u/Plane-Land-9234

I just started watching (still on season 1) and I'm definitely struck by the terrible luck of a few of the contestants right away. (Spoilers below! Don't know how to cover them, sorry!)

I know people like to shit on Josh but he literally got dropped off next to a whole den of bears! And he was the only one in that situation. I suppose he could have moved his camp in an attempt to distance himself from the Bears but come on, literally getting dropped off and seeing like, 5 bears within 24 hours is crazy. Especially the bear on the beach as they were boating away.

Then there was Wayne, who literally got charged by a bear and had to get rescued in the middle of the night. It didn't really seem to me like he did anything to bring that upon himself so that's just terrible luck and I do think them majority of people would leave after an encounter like that.

Outside of those two, it was pretty easy to see people who had better or worse times due to experience and making good or bad decisions - like the guy who lost his fire steel because he put it on a log and the tide took it, that was a silly mistake he could have avoided. Or the guy who was dropped off in a marsh and decided to move camp and found a much better spot, he made the best of his bad luck.

What do you guys think about the role of luck in the show? Happy to hear about further seasons in the comments, I don't care about spoilers and I'm really curious if other contestants had bad luck like Josh and Wayne.

I've been a casual weed smoker for about 8 years now, ever since I quit drinking I've had weed around once a week on the weekends.

Last weekend I was visiting my family and smoked a bit before bed. I was sleeping in my younger sisters room and it was just bursting with teenage personality. I'm 30 now, and life is good but different, so I was getting introspective about the teenage years and how beautiful a time that was and after a while of thinking about that I just burst into tears, like happy grateful tears that I got to experience that. Then I cried for like 10 minutes.

The thing is that I'm NOT a Cryer! I cry a few times a year at most and only when I'm very hurt emotionally. I've never cried from happiness before. I'm just not really sure what hit me there or how to process it.

Has this happened to anybody else? Sometimes I feel like weed really brings me greater mental clarity and introspection but this was something else. It was overall good but definitely a weird experience for me.

I'm not anti Catholic, I grew up Catholic and am now more of an agnostic or non practicing Catholic. But I was visiting my parents this weekend and was reminded of how obsessed they are with doing things the "right" way, which usually means the hardest way, as a form of suffering and/or moral purity (even if they continually fail at the hardest way)

To me this seems strongly linked to Catholicism (my parents are fairly devout), which to me has always had a hard on for suffering, but I'm curious what you guys all think?

Some examples:

- seeing the majority of medication for mental health disorders and weight loss as "cheating", in favour of simply "trying harder"

- insistence on doing things the cheapest possible way even if it's the most labour intensive and causes unpleasantness for years: things like doing all renovations themselves, avoiding automation in cleaning (like robot vacuum)

- for personal issues, instead of addressing the issue or trying to make their lives better, just trying to buckle down and pray the unpleasant feelings away. Mom says she struggles with jealousy, for reasonable things that she could fix ("I'm jealous of that lady's haircut and clothes" , ok well go get a nice hair cut and buy a nice outfit?) but rather than improving her life to the degree she won't be jealous, she just prays for less jealously lol.

I think my parents faith has helped them through a lot of hard times but I can't also feel like this obsession with doing things the right way and suffering has held them back quite a bit. Do you think this is related to Catholicism or just my parents personal quirks?

Hi, when I quit drinking 10 years ago I read a lot of "quit lit", things like "this naked mind", which really helped. I've read some Allen Carr books and I find them to be super basic and not long enough..this naked mind followed the Allen Carr methodology but it was a lot longer so it repeated the points way more and by the end I had had LOTS of time for the info to soak in.

I'm also interested in fiction recommendations where the characters quit smoking and it's a big part of the book. I've been reading a lot of Stephen King lately and ALL the characters smoke and it's kind of a trigger lol. I don't smoke daily but I want to quit in total because I want to start a family soon and ideally I would like to return to thinking cigarettes/vaping etc are disgusting. I find reading helps me a lot with changing my mind, but I can't find any good books on these topics..

Thank you!

I would say every now and then (somewhere between twice a week and once every two weeks) I'll have a day where it takes me ages to "wake up'. Iike I'm awake but can't drum up the energy to do anything.

I've definitely noticed that if I'm at the office this doesn't normally last longer than 2 hours, that is if I get to work at 8 am by 10 ish I can usually snap myself out of it. But it's sooooo much worse when I work from home - it's 3 pm and ive done so little work today.

I guess I'm wondering what kind of stuff I can make myself do in the morning to wake up faster on these days. Supplements? I already take creatine. Exercise? Going for a walk? Something else?

I exercise often but not daily and not always in the morning. Sometimes I wake up too late to exercise before work. Probably I would feel better if I got more sleep but if I wake up on a day where I have stuff to do , getting more sleep isn't always possible (like I don't have time to sleep in more or take a nap).

Would love any advice!

(anglais suite)

Bonjour! Mon mari et moi pensons à déménager à Gatineau (d'Ottawa). Mais je voudrais tomber enceinte bientôt. Je comprends que le Québec est meilleur que l'Ontario en termes de crédits d'impôts pour la famille et les garderies, mais j'ai entendu des mauvaises choses sur la qualité de soins de santé à Gatineau.

J'ai quelques questions à propos de l'accouchement dans un hôpital à Gatineau:

1. Si vous y avez accouché, est-ce que l'experience était bonne?
2. Si vous êtes un anglophone avec un niveau intermédiaire en français (comme moi), est-ce qu'il y a des médecins et infirmières qui parlent anglais ou ceux qui parlent français lentement pour aider avec la compréhension?
3. Si vous aviez le choix, choisiriez-vous d'accoucher dans un hôpital à Gatineau ou Ottawa? En particulièr si vous étiez anglophone?

Mon mari et moi, tous les deux nous sommes anglophones mais mon niveau de français est beaucoup plus élevé par rapport à celui de mon mari. J'imagine en contexte mèdical il comprendrait trés peu. Nous apprenons mais d'habitude le français gouvernemental, pas beaucoup des mots médicaux lol.

Merci beaucoup!

My husband and I are thinking of moving to Gatineau from Ottawa, but I would like to get pregnant this year. I understand Quebec is better than Ontario in terms of tax credits for families and daycare, but I've heard bad things about the quality of health care in Quebec.

I have some questions about giving birth in a Gatineau hospital:

1. If you have given birth there, was the experience good?

2. If you are an anglophone with an intermediate level of French like me, are there doctors and nurses who speak English or who will speak slowly to aid comprehension in French?

3. If you had the choice, would you give birth in Ottawa or Gatineau, especially if you are Anglo?

My husband and I are both anglophone but my level of French is much higher than his. I imagine in a medical context he would understand very little. We are continuing to learn French but mostly government French with very few medical words thrown in lol.

Thank you!

Hi, I've had the kyleena IUD for 8 years (replaced once), and ive really enjoyed it. I haven't had a period at all which has been amazing, and while on the IUD I had basically zero changes related to acne, weight etc. I think it's been a bit better for my mood.

I'm hoping to start a family this year which is why I'm getting it removed soon. I would just love to hear about people's experiences returning to their natural state after having an IUD (esp the kyleena). Ideally I would love to hear from people who had a positive experience with the IUD like me.

If you had an IUD for years and liked it, what was it like after removal? Did you get your period right away? Was your first period after IUD similar to the ones you had pre IUD? Did you experience any mood changes or weight/acne changes?

Thank you!

I was really happy to move into a supervisory position a couple of years ago but after doing it for a bit and also having some management and position changes, I am not so sure anymore.

Actually, I really loved my job for years but in the last year I've gone from loving it to just feeling stressed and burned out. Now I'm at the point where the thought of the next year of work just kind of fills me with dread.

I would say the main issues are that I was moved recently to a project in which everybody who has previously worked on it has retired or switched jobs, and I'm apparently supposed to be able to get this deliverable done in six months with nobody to show me the way, and it also has a lot of visibility. But I'm not really sure I can do it, to be honest.

The second issue is either that I'm a bad manager or just got unlucky with staff who I cant fully trust to get things done (or both!) but whichever it is, the result is that my projects keep stalling. So I'm trying to imagine learning an entirely new process in six months with people who haven't been able to do easier projects and my likely sub-par management skills and state of fatigue at doing any of this and it's just not looking like it's going to end well.

I'm considering sending out some feelers to see if anyone in my network has a position open at my level and trying to move to a place where there is somebody to show me things and maybe where it's a smaller file with less stress.

Has anybody else here done this?. Was it worth it? Did you ever go back to supervising after the fact?

Bonus points if you can give me advice on how to actually get people to do things, because I am not doing a good job with that at all.

One of my dearest friends lives on the other side of the country. She was recently diagnosed with cancer and will have to do chemo and radiation this year.

I've read the post on how to support friends with cancer, however most of the comments were for situations where you live near enough to somebody to provide real physical help. Sadly I cannot drive my friend to appointments or clean her house or bring her food because she's an 8 hour flight away.

My ideas so far have been:

1. Keep checking in on her and be emotionally supportive

2. Send her a monthly care package

3. Organize and pay for a biweekly or monthly maid service to clean her house since shes a very clean person and won't be able to do that as much

4. Buy her Uber eats gift cards? Maybe in the care package?

5. She's very frugal so I was also considering paying for some steaming services for her so she can watch whatever without problem when she's recovering.

I would love more suggestions but my other questions are related to the logistics of these things. Specifically if somebody offered you a service that helped when you had cancer, did they just organize and pay for it and tell you "the maid is coming on Tuesday", or did they ask you if you wanted it first? If somebody bought you something did they ask you or maybe communicate with your spouse first to get more info?

Lastly, if somebody sent you care packages when you were sick, which things did you like the most? I saw in the "what can I do to help" megathread that people didn't love cookies or unhealthy snacks, i was considering writing letters and maybe including some stuff that she could do while she was hanging out in the chemo lounge like a light read, colouring book, or a USB with movies and shows on it.

Neither of us do much stargazing, living in a city with lots of light pollution. Are there any items that we can buy that would make stargazing even more fun?

​

Some things I was considering:

- camping chairs that we can lean back in so we can look at the sky without discomfort

- book about constellations

- cheap telescope??

​

I'm mostly asking about stuff related to stargazing during the meteor shower; stuff related to just having a good time in general like drinks, food, games etc is already handled.

​

I just wanted to ask before I buy stuff that I don't need!

​

Thank you

Recently I started taking creatine because I heard it could help with energy, mood and focus and WOW I am totally amazed!

​

It's only been a few days but every day with a creatine dose my brain has felt the best it's EVER FELT. Especially because I haven't done anything especially interesting on those days, just normal work days, but every day has felt like the best day ever. I would even call it euphoria.

​

Additionally, after taking creatine I naturally want to do hard stuff - workout, do chores, etc. Yesterday I spontaneously went to the gym for a quick workout before work. Today I was planning to drive to work but decided to ride my bike instead.

​

As a comparison, on Monday I took my Vyvanse and was super low productivity at work. Doing anything was a slog. Yesterday I took Vyvanse + creatine and focusing at work was really easy, despite me getting a pretty bad sleep the night before.

​

Has anybody else experienced this? I feel like I've just discovered the secret sauce to life

My friends and I (4 ladies in early 30s) are going camping in a couple of weeks and the campground were going to and the surrounding area is pretty boring (no interesting hikes or nearby small towns to visit, cant do canoeing kayaking or beach due to friends dog).

​

Therefore I wanted to try to plan some little games or activities we can just do around the camp site and camp ground that will be fun and silly so we can still have a great time enjoying nature.

​

Do you guys have any ideas? I was thinking about bringing some cards and maybe some watercolor materials and we could do one of the watercolor games like paint eachother, paint for 5 mins then pass it on etc. But definitely looking for more ideas!

​

Thank you!

Unfortunately I've kind of gotten into smoking over the past few months. It was a slippery slope type of thing where I went from smoking at parties to buying a pack for the weekend to buying a pack for a stressful day etc. I've smoked or had nicotine in some form most days of the week for at least 1 month now. Maybe 2 or 3.

​

I'm generally a health conscious person and was training for a half marathon before hand. Which I ended up not doing because I smoked so much the month before the marathon I was scared to run because my lungs felt bad. I've known smoking is a bad idea the whole time but I don't drink so I thought "this is my only vice!' I knew I had to stop but I didn't quite have it in me.

​

A couple of days ago my husband (who's in the same boat), got a pack on his way home from work because he got a new job and wanted to celebrate. We ended up chain smoking those cigarettes like no tomorrow, and then I hung out with a friend and smoked a bunch more. By the time I went to bed I felt DISGUSTING and the last like .. 10 cigarettes did nothing for me.

​

The next day I had to call in sick at work and skip my weekly team sports because I felt so gross. It was like I gave myself a bad cold. Runny nose. Coughing, lungs felt terrible. Headache. All I could think of was 'why am I willingly making myself feel ill? The only cigarette that feels good is the first one'.

​

Anyway. In the past I would try to stop and think to myself that it's unfair thst I don't get to have a cigarette. But the past 2 days all I have thought is that I'm soooooo happy I don't have to smoke today. Not that I ever have to. But we don't have any more and therefore there's no temptation..it just seems disgusting to me. Im daydreaming about when my lungs feel normal again and I can go back to running. Hopefully this week.

​

Does anybody have any advice for keeping this going? I'm a bit worried that in q week or two I'll forget how bad this felt and get tempted again. But I really don't want to get hooked again.

Hi, I'm not a parent yet but planning to become one in the next year or so. A bunch of my friends just had babies and they ALL say that breastfeeding + pumping is significantly harder than they expected. It's actually the only thing they all complain about!

One of my friends told me yesterday that the only thing she recommends researching before childbirth is breastfeeding lol. I am a woman so this will apply to me.

I subscribe to the belief that "fed is best" but would like to breastfeed my future children if I can.

What did you find hard about breastfeeding?

Is there any advice or tips for breastfeeding that you wish you knew from the beginning?

What sorts of things helped with breast and nipple soreness?

If your child had a hard time latching, what helped? Ie lactation consultant, physio, osteopath, products, specific positions, something else?

Any products that helped a lot with breastfeeding?

Any recommendations for pumping?

I live in canada so happy for all advice but would especially love Canadian mom's advice!

My husband and i are getting ready to sell our first home; I’ve been touching up the paint and getting rid of things and moving extra stuff that we need but don’t use often to a storage unit. I’ve also been doing a lot of cleaning and we plan to hire cleaners to do a deep clean and to come weekly once we list so the house is clutter free and squeaky clean. also packed up the family photos, knick knacks and other personal effects.

However, i am a bit of a spendy person and all this spending on paint, caulking, moving supplies etc has got me in the spending mood, and now my brain is telling me i should upgrade the furniture items that are kind of shitty because it will make the house look better and therefore people will want to buy it. things like we have a média console that is a bit too small for our TV and was cheap and made of plastic, brain says time to upgrade to a nice one!

All of the things i want would definitely make the house look better, but before i press buy i wanted to check in with people who have actually sold homes before. our realtor is super new (my husband’s friend), so he hasn’t been super helpful. is this the sort of thing that helps at all? would stagers handle this sort of thing?

financially i can handle buying this stuff but it would be smarter to save it so i guess i am looking for a bit of a reality check and some extra info on what people look for when they buy a home and what stagers do.

I know that when i look at a home, while i am primarily looking at the layout, size and features of the home, if the furniture and décor is nice it definitely makes the house look better to me. I’ve also looked at houses where they hardly cleaned and the place was just absolutely packed with furniture, curtains were closed in photos, etc and i couldn’t look past it in the listing.

Hi, this is really a hypothetical question for me because I'm not making any changes at the moment, but may in the future.

Many medications out there are necessary but can cause issues at work. Things like antidepressants or antianxiety meds and some other ones can make people tired, unfocused, emotional, etc, especially as your body gets used to them.

People who have had to take a medication that makes it a lot harder to do your job for a while, what was that like? Did you talk to your boss and let them know you were on a new medication and that it would likely negatively affect your output? Did you take sick leave for the time that you were adjusting? Anything else?

Hi, I've been supervising for about 1.5 years and always a tiny team - just me and 1 student, then me and 1 employee. Found out today I'll be getting another employee in a couple of months, so it will be a team of 3.

I know the person who I'll be getting as an employee and one thing is that I know I have little in common with my employees - complete differences in age, gender, culture, language, political ideals, religion, and as far as I can tell, interests. My two employees will get along I think, as they have a number of similarities between them.

So far I've just kind of ignored team building as a concept because I feel awkward trying to organize a team building event for two people. 3 people seems more doable but honestly still awkward if you don't get along too well.

When I say "don't get along' what I mean is that conversation is polite but stilted and awkward. I'm a chatty person and normally can strike up a conversation with whoever but with my current employee it's always felt like work because I really struggle to hit on common ground. Even something simple like food; he only likes food from his culture and while I have an adventurous palette, his cultures food is actually one of the only cuisines I dislike. I also am happy to ask lots of questions about his life and background but I'm always worried about seeming ignorant if I ask too many questions or stupid questions about the country he immigrated from.

So my questions:

1. Should I attempt team building with such a small and varied team?

2. If yes, what sort of team building activities are likely to be well received, useful, and not weird?

Hi, my husband and I are getting ready to list our home. It's a condo and condos are selling really slowly in our city at the moment, as well as our condo Corp is about to embark on a ton of construction which will likely make potential buyers less excited. So we're expecting for this to possibly sit on the market for a few months.

We're planning on waiting until we sell to put in any offers, and we will be living here until it sells.

I can't seem to figure out how people keep their house in "sell condition", aka super clean, not cluttered, not including any personal effects, while living in it?

For the cleaning I'm planning on hiring a weekly cleaning service since I personally can't keep our house guest ready for showings on a daily basis while also having work and such. And I'm trying to declutter and pack up stuff we don't use super often as much as possible.took the wedding photos down.

But I can't really figure out what else I'm supposed to be doing? I don't want to take down my art or other decor even though it's not to others'taste because I think our place will look ugly without it. And I'm not sure how to reduce clutter to the point that would work for showings without daily life becoming really annoying.

Our realtor hasn't been super helpful (he just came over and pointed out normal cleaning stuff that I had already planned to do), so I would love any advice from people who have sold a home while living in it.

I've been having issues lately with my employee as well as my manager, in that I keep thinking things are super clear, and then when I receive results/feedback, it is not at all what I expected. So I wonder if something is getting lost in translation. And I would like to make sure I am communicating in a way that is clear and understandable.

With my manager, I keep informing him about the project and problems with the project, thinking hes on board only for the end of the project for him to say 'thats not what I wanted".

With my employee I keep giving what I think are clear instructions only for him to make the same error over and over and over and over again.

It's possible I'm not the problem but I would like to do whatever I can to mitigate this on my end..

Examples:

- boss asked for a study on reducing costs with cost estimate table. I make this, study has cost estimate table, boss says "I don't see the cost table." I scroll down to cost table and say "it's right here!' only for boss to say at the end of another meeting that he was disappointed the project wasnt costed. I worker with a couple other people on this project, one of which is at my bosses level, and they both agree it's a cost table. I didn't receive any specific feedback on what exactly was wrong with this table despite asking.

- I told employee to validate his presentation numbers against a master dataset, he sends me numbers that don't match, says they are better, doesn't provide explanation, and tells me 'this is what I have, you can validate it". Despite me saying explicitly multiple times.to validate his numbers against the master table before sending it to me. I've tried to say this in different ways as well as put it in writing.

I feel a bit like I'm going insane with giving what I think is very clear information and never ever getting anywhere with it, so would love some feedback from managers on communicating effectively with people who don't seem to understand what makes perfect sense to me.