u/MuslimShady37

I'm 26F and half of my friends from uni are married now. The pattern has been they suddenly announce their engagement, they slowly begin drifting away, they have their wedding and send out thank yous for coming, then they disappear almost entirely for about a year or two. I've gotten to the point where another marriage announcement feels like an official goodbye and I have to mourn our friendship and what it used to be.

I don't want to be the bitter unmarried girl but something has to give right? I get told that responsibilities just shift after marriage but I don't thjnk that's enough. I have non-Muslim friends who have gotten married and they still remain very much in touch, I even go to their homes and hang out with them and babysit their babies when they go out on date nights. It's been completely different with my Muslim girl friends.

I'm currently speaking with a potential with my mom chaperoning and I've told my mom that if I become overly obsessed with being married and cut off everything from my past, she has to whoop my butt lol. She's been just as surprised as me with how a lot of my friends have become after marriage. She and her friends often had very difficult lives after marriage, having to move to America with men who were practically strangers and find themselves. She and her closest friends instilled this sense of independence in me and my sister and ensured that we did not center our lives around men. I have trouble understanding my peers because of this

Is this just me being bitter?

I moved out a few years ago across the country for a new job. My parents have always had a bad relationship and are both retired now. They mainly ignore each other but often have silly arguments.

My sibling are still near my parents. In the past year or so my sister had to move back home because her arranged marriage deteriorated and she is fighting for custody of her children. She has been arguing with my parents about their role in her marriage being arranged and stuff. My brother is not involved with our family life at all.

My mom has also been iced out of her desi mom's group because of petty crap that she refused to take part in. She doesn't really have friends anymore because of this, but she used to be very social.

My mom called me a few days back and over the course of the conversation began making concerning comments about how she only has death to look forward to and she wonders if her life has truly amounted to nothing.

I feel terrible but most of all am very worried about her. I tried talking to my siblings but they say I gave up my right to meddle in family affairs when I moved away. I tried gently asking my mom if she would like to talk to a professional about her feelings but she immediately said no, that she'd be fine and just pray more. But I don't think she's fine. What can I do?

I'm thinking about taking some days off of work to go visit her but it'll take some time before I can get confirmation from my manager since we're reaching a project mileston. I feel a bit lost.

My boss sucks. He plays favorites, he talks shit about us to one another, he is terrible at managing multiple projects and he sucks at communication. Four people have left his team or the company this past year.

I was poached by him from another team during the end of my first year. I've been here for 3 years now. These past 2 years have been hell.

This past month, after one person left my team and another was pulled off the project, I was juggling the work of two people. I was expected to do both data science and data engineering that two others were doing. We don't have an active project manager. My manager has been skipping meetings and telling me to deal with it.

Today we had our first one on one after months and when I gave him updates on things I worked on just today, he said I should have never taken those meetings and I was making decisions without his approval. He berated me for not communicating with him enough (despite the fact that I am. He does not manage his slack or emails properly and forgets what's going on in which project) and implied that I was trending towards a poor end of year review. He said I waste time during our stand-ups with stories rather than actual updates - I did begin giving longer explanations after he complained about my communication a year ago.

This has happened before where he berates me and ends the convo. This time, I pushed back. I wanted to point out that his lack of communication has led to me needing to make on the fly decisions and that everything I have done so far has been in line with his earlier instructions. I did not make any finalized decisions without his approval. Unfortunately, I began tearing up and full on crying.

He left the room to give me time to collect myself and when he returned, he tried to change the subject and just frame it as me being overwhelmed and not mentioning that to him. I pushed back, explaining that this past year has been hectic and I haven't received much direction. I didn't view my actions as overstepping and I'm not sure what exactly he wants from me. He shifted blame to everyone else.

I'm upset at myself for crying in front of him and hate that I have to see him tomorrow. Knowing how he has talked shit about me before, I'm scared that he'll tell my coworkers about this. Ive actually heard about three other people on my team, former and currents members, who cried because of him. I shouldn't know that but I know it because he blabs about this.

I've been applying to other jobs for years now but only ever get rejections or interviews that end in nothing. I feel trapped and suffocated and can't do this anymore. I know the job market is trash, but what can I do?

I feel silly even typing this but I'm a community organizer so I'm photographed and filmed a lot during our rallies. Being a hijabi in a pretty white city means that the cameras unfortunately are constantly put on me when protesting or doing any City council type of stuff. A local org posted a video of me speaking on the page, and a comment made fun of my weight. The org deleted the comment as soon as they could (which I appreciate so much) but my mind has latched on.

All the air felt sucked out of my body and I hate the way I look. I deleted instagram to try and breathe but I feel so silly.

I'm staring at my stomach and not even thinking about the purpose of the rally in the first place. I'm not even thinking about the community we were trying to build.

Is it awful that rather be called islamophobic slurs than my body talked about like this? I want to move on but the shame is so overwhelming. How do I cope?

Edit: thank you all so so much 💖 I needed to step outside of my mind for a bit and reframe things and yall really helped with that. Very grateful to have this community of badasses!

I am proud of this body that helped me yell into a megaphone, brave the summer heat, and hug my community members. That insecure keyboard warrior can eat rocks 😅