u/anotherlesbianonline

My partner (31F) and I (28F) have a blended family that includes her child (8F) and my two children (8M and 6F). The past couple weeks, our 8s have been putting us through our paces. They’re so moody, they’ve been at each other and us (including 6) nonstop. They’ve both felt like it’s them versus the world and everyone is out to get them. I can tell they’re both trying, but they’re so disregulated. They’re screaming at each other, at us, can’t control their emotions at all. Anything that goes a tiny bit wrong is the end of the world. (ex: I told my 8M he needed to walk on our hike rather than run, told 8F we were setting the projector up on a wall adjacent to the one she wanted, both of those things resulted in screaming and crying.) They’re entitled, bossy, defiant, yet refuse to accept responsibility for anything.

I’m at a total loss in how to help them. I don’t want them to be in trouble all the time, but you can’t talk to people like that and doing so won’t be tolerated. Until recently, I’ve felt like they both had better social skills than they’ve demonstrated lately. If you had angry, emotional 8s, what worked to help them feel more stable and you as the parent to not feel so crazy?

I’m mostly just here to whine, but if anyone has advice on improving my own insecurities I’m open to that too.

My (28F) partner (31F) and I have been together two and a half years and we have always had really, really good sex. About a year ago, she went on an SSRI and rapidly had a drop in drive and frequency/ease of O. I was in my feelings about it for a while, we adjusted, and our new sex life included more toys, fewer o’s, and I got used to it. (She could cum with a toy, but not with just me. Before that, I was getting her off probably 95% of the time.) Sexual symptoms didn’t improve after time or with the addition of another medication to offset it.

She went off medication a few weeks ahead of our summer trips because of increased heat sensitivity and oh. My. God. I had nearly forgotten what I was missing. Her drive was up, I could make her cum, and we were having like truly mind blowing sex. She was more… I don’t know, not efficient. Consistent maybe? Eager? In the way she touched me. She was enjoying sex more. It felt so good physically and emotionally.

A few weeks ago, she went back on meds and we’ve dipped back to a place where I’m initiating pretty much every time, I can’t make her cum, and she’s just not as engaged/doesn’t have the same drive. And I know it’s just the medication, but it feels bad. Sex is still good, but it’s not what it was. I usually feel insecure or inadequate after sex, and then I feel selfish because I know that every other aspect of her life is improved on the SSRIs.

I just feel really pouty about it. I miss making her cum. I miss the way she touched me. I just miss our unmedicated sex life. I know sex doesn’t have to be about o and it’s not some essential finish line to having a good time. I know that this is just what it is and I’d rather have HER than better sex, but I’d be lying if I said it didn’t hurt my feelings a bit.

(We talk about it but talking doesn’t change her inability to cum/feel spontaneous desire so while it’s helpful in understanding each other it doesn’t really solve for my feeling inadequate.)

Howdy! I’m looking at our trip for next summer and would love to put Dollywood on the roster. At the time of travel, we’ll have 3 kids ages 7, 9, and 9. The only theme park I’ve taken them to is Disneyland and Disney World. I’d love any advice/comparison.

One of our 9s loves thrill rides, the other 9 and 7 do not. Disneyland does rider swap - does Dollywood do something similar?

How are food prices in the park? And upgrades/skip the line systems?

Dollywood is notably more expensive per day than our Disneyland trips have been. Is Dollywood worth more money than Disney in terms of experience? I obviously don’t expect ‘Disney Magic’ types of experiences, but am I likely to feel like we got less of an experience for the money paid?

Thanks!

To start, I’m just here to whine/commiserate. We’re already following appropriate avenues to resolve to real problems here, but we may be giving up flexibility with our SD’s schedule in exchange for it.

My partner (31F) and I (28F) just took our three kids - my two (8 and 6) and her one (8) - on a ten day road trip. The trip was fantastic, everything went great, and it felt really good to have all of us together for more than a couple days. The problem is when we got back…

6 is just ours, but 8 & 8 have parenting plans with our respective coparents. We both have to make arrangements with our coparent to accommodate extended trips. (My 8 is week on-week off, her 8 is 3/4/4/3.) We also make arrangements the other direction - my son’s dad takes him on trips/vacations and my SDs dad doesn’t take her on trips but he does occasionally ask for extra time with her to do local activities.

SD has been getting eaten by bed bugs at her dad’s for months now. We didn’t have proof of bedbugs, so we haven’t had a strong argument to push for anything to be done. He doesn’t care/doesn’t want to treat it. After our trip, we discovered her room - and only her room - had a minor bedbug infestation. We immediately did all the things you do, but he still refuses. Our home is bedbug free (and only a couple grand later) but she continues to return from his care with bites. He’s mad we told her he has bed bugs, he won’t do anything about it, but obviously she can’t live like this. It’s not the only hygiene concern but it is the straw on the camel’s back, so to speak. We didn’t tell her to villianize him, have expressed that bed bugs don’t mean she’s dirty, it’s not a moral issue, etc., but to avoid bringing them back again we’ve had to put a lot of new boundaries in place. She deserves to understand why the rules all changed.

The more we push, the angrier and pettier he gets. We keep telling him it’s not even about where the bedbugs started (him. They started with him and his thrifted furniture.) but about fixing it so SD has a hygienic home (his home will still be dirty but at least it won’t have bedbugs). I’m worried that our first big family trip will also be our last, and we’ll still plan smaller trips with her but it makes me so sad to think we might not get another opportunity to vacation all together. Our wedding day falls on one of his days and we’re worried we’ll have to move it to have her there now. We can’t let her live in a home with bed bugs, but I hate the idea of her missing out on family trips and vacations because of his pettiness.

Hey hey! We leave soon (10 days!) for our first blended family Disneyland/National Parks trip. In the past, I’ve packed our lunch into classic sterilite pencil boxes for 1 adult + 2 kids. This round we’re going as a blended family and I’m thrilled to take my fiance and stepdaughter for their first Disney trip! Just wondered if anyone had a better/more compact system for packing lunches or if I should roll with the ‘old’ system.

The pencil boxes have historically worked well to fit a sandwich, a piece of fruit (a banana, two cuties, a rockit apple, a baggie of berries, etc), and a couple side items (jerky, a cheese stick, small juice box, etc). Is there a better system or is this still the move?

Pretty much what the title says, but feat. backstory here in the doobly-do.

I (28F) am engaged to my fiance (31F). I moved from the Midwest US to the PNW when I graduated high school in 2016. I knew I had to get far away to get out of the cycles of alcoholism, neglect, filth, etc that I was raised in. Since then, I’ve built a modest but really wonderful life. I’ve visited my family in the Midwest perhaps 5 times; my mom has visited 3 or 4 times and it’s always tense.

I was recently in Tulsa for a wedding and invited my parents to come have dinner. I extended the invitation multiple times and months in advance. My mom finally bothered making plans the day before I flew into Tulsa. My fiance and I saw her for 2 hours and she spent it talking about how horrible I was as a child, what a snob I am now that I’ve moved, I never come home, etc. (I have come home but avoid being at my parents’ house because it’s filthy… like moldy dishes and dogs that aren’t housebroken filthy.) I don’t think my parents have done anything “wrong” since I moved but they haven’t gone out of their way to take responsibility or acknowledge my shitty childhood.

I don’t think my mom is a bad person, per se, and I’m sure she does love me but she doesn’t like me. I had initially planned on having her at my wedding but uninvolved. No presence in the bridal suite, no role in the ceremony, no speech, so on. After seeing her last week, I’ve decided not to invite her at all.

We’ve not shared our date on any social media, though those close to us have the date and save the dates are going out this month. We’ve been tight lipped not to share the date with her because I know she’d post it before we announce - she posted about my daughter’s birth after being explicitly told not to, she posted about my brother’s death before telling me even though I still lived with my parents at the time. I think I’m going to just avoid giving her the date.

In re: the wedding - only my brother (we’ll say brother A) has shared any excitement for me and he’s agreed that my other brother (brother B) and parents will probably under dress, run their mouth/drink too much, etc, if they came at all which is like 50/50. I don’t want to invite my mom, my dad probably wouldn’t come anyway, and I can’t invite brother B but not my mom without having to explain it. I don’t want to deal with the hurt feelings/conflict of telling them they’re not invited to the wedding but I don’t want them there. Would it be criminal to just… not say anything and let the fallout happen when they see the pictures online?

Seeking advice for how to navigate this both socially and emotionally. Thanks!