u/Royal_Marzipan_6432

My husband and I are hoping to buy a 2 bedroom apartment sometime in the next year in advance of trying for our first child. We have a comparatively modest budget and a lot of the units we’ve been interested in are ground floor or basement units.

Has anyone tried to raise a child in a ground floor or basement unit? We’re trying to avoid areas that are prone to flooding based on NYC’s flood maps but we’ve been trying to think through other concerns. Do these units have more issues with pests? Should we put up privacy film so people don’t watch our child? Any advice welcome.

I (30F) had heard of users regaining weight after stopping injections but was surprised at how quickly it crept back up and want to share my experience as a data point. My timeline below:

February 2023 - Started Ozempic injections, weighed 240 lbs, BMI 34.9

December 2024 - Reached my lowest weight of 150 lbs, BMI 21.8.

Then I stopped taking Ozempic. I was always scared of the needles and had become convinced that I could maintain my new weight through the new healthy habits I had developed (exercising a few times a week, clean eating, etc.). However, bad habits slowly came back, particularly binge eating when I got stressed.

August 2025 - I had gained back to 169 lbs, BMI 24.6.

This was significant but I attributed it to recent work stress and convinced myself that it was only 15 ish lbs (I rounded in my head) and one good stretch of 3-4 months would solve it.

I then maintained that weight for roughly the next year.

Then in June 2026, I was told I was getting laid off. Queue the emotional binging and complete lack of exercise.

Today, I weighed myself and I weigh 182 lbs, BMI 26.5. I am once again overweight. And in real life impacts, almost nothing in my closet fits.

However, I've learned a lot from this experience and I'm proactively trying to get my life back on track again. I've felt like a failure at regaining some of the weight but I finally got over that feeling last week and met with my endocrinologist. We discussed options and she prescribed me the Wegovy pill. I'm still deeply afraid of needles so she thinks this is worth trying. I'll be on a low dose but excited to be back in the saddle. I'm going on a long walk this evening. Another journey begins.

I'm considering an offer to join a NY firm that offers "unlimited vacation time." Is there a typical sense of what this translates to and what people take? Is it 4 weeks or is it less?

Title. Prepared in advance, came ready, and then vibes with the interviewer were just bad. Couldn’t figure out how to bond at all. Oil and water. Deeply annoyed at myself. Don’t have any other interview requests lined up.

I was recently told that I have until the end of September to transition out of my current role (white collar manager-type position) and the company. After that, I'll be formally let go and I'll get two months of severance and then nothing. They're eliminating my role and wanted to give me extra time to find something new. They're paying me during this transition period. I'm married and I make 2/3 of the household income, so it's a big hit. My husband makes 1/3 (same industry). We do have an emergency fund.

We have a variety of trips planned for the rest of the summer that we already bought tickets and hotel accommodations for, mostly flying for friends' weddings. Nothing international (farthest trip is to California) but it adds up. We also had an international trip planned for October which is definitely now cancelled (even if I find a new position, I won't be able to immediately take time off).

Our disagreement: I want to cancel the summer trips to save money, apologize to our friends and focus on the job hunt. I also feel comfortable telling friends that I got fired, in part for the emotional support and solidarity and in part to communicate my urgency to find something new. My husband thinks this is a terrible idea. He comes from a more professional/ upper middle class background than I do (my family is pretty blue collar) and is insisting that we basically keep up appearances, go on the summer trips and just tell friends that I'm looking for a career change. His reasoning is that being fired carries a stigma, that I haven't technically been fired yet and this head's up from my company is a boon, that friends are more likely to recommend me to their companies if they think this is a voluntary change, etc. To me, this feels disingenuous. I also don't like keeping secrets.

Has anyone faced this situation and have any advice on what is better career-wise?

I do a ton of work with a particular partner and counsel team. I’m a mid-level and all of my work goes through the counsel before I send to the partner. This was generally an okay dynamic except recently a) the counsel got busier and b) we got staffed on a deal where the client keeps putting us on tight timelines (think turnaround time of a few hours).

I prepare responses and comments basically as soon as the client ask comes in, then send it to the counsel. The counsel has repeatedly then sat on the proposed responses for hours, and several times the partner has begun providing thoughts unprompted to speed us along. A few times, we’ll be so close to the deadline (within 30 minutes) that I’ll just send to the partner without waiting further for the counsel because we’re just so pressed.

I feel like both the partner and the counsel now think poorly of me, but I’m also not sure what to do. I’m also insanely stressed now anytime an ask on this project comes in.

Any advice appreciated.

My (30F) sister (22F) recently graduated college and has seemingly gone low contact with our mom (60F). Our mom is a bit overbearing and has un medicated anxiety and likely ADHD so she’s a lot (will call a billion times, will send a slew of texts, etc.) when she’s feeling panicky. She’s not that hard for me to manage because I just provide her generic, filtered updates on my life (a call a week and some texts) and this satisfies her. My sister however isn’t great about texts or phone calls in general (by her own admission she’s bad at contacting friends and people she likes, not just my mom). As a result (and because she’s younger) my mom is more worried about her and is more eager for her updates.

My sister graduated college this past spring and moved states to live with her college boyfriend (22M). He’s studying for a masters and she’s unemployed. (Edit to add: she remains on my mom’s health insurance and receives financial support from her so she’s not fully independent). Her boyfriend seems okay if a little arrogant and they’ve been together without complaints for 4 years. They live a flight away so my mom can’t physically visit. My sister’s contact with my mom and me has decreased over the summer and now we sometimes don’t hear from her for over a week at a time. She still answers my texts when I reach out to ask her how she’s doing and we’ve historically had an okay relationship but she’s increasingly slow to respond to my mom and seems to be going low contact with her.

Our mom is very hurt by all of this and (because of her anxiety) keeps spiraling that something bad has happened to my sister. I get multiple calls a week now of my mom crying about hypothetical scenarios where my sister’s boyfriend is abusing and isolating her or maybe she’s sick or maybe she got murdered etc. and this is why she isn’t calling my mom back. Our mom will then proceed to call my sister 15x in a day and leave panicked voicemails and texts. Then she’ll call me again to cry more. I’ve tried to point out that my sister is likely fine (and each time it turns out she in fact is) but I think our mom just can’t accept that her daughter doesn’t want to talk to her. Sometimes to end this cycle I give my sister a call and get a brief update that I pass along to my mom, which calms her down but only for a little bit.

I don’t want to endlessly play peacemaker on this and I don’t want to be their go between. I have my own life to live. I work full time, my husband and I are trying to buy a house, and I’m switching jobs. I feel annoyed at my mom because she can’t get a handle on her anxiety but she’s also 60 and unlikely to change. I’m also annoyed at my sister for not just providing my mom or me with periodic updates, even by text. Excusing myself from the entire situation doesn’t seem to be an option since my mom will keep complaining to me about it.

Does anyone have advice on navigating breakdowns in sibling-parent relationships? What do you do if a sibling has seemingly gone low contact and a parent is actively grieving and refusing to accept this?

I’m a midlevel thinking about lateraling and a firm I applied to has offered me an in person callback for next week after a first round virtual screener. I’m a KJD, I did law school and OCI during Covid and I’ve never lateraled before so somewhat embarrassingly this is my first ever in person callback interview. They told me to expect it to last roughly 3 hours.

Any advice on best practices? Do people still bring printed copies of their resume (or is that a non-law thing)? Should I be taking notes when interviewers talk? Should I expect a food component (lunch or coffee)?

Anyone else looking at the Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce wedding as a case study of what not to do? So far I’ve got:

1. Have enough ceremony seats for guests so people don’t have to stand.

2. Don’t ask guests to arrive hours before the ceremony AND before your bar opens. (Literally nothing for them to do).

3. No buffets at black tie events.

4. Have assigned seating for your guests for dinner so they don’t have to scramble.

5. No raffles.

I’m genuinely baffled that there is a professional wedding planner attached to this wedding.

My wedding was 2 weeks ago and basically every night since then I wake up at random hours of the night completely convinced that there’s a wedding related event that we’re late to, or we forgot that wedding guests are coming to stay with us and we need to clean, or we need to do set up for some wedding thing we’re hosting. Last night I shook my husband awake at 3am completely convinced that his parents are flying in for the wedding and we need to go meet them at the airport. My husband finds this all amusing but also thinks it’s just residual stress. I feel ridiculous.

I’m a current biglaw mid level associate. As a hobby, I make various crafts when I have weekend free time (think pottery, digital artwork, etc.). It’s not currently something I monetize but rather a creative outlet to help manage the stress of the job. I periodically gift to friends. My art isn’t political, isn’t related to any law activities, doesn’t involve anyone else’s IP (not fan art) and isn’t related to my firm. I have a good backlog of items from the last few years.

I’m debating starting an Etsy shop to sell off some of these old items. The shop wouldn’t include my name on it (I’d give it a generic studio name of some kind). My firm doesn’t allow outside income without permission, so I’d seek approval before I do so. There’s no clear method for how to do this, but I assume I’d put together a rough business description (eg. that it’ll be mostly passive and co-managed by my spouse for actually shipping out items, that this shop doesn’t currently exist so I have no idea if this would even make money), but I’m worried that my firm will take it as a sign that I’m not serious about the law. I 1000% am, I just need the side creative outlet and I figure I might as well pick up some money if I’m going to make these anyway.

Has anyone approached their firm about something like this and if so, how did it go?

Transactional mid level exploring the NYC lateral market (hoping to make a move after bonus season) and debating whether it’s better to use a recruiter (got a good recommendation from two friends who independently suggested the same person) or just cold apply and ask my friends at various firms to recommend me. For context, none of my friends are more senior than me (basically all mid levels) and mixed bag on if they’re all transactional or not.

I’ve heard that a good recruiter can fight for you but some firms will ding you as a candidate because they need to pay a recruiter fee. On the other hand, current associates might be able to bump you (and get a small finder’s fee) but won’t otherwise be able to advocate and may not know if unlisted openings. I’ve also heard that you can apply to the same firm with both your recruiter and by yourself, so it’s a bit either or.

If anyone’s successfully lateraled, would appreciate any advice.

I’m a transactional 4th year, about to be a 5th year in September. Just had my review and they told me I won’t be making partner and should consider my long term career path elsewhere. Literally devastated. I love my firm and working at it, and I genuinely thought I was doing a good enough job to remain on the partner or at least of counsel track. Main feedback was that my delegation and deal management skills aren’t up to par. They think I’d be better suited for regulatory work, which we don’t do a ton of. My review before this one was glowing so this was a bit of a surprise.

I’m not fired. They phrased it a bit loosely but it sounds like they’re giving me basically a year to think through my next steps (at minimum through next spring). One of the partners offered to talk to me about in house career moves and help with that placement if I would like. Both emphasized that they liked working with me and think I have a good personality. I just feel sort of devastated and lost. I didn’t think I was bottom of the pile in my year or anything and I haven’t heard of other people being told similar things, so I thought I had more runway. If anyone has advice, I’m open to it.

My husband (30M) and I (30F) are gearing up to buy our first home. We’re both lawyers and post-taxes, we take home about $380k ($30k ish a month). We don’t have any kids but hope to once we buy a property. We currently have $200k in savings for a down payment and closings costs and have another $75k in additional savings (not including retirement). We’ve paid off all of our law school debt and are now debt free (which took a few years). Our careers are in flux since we’re only a few years out of law school but we anticipate that we won’t dip below $300k in take home post tax for at least the next decade (unless something serious happens medically or to the general economy).

We’re looking at purchasing brownstones in Brooklyn (roughly the Crown Heights area). The ones we’re considering are in the ~$1.5 million range and are mostly duplexes (a larger owner unit and a smaller 2 bedroom unit that we would rent out, conservatively, for about $3k a month).

We’re considering whether it would be feasible for us to purchase a property like this with 10% down ($150k for the down payment and $50k for closing costs) using a physician loan (so avoiding PMI). Our understanding is that these loans are often extended to lawyers (and both of our firms have broker relationships with large banks to (allegedly) offer lawyer employees better rates). On a $1.5 million property, Zillow thinks our monthly payment would land around $9k, which if offset with a tenant, would land around $7k (accounting for some vacancy time). On the one hand, on $30k a month, this all seems feasible, but also this is admittedly before us potentially paying for a nanny (estimating about $5-7k a month here) or other childcare in the future (and planning on public school instead of private). On the other hand, $1.5 million seems like a huge number (we’d be $1.35 million in debt) and I’m also wary of the potential for big ticket repairs popping up like a new roof or something.

TLDR: Can we afford a $1.5 million property with a 10% down payment on $380k a year plus potential rental income? Is a $75k margin of non-down payment savings too thin? Any advice welcome.

I just got married this past Saturday and absolutely loved the experience, both of planning and of the actual day. I did my own florals, did the invitation design, did the set up on the day and did a ton of DIY. It looked beautiful (like genuinely high end) and I loved organizing everything and running my small vendor team. I even liked tracking the budget and assembling timelines.

It was a wonderful creative outlet from my day job (I’m a corporate lawyer) and now that’s all done, I’m wishing I could continue in some way. I’ve started thinking about what next big events I’ll get to plan (A baby shower? A home warming? A big 30th birthday?) but it’s more daydreaming about the design and planning than the actual life milestones. Is this a common experience and just a particular version of post-wedding blues? I’m currently googling how much wedding planners and florists make to see if I could justify a career pivot. Maybe one of my sisters will get engaged and let me run her wedding planning for her.

I'm a mid-level getting married in 3 weeks and I'm officially climbing the walls because I cheaped out on hiring a wedding planner. I'm organized, I said. I'm good at planning and run M&A deals for a living, I said. I have a supportive future spouse (who is also in big law), I said. It's so much money (we got quotes between $15k and $35k), I said. All true but somehow all insufficient.

Everyone told me to hire one, including colleagues at my firm. They were all right. We were okay on finding vendors and negotiating the contracts initially. But now that we're close and it's all final details that can't be done in advance, having another person to handle all of the unbelievable minutia would be life saving. Having a wedding is like having an extra deal to run but no juniors. Hire the damn junior. Let them handle the calendar reminders, making the timelines, drumming up the specialist teams (florist, photographer, DJ, catering, environmental (maybe not the last one)). I'm not even particularly busy right now (20-30 hours billed a week), and yes my fiance is proactively running with several workstreams, and this is still a massive lift on top of regular life. I've followed up 4 times in the last 2 weeks with my venue and still haven't heard back. We're saving $20k and I'm miserable.

Hire the damn wedding planner. And better yet, ask your colleagues who got married in your wedding location who they used because they probably had someone decent.

My wedding is less than 3 weeks away and my venue is ignoring my emails. Recently, I learned that the reason is likely because I don’t have a planner and they think my wedding will be less than”nice” and so less useful for their social media presence.

Background: I’m getting married at a historic mansion venue that recently started growing their wedding business. They otherwise have a restaurant and do other events, so while they did weddings periodically in the past, it wasn’t until this year that they started growing their wedding business actively, including on social media. The venue is also our caterer, and we’re also having our rehearsal dinner there. All in, we’re paying $40k.

The venue switched their head events person in January. The old events person was great and generally responsive. We booked in part because of how quickly she responded and how organized she seemed. The new one is much younger and previously worked as an assistant wedding planner for one of the big companies in our Midwest city.

I’m now 3 weeks out from our wedding. At 6 weeks out, I started to reach out to the new events person to confirm certain decor, set up and menu elements (get a cocktail drinks menu for us to print (we had just booked tiers), get a floor plan, etc.). I also reached out about scheduling our month out meeting. Crickets. I followed up about once a week, then started calling, which all led nowhere. Last week after emailing the venue’s general manager, I finally got a half assed reply from her on some of the questions. Still no reply on our final meeting. I should add I’ve been warm and polite on all communications (call it Midwest Nice).

Separately, I don’t have a planner but I did hire a day of coordinator. That coordinator also offers full planning as a service. Recently we had our final month out meeting and I learned that she has another wedding in the same venue 2 weeks after mine for which she’s doing full planning. I asked her how communication has been and she said it’s been smooth! Apparently she’s getting 24 hour replies.

After that meeting, I started following the venue’s socials more closely and realized 100% of the weddings they post are ones with a planner attached. They also include little blurbs on their stories (like one posted just this morning about a wedding happening today) about “wow, X Planner’s design vision stunned us!”. No posts of weddings without planners.

I’m now deep in my suspicions that my wedding is being completely disregarded because this new events person thinks she can’t content farm off of it. It also makes me feel awful, like a complete vote of no confidence. I’m very organized and so far the planning process has been smooth otherwise (knocking on wood), which is why I didn’t get a planner originally. It also just feels like I’m being punished for not participating more in the wedding industrial complex.

Has anyone else run into this and any advice on what to do?