My wife treats me like “garbage’”… while I raise our daughter alone! | Reddit Stories - ok storytime

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Oh John, Oh Sam, I love you so much.

Speaker 2 (00:03):
I love you almost as much as the great stories
that are about to come up.

Speaker 3 (00:06):
And you know what, I love equally as much as
the two minutes of sponsor is coming up, because they
support the show and make sure that we will have
our happily Ever after my.

Speaker 2 (00:15):
Wife treats me like garbage while I raise our daughter alone.

Speaker 4 (00:19):
Well, you know what people do with garbage.

Speaker 1 (00:22):
What they take it out.

Speaker 2 (00:23):
That's true. Trigger warning some physical emotional coming up. If
you want to skip that, go to the next one.
Let's dive in there we go. Okay, so things have
been steadily going south for a while now. So all
condensed as much as I can on mobile, so pardon
any errors of formatting issues. We had our daughter last
year while I was in the military. She was living
in another state due to her National Guard duties. Because

(00:45):
of that, I only saw my newborn daughter on the weekends.

Speaker 3 (00:48):
All that's not a lot of time.

Speaker 2 (00:49):
But this comes from owl feet And if you want
to submit your own stories, go to the r slash
Okay storytime Subrendet's My wife had the full responsibility to
care for the baby, but her other kids from a
previous relationship. We're a big help, and some days took
care of the baby one hundred percent day. That's what
I call out sourcing. When I came up on the weekends,
of course I cared for her one hundred percent. I
did everything I could to help my wife rest. Fast

(01:11):
forward two and a half months. I got out of
the military, moved to her state, and then I basically
assumed full care of our daughter. She said that once
I felt how two and a half months of being
a single parent was, we could do a fifty to
fifty or as close as we could get. That time
never came. My daughter is now almost a year old.
I don't remember the last time she made a bottle

(01:32):
or change a diaper. Every time I bring it up,
she refuses to even watch her, even if I just
wanted a shower.

Speaker 3 (01:37):
That's messed up. I hate that. I hate when we
have stories where the parent, like one parent is not
even letting the other parent do basic needs.

Speaker 2 (01:46):
Now, she did have a month where she took care
of her while I had a job, but she mostly
used her kids until I got off. Now I was
working odd hours two to four am and one to
two pm. She made me quit, so she could get
a job. Now I'm back home being a dad to
three kids. I love my step kids like my own,
but still three kids are a handful. I haven't had
a night off in forever. While she goes out at

(02:09):
least once a week with her friends to the club,
and she's been out to lunch quote unquote with a
single male friend of hers a couple of times that
I know of. Multiple times she comes home way later
than she said, without even a call or a quick text,
and a few times she's almost missed work because of
her hangouts. She works on nights. If I ask to
go out, I get rid of fueleds man. Her excuse

(02:32):
is that she doesn't trust the other women out there,
and it's different with her because she mainly goes to
Spanish clubs. Since she can't speak Spanish, she can't be
tempted to cheat. This is horse crap, since she had
a Mexican boyfriend a couple of years ago and they
were together for a while. Not only is she controlling
in that regard, using me to watch the kids while
she goes and has fun, she forbids me from drinking

(02:54):
booze going out by myself. I need her permission, spending
any money on myself when all my checks went to her,
not necessarily to the family, and even having friends. I
had a friend at work that I was texting about
random crap, and she flipped out and forbade me from
texting him. My goodness, I am stressed out beyond all relief.
I have no release. I can't do the things I

(03:15):
used to enjoy playing guitar, for example, it gives her
a headache. Oh man, I am not happy. She is
harmful physically, verbally and emotionally. I am not a saint.
I call her names when we argue, but I've never
hit her. I was raised better than that. She has
no calms about getting physical, though she constantly tells me
I'm a crappy husband, but I don't see how I
can be better. I rub her feet when she asks

(03:37):
more like demands, usually daily. I stop what I'm doing
to make her food or run out to get her
what she wants. She calls me to come up and
change the movie on the TV that's seven feet away
from her because she doesn't want to get up.

Speaker 1 (03:46):
You have to leave, dude.

Speaker 2 (03:48):
Lee is just yeah, and also I'm sorry, but remotes
remotes remotes exists remotes.

Speaker 3 (03:54):
And also actually have to leave her because this is
just terrible situation. And also she's got it's massively and
also I mean she's not helping in any way. No,
I mean, what even is there here for you to
stay for?

Speaker 2 (04:08):
Yeah, there's nothing. She is completely controlling. Yeah, I watched
the kids and I'm monitored to the noise so she
can sleep. I wash the clothes and make sure she
wakes up on time for work when she goes out.
I hardly even mentioned the fact that I would like
a break. Heck, even this morning, my daughter was fussing
because of her teeth and wouldn't stop for anything. I tried.
My wife got annoyed and came down. I'm allergic to

(04:28):
this woman, demanding to know what I was doing to her.
Once I explained why she was crying, I made the
mistake of saying, you take care of her, then I
could use a break. Her response, excuse me, A full
night's sleep should be enough of a break, dude, Come on.

Speaker 3 (04:42):
A full night's She's like, you get to sleep, You
get to sleep.

Speaker 2 (04:45):
Who needs you know when you shower, when you use
the bathroom, and you need me to hold the baby. No, no,
you've slept.

Speaker 3 (04:51):
Is she amazon?

Speaker 5 (04:53):
Like?

Speaker 3 (04:53):
What are these work hours?

Speaker 2 (04:54):
You know what? He needs to learn how to use
the bathroom and shower on the job when he's sleeping.
He needs to learn to train himself how to sleep walk.
So terrible, Oh my god. The only breaks I get
are the occasional weekend when my daughter goes to her
faux grandma's house. I guess maybe if a grandma figure
and the kids go with their grandma or to their

(05:16):
dads on those weekends, she goes out and I have
to stay home alone. I've been thinking about a divorce
since I don't see how this relationship can be salvaged.
She's diagnosed with being bipolar, having depression. Her personality screams
self absorbed. The old saying love is blind can't be
more true. The only thing stopping me is my daughter.
My wife has told me that if I try to

(05:37):
take her, she will label me as Wow, we're gonna
dive in more in a second. But yeah, just real
quick on that, I would start recording everything sad.

Speaker 3 (05:46):
Yeah, I get as much like go reach out to
your friends, find out, like find text messages wherever she
said things verbally, record you know, get as many receipts
as you can and then go get a lawyer.

Speaker 2 (05:59):
She told me that she you will have her kids.
Our kids say whatever she tells them, and I would
never see my daughter again in good luck proving she
is an unfit mother.

Speaker 3 (06:07):
Yeah, record, start recording. I mean like, there's not many situations,
Like there's some situations that we've read where people record,
and you're like, I don't know if we should do that.
This is a case where you should record.

Speaker 2 (06:18):
It's beyond that point in safety. Yeah. Once it's a
matter of safety, the whole scenario is completely change.

Speaker 3 (06:25):
Absolutely.

Speaker 2 (06:26):
I have to try to compile evidence before I get
out with my daughter. Am I just being selfish? Can
this marriage be saved? Feel free to ask questions. I
will try to provide any answers I can And wouldn't
you know? We have an update we have. This marriage
cannot be saved, This marriage cannot be.

Speaker 3 (06:41):
Why because you should h save yourself.

Speaker 2 (06:44):
But ladies and gentlemen, we have the update where hopefully
wop he's getting out and about to live his best life.
So update. Not sure if anyone remembers my post or not,
I sure do from five seconds ago but I feel
I owe it to everyone who responded. So here's my update.
I am on my way to my parents with my daughter.
This is basically four weeks of a breather between us.

(07:04):
I don't know what will happen. I'm scared, physically sick,
and close to tears. However, I know this is what
needs to be done. Everyone I talked to said I
needed to at least go visit my parents. I have
discussed my wife's behavior and the consensus is that she
is a controlling aminipulative. The fact that I was paralyzed
by fear of her and physically sick shows how broken
I am and how emasculated. She made me the physical stop,

(07:27):
but the verbal only was increased. She would yell over
the smallest things, scream names at me in front of
the kids. The other day, I went to dinner and
forgot halapenos on her sandwich. She belittled me until I
went to go get her some.

Speaker 3 (07:40):
I go get your own alpanias.

Speaker 2 (07:42):
You see these, You see this, it's called hands.

Speaker 3 (07:45):
In her mouth, these these legs, go walk over there
and get your own alpanions.

Speaker 2 (07:50):
Use them. At that point she called me stupid, got
mad at me for going to get them. As I
shut the door of resounding, I effing hate you, followed
me after I got back. About five minutes later, she
refused to eat a sandwich and let it go to waste. Anyways,
I'm on my way and hopefully I can find my
masculinity in these four weeks. And we have update number two.

(08:10):
I think we've arrived at the parents place. Let's see
what happens. Hey, everyone, it's been a month or so
since the last update. Had to make a new account
since my old one got compromised. Okay, so a lot
of crap has happened. First and foremost, I feel that
the visit with my parents was extremely healing for both
my daughter and me.

Speaker 3 (08:29):
Yes, this is why we need support systems. Yes, people
who love you and want to protect you and want
to help you.

Speaker 2 (08:34):
Because imagine if OPI didn't have us.

Speaker 3 (08:37):
Yeah back, and a lot of people don't have those
support systems, and that's why they think that this type
of treatment is okay and they stay in it.

Speaker 2 (08:46):
It's like nope, yes, absolutely so she loves my mom
to She progressed incredibly fast after we got to my parents.
She went there on the bottle crawling and had major
separation anxiety with me. She is now off the bottle,
using sippy cups, eating real Foo food, walking, and is
totally comfortable if I leave the room, though sometimes she
tries to follow me. That's cute and yes. A couple

(09:07):
of days after we got there, I received a letter
in the mail from a lawyer soliciting his services, referencing
a case number and telling me divorce is hard, but
I don't have to do it alone. Yep. The very
next day after I left, she filed for divorce, and
I found out days before I got served the papers day,
but she.

Speaker 3 (09:26):
Filed for divorce.

Speaker 2 (09:27):
She filed for divorce, So I don't understand the logic,
but this is actually I feel like great. The fact
it was done so fast means she had this planned
and waiting. So my vacation turned into a game of catchup,
finding a lawyer, figuring out what to do, and basically
being stressed out. Being away from that toxic environment, away
from the ridicule, I saw how bad it really was.

(09:50):
It wasn't just me and the kids, but other people
in my wife's life as well. I was basically a prisoner,
but I loved her still even after all she did
and said, A part of me still does and probably
always will. Is honestly sounds like Stockholm syndrome. Now that
I'm away, hopefully the damage can be healed.

Speaker 3 (10:06):
It will be. It just takes time.

Speaker 2 (10:07):
Yeah, it takes time and life. Yeah. Oh, man, OPI
you should. I would highly recommend getting a therapist. Elpie says,
I found out from some sources that she has been
demonizing me to everyone here. I almost read demonetizing this, demonetize.

Speaker 4 (10:23):
Getting any money from this post good.

Speaker 2 (10:26):
She's been bad mouthing me and trying to get my
step kids to hate me. Apparently my stepdaughter, six female,
has been having nightmare since I left. She's always asking
Weenelby back and voiced her concerns that her sister won't
remember her. Oh, that is so sad. When asked why
she thought that, she said, that's what my wife told them.
She's six years old. That is not the right thing
to tell her. It broke my heart to hear how

(10:48):
she had been treated, how she has to listen to
her mom yell about me. What's fed up is that
I was coming back on the seventh of April. My
wife knew. I emailed her my flight information. I pushed
my return date back about a week to get there
right before the court date. After I found out she
had filed for divorce, she removed me from our joint
bank account. Don't know how she did that, but when

(11:08):
I log in, it says I have no account linked
to my profile and sold one of our cars.

Speaker 3 (11:12):
I mean, just take stock of all of that and say,
you know, when you get to the court hearing, you
say she removed me from the bank account that is
that both of us have been putting money in, and
show that you've been putting money in or that you
talked about it mm hmm, and then say like we
had this car that we both bought. You know that
maybe both of our names were on she sold that.

Speaker 2 (11:31):
Yes, it all helps like tell the true story of
what she's putting you through. So you know, a terrible
thing to happen, but the silver lining of using that
to get the best divorce for you possible, get as
much custody and everything for you. I have no family
in Indiana, few friends that are all my wife's friends
or family, no money, no transportation, and no place to stay.

(11:53):
She did all of that after she filed for divorce.
She seems to think I have no rights and she
will get everything while I get fed, make sways the Sunday.
Don't know what will come of that. I kept in
contact with her only over email, so I have a
record of our conversations. There we go. Yeah, email smart,
that's a good way to keep track. Every few days
she would ask me how's the baby. She never responded

(12:14):
to what I said. She never asked to talk to
her or see pictures, and didn't even wish her a
happy first birthday. I would have done all of that
for her if she had asked. Other people asked, and
I gave it to them right away. If y'all remember
from my first post, I was a staying home dad.
I took care of the house and the kids. She slept, partied,
and worked. Apparently the entire spring break. She pawned off

(12:35):
my step kids to their grandma and never once even
called to talk to them.

Speaker 3 (12:39):
What she just seems like a pretty neglectful parent.

Speaker 2 (12:42):
Yeah all round.

Speaker 3 (12:44):
Yes, I don't think we've seen any sign Yeah.

Speaker 2 (12:49):
No redeeming qualities. Also get grainy on the stands absolute.

Speaker 3 (12:52):
I was about to say, yeah, like this is all evidence,
This is all evidence you could use.

Speaker 2 (12:57):
But back to the story. But that's the grandma's I
and my wife thinks a eight and six year old
can be left alone all night bikes. The grandma had
been doing all the cleaning and caring for the kids
as soon as she got off work, basically doing what
I did while my wife slept. She stopped cleaning and
coming over early after she went over one day a
week ago and found a man there whoa yep, not

(13:20):
even a month into my vacation, and she had a boyfriend.

Speaker 4 (13:23):
Well, she probably had the boyfriend beforehand.

Speaker 3 (13:26):
Yeah, but he only speaks Ben.

Speaker 2 (13:28):
Yeah, yeah, it doesn't beg anglish. Okay, so it's not
cheating exactly if she hooks up with him, as long
as he cheating, As long as he only speaks in Spanish,
it's not cheating. Fine, that's how it works. She brought
a man into our house and is effing him in
our bed. The pain I feel, the worthlessness I feel.
It kills me. It really does. I know she is

(13:49):
harmful and she never really loved me. I suspected she
was cheating on me, but to have proof and for
a flaunt it, it really does hurt. Now, both Grandma
and faux Grandma a family friend are really I lived
with my wife and what she was doing. Granny's on
the stand, Ye, let's run it. Let's run it, especially
since it's in front of the step kids. I hate
that as well. I mean, what example does that set

(14:10):
for the kids? Cheating is okay? My stepdaughter is six,
She is seeing this and will think it's normal when
she grows up. For f six, the grandma has told
me that after all this is said and done and
my wife calms down, she will realize what she had
and what she gave up, since just over a year ago,
I was the best thing to happen to my wife.
Her words. Grandma said, not to be surprised if she

(14:31):
calls up trying to get me to watch the kids.
All my wife's and my friends who know me and
my part of the story are secretly rooting for me.
Part of the my wife gives them is threatening to
keep the kids from seeing them, saying that they are
not allowed to help me at all. The friends all
say I am the best man she ever had, and
in a roundabout way, insinuated I was too good for her.

(14:52):
I see that now. I realize now it wasn't my
fault for the fights, the arguments or the abuse. Hold on,
just quick, it's very proud of got out of the
vortex and you're seeing I couldn't have done anything to
prevent this, aside from me standing up for myself exactly. Yeah,
one hundred percent. I allowed this to happen by thinking
if I changed, she would love me like she used to.
I see that it was all an act now. But

(15:14):
ladies and gentlemen, we have the third and I think
final updates.

Speaker 3 (15:18):
Let's get into it.

Speaker 2 (15:19):
Okay, Sorry I didn't post the first part. Yesterday was busy,
A lot of crap went down. If you're still reading,
thank you. I know it's a long one and temporary
custody decision. Yesterday started rough. I had been hearing about
how my wife was planning to come at me. Pew
Pew's hot blasted me as a deadbeat dad and not
fit to care for her daughter. My wife was convinced

(15:40):
that I wasn't going to be there since she had
said that I could call into court for my appearance,
she thought she would get the judge to order me
back with my daughter. She also was convinced and told
everyone that I was stupid to hire a lawyer.

Speaker 3 (15:52):
Too stupid.

Speaker 2 (15:53):
Oh that I was too stupid to hire a lawyer.

Speaker 3 (15:55):
I wouldn't have hired a lawyer.

Speaker 2 (15:56):
Yeah, well, guys and girls, I came back to Indiana
with my daughter Let's go. My mom flew out with
me to help. My dad took out a loan against
his retirement to pay for my lawyer, and he also
set up a crowdfunding page to help with the leak fees.
Let's go. It was for family and friends. I'm not
going to plug it, but I'm thankful for all the
people who donated. I had never even met some of them.

(16:19):
The morning of the hearing, on the way to the courthouse,
I spent vomiting up stomach acid and bile for five minutes. Ooh,
I haven't eaten in two days. By then, I cleaned
up and we went to the courthouse. As we arrived
on the second floor, I saw her, my wife. I
was holding my daughter. I walked straight up to her
and said, hey, wife's name, here's your mommy baby girl.
My wife looked at me with the most perfect expression

(16:41):
on her face, total deer in headlights look. She didn't
say hi to her daughter, who she hadn't seen in
four weeks, by the way, She returned to what she
was doing, finishing writing her lawyer at check before taking
her daughter. She held her for about four to five
minutes before putting her on the ground. My daughter looked
at her, waiting for more interaction before coming back to
My wife and her lawyer left to discuss their plan

(17:02):
that I assume centered around me not being there. A
few minutes later, my lawyer came in and walked right
up to them and asked if they were ready to
review my counterpetition. I will never forget their reaction. They
both said, hit it, Sophia, cool, That's what they said.
He responded that he was my lawyer and we were
ready if they were. My wife apparently assured her lawyer

(17:26):
that I wouldn't get a lawyer myself. He flashed me
a big wink with a crap eating grin. He enjoyed
that ambush just as much as I did. While the
lawyers talked, I could see how angry my wife was.
I could almost hear her teeth grinding. After they talked,
they brought us to separate rooms. My lawyer told me
that they would try to settle since we got one
over them. They didn't prepare for me being there or

(17:48):
having a lawyer. Their whole case was they didn't even
come back in person for court. We settled in mediation.
I got three four seventy five percent custody of my daughter.
My wife gets her every week from two pm to
eight pm and alternating weekends. I completely ruined her plan
of getting one hundred percent child support. She had been
bad mouthing me and talking me down to her friends

(18:10):
and her family, telling them lies about me. But anyone
who knew me and my side of the story knew
she was full of crap. I'm curious to see how
she explains to them how an irresponsible idiot got more
custody of my daughter than she did. It seems like
more than twenty.

Speaker 3 (18:24):
Five Oh yeah, I like this way more more than
twenty five percent every weekday from.

Speaker 1 (18:28):
Two to eight.

Speaker 2 (18:29):
But I guess maybe he's working from that toy. But
I guess technically, if you have her the other what
would that be sixteen hours or something like.

Speaker 3 (18:38):
That, So you have her like when she's asleep.

Speaker 2 (18:40):
Basically, yeah, which is kind of I don't know.

Speaker 3 (18:42):
That's a weird custody agreement.

Speaker 2 (18:44):
She has had her since after the hearing. I'm already
going insane with worry. I don't know how she could
have gone and partied a day or two after I left.
I can't eat, her sleep, and all I think about
is my daughter. I get her back Sunday night. This
will be the longest weekend of my life.

Speaker 3 (18:59):
I will say, I think this is temporary custody. I
think they mentioned that this was a temporary custody agreement,
which makes a little bit more sense. Why it's like this. Yeah, yeah,
So maybe in the future, when they have the actual
custody agreement, it'll be a little different.

Speaker 2 (19:13):
Yeah, maybe that seventy five or yeah, maybe the seventy
five is part of the temporary nine percent. Sure, but
let us know what you think in comments. This is
only a small win in a long battle. I have
close to an impossible road ahead of me. I have
until Tuesday to find a place to live. I have
no money, no job, no car. But I do have
love for my daughter, and with that I will move

(19:35):
mountains for her and we will prevail.

Speaker 3 (19:37):
I mean, it's shocking that op got seventy five percent
custody with no job, no car, no house.

Speaker 2 (19:45):
You are bringing up a very good point, Mike.

Speaker 4 (19:48):
I mean it kind of to me shows how bad
she is.

Speaker 2 (19:53):
I also wonder how if he got money back from
the joint account, because I would assume legally you're entitled
to well.

Speaker 3 (19:59):
I think these are the divorce hearings. These are just
the custody hearings.

Speaker 2 (20:03):
Maybe just move back to the parents' house to plan
everything out, you know, like you know, I think, just
trying to get a job lining things up and you know.
But we have another update. I lied, I'm a big
fat liar.

Speaker 4 (20:15):
Let's read it.

Speaker 2 (20:16):
There's more. Okay, So, picking up off the last post,
I found a place for us to stay nice. That's great.
One of the daughters of the foe grandma and her boyfriend,
have opened up their house to me and my daughter.
That's awesome. We are both really grateful to them. We
currently go on one to two walks a day, and
earlier today we spent close to an hour just playing outside.

(20:36):
My daughter's mom started out strong with the custody hours,
but as I guessed, she started coming later and later.
Now it's an average of once a week that she
gets her and she's all but given up on the weekends.
So it's like I have full and total custody.

Speaker 3 (20:51):
I think someone mentioned that earlier. They were saying, like,
she's probably gonna like kind of just stop it out, yeah,
fade out, because she it doesn't seem like she wants
to take care of the kid in the first place.
It seems like she mostly just wanted custody to spite him.

Speaker 2 (21:05):
I totally agree. She brings her boyfriend every time she
comes to get our daughter. She refused to be cordial,
ignoring my wishes that she have a good day. Somehow
it's my fault that she has to drive out and
get our daughter. Her being inconsistent has really hindered me
though I have my daughter ready to leave before her
pickup time, but I have to wait three plus hours
to see if she really shows up, which, like you know,
OPI's probably working now or getting a job. That's very

(21:28):
you know, that's tough. She is inconsistent and may even
be doing it on purpose. I'm trying to be good
and have already on time, but it's really cutting into
my appointments. I now take my daughter with me to
my physical therapy because more often than not, my ex
won't pick her up. She is refusing to give me
my stuff, my clothes and other important items that I
left when my daughter and I took our trip to California.

(21:48):
She is also claiming that she has no money, so
she hasn't made her payments. She owes me a four
hundred dollars lump sum of child support. We agreed on
seven hundred and fifty in lieu of weekly child support,
but she somehow has money for new clothes, a new phone,
and a new smart watch.

Speaker 3 (22:05):
I feel like this is all information that you can
be taking stock of and bring back to another child.

Speaker 2 (22:10):
I have to imagine, and then the price goes up,
like all right, you interest, you decided not to pay me? Now,
all right, price going up? This is for our daughter.
I wonder how that works. Thankfully, I have people who
love my daughter, so she will never go without. I
have no money, and no one has given me a
callback for the jobs I've applied for, not that I
could work since I basically have my daughter twenty four

(22:30):
to seven, I have applied for unemployment. That was another
thing I'm gonna mention too, and am currently rolled in
school full time, but I've hit some roadblocks regarding my
gi bill.

Speaker 3 (22:39):
I also forgot. Oh he is a vet.

Speaker 2 (22:42):
Yeah, so maybe there's some opportunities there or something. He's
working on getting the GiB full school, which is great, hope,
maybe that should hopefully help. Maybe that a living stipend
or something.

Speaker 3 (22:51):
Usually, yeah, you can get like, you know, if you're
a better and you can get some sort of stipend
and some sort of funding. It's a bit hard, I
you know. Yeah, yeah, maybe like reaching out to.

Speaker 2 (23:02):
Worth looking into. But you know what else is worth
looking into? Sofia?

Speaker 1 (23:06):
What there are.

Speaker 2 (23:07):
Two thousand episodes of Okay story Time? But for some reason,
you right now haven't pulled out your phone gone to Spotify,
Apple or iHeart Podcast your favorite podcast app and search
Okay Storytime.

Speaker 3 (23:20):
That's so strange.

Speaker 2 (23:22):
What is wrong with you?

Speaker 3 (23:23):
You're telling me you're only listening to one episode of
Okay Storytime right now when you could be listening to
fifty four days worth of episodes at the same time.
Do better, It's too better.

Speaker 2 (23:34):
All right. So we have a little bit left in
the story here. So Opie says, my daughter's doing amazing.
She's surrounded by people who love her. She's walking so
good now and communicates more and more. She's getting so big.
It's night and day from before we left them. Now
she's getting more and more independent too, and she likes
to be in control. I'm hopefully not like your mother.
Oh god.

Speaker 1 (23:54):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (23:54):
My daughter is happy though, so I just need to
be strong for her. As for my divorce, I haven't
gotten to the next court yet, and my lawyer said
it isn't worth trying to change any temporary custody order,
so I just need to wait this out. It's hard
since I have to stay here in Indiana. If I
was in California, I would have my family, a job,
free college, and everything would be easier.

Speaker 3 (24:16):
Well, because probably he might be like in state because.

Speaker 2 (24:19):
The kid in access to the kid yeah yes, yeah, yeah,
So he can't leave to California with the kid to
be able to get all that stuff exactly because she's
still some custody, right.

Speaker 3 (24:29):
I'm just like, can you get more custody?

Speaker 2 (24:31):
I have to imaginef he says that to a judge like.

Speaker 3 (24:33):
Judge Jay, like, I have all of this access to stuff.
She doesn't even want the kid. She's not showing up
to pick up our child.

Speaker 2 (24:40):
So I'm stuck here probably for next sixteen years.

Speaker 1 (24:45):
I think you.

Speaker 3 (24:45):
Should go back get that little. I mean, you settled
in mediation, but like, is there any way that I
feel like you could have gotten more if you hadn't settled.
Maybe because it was cheaper.

Speaker 2 (24:54):
But that is it. That is literally all she wrote.

Speaker 4 (24:59):
I was spot having lunch with a co worker.

Speaker 1 (25:01):
My wife is furious have divorced for dessert.

Speaker 3 (25:05):
First of all, my workplace has three floors. One floor
has an evenish number of guys and girls. The other
two have mainly women. This new girl, Alice, joined a
few months ago. I didn't really know a whole lot
about her, but we have hung out in a few
Friday evenings after work drinking sessions. Not a whole lot
of interaction prior to that. We just chat on occasion

(25:25):
when we see each other at work, or if she
has to come to the floor I work on, or
I have to go down there. By the way, this
comes from Throwaway Just got food And if you want
to submit your own stories, go to the r slush
Oaki Storytime subburt it. So she is oware I am married?
They met briefly at a company event shortly after Alice
started working there. This was when I really first got

(25:46):
introduced her. Hell, most everyone here knows I'm married. Two
pictures on my desk or my family. Anyway, the other day,
I was heading to lunch when Alice asked me to
grab some lunch with her because she needed some advice.
I said, no problem. We went to Life. There's a
food court a couple of buildings away, so we went
there and I paid for both of us to grab
some Tai food. We chatted for a while, then she

(26:07):
began asking for advice, which was the purpose of grabbing
lunch together. She has a boyfriend. He's into fishing and
hiking and rock climbing that sort of thing.

Speaker 1 (26:15):
Ie.

Speaker 3 (26:16):
I like rock climbing.

Speaker 1 (26:17):
Too, so am I, so am I so am aw
not me.

Speaker 3 (26:23):
I don't like fishing though. Fishing is boring to me.
Oh couch, it's something my brothers and I, as well
as our sister grew up doing. One of the girls
on her floor mentioned that I'm into these things and
she should ask me because she wanted advice about what
kinds of gear to buy him for his birthday. She
wanted to buy him a compilation of equipment, some fishing gear,
some hiking, some climbing. So we chatted for a while

(26:43):
about that, and on her phone. I showed her some
supplies she could pick up for him and told her
if she needed more help, just ask. Then we went
back to work and that was it. So I came
home and forgot all about it, played with the kids,
watched television for a bit, washed the dishes, and that
was it. It wasn't something significant for me, so I
didn't mention it. Two days later, my wife Karen asks

(27:05):
me where I was for lunch that day, so I
told her, grabbing lunch with a coworker. She's angry, and
I'm pretty surprised as to why I just told her
Alice and I grabbed lunch. She wanted to help picking
presents for her boyfriend, who has similar interests that I
also have told her. I bought her lunch, We chatted,
I showed her some stuff she could buy on her phone,
and then we went back to work. I might as

(27:27):
well have dug my own grave, saying that she's been
absolutely furious the past couple of days, throwing scathing comments
and that sort of thing. I'm pretty hurt. I don't
see what I did wrong. Maybe not telling her immediately
was wrong, I guess, but I didn't do anything with
ill intent toward her or our marriage, so it just
didn't bother me. It also didn't help that her friend

(27:47):
saw us at the food court eating lunch, which was
who she heard it from. Now, the thing about Alice,
she's younger than Karen by eleven years and is a
typically attractive girl, perky and fairly cheerful.

Speaker 2 (28:00):
That's a weird word.

Speaker 3 (28:04):
Quite a few guys hit on her when we're at
those after work drinking sessions. So I guess this is
a factor because on Saturday, when I asked my wife
if she wanted to grab some dinner, I got a
very sullen.

Speaker 4 (28:16):
Maybe you should get lunch with Alice.

Speaker 3 (28:19):
In response, ewen nice a rock. Another time she did
mention maybe you just want a younger woman or something.
I don't. I love my life, I love my marriage.
I'm a faithful man. I don't think what I did
was wrong. I get her. Hearing it from a friend
made it sound much worse than it really was. Yes,
Alice is attractive and younger, but that doesn't matter to me. However,

(28:40):
it seems to bother my wife a lot. Was I
really wrong here? How can I address the situation? And
edit since this is apparently so important. Yes, I paid
for my coworkers lunch. I did it to break one
hundred dollar bill, and she did, in fact, repay me
immediately after. Okay, so Opie didn't even.

Speaker 2 (28:58):
Pay Nope is the gesture, Oh my goodness, and he
pulled out one hundred dollars bill to say like, hey,
I can take care of you. I am a male provider.
I even though you just paid me back a video.

Speaker 3 (29:11):
I didn't include this because where I'm from it's pretty
common for one person to pay for everyone's food. If
everyone is buying from the same place, then everyone else
just reimburses the cash afterward. Hope this clears up stuff
a little. That's what I do. That's what we always do.
Little venmo after situation. I didn't think it would be
such a huge issue. Edit too. Also, yes, I have
had lunch with coworkers before, sometimes in groups, sometimes just

(29:33):
one on one. Sometimes they're with guys, and sometimes they're
with female coworkers. This has never been an issue before,
which is also why I didn't mention it. It wasn't
important and it's not something that's bothered my wife before.
Just thought i'd put that in as well, and there
are some comments.

Speaker 4 (29:50):
But do you have any of your own comments?

Speaker 3 (29:52):
Because I sure do.

Speaker 2 (29:53):
I got an ICU.

Speaker 3 (29:55):
What's your ICU?

Speaker 2 (29:56):
I think maybe the old wife you o over there
has been seeing a Oh.

Speaker 4 (30:04):
You think a little bit of projection.

Speaker 2 (30:07):
Oh, like a classroom in the early two thousands.

Speaker 3 (30:09):
Hmm, that's true.

Speaker 2 (30:11):
I had projectors, that's true.

Speaker 1 (30:12):
Yeah, I got it, we were there.

Speaker 3 (30:14):
Never had that. Do you guys ever have the smartboard?

Speaker 1 (30:16):
Oh?

Speaker 2 (30:16):
Yeah, yeah, old shout out.

Speaker 1 (30:18):
To that common one.

Speaker 3 (30:19):
It sounds to me like her friend who spotted you
as given her a danging description of what you were
up to, which is coloring her reaction probably less oh
I saw your husband having lunch with some woman the
other day, and more like, hey, I saw your husband
at lunch with some hot young girl the other day.
They look pretty friendly, That's what I'm thinking. It sounds
like your wife is also possibly a bit insecure. I

(30:40):
mean the fact that she's saying like, oh, you want
a younger woman. Is that what you want?

Speaker 2 (30:44):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (30:45):
Whereas men have the stereotype of getting more attractive with age,
women are often seen as past their best once they
hit a certain point. She may be feeling sensitive about
her own appearance and declining youth, so hearing that you
got lunch with someone much younger likely prodded in already
sore spot for her. I just think about that today.
It's really messed up that like all these men they're like,
oh a silver fox, and every women are like either

(31:08):
too much boatox the commentary is either too much botox,
they look old.

Speaker 1 (31:12):
You can't win. Guys, stop it.

Speaker 3 (31:14):
Stop Stop giving women insecurities because then they accuse their
husbands of cheating on them.

Speaker 2 (31:19):
Can I tell you something? Men are ugly and.

Speaker 4 (31:21):
Are Wait that's not the takeaway.

Speaker 2 (31:24):
Yes it is. Yeah, I said it, and not taking
it back.

Speaker 1 (31:28):
Wait, John, are we ugly?

Speaker 2 (31:30):
Not us?

Speaker 1 (31:30):
Not us?

Speaker 2 (31:31):
The other men guys? So the other guys.

Speaker 1 (31:34):
Yeah, other men.

Speaker 3 (31:35):
I'm gonna say more of the story. Yes, I would
sit down with her and try to get her to
open up about why she's reacting like this. Does she
feel secure in the marriage? Is she genuinely worried that
she might be looking elsewhere? Or was she just embarrassed
that a friend thought you were up to no good?
Whatever it is, it helped to find the root of
why she feels like this, So you can work it
out with her, and comment too, did you ask her

(31:57):
why she was asking? It seems a bit odd to
ask days later. I personally don't think you did anything wrong.
I imagine you would have told her if she had asked
you that that evening how your day was. But I
wonder if a friend or colleague of hers saw you
two together, gave her a heads up and she's embarrassed
for one reason or another, and we already know that
the friend did ope. Another comment says you seem like
a very nice guy, but perhaps a bit oblivious. Your

(32:20):
wife's friend saw you with a younger woman mentioned it
to your wife because you never said a word to
her about it. Again, a valid mistake. And also I
think it happened like day of I think it's yeah,
like Opie got home and his wife was like, what
did you get up to today, and he's like, oh,
I had lunch with a coworker.

Speaker 2 (32:34):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (32:35):
So I don't even think that's like admitting anything.

Speaker 2 (32:38):
That's just And I believe when he says like, I
didn't think I did anything wrong?

Speaker 3 (32:42):
Yeah, no, you didn't. Yeah, it's like you don't have
anything to apologize for. You didn't do anything. Now, she
looks like a fool in front of her friends. Adding
on to the fact that she knows exactly who this
woman is. Anne has met her before and was already
feeling insecure about it. Another time, she did mention maybe
you just want a younger woman or something in her mind.
I bet she thinks Slash knows that this friend didn't

(33:04):
just mention it to her. She's probably feeling embarrassed because
she has to admit to her friend that the two
of you don't communicate because she has no idea this
was going on. Maybe that's in her mind, is what
the comment are saying. Add it on to the fact
that you never mentioned to her. I think this commentary
didn't really read a piece post is. I feel like
Opie mentioned that this all happened in the.

Speaker 2 (33:20):
Same day commenter, get it together, Get it together.

Speaker 3 (33:24):
I'm not saying what you did was wrong, but looking
at it from her perspective I think will help you
moving forward. Opie says, I have looked at it from
her perspective, but talking to her about the situation has
been difficult because she's been pretty aggressive the last few days.
Another poster said I should just wait for her to
mellow down before talking it out, and there is an update. Oh,
but I do have one thought. I think this is

(33:47):
not at all anywhere near a divorce, Like we're not
in that territory.

Speaker 2 (33:51):
At all, or or are we?

Speaker 3 (33:54):
Wow, John's got a strong I see you there. But
I think that right now, this this is just like
your wife is clearly dealing with some insecurities. I don't
think this is a point where we need to belittle her.
She's not doing a good job at communicating. But I
think you can go to her and be like, I
love you. I don't have eyes for anyone else. I
just want to like really affirm that. So it's been

(34:14):
a few days since everything happened, and Karen and I
have talked things out. One of the first things I
asked was why she got so angry about me having
lunch with my coworker. The op and its responses pretty
much gave me a solid idea, but I wanted to
hear it from her. At first, she said she didn't know,
but after a while of not saying anything, she admitted
that she'd been having a hard time at work lately,

(34:37):
and given that we'd both been busy, plus hearing from
her friend that she saw me with some young, hot
girl laughing at lunch made me feel like crap. She
admitted that she got really insecure and afraid at the
thought of me carrying on with the coworker and the
fact that she was younger and that her friend described
Alice as hot didn't help at all.

Speaker 2 (34:55):
Oh no, she's hot, good re friend John.

Speaker 3 (35:00):
She said that having kids, plus a hard time at work,
plus gaining a few pounds nothing significant at all, made
her feel threatened at the thought of someone younger who
hadn't been through.

Speaker 1 (35:09):
All of that.

Speaker 3 (35:10):
She said she should have known I'd never do something
like that, and that never once in her marriage had
I ever given a reason to think that. I told
her that once again, the reason why Alice and I
had lunched that day, and even showed her some of
the stuff I showed Alice to purchase for her ESSO.
By the way, I can show you how to listen
to full episodes and stories just like this. All you
need to go do is go to Spotify, Apple Podcasts,

(35:33):
or iHeartRadio and search a Pocus story time.

Speaker 2 (35:35):
I love it.

Speaker 3 (35:36):
I've showed you how, But there is a literle bit
left to the story, do me final thoughts?

Speaker 2 (35:40):
You know what we communicated.

Speaker 3 (35:41):
I love to see a little tiff turns into nothing
with a little bit of communication.

Speaker 2 (35:46):
So you're feeling, so I feeling And then yeah, you
always anytime when someone said, you're like, oh, yeah, I
get that.

Speaker 5 (35:51):
You know.

Speaker 3 (35:51):
It didn't exactly go back to normal asap, but she
did apologize for lashing out and not giving me an
opportunity to explain myself, as well as not trusting me.
Since then, we've had a couple of date nights in
the past five days left, the kids with the sitter,
had some thinner et cetera, et cetera. All in all,
things are back to normal and are better than before.
In other news, Alice mentioned that her boyfriend loves the

(36:14):
gear I suggested she buy for him, and comments comment
one says, by the way, your wife's friend sounds to
me like a catty witch. I would never say yours
et thou was out with a young hot chick. I
would say, oh, by the way, I saw your esso
at lunch yesterday, and then slowly introduce it to prevent
automatic suspicion. Part of this was caused by her being
a bad friend. I agree but that is also the

(36:36):
end of this story.

Speaker 2 (36:37):
Oh hey, it's Sam. We're going to get back to
the stories, but here's three minutes of bads from our sponsors.

Speaker 3 (36:43):
I had an affair with my brother's girlfriend. It tore
my family apart.

Speaker 1 (36:48):
You're the cheater, I mean, no, you're the cheaty. No,
you're the worst person.

Speaker 3 (36:52):
When I was in my mid twenties, my younger brother,
Ezra nineteen, went away to an out of state school.
I had just finished my own stay at my university,
so I went back home to find an apartment close
to my family. Ezra's girlfriend, Melanie nineteen, also stayed behind
to study at a local college. She and I would
hang out once in a while. I didn't realize at

(37:13):
first that I was playing with fire by doing this.

Speaker 1 (37:15):
Yes you did, Yes you do.

Speaker 3 (37:19):
By the way, this comes from husband, father, brother, and
if you want to submit your own stories, go to
the r slash. Okay, story time suffered at so Haufabrethor
Melanie and I got closer. We would go to the movies,
grab a bite, and hang out at family dinners. Ezra
couldn't be there, but my dad would extend invites to Melanie,
who Ezra dated all throughout high school. They planned to

(37:41):
be married after school, so she was family. My dad
also remarried, so we were trying to build new bonds
with his new wife and her kids, one of whom
was close in age to Melanie. I guess things began
to get messy when my dad's new wife started to
comment that I looked better with Melanie.

Speaker 1 (37:59):
You know what you do? You shut that down.

Speaker 3 (38:01):
I had a stable job and was ready to start
my life and settle down. Melanie was offended at first,
but as we grew closer, she began to make similar comments.

Speaker 1 (38:11):
What you shut this down?

Speaker 3 (38:14):
I'm sorry?

Speaker 1 (38:15):
Why are we not shutting this down?

Speaker 2 (38:17):
Why are we?

Speaker 5 (38:17):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (38:17):
She began to make similar comments about she looked better
with you than her boyfriend, Ezra would come down for
the summer or some weekends where they would still sleep
together and function like a couple because they are a couple,
because they're dating each other. Stop like a couple. Oh man,
there's no similes here. When he would leave, she would

(38:40):
be with me, you suck.

Speaker 2 (38:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (38:44):
Things got physical one night after I reacted jealously at
her and Ezra snuggling up her snuggling up with her boyfriend.
It was the turning point that I'd been waiting on.
I know now that I was wrong, and I'm not
proud of any of this. My dad and his wife
were at odds over our life relationship. My dad was
actually furious with me and demanded we stop good on

(39:04):
your dad unless he doesn't tell your brother. Melanie was
disinvited from family dinners smart and my dad reached out
to my mom to inform her about us. My dad's
wife had an opposite opinion. I have another sibling six
in total, all brothers, Aaron, who suspected something was off.
Things came to a head when Aaron took Ezra aside

(39:25):
during a visit to let him know what he learned
from who knows where. Aaron has always had it out
for me, or so I believe, another story for another day.
Get over yourself, Ophie, I'm sorry Aaron has it out
for you. So he told Ezra that you are cheating
with his girlfriend.

Speaker 1 (39:44):
Get over yourself.

Speaker 2 (39:46):
What are you doing?

Speaker 3 (39:47):
But what happened after set my whole life in motion
in the direction it's been for the last decade. It's
been just over ten years since Ezra discovered what we
had done. And set the whole family on fire.

Speaker 1 (40:00):
Oh ten years, ten years?

Speaker 5 (40:05):
What?

Speaker 1 (40:05):
Wow?

Speaker 3 (40:06):
He had to go at our parents and my dad's
wife for her involvement, and there's silence, and then he
just left. Yeah, I'd be pretty pissed if my parents
didn't tell me that my sibling.

Speaker 1 (40:15):
Was cheating with my partner. Oh, it sounds like a
personal problem.

Speaker 3 (40:19):
It sounds like a NDS like you need to get over.

Speaker 1 (40:21):
It sounds like a skill issue.

Speaker 3 (40:22):
It took a while, maybe a few months, eight but
he left and I have yet to ever see him
again because you betrayed him those eight months. I was
not a kind person.

Speaker 2 (40:33):
I was just cheating.

Speaker 3 (40:35):
After Melanie was embarrassed and mistreated by Ezra for cheating,
I immediately took her in. Wow, that's so unexpected of you.
You took it in the person that you were cheating me.

Speaker 1 (40:47):
This has to be bait. This is crazy.

Speaker 3 (40:50):
And we became official. Did we find this on am?
I the devil? Our family disapproved for a while, but
eventually they came around. She felt pregnant and I proposed
her parents and my parents learned of this and agreed
that it was best for the baby that we marry,
so they paid for everything. It was a humble wedding,
but my family pulled through for me and showed up.

(41:10):
During this time, Aaron continued to lecture my parents about
their involvement with our relationship and abandonment of Ezra. I
understood that he was in pain and needed them. I
did too. I was becoming a new father and husband.

Speaker 1 (41:24):
What is this story? Is this story? What is this story?

Speaker 3 (41:28):
I was looking into buying my first home or starting
my first big job, and planning a wedding. I didn't
expect Ezra to suck it up, but they are my
parents too. My parents were preoccupied with us, so much
so that Ezra moved a few towns over and we
didn't notice until a month or so. We used to
see him around town where he worked, but we noticed
we stopped seeing him. I reached out, only to find

(41:51):
his number was changed. Aaron was no help, just criticisms
and warnings about Ezra's well being, no kind.

Speaker 4 (41:57):
Words for me, Melanie or our child.

Speaker 3 (42:00):
Although what he lost to brothers in actuality, what do
you expect?

Speaker 1 (42:04):
Congrats on taking my girlfriend and having a baby with her. Dude.

Speaker 3 (42:11):
Eventually, our wedding grew closer and the invitations were sent out.
No response from Ezra and aeron this is bait, which
I expected, so I asked my mom to verify with them.
I understood if the answer was no. If if, what
we found was they were completely gone. Aaron had a
longtime girlfriend who RSVP'd no to our wedding and clammed

(42:34):
up about where my brothers went off to. Yeah, I'm
sure your brother Ezra doesn't want you to find out
if he has a new partner given what you did
with the last one.

Speaker 1 (42:44):
I mean, she wasn't doing ith One.

Speaker 3 (42:46):
Aunt, the one who would often echo Aaron's comments and
skipped out on my wedding, let us know that they
were safe and that we needed to move on. So
that was that. Sad to say, I haven't seen them
in ten years. My parents were obviously distraught and regretful.
It put a huge damper on our wedding and the
birth of my child. We thought about combining their names

(43:08):
as a middle name for my son, but ultimately decided no.
They would likely never meet my kids, so no need
to confuse them. However, watching my parents break down whenever
family would get together took its toll.

Speaker 4 (43:24):
Anyone who knew where they were.

Speaker 3 (43:26):
Did not say. It remains a great cloud over our
lives to this day. I thought we had moved on
by the time Mel and I had another kid. My
parents seemed happy to be with me and my remaining brothers,
and they saw that Mel and I were serious about
our relationship. An ideal match.

Speaker 1 (43:43):
Now they saw it was serious.

Speaker 3 (43:46):
Soon enough, though, my mom decided to voice her regrets
to me and Melanie personally. When she found out about
our relationship, she was staunchly against us, but came around
when Mel felt pregnant.

Speaker 1 (43:57):
Came around.

Speaker 3 (44:01):
Now she believes that she made a mistake where she
lost two sons. Her relationship with mel has suffered greatly.
My dad's family is much more welcoming to mel She's
one of their own. My dad does miss his sons,
but also loves his grandkids. He was content with this
for a long time until my mom went ahead and
located erin in Ezra. It hurt to feel that she

(44:21):
would prefer to have held on to them and lose
me and my sons in the process. She found that
they were both married, Aaron to his longtime girlfriend who
eventually moved away years ago, and Ezra to an unknown woman.
Both have a good amount of children, more than I have.
In fact, my mother got some therapy and reached out
to my brothers and has made contact with Ezra. Aaron

(44:42):
declined to reconcile, so she's been in contact with him
for a year, even going as far as taking my
youngest brothers with her to spend Christmas with Ezra and
his family. I've seen pictures of his sons and daughters
and his wife too. I thought to keep a lot
of this from my dad, but I come from he
gossipy family, so I did show them what I found

(45:03):
on my mom's Facebook. Before they could, my dad was
overcome again, as if the wound was freshly exposed. He
felt he missed a lot and couldn't bear it. He
looked at the images for a long time and eventually
called my mom and they spoke for hours. By the way,
you can listen to full episodes with stories just like

(45:24):
this for hours. Just go to Spotify, Apple Podcast, or
iHeartRadio and search a Pokey story time. So I sit
here with fractured relationships everywhere, and that you caused.

Speaker 5 (45:35):
Good job.

Speaker 3 (45:36):
My mom does not approve of me and my family.
Mel and my mom do not speak my dad is heartbroken.
Ezra and Aaron took off and build a life with
their own families. From pictures, it seems they are still close,
and though Aaron does not speak to our mother, his
wife and kids do the rest of my siblings are
young men just coming into their own I love them
so much, but I can't relate to them like I

(45:58):
relate to my brothers, who are closer in aid, It's
been years since I've had to deal with what my
actions have caused. At least you know they're caused by
your actions. My wife is beginning to get insecure about
my feelings towards her. She wonders if I regret her
and the kids. I want to fix this. I failed
to fix it before, but I need to now. I
don't know how to repair it, though. How can I

(46:19):
make amends for a marriage and life I don't regret.

Speaker 1 (46:22):
We have comments, We have comments, we have comments, and
it's literally mister Frog from smiling friends. He goes, hello,
but I'm not sorry.

Speaker 4 (46:31):
Comment one.

Speaker 1 (46:32):
Do I apologize for this thing? I'm not sorry for it.

Speaker 3 (46:36):
I it took you ten years to realize you may
have fed up, and you still sound entitled. How do
you even manage that. The whole story is a But you,
your now esra' is the bad guy because he wasn't there.
I say, why would he be there for.

Speaker 1 (46:52):
A stake like you.

Speaker 3 (46:54):
You were the one who implode your family. Not only
you betrayed him as a brother, but also your darling
wife with who you cheated on him with. Why would
he want anything to do with you? You both betrayed
him in so many ways that it really effed him up.
I'm glad for him he had Aaron to look after him.
And then then when he moved at you didn't even notice.

(47:14):
You didn't care. You don't even care now. You don't
want to reconcile for his well being or your parents
well being. No, you want to reconcile so nobody bothers
you about what happened and you and your wife can
live with no burden on your conscious I could go
on and on about how trash you are, but really
it's a waste of time. Good for your brothers to
cut out as toxic person as you are from their lives.

(47:38):
Leave them alone. You will continue to live with the
consequences of your actions even if you do contact them.
Comment two did you ever apologize for betraying him in
the worst way a brother can. Personally, you come across
as unapologetic. Ope, he says, a lot of people seem
to think I'm not sorry, or that I'm playing the victim.

Speaker 1 (47:58):
I swear I'll I'm not sorry, no regrets, not sorry.

Speaker 3 (48:01):
I swear I didn't mean to. I will bring this
post to my therapist so she can show me what
I can't see. You can't get a new therapist if
you don't if you haven't already gone over.

Speaker 1 (48:09):
This therapist you've been lying to.

Speaker 3 (48:11):
I tried to apologize so many times before he left.
I admit that I was a butt during that time
as well, so maybe the way I tried to make
amends didn't work because of that.

Speaker 1 (48:20):
I'm sorry I took your girl and now I have
kids with her. I'm so sorry you coulabreak up with her. Sorry,
probably agree more a lot.

Speaker 3 (48:28):
Of emotionally charged responses here. Going to try a less
angry Appliply, Unfortunately, you can't put the toothpaste back in
the tube. Though you may have failed to think the
decision through at the time, you made a decision to
have a relationship with your now wife, and give up
your relationship with your brother. Realistically, I don't see how

(48:48):
you could have expected a different outcome.

Speaker 1 (48:50):
He thought everyone was gonna you know, Yes, we're one big,
happy family. Kumbaiah.

Speaker 2 (48:54):
This is great.

Speaker 3 (48:55):
Betraying your brother also had the consequences of making your
family members two.

Speaker 1 (48:58):
Sides impossible task.

Speaker 3 (49:01):
In your conflict, again, you decided tearing your family apart
was worth it if you could be with your with
your brother's girlfriend now your wife. Looking back, you seem
to be realizing the actual choices you made. I would
regret the casualties of my family relationships as well. If
you want to write your brother some letters, by all means.

Speaker 1 (49:19):
Go ahead.

Speaker 3 (49:20):
I think your best bet is to move on and
try to be the best you you can be, best dad,
best husband, best son. You can't unmake the past, but
you can make your future. I feel for you, dude,
even if you were a gigantic a hole ten years ago.
If I could think of some advice to help you
put your family back together, I'd give it to you.
I just don't think it's possible.

Speaker 2 (49:40):
Yeah, but that is.

Speaker 3 (49:41):
The end of that story.

Speaker 2 (49:44):
Hey, it's Sam. We'll get back to the stories. But
here's three minutes of ads from our sponsors.

Speaker 4 (49:49):
My boyfriend's family is unsupportive of our relationship.

Speaker 1 (49:52):
They got cut off.

Speaker 4 (49:54):
Get out of here and trigger warning there is some
involved in this story. So I'm Indian descent. My boyfriend
and his family are Filipino. He and I have been
together for about five months.

Speaker 1 (50:06):
Shout out to no.

Speaker 6 (50:09):
Boy behind the camera Keon. He is half Filipino, so
he can half relate to this.

Speaker 1 (50:15):
I cannot half related.

Speaker 4 (50:16):
No. By the way, this comes from random person, and
if you want to submit your own stories, go to
the r slash past storytime separated it. So now, I'm
very from a multicultural city, so I've dated outside my
race before, but it's never really been a problem until now.
I had reservations about dating him because I knew his
family was devout Catholic, his parents and younger sister, not him.

Speaker 1 (50:36):
I had a feeling it would be difficult to.

Speaker 4 (50:38):
Find common ground with them, but I decided to go
for it despite that because I like him and I
can honestly see a future with him if things between
us stay on track. I'm fine with the occasional ignorant
remark when it comes to spicy food cab drivers, convenience
store clerks, and whatever other Indian stereotypes there are. But
his family doesn't make the occasional dumb joke. They make
it personal, as though they want me to be uncomfort

(51:00):
blatant racial discrimination. The things his family has said to me,
I don't even know where to start. His mother and
sister are very subtle about it, but at the same
time not really. I'm a little darker than them, which
I don't think is an issue at all, but to
them it is. They always make remarks about how dark
I am, how interesting it is that I'm still considered
pretty even though I'm dark, et cetera.

Speaker 1 (51:20):
Oh my gosh, what oh. I have a feeling about
this Filipino family.

Speaker 4 (51:25):
Being Indiana, I've dealt with colorism within my own culture before,
so I know how to brush it aside and not
take it personally. But then his mother gave me face
cream and soape that's the most to make your skin lighter.
She basically wants me to bleach my skin lmao. My
boyfriend was really embarrassed when that happened and had to
talk with his mother about never doing anything like that again,

(51:46):
and she listened. At first, but then it started again.
She her husband and their daughter treat me like I
grew up in a jungle or something. They just assume
my parents are uneducated and don't speak proper English because
of our race. The truth is, my parents are lawyers
and have lived in Canada since the seventies. Their English
is better than mine, and I've lived here my entire life.
But even if they were fresh off the boat, what

(52:06):
right does that give anyone to judge them. This type
of treatment is common from wealthy and or upper middle class.
I'm just going to say it white people. But his
parents don't fit that description at all. They're Filipino. They
run a few Filipino grocery stores in the city, and
they went through their own struggles when they immigrated here
in the early nineties, So why attack another minority.

Speaker 1 (52:26):
It doesn't make sense.

Speaker 5 (52:27):
Also, you know hot take here?

Speaker 1 (52:30):
Okay it?

Speaker 2 (52:32):
Oh please?

Speaker 6 (52:33):
I do see this remarks on the discriminatory Also, I
feel like it's hierarchy. Whenever some people are better off
than other people, they just want to put other people down,
and I feel like they have the right to do
it instead of being kind and loving people.

Speaker 4 (52:46):
So maybe they're just grasping at straws of how to insult.

Speaker 5 (52:49):
I think so.

Speaker 6 (52:50):
I think they just like putting people down, and you know,
probably from things from the past. They were put down before,
so it feels like, you know, it's a natural sackle
to put other people down, and it's such a hard
thing to break in such a you know, messed up
world we live in, sure, but it's just so sad
to see that it's happening in real time.

Speaker 5 (53:07):
Yeah. Yeah, ugh.

Speaker 4 (53:08):
It's clear that they would prefer that he ate a
light skin Asian girl, and that's fine, but at this
point they've attacked my skin color, my family's financial background,
my morals, my hygiene, and my intelligence all because I'm Indian.

Speaker 1 (53:21):
And darker than them.

Speaker 3 (53:22):
Ah.

Speaker 4 (53:23):
My boyfriend is on the verge of cutting them off,
and even though I do think it would be a
good wake up call for them, I feel bad because
they're still his family. His dad isn't that bad, but
I'm sure half the things his mother said is on
his dad's behalf. His sister is a nightmare, and I'm
pretty confident that she's a little jealous of me. I
do well for myself career wise, and I drive a
nice car, and I don't have solid evidence, but I'm

(53:45):
about ninety percent sure that she.

Speaker 1 (53:47):
Keyed my car on Christmas.

Speaker 4 (53:49):
I dropped by his parents' house that afternoon to pick
him up on the way to my parents' Christmas party.
He needed help loading some gifts into the trunk, so
I popped inside for a minute. His sister was in
the driveway at the time fixing something in her car.
When I came back, she was gone, and there was
a huge scratch on my car that ran the entire
length of the passenger side. Someone had to obviously keep it,
and I know for sure the scratch was not there before.

(54:11):
I feel bad for automatically thinking she's responsible, but I
wouldn't put it past any of them. At this point,
I haven't told my boyfriend the truth. I led him
to believe that someone had keeped the car outside of
my building. I don't want to put him in an
even worse position than he already is in, because honestly,
I'm not losing sleep over this.

Speaker 1 (54:27):
I've dealt with before.

Speaker 4 (54:28):
I had the crap punted out of me in high
school because of my race, so this isn't really that
huge to me. More of an inconvenience than anything.

Speaker 6 (54:36):
Oh my gosh, yeah, because it seems like you come
to this, this thing happens before. I've already got the
crap beat out of me before. This is nothing. But
it's gonna have to come to you every Christmas. Every Christmas,
you're gonna have to deal with this family if you're
still with this guy. Yeah, unless he decides stick up
for you and be like, hey, I'm I'm out of here.
We're done, We're not doing this anymore.

Speaker 3 (54:55):
You don't have to put up with it just because
you've had worse in the past.

Speaker 4 (54:57):
I don't think he's seen this side of them, for
he is more hurt by all of this than I am.
And I understand why he brought someone home, thinking his
family would be supportive of the relationship. But all they've
done is say and do things to make me feel
uncomfortable and at times disgusting. He was in shock at first,
he didn't know how to react or what to do,
but he's pretty much reached his limit. I don't want

(55:18):
to steer him in either direction. I want him to
decide on his own so he doesn't end up presenting
me later. He's tried talking to them about it, but
they don't take his concerns seriously. What's worse than the
way they treat me is the way that they treat him.
He's their flesh and blood and they still disrespect.

Speaker 3 (55:32):
Him like this.

Speaker 4 (55:33):
It makes me angry just thinking about it. Should I
tell him about the keying incident? Or should I just
go with the flow and stay out of it. I'm
interested to know if anyone else has experienced a situation
like this, and if so, how did you handle it?
Did the relationship stay afloat?

Speaker 5 (55:46):
Angie?

Speaker 6 (55:47):
If my family didn't like you, would you want to
come to Christmas with us?

Speaker 1 (55:51):
I would definitely not feel welcomed.

Speaker 5 (55:53):
Yeah, absolutely not? Yeah, absolutely no.

Speaker 6 (55:55):
I think you got to sit down, like, hey, boyfriend,
I am not going to put up with all of
my holidays looking like this. I know, like I don't
want my key to be card every Thanksgiving or Christmas?

Speaker 5 (56:07):
And what are you gonna do about this? Yeah?

Speaker 1 (56:10):
Yeah?

Speaker 5 (56:10):
Are they gonna come off yeah, or at.

Speaker 4 (56:12):
Least bring it up as like a possible thing, like
because I mean, it's hard because it looks like the
boyfriend is doing something which in a lot of the
stories that we read, it's like the boyfriend is just
you know, ignoring the problem.

Speaker 1 (56:22):
But he's not.

Speaker 4 (56:23):
He's like standing up to his parents, but they're.

Speaker 1 (56:25):
Just dismissing him too.

Speaker 5 (56:26):
Yeah, they're just out of this.

Speaker 6 (56:28):
Is this relationship worth going no contact with that side
of the family. If not, might need a break up
or you know, kind of find other situations. But I'm
leading on either breaking up or he goes no contact.
But that's huge ask for your partner.

Speaker 4 (56:43):
But anyway, there is an edit and an update here
edits things are getting ugly in the comments. There's no
reason to suggest an act of racial discrimination against his family.

Speaker 1 (56:51):
Two wrongs don't make it right, et cetera.

Speaker 4 (56:53):
The issue is that his family is discriminatory, not that
they're Filipino or that I'm.

Speaker 1 (56:58):
Dating down whatever the heck. That means.

Speaker 4 (57:00):
I included their racial background in the OPI to give
you an idea as to the social norms that could
very well play a part in all of this. I
don't think I'm better than him or his family. Please
keep that in mind. And with that, I think we
should just roll right into the update.

Speaker 5 (57:13):
Head first in a five foot deep pool.

Speaker 4 (57:16):
Before the actual update, I'd like to touch on a
few things boyfriend and I haven't been in a relationship
for long. It's only been five months, but we've known
each other for quite a while. We met two years
ago through mutual friends and went to the same parties,
get togethers, et cetera. So there is a level of
history and understanding there. I'm from Vancouver. Over here, there
isn't much of a difference between the average South Indian
and the average Filipino in terms of the socioeconomic scale.

(57:39):
We're pretty much the same. Doesn't matter either way, just
painting a more vivid picture. Our parents have never been introduced.
There have been a few occasions where they could have met,
but I've tried my best to avoid it for now.
If I annoy his family so much, I can only
imagine how bad my lawyer parents would annoy them.

Speaker 1 (57:55):
They annoy me half the time. Hahaha.

Speaker 4 (57:57):
Maybe it wasn't clear in the original post, but I'm
not around his family every day or even every other day.
I'd say about once or twice a month on average.
And he doesn't live with them, He has his own place.
The reason I picked him up from their house on
Christmas is because he was staying there over the holidays.

Speaker 3 (58:12):
Last but not least.

Speaker 4 (58:14):
Boyfriend has been sticking up for me throughout this whole ordeal.
He hasn't once led anything slide. I know for sure
he would not have letting the keying slide had I
told him from the jump. For that reason, I kept
it quiet. The last thing I wanted was for him
to confront her without evidence. What if she didn't actually
do it. I mean, I'm pretty sure she did, but
still they don't get along to begin with. His sister

(58:35):
has always been very competitive with him in terms of
who looks better to their parents. I'm sure that's a
part of the reason that she has taken their parents' side.
She wants their approval. Maybe that said, I ended up
telling him about the kying incident last night, regardless of
how weird it felt to talk about something that happened
a month ago. And the funny thing is he wasn't shocked.

Speaker 5 (58:52):
Oh no, oh no, that's just my mom. You know,
we're all your tires filled up? Okay, good, good god?
Oh okay?

Speaker 3 (59:01):
So doshabull of that.

Speaker 4 (59:02):
Even worse, he told me he hand suspected as much
at the time, and had actually asked his sister about it.
A day or two after Christmas, she flat out denied it,
and although he didn't believe her, there wasn't much he
could do. I haven't seen his family since the holidays,
but a cousin of his with whom I went to
high school and have known for a really long time,
she inmighted beat her engagement in her. I suspect I'll

(59:24):
see his sister and parents there. Kind of unavoidable, really,
but yeah, we'll see how that goes.

Speaker 1 (59:29):
And by the way, what's absolutely.

Speaker 4 (59:32):
Unavoidable is the fact that we have full episodes, more
stories just like this one on Spotify. iHeartRadio, Apple Podcast,
whatever your favorite podcast app is. Just search okay, storytime.
I was on Audible the other day and I searched
us up and sure enough, we were there.

Speaker 1 (59:46):
We were there, were audible, We're run audible.

Speaker 4 (59:49):
Yeah, there's a little bit more into the story, but
what are our thoughts?

Speaker 5 (59:52):
So I didn't get anything from that.

Speaker 4 (59:54):
It was kind of just like adding more to it's
like what we already know.

Speaker 5 (59:58):
I was hoping some threat down, you know, he's gonna
cut off family.

Speaker 2 (01:00:02):
Noah.

Speaker 5 (01:00:02):
I was like, basically, hey, mom, did you keep your car?

Speaker 2 (01:00:05):
Is its?

Speaker 5 (01:00:06):
Hey?

Speaker 6 (01:00:06):
Sister, did you get your car No, Well, dang, all right,
I guess I'm gonna see him soon.

Speaker 3 (01:00:11):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:00:11):
I feel like op is going about this in a
good way, though I think it definitely would come across
like it would probably make things worse if she was
like the sister did it, like everyone get get her,
get him, get him everyone, And then like, you know,
she didn't say anything.

Speaker 5 (01:00:27):
Yeah, she knows she's not the problem.

Speaker 4 (01:00:28):
Yeah, and the boyfriend knew anyway. So it's like the
problem is already being addressed, even though it's not solved.
It being addressed, but she doesn't have any like part
in it.

Speaker 5 (01:00:39):
Yeah, you know, she's just the victim.

Speaker 1 (01:00:40):
But there is a little bit more to the story.

Speaker 4 (01:00:42):
So in the meantime, he told me he's one hundred
percent done with his family's crap.

Speaker 1 (01:00:46):
No family dinners or visits.

Speaker 4 (01:00:48):
According to him, the only way to get the message
across is to do something like this. He's tried talking
sense into them multiple times, but they don't care. Hopefully
all goes well, and thank you so much for all
your advice. And it's a shaking my head. This is
in India versus Philippines. If you want to take it there,
kindly f off I know plenty of Filipinos who are
amazing people, and my boyfriend is obviously one of them.

Speaker 1 (01:01:10):
So is key on. Let's go.

Speaker 4 (01:01:19):
Oh and someone here does in the Philippines double edits.
Let's not crap on an entire nation. Yeah, that's the
basis of this entire issue.

Speaker 1 (01:01:29):
That people judge a whole group of.

Speaker 4 (01:01:30):
People based on a few crappy encounters. To any Filipinos out.

Speaker 1 (01:01:34):
There, y'all are great. Your spaghetti is bomb, it is,
it's so good.

Speaker 4 (01:01:38):
Do not take the negative comments to heart. Much love,
and that's the end of that story.

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