u/Ok-Combination9143

Sigh… like the title suggests, one night of fun ruined two weeks’ worth of progress that I had made with my skin.

I have full-body eczema now, and I finally decided that I was done with steroids after using them for about two months with very little improvement. I started a no-dairy, gluten-free, alcohol-free, and unprocessed-food diet. I was basically cooking every meal, drinking bitter teas twice daily, using raw aloe vera gel on my skin multiple times a day, and eating it once a day.

After the first week, to my surprise, my skin went from being inflamed to flaky all over from the neem baths to smooth, but very hyperpigmented and still quite itchy. The biggest difference was that I wasn’t flaring like crazy anymore.

Then I went out on Saturday night.

I’ve been going through a breakup with my child’s father, and I’m 10 months postpartum. I haven’t had a girls’ night out since the baby was born, so I said, “F this. Tonight is my night.”

I had a chicken sandwich and fries and four drinks, and I feel like I completely undid all the work I had put into my skin.…

I have been extremely itchy ever since. I’m even embarrassed to admit that I’ve gone back to using a rat-tail comb to scratch my skin because I cut my nails down so short so that I wouldn’t cut my skin up. Unfortunately, the comb ended up cutting me up a bit anyway.

I feel like it’s going to take forever to get back to that little bit of relief and the baseline I had reached. I know that other people who have followed this diet have seen improvements after about three to four months, but I just feel like the discipline required for this is so hard.

At the same time, I know that if I stick with it, my skin can turn around. I guess I just need to be more committed to myself and my health. If I say I’m going to do something, I need to follow through and make that promise to myself.

Because I don’t want to live like this anymore.

My child’s father recently broke things off with me. I’m 10 months postpartum, and he told me that we moved too fast. He said that after living with me, he realized he didn’t want to be in a relationship with me but toughed it out because I got pregnant fairly quickly.

I feel like someone has stepped on me and kicked me to the curb.

What makes matters worse is that I’ve been a SAHM since I got pregnant because I went through hyperemesis, so I don’t have much money of my own. He’s offered to take care of most of the expenses, and he’s also said he would help pay for my schooling. I’m genuinely grateful for the help.
An aunt recently told me that I should be grateful that he told me this now instead of years later, and that I should thank him for stepping up to the plate financially. I am grateful for those things, but I’m also completely torn.

I feel like I gave up so much, and despite his reasoning for breaking up with me, part of me still wants to say, *I could have changed. I could have been better. We could have worked this out. We could have been a family.*

I never, ever planned for my daughter to grow up with a single mom.

Although he has offered me an olive branch by saying that he hopes we can eventually grow to be close friends, I just feel so hurt. I hate him so much, and I love him so much at the same time.
I keep hoping maybe he’ll change his mind and that he just needs time. But deep down, I know he may never want a relationship with me again because of the reasons we broke up. Nothing terrible happened. He says that fundamentally, we want different things. He thinks I’m too moody and not enough of a go-getter for him.

I’m trying not to let those things destroy my self-esteem. Instead, I’m trying to use them as motivation to become a better person for myself and my daughter.

He also said that we haven’t been intimate in a while and that it negatively affected our relationship. That really hurt me too.

On top of everything emotionally, my body has changed so much postpartum. I lost a lot of weight while breastfeeding. I’m normally a small girl around 130 lbs, but after breastfeeding my weight kept dropping, and I’m currently around 110–115 lbs. I’ve also developed severe eczema after pregnancy, which has been another difficult thing to deal with.
I can’t help but wonder if he found someone else. He says he hasn’t, but he’s been partying almost every night and coming home around 4 AM, so it’s hard not to let my mind go there.

I feel so embarrassed because this wasn’t supposed to happen to me. I thought I chose well. I thought I was building the kind of family I never had growing up. I thought my daughter would have the family I always dreamed of having.

The worst part is that I can tell he feels relieved. He seems genuinely happy to be single again. He told me that he only gets sad about our daughter, but not about the relationship itself.
I’m devastated.

I’ll have to stay with him for a while until I finish school so I can build a stable career and take care of my daughter. He said he would help financially support me through school, and I know that’s a huge blessing.

But I hate that this is my reality.

I’m trying to accept it piece by piece. Some days I feel like I’m okay with it, and other days I’m right back at the beginning, wishing he would love me again and wishing we could somehow fix everything.
Unfortunately, you can’t make someone love you or want to be with you. You just have to accept what is and eventually learn how to move forward.

I’m trying to remind myself that just because our relationship ended doesn’t mean my life or my daughter’s life is ruined. I’m still her mother. I’m still a person with goals, dreams, and a future. I just never imagined I’d have to rebuild that future this way.

Has anyone else gone through something similar? Anyone have advice for a heartbroken baby mama who is trying to accept that the family she imagined isn’t going to look the way she thought it would?

Tdlr: My child’s father ended our relationship 10 months postpartum, saying we moved too fast and that we fundamentally want different things. I’ve been a SAHM since pregnancy due to hyperemesis, so I’m financially dependent on him right now. He’s offered to support me financially and help pay for school, which I’m grateful for, but I’m heartbroken and struggling to accept that our family is over. I still love him and secretly wish he would change his mind, while he seems relieved and happy to be single. I’ll be staying with him for a while so I can finish school and become financially independent. I’m trying to accept reality, rebuild myself, and be the best mom I can be, but I’m really struggling with the heartbreak and loss of the future I thought I was going to have.

My child’s father recently ended our relationship, and I’m struggling to understand how someone can go from building a family with you to feeling completely certain that they no longer want the relationship.

I’m 10 months postpartum. He told me that we moved too fast and that after living together, he realized he didn’t want to be in a relationship with me. He said he stayed and tried to make it work because I got pregnant fairly quickly, which honestly hurts to hear.

He says that fundamentally, we want different things. He thinks I’m too moody and not enough of a go-getter for him. He also said that the fact that we haven’t been intimate in a while negatively affected our relationship which I understand, he also didn’t like the fact that I lost weight after breastfeeding and that I developed eczema that covers most of my body from the pregnancy as well.

I’m not going to pretend I was perfect. I know I had things I could have worked on, and I probably still do. Part of me keeps thinking, If I had changed those things sooner, could we have worked? Could I have been a better partner? Could we have stayed a family?

But he seems very sure that he doesn’t want to try again.

What makes this especially difficult is that we have a 10-month-old daughter together. I never imagined becoming a single mother. I thought I had chosen someone who would be my family, especially because neither of us had the kind of family dynamic we wanted growing up.

I’ve also been a SAHM since becoming pregnant because I went through severe hyperemesis, so I’m not financially independent right now. He has offered to continue taking care of most of our expenses and even help pay for my schooling so I can eventually have a stable career. I’m genuinely grateful for that.
At the same time, it’s incredibly painful because I still love him.

He has said that he hopes we can eventually become close friends and have a healthy co-parenting relationship. He also told me that he feels sad for our daughter but doesn’t really feel sad about losing the relationship itself.
That part absolutely crushed me.
He seems relieved and happy to be single again. He’s been going out and partying almost every night and sometimes comes home around 4 AM. He says there isn’t another woman, but I’d be lying if I said I haven’t wondered about it.

I’m going to have to stay living with him for a while so I can finish school and become financially stable enough to support myself and our daughter. I’m trying to figure out how to emotionally detach while still living under the same roof and co-parenting.

For the men here:
If you’ve ever ended a serious relationship with the mother of your child, how did you know you were truly done?

Did you ever regret the decision later, or once you knew, did you never look back?

Can a man genuinely fall out of love with the mother of his child while still caring deeply about her as a person and wanting to support her?

When a man says, “We fundamentally want different things,” is that usually something that can be worked through, or is it often a softer way of saying the relationship is over?

And if you’ve been in his position, what did you need from the mother of your child to have a healthy co-parenting relationship after the breakup?

I’m not looking for men to tell me what I want to hear. I’m genuinely trying to understand the male perspective because right now I’m having a hard time accepting that someone I built a family with can be completely done with our relationship while I’m still grieving it.

I know I can’t make someone love me or want to be with me. I’m just trying to understand how to let go of someone I still love while accepting that he has already let go of me.

I’m feeling so hopeful but hopeless at the same time. Lately I have been breaking out into hives all over my body and then I got the flu earlier this week and now my eyelids are wrinkly and my face is covered in hives. My shoulders have hives all over. I just feel so ugly and I know that things could be worse but it’s so hard not to get into my head about it because I am also extremely stressed from my relationship ending at 10 months pp. I feel so stressed and the eczema is making it worse. My face feels so hot and itchy I’m constantly aware of it.

I’m starting a new diet again (ha). No gluten, sugar or dairy. All Whole Foods and I will also be purchasing some supplements like Omega 3, prenatals because I am still breastfeeding and beet root powder . I’m just praying to the God above to keep my mental health strong for my daughter and I so that I may have a chance to heal. I want to be healthy, i am praying for a breakthrough. I am praying for the discipline to steak to this diet as well.
If you got this far thanks for reading. Just a newly single mom trying to get her life back on track.

I’m feeling so hopeful but hopeless at the same time. Lately I have been breaking out into hives all over my body and then I got the flu earlier this week and now my eyelids are wrinkly and my face is covered in hives. My shoulders have hives all over. I just feel so ugly and I know that things could be worse but it’s so hard not to get into my head about it because I am also extremely stressed from my relationship ending at 10 months pp. I feel so stressed and the eczema is making it worse. My face feels so hot and itchy I’m constantly aware of it.

I’m starting a new diet again (ha). No gluten, sugar or dairy. All Whole Foods and I will also be purchasing some supplements like Omega 3, prenatals because I am still breastfeeding and beet root powder . I’m just praying to the God above to keep my mental health strong for my daughter and I so that I may have a chance to heal. I want to be healthy, i am praying for a breakthrough. I am praying for the discipline to steak to this diet as well.
If you got this far thanks for reading. Just a newly single mom trying to get her life back on track.

I’m really writing to vent because right now I’m trying my best to be strong during this transition.
I never thought life would turn into this for me.
For context, you can either snoop through some of my other posts or continue reading. It feels good to write because I don’t really have an outlet other than other people’s ears, and I know people are probably tired of hearing me go on about this at this point.

So, I (28F) moved abroad to an island (I don’t really like giving the island away because it just seems personal, but snoop if you must) to be with the father of my child (32M). I had hopes of continuing my education on the island, starting a family, and basically living happily ever after. Well... we started a family very quickly lol. That was the easy part.

I decided I didn’t really like the education system here after applying to a few schools and visiting one. Shortly after I got pregnant, I was laid off from my job because I had hyperemesis. I tried starting a couple of businesses, but I ended up not really seeing any of them through.
Anyways, I had my baby abroad and came back to the island, and that’s when my relationship began to disintegrate in the palm of my hands.
Fast forward to now...

Recently, my daughter and I came back from a month-long trip abroad. During that trip, my then-partner and I fought continuously because his work trip turned into a mini vacation while I was left struggling with the baby.

A couple of days after we came back, he told me he wasn’t attracted to me anymore because of my bodily changes after pregnancy. I’ve developed pretty bad eczema postpartum, and I’ve also lost a lot of weight from breastfeeding. On top of that, he said he needs someone who’s a "go-getter."
Obviously, this hurt. My only real rebuttal was that I’m constantly being left to care for the baby while he goes out multiple times a week. Just this week, he stayed out all night until 5 a.m., hanging with his friends and then going to the strip club after losing his wallet and coming home pissy drunk. Tonight he said he was at someone’s retirement party, and it’s currently 2 a.m.

I’m becoming immune to the late nights because every time I bring up needing help getting myself stable enough to leave—considering I haven’t worked since I got pregnant—he talks about not being able to fathom the thought of not having his family at home. I’m tired. I’m broke. I have no family to really turn to. And I have a Velcro crybaby whom I love more than anything in this world, but she is wearing me extremely thin because I just need a break too.

I think tomorrow night I’m going to give him a taste of his own medicine and leave around the same time he left today, just leaving him with the baby. I’ve never done that before. The longest he’s ever cared for our daughter without me present was yesterday because I had the flu and needed him to stay home.
I just need advice.

I know he’s taking advantage of this situation because, for him, he doesn’t have to be responsible for our daughter, and he gets to keep the image of still having his family. I’m just mentally and physically tired.

Please pray for me.

So, as the title suggests, my boyfriend has annual work trips where he travels to two different countries, normally back-to-back. We live abroad, so these trips are usually exciting and a nice change from our home country.

During his last trip, I went with him, but afterward, I decided I wouldn’t go again. At the time, I was heavily pregnant, and he left me twice to stay out all night drinking and partying with his friends. I remember feeling extremely left out and telling myself I wasn’t going to put myself through that again after our baby was born, especially because I knew I would be breastfeeding and would most likely end up being the primary caregiver during the trip.
This time, I decided to fly to LA and stay with my younger sister for the month. My boyfriend was originally supposed to go on the first trip, come back to our home country, and then leave again for the second trip. I’m not from the country where we live, and his mother also happened to be out of town, so I wouldn’t have had anyone around to help me with the baby. I figured staying with my sister was the best option.

It’s been alright staying with her, but obviously, she doesn’t have the same responsibility or obligation to help me with the baby that my boyfriend does.

I also want to preface this by saying that I have a serious Velcro baby. She will scream at the top of her lungs if I’m out of her sight for longer than five minutes. I’m also a stay-at-home mom, so she is extremely attached to me. She barely tolerates being with her dad and will scream and cry if he tries to take her from me so I can get a break. Because of this, taking any real break from my daughter has felt almost impossible. If I leave her with family, I get mom guilt knowing that she’s crying inconsolably, and I usually rush whatever I’m doing to get back to her. The longest I’ve been away from my daughter since she was born is about an hour.

So, I was surprised when my boyfriend told me that he had decided to extend his stay. Since the baby and I aren’t at home, he said there was no point in him flying back to our home country between trips, so he might as well stay where he is with his family and friends.

The first few days were fine. He was communicating and checking in with us regularly. Then work got busy, and communication started to dwindle. It got even worse after he went out with his friends one night. I stopped hearing from him that afternoon and didn’t hear from him again until the next day.
I was extremely upset because I feel like if I’m the one taking care of our baby 24/7, the least he can do is make sure his phone is charged and that we can contact him. After that, I became distant and stopped responding to his messages as quickly or conversationally as I normally would.

I’ve honestly been in a bad mood ever since.
Since extending his trip, he’s been going out, drinking, having fun, seeing friends, and constantly talking about how great the trip has been and how much he needed this break. Meanwhile, our baby is almost 10 months old, and I haven’t had a break from her for more than an hour since she was born.
I feel extremely frustrated and resentful toward him. Sometimes, it honestly makes me want to break up and not even be in a relationship anymore. At the same time, I know I may be reacting emotionally, and I genuinely don’t know how to handle the situation.
We got off the phone earlier today after I expressed a lot of what I’m writing here. I told him that one of the things bothering me is that he hasn’t been calling or checking on us nearly as much as he did when the trip first started.

He told me that his phone has been having charging issues. He also admitted that he hasn’t really wanted to contact me as much because he’s constantly out doing things, and he knows I’m going to get in my feelings about it. He said I’m normally in a bad mood when he tells me he’s out having fun, and because he’s usually gone from morning until late at night, it’s been a combination of things.

I told him that regardless, the least he can do is make sure his phone is charged and regularly check in with his family.

He said he understood where I was coming from and understood why I was upset that the majority of the responsibility for taking care of our child falls on me. However, he also said there isn’t much he can do about it while he’s away, which I understand to a certain extent.

I think what I’m struggling with the most is the resentment.

I’m watching him have this amazing trip, go out whenever he wants, drink, spend time with friends and family, and basically live without having to think about childcare. Meanwhile, I feel like I have been “on” 24/7 since our daughter was born.

I love my daughter more than anything, but I’m exhausted. I’m frustrated that I don’t have the same freedom he has, and I’m starting to resent him for it.
I guess I want to know if any other moms have struggled with these feelings, especially moms who breastfeed and have extremely attached babies. How do you deal with the resentment of feeling like you’re constantly responsible for your child while your partner still gets to have a life outside of being a parent?

When we get back to our home country, part of me wants to start leaving our daughter with him more often so he can understand what it’s actually like to be responsible for a baby 24/7. I also desperately want to start getting out of the house and taking more time for myself.

The problem is that I’m not from the country where we live, I don’t have any friends there, and because our daughter is so attached to me, I struggle with the guilt of leaving her.

Has anyone else been through something similar? Am I justified in feeling resentful, or am I being unfair because he’s technically away for work? And how do I start creating more time and independence for myself without feeling guilty every time I leave my baby?

Hi everyone,

I'm looking for some advice from anyone in Jamaica who works in the travel industry, particularly travel agents, visa consultants, or anyone involved in international travel services.

A little about me: I'm an American living in Jamaica and currently a stay-at-home mom. Over the last few years, I've developed a real passion for helping people travel, experience different cultures, and access opportunities abroad. Because of that, I'm interested in building a travel business that focuses primarily on visa assistance and travel support services for Jamaicans applying to visit countries such as the United States, Canada, the UK, Schengen countries, and others.
My goal isn't just to help people fill out forms. I want to build a professional, trusted business that genuinely helps clients prepare for travel and understand the process.

I already have access to a potential client base starting next year. My boyfriend operates a youth track and field program that takes athletes and families abroad for competitions, and I expect to assist with that side of the business. Typically, 100+ people apply for travel-related documentation each year, so I'm trying to spend this year building the business properly, learning the industry, and establishing a strong reputation before taking on larger volumes.

For those already in the field:
What training programs or certifications would you recommend?

How did you get started as a travel agent or visa consultant?

Are there any Jamaican organizations, associations, or courses worth joining?

What mistakes should I avoid in the beginning?

What services are most profitable or most in demand?

I'm also curious about complementary services that pair well with visa assistance. For example:
Travel insurance

Flight bookings

Hotel reservations

Airport transfers

Group travel coordination

Study abroad guidance

Cruise bookings

Passport renewal assistance

Visa interview preparation

Are there other services that clients frequently need that I may be overlooking?

I'd love to hear from anyone with experience in the industry, whether you're a travel agent, run a travel business, or have worked with Jamaican travelers. Any advice, lessons learned, or recommendations would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!

Hi everyone,

I'm looking for some advice from anyone in Jamaica who works in the travel industry, particularly travel agents, visa consultants, or anyone involved in international travel services.

A little about me: I'm an American living in Jamaica and currently a stay-at-home mom. Over the last few years, I've developed a real passion for helping people travel, experience different cultures, and access opportunities abroad. Because of that, I'm interested in building a travel business that focuses primarily on visa assistance and travel support services for Jamaicans applying to visit countries such as the United States, Canada, the UK, Schengen countries, and others.
My goal isn't just to help people fill out forms. I want to build a professional, trusted business that genuinely helps clients prepare for travel and understand the process.

I already have access to a potential client base starting next year. My boyfriend operates a youth track and field program that takes athletes and families abroad for competitions, and I expect to assist with that side of the business. Typically, 100+ people apply for travel-related documentation each year, so I'm trying to spend this year building the business properly, learning the industry, and establishing a strong reputation before taking on larger volumes.

For those already in the field:
What training programs or certifications would you recommend?

How did you get started as a travel agent or visa consultant?

Are there any Jamaican organizations, associations, or courses worth joining?

What mistakes should I avoid in the beginning?

What services are most profitable or most in demand?

I'm also curious about complementary services that pair well with visa assistance. For example:
Travel insurance

Flight bookings

Hotel reservations

Airport transfers

Group travel coordination

Study abroad guidance

Cruise bookings

Passport renewal assistance

Visa interview preparation

Are there other services that clients frequently need that I may be overlooking?

I'd love to hear from anyone with experience in the industry, whether you're a travel agent, run a travel business, or have worked with Jamaican travelers. Any advice, lessons learned, or recommendations would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!