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Discussion of the Diamond Handbook (Part 1)
2024.05.19 15:25 TheGangstaGandalf Discussion of the Diamond Handbook (Part 1)
Hey everyone, this will be my first attempt at a serious post on this sub. I’m not exactly practiced in articulating my thoughts (I’m more of a fiction writer) so please bear bull with any mistakes and please correct me if I’m wrong. The last thing I want to do is spread misinformation, I’m not an expert (or a financial advisor) on any of this. I'm here to learn, not to teach.
This post will be the first in a series of me reading through the entire Diamond Handbook (2nd) and just commentating on points I find interesting or discussion worthy. I will be asking questions as well as giving my own personal thoughts based on my understanding of the events that have transpired. I became an ape right after the sneeze, and followed a lot of the discussions back then, but have been zen for a while so I haven't fully kept up with a lot of the new developments.
I haven't actually sat down and read DD in a long time, so I decided to give myself a refresher and actually look at the Diamond Handbook (2nd) for the first time. I had read a lot of these posts as they had come out, so I had never felt the need to look at the full PDF before. For the apes that haven’t read it either, I recommend giving it a read. You can find the full DD library in the pinned post of this sub, and the Diamond Handbook is the first one there.
As I have been reading it, I’ve quickly realized that some of the stuff is a little outdated. That can’t really be helped since so much DD has been done between then and now, but this brings me to the two reasons for this post. The Diamond Handbook is likely the first piece of DD a new ape will be recommended; I want to spark discussion to clear up some things that are misguided or outdated in this handbook. The second reason is more of a personal challenge. Whenever someone denies the legitimacy of the DD, an ape usually responds by saying something like “Well, read the DD and prove it wrong”. The average MOASS denier won’t do this though, in my experience they just think it’s ridiculous on a conceptual level, and won’t take the time to actually look through all the DD available and construct a proper debate. I can’t really blame them for this though, spending so much time on something you have no interest in doesn’t sound like a fun time.
But I have a lot of interest in this, and I am an aspiring author who writes 400K word fanfictions for fun. I’ve got the time and the writing willpower. I am very big into trying to understand how a reader will interpret a piece of my writing, so I’ll be looking through that lens and will be writing this with the assumption that you have already read the Diamond Handbook (2nd). Please take the time to respond/correct what I say here, I want to learn.
With all that out of the way, let’s get started.
The Mother of All Short Squeezes (MOASS) Thesis, Published on May 26, 2021, by u(slash)HCMF_MACEFACE
Before we even get into the meat of this section I already see a bit of an issue. A lot of the language implies that MOASS is imminent, take this section for example:
Just because the sneeze happened in a week doesn’t mean MOASS will, in theory it should be a very long event as both the shorts and longs have a test of wills to see who caves first. However, the sneeze was the ‘beginning’ because it was exposed a lot of the fuckery that is going on in the market right now, I think that is the message that should be taken from this section.
The two big concepts I see missing are Options and Wash Sales/Stop-Losses.
Options are interesting because they create a different type of buying/selling pressure compared to just buying/selling stocks regularly. There are concepts like gamma ramps and stuff that can be relevant when discussing catalysts for price movement. However, options are pretty scary for most investors, I’ve only ever bought one, and forgot about it so it auto-exercised for me (lol), so it’s not a concept I would call essential. I just think it’s better to be educated than not.
The much more egregious omission is that of Wash Sales and Stop-Losses. Wash Sales are extremely dangerous to new investors who still make decisions based on emotions and are not used to the volatility that comes with GME.
If you are unfamiliar, a Wash Sale is when a person sells a stock at a loss, then buys the stock again within a short period of time. As an example, let’s say you bought a stock at $50, then the stock goes down to $40.00 and you no longer feel comfortable with your investment. You sell the stock at a loss. You lost $10.00 on this transaction, but it’s not all bad. When you go to do your taxes, you can report this $10.00 loss to the IRS. This is good because if you make a $10.00 profit off another trade, you now don’t have to take taxes out of that profit, since the IRS will see this as you breaking even in the grand scheme of your portfolio. You didn’t actually make any money, so they aren’t going to tax you for it.
A Wash Sale is triggered when you buy back the stock you sold in a short period of time, this can even apply if you buy a stock in the same sector. So if you buy a stock at $50.00, sell it at $40.00 then buy it again. That $10.00 loss you took can no longer be reported to the IRS as an actual loss. So when you make $10.00 on some other trade, the IRS won’t see you as breaking even, they will tax you on that $10.00.
For a stock as volatile as GME this can be very dangerous, I know people who brought in the peak, then as the price went back down they triggered a Stop-Loss (auto-sale you can program to trigger when a price falls), only to then buy back in when the stock dropped even lower, creating a wash sale that fucked their taxes.
We say “Buy and HODL” a lot, but I think the ‘why’ of it has been lost in the meme. I personally buy and HODL because averaging down is a lot better for me than accidently triggering a Wash Sale. I fucking hate the IRS and don’t want any of that smoke.
This next part I’m a little shaky on, I’m probably getting some things wrong here:
Ok, well how are they going to get margin called? The problem I see is that these Short Hedge Funds (SHF) are making a lot of money by selling naked shorts. It’s really hard to get margin called when they are literally printing money, and since they don’t have to report these their books just look to be filled with an infinite amount of cash.
So, there are a couple solutions to this:
1, Government regulation. If the SEC puts a stop to naked shorting, these SHF can’t print money anymore. Eventually the interest from their positions will eat them alive, and they will get margin called. Unfortunately, MOASS has the potential to destroy the economy like in 2008, so they probably aren’t too keen on just doing this without creating some kind of safety net. So I can’t really count on them to help, because the government has a vested interest in keeping MOASS from happening. It’s just not something I believe will be the catalyst. Although they might just do it on purpose given the right reason, like pinning the economic collapse on a scapegoat, or by GameStop forcing their hand by exposing the fraud somehow. I’ve seen a lot of apes hoping for one of these reasons to come to pass, but for me, I don’t see enough motivation from the participating parties.
2, A price run-up. If the price of the stock can unbalance the books of the SHF enough then they could also get margin called. I’m not counting on this either, since the price is manipulated by the process of naked shorting. Sure, they are digging a bigger grave when they suppress the price like this, but it can also help smaller SHFs with exiting their positions with OTC stuff. Over-The-Counter trades are trades made off the lit exchanges, historically it was intended to kind of simulate a transaction between two individuals, like buying a video game from a buddy off the books, no taxes, no regulation. Unfortunately, this is abused by institutions and can’t even be used by individuals, making dark pools of trades full of fraud and undermines the free market. Smaller SHFs that are more at risk of getting Margin Called due to their lack of collateral, can make OTC trades with the big naked-shorting market makers to ‘close’ their positions using fake shares. Of course, this only passes the buck so to speak, but it’s a viable strategy for them since the big SHFs that take on these ‘bucks’ are less likely to get margin called. A lot of historic short squeezes happen because a small SHF gets margin called, then drives the price up and causes a bigger SHF to get called, and so on until they’re all in the grave. This is why I don’t really give a shit if the price goes up to $80 in a week, it’s not enough, the buck has been passed. (To be clear, I don’t have proof that this is the reason for the uptick in OTC transactions, it’s just a theory. If a smarter ape than I can get on this that would be great.) But, even if a price run-up itself doesn’t cause MOASS, it may give motivation for the true trigger:
3, Interest Rates. Here is the big one that I look at, that I believe will be the true cause of MOASS. Now please, correct me if I’m wrong again, I am just an ape who dropped out of college. So, from what I understand a Short institution has to pay a certain amount of interest to the people they borrow the stocks from. This is the cost of borrowing and is how these Lenders make money. For a long time, the interest rate was at like 1%, this means that selling one naked short could cover the cost of the interest 100 times over. However, let’s say that the interest rate becomes 110%, sounds crazy, but this would mean that borrowing the share would cost more than the share. This would destroy the balances of the SHFs and ensure they get margin called. Why would this ever happen though? Because these lenders want to make money. These lenders are the real winners of MOASS, and they aren’t talked about enough in my opinion. Lenders can’t sell the shares they’ve lent out, their income is in the interest rates, there has to be a balance here between it being more profitable to lend the shares or to sell them. If Lenders start to think that lending their shares aren’t making them more money than the alternative, they will raise interest rates to make these profits until SHFs can’t pay them, then the SHFs have to return the shares, causing MOASS with the massive buyback, then lenders can just sell the shares on the way down. Lenders have a monetary business interest in causing MOASS, so they are the most likely cause of it in my opinion.
FAQ, Published April 12, 2021, by u(slash)BYE_TRIANGLE
Now, on the flip side, I know people on the old sub to buy and sell with these fluctuations, they did it during the sneeze and I’ve seen comments claiming to do it last week. I think this is why Roaring Kitty really had to speak to congress about this, because a legitimate-seeming argument could be made that retail was buying and selling at high volumes. The loss and gain porn on the old sub could be presented as evidence. Here though, apes hold, we glaze purple doughnuts.
So when MOASS does happen, the massive price increase will be only due to buying pressure from SHFs, so they are the only ones that can take the blame for what happens next.
Keep in mind that even though ‘buying pressure’ moves the price up, someone has to be willing to sell in order for someone to buy. So as the price creeps up from $100 to $1000 to $100000 to $8675309 someone will be selling on the way up to get there.
However, if you go into the comments of these posts, there are apes investigating the profile history to determine if posters are bots, regardless of the pushed narrative. If you look past the upvote counter, apes are very skeptical of any post that isn’t based in fact or harmless memes. The comments rule the post, and I have to say I’ve very proud of this sub for staying vigilant in the wake of Reddit restricting moderation tools.
I don’t really like the language being used here, stuff like ‘clearly believes’ ‘seen as incredibly bullish’ are all pretty emotive and doesn’t actually explain why these are positive growth signs for the company, they are just saying it is ‘bullish’, the average new investor isn’t even going to know what that really means. Even though GME is extremely manipulated, causing Technical Analysis to become increasingly difficult to depend on, the investment is still rooted in fundamentals of deep value.
-Gamma Squeeze
-Gamestop’s Q1 Earnings Call
-Some speculate Gary Gensler (Newly appointed head of the SEC), may make some move that sets things in motion
-DTCC rule changes taking effect
-Appointment of a new CEO”
Yeah… this feels bad man. I’ve talked about this already, but we can rapid fire down this list.
The stock split didn’t work out, since those in charge of distributing the splits did it fraudulently. Gamma Squeeze is the kind of thing that could trigger a smaller hedge fund to get margin called and cause a domino effect, but I’ve shared my theory of the OTC action. Earnings are nice, but public sentiment has always been more tied to the media manipulation than actual facts. Fucking Gary.
On the subject of bringing in new talent, I do feel like a big move will happen soon. We’ve already seen a lot of job offerings from the Corporate side of GameStop so this could be the next phase of the plan. I really think that RC has spent these last few years taking precautions to make sure the company can’t go bankrupt, the last thing he wants is to turn out like Toys-R-Us. A lot of downsizing happened, so now he can start thinking about upsizing again.
I’m not necessarily saying that these things can’t trigger the squeeze, but I am saying that depending on something to start it is just inviting disappointment. I think the ‘no dates’ rule has been sorely forgotten lately with all the hype and speculation around Roaring Kitty’s tweets and stuff. I am a zen ape, it happens when it happens.
I glaze those purple doughnuts, yum.
Citadel Has No Clothes, Published March 14, 2021, by u(slash)ATOBITT
Ohhhh, this one is special to me, I read it when it first came out, first time I was there on release night. Let’s see how it hodls up.
In order to calculate that we gotta do one of those double equation variable bullshit things we all hated in school, I forgot what they were called but I remember how to do them.
So, we have a few variables:
C = Citadel’s Portfolio = $384,926,232,238
S = Shorted Shares = 696,000,000
I = Intrest = 0.30
X = Price Per Share
Y = Citadel’s new portfolio amount after paying interest
So, X and Y are undetermined, but we have two equations to work with
C – I(X*S) = Y
This one calculates how much money is going to be in citadels new portfolio after paying interest, we calculate the interest by multiplying the cost per share, by the amount of shorted shares, and multiplying that by the interest rate, then subtracting it from their total portfolio.
Y * 1.25 = X * S
This one calculates the total amount those shorted shares have to be in order for Citadel to get margin called, by multiplying their new portfolio by 5/4 and calculating the total cost of the shares.
X * S has a direct value; we can plug the left side of the second equation into the first to get
C – I(Y*1.25) = Y
Now we just gotta isolate Y on one side of the equation.
C = Y + 0.3(Y*1.25)
C = 1.3Y * 0.375
C= 0.4875Y
C * 0.4875 = Y
Y = $187,651,538,216.03
Now we gotta find X, we can just plug in the other stuff.
(Y* 1.25)/ 696,000,000 = X
X = $337.02 per share for shitadel to get margin called on 30% interest.
Holy shit, now that’s what I call reasonable. See how much interest can completely fuck a portfolio? They lost almost half of their portfolio value to a 30% interest to this. This is why the whole market will bleed red on the run up to MOASS, they will have to sell half of their portfolio just to pay the interest.
Citadel is probably not a good example of this, since they print the naked shorts themselves... so they would be paying interest to... themselves... when they borrow them? Citadel is so fucked up, I don't have enough wrinkles for this.
But hey, I think the concept of what I said is fine. High interest rates can reduce collateral and cause margin calls. Hey, just out of curiosity, how much is the borrowing interest rate looking now?
16.5%
SHF are fucked.
Anyway, I’m writing this on a Wordpad document so I’m not sure if I’ve come up on the character limit, but I think I’m getting close so I’ll end this part here. Please let me know what I’ve got wrong or any insights you want to share, I’ll be sure to talk about any interesting comments when I do a part 2!
TLDR: I am reviewing the Diamond Handbook (2nd) and seeing what has changed in the three years since it’s been compiled. I have a bias in thinking that high borrowing interest rates are what will cause MOASS, and that is shown here. This is not meant to be an impartial analysis, just my thoughts. Not financial advice.
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This post will be the first in a series of me reading through the entire Diamond Handbook (2nd) and just commentating on points I find interesting or discussion worthy. I will be asking questions as well as giving my own personal thoughts based on my understanding of the events that have transpired. I became an ape right after the sneeze, and followed a lot of the discussions back then, but have been zen for a while so I haven't fully kept up with a lot of the new developments.
I haven't actually sat down and read DD in a long time, so I decided to give myself a refresher and actually look at the Diamond Handbook (2nd) for the first time. I had read a lot of these posts as they had come out, so I had never felt the need to look at the full PDF before. For the apes that haven’t read it either, I recommend giving it a read. You can find the full DD library in the pinned post of this sub, and the Diamond Handbook is the first one there.
As I have been reading it, I’ve quickly realized that some of the stuff is a little outdated. That can’t really be helped since so much DD has been done between then and now, but this brings me to the two reasons for this post. The Diamond Handbook is likely the first piece of DD a new ape will be recommended; I want to spark discussion to clear up some things that are misguided or outdated in this handbook. The second reason is more of a personal challenge. Whenever someone denies the legitimacy of the DD, an ape usually responds by saying something like “Well, read the DD and prove it wrong”. The average MOASS denier won’t do this though, in my experience they just think it’s ridiculous on a conceptual level, and won’t take the time to actually look through all the DD available and construct a proper debate. I can’t really blame them for this though, spending so much time on something you have no interest in doesn’t sound like a fun time.
But I have a lot of interest in this, and I am an aspiring author who writes 400K word fanfictions for fun. I’ve got the time and the writing willpower. I am very big into trying to understand how a reader will interpret a piece of my writing, so I’ll be looking through that lens and will be writing this with the assumption that you have already read the Diamond Handbook (2nd). Please take the time to respond/correct what I say here, I want to learn.
With all that out of the way, let’s get started.
The Mother of All Short Squeezes (MOASS) Thesis, Published on May 26, 2021, by u(slash)HCMF_MACEFACE
Before we even get into the meat of this section I already see a bit of an issue. A lot of the language implies that MOASS is imminent, take this section for example:
*“If you don't believe me, just look at the chart of GME which our DD (Due Diligence/research/analysis) has been forecasting for a while now. The below pattern has only preceded massive spikes in price, but this time, those on the other side of the trade are going to have a much harder time suppressing the price like they did in January and March. Thanks to the activity on 5/25, we have entered the end-game. The MOASS is beginning.”*I think most new apes will look at this, then look at the date of posting (three years ago), and think this is delusional thinking. They will say that MOASS did not ‘begin’ because it hasn’t happened yet. This would be pretty short sighted though, GME has always been a Deep Value investment, long positions are called long for a reason. ‘Buy and HODL’ is such a repeated mantra because that is the investment strategy most apes employ. Like most investments, it takes a long time to realize gains. Your retirement account will be growing for 40+ years before you cash that thing out, GME is my retirement plan so I don’t expect it to be much different.
Just because the sneeze happened in a week doesn’t mean MOASS will, in theory it should be a very long event as both the shorts and longs have a test of wills to see who caves first. However, the sneeze was the ‘beginning’ because it was exposed a lot of the fuckery that is going on in the market right now, I think that is the message that should be taken from this section.
*“These terms are key to understanding the theory and speculated value of a GME investment. Hyperlinks to Investopedia, "the world's leading source of financial content on the web", have been included for most market terms and concepts and it is recommended to check them out if they are not clear. We will be breaking down some of the more complex terms and concepts within the post and framing them within the context of GME.”*After the introduction, this post does a great job of explaining all the concepts of the stock market that are relevant to the MOASS thesis. However, I do wish it mentioned some other stock terms for the sake of new investors. Since none of the DD is supposed to be financial advice, I can’t really blame them for these omissions, but at the beginning the OP does say they wanted the post to be good for newer investors, so I think some more pointing in the right direction should’ve been provided. I do appreciate the link to Investopedia, but this DD is already a novel, and the average reader might forget about that link by the time they finish it. So an additional link should’ve been provided at the end.
The two big concepts I see missing are Options and Wash Sales/Stop-Losses.
Options are interesting because they create a different type of buying/selling pressure compared to just buying/selling stocks regularly. There are concepts like gamma ramps and stuff that can be relevant when discussing catalysts for price movement. However, options are pretty scary for most investors, I’ve only ever bought one, and forgot about it so it auto-exercised for me (lol), so it’s not a concept I would call essential. I just think it’s better to be educated than not.
The much more egregious omission is that of Wash Sales and Stop-Losses. Wash Sales are extremely dangerous to new investors who still make decisions based on emotions and are not used to the volatility that comes with GME.
If you are unfamiliar, a Wash Sale is when a person sells a stock at a loss, then buys the stock again within a short period of time. As an example, let’s say you bought a stock at $50, then the stock goes down to $40.00 and you no longer feel comfortable with your investment. You sell the stock at a loss. You lost $10.00 on this transaction, but it’s not all bad. When you go to do your taxes, you can report this $10.00 loss to the IRS. This is good because if you make a $10.00 profit off another trade, you now don’t have to take taxes out of that profit, since the IRS will see this as you breaking even in the grand scheme of your portfolio. You didn’t actually make any money, so they aren’t going to tax you for it.
A Wash Sale is triggered when you buy back the stock you sold in a short period of time, this can even apply if you buy a stock in the same sector. So if you buy a stock at $50.00, sell it at $40.00 then buy it again. That $10.00 loss you took can no longer be reported to the IRS as an actual loss. So when you make $10.00 on some other trade, the IRS won’t see you as breaking even, they will tax you on that $10.00.
For a stock as volatile as GME this can be very dangerous, I know people who brought in the peak, then as the price went back down they triggered a Stop-Loss (auto-sale you can program to trigger when a price falls), only to then buy back in when the stock dropped even lower, creating a wash sale that fucked their taxes.
We say “Buy and HODL” a lot, but I think the ‘why’ of it has been lost in the meme. I personally buy and HODL because averaging down is a lot better for me than accidently triggering a Wash Sale. I fucking hate the IRS and don’t want any of that smoke.
*“SPOILER: GME and \[Popcorn\] have tons of FTDs reported.”*I just kinda don’t like the mention of the Popcorn stock here, it has never been a deep value investment. If you are unfamiliar with the Deep Value investment strategy, please take a look at the old Roaring Kitty livestreams. In summary, Deep Value investing is defined by looking for stocks that are extremely undervalued and unpopular due to no fault of the company. These external factors that are making the stock undervalued can be anything, shorting, COVID, stuff like that. But what makes it a Deep Value investment is always strong management within the company. If the company is not mismanaged in any way, then it is very unlikely to go bankrupt, and will have opportunities to make a comeback. GME has Ryan Cohen leading, a proven successful businessman that has already taken precautions to ensure GameStop never goes bankrupt. Popcorn just doesn’t have that. It is very short-squeezable, but it’s not deep fucking value.
*“Short sellers must eventually close, or cover, their short position.”*Ok, but why ‘must’ they? This is another point I think has been lost in the memes. There are two problems with just saying ‘shorts must close’ without providing context. The first is the simple fact that there isn’t a due date. Unlike a common car loan or mortgage, a short position doesn’t operate on a time table. They can wait forever to close, unless they get margin called.
This next part I’m a little shaky on, I’m probably getting some things wrong here:
Ok, well how are they going to get margin called? The problem I see is that these Short Hedge Funds (SHF) are making a lot of money by selling naked shorts. It’s really hard to get margin called when they are literally printing money, and since they don’t have to report these their books just look to be filled with an infinite amount of cash.
So, there are a couple solutions to this:
1, Government regulation. If the SEC puts a stop to naked shorting, these SHF can’t print money anymore. Eventually the interest from their positions will eat them alive, and they will get margin called. Unfortunately, MOASS has the potential to destroy the economy like in 2008, so they probably aren’t too keen on just doing this without creating some kind of safety net. So I can’t really count on them to help, because the government has a vested interest in keeping MOASS from happening. It’s just not something I believe will be the catalyst. Although they might just do it on purpose given the right reason, like pinning the economic collapse on a scapegoat, or by GameStop forcing their hand by exposing the fraud somehow. I’ve seen a lot of apes hoping for one of these reasons to come to pass, but for me, I don’t see enough motivation from the participating parties.
2, A price run-up. If the price of the stock can unbalance the books of the SHF enough then they could also get margin called. I’m not counting on this either, since the price is manipulated by the process of naked shorting. Sure, they are digging a bigger grave when they suppress the price like this, but it can also help smaller SHFs with exiting their positions with OTC stuff. Over-The-Counter trades are trades made off the lit exchanges, historically it was intended to kind of simulate a transaction between two individuals, like buying a video game from a buddy off the books, no taxes, no regulation. Unfortunately, this is abused by institutions and can’t even be used by individuals, making dark pools of trades full of fraud and undermines the free market. Smaller SHFs that are more at risk of getting Margin Called due to their lack of collateral, can make OTC trades with the big naked-shorting market makers to ‘close’ their positions using fake shares. Of course, this only passes the buck so to speak, but it’s a viable strategy for them since the big SHFs that take on these ‘bucks’ are less likely to get margin called. A lot of historic short squeezes happen because a small SHF gets margin called, then drives the price up and causes a bigger SHF to get called, and so on until they’re all in the grave. This is why I don’t really give a shit if the price goes up to $80 in a week, it’s not enough, the buck has been passed. (To be clear, I don’t have proof that this is the reason for the uptick in OTC transactions, it’s just a theory. If a smarter ape than I can get on this that would be great.) But, even if a price run-up itself doesn’t cause MOASS, it may give motivation for the true trigger:
3, Interest Rates. Here is the big one that I look at, that I believe will be the true cause of MOASS. Now please, correct me if I’m wrong again, I am just an ape who dropped out of college. So, from what I understand a Short institution has to pay a certain amount of interest to the people they borrow the stocks from. This is the cost of borrowing and is how these Lenders make money. For a long time, the interest rate was at like 1%, this means that selling one naked short could cover the cost of the interest 100 times over. However, let’s say that the interest rate becomes 110%, sounds crazy, but this would mean that borrowing the share would cost more than the share. This would destroy the balances of the SHFs and ensure they get margin called. Why would this ever happen though? Because these lenders want to make money. These lenders are the real winners of MOASS, and they aren’t talked about enough in my opinion. Lenders can’t sell the shares they’ve lent out, their income is in the interest rates, there has to be a balance here between it being more profitable to lend the shares or to sell them. If Lenders start to think that lending their shares aren’t making them more money than the alternative, they will raise interest rates to make these profits until SHFs can’t pay them, then the SHFs have to return the shares, causing MOASS with the massive buyback, then lenders can just sell the shares on the way down. Lenders have a monetary business interest in causing MOASS, so they are the most likely cause of it in my opinion.
*“This is the GME MOASS thesis. GME is a stock that stands to hit an unprecedented price point due to the fact that manipulators of the market have failed to bankrupt GameStop thanks in huge part to the Legendary Keith Gill AKA* u(slash)DeepFuckingValue*, Ryan Cohen, and all of the GME investors who took part in this saga. It may not be today, this week, or even this month, but one day soon, these toxic participants have no choice but to buy the stock to close out their short positions.”*I don’t think this is necessarily inaccurate, but I think it’s misguided, and the language here is a bit to emotive for my taste. I think the reason the company didn’t go bankrupt is because of the strategic share offering made by Ryan Cohen to build up more cash than the company’s valuation (at the time). All the other stuff was just dressing, DFV and retail did not make RC do this, this move by RC is what ensured the company literally can’t go bankrupt, until then (and at the time this was posted) it was still a risk in my opinion. So this huge thanks feels kinda like a pre-cum celebration, and I've never really liked putting Keith on a pedestal, he's just an individual investor, just like the rest of us.
FAQ, Published April 12, 2021, by u(slash)BYE_TRIANGLE
*“Why does Holding do anything?”* *“They need your shares to cover their short positions! They got greedy. Thinking GameStop would fail, the short sellers started Naked Shorting the stock. Long story short they created synthetic stocks with their special privileges as Market Makers. But they can’t cover a short with a synthetic share. So because of the Naked Shorting, the Short Sellers, multiple large greedy money managers, and Hedge Funds need a total number of shares greater than the number available to purchase. THEY NEED EVERY SHARE, EVEN YOURS CONAN!”* *“aRe YoU GuYs MaNipuLatIng THe MaRKeT?!”*Holding does something else that I think is really important. It proves that retail is not responsible for the manipulation of the price. You see it in the mainstream media every time the price fluctuates, they say that retail and Roaring Kitty is driving the price up for the memes, and that the ‘meme stock craze is dead’ whenever the price falls, claiming that retail is selling. However, it quickly becomes clear to anyone with the willingness to research that retail holds. Holding doesn’t move the price at all, so they literally can’t blame this sub for the fuckery that happens.
Now, on the flip side, I know people on the old sub to buy and sell with these fluctuations, they did it during the sneeze and I’ve seen comments claiming to do it last week. I think this is why Roaring Kitty really had to speak to congress about this, because a legitimate-seeming argument could be made that retail was buying and selling at high volumes. The loss and gain porn on the old sub could be presented as evidence. Here though, apes hold, we glaze purple doughnuts.
So when MOASS does happen, the massive price increase will be only due to buying pressure from SHFs, so they are the only ones that can take the blame for what happens next.
*“No one knows how high the squeeze could take the stock price. The best rational reasoning says that these numbers \[500k per share\] are possible through the laws of supply and demand. Furthermore, it is likely that the Short Percentage is a lot higher than reported, with many suggesting that the short-sellers, cumulatively, need more than 100% of the float to cover.”*A lot of naysayers will claim people are insane for thinking that phone number prices are possible. They will cite that it would make the company’s valuation higher than the amount of money in the world, which is true. However, with the nature of fraudulent naked shorts being fake, the price is fake too, and the valuation of the company doesn’t necessarily mean that the whole float will be sold at those prices. Yes, it shouldn’t be possible, by all accounts it wouldn’t make sense, but it is possible due to the naked shorting. Also, institutions that own shares likely won’t HODL out for the phone number prices, they will sell when they think it’s safe, and when they won’t get in trouble with the SEC for destroying the economy. The infinity pool (the shares that will be sold at these prices) will be a small fraction of the total amount even among retail investors. So the argument that I see against the possibility of this doesn’t hold a lot of weight.
Keep in mind that even though ‘buying pressure’ moves the price up, someone has to be willing to sell in order for someone to buy. So as the price creeps up from $100 to $1000 to $100000 to $8675309 someone will be selling on the way up to get there.
*“Synthetic long positions could be used to disguise their short positions as well, the mechanisms behind this practice utilize the options markets and could explain some of the crazy options activity that we have seen in GameStop the last few months.”*So uhm… I don’t understand ‘Synthetic Longs’ at all. Could an ape with more wrinkles elaborate on this? From what I can extrapolate, this may refer to an institution purchasing a naked shorted share from someone else?
*“While at the same time they employed the use of social engineering to slowly depress the positive sentiment for the stock on Reddit and elsewhere.”* *“You may have been called a Shill for one of a number of reasons. This community is very inclusive and open to everyone, but because of the blatant attacks this forum has suffered a lot of people are understandably paranoid. (Myself included). Please, unless you really are a shill, don’t take it personally.”*I want to address this, because there is a lot of misconception about SuperStonk. A lot of people will claim that this sub is just an echo chamber cult that can’t handle anyone questioning the narrative. This may seem true on the surface, but I think the reality is just that we’ve become hyper sensitive to the social engineering the old sub fell victim to, and I remember this sub being attacked with that as well. So whenever we see a post that has extremely emotive language, we become skeptical and down vote it. Emotions have no place in investing, that is a common rule touted in even the oldest investing books, so posts that try to incite an emotional response are shot down. Apes aren’t about to be manipulated again. That being said there are emotive posts that still get upvoted, ones with positive hype-filled narratives. Since these get upvoted and the negative ones don’t that sometimes gives the impression of an echo chamber. This is because the facts do support the MOASS thesis, so a hype title and opening paragraph is just more agreeable with the facts-based narrative. Some people are just scrolling on their phone and don’t have time to read the whole post.
However, if you go into the comments of these posts, there are apes investigating the profile history to determine if posters are bots, regardless of the pushed narrative. If you look past the upvote counter, apes are very skeptical of any post that isn’t based in fact or harmless memes. The comments rule the post, and I have to say I’ve very proud of this sub for staying vigilant in the wake of Reddit restricting moderation tools.
*“Ryan Cohen clearly believes in Gamestop, to the point of announcing that he will be taking equity as compensation. In fact, as of writing this all of the new Gamestop board members are going to be taking equity as compensation. This is seen as an incredibly bullish sign of the company's future success.”*This is one of the principles of Deep Value investing, I wish this was elaborated on more of why this is bullish. This means that the board, and more importantly Ryan Cohen, is tying their individual self-worth to the company. Due to this tie, they will essentially ‘go down with the ship’ if the company goes down. This means that the board and Ryan actually have an interest in the company doing well, instead of having an interest in making money off the company. You may think this sounds like the same thing, but it’s not. If RC cared more about money than the company, then he could destroy the company to make money (this is what’s happening to popcorn), but by tying his worth to the shares, the only way for him to become richer is for the company to flourish.
I don’t really like the language being used here, stuff like ‘clearly believes’ ‘seen as incredibly bullish’ are all pretty emotive and doesn’t actually explain why these are positive growth signs for the company, they are just saying it is ‘bullish’, the average new investor isn’t even going to know what that really means. Even though GME is extremely manipulated, causing Technical Analysis to become increasingly difficult to depend on, the investment is still rooted in fundamentals of deep value.
*“Below is a shortlist of some of the potential catalysts people are speculating about:*-A Stock Split, or some similar move from Gamestop that recalls shares
-Gamma Squeeze
-Gamestop’s Q1 Earnings Call
-Some speculate Gary Gensler (Newly appointed head of the SEC), may make some move that sets things in motion
-DTCC rule changes taking effect
-Appointment of a new CEO”
Yeah… this feels bad man. I’ve talked about this already, but we can rapid fire down this list.
The stock split didn’t work out, since those in charge of distributing the splits did it fraudulently. Gamma Squeeze is the kind of thing that could trigger a smaller hedge fund to get margin called and cause a domino effect, but I’ve shared my theory of the OTC action. Earnings are nice, but public sentiment has always been more tied to the media manipulation than actual facts. Fucking Gary.
On the subject of bringing in new talent, I do feel like a big move will happen soon. We’ve already seen a lot of job offerings from the Corporate side of GameStop so this could be the next phase of the plan. I really think that RC has spent these last few years taking precautions to make sure the company can’t go bankrupt, the last thing he wants is to turn out like Toys-R-Us. A lot of downsizing happened, so now he can start thinking about upsizing again.
I’m not necessarily saying that these things can’t trigger the squeeze, but I am saying that depending on something to start it is just inviting disappointment. I think the ‘no dates’ rule has been sorely forgotten lately with all the hype and speculation around Roaring Kitty’s tweets and stuff. I am a zen ape, it happens when it happens.
*“First of all, it is incredibly important to note your potential biases when determining if someone is just a shill trying to spread FUD. Not all FUD is invalid, someone may bring up a solid point against an otherwise great DD, and that could scare you. Remember that just because you do not like what someone is saying, doesn’t make it invalid. It is important users here work with constructive criticism to refine their theories.”*Damn, wasn’t I just talking about this? This critique isn’t going to just be wagging fingers, this is really good stuff that still applies today, and from what I’ve seen apes are doing a great job of distinguishing between FUD and legitimate criticism. I also want to take a second to thank the mod team, especially after their tools were restricted, they’ve been a great help.
*“…but since then retail investors have been buying on every single dip in the price… That's more than two whole months of buying-the-dip. Now, I will not speculate on numbers here, if you want to know more you will have to read the DDs on that.”*This is pretty outdated now. Apes have been buying for three years now, and with the advent of Direct Registering we have a much better idea of how much apes hold. I can say with confidence now that retail owns a floats worth of shares. Since there is so much naked shorting, a lot of institutions probably own their own floats too.
I glaze those purple doughnuts, yum.
Citadel Has No Clothes, Published March 14, 2021, by u(slash)ATOBITT
Ohhhh, this one is special to me, I read it when it first came out, first time I was there on release night. Let’s see how it hodls up.
*“TL;DR - Citadel Securities has been fined 58 times for violating FINRA, REGSHO & SEC regulations. Several instances are documented as 'willful' naked shorting. In Dec 2020 they reported an increase in their short position of 127.57% YOY, and I'm calling bullsh\*t on their shenanigans.”*58 times. I don’t actually know how much that number has gone up, but I’m sure it has. I am reminded of an old saying, that if the punishment for a crime is a fine, then it only a crime for the poor. The crime being done to GME is class warfare, it’s nothing less.
*“$295,347,948,000 of that is split into options (calls & puts), while $78,979,887,238 (20.52%) is allocated to actual, physical, shares (or so they say). The rest is convertible debt securities.”*This is why I’m skeptical that it’s even possible for Citadel to get margin called by a normal price run-up. Let’s do some math here. GME’s float is at 232 million-ish shares, let’s say they shorted 300% of that, just to be conservative (lmao), so that’s 696 million. To take what the first post said, Margins don’t get called unless an entities’ collateral becomes less than 80% of what they’ve borrowed. If they use their entire $384,926,232,238 portfolio as collateral, then GME would have to soar to a price of… divide by 4, multiply by 5… $691.32 per share. That may sound relatively reasonable, but I don’t think a normal catalyst would be enough for that. I really think interest rates are the key, think about it, if they have to pay like 30% interest on all of those shares, their portfolio will be reduced by that much (kinda) and we can find a much more reasonable midpoint. Now brace yourselves, I’m about to spend an unreasonable amount of effort on something that is probably wrong because I don’t know shit about fuck about margins or getting called (I have a cash account and I lack rizz).
In order to calculate that we gotta do one of those double equation variable bullshit things we all hated in school, I forgot what they were called but I remember how to do them.
So, we have a few variables:
C = Citadel’s Portfolio = $384,926,232,238
S = Shorted Shares = 696,000,000
I = Intrest = 0.30
X = Price Per Share
Y = Citadel’s new portfolio amount after paying interest
So, X and Y are undetermined, but we have two equations to work with
C – I(X*S) = Y
This one calculates how much money is going to be in citadels new portfolio after paying interest, we calculate the interest by multiplying the cost per share, by the amount of shorted shares, and multiplying that by the interest rate, then subtracting it from their total portfolio.
Y * 1.25 = X * S
This one calculates the total amount those shorted shares have to be in order for Citadel to get margin called, by multiplying their new portfolio by 5/4 and calculating the total cost of the shares.
X * S has a direct value; we can plug the left side of the second equation into the first to get
C – I(Y*1.25) = Y
Now we just gotta isolate Y on one side of the equation.
C = Y + 0.3(Y*1.25)
C = 1.3Y * 0.375
C= 0.4875Y
C * 0.4875 = Y
Y = $187,651,538,216.03
Now we gotta find X, we can just plug in the other stuff.
(Y* 1.25)/ 696,000,000 = X
X = $337.02 per share for shitadel to get margin called on 30% interest.
Holy shit, now that’s what I call reasonable. See how much interest can completely fuck a portfolio? They lost almost half of their portfolio value to a 30% interest to this. This is why the whole market will bleed red on the run up to MOASS, they will have to sell half of their portfolio just to pay the interest.
Citadel is probably not a good example of this, since they print the naked shorts themselves... so they would be paying interest to... themselves... when they borrow them? Citadel is so fucked up, I don't have enough wrinkles for this.
But hey, I think the concept of what I said is fine. High interest rates can reduce collateral and cause margin calls. Hey, just out of curiosity, how much is the borrowing interest rate looking now?
16.5%
SHF are fucked.
Anyway, I’m writing this on a Wordpad document so I’m not sure if I’ve come up on the character limit, but I think I’m getting close so I’ll end this part here. Please let me know what I’ve got wrong or any insights you want to share, I’ll be sure to talk about any interesting comments when I do a part 2!
TLDR: I am reviewing the Diamond Handbook (2nd) and seeing what has changed in the three years since it’s been compiled. I have a bias in thinking that high borrowing interest rates are what will cause MOASS, and that is shown here. This is not meant to be an impartial analysis, just my thoughts. Not financial advice.
2024.05.19 15:22 nun_atoll 4
Frank could have slept in the trailer, but he preferred being in the van under current circumstances. He could scare off anyone who got a bright idea to try and steal the vehicle, for one thing. And if something happened in the motel room, if Jenna and Mike needed help, he was closer.
Not that any of that seemed likely; this place seemed dead as hell.
The motel was a not-too-busted-down place. The town it sat at the edge of was a wide-spot-in-the-road type. An out-of-the-way hamlet, some might call it. To Frank's parents, the town would have seemed ideal. Small enough to seem homey and friendly — and Christian, of course — but large enough to have the basic amenities: a pool of suckers for Mama's MLM sales and other schemes, people looking for someone like Papa who could at least seem to fix anything for cheap, and an attitude that led people to mind their own business, even with new folks and strangers, leaving no one too inclined to call in Youth Services or the equivalent at every sign of a bruise or a scrape or bleeding backs or broken limbs.
They'd done a lot of midnight runners out of places where people showed some level of neighborly concern. Left a lot of things behind in rented houses and apartments.
The best time had been when Frank was between the ages of five and seven. They lived with Grampa and Gramma Schnedeker then, and all the kids who were old enough got to go to proper school for a while, like school-school. Grampa Schnedeker needed a lot of looking after, and Gramma wanted the kids out of the house at least a few hours a day so as not to disturb him too much.
Since they got to go to school, Frank and his siblings right on either side actually learned to properly read and do the beginnings of math and such. Mama said all they needed to read was the Bible, and Papa said math was only important as far as helping him measure and cut lumber and pipe for projects, but still, the kids learned. And when Grampa Schnedeker died and the family moved on, the kids who had got school for a while tried to keep up and to teach things to the little ones.
That got stopped pretty quick, and Mama took over the "lessons," which really just meant she handed the kids their little workbooks every morning after breakfast and left them to work — QUIETLY as she always demanded — while she went and schmoozed sales or whatever. All the boys stopped having any "lessons" after 10 years old. That was when they would start going to work with Papa.
All the boys besides Frank, anyway. But that was before anyone besides Frank even knew that Frank was a boy.
And boy, had that been Hell on Earth when he finally outright told them he was a boy. Mama went to scream-praying like she tended to, and Papa tried to beat Frank to death, and then he did other things that really almost did kill Frank, but luckily Susie called 911.
It was Hell after, too. All that time in the hospital, and the stuff was on the news, and then Frank was sent to foster parents practically across the country. Those first ones were okay, except they also didn't believe Frank was a boy. They just tried to send him to a conversion therapist, who somehow luckily realized that there was no converting Frank and tipped off the social workers. Frank got new foster parents who accepted him, helped him get a name change, and even let him stay with them after he aged out of the foster system, until he could get his GED and see about college.
And then there was college, with his new name and his new clothes and finally being himself, and then the year of college, he met Jenna, and everything since then had been almost golden.
He could not sleep, crunched up in the driver's seat of the van with his head full of memories, so instead he just let it all play, the good and the bad, until it was almost sunrise and he needed to piss like a racehorse.
Then he got out of the van and went to knock at the door of the motel room. After he peed, he would ask Jenna if she minded taking the first shift driving today.
Gotta be up early and get everything together. Danna hated cooking, so Derick made breakfast, got the kids settled, and carried a plate back to his wife, still ensconced in the big bed in the back of the RV.
God had said that the wife should be the one to tend to the home and children, had he not? And yet, if the wife was unable to do some part of that, surely the man, in his free moments, should try and help. Thus, Derick would cook and would see that the children had breakfast, since Danna had such trouble sleeping, and then had trouble waking in the morning, especially when she was pregnant.
And if Danna's mother had never taught her to cook, well, that was the sin of Peggy Lynn Sooks, not her daughter. God would punish Peggy for her failures as a wife and mother.
Other than the sleeping trouble and the aversion to some of the arts of housewifery, Danna was excellent. She was really smart, figuring out how to put together all the social media stuff. And she was always ready to go whenever God told Derick they needed to pick up and move on. She greeted each trip, long or short, with joy, and she treated her other wifely obligations with equal joy.
Perhaps too much joy, sometimes. Danna, for example, took great joy in the act of procreation. That was good, of course, for they were to be fruitful and multiply and spread their family over the Earth to carry the Truth of God's message.
But the act of procreation, sacred and holy as it might be, was never something Derick greatly enjoyed. He did not, as he knew some husbands did, press his wife to fulfill her duties every night. In fact, their marriage had not been conssumated for nearly two months after the wedding, simply because Derick was disinclined. It took Danna reminding him that God's holy word also said a husband should satisfy his wife, and then they finally joined fully in their union.
Still, they did not do it often, unless Danna pressed Derick. As the years went on, she did so more and more, and so he let her have her desire. It was his duty as a husband.
Today, they would stay here. God had said they would be here about a week. Danna seemed happy with that, and the children seemed pleased as well.
They always seemed happiest when the family stopped wandering a while.
Derick had tried to explain to the children why they moved around so much, and why they must keep doing so. He thought perhaps the oldest two boys were beginning to understand. The little ones were still far from such wisdom, but there was time yet.
There was time.
3 Table of Contents
submitted by nun_atoll to liulfr [link] [comments]
Not that any of that seemed likely; this place seemed dead as hell.
The motel was a not-too-busted-down place. The town it sat at the edge of was a wide-spot-in-the-road type. An out-of-the-way hamlet, some might call it. To Frank's parents, the town would have seemed ideal. Small enough to seem homey and friendly — and Christian, of course — but large enough to have the basic amenities: a pool of suckers for Mama's MLM sales and other schemes, people looking for someone like Papa who could at least seem to fix anything for cheap, and an attitude that led people to mind their own business, even with new folks and strangers, leaving no one too inclined to call in Youth Services or the equivalent at every sign of a bruise or a scrape or bleeding backs or broken limbs.
They'd done a lot of midnight runners out of places where people showed some level of neighborly concern. Left a lot of things behind in rented houses and apartments.
The best time had been when Frank was between the ages of five and seven. They lived with Grampa and Gramma Schnedeker then, and all the kids who were old enough got to go to proper school for a while, like school-school. Grampa Schnedeker needed a lot of looking after, and Gramma wanted the kids out of the house at least a few hours a day so as not to disturb him too much.
Since they got to go to school, Frank and his siblings right on either side actually learned to properly read and do the beginnings of math and such. Mama said all they needed to read was the Bible, and Papa said math was only important as far as helping him measure and cut lumber and pipe for projects, but still, the kids learned. And when Grampa Schnedeker died and the family moved on, the kids who had got school for a while tried to keep up and to teach things to the little ones.
That got stopped pretty quick, and Mama took over the "lessons," which really just meant she handed the kids their little workbooks every morning after breakfast and left them to work — QUIETLY as she always demanded — while she went and schmoozed sales or whatever. All the boys stopped having any "lessons" after 10 years old. That was when they would start going to work with Papa.
All the boys besides Frank, anyway. But that was before anyone besides Frank even knew that Frank was a boy.
And boy, had that been Hell on Earth when he finally outright told them he was a boy. Mama went to scream-praying like she tended to, and Papa tried to beat Frank to death, and then he did other things that really almost did kill Frank, but luckily Susie called 911.
It was Hell after, too. All that time in the hospital, and the stuff was on the news, and then Frank was sent to foster parents practically across the country. Those first ones were okay, except they also didn't believe Frank was a boy. They just tried to send him to a conversion therapist, who somehow luckily realized that there was no converting Frank and tipped off the social workers. Frank got new foster parents who accepted him, helped him get a name change, and even let him stay with them after he aged out of the foster system, until he could get his GED and see about college.
And then there was college, with his new name and his new clothes and finally being himself, and then the year of college, he met Jenna, and everything since then had been almost golden.
He could not sleep, crunched up in the driver's seat of the van with his head full of memories, so instead he just let it all play, the good and the bad, until it was almost sunrise and he needed to piss like a racehorse.
Then he got out of the van and went to knock at the door of the motel room. After he peed, he would ask Jenna if she minded taking the first shift driving today.
God had said that the wife should be the one to tend to the home and children, had he not? And yet, if the wife was unable to do some part of that, surely the man, in his free moments, should try and help. Thus, Derick would cook and would see that the children had breakfast, since Danna had such trouble sleeping, and then had trouble waking in the morning, especially when she was pregnant.
And if Danna's mother had never taught her to cook, well, that was the sin of Peggy Lynn Sooks, not her daughter. God would punish Peggy for her failures as a wife and mother.
Other than the sleeping trouble and the aversion to some of the arts of housewifery, Danna was excellent. She was really smart, figuring out how to put together all the social media stuff. And she was always ready to go whenever God told Derick they needed to pick up and move on. She greeted each trip, long or short, with joy, and she treated her other wifely obligations with equal joy.
Perhaps too much joy, sometimes. Danna, for example, took great joy in the act of procreation. That was good, of course, for they were to be fruitful and multiply and spread their family over the Earth to carry the Truth of God's message.
But the act of procreation, sacred and holy as it might be, was never something Derick greatly enjoyed. He did not, as he knew some husbands did, press his wife to fulfill her duties every night. In fact, their marriage had not been conssumated for nearly two months after the wedding, simply because Derick was disinclined. It took Danna reminding him that God's holy word also said a husband should satisfy his wife, and then they finally joined fully in their union.
Still, they did not do it often, unless Danna pressed Derick. As the years went on, she did so more and more, and so he let her have her desire. It was his duty as a husband.
Today, they would stay here. God had said they would be here about a week. Danna seemed happy with that, and the children seemed pleased as well.
They always seemed happiest when the family stopped wandering a while.
Derick had tried to explain to the children why they moved around so much, and why they must keep doing so. He thought perhaps the oldest two boys were beginning to understand. The little ones were still far from such wisdom, but there was time yet.
There was time.
2024.05.19 15:21 Woodstovia [Day of Ascension] The beginning of an uprising
For some context, a tech-priest has discovered a Genestealer Cult on a Mechanicus world and has decided to use them for his own ends. He tells them that he will wipe them out unless they perform an uprising during the national "Ascension Day" celebrations, where he will use the chaos they create to seize power for himself.
The Magus of the cult Claress is old and decrepit, she feels that they missed the time they were actually meant to rise up decades ago and the cult has atrophied since then. Worse, after a series of failed raids their best fighters were killed or imprisoned. She knows they have no chance against the crack Mechanicus troops who have pressed the world for generations but facing no other option the Cult begins its preparations and sends messages to the uncorrupted workers unions and factories that have pledged their support if an uprising against the Mechanicus happens (not knowing that they're dealing with a cult).
I like this section as while it falls into the modern 40k novel habit of listing a bunch of codex units and describing how they fight, I think that it does a good job of portraying the awkward beginnings of an uprising, where nobody actually knows what will happen that spirals into the Genestealer Cult suddenly realising that if they work together they might have a chance.
submitted by Woodstovia to 40kLore [link] [comments]
The Magus of the cult Claress is old and decrepit, she feels that they missed the time they were actually meant to rise up decades ago and the cult has atrophied since then. Worse, after a series of failed raids their best fighters were killed or imprisoned. She knows they have no chance against the crack Mechanicus troops who have pressed the world for generations but facing no other option the Cult begins its preparations and sends messages to the uncorrupted workers unions and factories that have pledged their support if an uprising against the Mechanicus happens (not knowing that they're dealing with a cult).
I like this section as while it falls into the modern 40k novel habit of listing a bunch of codex units and describing how they fight, I think that it does a good job of portraying the awkward beginnings of an uprising, where nobody actually knows what will happen that spirals into the Genestealer Cult suddenly realising that if they work together they might have a chance.
‘This is the end of us,’ she hissed. ‘The priest will use us, and then he will destroy us. Or imprison us in his jars and make us his experiments. All our ways, our traditions, our faith. He will melt it out of us. There will be nothing left but his science.’
‘Child…’ Claress repeated.
‘We should flee,’ Davien almost shouted at her. ‘All of us, each to a different hole. We should abandon this city. We should carry our words and our blood to other places. We’re finished here! I’m sorry, magus, I’m sorry.’ And she was simultaneously weeping and incandescent with rage. At herself, at Triskellian, at Claress. ‘I have ruined us! I’m a traitor. Punish me, magus. Destroy me.’
‘You have listened to the lies of the enemy, it is true,’ Claress said softly. Her hand fell on Davien’s shoulder, a husk of a thing, no weight to it. ‘And you may be punished in time, that is also true. But for now, you are one of us, and you must play your part in what is to come.’
‘But it’s a sham!’ Davien exclaimed. ‘It’s some Taskmaster plan, some infighting between them. It isn’t the time!’ Struck by a sudden hope, she searched the old woman’s face. ‘Is it? Is all this… the Emperor’s plan for us? Can it be?’ And before she could hear any empty comforts, she rushed on. ‘Tell me truly, magus. Please tell me.’
The sad calm on Claress’ face was heartbreaking. ‘I don’t know, child. I wish I could give you all the grand certainties in the world. I wish I could give you the words of fire and faith I’d speak in the chapel, of the Many-Handed Emperor and His angels. But that is what faith is for, Davien.’ She sagged, sinking in on herself a little more. ‘Take me to my chamber. I must rest before tomorrow.’
‘You can’t take to the streets, magus. Not you.’
‘I must. We all shall play our part. We shall triumph together, or we shall fall. I do not want to be left alone if my kin are taken from me.’
Davien led her deeper into the maze of cellars. All around, the Congregation were in a frenzy of preparation. The building was haemorrhaging the faithful as they rushed out to carry the magus’ words across all the poor districts of the city. Out there, all Davien’s distant kin would be arming themselves. And the others, all those who weren’t blood but who had suffered beneath the crushing iron boot of the tech-priests, they’d be gathering too. All of them cast against the iron walls of the Hollow Men.
When she had Claress back to the old woman’s bed, she helped her lie down, hearing joints click and crack. The magus lay there, staring at the low ceiling, then shifted her head to look at the painting of the Emperor on the far wall. It was flaking now, half-obscured with grime. A depiction from the time of the Great-Aunts and Uncles, when the blood of the Emperor was stronger in them, so that none of the Congregation could show their faces for fear of being known for what they were. A figure with four arms: two human hands and two with radiant claws like crescent moons. An elliptical head split by a great benevolent smile that was all teeth. The eyes were beatific, murderous, inhuman. Davien had stared at the image often, feeling out its contradictions, letting them speak to the human and the inhuman within her. It frightened her; it inspired her.
‘I hear them singing to me.’ Claress’ dry voice rose to her. ‘The angels. They throng the cold void. And I sing back. I tell them, We are here. We are faithful. We’re waiting for you. And their great wings carry them across the freezing spaces, through the perilous labyrinth of the warp. They are coming, Davien. They tell me, We hear you. We come for you. Only have faith, and you shall become part of us. The Blessed Union, child. Our destiny.’ She laughed softly, coughed, shuddering with each dry convulsion. ‘They came from the stars, our ancestors. The first on Morod to bear our blood was an angel’s child, and so we are children of angels. But weaker, each generation. I lack the strength of the Aunts, the might of the Great-Aunts. I am too human to be truly strong. But I hear them, Davien. They are so beautiful. There is nothing on this ugly world to compare to them. I need to see them with my own eyes, before I grow too old.’
And Davien, one of the diminished survivors of a younger generation still, thought about how thin her own blood was, how little of the angel remained. ‘Do you think the priests’ Ascension Day will be our ascension too? Or will all our blood just end up on the streets and in that priest’s laboratory?’
Claress’ yellow gaze switched to her. ‘Faith is all that we have, when the machinery of this world comes to crush us. I hear the angels. They come to us, but space is vast and the warp is a trickster. All we can do is believe that the Many-Handed Emperor will not abandon His faithful in their time of need. That He is a true divinity, beyond the enthroned corpse the machine-priests worship. Our god lives, Davien. Our god is life, life in all its many forms and guises. Theirs is dust and ancient mechanisms. We must prevail, or we give the universe over to entropy and death. Only by our truths can life eternal survive and spread throughout the cosmos. Do you understand me, child? Do you have faith?’
And Davien thought, We are going to die tomorrow, on the streets and in their arena. This is not the true uprising we were promised, it is some priest’s gambit. But she couldn’t hold to those thoughts against the old woman’s rustle of a voice. It got under her skin. It spoke to all those services in the buried chapel. It spoke to her blood.
Easy to have faith when you were strong, after all. And what was the value of it, then? But they stood under the steel hammer of the tech-priests, and they would rise up nonetheless. Let Triskellian think it was all to his plan. The Congregation would rise because it was their time. Who said that he was using them? And even though, intellectually, she knew the truth, she still felt that fire in her, that burned away all doubt.
‘I believe, magus,’ she said fiercely. ‘Tell me what I must do.’
The next dawn, even as the tech-priests were attending their early Ascension Day devotions, the streets of the South Chasm districts erupted into armed uprising.
Davien saw it from the rooftops, crossing from building to building by the gantries, bridges and ropes that the skitarii periodically brought down but the locals always strung up again. All night the Congregation’s messengers had been running like sparks through the poorer districts of the city, seeing which claves would catch their fires. All of the true faithful rose up without question, of course. Right now she could only see the more inarguably human of them, those marked only by a pallidity of skin, patches of chitinous scales, unblinking yellow eyes perhaps. No unusual traits on as poisonous a world as this. Behind and within the walls of the tenements, though, the older generations of the god-touched would be stirring; would be eager. They had waited all their long lives, after all. They had hidden away as their younger offspring had busied themselves in the world, unable to show their distorted faces. They had known only the burning fire of their faith, and now that faith told them, Rise!
The streets were thronging with people, just ordinary people. And yet, not ordinary, for in many of those bodies a few drops of divine blood ran. But they were not the superhuman figures of Imperial myth. Not the Adeptus Astartes that had been made into little gods; not the tech-priests, elevated by machinery until they had forgotten what it was like to have two living feet on the ground. People, with nothing but their faith, and what tools and weapons they could scavenge or make themselves. And today they would attempt to wrest control of their destiny from those who had ordered and limited their whole lives.
And they would die, she knew. Heavy-hearted she watched them muster, factorum workers clapping each other on the shoulder, hard greetings called across the crowd. There were banners there, and some were of the Many-Handed Emperor Scattering His Angels Upon the Faithful, but there were others, too. Crude standards celebrating this ward or that factorum, this mining crew, even one for the staff of a workers’ refectory. There was an air of festival, just as if they were celebrating the damned Ascension Day after all.
And then the first skitarii came into sight. Davien knew she should be away by now, off on the errand that Claress had given her, but she couldn’t. She had to see if the whole venture would collapse into tragedy.
A wedge of red-clad cybernetic soldiers ordered itself precisely across the street ahead of the gathering mob. Behind them, a pair of dragoons stalked in, towering over the soldiers’ heads. Their riders couched forked lances snapping with sparks, even as the servitor beneath them, merged with the workings of the machine, directed the Ironstrider’s jerky motions. The crowd stilled, seeing all those carbines levelled at them, knowing more would be on the way.
The skitarii alpha called out, voice amplified until it rattled Davien’s skull like thunder. ‘By the order of the Fabricator General, you are required to disperse. There will be no second warning.’
And Claress stepped forwards from the ranks of the crowd, standing ahead of them, raising her staff. Somehow her high, clear voice carried even to Davien. ‘Faith and freedom! Faith for the true Emperor’s blood! Freedom from the yoke!’
The skitarii opened fire.
Davien screamed when they did it, curled away from the blaze and heat of it, knowing this was surely the end even as the uprising began. But in the echo of the shots she dared look, and saw Claress somehow untouched, standing with bodies to her left and right, the faithful who had put themselves in harm’s way. And not so many bodies, even, not compared to the vast mass of humanity that was packing the street. Angry humanity, crammed with grievances.
Claress’ voice called out again, and now she was sounding the charge. Davien saw members of the Congregation break into a run on either side of her, funnelling through the streets in a great rush, wielding hammers and prybars and power-cutters, emptying their shotguns and automatics into the skitarii wedge. The dragoons were in motion instantly, striding over the heads of their human-sized allies, accelerating into a counter-charge with lances lowered. Davien saw the first connect, its huge iron feet sending insurgents flying even as the lance swept an arc through the crowd, charring and burning. Then an eye-rending beam of light seared into it. One of the mining crews had a rock laser set up on the rooftop across from Davien and they drew lines of molten steel across the dragoon’s chassis before striking something vital.
In an instant the walking machine flashed incandescently and exploded, laying waste to the nearest fighters in a horrible toll of shrapnel and shredded flesh. For everyone left standing, though, that was the signal to rush forwards. Moments later the skitarii were giving ground, shooting and falling back. Or just falling, dragged down by the crowd who saw them as nothing more than the tools of their oppressors.
And then Davien was off, roof to roof, eyes open for when the tech-priests’ more subtle instruments decided the higher reaches were their territory. There would be rangers up here sniping down at the crowd soon enough. There would be the murderous rust-stalkers trying to flank the Congregation to bring down its leaders with their blades and claws. She had to be ahead of all of that. She had work to do, a task entrusted to her by the magus herself.
She shadowed the forerunners of the mob until they exploded out before Nilhetum Square, where the rail depot was. More of the Palatium’s troops were disembarking even as everyone arrived, hurriedly evacuating the train and taking up position to defend it. And if the Congregation wished to reach the Palatium, they needed to control the train line, and they needed to take it swiftly before the tech-priests began destroying their own infrastructure to deny it to the rebels.
There were more than just skitarii out there. She saw the low, trundling shapes of Kataphron servitors grinding down ramps from flatbed carriages, armoured human head, torso and arms set into a mechanised assault vehicle that was also their lower body. Davien felt a flare of rage at the tech-priests and their meddling. They took the divine flesh and carved it and pared it down, merged it with their devices. Nothing could be left alone. Nothing had any value until it was incorporated into their machines. And, on a grander scale, no individual lives had worth unless they were components of the wider priestly engine that spanned the human universe and enslaved everything it touched to their cold metal vision.
The Kataphron were terrors, nigh invulnerable to the weapons the foot-soldiers of the Congregation had brought, but by now the rioters had been given the chance to bring in their own big guns. With a choking roar and a belch of smoke one of the big quarry trucks raced out of a side street, already up to its lumbering top speed. It was a heavily armoured Goliath model, its entire front given over to rock-grinding blades that would chew hungrily on skitarii machine-flesh or the armour of the Kataphron. And, in its wake, a flurry of robed figures bearing a banner showing that familiar many-armed figure. The Aunts and the Uncles had come out from their cellars and holes, from their forgotten wall-spaces where they had waited for generations. Even as the Goliath powered forwards, meeting the lead Kataphron head-on and making a jagged mess of its armour, the elders were leaping around and over it, brandishing knives, pistols, or just their own hooked talons. And there was more. Davien felt a voice in her head, then. A singing so pure and beautiful that she thought it must be the angels, come at last. All the Congregation must have heard it, from the way they redoubled their pace and closed joyously with the skitarii and the machines.
A great figure, head and shoulders over the rank and file, had come into the square – a Great-Aunt, one of the true elders, shrouded in streamers and rags of cloth that could not hide the divinity of her form. She sang, and the Congregation echoed her, voices upraised in prayer and praise. In one of her three hands was a banner, not the crude handmade things the crowd had spent last night creating but something ancient, preserved for this day over generations. It showed not the expected Imperial visage, but an emblem with that same long-jawed head and a trailing cog-backed body; a serpentine shape curled in upon itself, one end a hooked claw, the other hungering jaws ready to devour the tech-priests and all their works.
The skitarii turned their weapons on her, blasting away, but the banner had electrified the Congregation so that they were swarming the lines, clambering over the Kataphron, braving the massed fire of their foes. Davien saw explosives go off, mining charges devastating bodies on both sides. She saw brutal knots of knife-work and bayonets and the bludgeoning butts of carbines, no quarter given.
2024.05.19 15:19 Stressed_Stunning How to not feel the worst mama while sleep training?
Hiya, FTM here and we started sleep training our bubba - we’re currently on our 3rd day. We’re using the Ferber method and the check-in time is getting longer and during these, our bubba started standing up and holding the cot rails while crying and falling down. It’s so hard to watch him falling and hitting his head on the cot walls over and over again. I’m feeling the worst mama right now and I need some advice or words of encouragement. What can I do? How can someone still be consistent when you see your baby falling and hitting his head? For the mummas out the whole had success with Ferber, when will it get better? The crying is breaking my heart and making me really anxious. I really don’t know if I can keep being consistent atm.
submitted by Stressed_Stunning to sleeptrain [link] [comments]
2024.05.19 15:16 rah0on Is this OCD or something else?
I (21M, not diagnosed with anything) have this strong aversion towards the “almost perfect.”
One of the ways this manifests itself is in “good and bad” numbers. Some examples of good numbers in my mind are: 10, 27, 88, 642. Examples of bad numbers: 1, 34, 99, 554, 1,001. However, if say, 27 and 88 were in the same sentence/context, they would both be bad numbers. You’re probably very confused right now, so I’ll try to explain to the best of my ability. The number 1 is only good to me if it represents what I view as a “whole” number (I know the term whole number means something different in a mathematical context), which are 10, 100, 1,000, etc. The reason why 1 as in just the number 1 is bad to me is because it is too close to 0. Since 0 represents absolute nothingness, I view it as THE perfect number. 1 irks me because it’s so close to the perfect number, 0, but not quite there. This same reasoning applies to 101, 1,001, etc. as well anything involving the number 9 due to it being 1 off from 10. The other type of numbers that annoy me are numbers such as 34, or 554. Both of these numbers disturb me due to the fact that they contain numbers that are 1 off from each other. (3 and 4, 4 and 5) 554 also irritates me due to the fact it is 1 off from being a “perfect 3.” (555) When two numbers are in a sentence together, they must be vastly, or at least considerably (depending on the context) different from each other. I can’t handle numbers that end in numbers 1 off from each other (e.g. 27 and 88) being seen together.
So what problems does this cause me? If I need to go somewhere, say work, and my phone is on charge and it is at 71%, I will wait until it gets to 72% before I take it off charge and leave the house, even if it means I’m late to work. Something that constantly happens to me is I’ll look at the time on my phone, either intentionally or unintentionally, and it will be a “bad” number, now I have to constantly check the time over and over again to make sure I view it when it becomes a “good” number. This is because when I see a bad number I get this feeling like it has “dirtied” my eyes and I need to “cleanse” my eyes by looking at a good number.
Another issue is with comments on social media, I’m using TikTok as an example because that’s what I use the most but you can visualise Instagram instead if you are unfamiliar with TikTok. When there are a lot of replies to a comment it will display as “view [number] replies.” With TikTok it used to be that if you tapped it, it would show 3 more more replies, and so on, reducing the [number] by 3 each time. However this has recently changed to revealing 3 more replies the first time you tap, and then 8 more for each time after, which is causing me even more issues. Anyways, if it reads “view 392 replies” that is obviously a bad number, so I’ll tap it once and it will become “view 389 replies,” which is still a bad number so I keep tapping it until it becomes a good number. What complicates things further, though, is my need for all the numbers displayed on my screen to be harmonious with each other. So I will spend ridiculous amounts of time trying to make all these numbers perfect.
For a more real world example, if I’m putting a book on a table, I will intentionally avoid trying to place it parallel/perpendicular to the table’s edges. Now, if there were a way for me to guarantee I was placing this book at an exact 0°/90° angle, I would do so in a heartbeat. However, this is impossible, so what I instead do is I place it and very random angle (but NOT approximately 45°) to eliminate the chances of the book being, say, 1° off from being parallel to the edge of the table.
I also do some more, I guess… typical OCD things. I constantly recheck things are turned off/locked. A big, but stupid, thing for me is being convinced light switches will somehow turn themselves back on after I turn them off, so I have to make sure I press extra hard when turning lights off so they don’t magically turn themselves on. I do everything left to right, such as repeated clicking my fingers in a specific pattern (left pinky, right pinky, right ring, left ring, left middle, right middle, right pointer, left pointer, both thumbs at the same time), putting shoes on, and stepping on new surfaces. (e.g. carpet to wood, footpath to road) If I’m walking up/down stairs I will always take the first step with my left foot, if it so happens that the amount of stairs in the staircase forces me to step off with my right foot I will do a kind of shuffle to make sure I’m stepping onto the new floor with my left foot first. This causes other issues with the amount of time each foot makes contact with the floor, how hard I press each foot on the floor, etc. I spend a lot of time shuffling around in place trying to “even out” my feet. Don’t even get me started on cracks in the footpath, shadows, multi-coloured tiles, etc.
But what happens if I don’t meet these conditions my brain has imposed upon me? I don’t feel as if I will die as result of this, but I feel anxiety over the thought of dying for some other reason and leaving behind unfixed numbers, misplaced books, a foot that touched the ground more than the other, whatever. I could die at any moment—this is a fact—I could get in a car accident, have an aneurysm, or be murdered. If that happens there won’t be a chance to fix all those things.
I’m pretty damn sure I have OCD, I just have some… oddly specific obsessions, and probably some other stuff mixed in. I just don’t want to tell a doctor all this and have them look at me crazy because they don’t understand what I’m talking about. Plus I’m way worse at explaining these things in real life.
submitted by rah0on to DiagnoseMe [link] [comments]
One of the ways this manifests itself is in “good and bad” numbers. Some examples of good numbers in my mind are: 10, 27, 88, 642. Examples of bad numbers: 1, 34, 99, 554, 1,001. However, if say, 27 and 88 were in the same sentence/context, they would both be bad numbers. You’re probably very confused right now, so I’ll try to explain to the best of my ability. The number 1 is only good to me if it represents what I view as a “whole” number (I know the term whole number means something different in a mathematical context), which are 10, 100, 1,000, etc. The reason why 1 as in just the number 1 is bad to me is because it is too close to 0. Since 0 represents absolute nothingness, I view it as THE perfect number. 1 irks me because it’s so close to the perfect number, 0, but not quite there. This same reasoning applies to 101, 1,001, etc. as well anything involving the number 9 due to it being 1 off from 10. The other type of numbers that annoy me are numbers such as 34, or 554. Both of these numbers disturb me due to the fact that they contain numbers that are 1 off from each other. (3 and 4, 4 and 5) 554 also irritates me due to the fact it is 1 off from being a “perfect 3.” (555) When two numbers are in a sentence together, they must be vastly, or at least considerably (depending on the context) different from each other. I can’t handle numbers that end in numbers 1 off from each other (e.g. 27 and 88) being seen together.
So what problems does this cause me? If I need to go somewhere, say work, and my phone is on charge and it is at 71%, I will wait until it gets to 72% before I take it off charge and leave the house, even if it means I’m late to work. Something that constantly happens to me is I’ll look at the time on my phone, either intentionally or unintentionally, and it will be a “bad” number, now I have to constantly check the time over and over again to make sure I view it when it becomes a “good” number. This is because when I see a bad number I get this feeling like it has “dirtied” my eyes and I need to “cleanse” my eyes by looking at a good number.
Another issue is with comments on social media, I’m using TikTok as an example because that’s what I use the most but you can visualise Instagram instead if you are unfamiliar with TikTok. When there are a lot of replies to a comment it will display as “view [number] replies.” With TikTok it used to be that if you tapped it, it would show 3 more more replies, and so on, reducing the [number] by 3 each time. However this has recently changed to revealing 3 more replies the first time you tap, and then 8 more for each time after, which is causing me even more issues. Anyways, if it reads “view 392 replies” that is obviously a bad number, so I’ll tap it once and it will become “view 389 replies,” which is still a bad number so I keep tapping it until it becomes a good number. What complicates things further, though, is my need for all the numbers displayed on my screen to be harmonious with each other. So I will spend ridiculous amounts of time trying to make all these numbers perfect.
For a more real world example, if I’m putting a book on a table, I will intentionally avoid trying to place it parallel/perpendicular to the table’s edges. Now, if there were a way for me to guarantee I was placing this book at an exact 0°/90° angle, I would do so in a heartbeat. However, this is impossible, so what I instead do is I place it and very random angle (but NOT approximately 45°) to eliminate the chances of the book being, say, 1° off from being parallel to the edge of the table.
I also do some more, I guess… typical OCD things. I constantly recheck things are turned off/locked. A big, but stupid, thing for me is being convinced light switches will somehow turn themselves back on after I turn them off, so I have to make sure I press extra hard when turning lights off so they don’t magically turn themselves on. I do everything left to right, such as repeated clicking my fingers in a specific pattern (left pinky, right pinky, right ring, left ring, left middle, right middle, right pointer, left pointer, both thumbs at the same time), putting shoes on, and stepping on new surfaces. (e.g. carpet to wood, footpath to road) If I’m walking up/down stairs I will always take the first step with my left foot, if it so happens that the amount of stairs in the staircase forces me to step off with my right foot I will do a kind of shuffle to make sure I’m stepping onto the new floor with my left foot first. This causes other issues with the amount of time each foot makes contact with the floor, how hard I press each foot on the floor, etc. I spend a lot of time shuffling around in place trying to “even out” my feet. Don’t even get me started on cracks in the footpath, shadows, multi-coloured tiles, etc.
But what happens if I don’t meet these conditions my brain has imposed upon me? I don’t feel as if I will die as result of this, but I feel anxiety over the thought of dying for some other reason and leaving behind unfixed numbers, misplaced books, a foot that touched the ground more than the other, whatever. I could die at any moment—this is a fact—I could get in a car accident, have an aneurysm, or be murdered. If that happens there won’t be a chance to fix all those things.
I’m pretty damn sure I have OCD, I just have some… oddly specific obsessions, and probably some other stuff mixed in. I just don’t want to tell a doctor all this and have them look at me crazy because they don’t understand what I’m talking about. Plus I’m way worse at explaining these things in real life.
2024.05.19 15:16 Imjust_adreamer_84 P0191 Code Ford 2005 v10 RV
Code says: Fuel rail pressure sensor... changed the fuel pressure sensor, cleaned the air filter (which wasn't bad at all), the fuel filter has been changed. Husband added Lucas oil to fuel tank. Still throws this code after clearing and has recently thrown a P1000 code (Manufacturer Controlled Diagnostic Trouble Code (DTC) that indicates that your Ford's Engine Control Computer (ECC) has not completed its emission systems testing). Has anyone else had this problem?.
submitted by Imjust_adreamer_84 to RVLiving [link] [comments]
2024.05.19 15:16 jrochkind Does this mean there won't be a Rails 7.2 release?
I've been seeing mixed information for a while about whether next rails will be 7.2 or 8, with no official pronouncements I could find.
But last week at RailsConf some people who were in a position to know told me there would be a Rails 7.2 release, coming soon.
But now official Rails news says, "Development of Rails 8 starts now", linking to this commit that changes main branch to say 8.0.0.alpha instead of 7.2.0.alpha.
Does that mean that the next release will be 8.0.0 and we won't get a 7.2.0? I am still not sure! I guess if so, that decision was just made in the last week officially?
Under Rails current maintenance policy, when major versions change over has direct affect on how long past versions are maintained... but I think I heard talk about changing that too maybe, perhaps it will be changed before it matters (or ignored again, as it's currently being ignored to leave 6.1 in "security issues" maintenance)
submitted by jrochkind to ruby [link] [comments]
But last week at RailsConf some people who were in a position to know told me there would be a Rails 7.2 release, coming soon.
But now official Rails news says, "Development of Rails 8 starts now", linking to this commit that changes main branch to say 8.0.0.alpha instead of 7.2.0.alpha.
Does that mean that the next release will be 8.0.0 and we won't get a 7.2.0? I am still not sure! I guess if so, that decision was just made in the last week officially?
Under Rails current maintenance policy, when major versions change over has direct affect on how long past versions are maintained... but I think I heard talk about changing that too maybe, perhaps it will be changed before it matters (or ignored again, as it's currently being ignored to leave 6.1 in "security issues" maintenance)
2024.05.19 15:14 JudgementReporter AITA for saying to a student in the year above me a cheater who was unfaithful with many boys in her class?
I 17M moved her bags a long with a few other people’s as well after they made a lot of noise and threw stuff such as pens and pencil cases at me when I was trying to work in a Silent Study room. When they were asked about why they were being rowdy, their excuse was it was left in an unsupervised state which ‘implied’ talking is allowed EVEN THOUGH there was a notice board that specifically said it was a quiet room.
After this happened, I messaged one of the people involved, apologising for my actions and just explained that it was frustrating trying to work in what was meant to be a silent room and having to put up with noise and things being thrown at me, acknowledging it would have been better to move myself to another table.
The day after all this happened, the girl in question (We’ll call her Kat) and a friend (We’ll call her Sam) came into the room. They began making indirect comments alluding to the day before and in these comments, they stated my behaviour is ‘racially motivated’ and they would jump me after school. One of my friends (also in the room) said she heard them mentioning a knife being involved. Kat and Sam went on to make comments every time someone coughed or sneezed which were ‘Let’s hope he doesn’t move their stuff, I think that pretty loud.’ They then tried to make a scene about me closing a set of blinds on one of the windows as it was creating a glare on the computers in the room, making it hard for people to read digital work and it didn’t make sense to have them open if the lights in the room were also on. Sam tried to say she found it easier to read her iPad with the blinds open and when I pointed out that it made no sense, she tried to change the topic entirely by saying she had an exam the next lesson and that I should show consideration to her and grace to her and drop the argument.
When I said that I wasn’t the inconsiderate one, two of their friends (Missy and Pam) also began to attack me verbally as well. I said to Missy not to get involved because she has other things to worry about like her boyfriend being a dealer who cheats on her regularly and has sent inappropriate messages to many girls including my sister. Pam then turned around and out of thin air tried to suggest I online date on a kid’s game which I’ve never played before and also brought up my parents living abroad for work, saying they didn’t love me enough to take me with them. Kat then tried to say to me to be considerate again so I said ‘You mean like you were showing consideration to your boyfriend when you cheated on him with half your grade? Close your mouth and close your legs please.’ After this, I left the room.
The next day, I found out Kat had told people outside of the room what happened however she exaggerated many details. Then when I began discussing my perspective, she tried to say I was spreading malicious lies even though I only had discussions with those who were in the room, unlike her because she was sobbing to all who’d listen.
submitted by JudgementReporter to AmItheAsshole [link] [comments]
After this happened, I messaged one of the people involved, apologising for my actions and just explained that it was frustrating trying to work in what was meant to be a silent room and having to put up with noise and things being thrown at me, acknowledging it would have been better to move myself to another table.
The day after all this happened, the girl in question (We’ll call her Kat) and a friend (We’ll call her Sam) came into the room. They began making indirect comments alluding to the day before and in these comments, they stated my behaviour is ‘racially motivated’ and they would jump me after school. One of my friends (also in the room) said she heard them mentioning a knife being involved. Kat and Sam went on to make comments every time someone coughed or sneezed which were ‘Let’s hope he doesn’t move their stuff, I think that pretty loud.’ They then tried to make a scene about me closing a set of blinds on one of the windows as it was creating a glare on the computers in the room, making it hard for people to read digital work and it didn’t make sense to have them open if the lights in the room were also on. Sam tried to say she found it easier to read her iPad with the blinds open and when I pointed out that it made no sense, she tried to change the topic entirely by saying she had an exam the next lesson and that I should show consideration to her and grace to her and drop the argument.
When I said that I wasn’t the inconsiderate one, two of their friends (Missy and Pam) also began to attack me verbally as well. I said to Missy not to get involved because she has other things to worry about like her boyfriend being a dealer who cheats on her regularly and has sent inappropriate messages to many girls including my sister. Pam then turned around and out of thin air tried to suggest I online date on a kid’s game which I’ve never played before and also brought up my parents living abroad for work, saying they didn’t love me enough to take me with them. Kat then tried to say to me to be considerate again so I said ‘You mean like you were showing consideration to your boyfriend when you cheated on him with half your grade? Close your mouth and close your legs please.’ After this, I left the room.
The next day, I found out Kat had told people outside of the room what happened however she exaggerated many details. Then when I began discussing my perspective, she tried to say I was spreading malicious lies even though I only had discussions with those who were in the room, unlike her because she was sobbing to all who’d listen.
2024.05.19 15:14 Frequent-Version956 Should I keep trying to make it work or leave?
Do I stay or cut my losses?
TL/DR - BF still talks to Ex Gf - BF still smokes w$&d - I want a baby and family which he said he wants to but he’s done nothing on his behalf to try and workout why we aren’t pregnant, 2 years later - I’ve had the blood work and psmr done and got the all clear from my dr and gynaecologist - Lies, Fights and lack of validation
I 34F have been with my bf 35M)for 5 years. Things were great until 3 years ago when I made it very clear that I wanted atleast 1 child by 35. He agreed and we both made promises to get better financially (savings and get rid of debts), work on ourselves - fitness and mental health, slow down and eventually stop partying and going to raves (within the year), and overall take steps towards building a family. He smokes weed daily and this was the biggest promise he made- to stop smoking w$&d. 2 years ago I had my IUD removed so we could get the ball rolling for trying for a baby. I had my blood tests done and p-sMear to make sure everything was in order and I got the all clear. After a year of trying, nothing has happened. He hasn’t stopped w$&d, but he tells me weekly that he will- at this time, it was because he was struggling mentally, which I said I understood and he should seek counselling, which he said he would. I also suggested he get a sprm count so we can try and eliminate all possibilities of why we’re not pregnant yet. He says every other month that he will quit w$&d and get the sprmcount done and hasn’t.
We are now 2 years into trying and still nothing has happened- the w$&d continues and he still hasn’t seen a counsellor or had a sprm count done and every time I bring it up, he says he now needs the w$&d for his epilepsy ( which he was diagnosed with a year ago). I reminded him that he really shouldn’t be on any dr!?gs at all, as per his Drs and his neurological professor as he has mental illness issues as well.
This has caused a huge friction in our relationship and many, many arguments have been had, because I’m feeling so resentful and angry that, every other week he promises to stop the w$&d and get a sprm count done and see a counsellor and he hasn’t.
On top of this, I asked him 3 years ago to stop speaking to his ex because she keeps asking him about their past and “do you ever think of what it would be like if we were still together?” And I told him this was disrespectful to me and our relationship. I just found out 4 weeks ago that he still talks to her, even though he never initiates the conversation, he doesn’t ignore it either and responds every time. ( I needed to find his bosses number after he went to a rave, had dr@gs and ended up having 3 full body seizures which he’s never had before, and ended up in hospital, and I saw the messages of him chatting to her the night before.) He swears up and down that THAT was an eye opener and he’s truly sorry and he’s blocked and deleted her and he wants to focus on me and our future. ( he’s also said this multiple times over 3 years and I found out time and time again it was a lie.)
Also come to find out, he got a number from a girl at the petrol station and she’s been venting to him about her relationship and he about ours. ( another conversation that isn’t anything sexual or otherwise, but the thought of him venting about our relationship to a complete stranger who felt comfortable to give her number and he didn’t tell me at all until a week later made me really upset as it all coincided with him still talking to his ex).
He has no idea why I’m so upset about this; the w$&d, the sprm count, the lack of sex in general, random girls number, his ex and when I express how much he’s hurting me, he takes the “ well find better. You deserve better than me” route and just hides away from me in the house ( we live together ).
We can never have a discussion about anything at all without him turning it into how he’s the victim and feeling attacked, and all I’m bringing forward is how he’s hurting me, complete with examples and screenshots and why it’s not ok. He’s in turn told me the following; “You’ve got mental health problems because you’re not right in the head and you’re abusive and your behaviour is abusive” “ get meds because you clearly need it! You can’t keep blaming everything on me! You’re a problem too!”
I stopped partying 3 years ago. I started going to the gym again to get fit and healthy I’m watching what I eat and being more mindful of my surroundings so I’m in a good place mentally I feel so defeated, 3 years on, that I’m resentful, I’m mad, I’m hurt, I’m on antidepressants and I’m seeing a psychologist and he still hasn’t done anything he promised he would.
It’s gotten to the point where my family hates our relationship, my best friend thinks he’s a joke and is wasting my time and taking me for granted and none of my friends want to be around me because of how he treats me ( “he’s very aggressive the way he speaks to you. Always making out like you’re dragging him around or nagging him or always on his case … he doesn’t have to come if he doesn’t want to…. It’s hard to hang out with you and watch him treat you the way he does”.)
Worst of all, he interfered with my work ( disconnected the internet and berated me and my work colleague heard it all) and my work has now listed me as “in a domestic abse” situation and I’ve been interviewed by HR. At the same time he started a new job and while he’s bragging about how wonderful his job is, he’s completely ignorant to how he’s ruined mine and my reputation.
I guess the answers are all in front of me on what to do: Do I bother trying to believe that maybe one day his “magical promises” might come true or cut my losses while I still can.
I still love him, and I still want the family we both dreamed of! It feels like I’m the only one invested and I pushing someone to change when his actions proved he was never going to.
Am I overthinking this? Am I hoping on a dream that will never happen? Am I fooling myself? Do I need to change?
submitted by Frequent-Version956 to relationships [link] [comments]
TL/DR - BF still talks to Ex Gf - BF still smokes w$&d - I want a baby and family which he said he wants to but he’s done nothing on his behalf to try and workout why we aren’t pregnant, 2 years later - I’ve had the blood work and psmr done and got the all clear from my dr and gynaecologist - Lies, Fights and lack of validation
I 34F have been with my bf 35M)for 5 years. Things were great until 3 years ago when I made it very clear that I wanted atleast 1 child by 35. He agreed and we both made promises to get better financially (savings and get rid of debts), work on ourselves - fitness and mental health, slow down and eventually stop partying and going to raves (within the year), and overall take steps towards building a family. He smokes weed daily and this was the biggest promise he made- to stop smoking w$&d. 2 years ago I had my IUD removed so we could get the ball rolling for trying for a baby. I had my blood tests done and p-sMear to make sure everything was in order and I got the all clear. After a year of trying, nothing has happened. He hasn’t stopped w$&d, but he tells me weekly that he will- at this time, it was because he was struggling mentally, which I said I understood and he should seek counselling, which he said he would. I also suggested he get a sprm count so we can try and eliminate all possibilities of why we’re not pregnant yet. He says every other month that he will quit w$&d and get the sprmcount done and hasn’t.
We are now 2 years into trying and still nothing has happened- the w$&d continues and he still hasn’t seen a counsellor or had a sprm count done and every time I bring it up, he says he now needs the w$&d for his epilepsy ( which he was diagnosed with a year ago). I reminded him that he really shouldn’t be on any dr!?gs at all, as per his Drs and his neurological professor as he has mental illness issues as well.
This has caused a huge friction in our relationship and many, many arguments have been had, because I’m feeling so resentful and angry that, every other week he promises to stop the w$&d and get a sprm count done and see a counsellor and he hasn’t.
On top of this, I asked him 3 years ago to stop speaking to his ex because she keeps asking him about their past and “do you ever think of what it would be like if we were still together?” And I told him this was disrespectful to me and our relationship. I just found out 4 weeks ago that he still talks to her, even though he never initiates the conversation, he doesn’t ignore it either and responds every time. ( I needed to find his bosses number after he went to a rave, had dr@gs and ended up having 3 full body seizures which he’s never had before, and ended up in hospital, and I saw the messages of him chatting to her the night before.) He swears up and down that THAT was an eye opener and he’s truly sorry and he’s blocked and deleted her and he wants to focus on me and our future. ( he’s also said this multiple times over 3 years and I found out time and time again it was a lie.)
Also come to find out, he got a number from a girl at the petrol station and she’s been venting to him about her relationship and he about ours. ( another conversation that isn’t anything sexual or otherwise, but the thought of him venting about our relationship to a complete stranger who felt comfortable to give her number and he didn’t tell me at all until a week later made me really upset as it all coincided with him still talking to his ex).
He has no idea why I’m so upset about this; the w$&d, the sprm count, the lack of sex in general, random girls number, his ex and when I express how much he’s hurting me, he takes the “ well find better. You deserve better than me” route and just hides away from me in the house ( we live together ).
We can never have a discussion about anything at all without him turning it into how he’s the victim and feeling attacked, and all I’m bringing forward is how he’s hurting me, complete with examples and screenshots and why it’s not ok. He’s in turn told me the following; “You’ve got mental health problems because you’re not right in the head and you’re abusive and your behaviour is abusive” “ get meds because you clearly need it! You can’t keep blaming everything on me! You’re a problem too!”
I stopped partying 3 years ago. I started going to the gym again to get fit and healthy I’m watching what I eat and being more mindful of my surroundings so I’m in a good place mentally I feel so defeated, 3 years on, that I’m resentful, I’m mad, I’m hurt, I’m on antidepressants and I’m seeing a psychologist and he still hasn’t done anything he promised he would.
It’s gotten to the point where my family hates our relationship, my best friend thinks he’s a joke and is wasting my time and taking me for granted and none of my friends want to be around me because of how he treats me ( “he’s very aggressive the way he speaks to you. Always making out like you’re dragging him around or nagging him or always on his case … he doesn’t have to come if he doesn’t want to…. It’s hard to hang out with you and watch him treat you the way he does”.)
Worst of all, he interfered with my work ( disconnected the internet and berated me and my work colleague heard it all) and my work has now listed me as “in a domestic abse” situation and I’ve been interviewed by HR. At the same time he started a new job and while he’s bragging about how wonderful his job is, he’s completely ignorant to how he’s ruined mine and my reputation.
I guess the answers are all in front of me on what to do: Do I bother trying to believe that maybe one day his “magical promises” might come true or cut my losses while I still can.
I still love him, and I still want the family we both dreamed of! It feels like I’m the only one invested and I pushing someone to change when his actions proved he was never going to.
Am I overthinking this? Am I hoping on a dream that will never happen? Am I fooling myself? Do I need to change?
2024.05.19 15:13 RnsW33kly Attitude is everything
I had the most unpleasant and sour experience of my life playing the tcg in person at a pre-release... for the first time ever and I understand why people say they don't play in public anymore.
I am a collector through and through. I buy to look at shiny cardboard and to have fun opening packs to collect Mt favorite pocket monsters.
I've been doing so fairly consistently since 2016 and very seriously since August of last year. I have never played the game publicly ever in my life, only with family and friends in a safe and casual environment.
I've been incredibly excited for Twilight Masquerade since it was reported on months ago. I loved the Teal Mask DLC and all its editions, some of my favorite content in poke.on period. So I wanted to get my hands on it early and enjoy getting packs with my family at the local card shop, lcs. Well I was having a blast until my last game.
I was 0-2 as I'm a complete novice and building decks with a 40 card deck and packs isn't ideal, so obviously I wasn't good. I am a 24 pro guy and I got washed by an 11 year old girls palafin in one turn. But I was still optimistic that I might get lucky on my last game.
I find my table and introduce myself and the first thing I was met with was "alright, let's get this over with" in the most exasperated, annoyed, and rude tone ever. My smile immediately turned to a stone cold face. My opponent starts by rapidly shuffling their deck and just slams it on the table and starts setting up so loudly that the other people at the table (my brother being one playing right next to them) stopped their game out of shock. And the entire time was seriously emanating a foul, bitter, and horrid aura of sheer disgust. "Flip your card" "Heads or tails, call it". Slamming cards down left snd right. Constantly saying backhanded comments, being rude to everyone around us, budding in on my brothers game. Groaning at my pace, grabbing my cards off my side of the table without asking, degrading me and belittling my knowledge. Sitting up and shooting daggers of disgust and contempt and asking "is this your first pre-release?". God forbid a collector who spends their free time and expandable income on video game cardboard cards want to participate in the hobby at a deeper level. And of course my deck shuffle luck is horrendous and I can't get my second electric or luminous energy to damage, so it looks like I'm stalling. "You're not going to play the tatsugiri, wow, okay" rolls eyes and scoffs.
Finally starts dealing damage and eventually takes me out. Then when the judge, their friend and the professor of the store, comes over they get sportsmanlike and says "wow that sure was close at the end, I was getting nervous!" (Which to be fair, was a little true, I could see the nervousness). But then like tossed the table slip at me to sign and told me where to sign, even though, I had just done this twice...
I was so peaved the whole time that I spent my day awake at this even mid-day, when I could be sleeping because I work third shifts usually and going off 1 hour of sleep.
I told my brother who was there the whole time and didnt stop their terrible behavior, etiquette, and attitude, not one word in the store.
I finally got a second with a worker in the store and told them what happened. I got some of my favorites, crown zenith 3 packs, and a lost origin blister for 4 bucks, and was about to go. The professor comes up and apologizes to me about what happened and said that no matter what, behavior like that is not acceptable and that they apologize profusely. Tried explaining how this isn't a surprise but nonetheless a disappointment and that they'd talk to their friend to say how that behavior isn't acceptable.
I go there all the time. Every off day, I try and go and when I do, 9/10 times I'm walking out having spent at least 35 dollars and even more fairly often. And that won't change after the one bad experience. I appreciate the professor for what they did, but I should've stood up for myself but I didn't want to cause a scene at such a fun event.
I just hope that people can have some grace and patience for newcomers to the game without being total jerks.
I'm sorry for the long post. I just needed a place to share my experience to the people who'd understand the most. Thank you for the time and I hope you have a great day.
(P.s. if you're going to leave a mean or rude comment, just be blunt about it, that's all that I ask)
submitted by RnsW33kly to PokemonTCG [link] [comments]
I am a collector through and through. I buy to look at shiny cardboard and to have fun opening packs to collect Mt favorite pocket monsters.
I've been doing so fairly consistently since 2016 and very seriously since August of last year. I have never played the game publicly ever in my life, only with family and friends in a safe and casual environment.
I've been incredibly excited for Twilight Masquerade since it was reported on months ago. I loved the Teal Mask DLC and all its editions, some of my favorite content in poke.on period. So I wanted to get my hands on it early and enjoy getting packs with my family at the local card shop, lcs. Well I was having a blast until my last game.
I was 0-2 as I'm a complete novice and building decks with a 40 card deck and packs isn't ideal, so obviously I wasn't good. I am a 24 pro guy and I got washed by an 11 year old girls palafin in one turn. But I was still optimistic that I might get lucky on my last game.
I find my table and introduce myself and the first thing I was met with was "alright, let's get this over with" in the most exasperated, annoyed, and rude tone ever. My smile immediately turned to a stone cold face. My opponent starts by rapidly shuffling their deck and just slams it on the table and starts setting up so loudly that the other people at the table (my brother being one playing right next to them) stopped their game out of shock. And the entire time was seriously emanating a foul, bitter, and horrid aura of sheer disgust. "Flip your card" "Heads or tails, call it". Slamming cards down left snd right. Constantly saying backhanded comments, being rude to everyone around us, budding in on my brothers game. Groaning at my pace, grabbing my cards off my side of the table without asking, degrading me and belittling my knowledge. Sitting up and shooting daggers of disgust and contempt and asking "is this your first pre-release?". God forbid a collector who spends their free time and expandable income on video game cardboard cards want to participate in the hobby at a deeper level. And of course my deck shuffle luck is horrendous and I can't get my second electric or luminous energy to damage, so it looks like I'm stalling. "You're not going to play the tatsugiri, wow, okay" rolls eyes and scoffs.
Finally starts dealing damage and eventually takes me out. Then when the judge, their friend and the professor of the store, comes over they get sportsmanlike and says "wow that sure was close at the end, I was getting nervous!" (Which to be fair, was a little true, I could see the nervousness). But then like tossed the table slip at me to sign and told me where to sign, even though, I had just done this twice...
I was so peaved the whole time that I spent my day awake at this even mid-day, when I could be sleeping because I work third shifts usually and going off 1 hour of sleep.
I told my brother who was there the whole time and didnt stop their terrible behavior, etiquette, and attitude, not one word in the store.
I finally got a second with a worker in the store and told them what happened. I got some of my favorites, crown zenith 3 packs, and a lost origin blister for 4 bucks, and was about to go. The professor comes up and apologizes to me about what happened and said that no matter what, behavior like that is not acceptable and that they apologize profusely. Tried explaining how this isn't a surprise but nonetheless a disappointment and that they'd talk to their friend to say how that behavior isn't acceptable.
I go there all the time. Every off day, I try and go and when I do, 9/10 times I'm walking out having spent at least 35 dollars and even more fairly often. And that won't change after the one bad experience. I appreciate the professor for what they did, but I should've stood up for myself but I didn't want to cause a scene at such a fun event.
I just hope that people can have some grace and patience for newcomers to the game without being total jerks.
I'm sorry for the long post. I just needed a place to share my experience to the people who'd understand the most. Thank you for the time and I hope you have a great day.
(P.s. if you're going to leave a mean or rude comment, just be blunt about it, that's all that I ask)
2024.05.19 15:13 Frequent-Version956 Am I wasting my time or should I keep trying?
Do I stay or cut my losses?
TL/DR - BF still talks to Ex Gf - BF still smokes w$&d - I want a baby and family which he said he wants to but he’s done nothing on his behalf to try and workout why we aren’t pregnant, 2 years later - I’ve had the blood work and psmr done and got the all clear from my dr and gynaecologist - Lies, Fights and lack of validation
I 34F have been with my bf 35M)for 5 years. Things were great until 3 years ago when I made it very clear that I wanted atleast 1 child by 35. He agreed and we both made promises to get better financially (savings and get rid of debts), work on ourselves - fitness and mental health, slow down and eventually stop partying and going to raves (within the year), and overall take steps towards building a family. He smokes weed daily and this was the biggest promise he made- to stop smoking w$&d. 2 years ago I had my IUD removed so we could get the ball rolling for trying for a baby. I had my blood tests done and p-sMear to make sure everything was in order and I got the all clear. After a year of trying, nothing has happened. He hasn’t stopped w$&d, but he tells me weekly that he will- at this time, it was because he was struggling mentally, which I said I understood and he should seek counselling, which he said he would. I also suggested he get a sprm count so we can try and eliminate all possibilities of why we’re not pregnant yet. He says every other month that he will quit w$&d and get the sprmcount done and hasn’t.
We are now 2 years into trying and still nothing has happened- the w$&d continues and he still hasn’t seen a counsellor or had a sprm count done and every time I bring it up, he says he now needs the w$&d for his epilepsy ( which he was diagnosed with a year ago). I reminded him that he really shouldn’t be on any dr!?gs at all, as per his Drs and his neurological professor as he has mental illness issues as well.
This has caused a huge friction in our relationship and many, many arguments have been had, because I’m feeling so resentful and angry that, every other week he promises to stop the w$&d and get a sprm count done and see a counsellor and he hasn’t.
On top of this, I asked him 3 years ago to stop speaking to his ex because she keeps asking him about their past and “do you ever think of what it would be like if we were still together?” And I told him this was disrespectful to me and our relationship. I just found out 4 weeks ago that he still talks to her, even though he never initiates the conversation, he doesn’t ignore it either and responds every time. ( I needed to find his bosses number after he went to a rave, had dr@gs and ended up having 3 full body seizures which he’s never had before, and ended up in hospital, and I saw the messages of him chatting to her the night before.) He swears up and down that THAT was an eye opener and he’s truly sorry and he’s blocked and deleted her and he wants to focus on me and our future. ( he’s also said this multiple times over 3 years and I found out time and time again it was a lie.)
Also come to find out, he got a number from a girl at the petrol station and she’s been venting to him about her relationship and he about ours. ( another conversation that isn’t anything sexual or otherwise, but the thought of him venting about our relationship to a complete stranger who felt comfortable to give her number and he didn’t tell me at all until a week later made me really upset as it all coincided with him still talking to his ex).
He has no idea why I’m so upset about this; the w$&d, the sprm count, the lack of sex in general, random girls number, his ex and when I express how much he’s hurting me, he takes the “ well find better. You deserve better than me” route and just hides away from me in the house ( we live together ).
We can never have a discussion about anything at all without him turning it into how he’s the victim and feeling attacked, and all I’m bringing forward is how he’s hurting me, complete with examples and screenshots and why it’s not ok. He’s in turn told me the following; “You’ve got mental health problems because you’re not right in the head and you’re abusive and your behaviour is abusive” “ get meds because you clearly need it! You can’t keep blaming everything on me! You’re a problem too!”
I stopped partying 3 years ago. I started going to the gym again to get fit and healthy I’m watching what I eat and being more mindful of my surroundings so I’m in a good place mentally I feel so defeated, 3 years on, that I’m resentful, I’m mad, I’m hurt, I’m on antidepressants and I’m seeing a psychologist and he still hasn’t done anything he promised he would.
It’s gotten to the point where my family hates our relationship, my best friend thinks he’s a joke and is wasting my time and taking me for granted and none of my friends want to be around me because of how he treats me ( “he’s very aggressive the way he speaks to you. Always making out like you’re dragging him around or nagging him or always on his case … he doesn’t have to come if he doesn’t want to…. It’s hard to hang out with you and watch him treat you the way he does”.)
Worst of all, he interfered with my work ( disconnected the internet and berated me and my work colleague heard it all) and my work has now listed me as “in a domestic abse” situation and I’ve been interviewed by HR. At the same time he started a new job and while he’s bragging about how wonderful his job is, he’s completely ignorant to how he’s ruined mine and my reputation.
I guess the answers are all in front of me on what to do: Do I bother trying to believe that maybe one day his “magical promises” might come true or cut my losses while I still can.
I still love him, and I still want the family we both dreamed of! It feels like I’m the only one invested and I pushing someone to change when his actions proved he was never going to.
Am I overthinking this? Am I hoping on a dream that will never happen? Am I fooling myself? Do I need to change?
submitted by Frequent-Version956 to u/Frequent-Version956 [link] [comments]
TL/DR - BF still talks to Ex Gf - BF still smokes w$&d - I want a baby and family which he said he wants to but he’s done nothing on his behalf to try and workout why we aren’t pregnant, 2 years later - I’ve had the blood work and psmr done and got the all clear from my dr and gynaecologist - Lies, Fights and lack of validation
I 34F have been with my bf 35M)for 5 years. Things were great until 3 years ago when I made it very clear that I wanted atleast 1 child by 35. He agreed and we both made promises to get better financially (savings and get rid of debts), work on ourselves - fitness and mental health, slow down and eventually stop partying and going to raves (within the year), and overall take steps towards building a family. He smokes weed daily and this was the biggest promise he made- to stop smoking w$&d. 2 years ago I had my IUD removed so we could get the ball rolling for trying for a baby. I had my blood tests done and p-sMear to make sure everything was in order and I got the all clear. After a year of trying, nothing has happened. He hasn’t stopped w$&d, but he tells me weekly that he will- at this time, it was because he was struggling mentally, which I said I understood and he should seek counselling, which he said he would. I also suggested he get a sprm count so we can try and eliminate all possibilities of why we’re not pregnant yet. He says every other month that he will quit w$&d and get the sprmcount done and hasn’t.
We are now 2 years into trying and still nothing has happened- the w$&d continues and he still hasn’t seen a counsellor or had a sprm count done and every time I bring it up, he says he now needs the w$&d for his epilepsy ( which he was diagnosed with a year ago). I reminded him that he really shouldn’t be on any dr!?gs at all, as per his Drs and his neurological professor as he has mental illness issues as well.
This has caused a huge friction in our relationship and many, many arguments have been had, because I’m feeling so resentful and angry that, every other week he promises to stop the w$&d and get a sprm count done and see a counsellor and he hasn’t.
On top of this, I asked him 3 years ago to stop speaking to his ex because she keeps asking him about their past and “do you ever think of what it would be like if we were still together?” And I told him this was disrespectful to me and our relationship. I just found out 4 weeks ago that he still talks to her, even though he never initiates the conversation, he doesn’t ignore it either and responds every time. ( I needed to find his bosses number after he went to a rave, had dr@gs and ended up having 3 full body seizures which he’s never had before, and ended up in hospital, and I saw the messages of him chatting to her the night before.) He swears up and down that THAT was an eye opener and he’s truly sorry and he’s blocked and deleted her and he wants to focus on me and our future. ( he’s also said this multiple times over 3 years and I found out time and time again it was a lie.)
Also come to find out, he got a number from a girl at the petrol station and she’s been venting to him about her relationship and he about ours. ( another conversation that isn’t anything sexual or otherwise, but the thought of him venting about our relationship to a complete stranger who felt comfortable to give her number and he didn’t tell me at all until a week later made me really upset as it all coincided with him still talking to his ex).
He has no idea why I’m so upset about this; the w$&d, the sprm count, the lack of sex in general, random girls number, his ex and when I express how much he’s hurting me, he takes the “ well find better. You deserve better than me” route and just hides away from me in the house ( we live together ).
We can never have a discussion about anything at all without him turning it into how he’s the victim and feeling attacked, and all I’m bringing forward is how he’s hurting me, complete with examples and screenshots and why it’s not ok. He’s in turn told me the following; “You’ve got mental health problems because you’re not right in the head and you’re abusive and your behaviour is abusive” “ get meds because you clearly need it! You can’t keep blaming everything on me! You’re a problem too!”
I stopped partying 3 years ago. I started going to the gym again to get fit and healthy I’m watching what I eat and being more mindful of my surroundings so I’m in a good place mentally I feel so defeated, 3 years on, that I’m resentful, I’m mad, I’m hurt, I’m on antidepressants and I’m seeing a psychologist and he still hasn’t done anything he promised he would.
It’s gotten to the point where my family hates our relationship, my best friend thinks he’s a joke and is wasting my time and taking me for granted and none of my friends want to be around me because of how he treats me ( “he’s very aggressive the way he speaks to you. Always making out like you’re dragging him around or nagging him or always on his case … he doesn’t have to come if he doesn’t want to…. It’s hard to hang out with you and watch him treat you the way he does”.)
Worst of all, he interfered with my work ( disconnected the internet and berated me and my work colleague heard it all) and my work has now listed me as “in a domestic abse” situation and I’ve been interviewed by HR. At the same time he started a new job and while he’s bragging about how wonderful his job is, he’s completely ignorant to how he’s ruined mine and my reputation.
I guess the answers are all in front of me on what to do: Do I bother trying to believe that maybe one day his “magical promises” might come true or cut my losses while I still can.
I still love him, and I still want the family we both dreamed of! It feels like I’m the only one invested and I pushing someone to change when his actions proved he was never going to.
Am I overthinking this? Am I hoping on a dream that will never happen? Am I fooling myself? Do I need to change?
2024.05.19 15:08 misschris666 Should I tell my ex’s girlfriend he’s cheating?
So this is a long and weird story... I'll try to keep it short, but buckle up.
I was with my ex from 2018 to June/July 2023, so quite a while. I broke up with him last summer because it felt like I was begging for the bare minimum, he wouldn't move out with me, and I felt like we were just headed nowhere and that I wasn't valued. However to be clear, I never wanted to lose him. I felt more or less cornered into breaking up with him because I spent years waiting for more and it was breaking me down. After our breakup we still talked frequently and it still felt as though he was my best friend, and I'll admit we still slept together often- the only change was I felt freed from being disappointed by him on a romantic relationship front. Fast forward to January 2024, and he randomly told me one day that he needed to shut down all social media and ghost me for a few days because "something bad happened", but that he loved me very much and would explain when he could. At this time I came to find out through a facebook group and through other women that he cheated on me with at LEAST 4-5 women (that I know of) throughout our relationship. And not only that, but I found out a girl he was seeing for 10 months (prior to me dumping him) broke it off with him because she found out he had a girlfriend... but that girlfriend she was referring to wasn't me. It was another girl. He was dating AND MOVED IN WITH another girl BEFORE I BROKE UP WITH HIM. And keep in mind, one of the main reasons I broke up with him was because he wouldn't move in with me.
Anyway... he created a secret snapchat, complete with a username that is the nickname he calls me, to continue talking to me behind her back. He finally fessed up to dating and living with this other person while still in a relationship with me, among others. I didn't keep quiet and let all these other women know that he was with me the whole time he saw each and every one of them. So to my knowledge, she knows I was in the picture long before her and basically the entirety of their relationship, but she didn't break up with him. However I know for a fact she's not aware that he was sleeping with me all those months between our breakup and when I found this stuff out. And I know she's not aware he's still talking to me right now. He's gradually been trying to get close to me again and is basically still trying to cheat on her- because not all cheating is physical of course.
So... do I tell my ex's new girlfriend that he both has in the past and currently is trying to cheat on her with me?
Note: To be clear, I have not kept talking to him to crap on the new girl. I was with this man for years and had a loooot of questions I needed answers to and a lot of closure to get. Plus, as I said, he was my best friend. I took a long time to wrap my head around letting him go because loving someone doesn't stop in an instant. I would have never continued seeing him if I knew someone else was in the picture. Now I just feel bad that he's doing to this girl the exact same thing he did to me, and I wish someone had told me much sooner... that's why I wonder if I should tell her, even if that requires admitting that I've been talking with him all this time behind her back. I'm at the point where I'm done and don't want to be in the middle, but I don't feel like I owe him anything and should not be doing him any more favours by keeping his secret after everything he did to me.
TL;DR- was with my ex 2018-2023, continued seeing him after I dumped him, found out after the fact that he was dating someone else and moved in with her BEFORE I dumped him which means I also found out that basically the table flipped and he was now cheating on her with me, even after this was all found out he continued to talk to me on a secret snapchat. I'm wondering if I should tell the new girlfriend that he's been talking to me and also cheated on her with me because I'm certain she doesn't know. I'm at the point where I'm done and don't want to be in the middle, but I don't feel like I owe him anything and should not be doing him any more favours by keeping his secret after everything he did to me.
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I was with my ex from 2018 to June/July 2023, so quite a while. I broke up with him last summer because it felt like I was begging for the bare minimum, he wouldn't move out with me, and I felt like we were just headed nowhere and that I wasn't valued. However to be clear, I never wanted to lose him. I felt more or less cornered into breaking up with him because I spent years waiting for more and it was breaking me down. After our breakup we still talked frequently and it still felt as though he was my best friend, and I'll admit we still slept together often- the only change was I felt freed from being disappointed by him on a romantic relationship front. Fast forward to January 2024, and he randomly told me one day that he needed to shut down all social media and ghost me for a few days because "something bad happened", but that he loved me very much and would explain when he could. At this time I came to find out through a facebook group and through other women that he cheated on me with at LEAST 4-5 women (that I know of) throughout our relationship. And not only that, but I found out a girl he was seeing for 10 months (prior to me dumping him) broke it off with him because she found out he had a girlfriend... but that girlfriend she was referring to wasn't me. It was another girl. He was dating AND MOVED IN WITH another girl BEFORE I BROKE UP WITH HIM. And keep in mind, one of the main reasons I broke up with him was because he wouldn't move in with me.
Anyway... he created a secret snapchat, complete with a username that is the nickname he calls me, to continue talking to me behind her back. He finally fessed up to dating and living with this other person while still in a relationship with me, among others. I didn't keep quiet and let all these other women know that he was with me the whole time he saw each and every one of them. So to my knowledge, she knows I was in the picture long before her and basically the entirety of their relationship, but she didn't break up with him. However I know for a fact she's not aware that he was sleeping with me all those months between our breakup and when I found this stuff out. And I know she's not aware he's still talking to me right now. He's gradually been trying to get close to me again and is basically still trying to cheat on her- because not all cheating is physical of course.
So... do I tell my ex's new girlfriend that he both has in the past and currently is trying to cheat on her with me?
Note: To be clear, I have not kept talking to him to crap on the new girl. I was with this man for years and had a loooot of questions I needed answers to and a lot of closure to get. Plus, as I said, he was my best friend. I took a long time to wrap my head around letting him go because loving someone doesn't stop in an instant. I would have never continued seeing him if I knew someone else was in the picture. Now I just feel bad that he's doing to this girl the exact same thing he did to me, and I wish someone had told me much sooner... that's why I wonder if I should tell her, even if that requires admitting that I've been talking with him all this time behind her back. I'm at the point where I'm done and don't want to be in the middle, but I don't feel like I owe him anything and should not be doing him any more favours by keeping his secret after everything he did to me.
TL;DR- was with my ex 2018-2023, continued seeing him after I dumped him, found out after the fact that he was dating someone else and moved in with her BEFORE I dumped him which means I also found out that basically the table flipped and he was now cheating on her with me, even after this was all found out he continued to talk to me on a secret snapchat. I'm wondering if I should tell the new girlfriend that he's been talking to me and also cheated on her with me because I'm certain she doesn't know. I'm at the point where I'm done and don't want to be in the middle, but I don't feel like I owe him anything and should not be doing him any more favours by keeping his secret after everything he did to me.
2024.05.19 15:07 MMG_LOVER69420 Which skill storage should I use?
 | submitted by MMG_LOVER69420 to MLB_9Innings [link] [comments] |
2024.05.19 15:06 jessmarie123 Sleep sack transition
How the heck do you put a baby down without waking them up in one of these things?? My little guy is a few days away from being 4 months, and uses an arms up sleep sack/swaddle, but I think it’s time to make change to an arms out one. I’ve been practicing at his first nap every day putting him in his crib in it, and without fail, his startle reflex kicks in and he’s wide awake. I’ve tried holding his arms down once he’s down, holding them up, tucking them sort of before laying him down, it’s like he has an internal alarm that sets off as soon as I bend down with him. He’s already a very light sleeper and Im pretty sure we’ve started the 4 month regression…I fear this sleep sack will never let me sleep again.
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2024.05.19 15:04 Passerby_N Player Looking for an Online One on One Text-based 5e Campaign
Hello all! As the title suggests, I am looking to delve into a one on one text-based campaign.
To give myself a little introduction, I am a 22-year-old college student approaching their senior year. I love all things with movies and comic books and video games and I have grown a love for DND. It’s a pleasure to meet you!
As a player, when playing a TTRPG I really like to collaborate and spitball ideas with the table and with the DM, especially. I’ve been playing TTRPG for over a year now with most of my experience coming from DND. I am very comfortable with Avrae and Discord and with Text RP.
As for what I am looking for in terms of the campaign, I have a few character ideas, which will guide what sort of stories I am willing to engage in. We can either base the campaign off of that or whatever ideas that you have in mind and I can try and fit them in. However, I would like to discuss those character ideas with you one on one. I do not really have any veils or lines, so I’m comfortable with pretty much anything showing up in the campaign. If that changes, I will let you know. I prefer a more serious tone, but one that allots for silly moments to occur because funny is also part of the fun.
that’s all for me! If this interests any DM‘s out there, then feel free to hit me up on discord at notoriety443.
submitted by Passerby_N to lfg [link] [comments]
To give myself a little introduction, I am a 22-year-old college student approaching their senior year. I love all things with movies and comic books and video games and I have grown a love for DND. It’s a pleasure to meet you!
As a player, when playing a TTRPG I really like to collaborate and spitball ideas with the table and with the DM, especially. I’ve been playing TTRPG for over a year now with most of my experience coming from DND. I am very comfortable with Avrae and Discord and with Text RP.
As for what I am looking for in terms of the campaign, I have a few character ideas, which will guide what sort of stories I am willing to engage in. We can either base the campaign off of that or whatever ideas that you have in mind and I can try and fit them in. However, I would like to discuss those character ideas with you one on one. I do not really have any veils or lines, so I’m comfortable with pretty much anything showing up in the campaign. If that changes, I will let you know. I prefer a more serious tone, but one that allots for silly moments to occur because funny is also part of the fun.
that’s all for me! If this interests any DM‘s out there, then feel free to hit me up on discord at notoriety443.
2024.05.19 15:01 ibid-11962 Writing and Publishing Eragon [Post Murtagh Christopher Paolini Q&A Wrap Up #6]
As discussed in the first post, this is my ongoing compilation of the remaining questions Christopher has answered online between August 1st 2023 and April 30th 2024 which I've not already covered in other compilations.
As always, questions are sorted by topic, and each Q&A is annotated with a bracketed source number. Links to every source used and to the other parts of this compilation will be provided in a comment below.
The previous post focused on details about the writing of Murtagh. This installment will focus on The Writing and Publication of Eragon, including the early abandoned starts and drafts the preceded the self-published version and Christopher's journey towards getting traditionally published. In this post the topics are arranged in almost a chronological order. The next post will focus on the writing of the Fractalverse, and so will be posted on /Fractalverse.
submitted by ibid-11962 to Eragon [link] [comments]
As always, questions are sorted by topic, and each Q&A is annotated with a bracketed source number. Links to every source used and to the other parts of this compilation will be provided in a comment below.
The previous post focused on details about the writing of Murtagh. This installment will focus on The Writing and Publication of Eragon, including the early abandoned starts and drafts the preceded the self-published version and Christopher's journey towards getting traditionally published. In this post the topics are arranged in almost a chronological order. The next post will focus on the writing of the Fractalverse, and so will be posted on /Fractalverse.
Writing and Publishing Eragon
The Original Idea[When I start to write a new book] I have an image. There’s always a strong emotional component to the image, and it’s that emotion that I want to convey to readers. Everything I do after that, all of the worldbuilding, plotting, characterization, writing, and editing—all of it—is done with the goal of evoking the desired reaction from readers. In the case of the Inheritance Cycle, the image was that of a young man finding a dragon egg (and later having the dragon as a friend). [10]
Who's your favorite character to write? Well, for me, it's the dragon Saphira. She's the reason I got into writing a dragon. She came first? She came before Eragon? Like she was the catalyst? The relationship came first, her and Eragon. [33]
I was specifically inspired by a YA book called Jeremy Thatcher Dragon Hatcher by Bruce Coville, which is a delightful book. I just loved that idea so much of finding a dragon egg, I was like, "Well, what sort of a world would a dragon come from?" And I knew I wanted the sort of bond between rider and dragon that Anne McCaffrey had, but I wanted the intelligence of the dragons that you find elsewhere, and the language and the magic. And I wanted sparkly scales because it just seemed like dragons are fabulous creatures and they ought to have sparkly scales. That's the fun thing about writing your own books. You can make them exactly the way you want to make them, and hopefully then that appeals to the audience as well. [30]
All of that kind of was swirling around in my head, and I wanted to write about dragons in a way that kind of combined a lot of elements in a way that, "I like this", and "I like this piece", and "I like this piece", but I kind of wanted to have all these different pieces in one type of dragon, and no one had quite done it exactly the way I wanted. [30]
I live in Montana, and our library is an old Carnegie or Rockefeller library, and especially back in the 90s, it didn't have that many books. So once I read all the fantasy in the library, I thought I had read all the fantasy there was to read. Because I was not the smartest kid in the world sometimes. And I kind of thought, "Well, it's the library. They have all the books that exist, right? All the books that matter are in the library." And I really had no idea what to read after that. So I decided to start writing myself and to try and write the sort of story that I would enjoy reading. And of course, what I enjoyed reading was books about flying on dragons and fighting monsters and having adventures. [35]
Reading and literature was always important in our family. My father's mother was a professor of comparative literature and wrote books on Dante and all sorts of stuff like that. Was the myths and folklore part of your life at this time? Yes, but I should clarify that it wasn't formally introduced to me. It was in the house. People weren't wandering around talking about. It was just like the Aeneid is sitting on the shelf. I would go read things. I have a great uncle. He's 90 now, my mother's uncle. Guy is still sharp as a tack. It's amazing. But he gave me a set of cassette tapes of Joseph Campbell, who did Hero of a Thousand Faces. So that was my exposure to his theories of the monomyth and the eternal hero and all sorts of things like that. That got me very much interested in and thinking about the origins of the fantasy that I was reading because I was reading Tolkien and David Eddings and Anne McCaffrey and Raymond Feist and Jane Yolan and Andre Norton and Brian Jaques, and all of these you know authors who were popular at the time. I was very curious where does this come from. Tolkien, of course, felt like sort of the origin in a lot of cases but then I was discovering that, there are earlier stories that even Tolkien was drawing from. That was really a revelation to me. I really sort of got enamored with it. A lot of fantasy is nostalgic and that appealed to me because I was homeschooled and my family didn't really have a lot of relatives in the area, so I felt very unmoored from the rest of society. I think I was looking for a sense of tradition or continuity with the past and fantasy helped provide that. That's an incredibly articulate thought for a 15-year-old author. Or has that come with age? No, it was something I was feeling at the time. You were conscious of it at the time? Well, listening to the Joseph Campbell stuff, I was looking: Where are our coming of age traditions? Where is the great quest to go on to prove yourself as a young adult, as a man? Where's the great adventure? What do I do in life? Those are all things that are part of the adolescent experience and always have been which is why so many mythic stories about coming of age deal with those questions. I think it's a universal thing. That's why Harry Potter, Eragon, Twilight, all of these have appealed so much because they deal with adolescence. They deal with finding your place in the world as an adult when you're starting as a young adult or a child. [28]
What games have taught you to be a better writer either in creating characters or worldbuilding or plotting even? All of my gaming experience was computer games, video games. One that had a huge influence on me was the old Myst series. Personally I love solving puzzles, so that's the first thing. And also the concept of the series, especially with the second game, Riven, it's all based around people writing books that create new worlds. And you get to go in them and solve puzzles and understand how that world works. And that just tickled every single part of my brain back in the day. Now, I'm going to be slightly unkind here, and I apologize if the author [David Wingrove] is listening to this, but there were a couple of novels based off of Myst. And I was such a fan of the series that I got the books, and I started reading them. And my first thought was, "I could do better than this." And so I decided to rewrite the first Myst novel. And I created a document in MS Word, and I got exactly three sentences into my rewrite. And I thought to myself, "okay, I think I can do this, but I could never sell it. So I better go write something of my own." And the next thing I did was Eragon. So video games kind of had a direct influence on me writing. But actually reading something that I felt was not particularly successful was such an inspiration. Because it was like, "this got published, I know I can at least get to this level." And it was published. And then maybe I can shoot for a little bit higher. [pause] I think some people have had that experience with Eragon. [26]
Early Abandoned Starts
I had the original idea, the concept of boy finding dragon egg, and I tried writing a couple of very short versions of Eragon when I was fourteen, and none of them panned out so I stopped writing for a while. [28]Real World Version
What do you remember about the early days of writing “Eragon?” Originally, Eragon was named Kevin and the story was set in the real world. But I only finished around 10 pages. [16]Arya Opening Fantasy Version
I wrote three versions of Eragon before I wrote the version that had the unicorn, which was the first major draft. The first version was set in the real world, and that's why he's named Kevin. And the reason it was set in the real world is I was inspired by Jeremy Thatcher Dragon Hatcher, which is set in the real world. [32]
I was specifically inspired by a book called Jeremy Thatcher Dragon Hatcher by Bruce Coville. By the way, Bruce knows this. If you haven't read it, it's a great book about this young man in the real world who, spoiler, goes into an antique shop and buys a stone that ends up turning out to be a dragon egg. And I really loved that idea of a stone that was actually a dragon egg and the young man becoming joined with the dragon. And so I tried writing the story. And I got exactly five pages or six pages into it and I ran into a brick wall, because a boy finding a dragon egg is a good event, but it is not a good story. And I needed to figure out what was going to happen after that. I didn't know that at first. [36]
But then I was going down the rabbit hole of, "Well, if there's a dragon, where did the dragon come from? What if it were an actual fantasy world where the dragons were native?" And then that led me to then write a second beginning--I didn't get very far with this--that was more of a traditional fantasy story, and it opened with Arya and a couple other elves escaping a dungeon with a big battle, and at the very end of the battle, they send the dragon egg away, and Kevin finds it. But I didn't have the rest of the story, so I stopped writing it in that format. [32]Research Break
So I tried writing a second version of the story. So the first version of that story I wrote was set in the real world. Second version was more of like a fantasy world. [36]
I had the original idea when I was fourteen. I even wrote an early version of the story where it was set in the real world. But I soon realized that it was a lot more interesting to have a dragon in a fantastical setting. [8]
I tried writing before and I always failed because I would only get like four to six pages into a story and then I didn't know what to do next. And that was because I didn't actually have my story. All I really had were the inciting incidents, like a boy finds a dragon egg in the middle of a forest. Great. But that's not a story, that's just one event. What happens as a result? So before starting Eragon, I was very methodical about this. I read a whole bunch of books on how to write, how to plot stories. [35]Unused Arya Outline
I realized I wasn't getting anywhere. And I didn't know how to do what I was trying to do. Now, fortunately for me, my parents had noticed that I was getting interested in writing. And all of a sudden, books appeared in the house. There was no comment, no one forced it, these just magically appeared, and I read them. Some of the books that were incredibly helpful to me were these books that were called The Writer's Handbook, which was a collection of essays published each year by The Writer's Digest magazine. I had one from 1998, and I had one from, I think, 1993, or something like that. And there were essays from Stephen King and John Grisham and I think Ursula Le Guin and all sorts of other authors about what it was like to be an author both professionally and creatively. And that was incredibly helpful to me because again, the internet was not a resource. But the book that really made the difference for me was a book called Story by Robert McKee. It's a book for screenwriters and it's all about the structure of story. And up until that moment, I had never really consciously thought about the fact that stories have structure and that you can control that structure for the effect on the readers. So I devoured that book and I said, okay, I'm going to try this again. [36]
Did you very much sit down and study structure and character development and etc? I did. It wasn't a formal course or anything, it's just that my parents started buying these books and they started showing up. In fact, I still have them here on my shelf. This bookcase to my right is full of research books, technical books, language books. I read a book called Story by Robert McKee, which is a screenwriting book, that was and often has been very popular in Hollywood. It's a fairly technical look at story structure. I would never say do everything he says because of course you shouldn't necessarily follow any one formula, but that book really got me thinking about the fact that stories do have structure, which I hadn't really thought about before that. And that one can control that structure, and that this gives you something to work with. Before Eragon, I tried writing a number of stories and I never got past the first four to six pages, ten pages, because I never had the plot. All I would ever have was the inciting incident which, in the case of Eragon, is a young man finds a dragon egg. Ok, fine, but that's not a story. So when I read that book, then I was like wow, so I can control the structure of this. [28]
The problem with all of my early writing was that I’d get an idea and just start — I didn’t actually have a plot. But I was a pretty methodical kid, so I started reading about how to write. Fortunately, my parents are observant, and these kinds of books magically began appearing in the house. And I read all of them. [16]
So at this point, I was 15, that's when I graduated from high school and I was very methodical about it because I hate failing. So I said, okay, I'm going to create a fantasy world. And I did that. And then I said, I'm gonna plot out an entire book in this fantasy world. And I did that too. And then I said, but I'm not gonna write this. This is just a thought exercise. I'm gonna do this and I'm gonna stick it in a drawer. And I still have that to this day, that world and that story, I still have it sitting in a drawer somewhere. [36]
Then I spent some time and I created an entire fantasy world and I plotted out an entire fantasy novel in that world and I did not write it. I just stuck it in a drawer and that's where it's been sitting for 25 years now. And then I just did that to prove to myself that I could plot out an entire book. [35]
Before writing Eragon, again I was very methodical even as a teenager, I created an entire fantasy world. Wrote pages and pages about the worldbuilding, and then I plotted out an entire story in that world just to prove to myself that I could plot a story, create a world, and then I didn't write it. I put it aside. I still have it all saved. Put it in a drawer. [28]
Kevin
Writing The First Full DraftAnd then I decided okay now I'm going to plot out a trilogy, because all great fantasy stories are trilogies. I'm going to do it as the heroic monomyth, because that is, at least my understanding back then, is this is one of the oldest forms of stories. I know it works on a general sense. It's going to give me a safety net, and then I'm going to write the first book as a practice book just to see if I'm capable of producing something that's three, four, five hundred pages long. And that's what I did. That was about two and a half months of worldbuilding, plotting, creating this. Then I wrote the first book and that was Eragon. That was my practice book. I never actually planned on publishing Eragon. It was only after I'd put so much work into it and my parents read it that then we proceeded with it. I was aware of story structure. I continue to read lots of books on it. [28]The First Draft
And then version three is the version that everyone generally knows. And that's where I spent the time to plot out the whole series before writing, because having a idea of where you're going seems to help with the writing, at least for me. Usually. [32]
I originally saw Eragon as a practice novel, which is part of why it’s a very typical hero’s story. I knew that structure worked and it gave me the safety net I needed. [16]
The first draft went super fast. It went really fast because I had no idea what I was doing. And I just wrote that sucker. I wrote the first 60 pages by hand with ballpoint pen, cause I didn't know how to type on a computer. And then by the time I typed all that into the computer, I knew how to type. I did the rest in the computer. But this was back in the day when computers were fairly new. We had a Mac classic, which only had two megabytes of RAM. And the problem is that the operating system chewed up some of that memory. And my book file was around two megabytes large. So I actually had to split the book into two because I couldn't open the whole file on the computer or the computer would crash. So I had to open half the book and then close that and then open the other half. [35]
Once I finished the first draft, I was super excited and I thought, "well all of these things on how to write say that you should read your own book and see if there's any tweaks you wanna make." But I was really excited because I was getting to read my own book for the first time, and I thought this is gonna be awesome. And it didn't take very long while reading it to realize that it was awful. It was horrible. And just to give you an idea of just how bad that first draft was, in the very first draft of Eragon, Eragon wasn't named Eragon, Eragon was named Kevin. And there was also a unicorn in that first draft at one point, so you know it wasn't very good. [35]Releasing the Kevin Cut
If I heard correctly as I was reading, Eragon wasn't originally called Eragon? No, in the first draft of the book he was called Kevin. There's a reason! Look I have an explanation for it, okay. The explanation is that my original inspiration was Jeremy Thatcher Dragon Hatcher which is set in the real world. The original version of Eragon that I was developing was set in the real world and when I decided that it would make more sense to have a world where the dragons were native to and switched it over to this fantasy world and began to develop that, I just kept the name that I'd been working with, which was Kevin. Naming a main character is hard, especially when you get used to a certain name. I don't want to say I was lazy. I want to focus on the world building and writing the first draft and I'll worry about the name later. [28]
There is an early version of Eragon that no one's seen, that even my editor at Random House never saw. And that was my first draft. And in that first draft, Eragon encountered a unicorn in the Beor Mountains on the way to the Varden. And the unicorn touches him and essentially affects the transformation that he goes under during the blood oath ceremony with the elves in the second book, in Eldest. And his whole storyline with the Varden once he gets to Farthen Dûr is completely different because now he has these abilities and he and a team of people ends up getting sent on a scouting mission in the dwarven tunnels to go find the Urgal army and then they have to flee back through the tunnels to warn everyone of this huge army and I had a underground cave full of lava, and multiple shades, and a huge Urgal army. There was there was a lot of dramatic stuff. Finding the Ra'zac in Dras-Leona was completely different. This is the draft where Eragon was named Kevin. [32]
I haven't thought about that version in ages. I think Arya was awake all the way from Gil'ead to Farthen Dûr in that version. That's right, I had to completely rewrite that. It's an unpleasant ride for her. No, no, no, she was awake and healed. She was awake. That's right, God, I had to rewrite most of the last chunk of the book now that I think back, it's been a long time. [32]
The worst thing is, I think Kevin would actually take a larger budget [to adapt to film]. No, stop. Why would Kevin take a larger budget? Because the battles were bigger, there was more stuff going on. Seriously, there were more creatures, more travel. Yeah, I think Kevin would actually take more money than Eragon. [32]
You said that Eragon's name was originally Kevin. Was Eragon's name originally Kevin? It was. And I really regret I didn't stick with it because I think that as many books as I've sold, the series would have been at least twice as successful if it had been about the adventures of the great dragon writer Kevin. Especially just seeing Kevin on the front cover. Imagine the appeal to the modern youth. Kevin the dragon writer. I mean Eragon, it's confusing with Aragorn. Oregano. Oregon. But Kevin, Kevin stands out, Kevin's original. That's why I had to move away from it. [31]
So do you wanna share some of those drafts with us, Christopher? Just kidding. Well, I actually had a fan reach out to me. He's one of the big members of the online fan community on Reddit and elsewhere. And he's kind of interested in some of these early versions from almost an archivist point of view, a scholarly point of view. Which is certainly an interesting idea. I mean, there is an early version of Eragon that no one's seen, that even my editor at Random House never saw. ... I cannot describe how much the Internet absolutely needs for you to put out an edition of Eragon that just says Kevin. Should this be like Mistborn or Way of Kings Prime? This is the Kevin edition of Eragon. The Kevin cut. Oh my god. It's "Eragon: Kevin's Version". ... We absolutely need Kevin's Version of Eragon. That's something we need. It's bad. It's bad. Look, there are certainly people who can look at Eragon, the version we have now, and say, "we can tell this was a younger writer." I look at it and I can tell. I could do so much more now with the material than I could then. But if you think that about the published version of Eragon, man, if you saw the unpublished version, the early version, it really is the raw writing of a homeschooled 15-year-old, who wrote a 500 page book about Kevin. I don't know, the internet is very unhinged these days. They would love this. It needs to exist somewhere on the internet. [32]
Publishing
EditingSo I wrote Eragon, and then I read the first draft and it wasn't particularly good, so I spent a good chunk of a year rewriting it as best as I could. I didn't know what I was doing but I was trying. I've heard it said that being displeased with your own work is actually a good thing because it means you know what is good work, and if you're not happy with your work because it's not good, it means you could at least have a goal to shoot for. If you read your work and you're like this is the best thing that's ever been written, you're never going to get any better. [28]Self-publishing
But I could see that the book needed work, so I decided to try to fix it as best I could, and I spent the better part of that year revising, rewriting, changing Kevin to Eragon. And then I gave the book to my parents and fortunately for me, they actually enjoyed what I had done. And they said, we think you have something, let's try to take it out into the world and see if anyone else wants to read it. [35]
[We] decided to self-publish the book as a joint venture since we didn't know anyone in the publishing world. That was again a good chunk of a year where we were editing the book as best the three of us could. Preparing it for publication, formatting, I drew the cover. [28]Promotion
Now you have to understand, my parents were always self-employed, have always been self-employed and we were always looking for things we could work on together as a family business. And Eragon was like the perfect opportunity for that. They'd had some experience self-publishing a couple of small educational books my mom had worked on. Because she was a trained Montessori teacher, and so she was trying to use that expertise to write some material herself. But I don't even think we sold 100 copies of those. So we spent another good chunk of a year preparing the book for publication with doing more editing, doing the layout, designing the cover. [35]
The first set of 50 books showed up while we were watching Roman Polanski's Macbeth, which seemed fitting because those first 50 books were all miscut from the printer. And as a result, we had to rip the covers off, send them back for credit from the printer, and then burn the insides of the books. So we had a proper book burning in our yard, and I actually saved some of those burnt pages just as a memory of that event. [35]
Self publishing wasn’t as viable then as a pathway to a career as an author as it is today. Why did it work for you? Everything completely changed because of e-readers. If you wanted to read an e-book, you had to have a PDF on your computer. There were no distribution systems like Amazon and Barnes & Noble. Back then, the lowest amount you could print and not have the book be too expensive was probably about 10,000 copies. But we were fortunate because print-on-demand had just become a thing, so books were just printed as needed. Self publishing is a lot easier these days. Of course, today’s marketplace is a lot more crowded as a result. [16]
My family and I were going around the western half of the United States with the self-published edition of Eragon. I was cold calling schools, libraries, and bookstores to set up events. I was doing two to three one-hour long presentations every single day for months on end at various times. You have to understand that because my parents were self-employed, the time they took to help prepare Eragon for publication was time they weren't working on other freelance projects that would have been bringing in money. So by the time we actually had Eragon printed and in hand, if it had taken another two to three months to start turning a profit, we were going to have to sell our house, move to a city, and get any jobs we could. Because of that financial pressure I was willing to do things I probably would have been too uncomfortable to do otherwise. Like doing all those presentations. [28]Getting traditionally published
We were doing a lot of self-promotion. I was cold calling schools and libraries and talking them into letting me do presentations. And that worked pretty well because the librarians could take pre-orders for us. If we went into a bookstore, by hand selling, I could maybe sell anywhere between 13 to 40 books in a day. 42 was like the best I ever did, but usually it was around 15 or so books, which just didn't cover printing costs and travel and food and all of that. But going into the schools, we were doing about 300 books a day, which was excellent. [34]
Can you tell me a little bit about how you and your family self-published the first Eragon book and what marketing strategies you did? Oh, it was all nepotism, you know. I wouldn't have gotten published without my parents. There's nothing as powerful as a publishing company that's four people sitting around a kitchen table in the middle of rural Montana. So yeah, without Nepotism, I wouldn't have gotten published. You have to embrace something like Nepotism if you really wanna succeed in today's world. In fact, people don't realize that you actually get a Nepotism card. There's a secret club. You go to New York and there's huge network opportunities. There's branches of the club everywhere, especially strong in Hollywood, of course, in music. Taylor Swift is an example. So if you can get into the nepotism club, I won't say you're guaranteed success, but you got about 80% chance of actually making it that you wouldn't have otherwise. Do you think your mom and dad would be willing to be my mom and dad? No, absolutely not. No, no. You don't have brown hair, so it doesn't work. You have to have brown hair to be a Paolini. Okay, I'll try to find a different way in, I guess. [31]
So you were very much looking for that partnership? Well we were wary. But the thing is is we were selling enough copies of Eragon that to scale it up we were going to have to start duplicating all the things that a regular publisher does. We were actually looking at partnering with a book packager or a book distributor just to get more copies out. To do everything a traditional publisher could do for me was a huge amount of work so it made sense to pair with Random House or someone else at that point. But it was still nerve-wracking because the book was being a success and then handing it off to another company, we didn't know if it was just going to end up in the remainder bin two weeks after it came out. [28]Gaining Confidence
People in the book world were starting to take notice because of course, if you've been to public school, you may remember the Scholastic Book Fairs and all of the Scholastic reps in the different schools were seeing me come to the schools and selling these books and hearing the kids talk about it. And it was getting attention. So we would have gotten a publisher, I would have gotten a publisher eventually. [34]
The book sold enough copies and bounced around enough that we'd heard that Scholastic—because Scholastic does all the Book Fairs in schools in the US—was interested and that we might get an offer from them. Before that happened though... [34]
Eventually another author by the name of Carl Hiaasen ended up buying a copy of the self-published edition of Eragon in a local bookstore. Which now that I'm older, I'm rather shocked at because it takes a lot to get me to buy a self-published book. It's got to look really good. [35]
Carl Hiaasen wrote the young adult book Hoot as well as many adult books. He comes up to Montana, I think he's got a vacation home here in the valley, but he was up here fly fishing and he bought a copy of Eragon for his then 12 year old son, Ryan. And fortunately for me, Ryan liked the book and Carl recommended it to Random House and it sort of bounced around among the editors for a couple of months before my editor-to-be grabbed it and said, "Yes, we will. I want to take a chance on this teenage author and we're going to offer him money for a trilogy that only exists in his head and see what happens." [34]
How did you find an agent? We had the offer from Random House, and like two days later, we had the offer from Scholastic. And so we knew we didn't know what we didn't know. My dad participated in some online self-publishing forum sort of thing. So he posted up a question and said, look, this is the situation we're in. Does anyone have any advice? And another one of the members said, "well, I was just at this publishing writing conference and there was this young agent there and I was really impressed with his presentation, or him talking about the industry." So my dad got his information online and did what you're never supposed to do, which is he called the agent directly and left this long rambling voicemail message because it was lunchtime in New York and you take your lunch breaks in New York. And only at the end of the message did he say, "oh, yes, and by the way, we have two competing offers from two publishing houses." And when I asked him, I said, "why did you do that?" He said, "well, because if he's any good as an agent, he's going to listen to the whole message before he deletes it." And we found out later that he nearly deleted the message. Because my dad started off like, "I got this teenage son, and he's written this book", and yeah, that, OK. So it was like two hours later we got a call from Simon. And Simon said overnight me a copy of Eragon and if I like it I'll represent you. And Simon has been my agent for 21 years now. [34]
It was a big risk for Random House. And it was a big risk for me because the book was successful, self-published, and we knew that giving it to a publisher, you lose the rights to a degree, and most books don't turn a profit, and it could have just ended up in the remainder bin. So what really worked in my favor is that Random House, and specifically Random House Children's Books, and specifically the imprint of Knopf, which is where I'm at were looking for their own Harry Potter, essentially. Scholastic was publishing Harry Potter. And Scholastic also gave me an offer for Eragon, but I could tell that Random House was the one that really loved the book and Scholastic was doing it because they thought it was a good business opportunity. Scholastic actually offered more money than Random House. But I went with Random House and it was the right choice. And I found out after the fact that Chip Gibson who was the head of the children's department at the time basically chose to use Eragon as sort of something to rally the troops and put the entire children's division behind it, and I was the very fortunate recipient of that love and attention. Which of course would only get you so far if people didn't enjoy reading the book. But fortunately for me, they did a great job marketing it and then people actually enjoyed the book. Which is why when people ask me how to get published, it's like, what am I supposed to say? The answer ultimately is you write a book that people want to read, and that's a facile answer, but it is true. If people want to read it, it makes everything else easier. The agent wants you, the publishers want you, and ultimately the public wants you. [34]
And I didn't realize how much was behind that email, because large publishers do not just casually say, "hey, we want to publish your book". There was a whole plan there, and they had a plan. And so they did. Eragon came out and then I had to figure out how to write a book with everyone expecting the sequel. [36]
So you kind of went and peddled your books at schools, as I understand, right? It seems to have paid off though, because it eventually landed in the hands of bestselling author Carl Hiaasen, but not right away. First, your book got in the hands of his stepson, and the kid liked it so much that he told Hiaasen about it, who then got Eragon fast-tracked with Penguin Random House. I really admire the way that you went for the weakest links, manipulating the minds of our youth and using them to shill your book for you. It's a tried and true marketing strategy from Girl Scout Cookies to coupon books, and I applaud you for your ingenuity. My biggest question here is, do you pay Carl Hiaasen's stepson the agent royalties he so rightfully deserves? He tried to collect one time, but I had to hire a couple of guys to drive him off. But, no, you always go for the weakest link. Back when I was self-published and all that I even tried to get Eragon reviewed by Entertainment Weekly, so I called up the subscription number on the back of the magazine and told them I'd made a mistake and asked them to transfer me over to corporate, and managed to get right to their book reviewer and tried to talk him into reviewing Eragon. So you always go for, as you said, the weakest link. Which is corporate. Ryan, Carl's son, though, yeah, I probably owe him a ridiculous amount of royalties. I'd say so. He made you. Oh, he did, absolutely. Without him, I'd be nothing. I guess the lesson here for aspiring authors is that it's not really about finding your target audience, necessarily. You just have to find your target prolific author's stepson and let the kid take it from there. Yeah, absolutely. As I said, that's part of the nepotism package. The sort of networking inside the industry. This is the stuff that you can never access otherwise, and you'll never get published otherwise. So it's not like you can just grow up in the middle of nowhere in Montana, self-publish a book, and then just become a success, by promoting it. You have to have connections. That's genius. I think you could have had an incredible career in designing loot boxes for mobile games based on how good you are at manipulating the world. Absolutely, microtransactions are God's work. [31]
Was anxiety something you felt moving to this deal with Random House? Was that quite pressuring? Yes, it was a big change to go from writing for yourself as a teenager, homeschooled, living in the middle of nowhere, to knowing that there was a large audience for your next book and that they had expectations. I got criticized quite a bit, critiqued quite a bit when Eragon came out for, shall we say, my lack of experience on the technical side of things with the writing. I'd say some of those were certainly fair critiques. The great advantage of youth is that you don't know how difficult things are and you have a lot of energy. The great disadvantage of youth is you don't have experience, and there's no fixing that aside from time and effort. All of that was definitely in my head when I really started work on Eldest and it was pretty nerve-wracking quite honestly. [28]
When you finished the book, I mean your parents believed in it obviously. Did you too? Or were you like, "You know what, maybe the second book, maybe go all in on the second one?" I didn't feel like I was actually an author until my third book was published. Because the first one, well, that could be a fluke. Well, the second one, yeah, but you know. But once the third book came out, then I was like, okay, maybe I'm actually a writer. But even then, even after I finished the series, I still felt like, okay, now I have to write something that's not Eragon, just to prove that I can. So every book has been its own challenge and has been a way for me to keep feeling like I'm growing as an artist and learning to become a better and better writer. [2]
It took me, I wanna say almost 10 years to feel like I wasn't an imposter and that it wasn't just gonna get yanked away. You know what my dream was when Eragon was was going to get published by Random House? Like this was my pie in the sky because I didn't think it was going to happen. But this was my dream. I did all the math and I was like, man, if I could somehow someday sell 100,000 books, which is impossible. But man, if I could sell 100,000 books, that's a darn good living. Man, I could really make a living off that. I could support a family and 100,000 books. Man, that'd be amazing. And then it kind of took off from there. [33]
2024.05.19 14:58 Prestigious_Ad7880 Marriage problems after baby
Hi all,
I'm hoping it's ok to ask this here, although it's not entirely about OAD I'm hoping that others have had similar experiences and can offer advice.
I've been lurking this sub because I think I might be OAD. Our baby is 1 years old, and the last year has taken a heavy toll on our marriage.
We've been together for nearly 20 years, we were best friends before the birth and it was a tough journey through IVF to get our baby, but I felt that we grew even closer during the pregnancy.
Something has happened since. I understand that our dynamic has changed, we've gone from 2 to 3 and the lack of sleep has taken it's toll. But it's as though we don't even like each other anymore. I'm worried that our marriage may break down. Speaking to friends I've learned this might be common.
Please can anyone recommend any podcasts or books that help explain why this happens to relationships after birth, and how they can be repaired?
And if anyone is willing to share their experiences I'd appreciate it too.
submitted by Prestigious_Ad7880 to oneanddone [link] [comments]
I'm hoping it's ok to ask this here, although it's not entirely about OAD I'm hoping that others have had similar experiences and can offer advice.
I've been lurking this sub because I think I might be OAD. Our baby is 1 years old, and the last year has taken a heavy toll on our marriage.
We've been together for nearly 20 years, we were best friends before the birth and it was a tough journey through IVF to get our baby, but I felt that we grew even closer during the pregnancy.
Something has happened since. I understand that our dynamic has changed, we've gone from 2 to 3 and the lack of sleep has taken it's toll. But it's as though we don't even like each other anymore. I'm worried that our marriage may break down. Speaking to friends I've learned this might be common.
Please can anyone recommend any podcasts or books that help explain why this happens to relationships after birth, and how they can be repaired?
And if anyone is willing to share their experiences I'd appreciate it too.
2024.05.19 14:58 Extension_Breath1407 Probably the worst action Gus could make. (Don't read this if you hate spoilers)
Mike: I am not locked in a room with you, you are locked in a room with me.
So in Season 6, Gustavo Fring's attempt to kill Lalo in his Compound failed and Nacho is on the run from the Cartel due to being forced to assist in it.
Gus is desperate to have Nacho silenced one way or another while Mike wants to rescue him from his situation.
This is the moment where Mike is done with Gus's callousness. Especially when he plans to have Manuel Varga kidnapped as a hostage to use against Nacho and Mike makes it clear that is where he draws the line. And Gus fully plans to have Mike killed if he intends to get in his way.
So this is probably the dumbest action that Gus could do as of that moment. (Besides walking straight up to Hector thinking he ratted him out to the DEA and leaving himself wide open to eat a Suicide Bomb attack)
Who knows what would happen if Nacho did not call at this time? (And I am also curious at what made Mike so certain that Nacho would call? What did he think he was going to ask? Did he expect that Nacho loved his father so much he would be willing to die for him.)
There are three things Gus failed to consider.
submitted by Extension_Breath1407 to betterCallSaul [link] [comments]
So in Season 6, Gustavo Fring's attempt to kill Lalo in his Compound failed and Nacho is on the run from the Cartel due to being forced to assist in it.
Gus is desperate to have Nacho silenced one way or another while Mike wants to rescue him from his situation.
This is the moment where Mike is done with Gus's callousness. Especially when he plans to have Manuel Varga kidnapped as a hostage to use against Nacho and Mike makes it clear that is where he draws the line. And Gus fully plans to have Mike killed if he intends to get in his way.
So this is probably the dumbest action that Gus could do as of that moment. (Besides walking straight up to Hector thinking he ratted him out to the DEA and leaving himself wide open to eat a Suicide Bomb attack)
Who knows what would happen if Nacho did not call at this time? (And I am also curious at what made Mike so certain that Nacho would call? What did he think he was going to ask? Did he expect that Nacho loved his father so much he would be willing to die for him.)
There are three things Gus failed to consider.
- Either Tyrus kills Mike or Mike somehow manages to turn the tables on Tyrus. If it is the former, Gus just killed his most useful asset and the one person that Nacho trusted. If Mike died at that time, Nacho has nothing to say to Gus and would just hang up.) If it is the latter, well, Mike has Gus at gunpoint. Maybe he would pull the trigger after realizing that Gus is no better than the Salamancas.
- Kidnapping Manuel does not change the fact that Nacho is still being hunted down by the Salamancas and the Cartel. How would Nacho know that Gus kidnapped his father unless they gave him a call again? And I think Nacho would be done receiving any more calls after Gus tried to trick him into dying in a shootout at the motel. Also, the Salamancas are still hunting him down but aren't trying to kill him until they find out what he knows about the attack on Lalo. And if Gus tries to have Nacho killed by his men, the Cartel would think that Nacho knows something that Gus is trying to hide from them.
- After kidnapping Manuel, then what? What happens to Manuel after Nacho dies the way Gus intended? Do you think Manuel would just forget what they did to him? No! Manuel just becomes another loose end that Gus has to dispose of. And Nacho probably already knows that so if he hears that Gus kidnapped his father, then he officially has nothing left to lose. He would probably hate Gus even more than the Salamancas at that point and would make sure to tell them everything just so that he would ensure Gus dies with him.
2024.05.19 14:57 Own-Worry9880 Another vent post
//throwaway account
Hello,
For all the other parents going through this, I feel you. You are doing great and are a great role model for your child. I know I should practice what I preach, but it's hard.
I (38m) am kind of at my wits end with my wife from time to time. I consider myself as the primary caregiver of a our 2.5y old: I do all the cooking and dishes, morning daycare drop offs and afternoon pick-ups. Most of the laundry îs on me, as well as cleaning. My wife (34f) does some cleaning maybe a day every 2 weeks and change the diaper once every 3 or 4 days. I do all the morning routine with the toddler and bath time. She still breastfeeds as it's the only way the boy knows to fall asleep at home. From time to time I take him with the car to sleep at noon and sometimes to fall asleep at night if it's too late.
She always tells me about fathers of her friend that are not involved, but she doesn't realize she is actually those fathers. And I feels she Sometimes feels frustrated as people ask her about cooking or different activities. She says that we both cook or gives a generic answer, but she doesn't acnowledge that I do most of the work.
We both work from home, but it feels like even when she was on maternity leave, I was still doing the same stuff, as it wouldn't matters that I actually have to work. He goes to daycare from monday to friday from 8 am to 3 or 4 PM, but there are times when he îs sick and those days are mostly on me. I am in constant touch with the teacher at the nursery and the peidatrician. I give him all the suplements, as well as all the medication when he is sick. My wife goes to work a day per week and it will be probably extended to 2 days per week.
She was never a morning person, and now it's worse. Sometimes we leave the flat even before she gets up. In the weekends, most of the time she wants to stay one more hour în the bed, which is usually around 2 hours. This frusrates me a lot. I am the last one to go to sleep and the first one to go up. I need to work late or do some dishes in the evenings. I also want to spend some time with her, so sometimes it gets very late for me and I get maybe 6 hours of sleep. We cosleep and the toddler still wakes up from time to time to nurse, so I partially understand she is tired, but somehow I cannot fully accept that she is tired all the time, yet I always find the resources.
Some times I get enthusiastic about sending time together in the morning, but she wants to stay in bed one more hour and everything goes down from there. For example, today (sunday) I woke up and thought about making pancakes for everyone, as the boy mentioned pancakes yesterday. We didn't have bananas and I thought to myself once baby gets up, I will run quickly to grab some from the store. My wife woke up shortly and told me she wants to sleep one more hour, and if I want, I can go out with the kid after he eats. I was s-o disappointed about this..
I know some of these point to a communication problem, but it's so hard to tell exactly how I feel because she always takes things personally and she think I am criticising her and jufmdge ger for not being a good wife or mother.
She never spent more than 4 hours alone with the kid, and this is something else that îs frustrating. I wanted to go one full day to the office when she was on maternity leave and she told me she needed help, so I shouldn't leave her alone. But I can spend 6 or 8 hours alone with the kid (and this was pretty often for me). And I know he can be very energic and strong willed. I am more active than her, so I can handle him going outdoor easier.
We don't have any help from our parents and it feels like I am single parenting 99% of the time. I feel like I should leave for a few hours and let her alone, but then I feel I would just neglect them. When I went out to see my friends, we always went to the park as I was with the kid, but she always goes alone to see her friend.
I know for sure I am part of the problem as I allowed this behavior and I think now it's too late to change anything. I try to involve the kid in everything I do, but sometimes he just wants mommy and there is nothing I can do.
I suspect she had some PPD for a few months, but she never acknowledged it. I tried to start therapy, but after one meeting, I just couldn't find the time for another session.
And there's a lot of other stuff. This is just the tip of the iceberg.
tl;dr: communication issues, frustrated with wife, don't really know how to handle the toddler stage
submitted by Own-Worry9880 to Parenting [link] [comments]
Hello,
For all the other parents going through this, I feel you. You are doing great and are a great role model for your child. I know I should practice what I preach, but it's hard.
I (38m) am kind of at my wits end with my wife from time to time. I consider myself as the primary caregiver of a our 2.5y old: I do all the cooking and dishes, morning daycare drop offs and afternoon pick-ups. Most of the laundry îs on me, as well as cleaning. My wife (34f) does some cleaning maybe a day every 2 weeks and change the diaper once every 3 or 4 days. I do all the morning routine with the toddler and bath time. She still breastfeeds as it's the only way the boy knows to fall asleep at home. From time to time I take him with the car to sleep at noon and sometimes to fall asleep at night if it's too late.
She always tells me about fathers of her friend that are not involved, but she doesn't realize she is actually those fathers. And I feels she Sometimes feels frustrated as people ask her about cooking or different activities. She says that we both cook or gives a generic answer, but she doesn't acnowledge that I do most of the work.
We both work from home, but it feels like even when she was on maternity leave, I was still doing the same stuff, as it wouldn't matters that I actually have to work. He goes to daycare from monday to friday from 8 am to 3 or 4 PM, but there are times when he îs sick and those days are mostly on me. I am in constant touch with the teacher at the nursery and the peidatrician. I give him all the suplements, as well as all the medication when he is sick. My wife goes to work a day per week and it will be probably extended to 2 days per week.
She was never a morning person, and now it's worse. Sometimes we leave the flat even before she gets up. In the weekends, most of the time she wants to stay one more hour în the bed, which is usually around 2 hours. This frusrates me a lot. I am the last one to go to sleep and the first one to go up. I need to work late or do some dishes in the evenings. I also want to spend some time with her, so sometimes it gets very late for me and I get maybe 6 hours of sleep. We cosleep and the toddler still wakes up from time to time to nurse, so I partially understand she is tired, but somehow I cannot fully accept that she is tired all the time, yet I always find the resources.
Some times I get enthusiastic about sending time together in the morning, but she wants to stay in bed one more hour and everything goes down from there. For example, today (sunday) I woke up and thought about making pancakes for everyone, as the boy mentioned pancakes yesterday. We didn't have bananas and I thought to myself once baby gets up, I will run quickly to grab some from the store. My wife woke up shortly and told me she wants to sleep one more hour, and if I want, I can go out with the kid after he eats. I was s-o disappointed about this..
I know some of these point to a communication problem, but it's so hard to tell exactly how I feel because she always takes things personally and she think I am criticising her and jufmdge ger for not being a good wife or mother.
She never spent more than 4 hours alone with the kid, and this is something else that îs frustrating. I wanted to go one full day to the office when she was on maternity leave and she told me she needed help, so I shouldn't leave her alone. But I can spend 6 or 8 hours alone with the kid (and this was pretty often for me). And I know he can be very energic and strong willed. I am more active than her, so I can handle him going outdoor easier.
We don't have any help from our parents and it feels like I am single parenting 99% of the time. I feel like I should leave for a few hours and let her alone, but then I feel I would just neglect them. When I went out to see my friends, we always went to the park as I was with the kid, but she always goes alone to see her friend.
I know for sure I am part of the problem as I allowed this behavior and I think now it's too late to change anything. I try to involve the kid in everything I do, but sometimes he just wants mommy and there is nothing I can do.
I suspect she had some PPD for a few months, but she never acknowledged it. I tried to start therapy, but after one meeting, I just couldn't find the time for another session.
And there's a lot of other stuff. This is just the tip of the iceberg.
tl;dr: communication issues, frustrated with wife, don't really know how to handle the toddler stage
2024.05.19 14:57 ExtraTrade1904 [A Bola] Roger Schmidt will stay at Benfica for next season
Roger Schmidt will remain in charge of Benfica. Despite a troubled season, the Reds' management will keep the coach who is tied to the club until 2026, reports A BOLA.
The events of this season have been scrutinised, but there could also be a change of direction on the coach's side. On Saturday, the Bild newspaper again reported that Bayern Munich were interested in the coach. According to the German publication, Roger Schmidt told the Bavarians this week that he was staying at Benfica, something that our newspaper is able to confirm.
A unilateral cancellation by the Reds would cost €16 million, although the coach himself had said that if he was the problem, he would leave. The coach's results and performance in managing the team were analysed and caused, as we reported, discomfort and different opinions within the Reds' structure.
Benfica won the Super Cup at the start of the season and fought until the beginning of April to win the league. They had a poor group stage in the Champions League (four defeats, one draw and one win, 11 goals conceded and seven scored), and were eliminated by a team considered accessible (Marseille) in the quarter-finals of the Europa League; they fell in the League Cup and were eliminated by Sporting from the Portuguese Cup.
The performance in matches against rivals - including league defeats to FC Porto (0-5) and Sporting (1-2) - were also in the balance, as was the relationship with the fans. The coach was heavily criticised, which even led Rui Costa to feel the need to go public twice to ask for restraint in the displeasure of the fans, who even spat at the coach and players and threw bottles.
On Friday, after the 1-1 draw with Rio Ave in Vila do Conde, in the final match of the league season, several fans gathered outside the stadium after the game and insulted Schmidt and Rui Costa once again. The police even had to intervene to prevent further embarrassment. However, both the organisation and the coach, who has spoken about the issue several times, believe that this overly hostile atmosphere was created by a smaller group of supporters, and that it does not represent the majority of Benfica fans. Many of them even rioted in Luz when they responded to the insults coming from one of the claques during the match against Arouca.
Changing room and training Another factor on the table was Schmidt's relationship with the players. Ultimately, the dressing room continues to believe in the coach. In March, Orkun Kokçu's interview called his leadership into question, but Schmit took a stand and the Turk, after missing the game with Casa Pia, was reintegrated and improved his performances. He even finished as a substitute in the last game of the season, a sign that things have gradually settled down. Another sign is Rafa's words on leaving the club, which show the group's feelings about the coach.
In Vila do Conde, Schmidt's talk turned to 2024/25, on a night when he gave debuts to Prestianni and Gustavo Varela. That's another factor to take into account, the bet on young players, especially from the youth system, such as João Neves and António Silva, the most popular, but also Morato and more recently Tiago Gouveia and Tomás Araújo.
Roger Schmidt admitted that the pre-season will be crucial and will have to be well planned, not least because Benfica still don't know if they'll get in straight away or if they'll have to qualify for the new Champions League. The guaranteed income from an immediate entry into the group stage may also give different perspectives on the market, but in Luz it's considered that there is talent to capitalise on. Rollheiser has already started, Prestianni made his debut on Friday and there's also Andreas Schjelderup, not to mention the youth players.
submitted by ExtraTrade1904 to soccer [link] [comments]
The events of this season have been scrutinised, but there could also be a change of direction on the coach's side. On Saturday, the Bild newspaper again reported that Bayern Munich were interested in the coach. According to the German publication, Roger Schmidt told the Bavarians this week that he was staying at Benfica, something that our newspaper is able to confirm.
A unilateral cancellation by the Reds would cost €16 million, although the coach himself had said that if he was the problem, he would leave. The coach's results and performance in managing the team were analysed and caused, as we reported, discomfort and different opinions within the Reds' structure.
Benfica won the Super Cup at the start of the season and fought until the beginning of April to win the league. They had a poor group stage in the Champions League (four defeats, one draw and one win, 11 goals conceded and seven scored), and were eliminated by a team considered accessible (Marseille) in the quarter-finals of the Europa League; they fell in the League Cup and were eliminated by Sporting from the Portuguese Cup.
The performance in matches against rivals - including league defeats to FC Porto (0-5) and Sporting (1-2) - were also in the balance, as was the relationship with the fans. The coach was heavily criticised, which even led Rui Costa to feel the need to go public twice to ask for restraint in the displeasure of the fans, who even spat at the coach and players and threw bottles.
On Friday, after the 1-1 draw with Rio Ave in Vila do Conde, in the final match of the league season, several fans gathered outside the stadium after the game and insulted Schmidt and Rui Costa once again. The police even had to intervene to prevent further embarrassment. However, both the organisation and the coach, who has spoken about the issue several times, believe that this overly hostile atmosphere was created by a smaller group of supporters, and that it does not represent the majority of Benfica fans. Many of them even rioted in Luz when they responded to the insults coming from one of the claques during the match against Arouca.
Changing room and training Another factor on the table was Schmidt's relationship with the players. Ultimately, the dressing room continues to believe in the coach. In March, Orkun Kokçu's interview called his leadership into question, but Schmit took a stand and the Turk, after missing the game with Casa Pia, was reintegrated and improved his performances. He even finished as a substitute in the last game of the season, a sign that things have gradually settled down. Another sign is Rafa's words on leaving the club, which show the group's feelings about the coach.
In Vila do Conde, Schmidt's talk turned to 2024/25, on a night when he gave debuts to Prestianni and Gustavo Varela. That's another factor to take into account, the bet on young players, especially from the youth system, such as João Neves and António Silva, the most popular, but also Morato and more recently Tiago Gouveia and Tomás Araújo.
Roger Schmidt admitted that the pre-season will be crucial and will have to be well planned, not least because Benfica still don't know if they'll get in straight away or if they'll have to qualify for the new Champions League. The guaranteed income from an immediate entry into the group stage may also give different perspectives on the market, but in Luz it's considered that there is talent to capitalise on. Rollheiser has already started, Prestianni made his debut on Friday and there's also Andreas Schjelderup, not to mention the youth players.
2024.05.19 14:55 Axenfonklatismrek Do you have Expy characters in your settings?
FIRST OF ALL MUSIC
My inspiration came from u/SpartanSpock post on Worldbuilding, who did the same thing, but i'm gonna copy my comment i posted there with changes
For those who don't know, EXPY is a character, who the author based on someone, either real, fictional or historical, but since my world is one big expy(Lornhemal's cultures are copies of real world cultures with some tweaks), i'm gonna go wiht some of my favorites and the most obvious
I HAVE A LOT OF EXPIES, so i'm gonna get some of my favorites, from easiest to guess to probably the hardest. So I'm gonna lay down their basic descriptions
Göts, A Mercenary Swordsman, who became famous for besting very tough knight in a combat, known for wearing black armor and carrying largest sword in the world, then becomes one of Erika's lackeys, who helped her gain more power(by defeating bandits and stuff like that) and obtain her lordship of Gradsko
Wlad I. An Eastern Batrianic's Empire's warlord, master of the Black Wolves(Knightly order originally founded to repell Eastern Tribesmen), who decided to become his own king, famous for his cruelty and savagery. He was successful for a while, then heart attack killed him and half of his army got destroyed by earthquake.
Sir Loxley, a nobleman, who goes against all law and seeks to keep the corrupt and greedy officials in line, very strong bowman, taught Vigviid I.(Main Protagonist of 2nd crisis saga, soon to be Tsar, who was sent to Western empire by his uncle to be raised while he went to end Civil war(Also known as 2nd Crisis of the 16th century)) how to plan battles. Friendly but not nice, harsh but careful, strict but with reason to be.
Kiš Zabaru, a mad king who slaughtered every slave child in his kingdom in order to avoid destiny fulfilling some nonsensical destiny, for which Thorik(Main villain of 2nd crisis saga: Batrian IV's story, and the man who started it) razed the entire city of Kish became punished for his crimes.
Erika Keszek, a vengeful lady, who was seeking a way to get revenge on her mother for her crimes and thus was willing to do everything, even literally bathing in blood of the innocents. She found her hideout in form of abandoned castle of Gradsko, where she practiced all sorts of blood sorcery to discover her mother, only to find out her mother is gonna be executed. When she returned, her reign of terror continued, this time she became obsessed with eternal youth, then she was killed by 3 of her men(2 didn't make it out, 3rd one was her lover Ion, who then died of rusty nail poisoning him), who realized she's gone mad
Ó Sterey, Gallowglass warrior, Ó Belay's best friend, man of average stature, blonde hair and moustache, very clever fighter, his favorite weapons are javelins and Sword, very friendly and like his friend, very good company when near children, taught Vigviid how to fence and fight with sword
Ó Belay, Another Gallowglass warrior, Ó Sterey's best mate, tall man, who carries large sword, red moustache, big belly but very strong, even in melee hes dangerous, but overall very friendly, especially towards Children. Taught Vigviid how to fight against other weapons like Axes, maces or shields
Hugo the Shadowhair, an assassin who was hired to kill Vigviid,only to kill Loxley and 15 other men, while he almost killed Vigviid and his remaining friends, he bled to death before doing a striking final blow at one of them(Specifically Mabyn, Vigviid's older tomboy cousin), wears black leather armor, armed to the teeth(Has 2 swords, 3 daggers, 1 long sharp chain, and carries drugs that nullify his pain), fast in attacks, brutal in combat, has no mercy towards anyone who draws a sword against him. His first appearance is him sitting in the pub, some drunk disturbs him, and Hugo slams Drunk's face to the table, killing him. Rest of the Drunk's friends come in and want to kill him, when guard steps in, Hugo pays the Barkeep, and leaves behind 8 brutally mutilated men.
Morhun Van Hausern. Son of a former king of central Batrianic empire, then prime minister, and then Tsar Batrian IV. Brown curly hair, very handsome man, Very good company to be around, ace in horseriding, fencing is his poetry, very charismatic, even the ladies want him, but he has one secret that may have caused his doom: Hes a Homosexual, which resulted in his rival, Thorsenn Knärsen(Spoiled son of the villain Thorik Knärsen), who shot him in the back due to a petty revenge(Morhun insulted his pride), and because LGBT people are considered "Freaks" by the Batrianics(yes, Batrian IV was bit of a homophobe(IE. may criticize you for your Sexuality, but won't be hostile unless theres a reason, besides, Morhun was his son, and if theres one thing Batrian IV can't stand, its the thought that someone might hurt his family, which is why his morality was slowly dropping after his son's death)).
submitted by Axenfonklatismrek to fantasywriters [link] [comments]
My inspiration came from u/SpartanSpock post on Worldbuilding, who did the same thing, but i'm gonna copy my comment i posted there with changes
For those who don't know, EXPY is a character, who the author based on someone, either real, fictional or historical, but since my world is one big expy(Lornhemal's cultures are copies of real world cultures with some tweaks), i'm gonna go wiht some of my favorites and the most obvious
I HAVE A LOT OF EXPIES, so i'm gonna get some of my favorites, from easiest to guess to probably the hardest. So I'm gonna lay down their basic descriptions
Göts, A Mercenary Swordsman, who became famous for besting very tough knight in a combat, known for wearing black armor and carrying largest sword in the world, then becomes one of Erika's lackeys, who helped her gain more power(by defeating bandits and stuff like that) and obtain her lordship of Gradsko
Wlad I. An Eastern Batrianic's Empire's warlord, master of the Black Wolves(Knightly order originally founded to repell Eastern Tribesmen), who decided to become his own king, famous for his cruelty and savagery. He was successful for a while, then heart attack killed him and half of his army got destroyed by earthquake.
Sir Loxley, a nobleman, who goes against all law and seeks to keep the corrupt and greedy officials in line, very strong bowman, taught Vigviid I.(Main Protagonist of 2nd crisis saga, soon to be Tsar, who was sent to Western empire by his uncle to be raised while he went to end Civil war(Also known as 2nd Crisis of the 16th century)) how to plan battles. Friendly but not nice, harsh but careful, strict but with reason to be.
Kiš Zabaru, a mad king who slaughtered every slave child in his kingdom in order to avoid destiny fulfilling some nonsensical destiny, for which Thorik(Main villain of 2nd crisis saga: Batrian IV's story, and the man who started it) razed the entire city of Kish became punished for his crimes.
Erika Keszek, a vengeful lady, who was seeking a way to get revenge on her mother for her crimes and thus was willing to do everything, even literally bathing in blood of the innocents. She found her hideout in form of abandoned castle of Gradsko, where she practiced all sorts of blood sorcery to discover her mother, only to find out her mother is gonna be executed. When she returned, her reign of terror continued, this time she became obsessed with eternal youth, then she was killed by 3 of her men(2 didn't make it out, 3rd one was her lover Ion, who then died of rusty nail poisoning him), who realized she's gone mad
Ó Sterey, Gallowglass warrior, Ó Belay's best friend, man of average stature, blonde hair and moustache, very clever fighter, his favorite weapons are javelins and Sword, very friendly and like his friend, very good company when near children, taught Vigviid how to fence and fight with sword
Ó Belay, Another Gallowglass warrior, Ó Sterey's best mate, tall man, who carries large sword, red moustache, big belly but very strong, even in melee hes dangerous, but overall very friendly, especially towards Children. Taught Vigviid how to fight against other weapons like Axes, maces or shields
Hugo the Shadowhair, an assassin who was hired to kill Vigviid,only to kill Loxley and 15 other men, while he almost killed Vigviid and his remaining friends, he bled to death before doing a striking final blow at one of them(Specifically Mabyn, Vigviid's older tomboy cousin), wears black leather armor, armed to the teeth(Has 2 swords, 3 daggers, 1 long sharp chain, and carries drugs that nullify his pain), fast in attacks, brutal in combat, has no mercy towards anyone who draws a sword against him. His first appearance is him sitting in the pub, some drunk disturbs him, and Hugo slams Drunk's face to the table, killing him. Rest of the Drunk's friends come in and want to kill him, when guard steps in, Hugo pays the Barkeep, and leaves behind 8 brutally mutilated men.
Morhun Van Hausern. Son of a former king of central Batrianic empire, then prime minister, and then Tsar Batrian IV. Brown curly hair, very handsome man, Very good company to be around, ace in horseriding, fencing is his poetry, very charismatic, even the ladies want him, but he has one secret that may have caused his doom: Hes a Homosexual, which resulted in his rival, Thorsenn Knärsen(Spoiled son of the villain Thorik Knärsen), who shot him in the back due to a petty revenge(Morhun insulted his pride), and because LGBT people are considered "Freaks" by the Batrianics(yes, Batrian IV was bit of a homophobe(IE. may criticize you for your Sexuality, but won't be hostile unless theres a reason, besides, Morhun was his son, and if theres one thing Batrian IV can't stand, its the thought that someone might hurt his family, which is why his morality was slowly dropping after his son's death)).
2024.05.19 14:53 Tricky_Shallot_9849 WIBTA to insist that our child takes my last name first?
For context: I’m (33F) from a country in which we use two last names. Usually, the father’s last name is used first. Up to a few months ago, the law didn’t allow the mother’s last name to be used first. It does now.
I was 9 weeks pregnant when we found out that the law changed and now allows parents to decide which last name is used first, this is my first pregnancy. I mentioned it to my husband who immediately shut me down, he got angry and wouldn’t consider it. I said well, if you won’t hear about it, I should at least have a bigger say when it comes to naming the child; he didn’t like it, but agreed.
A few weeks later we found out that we are having a boy. We had a list of names that we had chosen together. From the list, I said I liked “x” the most. He wasn’t particularly fond of “x”, but later said he liked it, so we agreed to name our son “x”.
To clarify, I didn’t impose, nor made the decision for both of us. I just said I liked “x” the most, and was actually happy when he said he liked it too. He has since told me how happy he is that we chose to name our son “x”, we get a lot of compliments for it.
I’m 26 weeks pregnant now. I have a long list of symptoms that I’ve experienced and am now entering my third trimester, so starting to experience new ones and getting uncomfortable. I will have to go through child birth in a few months, and will be breastfeeding our son after. FYI I’m happy and calm, just acknowledging the physical/mental strain/responsibility that comes along with pregnancy/motherhood.
Husband has been supportive. He has not missed a doctors appointment, took over household responsibilities while I was physically ill (first trimester), talks to baby in belly… what he can do, he’s doing.
As the pregnancy advances, the last name thing has come to mind again. I’d really like to use mine first. Don’t get me wrong, I know both parents’ role is important, but feel women should be allowed credit for the unique role that we have in all this… as it’s my first pregnancy, I wasn’t really aware of the implications when we had that first talk (and yet to fully find out).
I mentioned it briefly to my husband yesterday. He said we have an agreement and that “I” chose our son’s name. So now expects me to hold my end of the agreement. From my point of view, we both chose the name, but he is now saying that he wasn’t fond of “x” and only said yes because of our agreement.
I’m frustrated and sad, such “agreement” was only made in the first place cause he wouldn’t talk about nor consider my request. He’s been first hand witness of my pregnancy experience, and I feel he’s accommodating the name choosing to his convenience, which I genuinely feel we did together.
He’s also saying that I’m only insisting as I have a “fancy” last name (it’s Irish and uncommon here, his is Spanish and “common” for the country). I’ve explained it has nothing to do with that, he’s convinced that it does.
WIBTA to insist?
submitted by Tricky_Shallot_9849 to AITAH [link] [comments]
I was 9 weeks pregnant when we found out that the law changed and now allows parents to decide which last name is used first, this is my first pregnancy. I mentioned it to my husband who immediately shut me down, he got angry and wouldn’t consider it. I said well, if you won’t hear about it, I should at least have a bigger say when it comes to naming the child; he didn’t like it, but agreed.
A few weeks later we found out that we are having a boy. We had a list of names that we had chosen together. From the list, I said I liked “x” the most. He wasn’t particularly fond of “x”, but later said he liked it, so we agreed to name our son “x”.
To clarify, I didn’t impose, nor made the decision for both of us. I just said I liked “x” the most, and was actually happy when he said he liked it too. He has since told me how happy he is that we chose to name our son “x”, we get a lot of compliments for it.
I’m 26 weeks pregnant now. I have a long list of symptoms that I’ve experienced and am now entering my third trimester, so starting to experience new ones and getting uncomfortable. I will have to go through child birth in a few months, and will be breastfeeding our son after. FYI I’m happy and calm, just acknowledging the physical/mental strain/responsibility that comes along with pregnancy/motherhood.
Husband has been supportive. He has not missed a doctors appointment, took over household responsibilities while I was physically ill (first trimester), talks to baby in belly… what he can do, he’s doing.
As the pregnancy advances, the last name thing has come to mind again. I’d really like to use mine first. Don’t get me wrong, I know both parents’ role is important, but feel women should be allowed credit for the unique role that we have in all this… as it’s my first pregnancy, I wasn’t really aware of the implications when we had that first talk (and yet to fully find out).
I mentioned it briefly to my husband yesterday. He said we have an agreement and that “I” chose our son’s name. So now expects me to hold my end of the agreement. From my point of view, we both chose the name, but he is now saying that he wasn’t fond of “x” and only said yes because of our agreement.
I’m frustrated and sad, such “agreement” was only made in the first place cause he wouldn’t talk about nor consider my request. He’s been first hand witness of my pregnancy experience, and I feel he’s accommodating the name choosing to his convenience, which I genuinely feel we did together.
He’s also saying that I’m only insisting as I have a “fancy” last name (it’s Irish and uncommon here, his is Spanish and “common” for the country). I’ve explained it has nothing to do with that, he’s convinced that it does.
WIBTA to insist?