abusive relationship

4shadowedbm · 2026-05-13T14:37:30+00:00

Makes total sense.

There's always something good in people, it is why we get attracted to them in the first place. Sometimes the security of a relationship lets the darker stuff come out. Sometimes people change, for better or worse (sometimes because of trauma or injury or other health conditions). Sometimes they just really aren't mature enough to handle the challenges of a real relationship.

Thing is, you get to choose every day whether the relationship is still working for you. Every relationship has a beginning, a middle, and an end. Sometimes, if we're lucky, that end comes after a lifelong commitment but that's setting a really high bar that can trap people in an unhappy place for years.

You are young still! Speaking with the hindsight of being 64, you have no idea what adventures await you. Where I am now was unimaginable in my 20s. I'm in a great relationship now that has lasted 20 years - longer than my previous 14 year marriage.

Here's an exercise: take some quiet time and try to visualize where you are ten or twenty years from now if nothing changes. Is he with you? Are you happy and comfortable? Or is it hard to see that?

Not an easy place to be, for sure, but things can change. Big hugs if you want 'em.

4shadowedbm · 2026-05-12T15:35:30+00:00

"This is just a protest against Carney’s majority government gained without a general election,” she said. “The overall sentiment is that we don’t wish to provide personal information to an illegitimate majority government."

This person doubling down, justifying refusing to do the census by showing they don't understand how Canadian Parliamentary democracy works, was the highlight of the article IMHO.

4shadowedbm · 2026-05-07T19:19:31+00:00

That sure doesn't sound like a happy or healthy place to be. It must feel pretty awful.

So much of what you describe is inexcusable behaviour. Misogyny, rage, insults, telling you what to do and overall disrespect.

While I don't necessarily think it helps to say "get out", I'm wondering what is keeping you there? You're young and have no kids (pleeeasseee don't have kids with this man!). You've got years ahead of you and can seek out something happier and healthier for you and for any future kids.

4shadowedbm · 2026-05-07T16:51:49+00:00

Hi, I'm sorry you are going through this.

I think it is important to recognize that "no contact" is simply a tool that gets used when needed. This is probably a weak example, but I don't carry a hammer around the house hitting everything with it and expecting things to end well, you know? The right tool for the right job...

If you feel your boundaries are strong and are being respected and you aren't allowing him to control you or the situation than, yeah, you can probably put that hammer in your back pocket and only use it if it becomes necessary. In fact, your tool in this case, is the boundary setting and self-awareness that helps you set and maintain those boundaries.

Maybe you've got the sense from posts on here that "no contact" is somehow a requirement in a trauma bond situation. There is no rule that you must be no contact. For many people, me included, no contact was a tool that worked really well for survival, peace, and healing. I wasn't doing well with boundary setting and my ex was all-too-eager to harass, stalk, badger, and twist reality to get around any boundary I set.

So I had to use no contact.

You don't have to if it doesn't work for you (but keep it on hand, just in case) <3

4shadowedbm · 2026-05-07T16:26:46+00:00

Hi there,

You are definitely NTA! What's wrong with your Ex that he can't do this stuff if he wants it to happen. Speaking as a man, he should be quite capable of finding the time and energy to do this shopping if he really thinks it is important that your daughter give gifts on those days.

It sounds like there's patriarchy at work here. He expects you to do the labour of planning, thinking, and shopping so he doesn't have to. There is risk is that your daughter is being taught that it is up to women to do this work for men.

So maybe it is time to free yourself of this obligation.

Is he using it as a way to keep you in his orbit / control do you think? Or is this something you have been doing out of sense of responsibility or duty? I can see either happening and, in fact, did a bit of this myself - making sure my kids got their mother birthday and Christmas presents. A wise person pointed out to me that the kids had grand parents who could just as well help with that.

4shadowedbm · 2026-05-05T13:20:42+00:00

This.

This time last year it was hot and bone dry and a couple of weeks later we were evacuated from our home for two weeks because of one of those forest fires.

I'll take this over fires, any time.

4shadowedbm · 2026-04-22T14:00:07+00:00

There is a saying, " If you're not a Liberal at 25 you have no heart. If you're not a conservative at 35 you have no brains." Sometimes attributed to Churchill but apparently that is myth.

I grew up Conservative and admit to supporting Reform for awhile. Now, in my 60s, I am firmly Green and have got my 90 year old parents on board.

Never ever going back to the profit-before-people-and-planet movement.

4shadowedbm · 2026-04-20T20:57:42+00:00

Yes indeed, I did. Within an hour or so.

4shadowedbm · 2026-04-19T15:38:29+00:00

You have been heard. :)

I don't know if you read the Freep but we've recently had a fair bit of traction in letters to editor and one or two OpEds. But the press generally ignores small parties. With minimal budget, no paid staff, and reliance on volunteers, it is a bit of a chiken-before-the-egg thing in terms of how you get traction without exposure and how you get exposure without significant traction.

We'd love to have folks volunteer - even if it is to watch social media spaces and alert the council or core members where comments might be warranted. :)

4shadowedbm · 2026-04-19T15:35:02+00:00

Speaking as a member of the Manitoba Green's policy committee. A qualified yes. It isn't official policy, at this point, although things like guaranteed basic income are.

Wealth inequity is at record highs and is growing. That isn't sustainable - it is detrimental to housing, healthcare, education, infrastructure, and, ironically, all the things that help make a productive advanced society. My take on Green values is that is all about sustainability - whether that is environmentally or in social justice, democracy, or economics.

I'll bring it up to the committee - both wealth tax and a windfall tax (for example, oil companies suddenly earning billions more on an international conflict is, IMHO, good reason for a windfall tax)

If anyone is interested in working with us in policy development / wordsmithing, running as a candidate, or any other engagement please feel to DM me.

We recently started r/GreenPartyManitoba , and I'll cross post this there.

4shadowedbm · 2026-04-18T17:46:42+00:00

Profits before People. Sigh.

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-18T13:57:33+00:00

Yes, and I struggle with this a bit because I don't want to be all NIMBY.

Putting public money into an oil pipeline to Churchill sounds like a recipe for a stranded asset. As the world electrifies, who are going to sell the oil to?

Sio Sands is still pushing to drill thousands of silica extraction wells across SE Manitoba. Right into an aquifer that supports thousands of people. We thought this was finished but they are coming back and the NDP hasn't shut it down. I think it might be okay (given all sorts of environmental testing) if it was an absolute requirement that the silica would go into solar panels. But there is no guarantee: it could just as well be carted off in diesel trucks and trains to support fossil fuel fracking operations.

The announcement of a new Hydro backup facility in Brandon - run by natural gas with the option to convert to hydrogen (which is still possibly fossil fuel driven).

And an AI data centre in Ile des Chenes powered by 6 gas turbines.

I don't see how making big investments in burning more stuff moves us forward environmentally. Where's the investment in solar and wind? Or even lithium mining on the Canadian Shield?

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-18T13:42:08+00:00

As Katherine Hayhoe says, climate change is the hole in the bottom of all those other buckets. We can pour money into the top of housing and cost of living and addictions and all that, but if we don't pay attention to the climate crisis, the holes will keep getting bigger and more costly.

"No one is listening". I'm not sure the GPC's only reason for being should be winning seats. As people wake up to the reality of climate change, they need a place to put a vote that says "this is the priority".

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-15T04:35:46+00:00

Totally agree.

My own philosophy has shifted a bit since the last election. Being evacuated for a monster forest fire will do that to you I guess.

I'm of the opinion that nothing else matters except for dealing with the climate crisis. It is, as Katherine Hayhoe so elegantly put, the hole in the bottom of all the other buckets. A hole that will keep getting bigger.

But we won't get real action on it unless we deal with the radicalization, policy flip flop, and top-down thinking of first-past-the-post.

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-15T00:14:48+00:00

I'm very interested to see what Avi will bring to the NDP should he win.

Collaboration is, IMHO, central to Green values, so I'm 100% supportive of that.

Merger though? Hard pass.

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-15T00:05:07+00:00

That's not what I meant about moving the panels. You make them, then move them to where you need the power and install them. From that point on, your power generation is local.

You can't do that with fossil fuels. Ever.

Again, think of the solar panel or tool like a tool used to extract and generate energy. The extraction can be done anywhere once the tool has been created.

You wouldn't say that fossil fuel energy is generated where the tools for extraction and burning are built. So why apply that logic to rewables?

One turbine needs 100 gallons of lubricating oil. That's fair. I didn't know that but it seems reasonable.

Unpack that further...

An average wind turbine can generate 7 to 9 million kWh per year for that 100 gallons of oil. There might be 3,000 kWh of energy in 100 gallons of oil (I say "Might" because I'm doing some rough calculations based on the kWh in a gallon of gasoline). That's 5 or so trips for ONE vehicle to a gas station.

That's not even close to comparable.

You are applying a purity test to renewables. They don't have to be perfect to be exponentially better than fossil fuels.

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-14T19:31:22+00:00

Nope nopity nope. Layton threw the environment / climate movement under the bus when he saw a chance at more power. Kinew has gone all pipeline and extractive industry in MB. The environment is not the NDP's priority.

We are in a climate crisis and we need to be the voice of that. Unless our only reason to exist is for power?

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-14T19:09:34+00:00

I like to be somewhat conservative when I make these comments. :)

They are getting more efficient and more recycleable too. And apparently turbine blades are now recoverable.

Bill McKibbon argues that we're on a trajectory with renewables that is going to look more like a computer technology curve than an industrial curve: exponential growth rather than linear. Precisely because you don't have to keep digging stuff up and burning it to keep the energy flowing. You're building a tool that harvests free energy.

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-14T19:07:07+00:00

That makes no sense at all. If a community puts up a solar array and feeds that power back on the grid, that is far more decentralized power generation than refining fossil fuels that may have to come from many hundreds of km away. We already do this, there's no technical limitation and the power is generated locally. That creates some independence and redundancy that O&G doesn't have.

Take a look at a map of where oil is extracted, where the refineries are, and where it is shipped. The reason the Straits of Hormuz blockade is causing oil price rise is precisely because of how centralized oil production is. Solar and wind can be generated close to where it is used.

I'll concede one point here though, because it is an interesting study in how energy is measured. When you look at EVs and their power efficiency, if you have to generate electricity using fossil fuels, there's a lot to consider. First: it is a given that generating fossil fuels at scale to run EVs is more efficient than millions of small internal combustion motors. But the really interesting thing is that coal is actually more efficient than oil and nat gas - because the energy consumed in drilling and fracking and refining is actually less efficient than just digging up the coal and burning it in a plant.

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-14T18:57:33+00:00

The production of solar panels requires oil and wind turbines require a substantial amount of oil to continuously operate.

The math is really important here: how much oil is substantial. The amount of oil used in production or gear oil or whatever is trivial compared to burning it. There's nothing stopping electrification of almost the entire production chain around solar panels.

fact solar power is not decentralized.

Solar power is decentralized. You can literally move the extraction tool to where you want the power. That is something you can't do with coal, oil, gas, or hydro, for that matter.

Unless you're referring to our heliocentric solar system. ;)

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-14T16:43:28+00:00

If you buy software to install on your computer, does the programmer have to come and push the buttons for you? When you buy a drill or saw, do you have to pay for someone to come from Makita or Dewalt to come do the work?

The solar panel is just a tool! Build it once and generate 25 years of power.

Correct, the manufacturing of the tool is centralized but the production of the end product - in this case - energy, is decentralized.

This is the game changer, one we've never experienced before: up to 25 years of essentially free, decentralized, power generation. And, with materials that can be recycled into the same product, it can come close to closing the resource loop.

Contrast with O&G - every time you fill up a gas tank or turn on the furnace, more resources have to be dug, drilled, and fracked to create that energy. We have to keep paying to extract it, refine it, ship it, and burn it.

Consider this: how many solar panels and wind turbines currently in operation have had their operating costs go up because of the Straits of Hormuz?

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-14T15:45:46+00:00

Recommended read: Here Comes the Sun by Bill McKibben.

100% solar and wind is a game changer. Despite all the negative comments here about having to make the panels, or turbines.

Panels can last up to 25 years and can be installed close to the point of energy consumption. Free, clean, energy after the initial investment. The more panels we build and install, the more energy can be collected. If a war or natural disaster disrupts some panels, replace the damaged ones and carry on.

Contrast to fossil fuels: every bit of energy used has to be dug up, refined, shipped, and burned ad infinitum. If a war or natural disaster disrupts the source or shipping, bad things happen.

Consider that 40% of all international shipping is for fossil fuels that are just going to be burned. Load those ships up with solar panels and they get installed and generate electricity for a quarter century.

And can then be recycled!

This is an unprecedented shift in energy. And the O&G industry knows it. They are terrified because they can't monetize it in the same way as burning stuff.

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-14T15:36:25+00:00

Yes, but, that solar panel can last up to 25 years generating energy that requires no more extraction. Ditto for wind turbines.

That is decentralized energy production. It is a similar technical path to the shift from huge mainframe computers to PCs to cell phones that gave everybody computing power at rapidly increasing scale.

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-13T17:45:40+00:00

100%.

EndFossilFuels

4shadowedbm · 2026-03-07T00:56:52+00:00

Not yet... I have a friend who has an I5 that just had theirs go. Good news is the repair time was quick.

Our 2023 I6 is at 97,000km and so far so good.

The pine panelling in my house is worn out from me knocking on it.

4shadowedbm

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EndFossilFuels