at work, but when she comes over she just acts so immature and I’m for to deal with it. I can’t just lock myself in a room either because I live in a studio apartment. She also just always has a problem with everyone, and acts super snarky. she can also do bad things to you, but when it happens to her it’s such a big deal
I’m honestly sick of the way she treats me specifically. She’s always playing super rough with me. she’s always hitting me and while it’s not malicious, i still definitely don’t like it. she always manages to degrade me in all sorts of ways, and it really hurts hearing every time. She’s also always infantilizing me, and treating me like a literal fucking toddler and it’s super annoying and degrading. i’ve gotten a huge inferiority complex because of the way she treats me, and I don’t feel safe to be myself or to feel like a human whenever I’m around her. she’s also always making fun of me whenever I do or say anything higher that might seem “cringe” to her and she always gives me this face of disgust that i always hate seeing
she doesn’t have boundaries either, and is always touching us inappropriately. not sexually, but she’s always doing something enough to make us feel uncomfortable. she has such a raunchy sense of humor, and it’s always at the expense of making us feel uncomfortable
one thing we both deal with is mental health, and she is constantly picking at me about it even after how badly it affects me. not only does she call me names like disgusting, filthy, etc even when i deal with a lot of self hate but she’s always making fun of me over serious mental stuff i’ve dealt with before. i remember one time i said i’d kms, and she told me I wasn’t down. she’s dealt with pretty bad stuff too and I’m not going to discriminate her against it but she can always say something sensitive to mock you but if you say anything to her, she’ll expect you to sympathize with her
idk, this probably all sounds like normal family shit but at this point it feels so overbearing and i’m just so sick and frustrated of dealing with it. its just issue after issue. she always says i treat her badly because I ignore her and sound frustrated when i talk to her, but I do it because she acts like this
i’m sorry if this post sounds super hateful but, i’m just very frustrated. i don’t hate my sister, and i’m greatful over all the things she’s done for me but I just can’t stand her and her personality any more. i want to get away so badly but i’ll be honest, i give into it way too much and i’m not sure how to break away or gain independency. it’s a weird situation, because my sister is the mediator in our family. she’s the easiest to get along with and brings us all together. she is also smart, and is able to do many things for us as well as gets us stuff, but the environment is just way too toxic and I don’t know how much more of it i can handle

We are going on a roadtrip with our 2.5 year old rear-facing toddler and infant. Is there some magical center console or back of seat situation we can get so she can reach her toys/snacks? Whenever we drive now she looses it when she drops/can’t reach things. Thank you!

Sorry for the pictures. They are disgusting, which is why I’m here. I’m walking around with this gnarly welt on my face
I got this piercing about a month ago, it’s got this huge lump. My piercer did warn me about this happening but it’s really bad now.
I’ve tried salt water soaks with a cotton bud, cleaning with alcohol wipes, I spray it 3 times a day with after care.
Is there anything else I can do? Or should I see my doctor?
I don’t want to take this out. I took it out last time for this same reason and I’m sick of wasting money.
Or should I change it to a stud? I’m so fed up with it at this stage
Thanks guys! Xx

The smell of money... Tea, incense, and sweet foods... All of this to be found in FuMuCha. A tea shop in San Francisco Chinatown, FuMuCha was a safe place where immigrants and their descendants could coexist in peace. The Lees, a Korean immigrant family, moved in many years ago with their toddler son. Their son, Vincent Lee, was easily impressionable and very outgoing. He easily made friends because he was taught to help and be helped to survive. "Money isn't everything, but take the opportunity to live", his parents told him. His parents were smart, they befriended and learned Chinese culture to make life easier to start. Time passes, preschool, ESOL, elementary, then... Middle school.
A loud thud. Blood on the ground. The silence of fear... And trembling...
"Go back to your country!" "You're not welcome here!" "Look at this loser trying to be normal."
Vincent is on the ground, bloodied nose, bruised face, cracked ribs... "I'm... Sorry...". He regretted living. He had no purpose. Living day to day just like the other kids... Until they were taught world history. No matter what he did, the kids bullied him for being the same ethnicity of those who did terrible things or were under the foot of another. Nanking, The railroad, comfort women, the boxer's rebellion, the cultural revolution... He was blamed for all of that just for being born. Isolation, growing his hair out because he refused to go out. This torment lasted until 8th grade.
Vincent walked home from school... The last day of 7th grade, he heard something... "Hiya! Ha!". He turned to look. A man on the television, a weird hairstyle, funny clothes, but... Amazing fighting skills. Vincent immediately wanted to fight like him. He found someone... Someone who could save him from his hell. He used the last of his savings to buy all of the kung fu dvds he could. He spent all summer on his own watching, learning, training... To be like the men... No, the heroes, that saved his life. He found purpose. Being someone else was so... Different. But he needed to be. When he confronted those bullied him, they couldn't win... Vincent was like a bat out of hell. Sloppy techniques, but fast, dedicated... Eventually, with each opponent he defeated, he got a bit better each time... Less bruises, less bloody noses, but... More heart. Too much. His parents decided that America may not be safest... After all, Vincent attracted the attention of the underworld Chinese Mafia. They were going to induct him once he got into highschool because of his knack for violence... So they moved.
"Korea? Why? Why're we moving? I'm getting better, Ma! I'm strong now!" Vincent didn't understand... Not until his mom held him close and said, "that's right, you're very strong. You're my strong baby boy... But ma and pa are not like you... Make sure you protect us too, okay? Protect your family in Korea."
Vincent understood that his new hope wasn't meant for just him... Fighting? Is that all there is to power? No... There's gotta something out there that will teach him what it is to be strong... Something like four schools...

Writer's Block? More Like Writer's Mock! Let's Outsmart That Blank Page:

Tired of staring at a cursor that blinks like a judgmental disco ball? Fear not, fellow wordslinger, for we shall vanquish this block with unorthodox weaponry! Forget boring brainstorming – let's get weird, wild, and ridiculously effective.
Step 1: Embrace the Chaos of Your Procrastinating Soul:

• Channel Your Inner Toddler: Throw a tantrum on paper! Scribble nonsense, draw explosions, write bad poetry about your nemesis (the blinking cursor). Release the creative gremlins and laugh in their judgmental faces.
• Become a Fortune Cookie Writer: Grab a bowl, write prompts on slips of paper (e.g., "Your protagonist wakes up as a talking croissant"), draw one blindly, and write whatever chaotic story emerges.
• Themed Freewriting Frenzy: Set a timer for 5 minutes and write non-stop about the most mundane object in your vicinity (bonus points for using a thesaurus to describe a stapler in Shakespearian prose).

Step 2: Befriend the Uncomfortable:

• Write Backwards: Start with the last sentence and work your way to the beginning. Embrace the confusion, it might just birth brilliance.
• Automatic Writing: Don't think, just let your hand move across the page, even if it writes gibberish. Sometimes, the subconscious holds the key.
• Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: Write a scene from your story reflected in a mirror, distorting perspectives and realities.

Step 3: Befriend the Outside World (But Not Too Much):

• People Watch with a Twist: Observe someone at a cafe, but imagine their secret life as a spy, rockstar, or intergalactic time traveler. Write their untold story.
• Eavesdrop Ethically (ish): Catch snippets of conversations around you and weave them into your own narrative. Just, you know, don't get creepy.
• Themed Playlist Challenge: Pick a genre (sci-fi, romance, thriller) and write a scene inspired by each song on a random playlist. Let the musical chaos guide you.

Remember: Perfection is the enemy of progress. Embrace the weird, the silly, the downright nonsensical. You might just surprise yourself with a spark of genius hiding in the unexpected. Now go forth, conquer that blank page, and unleash your inner writing warrior (even if they wear mismatched socks and wield a spork)!

i applied for disability in July of 2022 (i have autism and also something physically wrong with my knee but my doctor hasn't figured out what it actually is yet.)
after over a year of going back and forth with the stupid disability place and them sending me packets upon packets or the stupidest questions and me filling them out and sending it back and phone calls and a meeting with a psychiatrist and all kinds of jumping through hoops, they denied it. my autism was diagnosed when i was a toddler and they told me i most likely won't get disability without an updated diagnosis, like they think autism is just something i can outgrow or something.
well, the whole time I've been dealing with them I've also been trying to get refered somewhere to get an updated autism diagnosis but it's very hard to find someone who will diagnose adults, is close enough for me to actually go to (because diagnoses like that usually take multiple appointments), takes my insurance, and doesn't have a 2+ year waiting list. my doctor found me one single place that actually met the criteria (it still had like a 3 year waiting list but beggers cant be choosers) and sent a referral for me but they just never got back to my doctor or me because I also called and asked about it. I've also been doing blood work and x rays and physical therapy and trying really hard to figure out what's wrong with my knee but nothing has come up yet so I'm still just suffering with that.
Well, i appealed the disability thing, they sent it to a judge cause that was the next step, i had a hearing with a judge and a job expert and the judge asked me why i felt like i couldn't work and i literally had a breakdown and cried and told him how i had one job before and it was a super basic job at goodwill working in the back sorting books and not dealing with the public but I still couldn't handle it. I explained how working that job made my knee swell up and be in near constant pain and how the job (working barely 10 hours a week) made me so exhausted that I literally couldn't function outside of work. I would go to work, come home, sleep until my next shift and repeat. I felt like a zombie. The only time I would function was the weekends (barely) and all of that energy and time would be spent on meal prepping for the week so I wouldn't starve because I knew I wouldn't have the energy to make food, and I would do the dishes that piled up all week and sometimes if I had enough energy I would even shower on the weekends. I was so depressed and exhausted and not functioning outside of work at all and one day I woke up at 6 am to my alarm for work and i decided I was either going to quit my job or I was going to off myself and i had the self awareness to quit my job instead of trying to delete myself. and i had such a big meltdown and told all of this to the judge and more. and then i had to sit there, still crying and trying to collect myself while the judge talked with the fricken job expert about how many 'low effort, readily available jobs' HYPOTHETICALLY could exist in my town (this was all based on some bullshit guestimating math equation instead of realistic research into the topic) and then he had the audacity to tell me he "wasn't sure" and "needed time to think about it" just to take 3 fricken months to send me a letter denying my case again because, according to their stupid bullshit, i participated in "substantial gainful activity" (the one job i worked for 3 months and quit so I wouldn't commit unalive) therefore i "can't be disabled."
and it just felt like a spit in the face. like this man really listened to me have a mental breakdown about how the easiest job i could find, working 2-3 hours a day 3 days a week, made me so depressed and nonfunctionial that i was about one more shift away from taking myself off this planet and how my knee hurt so bad i literally just wanted to cut my leg off right above it if it would make the pain stop, and about my autism and how i don't feel like a human i just feel like i was shoved into a human suit and thrown on my ass like 'good luck, figure it out.' and he really listened to all that and still decided that 'im not disabled.' and 'theres plenty of jobs I can do, I just have to find one.' like I'm so stressed and depressed and worried about money constantly that I barely have the capacity to take on anything else, let alone another job that's gonna make me wanna blow my brains out again. I got the letter today and I've cried like 3 times about it because it really feels like I'm already down on the ground and he just decided to kick me with spikey steel toed boots.
I have one more appeal left, where it goes to a disability council (whatever that means) and their options are 1. deny it (most likely to happen) 2. send it back to the judge to 'look at it again' (basically guaranteed for it to get denied) 3. approve it (very very highly unlikely) or 4. throw it out (why is that even an option? That's so stupid) so its like an 80%+ chance of it getting denied from here, and if it gets denied at this point then i have to start all over and the last two years of waiting and hoops and paperwork and crying and pain and feeling like a puppet on display trying to "prove I'm disabled" will just mean literally nothing. And that's a really depressing thing to think about, that the last 2 years of my time and effort and humiliation were basically for nothing.
Besides that, if it gets denied again and I have to start all over, and there's no point in even doing that unless i can get new 'evidence' (like an updated autism diagnosis, which I can't because the one place thats close enough, takes my insurance, and actually tests adults, has a 2+ year waiting list and also won't fricken get back to me about even getting me on that stupid waiting list) and even if I do get an updated diagnosis, they can still deny me disability. I hate this so much.
I feel like a giant brick wall has fallen on top of me. I'm so exhausted mentally and I'm so stressed and I'm so tired of worrying about money and not being able to buy things i need and just barely surviving and I'm just so exhausted of it all. i live with my boyfriend and he has disability and it all goes to the bills and stuff so we have water and power and things, but most times we don't have cleaning supplies or toilet paper or things like that because we don't have the money for it. we only have food because we have foodstamps. I've had my whole wardrobe since highschool and I'm down to 2 pairs of shorts and 3 pairs of leggings because they all rip at the thighs after a while and I'm running out but I don't have money for clothes, y'know? And my boyfriends mom owns the house we live in (she bought it so he wouldn't have to worry about rent and stuff, but then told him he has to pay her back rent for all the years he's been here when he has the money) and she recently told me that when/if i get on disability she expects back rent from me all the way from 2021, which would be like $20,000 at this point and that number just keeps building and it feels like a giant tower looming over me. I don't feel like I'm living, I feel like I'm just barely surviving. And i know there are people out there that have bigger worries then running out of toothpaste and shampoo and not being able to afford more, but like. It's still very real worries I have and I just feel like garbage about it and I'm constantly worried about money and it's just so exhausting.
And to have someone look at me and disect my situation and basically tell me that I'm "not disabled" and basically that I dont deserve money that would help me possibly survive is like a punch in the gut. It hurts, a lot. And I'm so exhausted and upset and frustrated and i really don't know what to do anymore, about any of this stuff.

Hello everyone!
Before I start, please be aware that english isn't my native tongue. I am also bad at explaining, so please ask questions if needed, I will try my best anyways.
TL;DR: My parents were abusive and neglective to both, me and my sister. As result, neither lives closeby with me moving to the opposite of our country, hardly visiting. Which pains my father, who's getting second-hand punishments due to our toxic mother's behavior.
I was the oops-baby to my boomer parents when they were already done with having kids. I have an older sister and while I can't say that my life was oh so terrible, I can't for sure say that my life was oh so happy either.
My parents were increadibly bad with alcohol. Not to the point outsiders would see it, but there were many violent episodes at my home. As I grew older, I realized that, while they never were physically violent towards me, they were emotionally abuusive at worst and simply neglective at best. I can hardly look back and say that they knew me or we did fun family activities. My sister, yes, she was 15 years older than me and tried to make up for what our parents lacked at the expense of her own mental health.
To put it frankly, my sister was nothing more than a life thing they checked off their list since they were supposed to have a child at some point, but never grew mentally enough to accept what being a parent means. With me, they told me from toddler age on that I was basically unwanted, somehow still loved, but ultimately should be grateful they didn't aborted me.
The approach to either of us was different, the end result the same. Neither my sister nor me have fond memories of our home, our childhood and we both left pretty early. She, as soon as she turned 18, just to be out of that house. Me, at 20, after graduating and working for a year to leave for my long distance boyfriend (soon to be husband in 3 weeks) and university. While they did differ between my sister and me in all the terms that benefited them and some that I took benefit of (she got a car, got sponsored a private school for her dream profession, fancy vacations vs me, who got a bit more pocket money, got driven to elementary school, softer curfews and didn't have to get a job outside of school) they failed to seperate that I didn't leave out of spite, but because I simply wanted a life on my own. In a strange way, I was both, the favored, golden child and the one that constantly got put down.
They made a lot of fake promises, but never put any truth to their word. Again, my overall feeling was that they simply cared more about that the family looked whole rather than actually be a true family. While I've been living here for nearly 11 years now it wasn't until last christmas that they actually visited. My mother told me to my face that she'll never get over the betrayal of me leaving, really didn't care about how much I wished they had visited me over the first years with my boyfriend (I moved 600km away) and while she knows by head that I am her daughter, she will never see me as daughter by blood again, unlike my sister.
Now comes the problematic part... Usually I could have taken this as sign to go NC. The thing is, my father really is the family type of person. If sober, he's super kind and nothing matters more to him than family. While my sister lives half an hour away from them and still visits often with her children I really can't. I am chronically ill with migraines and other stuff and the least I need is a place to rest. My parents turned my old room into some kind of Harry Potter chamber. You can slap an air matress into that room, surrounded by utilities and stuff they no longer need, but it's far from ideal. Their soloution to my pain is stuffing me with painkillers. Last two times I was there I basically spent my whole visit being out of it and hardly responsive. Even my doctors said I should keep my stress low and excessive painkillers aren't the answer. Plus, I suffer from a brain tumor that's 99% harmless (prolactinome), but has bleeding tendencies and this 1% chance it might harm my seeing nerves, which would leave me to undergo surgery ASAP if it happens. The only sign the doctors gave me that indicates this is happening is 1) strong headaches and 2) disruption in my ability to see. As someone who has frequent migraines (once a month) it makes you really not want to leave for long distances.
Their golden wedding came up and my sister and me pitched in together to book a small vacation in a huge animal sanctuary to fulfill my mother's with of being close to and feeding a giraffe. Both were whole-heartedly disappointed by the gift and really didn't respond much to us after that. Last I heard from them they are looking for an alternative gift.
While this really bummed me we came to conclusion they really just want quality family time... And I am super torn. I know that my father is getting punished for crimes mostly my mother is doing. He probably wished for this typical old grandpa life surrounded by his daughters and grandchildren, happily and loved. My mother probably wishes, or at least, demands the same, seeing how their friends and surroundings are living this exact life.
Can I fix this somehow? Is this worth fixing? I am so conditioned to not stand up for myself against them that I really don't know if what I did by leaving was really betraying them... I just want to be happy and live my life. But I am also tired of being held accountable by a standard they somehow set for me while never putting any effort into upholding the same standard for them towards me. If that makes any sense.

So let me tell yall about this job I was working at before I made the ultimate decision to leave. Bare with me because it’s a long ride…
So for starters, I was working at a daycare not long ago, it wasn't too bad. The job itself was good and the pay wasn't so bad either. I'd work 80-90 hrs bi weekly. So l'd get paid biweekly but my Manager? OOUUUUU she is just, idk how to explain it. Shes just one of those managers who believes she’s above everyone including her employees. My coworkers? Worse. They all literally compete against each other. It’s weird asf if you ask me. I was a teacher aid. At the end of the day, teacheteacher aid. We’re all getting paid the same and working the same hours (besides part timers) nevermind the fact, The amount of incidents that occur in the center is ABSURD.
So if you know Florida, you know Florida is hot AS FUCK ALL YEAR ROUND (majority of the time) a parent comes to pick up their child in the classroom and the child isn't present and they not checked out on the CSR (Child Supervision Report) To better explain, Anytime a child leaves we have to mark the time they left on the paper. So basically, for better understanding… Arrival times and departure times. Including if they were moved to a different classroom also if we take children outside. That is also marked on the CSR. CSR’s also have something called “Name-to-face” which has hourly times where us as the teachers or teacher aids have to mark the minute within the hour so for example: 12PM so for that we would check the time once it’s 12PM and then add the minute which for example would be: 12:43. After we do that we have to check every child off that they are still in the classroom within that time. At the bottom we have to count the amount of children and the amount of teachers and initial at the bottom. It’s basically to help teachers keep track of when children leave or if a child is missing. Well, said child isn't checked out on the CSR. parent goes crazy trying to figure out where kid is because no one else picks child up besides parents. Turns out the kid is outside on the playground sleeping. IN THE HEAT, So parent goes to my boss and goes completely bazurk. Which I don't blame them. Parent mentions how they are worried about the child maybe having had a heat stroke and that’s maybe why they are on the playground sleeping but that’s what the CSR is for.
Another kid, in the toddler Classroom. Probably the cutest child. Little Cuban/Puerto Rican baby if I’m not wrong.I kid you not, that child HAS STACKS ON TOP OF STACKS ON TOP OF STACKS of incident reports from them biting kids. Child bit a another child in their sleep. When parents were told about the behavior they looked at us and literally laughed and said "well my child is being provoked to act that way” PROVOKED BUT THEY WAS SLEEPING? manager wouldn’t kick them out the center but was quit to kick another child out for hitting another child ONCE. Should I also add that this specific child had to be put in a classroom with the same gender be they attack the other gender. Not to mention, some of the teacher (not myself included) be spanking the child who likes to bite. My boss has no idea but I have indeed seen it first hand and may I add that obviously us as the teachers aren’t supposed to be hitting and or spanking but…. NOBODY and I mean nobody wants to deal with said child. Everyone refuses to be in the classroom with that child. May I also mention that the spanking includes pulling their ear, pulling their hair, pushing them on the ground and pinching their body.
One of coworkers, has a medical condition apparently but long story short, coworker falls asleep very easily. You can be talking to them about something important and they are literally ASLEEP. Coworker was in the infant classroom with me and was rocking one of the babies to sleep. Coworker started falling asleep so l asked them politely to hand me the baby. They refused so I said "whatever if they get in trouble that's on them” sure enough they dropped the baby on their head. A 3WEEK OLD BABY. Causing the soft spot to become misplaced. Now said coworker has an open court case for that with the family and they're trying to sue the center for neglect.
My daughter came to work with me one day. While being there she did good but a child slapped her straight in her face and that was enough for me to say "yeah she's never coming back" and she hasn't since. I never told my boss about it because even then, what would be done? Nothing but an incident report would be written. Also, while on the playground. My daughter was trying to reach the water and couldn’t. For those who don’t already know, my daughter is a little person so she often times needs assistance. She was standing there for I KID YOU NOT, 15 mins waiting on said teacher to help her reach the water. Teacher was standing around gossiping with other teachers. That was a red flag for me.
The worse thing about it is, it's said to be a learning center right???? Well sad to tell you but they do no actual curriculum with the kids, kids sit in a classroom majority of the time playing with broken toys or toys that are missing pieces. Fight with one another or sleep. They eat lunch and snack and other stuff but they only go outside twice a day for 30 mins. They (the teachers) have a whole book to read from and figure out curriculum but they don't do it so most the time the kids are over stimulated being locked up inside. They're also supposed to potty train the kids but NOPE, not even that. There are 4-5 year olds in the center who still wear diapers. It's crazy honestly. I’ve never seen more lazy and neglectful workers A DAY IN MY LIFE. Diapers are supposed to be changed every two hours but they don’t check them or change them accordingly. Children have gotten back to back rashes due to the neglect of diaper changes.
Now about my boss, her son, he is the absolute cutest being ever. He's literally a chunky monkey. We all call him Babybear, chunks or chunka monks. Unfortunately, he has a lot of medical conditions so my boss is constantly in and out of the center but when she is in the center she does NOTHING all day besides yell at us or sit at her desk on her phone. Not engaging with parents, not helping out in the kitchen, NOT NOTHING. Just on her phone on TikTok or Instagram or on FaceTime and this is facts because I have indeed seen it while on my lunch break.
There was an incident that occurred while I was on the clock with the preschool kids. I was outside with them on the playground. I was helping a child pour water into the cup and another kid was on the playground on the slide. I hear crying so I turn around to see who it is and I notice bleeding so I run to the child to figure out what happened. Child won't tell me just only saying their mouth hurts so I call someone on the walkie to take the child up front for proper care. They take child and whatever boom, they get the care they need. I make an incident report and that's it. Anytime a child hurts themselves or they injur one another. An incident report had to be made for both parties. May I also add that our form of communication within the center is WALKIE TALKIES. NOWWW, Weeks after the incident my boss brings me into the kitchen and starts yelling at me I mean like screaming. Saying she can't trust me because I have yet to tell her what happened that day on the playground. Saying I'm an outsider to everyone within the center and I have to redeem myself to them. Anything I say to them (coworkers) will be ran back to her. I like “instigate” things with coworkers according to her. She also mentioned how she had multiple complaints about my coworkers saying that all I do my entire shift is sit in which I explained that I suffer from Vertigo. I have it written on medical papers and medication doesn’t help half the time. I sated that me sitting is me giving myself the opportunity to stop a dizzy spell from occurring and or progressing. She really just said a bunch of bullshit and that's really when I realized that I was done working there. I was being overworked for one and two, I really wasn’t appreciated so I left.
Sorry for the rant but moral of the story is…… DO NOT TAKE YOUR KIDS TO ANY KINDERCARE LEARNING CENTER AND OR WORK THERE. THEY ARE HORRIBLE, And I mean ALL of them. Keep your babies safe and yourself included stay blessed 🥹🩷

Earlier today my toddler was in the bathroom on his little potty (he is potty training). I left the room for literally 8 minutes to go make him some lunch while he was sitting, and he managed to get into my shampoo and smeared it all over the floor, all over his hands, face, his eyes, everywhere. I got it all cleaned up and I wanted to be careful about making sure it was all off of his face so I took a wet towel and scrubbed around his eyes. I think I may have done this a little too aggresive on one side unitentionally because he has redness under his eye 6 hours after the fact.
Tonight I did a warm compress on his eye to try to minimize the redness and any soreness he may have from the towel scrubbing under his eye (it's not an open wound or anything, just redness!). It's worrying me that there's still some redness from that though, I didn't mean to scrub his face that hard I just wanted to ensure I was getting it all off of him so he wouldn't have burning eyes. Poor baby. I'm also worried his daycare workers are going to call cps because of that now, I just have anxiety. I just feel so awful and I know things like this happen but I should have been more gentle when I was scrubbing his little face.