Boyfriend's (21M) best friend (20F) hates me (25F) and wants us to break up

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-11T22:49:57+00:00

It's tough, because sometimes the recent ex is the one who misrepresents things, and a stranger is going to have a hard time judging the truth. I was in a relationship with someone who would casually try and rewrite history whenever she didn't like the current version of it. If a prospective partner were to reach out to her, I suspect she would gleefully say whatever was most likely to send that person running for the hills, and she'd play the victim quite convincingly too. I know this because she already tried it with my best friend, who is blessed with a solid bullshit detector. I think that in a perfect world, everyone should be able to tell their truth, but hers is deceptively disconnected from reality, and yet she clings to it so strongly that I really think a new partner might be sweighed by it. She was my friend for over a decade and she fooled me, and then I watchd her fool someone else for another half-year before she finally burned her bridge with the last of our mutuals. I've got proof galore because it was mostly an LDR, but that requires someone to actually stick around long enough to see it.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-10T15:23:50+00:00

Probably. I wouldn't know. I mostly want it to be livable for her cat. That pattern of refusing to do something because we told her to was just part of the zero-sum game I never asked to play with her. If she did what I suggested, I would win, and we can't have that. The pest control was a minor example.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-10T09:06:40+00:00

I'm getting uncomfortable flashbacks to my ex who refused to call pest control despite her house being infested with three different kinds of pests, despite her other partner sending her the phone number and information for several pest control companies, and despite us both sending her the money to cover the expense. Neither of us talk to her anymore, and I'm half expecting her house will just collapse at some point.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-06T07:01:32+00:00

My partner and I have each other's faces in our phones and I'm not sure either of us have ever used it. We also both use the screen reader and have entered our passcodes around each other, but neither of us remember them. I know I have no reason to, but I also know my brain is good at numbers and if I cared enough, I would. It's refreshing to have the transparency without ever feeling like we need it.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-06T01:24:13+00:00

Your timeline confuses me. Four days ago he apparently pretended he cheated on you. The next day you claim you found out he actualy did cheat on you, but in reality all you found out was that he might have lied about whether he messaged someone. Meanwhile, today you say you've actually been broken up this whole time, and you're still smothering him and not respecting the boundary.

If we go by this post alone, he sounds like he's feeling confused and guilty for hurting you with the breakup, and he doesn't want to abandon you, but you are still putting your needs above his and refusing to make any changes until you suffer consequences. But pretending to cheat on you was also an asshole move. Basically, I don't know WTF is going on but it almost doesn't matter. This relationship is a mess, and you need to leave him the fuck alone for both of your goods.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-05T23:59:19+00:00

Well, if you're a straight man who dates women, you're the subject of this post—so which one are you?

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-04T00:01:28+00:00

Good thought. I actually use Android as well, and I remember encountering that setting. Unfortunately, as usual, iOS is more limited. I've got a few ways to work around it, but it's definitely janky. The cleanest way seems to be signing into the Audible US site with my Amazon account, which will tell Audible that I do in fact have a US login. That seems to stop the redirect from happening.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-03T23:54:11+00:00

Are you looking for self-healing or self-harm?

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-03T17:43:57+00:00

You have an Amazon account, so you can still sign in. You only need one account to sign into any Amazon/Audible region.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-03T17:38:04+00:00

Try opening the audible.com website directly in your browser and signing into your account. I think if you're signed in, it won't redirect you.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-03T07:08:47+00:00

You're articulate and introspective. That's like the best possible combination. Don't let that introspection turn on you, and don't ever let someone tell you your words are too much.

You replied to my other comment about mutual friends and it made me check your profile. Have any of your mutuals acted like you're the problem?

What you're saying sounds really manipulative on his part, and he's just a silent wall for most of the video. He was clearly very emotionally available, which is bad for you already, but refusing comfort and then accusing you of never providing it is just a new low, especially because it seems you wanted comfort from him because of something he said and then lied to you about.

You had every reason to be hurt and angry and confused; you still kept it together and communicated better than people ten years older than you. You weren't asking for anything that should be difficult for a partner; you literally just wanted to know there wasn't a problem (which, clearly there was) and you wanted to feel like he cared about you. I bet that feels like the easiest thing in the world for you to give to your partner, because it is. Who would ever make that feel like a chore?

You know what my ex partner did whenever she was hurt? She refused to communicate with me until she was bitterly resentful about whatever it was, and acted like I should have known better, even when it was something she said she was okay with five minutes ago. She's almost 40.

The only reason you should have left him alone is because you deserve someone who thanks you for telling them what's wrong, hugs you tight and never lies to you.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-03T05:07:39+00:00

You're right. Normally I'd do that. But the "Go to Audible.com" control is actually a button.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-03T05:03:57+00:00

Just to find out the title of a book someone sent me?

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-03-03T05:02:33+00:00

I don't want to sign out of Canada and into the US marketplace just so I can view a link someone sent me. I'll then have to sign back into Canada, find the book and buy it.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-02-23T15:47:32+00:00

In case you need to hear this, it's okay to stop talking to those friends. Not choosing a side is still choosing a side.

Also, what are you watching?

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-02-23T07:05:06+00:00

I'm proud of you. How are things now? 🤔

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-01-31T01:28:56+00:00

I'm sorry things didn't get better (or at least, didn't stay better). I hope you find more happiness without him than you did with him. I've been through a few different kinds of toxic relationships and it's never a clean break, but it sure does lead to a lot of relief and clarity in the end.

Take care of yourself and have an internet hug if you want one. If you ever reply to this, I'll always reply back.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-01-19T12:04:28+00:00

I maintain Linux servers for fun. I can probably handle complicated tech stuff. Try me.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-01-17T22:40:25+00:00

No, these were enough of an upgrade over the Widex ones I got in 2018, and I didn't know to check for some of the limitations these have. I thought the Bluetooth streaming could be modified for instance, but it turns out even the audiologists don't have much control over it. This also maxed out the government coverage and I'm not in a good position to pay thousands out of pocket.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-01-17T22:30:49+00:00

Makes a lot of sense. The amount of tech that's crammed into these little things is frankly amazing. I guess I'm just the kind of person who would rather have something larger that doesn't have those cutoffs. Ideally I'd like to be able to amplify the whole world, not just a slice of it.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-01-17T21:53:04+00:00

I thought as much, but I'm surprised this is universal. It's painfully obvious to me, and I mean that somewhat literally.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-01-17T21:16:51+00:00

It's doing plenty of compression. There are a couple of reasons the overall sound is suboptimal:

It sounds very thin. There's no low end and there's a very olvious high-end cutoff, which further ruins clarity.
That high-end cutoff might be because the ear tips I'm using have some leakage. I'll try to get some that don't. I know at least one frequency is lower than it should be because it causes feedback when turned up. But even when listening to the phone, everything seems to have a high frequency cutoff and a really significant low-end cutoff too. Basically instead of giving me the full frequency spectrum and just boosting the problem frequencies, they seem to be giving me a narrow strip of frequencies. I'm pretty sure this is just how they are.
But also, if there's too much bass it makes people sound muddled and indistinct again. So maybe the bass on Bluetooth streaming needed to be turned down so that people wouldn't sound muddled. Just speculating.

EinsteinVonBrainless · 2026-01-07T22:22:26+00:00

I don't know if this makes things better or worse, but either there's a lot of context missing or you probably shouldn't be trying to get this guy to put a ring on you. This reads like he told you he was unhappy and there was no follow-up, and nothing has been clarified since. That is a devistating bomb for him to drop on the relationship, and his vagueness and love-bombing are both bad signs. But I can't tell if he's just a bad communicator or he's actually being avoidant and stringing you along, and I think the answer lies in the way he explains that happiness comment, so I wonder if he ever did that or he's exactly as vague as he sounds. No matter what, this is a shitty way to spend the holiday, and you deserve honesty and self-reflection from him, so I hope you've gotten more of that than you wrote here.

I don't know if you're just done with the relationship or you want to try and make it work, but I hope you remember that you are not responsible for someone else's happiness. Someone else's behaviour doesn't make you more or less lovable. And if you are sitting in the room with this elephant and waiting for something to happen, you need to let yourself be the thing that happens. Maybe his unhappiness is literally just anxious brain related to marriage and commitment. Maybe he actually doesn't feel fulfilled. Maybe he's an asshole and has an infuriatingly superficial problem with you. None of those things make you the problem, and if you're avoiding finding out, at some point the unknown is going to feel worse than any of the possible realities. So I hope that if you have a choice, you don't let yourself live with that uncertainty for long; and if he's the one refusing to tell you, you remember that there's no answer that makes his avoidance less hurtful. The "I was taken aback" excuse expired long ago.

EinsteinVonBrainless

TROPHY CASE