u/Alternative-Ad6055

Hi everyone! I am taking a friend out tonight who is recently divorced. We are looking for friends who want to meet up and chat over dinner. We both met on timeleft and are comfortable meeting new people, but we both left the app recently.

We both like music, trying new food, comedy shows, craft cocktails. We are looking for folks in a similar life stage — late 30s/early 40s, established in Portland with stable jobs, outgoing, and wants to experience Portland’s great foodie scene.

Bonus points if you can easily move from a conversation about your favorite music venue to the implications of AI on the workforce. If this sounds like you, would love to chat!

I’ve been having a rough couple weeks. I usually walk around my neighborhood to clear my mind. This morning I decided to walk around lacamas lake. It was quiet, barely any people on the trail. There was an older couple that walked past me, presumably husband and wife. The woman had a beaming smile on her face as I walked by. The type of smile you’d expect from someone who is so happy to see you. That smile from her changed the trajectory of my entire day. I felt seen and safe. I’m still thinking about that random act of kindness tonight. And now I’ve decided that I will smile like that at everyone I see on the trail. Pay it forward ❤️

This community has been really helpful for me through my most recent limerence episode. I recently went NC with my LO who I had a great friendship with. We were coworkers. Some boundaries were crossed (we are both in relationships) and I couldn’t continue with the friendship because it was eating at my mental health. I went NC 6 months ago. It was HARD cutting off contact and severing the uncertainty/hope. Not to mention changing habits of calling/texting and rewiring my brain to stop the limerent thoughts. But each day it got better and better, and with the help of therapy, I was getting back to my normal self. I was focusing on healing areas of my life that needed to be healed.

Well… my LO randomly called me out of the blue yesterday. We had an hour long conversation just catching up on life. After we ended the call, I had a pit in my stomach that wouldn’t subside for hours. I was dysregulated. Almost like the limerence anxiety came crashing back all at once. I hated that feeling and didn’t want to fall back into the vicious addiction cycle. Today, I’m feeling much more resolved in my decision to go NC months ago. I am more vigilant about my emotional state and feel mentally stronger to not get sucked back in.

For anyone struggling with NC please know there is light at the end of the tunnel! It takes time and it can be painful but it’s worth the work you put into it.

H and I (both 39) have been together for 10 years, married for 6. We have a nonverbal autistic 4.5 year old. There’s always been core issues in our relationship but everything exacerbated when our son was born.

H makes more money than me. We both work full time. H works 3 hours away so he is gone Tuesday through Thursday every week. My son is in ABA and daycare and has a good routine.

We are in marriage counseling. My husband admitted recently that he knows there’s a big disparity in our marriage — I am the person that runs the household, is responsible for most things around the house and for our son. Positives: my husband takes out the trash every week. He cooks when he wants to. He plays with our son. He is optimistic and we get along when there’s no stress. He takes my son to school and picks him up Monday and Friday. I can’t think of anything else he is primarily responsible for. We pay bills together.

I am more handy, quick, responsible, emotionally intelligent - H would agree to this. I’ve been lifting him up in every way in our relationship/marriage and it’s all feeling incredibly lop sided. He says I am not warm or kind to him anymore. How can I be when I am the one teaching him how to install blinds, cook chicken, approach team meetings, and engage with our son? There is nothing he can do or teach me or help me with that I cannot do myself. It doesn’t feel like a partnership, it feels like I am always carrying him up the ladder.

I’ve been struggling a lot in motherhood. Having an autistic child is hard. But he is happy and thriving in his current routine.

There’s a lot more but I feel like this is getting long. I’m just tired and often times feel like this life isn’t worth it. There’s very little joy on a day to day. What details am I missing for you lovely community to give me feedback and advice? Thank you all.

My family is coming to visit in a month and I have so much anxiety thinking about this. My son is 4.5, nonverbal, lots of stims, very noticeable autism. My family hasn’t seen my son in over a year because they live far away.

I worry about how my family will interact and judge my son because they have no experience with neurodivergence and autistic kids. There will be 7 people in our home (4 adults 3 kids) and I worry how my son will feel with so many people in his space. His temperament is really unpredictable. I worry about his cousins not liking him because he prefers to play alone. I worry about having to entertain and put a smile on when most days I’m just trying to survive.

I’m happy they are visiting, but it’s causing me so much anxiety. Does anyone have any advice for how I can set expectations and boundaries? I still get triggered everyday from seeing kids do things my son can’t, and my nieces and nephews are all neurotypical so I know it will be hard. I’m in therapy, still going through my own grieving journey. It’s hard. But I appreciate any advice.

We are beginning the process of potty training our nonverbal son. Last week my husband took off work to train him. Had him sit on the potty every hour and he got to use his blue iPad (his reward). He got the hang of sitting on the potty and was able to pee and poop once!

During the week, he goes to ABA in the morning and daycare in the afternoon. We can’t bring the blue iPad everywhere. So we asked them to take him every hour to see if he will use the potty. He is in pull ups when he goes. No luck at all.

When he gets home from daycare, I have him run around naked. This week, I didn’t give him the blue iPad unless he actually goes pee or poop in the potty. He is so motivated! He pees consistently! I praise him SO much. I believe he likes the praise and the iPad.

Tonight, it became a game. He sits on the potty, pees, I praise him, give him the blue iPad, he watches for 10ish min, then I take the iPad away. He will then go to the potty and make himself pee. Then I praise him and give him the iPad. Then I take it away and he pees in the potty again. We did this about 10 times tonight (!!!!)

I am SO happy with his progress. But I’m unsure what to do now to help him use the potty on his own without the iPad. Should I switch to a new reward? Should I take away the pull ups? Help!