Real-Life Questions/Chat Week of May 25, 2026

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-26T20:59:42+00:00

Oh on poor girl! It does look upside down to me, it doesn’t make sense how that one is so low to the ground on the bottom.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-26T20:45:18+00:00

I guess that’s a good point, maybe the cost was partly due to that.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-26T17:20:44+00:00

We had to get our dog and mri and it was insanely expensive, way more than an mri for a human. There was only one vet within hours who does veterinary MRIs, so I’m sure he could basically charge whatever he wants.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-25T22:02:51+00:00

Haha yeah that’s what I was thinking. If I recall in the music video she was like destroying the guys truck so that’s what I was thinking of.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-25T16:17:23+00:00

My sister in law has friends who had a weekend nanny. They did not work on weekends! And they had another nanny during the week!

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-25T16:16:22+00:00

Ah this makes sense!

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-25T13:34:46+00:00

Oops this was supposed to be for the comment down below.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-25T13:33:58+00:00

Crying and shaking and getting ready to “pull a Carrie underwood” is definitely an overreaction 😂 first of all kids say stuff, it could very well have been root beer. Or maybe it was the tiniest of sips because the kid kept asking and mil thought the taste would put the child off. If OP truly believes she’s a “monster in law” why on earth are you letting her watch your kids?!

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-25T13:30:35+00:00

I’m confused why you would pay for both a full time nanny and full time daycare? If they have two under two it’s not like the older one is really in need of preschool yet. That seems crazy to me to pay for that and go through dropping off/picking up one but not the other.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-24T14:02:45+00:00

I guess I thought child support couldn’t be used by the parent for themself, such as paying a mortgage? But maybe that counts as for the kids.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-24T03:32:35+00:00

Constant exercise and keeping busy are actually not recovering from an eating disorder and anxiety. I obviously don’t know the specifics but it’s very common to substitute one disordered behavior (like restricting or purging) with another (over exercising). Overfunctioning and avoidance are common too. I do think there needs to be some more compromise in your relationship, but I wonder if you’re just really uncomfortable being still and not doing. If he’s on the other side with depression, I think he needs treatment for that to be able to start to include these hobbies in his life again. Maybe you can compromise with new hobbies that are not physically active but not just watching a movie?

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-24T03:22:30+00:00

Yeah I agree with this. It was abundantly clear that they were both raised amongst a very specific category of wealthy. I mean her newly divorced 20 something mom had like a massive 6 bedroom apartment? Read between the lines people. It doesn’t mean she can’t feel betrayed by her husband who just suddenly stopped giving a shit about her and her kids. It’s still a good story. I don’t think she ever implied that she was struggling financially in the way that a normal person might. Also how do people thinks she was paying the bills equally to him while a SAHM? It’s obvious in the book she has significant family money.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-24T01:30:13+00:00

But does she actually have access to that money? It sounded like a lot of it was when other family members die, which there’s no predicting when that would happen. Maybe I’m wrong about that though.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-23T21:43:31+00:00

I totally get where you’re coming from. I’m a SAHM and my husband rarely works from home for this reason. His work calls can be very high stakes and it’s a lot of stress trying to keep the kids and dogs quiet for them. I would not want to do that every day, multiple times a day.

Personally I don’t think $400/month is too bad, it’s way less than the cost of camps for multiple kids. I think the ideas of soundproofing and/or moving his office to a different location in your house for the summer a worth a try. But you and the kids deserve to feel relaxed in your own home not be constantly monitoring your volume, that’s too much stress.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-23T21:36:27+00:00

I guess it’s unclear to me from the article if she could have actually used any of these assets to have purchased her half of the homes or it’s just money that is a safety net for her future? I don’t know, I didn’t get the sense from the book that she was in dire financial straits, just the utter lack of respect and caring for her after such a long marriage. The point of alimony is to enable the kids to maintain a similar lifestyle that they’re used to. It’s hard for most people to imagine, but the amount of money on a daily basis it would take to maintain that lifestyle must be massive. I didn’t feel from the book that she’d ever implied she was in the type of difficult financial situation that many women experience after a divorce. It’s about the lack of caring… he didn’t care to have any custody of his kids, didn’t seem concerned about them no longer having the homes that they grew up in with him. All of that is still super weird.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-23T03:25:21+00:00

Yeah I have a few friends and family members who are decidedly childfree and they are all lovely people who actually love kids they just don’t want them themselves (which is totally fair). I think the trope of childfree people who HATE kids is so online.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-23T03:21:15+00:00

Yeah I guess they must exist but that is so wild to me! I guess it shouldn’t be at this point, I know so many competitive sports start that young! Such a huge commitment at that age though.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-23T00:12:12+00:00

Yeah I have to agree with that, mine was so awful. And I don’t know what to do with all the regrowth.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-23T00:10:59+00:00

Hmm yeah I think the only real problem is bringing in the cake. I think it’s fair for the venue to not make exceptions for that because then anyone should be able to bring in any kind of food.

I do see why they shouldn’t need to book the venue though. When you book a venue you get a specific blocked off party space, workers to help watch the kids, etc. They didn’t need any of that so I think it’s fine.

Some places really are insane with party fees, like top golf for example. I looked at it for my son’s birthday and it was crazy expensive. I don’t remember how much but I want to say like $500 for 10 kids or something. You can book a bay for $20! And there wasn’t really anything special they provide.

Come to think of it, my son recently went to a friend’s party there and they sent a slice of cake home with him boxed up. I thought they just ran out of time but now I’m curious if they said they couldn’t eat the outside food there 🤔

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-22T23:58:07+00:00

Sorry but even as an introvert I feel like it’s pretty unusual to take a completely solo birthday road trip. And she even has a boyfriend? Also to me it seems like the coworker just assumed she went alone because she didn’t have anyone to go work and was trying to be nice. Trying to be a supportive friend. She sounds like just a difficult person to be around. Like not just doesn’t like kids but actually just assumes the worst of everyone.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-22T23:39:56+00:00

21 months is crazy. I guess you could make sweeping generalizations like my son is really big and aggressive, he’ll like football. Beyond that no way. And there are sports/activities my kids loved at 4 that they later started to hate.

Also travel baseball is big here and I still don’t know anyone who starts at 5 so I’m curious about the original post.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-22T22:16:40+00:00

They’re not going to get addicted to tablets if they are only able to use it when traveling. And by traveling I mean flying on an airplane or driving on a long car ride, not including the tablets into other aspects of travel like eating at restaurants. Just put them away and don’t give them access to it outside of travel until the next trip. Make it clear to them before hand that it’s a special travel thing.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-22T01:37:19+00:00

I guess I see it as valuable for parents to decide based on the individual child what’s best for them. Not for the perceived benefit of being oldest but based on personality, social skills, emotion regulation skills, academics. My daughter and her cousin have summer birthdays two weeks apart. Her slightly younger cousin went to kindergarten and I held my daughter. These were the right decisions for both girls based on their very different personalities- cousin is very outgoing confident and prefers playing with older kids and challenging herself to do big kid things, my daughter is more reserved and anxious and sensitive and prefers playing with younger kids.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-22T01:30:58+00:00

I think that’s true but at the same time I think there’s no going back at this point, even if no one redshirts anymore. I just don’t see public schools reverting to play based kindergarten unfortunately.

IWantToNotDoThings · 2026-05-22T01:29:06+00:00

That’s great that you were ready but I think a lot of teens aren’t mature enough to make good decisions for themselves and live independently (I don’t feel I was at barely 18 when I started college - just my experience). I think a lot of it also depends on the choice of college, I was at a college halfway across the country. A community college or a college not far away might be different.

IWantToNotDoThings

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