u/nari_n

hii, I need tips for IELTS reading. My current level stuck on 5.5, and idk what to do, but I need overall 8 and I’m going to take exam in September or October

I’m looking for a study partner to prepare for IELTS together over the next 1.5–2 months.
My current level is around B2, and I’m planning to take the exam in September or October (possibly late August).
It would be great to find someone around the same level who is also preparing, so we can support each other and stay consistent during preparation.
We can:
 practice Writing and Speaking together
 exchange and check essays
 motivate each other and stay on track

Sometimes I think there are people who need power over someone else just to feel significant. They call it care, guidance, or life experience. But beneath those words often lies something entirely different: not the desire to understand, but the need to control. It isn’t enough for them that you live. They need you to live according to the life they have already planned for you.
In families like this, love slowly stops being unconditional and becomes a contract. You are accepted only as long as you remain convenient. As long as you agree. As long as you stay quiet. As long as your choices never challenge their authority. The moment you begin thinking for yourself, your independence is seen as disrespect, your opinions become defiance, and your desire for freedom is labeled as ingratitude.
With time, I realized that shouting isn’t the hardest part. Shouting eventually ends. What is far more exhausting is living with people who make you feel as though you must earn the right to exist as your own person every single day. When even silence doesn’t protect you from criticism, and obedience never brings peace, you begin to wonder whether the problem was ever you at all.
Perhaps the real issue isn’t that some children are “too difficult.” Perhaps it’s that some people mistake control for love. They become so attached to shaping another person’s life that they fail to notice they are slowly erasing the person they claim to care about.
To me, genuine care leaves room for choice. Control leaves only the illusion of it.
Where do you think the line is? At what point does caring for someone stop being love and start becoming control?