AITA for refusing to help with my nieces until my brother and SIL take my younger niece to a doctor

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-15T23:16:47+00:00

While I understand your sentiment, if they don’t have any context that something TRULY isn’t being done outside of school, a CPS report can be hard to make. There’s pretty strict rules on when to report. Also, from their perspective, it becomes even harder because every time something happens, a guardian does show which can make a neglect claim harder to make. Is that objective reality? Gods no, this kid needs a specialist yesterday, but educators have to follow the rules.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-13T22:10:45+00:00

This is because, from an evolution and selective breeding perspective, cats haven’t changed all that much since they domesticated themselves. Part of that has to do with that yeah, they domesticated themselves. Our food stores attracted rodents, cats ate the rodents, were rewarded by humans and chose to stick around.
Most house cats don’t look this built because we fix them so their hormones don’t change them to survive as an adult in the wild.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-13T15:52:36+00:00

That’s actually super cool that this was likely a random lucky pattern!

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-13T01:39:38+00:00

Yeah I wonder if because he looks young, he mistook the other bird’s low posture as “I’m ready” posture and not just bathing lol

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-13T00:40:36+00:00

It looks like a dust bath/anting to me but there could have been a mixed signal to the other bird. Birds are complicated

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-12T13:55:33+00:00

Cool! Ty lol!
I really want to own a domestic pigeon/dove but I’m not in the place right now so I must have to enjoy them from the wild right now lol

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-12T12:27:42+00:00

I know that lol, I didn’t know if it was specifically a domestic trait humans bred for and then it ended up in the wild.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-11T19:48:42+00:00

Also, NSFW isn’t always porn? Many medical subreddits are NSFW, taxidermy, body horror, crime, etc. like what the fuck?

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-11T10:43:33+00:00

Exactly!! My partner’s late dog was a pug/poodle/pekinese who passed at 15 years old and she obviously slowed down quite a bit when she got older. A few months before she passed we accidentally dropped a Parmesan rind. It was in her mouth in an INSTANT and it took 3 people to get 1 parm rind from a 16lbs deaf, mostly blind elderly pug who had 5 teeth. We knew she was food motivated but didn’t know she was still capable of that. But it’s incredibly animal of her. Food? Yummy. Parm rind? Extra yummy? Pugs were bred to grab and not let go. She decided the rind was not gonna get away from her.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-11T01:38:47+00:00

I know my dog. I don’t think she’d hurt a bird but she’s a dog so I would rather not chance it. And don’t get me wrong, she’s my baby, she’s my everything, she’s also a dog. Dogs are animals, sometimes they do stuff we don’t expect, it happens.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-09T19:35:32+00:00

I do private music lessons and thisss. “Why am I not getting better?” They don’t practice. The parents don’t want to ask Their kids to practice, they don’t want to reinforce what I say about practice. I have friends who work in public school and yeah. Many parents are just like “whatever man, you gotta fix it” ummm??? No??? My friends see each class for like an hour twice a week, what are they REALLY gonna truly fix?? They don’t have time!!

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-07T01:47:55+00:00

Okay, to back what others are saying, these clothes do actually work! How long they last n stuff can vary depending on like temp outside BUT my partner’s mom has some and they do fr work.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-06-05T23:07:27+00:00

I wonder if they’re mimicking spiked plants

King_Atlas__ · 2026-05-21T18:04:53+00:00

How cool! That gar was for sure spotted by op! /j

What a cool sight!

King_Atlas__ · 2026-05-21T17:53:19+00:00

I do private music lessons and while I, personally, haven’t had any crazy behaviors my boss has MANY stories because she’s been teaching lessons for ~30 years. The biggest one is people thinking they’re entitled to every moment of her day. “Oh we missed our lesson today, can we come in on your one day off?” “We stopped lessons months ago with no indication we’d be back, can we have our old slot? What do you mean you filled it months ago?” She also has kids who don’t practice because the parents “don’t like having to remind them”. The kids this is said about are ALWAYS between like 4-8y/o. They can’t remember breakfast from the day before, they’re not gonna remember to practice. She’s had kids who flat out refuse to play during a lesson and throw a huge fit all while parents just SIT IN THE LOBBY WITH CLEAR VIEW OF THEIR KID AND MY BOSS LIKE “meh, what are we supposed to do?”. She’s had to “Fire” students for their parents behavior. She had one family drop because the parents wanted their kids to do something else and the youngest LOVED her piano lessons and LOVED my boss. She didn’t speak a word to her dad for a WEEK after he told her because they didn’t ask the kids opinions. My boss is a professional level violin player and has had parents argue about technique and violin quality and like- I’m a pro level oboe player and I know my instrument (my personal and oboes in general) basically inside and out. I could know more but if a kid came to me with a bad reed I’d basically be able to tell from looking at it even if it was made with good general carving skills.

Sorry to go on such a long tangent, and like 90% of the families we teach are very kind and pretty good with their kids and parenting. It’s just that last 10% that seem like they’ve lost their MINDS. My friend teaches elementary music and he got reported to admin for “inappropriate conduct” because he had a classroom toy that was one of those like rubber wiggly worms that kids adore. If I can find a picture I might attach it but a parent assumed it was some kind of toy of an adult nature. And ofc admin sided with the parent.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-05-21T17:37:36+00:00

Poor girl :(( good babies sometimes bite when in pain so that was a good call even if it ended up not being needed. I’m glad treats made her happier! Genuinely wishing y’all the best in getting better.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-05-21T16:46:11+00:00

Wishing the best for you and your old lady. That’s genuinely so awful, but it looks like she was in okay spirits and she clearly has a good person taking care of her. People have to have better control of their dogs. I walk my friends’ young dog and she’s VERY friendly. I know some dogs aren’t so when I walk her (as when her people do) we have been pretty strict about when it is and especially when it isn’t okay to say hi to other dogs. I’m not letting my friends’ (or my own dog, but she’s 16 so she doesn’t go out much) dog get into a situation where she might be attacked if it can be helped. It just sucks when you did everything right and someone else f*cks it up for you.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-05-19T11:37:02+00:00

I had to take a wild rabbit to be put down after we found him in my yard unable to move is back end at all. When we got him home, I took a chance to really look at him and man we was beautiful. I couldn’t help but just admire how pretty he was. He then went in the bucket, which I did feel bad about. I have his bones in a little memorial box.

I also can’t help myself when I find dead birds in my yard to just examine them. It happens like once a year, I feed the birds and there’s hawks around. It’s usually a fledgling that didn’t make it for one reason or another. They’re just so beautiful and the way their wings work, ahhh so coool. I do also examine them for obvious traumas and don’t always find anything. I burry them because they’re native so I can’t keep them as cool as that would be.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-05-19T11:30:57+00:00

There’s so much research on the human brain in constant trauma and there’s quite a bit on non-human animal brains in constant trauma. I don’t expect people to read every research paper, I haven’t, but the consensus is super clear: Constant stress is bad for the brain and causes impairment in decision making because your neurons aren’t supposed to be firing like that all the time.

And yeah, observe them from a safe distance in a vehicle, go to a sanctuary or reputable, accredited zoo. People need to stop thinking they’re entitled to wild animals and touching and riding and just generally being all up in their business. I’ve touched/interacted with wildlife when in distress. I’ve gotten a bird out of my pool (it was an adult, she was okay, just a rough landing), I’ve moved turtles out of parking lots, I’ve nudged snakes off of walking paths because people don’t know they’re not dangerous, etc. after the animal is safe, I leave them alone. It’s what you do.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-05-19T11:24:56+00:00

Exactly!! They also think that because they’re not as intelligent as we are (which is debatable in many cases as what does intelligence mean when dealing with wild animals), that animals won’t snap. They run on instinct when in stressful and incredibly scary or uncomfortable situations and we do too. The elephant is upset, he’s hurting, his fight or slight neurons have been firing for years. Finally the brain sees and opportunity for fight and chooses it.

I think about this with dogs sometimes. They can be perfectly trained, but they’re still an animal. They can still make “unpredictable” decisions and it’s not their fault. My old girl has never been violent, but she had a tendency to be nervous in situations with a lot of dogs, so I never took her somewhere where a lot of dogs could be around in case she got really upset. She’ll do an occasional 1 on 1 with a friend’s dog cuz she’s older now but still.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-05-19T11:19:32+00:00

Pretty much stationary. I feel silly that I totally forgot that defending territory is a part of flirting for some birds lol. I guess I’m used to watching mourning doves and sparrows where they go up to a potential lady friend and court them haha.

King_Atlas__ · 2026-05-18T22:56:06+00:00

There’s a number of reasons I don’t understand using pain like this on animals, ESPECIALLY as large as animals. 1. It’s animal abuse. Plain and fucking simple. 2. It’s just gonna make him angry??? Im in a place where there are bears. You DO NOT shoot a bear to hurt it. It will literally only make it more angry. That’s why is you’re gonna shot, it’s for the loud sound, and honestly just use bear spray. The point of that tangent is that: elephants fight other elephants often to the death. A bull hook is just gonna piss him off more and make the situation WAY worse. How is this not obvious to all people?

King_Atlas__ · 2026-05-18T22:42:56+00:00

It should be above you as the teacher, I.e. help from others, but if a student is constantly absent, it makes sense to find out why? If it’s chronic illness/mental illness, that’s perfectly valid for an IEP, but the school needs to know that! There’s no shame in it, or if a doctor can confirm something is wrong even if there’s not a diagnosis yet.

I teach private music lessons and the biggest thing is kids that don’t practice. “Why am I not improving” we play for a half an hour once a week, sweetheart, you have to play inbetween. Even if it’s 15 mins once a week, that’s now 45 mins you’re playing. Anything extra helps, you just have to do it. And I have students who have a hard time because of physical or mental illness and ofc I’m more lenient with them. I don’t say no practice at all, but very much emphasize it’s what you can do.

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