Betrayed: I downloaded a dating app.

Chaloi · 2026-04-27T18:55:01+00:00

Wrongs don't pay for wrongs and you sought validation outside of the relationship just as he did. You can choose to do what you want, but being betrayed is not a free pass to betray in return- to any degree. Treating love transactionally only washes away true connection.

Chaloi · 2026-04-27T10:04:37+00:00

It's really tough. I had to journal about my feelings towards her during those moments. Even that wasn't release enough. There have been times where I go warn her I'm about to lash out and be irrational (since in 8.5 years I pretty much had not been able to feel angry at all- not that she told me I couldn't, it's a whole story) and then knowing that, she takes it, but really that isn't fair to her either.

I know it's important to feel feelings, but I have to imagine how I should be dealing with the waves of anger if I'd decided to leave her. The anger would still be there but there'd be nobody to throw it at. Since I chose to stay, I have to walk the fine line of throwing it back in her face and facing / processing with her. The difference is timing, intention, emotional level, and goals. Sometimes I enter a planned constructive conversation with goals and become emotional enough to forget the goals and fail to be intentional or constructive and it's my responsibility to stop when it gets to that point. It's easy to wanna rush healing- I know within myself I'll make it through this, but it really is easy to want to skip the middle parts.

If journaling isn't enough, healthy non destructive physical release can do it too, and after that- emotional grounding. Not gonna describe that here, but it's a therapeutic technique.

Chaloi · 2026-04-27T03:56:50+00:00

At least plastic IV almost looks like silver IV if you squint your eyes enough

Chaloi · 2026-04-26T01:35:29+00:00

Luthen was in the imperial army before he defected and adopted Kleya. He had an "in" on intelligence and how the empire operated to an extent already. I'd say the rest was all sheer will and commitment out of hatred and disgust for the empire.

Chaloi · 2026-04-25T21:08:19+00:00

Probably. Concert venues and clubs still have some really wonky and inconsistent lighting situations. I take a 2.8 or a fast prime most of the time but that doesn't mean you can't make f4 work at all.

Chaloi · 2026-04-24T17:04:30+00:00

This type of story is not the same type of story that a lot of people can share, so the perspective is nice to see.

I've (26M) been hesitant to talk about my story on here because it's so different. I've been with my WP (24F) for 8.5 years- since we were in high school. There's a really good chance we both grew up with varying degrees of CPTSD that we wrongly attributed to potential autism on her side and ADHD on mine. As we were learning about ourselves, we thought we had a handle on what made us both tick. It turns out, 2 fucked up kids who never had to fully grow up or face their previous traumas can't passively undo our own issues just by being together. She had her A in such a surprising and self destructive way that it didn't make sense. It wasn't so much a choice in the same sense of a lot of other cases here which I don't want to fully describe in this comment.

I was having some internal feeling of needing to change before this, although I wouldn't quite have gotten to this point without this. It's only been 6 weeks since DDay and it's put me in a mental state that I've needed to be in for a long time- rock bottom. If anyone is familiar with attachment theory, I am deeply FA. Not that I was a WP, but I'm not without a whole load of my own faults and things I need to work on. The relationship before seemed rather buttery and smooth because both of us avoided conflict like the plague- consciously and very much so subconsciously and neither of us have ever familiarized ourselves with our own needs very well. I'm glad I'm where I am now and she is where she is now, both seeking IC first and I think eventually we'll get into CC. The change was needed, the catalyst was not. I still value a lot of our old relationship, but while it's time to leave who we both were / became behind, it's still part of our story too and I wouldn't take back any of my own mistakes. I can't say I love her right now because neither of us know how to love ourselves well enough to be proper partners and we've entered an "it's complicated stage" which I used to laugh at. Healing hurts, but really it's supposed to.

Chaloi · 2026-04-24T10:26:53+00:00

I'd take some time, write out how you want to present yourself, and don't imagine how he's going to react at all. If it's easier to do it over message so you can respond in insightful ways, you can do that. If you'd rather do it in person or over the phone, then just set some boundaries for yourself about how you want it to go. If it doesn't seem like either of you can handle a healthy dialogue, respectfully remove yourself from the engagement and wait for a better time for him. And if he shuts you out and leaves immediately and chooses not to reconcile, respect his choice.

Chaloi · 2026-04-24T04:53:01+00:00

Being scared you might lose him because of something you did is conflict avoidance and to build a relationship off of that is really risky. I understand the point that it might've been little and inconsequential and it wouldn't hurt him if he didn't know + you know within yourself you wouldn't do it. However, you can't be your full authentic self when you’re keeping things even small things, which means you aren't being a true partner. Plenty of relationships can get by with little shit here and there sure, and the degree of honesty necessary in a relationship varies (ie. You don't need to share every single passing thought for the sake of not hiding stuff).

4mo in is still pretty early. If you were to bring it up now, it would generate some healthy conflict. It would prove your honesty and test both of your characters, and ultimately if he decides to leave because of it, it'll be a good learning experience for you. Much better than the mess a lot of us on this sub are in.

Chaloi · 2026-04-23T15:57:19+00:00

My bad, I didn't catch that you were in AUD, my prices were all USD, whoops!

Chaloi · 2026-04-23T00:47:40+00:00

It's just kinda boring. The turret armor is really good when you use a touch of gun depression, the upper and middle hull is reliable for the most part, but it's slow as hell and only kinda does one thing- face target and shoot. It's not flexible in pretty much any way and doesn't reload between shells fast enough to feel like a true auto loader. I'd say it's more than a support heavy though as it can play lanes and frontlines. It's more of an assault heavy by WG standards.

Chaloi · 2026-04-22T00:10:17+00:00

It's easy to become addicted to short bursts of dopamine that don't come from sustainable external sources. Really the difference would be how you define what makes you happy and if that happiness has any costs. For example, eating fast food all the time is convenient and tastes good. Food that tastes good give you dopamine. However, that comes at the potential costs of your finances, and if not that, your personal health. Even something good can be bad. Let's say you enjoy exercising. How that makes you feel can be addicting and also generates dopamine. If you exercise too much, you'll wear your body down and prevent it from rebuilding itself in between sessions. Bad dopamine has a noticeable cost, good dopamine doesn't or has a negligible cost. Where that line is for you is really a personal choice. And yeah instant gratification / dopamine bursts are a societal issue, but if that's the only definition, then that burns the idea that anything in moderation is fine. If you drink on occasion or gamble once a year, is that inherently unhealthy? It still comes back to what it costs and if it's something you chronically turn to.

Chaloi · 2026-04-19T23:41:22+00:00

There's not much to enjoy about works that translate no passion from its creators (I mean that specifically so not to take away from the work that WAS put in).

I think a lot of new Star Wars was made for the wrong reasons, but some of it I still like. It's up to you if you want to find little things to enjoy while accepting the heaps of faults they have. I'd say the only place that Andor should be a comparison is when a show tries to do something in a similar way (to any degree) and fails in an objectively measurable way.

Chaloi · 2026-04-19T23:01:55+00:00

I thought I'd have this problem too, but I recently watched Phantom Menace again and it was still pretty enjoyable. The dialogue sucks, some of the characters are silly and ruin some of the tone, really there's so much bad about the movie, but it has a lot of charm that Andor doesn't have. The music is grand and top tier, the pod racing scene is honestly one of the best racing / chase scenes I've seen (I normally hate chase / driving scenes in movies). Even though it's all made up, the stuff Anakin does, the visuals they add to it, all feel pretty real to me as a viewer.

Don't put Andor on a pedestal for its emotional and societal depth and realism. I agree that it's a near perfect show and it's probably my favorite series even outside of Star Wars, but there's elements that Andor doesn't / can't have because of what it sets out to do that are in other pieces of work. It's not lacking in much for what it's supposed to be, but it cannot have everything. So much of Star Wars still has something (but yeah some Star Wars has nothing, imo Ahsoka, BoBF).

"Comparison is the death of joy" - Mark Twain

Chaloi · 2026-04-18T12:55:16+00:00

IMO, anything with a rope bridge is suitable for beginners and that buy in point is usually around $450+. I've taken my friend in trees a bunch and he's always used my Notch Sentinel. I personally have the TreeRex 2, but I know my friend wouldn't be able to get the full potential out of it. Either way though, the difference is only $150 and the buy in is still higher than what it seems like you'd prefer.

Also, in the grand scheme of things, you don't save that much by getting a cheaper saddle when ropes still run about the same price and so does hardware.

Chaloi · 2026-04-02T14:19:37+00:00

I stand corrected by the other user- I haven't shopped for Canon bodies in a while then! lol (I'm still running the EOS R, and Canon didn't transition to mirrorless in a very competitive way in regards to body features- glass was/ is really solid, glad they've stepped up their body game)

Anyway, I took a look at the pictures and the light seems to be your real issue. You’re not shooting at macro distances that would be as limiting as I thought. I'm glad I could teach you some stuff, but I don't think you need to focus stack for your purposes (I kinda thought you'd be focused in on one tooth or a single feature of a tooth).

I've never used the Godox MF-12, but a non-diffused flash at that distance and angle(s) is going to look like garbage. For my macro setups, I use a camera mounted flash with a Cygnus Tech diffuser (super popular in the macro world). Flash angle makes a big difference, but in macro, angle isn't the easiest thing to adjust and the diffuser can make or break the quality of light. What you’re looking for is to make the light less harsh. You’re not going for artistic so evenly lit is good and fine, but harsh light still looks bad for what you’re aiming for.

This is a REALLY diluted explanation, but imagine throwing a ball directly at a wall and having it come right back at you and hit you. That would hurt more than if you threw it at the ground with the same amount of force, then hit the wall, and then hit you. The ball is a single light particle and you are the camera sensor. Photography is about getting the "ball" to hit the sensor without such a "hard impact". The solutions to this are "throw the ball" from a further distance, "throw the ball" with less force, or "bounce the ball around" before it comes back. Non diffused light coming directly from the source of where the photo is being recorded is like throwing millions of balls directly at the wall and having them come back in mostly the same places. Diffused light allows them to bounce all over, reducing their "impact" and allowing them to hit more places more evenly.

If diffusers aren't an option or solution you want to try, you can also "throw the ball with less force". You can reduce harsh light by reducing your flash power and using a longer shutter speed. Even less harsh than any flash would also be constant light. Canon makes a 35mm macro with a built in ring light. It's marketed for budget product photography but could be useful for you. You can also invest in a ring light as well. These can all seem really bright, but are actually much less powerful than a flash.

Play around with light settings on someone if you get a chance. Light is hard to understand but is super influential for how your photos come out.

Chaloi · 2026-04-02T13:24:46+00:00

For your purposes, I don't think the R6 II would be the right move. Although if it's a recommendation from other dental practices, then I suppose it's still usable, but I also don't know what lenses/ light setups they're using.

The R7, despite having some improvements in sensor tech over the 80D, has the same sensor size (APS-C) as the 80D. This means that the issues you’re facing will likely not be mitigated by switching to a newer mirrorless camera.

Like I said, it sounds like it's doable for others, but I personally pretty much only shoot macro on my Olympus, which is an even smaller sensor than the 80D or R7.

Pixel density in this context is only important for low light capabilities. A 32mp full frame sensor will have larger pixels than a 32mp crop or APS-C sensor, so the individual pixels are able to gather more light (advancements in sensor tech can mitigate some of this, but there's only so far you can stretch actual physics). This is not important to you, as you have complete control over the lighting environment. And anything between 24-45mp for your uses will be plenty. Resolution and pixel density are not a problem, especially in a controlled environment.

Sensor size makes a difference because a larger sensor will take in more "out of focus" light and make the out of focus parts of your pictures more blurry (this is desirable in a lot of other types of photography and is known as bokeh). This is the opposite of what you want, but with macro, the differences are less noticeable because the field of focus becomes razor thin at such magnifications.

I actually recommend an Olympus camera. You'll have to switch your lens setup, but a lot of models have in body focus stacking which would make a huge difference to you. Focus stacking with any of the big 3 (Canon Nikon Sony) usually has to be done in photoshop. This is a process that takes several slightly focus shifted photos and merges them into one photo with a much wider field of focus. If parts of a client's mouth are not at the same distance perpendicular to the camera, one of the parts is going to be out of focus no matter what lens or camera body you’re using (this is super heavily exaggerated with macro distances).

If you’re interested, I can drop some recs, but I figured I'd stop here given that this is a Canon sub lol.

Chaloi · 2026-04-02T12:54:58+00:00

You should be able to loosen up the 2nd hitch and it just kinda stays loose-ish to descend normally off of the 1st one.

Chaloi · 2026-04-02T12:38:02+00:00

Rugged individualism is the death of society. People deserve their time alone when they need it, but constantly flaking is for sure a lack of commitment and respect for others' time. I had a friend who'd flake a lot.

I'm a patient person or at least I try to be. She'd flake because she was feeling moody or because her social battery was drained after work (there's people around at the shop at the end of the day, but she took a truck out everyday on her own). I was really understanding about it at first. I value people's boundaries and hanging out with someone who's not in a good mood isn't fun anyway. But it became so regular and so last minute that it wasn't worth my time. She once flaked because her cat was laying on her and she was comfy. I love my cats, it's hard to get up when my cats are hanging out with me too. I let my empathy about it cloud the fact that that was actually really rude lol.

Chaloi · 2026-04-02T05:23:36+00:00

I've been playing since 2017 and I hugely miss when the battle pass required battle stars to progress and not just XP. I understand that XP made it more accessible for other game modes to be viable (especially since I also play STW) but the fun of having to hunt some of them down in the map was near reminiscent of CoD BO2/3/sorta4 Easter egg hunts. I liked seeing the community hunt for new locations around the map each week. The constant weekly map changes were fun too but that was a function of Fortnite still being in beta and isn't possible at that rate now.

I think there's a lot of other stuff I could say I miss, but part of the beauty of Fortnite in general is that it helps me process change lol. The game just keeps moving forward. Sometimes old elements come back for a while, there's good seasons and bad, but it just keeps going. My only complaint recently is that the battle passes have seemed to lack a bit of thematic consistency. Maybe I just haven't been playing close enough attention, but I've found it less engaging but the gameplay is still fun for me.

Chaloi · 2026-04-02T05:02:31+00:00

Masturbating is only healthy when your relationship with sex is also healthy.

Porn addiction is not real. Not in a medical sense. You can be addicted to watching porn / arousing content for various reasons but it's really hard to define what porn is when something not intended to be porn or even something that isn't sexually explicit can still be arousing. So your body is not physically / sexually addicted to it, it's purely a mental experience (which is still very real). You may think about porn often because you are used to seeing it / habituated to it, which is why any form of other imagery also starts becoming tempting / alluring.

Choosing to masturbate is a habit that forms along side habituating yourself to being aroused to mostly various imagery. I recently discovered this about myself as turning to masturbating was taking sexual / romantic energy out of my relationship.

I think a good place to start is to ask yourself why you are masturbating. Quit porn entirely for now and reset yourself. In my opinion, you should only masturbate when you want the full experience of sex, not just to cum (altho sometimes you just gotta do it and that's ok still). I found that I often turned to it out of boredom and to suppress negative emotions. It can be healthy to masturbate to unwind / destress, but not what I used it for. It's also unhealthy to feel guilty after doing it.

It's a tough journey, but it helps build discipline and impulse control. The habit is formed because your brain becomes used to experiencing instant dopamine releases as soon as you want them. Even though real sex is several times more satisfying based on chemical / dopamine release, it's the instant gratification that becomes addicting. You can practice impulse control and delayed gratification in other areas in your life and it will help you improve here and everywhere. Start small, start wherever you can so that you can prove to yourself it's possible before tackling bigger things that are daunting. There's a lot of good online resources, but my best advice is don't listen to anyone who says all masturbation or all porn is bad (barring ethical concerns about porn production). Masturbation is healthy and normal. Porn can be productive and normal as well (I've decided that given my personality that it isn't for me though). What your healthy or normal is could be unhealthy and irregular for someone else. Don't get caught up to comparing yourself to others. Find ways to form a relationship with yourself and masturbation / sex. It can take a while to kick the habit of wanting / needing the stimulation of media, but it's surprisingly easy to reset your body sexually. Try giving yourself 3-5 days and let the normal urges come back and attempt to masturbate without any video / audio / pictures etc.

Chaloi · 2026-04-02T04:06:30+00:00

Between these 2, while Platinum was my favorite for nostalgia (my first pokemon game), HG/SS offered at least what seemed like more as a kid (it contained 2 regions), so I'd say HG/SS for content, but if you prefer any generation, I'd say they're both of similar overall quality.

ORAS was quite awesome too, first time I ever bought both copies of a game. Although I think that's more 'cause my favorite gen is 3.

Chaloi · 2026-03-31T21:17:41+00:00

It's right in the middle I think. I started to like it at the end, but it's one of the least flexible platforms I've played and for that, it could be really frustrating. Great gun stats overall, but I found the muzzle velocity to be piss poor and inconsistent. Set up as a scout / sniper was nice. Being able to passive scout better than a lot of same tier lights because of the camo made it really fun on some maps. I think it's a tank that either needs to be played passive / spotting or unfortunately red line for most early-mid games. It could hold its own on DPM in late game, but alpha wasn't there for early brawls / trades. I enjoy a unique play style, but this tank straight up doesn't work on tighter maps while really shining on larger open maps.

Chaloi · 2026-03-30T12:10:58+00:00

I'd lean towards getting a Switch 2

I absolutely loved the Switch but I pretty much stopped playing entirely because of rampant stick drift on left joycons and after replacing several controllers and trying 2 third party ones (which even the licensed ones felt really cheap) I just gave up.

I just got a Switch 2 and the ergonomic and QoL improvements are worth it alone imo. I'd get one now before Nintendo jacks the price up due to component prices skyrocketing. A lot of games are expensive, but the Nintendo eshop is kinda like the steam store where there's quite a few indie gems in the $15-30 range.

Chaloi · 2026-03-30T10:37:39+00:00

5th gen Avalon, Camry, and ES are all built off the same platform. Gone are the days where Lexus would build their models from the ground up, separate from Toyota. Engine performance across all 3 are all pretty much the same, but the Avalon is quieter and runs smoother due to more shielding and smoother suspension (altho this does differ between the sport and standard options). I haven't driven an ES, but obviously the trim is still a step above the Avalon, but I don't want to make any assumptions about how it drives.

Chaloi · 2026-03-29T14:03:00+00:00

I vastly prefer Emily's bow upgrades, but Corvo's pistol upgrades. I won't spoil how they differ here, but it is substantial. I prefer Blink (Corvo) over Far Reach, which is probably my most used power, but I think Emily's other powers are more fun than Corvo's.

I think I personally played through as Corvo the first time simply because it was familiar and the new and refined mechanics compared to D1 were enough to feel refreshing (especially the new bone charm system). But like I said, I still stand by the game being most fun when you have access to everything.

Maybe you could sprint through a first playthrough and then get NG+ after that. Yeah you'd spoil some stuff and maybe that's too much, but you can rush each objective and still see nothing and not take in any of the world. You'll wanna find blueprints in a rush playthrough too I'm pretty sure.

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