r/1800Drama

I (29F) have been out as a lesbian for about four years. I was raised in a small conservative Christian town and went to a Christian university where it was normal to get married right after graduation. I got married to the first man I ever seriously dated at age 22 and it took three very difficult years for me to deconstruct my Christian faith, come to terms with my sexuality and divorce my ex-husband. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, and I am so so proud that I got myself to where I am now. 

For context, I lived with my parents for about six months after my divorce, and came out to them shortly before I moved out on my own in my new city, which is across the state from them (about 8 hours by car). My parents have always been very religious, and the political climate of the past decade has made them even more conservative. When I came out, they were in denial and thought I’d heal from the pain of my marriage and grow past the “phase.”

Spoiler alert, it wasn’t a phase. In my new city, I met my amazing girlfriend “N” (28F) and we have been together for almost three years now. We moved in together last year and I am planning to propose to N early next year. I love my life with N, her family has been so loving and accepting of me and we have tons of great friends in our city. In almost every way, life is so so good. 

My parents, though, have refused to even acknowledge N’s existence in my life. When I first told them about her, we had a six month period of not speaking. And then, about a year ago, when N and I were planning a trip to visit my hometown, I asked them if we could get coffee so they could meet her, they said they’d meet up with ME for coffee, but not if N is there. Also last summer, I planned a baby shower for my sister in her city (four hours from me, four hours from my parents) and N, with the permission and encouragement of my sister, came to help me set up. When I told my mom that she would be there, my mom didn’t show up to the shower. When I’ve broached the topic with my parents, about how painful it is to have this massive part of my life ignored, they always have some Bible verse ready about how supporting a sinner is tantamount to sinning yourself, or how homosexuality is perverse and wrong. I’ve tried to show them other Christian perspectives on queerness, but they have not been receptive to even reading any of the material I’ve sent. Our last conversation lead to a fight so bad that I spent Christmas alone in my town, instead of going to my parents house with the rest of my family.  In no uncertain terms, they’ve made it clear that they plan to keep ignoring N and my relationship with her.

At first, I understood that they needed time to process and this was a shock for them. I even understood that their worldview condemns people like me, and that they don’t have much experience with queer people, especially lesbians, so it was scary and uncomfortable for them to be confronted with something so unfamiliar. But at this point, it has gone beyond giving them space and time and started to feel like letting them blatantly disrespect N and me. And I’m starting to lose hope for reconciliation because it upsets me that they don’t seem like they are even trying. 

Here’s where I might be petty and run the risk of causing drama. I am the middle child of three. And  am not the only child “living in sin” (heavy of the quotes). My sister is not married to her baby’s father… but he was invited to Thanksgiving with the whole extended family last year. My brother lives rent-free in a house that my parents own. His ex-girlfriend was allowed to move in with him a few years ago and now his current girlfriend more or less lives there as well. My parents met her parents a few weeks ago. They’ve been dating for six months. I don’t say any of this to condemn my siblings. I am so so happy that they are happy and loved. I say all of this because the double-standard is so frustrating. My siblings' partners have been welcomed into the family with open arms and, even if my parents don’t totally agree with their “lifestyles” they give them the respect of learning their names and shaking their hands. It has been hard not to feel a little bit of resentment towards my siblings and their partners for this. I’ve been trying to be honest with them about it so those feelings don’t build up, but they’re there from time to time. 

I have recently sent another message to my parents to try and set up another opportunity for them to meet N. So far, they’ve just completely ignored my message (it has been two weeks). My sister has offered to host Thanksgiving at her house this year, and has told me N would be invited. I want to give my parents an opportunity to meet N one-on-one before being faced with meeting her at Thanksgiving, but part of me also wonders if I should just bring her to Thanksgiving and not tell them she’ll be there, so they will have to come face to face with their greatest fear (gasp! a loving lesbian relationship! /j) I know that that would be an immature choice, but having to be the mature one this entire time has become exhausting. I also know that, if they know she’ll be there, they might just not show up altogether. I feel like this would be unfair to my siblings, if me bringing my partner along means they don’t get to see our parents. I don't want to be selfish,  but I also don’t want to just keep lying down while they disrespect N. We have also talked about just going on a trip the two of us for Thanksgiving weekend, but I haven't seen my siblings or my nephew in almost a year, and I would really like the opportunity to see them and have N spend more time with them as well.

I don’t know what the best course of action is here, or what the best thing to say to my parents is. And I don’t know how to stop feeling guilty about how this has impacted my siblings as well. Any advice is greatly appreciated!

I am 51 years old and I have a reputation for being honest and law-abiding. Unfortunately, I have several family members who are not. I have a nephew who has been arrested multiple times for thievery. I have a sister who has been arrested for drugs. I have another nephew with a felony conviction. I have a son that does things I am completely ashamed of, and to be honest, I just want to change my last name and start over and not be affiliated with any them. I'm not proud of my name and lately I have become quite ashamed to even google it. I do not communicate with any of my familly members with exception to a cousin and a niece. I have no desire to ever reestablish a relationship with them. Am I being petty or do I have an actual reason? And why do I even care?

AITD for asking a creator how much they are using AI? I like their work and find it helpful. I am in personal contact with them, so this wasn’t getting in touch out of the blue to ask about this. They are upfront about using AI as a tool, which I appreciate. I asked whether they use it to come up with the substance/content of their writing, or just for the presentation like images etc. I was polite and didn’t say anything negative, but after hitting send I’m worried that it might come off as hostile because AI can be a controversial topic. I’m probably worrying over nothing, but could I be the drama? Too late to unsend but I read it over and I don’t think it was unkind. Im worried that the question was too intrusive. I don’t know the rules over this.

Am I the arsehole for ignoring my friend for not coming to my birthday.

Backstory, I run a local club in my town. It’s been a tremendous success and I’ve made many friends from doing it.

At our one year mark, the local paper ran an article on us and this particular friend was in the group photo.

Six months later he said I needed to contact the paper and get the article taken down from online as it has his face in it and he didn’t feel comfortable.

As a compromise, I contacted the paper and asked them to remove the photo from the article which they did in 24 hours.

He then told me he was interested in a fellow member but thought she was too young. I knew her real age which was just a couple years off from his and he told me to stop as I was being creepy, respected his decision.

Anyway, I’ve always felt like I’m treading on eggshells with him and always tried to get him to talk to other members but, it never works but I always tried to make him feel welcome.

My birthday party was two days ago merged with our monthly club meet up. A local politician was coming down to see our work. He wasn’t going to be sat with her. The police would be on site too for security reasons.

He text me the afternoon of the party to say he wouldn’t be coming as he didn’t want to be seen endorsing politicians or be around police. Once again I was annoyed, but I respected his decision.

When the party was over we moved to another bar and he was sat there. I waved at him whilst I got a drink. By the time I got a drink and accepted a couple of happy birthday wishes I looked behind me to notice he vanished again.

No goodbyes. No birthday wishes. Nothing.

He is known to overreact and overthink and I’ve always tried to work around that. But now I feels like he’s just being rude.

He text me the following morning asking how my party was. I ignored it because I felt like responding saying “well you would know if you were there”

But I didn’t react and chose to ignore the message.

This morning I’ve had a text saying his original text was too harshly worded and he hopes I’m ok.

I think our friendship is done. I’ve always tried to work around him and make him feel welcome. But he would rather not go to his friends birthday because he’s worried someone on the internet might think he’s linked to a politician (when it’s my event) and even when I run into him afterwards he just leaves without saying anything.

My family's sphynx cat was put down within the last 24 hours due to heart failure.

Everyone is still grieving.

A part of me wants to get another cat. So I started looking for sellers and found sphynx kittens near my area.

I have not raised or been with kittens as an adult. I barely remember being around kittens when I was a child.

I plan on doing more research (how to take care of the specific breed, things to be aware of, other needs and instructions for proper health and care) before asking my family, who I still live with, if it would be okay for me to purchase a kitten. Not to replace our previous cat, but because I want a cat. I'm a cat person.

Though it may also be that my grief is influencing that desire to have a cat.

I also don't plan on getting one until after a planned trip/vacation in November since I won't be able to bring it with me and I don't want to leave it alone or in someone else's care while it is still getting accustomed to my family and house.

Would I be the drama for telling my family that I am thinking of getting another cat?

Sorry for any poor grammar.

My father has been no contact with his sisters for a few years. A few month ago one of them died and the other really struggles with it. She told me she wanted her brother back. She knows he is difficult (very sensitive and holds grudges).

I coaxed him into sending her a text, offering help with something/anything. I didn't tell him what to write just suggested offering help as a way to start a conversation (+ he feels better when feeling useful). I thought that would be it. My aunt tends to be good with people from what I know (which isn't a lot, to be fair), so I thought they'd figure it out from there. She answered a few days later because she was shocked - understandable.

She basically asked him to come live in the house of their dead sister to take care of the sisters cat (not exactly the wording but this was what she told him she struggles with). I (internally) lost it. Obviously he wouldn't. He didn't answer at all.

She tells me everytime/sometime (?) when we talk on the phone (not often) that he hasn't written back. I don't want to tell her why - I think it's obvious, I probably wouldn't be (able to be/stay) kind and they are both full grown adults.

AITD for not telling my aunt why my father has not and will not write back?

I (23F) was planning to spend the day at pride with friends despite being in a flare-up (I'm chronically I'll). What my best friend "Lena" (27F) and I didn't know was that our friends had plans to go to a music festival after a few hours. Lena and I went to my place quickly to grab some stuff and then meet up with the rest again for a short time. Well we didn't find the place they were at. Lena tried to look it up and didn't find anything, tried to call them and nobody answered. Finally after like 10 minutes I decided to try, planning on heading home otherwise. Within a minute I knew which place they had tried to describe us. Apparently I was pretty harsh when I told her.

Our friends were dancing and we just stood there watching for a while. Then "Elias" (34M) came over to us to drink something and asked me if I felt well enough to dance. I wanted to dance one song with him and then probably go home shortly after. Lena immediately got mad at me because she would be the only one left out. We fought until the song was over and there was a break. During the break I asked two of our friends (26F&27M) to show me the base steps of the dance since I didn't know them. Lena got mad again that I was dancing when I had said earlier that I wasn't feeling well. I told her that I wanted to stay to dance at least one song with Elias and that I don't care if I'll feel like shit tomorrow. My suggestion to try to learn the steps to be able to dance was ignored. Our friend group was chatting and Lena didn't try to participate in the conversation and took me aside after a while. We fought again and she left without saying goodbye to the others.

I stayed long enough to dance to 2 songs with Elias and 2 with strangers because Elias wanted to dance with his friends as well and I didn't want to stand around alone watching my friends.

I'm in pain and exhausted right now, which I anticipated. My health got so much worse during the last year and I'm still struggling with adjusting to it. I'm aware that dancing was irresponsible but it's something that makes me happy.

I feel bad about the situation but I'm also annoyed that it's often impossible to leave Lena alone for a bit without her feeling excluded. It feels like we just make things worse for each other at the moment.

(Edited because I noticed a bunch of grammatical errors and wanted to fix them)

Hello Peaches! Not sure if I'm the drama here.

I'm Magpie, he/him 18m. Little sister is "Flamingo", she/her 16f. Little brother is "Crow", he/him 14m.

We recently lost our friend "Robin", he/they 13m. He died from heart failure about a month ago. He was Crows best friend, and a close friend with the rest of the family. I've known him for 9ish years, maybe even 10. Their family are all scout leaders, our family are all scout leaders, and anyone who's familiar with scouts (at least in the uk, cant say for the rest of the world) knows that scouting families tend to be quite close with eachother.

Yesterday was his funeral. There was first a ceremony in one place, the place was packed and there were so many people that half had to stand. It was beautiful and heartwarming and I cried quite a bit. My little brother clung to me and my sister the entire time, and we held back because it's an awful thing to go through, especially so young. Then there was a second ceremony elsewhere, a goodbye before Robin is cremated. At this one all the scout leaders of the district turned up in uniform to say goodbye, and his necker was laid on his coffin. My brother sat with his friends in this one, all of them friends of Robin

Next came the Wake. The wake happened to be close(ish) to my sisters boyfriends house. They've been dating two months, maybe less? She's quite secretive about her partners and they come and go quickly. Anyway, he'd been on holiday for about a week so she hadn't seen him for a week, so as soon as she arrived at the wake she contacted him. At the time my brother an this friends were panicking and upset because the wake was "welcome to everyone" and bullies of Robin had decided to turn up and laugh/take photos of grieving people and the photos of Robin on a showreel (they left within an hour after numerous attempts by actual friends of Robin to tell adults to kick them out). 5 minutes into the wake, my sister announced she was leaving to go to his. It felt really early to be going, and whilst my brother was upset too? I also asked Flamingo if she was going to write a memory of Robin in the memory book his parents had put out, and she told me she "can't be arsed, can you write something for me?". So I wrote something for us both. But it felt incredibly rude.

Later my brother said he had noticed Flamingos absence at the wake and he said it had been quite upsetting. I messaged her (whilst she was still out at her boyfriends) that I felt it was rude, how she left so soon and couldn't even wait to write in the book (which didnt even have a queue when she left, i was just about to start writing). Yes, she hadn't seen her boyfriend in a week, but she's never going to see Robin again? She read the message but didn't respond. She got home after I went to bed and I think she's still in bed now so I haven't seen her since the wake.

AITD for calling her rude?

Edit Update: Me and my sister are on completely normal terms again, I'm guessing she assumed that I was upset in the moment and we haven't spoken about what I said. Thank you everyone for providing other perspectives, I see now that I shouldn't have said what I said and understand that she was processing differently

I feel a bit vulnerable writing this, but the main reason I am writing is because I really want to know if I’ve messed up.

I am a 20-year-old trans man, and my boyfriend is an almost 19-year-old cis man <3 I will call him Clay.

We are long-distance as of a month ago, so I was excited to hear that he would be coming to my town to celebrate the 4th of July. He asked if I wanted to spend it with him, and of course I said yes, especially because I would otherwise be alone on the holiday. Then I asked him where he would be, and he said he is visiting “the Steps” for the holiday. Immediately I was disappointed and didn’t want to go anymore.

The Steps are his stepparents and his younger half-siblings. He has lived with them full-time for most of his living memory, and they are the most unpleasant people I have ever met. They’re all unpleasant, but the Most Unpleasant™ is his father figure, who I will call Seth. I would never be able to write out every single oddly inappropriate thing he has done to me and Clay, but I’ll hit the highlights.

Seth is extremely homo/biphobic towards Clay. He is transphobic towards me, *corrects* Clay when Clay genders me correctly, criticizes me when I wear men’s clothes (“that’s not how you tie a tie” yeah thanks Sherlock that’s probably because I’ve never worn one before), asks obviously dysphoric questions like “what color is your dress going to be?”, etc., etc. He often “punished” Clay for not doing his chores by not allowing us to see each other for WEEKS at a time, but then he’d turn around and invite me to church all friendly and say that “I’m always welcome” at their house. Last time I was at their house, he sat us down and ordered us not to kiss. He has also asked Clay not to touch me. As in, not to tap on my leg or put an arm around my shoulder. I have overheard him over the phone yelling at Clay for not being a “gentleman” towards me, yelling at him for not offering to buy my car gasoline because men are supposed to be the providers. And that’s just how Seth treats Clay and me; he’s also just a jerk in general to his own wife and other children.

The reason why Clay and I are long-distance now is because Clay moved out the moment he was able to. He lives with other family now, who are a long drive away but much kinder to both of us.

Shortly before the move, an event occurred that was the final straw for me. Seth and his wife had agreed to let Clay stay at my house overnight. This was planned literal months in advance, but tHE NIGHT BEFORE, Seth had some concerns and made up some conditions: 1) my mother has to be in the house the whole time, 2) we cannot sleep in the same room, and 3) Clay has to go to the store, supervised, and buy [devices to keep me from getting pregnant]. After I had AGREED to the ridiculous terms, he flipped out and cancelled the evening altogether.

I have fought tooth and nail to follow Seth’s rules because I’m afraid Clay will be punished if I don’t, but even when I follow them perfectly, he still punished us. I felt hopeless. Clay called me on the phone and I snapped. I can count on one hand how many times I’ve been angry to the point of yelling and this was one of those times. I yelled, “Seth hates me because I’m trans and tortures you for dating a trans person. I bet he only tolerates me at all because I have a female body. If I had a male body he wouldn’t let you date me at all and that is disgusting.” My mom heard me yelling from a different room in the house and asked what on earth was going on. I broke down sobbing.

I told Clay that I never want to see Seth again. I have not seen Seth since. This was a little over a month ago.

I’m not sure why Clay is visiting them for the holiday, but I told him if Seth is going to be there, I really don’t want to go. Clay immediately responded with, “Please. I need emotional support and I want to see you.” I told him I will have to think about it because I was very serious when I said I never want to see Seth again.

I don’t want Clay to be alone, and I do want to spend time with him. I miss him. I don’t want him to have a bad time, and I don’t want him to feel like I care more about my own comfort than his. I don’t want to make a selfish move by protecting myself but leaving him to the wolves. That being said, if I go, I feel like I’m not putting my foot down, or not taking transphobia seriously.

So, AITD for refusing to spend the 4th of July with my boyfriend?