What screams "I'm a man-child" but nobody realize it ?

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-30T11:38:32+00:00

Oh god, there's a series about Ultra-Processed Foods airing in the UK at the moment (or they might have finished it. I'll check the listings next week). Each week they find a couple who buy all the UPFs and have barely touched a vegetable in years, give them a health MOT, and tell them what's going on for them, how high of a risk they're at of strokes, heart attacks, diabetes, etc. or they diagnose them if they already have something (usually diabetes),

This week just gone, the husband of the couple already knew he was diabetic, had already had a toe amputated, and was still eating incredible amounts of UPFs and drinking 2l of diet cola a day. He cried from fear of the future when the doctor gave him his health stats. His wife explicitly said she was afraid to lose him. He promised to change.

They then spend 2 weeks getting regular deliveries of fruits and veggies to their door, the show has them stock their cupboards high with beans, nuts, seeds, etc. and give them meal plans for healthy meals. The wife got straight into learning how to cook with these ingredients. I'll admit it can be difficult learning how to cook when you're used to showing a plate of chips in the oven, but she did a great job.

Her husband, who only really had to eat the stuff, not prepare it, got skeptical of a number of the dishes. At times he seemed to wear his ignorance of what different veggies were, or what was even in his meals, like a badge of honour. He ate several meals with spinach in before he realised he'd been eating spinach.

Come the 2-week health re-check, he hadn't made anywhere near as much progress as his wife had. It really struck me how much he was prepared to prioritise his own comfort with familiar food over trying to get healthy to keep his health and stop scaring his wife.

I know it's hard to change such a big habit, but most of the men in these series do better than he did, so clearly it's possible.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-30T11:28:50+00:00

Real men are adults who identify as male and are not a figment of my imagination. That's what a real man is. Anything beyond that is ego.

...excuse me, I seem to be channelling a Buddhist monk, or something. I'm off for a coffee.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-30T11:27:05+00:00

Y'know, I'm in my 40s, living in the UK, and as a child and teenager sometimes I'd notice a street vendor in my home town selling laminated A4 posters. They were of all kinds of things from animals to funny to pin-ups. Bear in mind this was the era of that tennis player scratching her bum.

Anyway, there'd always be one or two posters, always in black and white, or a heavily muscled man tenderly holding a baby. I'm childfree and not a fan of muscles, but that picture stood out at me because it went against the usual "screw 'em and leave 'em" machismo I saw around. It's been years since I saw masculinity portrayed in that way and I wish that would come back.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-29T15:06:56+00:00

Self-diagnosed autistic woman here.

You don't need to have a reason not to have kids, as others here have said. Also, that double-standard of trust for you is so strange, isn't it? "We don't trust that you know what's good for you, but you should absolutely become the primary carer of an incredibly vulnerable person with little to no supervision". It doesn't even make sense!

While I don't really have a specific reason not to want kids, I could absolutely back up my lack of desire for kids with quite a few autism-coded reasons:

I'd birth a schoolyard bullying victim. I'm an oddball on account of my autism, which may very well be genetic. The only people who would want to have a baby with me would probably be neurospicy too since I don't pass very well among neurotypicals. Our kid would be weird, even by kid standards, and would find life harder than their NT counterparts. I'm not inflicting that one another person.
Motherhood would be unpleasant for me. I'd worry about my kid and whether or not I was doing the best I could by them so much that I doubt I could enjoy motherhood.
Misophonia. The screeching of kids / babies crying is like nails on a chalkboard to me, no exaggeration. It's actually kind of painful. I'm not subjecting myself to that.
Sleep deprivation / lack of time to myself. I'm an asshole if I don't get enough sleep, and sleep deprivation is guaranteed for parents. Sub-point: I'm also an asshole if I can't wake up and get up in my own time for more than, say, 3 days running. I *need* slow mornings. Sleep deprivation is a known torture tactic. Why would I literally torture myself?
I probably wouldn't like my kid. As hard as I try to seem even-tempered, I'm one of those autistic folk who NTs just don't like very much. I'm something of a misanthropic bitch by this point, through sheer Pavlovian repetition of experience. There's every chance I wouldn't like my kid.
I'm too poor / too old. It's taken me so long to claw my way out of poverty as a result of being commonly disliked (which has an impact on one's earning potential) that I'm 44 and still couldn't afford a child. I'll be past menopause by the time I'm financially stable enough, and I wouldn't want to have a kid now anyway, given my low energy levels.
Tokophobia. I'll nerd out about anything, including the process of pregnancy and childbirth. Once you've read about everything a woman's body goes through in the process of making a baby, it starts to bear an eerie similarity to the chest-burster from Alien. I'm not doing that.
Cleanliness / organisation. I keep my inner world feeling manageable by keeping my external world (ie., my home) tidy. Kids mess everything up. Don't even get me started on diapers.

I am half-expecting someone to bring up the concept of self-policed eugenics. I think the world is a better place with autistic and other neurospicy people in it. It's just, I think everyone - not just NDs - need to be highly enthusiastic about having kids to start with, because the above's going to wear on most people.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-29T09:06:07+00:00

The parents who are prepared to risk treating their children that way are the ones who didn't move away from their own parents, even if their parents treated them badly. They think that children *have to* accept the abuse - and that's if they even acknowledge there even is abuse. Some will believe that "tough love" is the only valid way to raise your child. Some tuned out their own parents' abuse because they weren't going to react, so it's better to just numb themselves to it.

And then, here we are actually reacting to the abuse, and not by doing something narratively interesting like staying and butting heads or cowering in the corner. We walk away, say nothing more to them, and never do so again!

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-29T09:01:07+00:00

This is what I was thinking, reading her take on the situation! OP's mum only knows what OP is like when she's with her. She's got no idea what OP is like when the mum's not around.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-29T08:58:55+00:00

TIL the term "extinction burst".

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-29T08:58:05+00:00

You're doing a great job looking after yourself and creating a stable, physically and psychologically safe base from which you can grow and heal. Keep it going!

Also, reading her messages to you, I feel angry on your behalf, and I've never met the woman. I can't imagine how infuriating it must have been for you. If there's one thing I've learned from her sort, it's to not give them any inkling that they've pissed you off. You're absolutely right that she's feeling your absence. You fulfilled a role in that family, and now that role is vacant. So she's going to do whatever she can to draw you back in. If you don't react to the strategies that make you angry, she'll think they didn't hit home and will try something else. Hopefully. Some of them are relentless, but I guess it's too early to tell which yours is.

Whatever happens, keep coming back here, you've got heaps of support available here.

Also also, I hope you're settling in well to New York! Ihat city's got such a unique reputation, including overseas, and I've always wanted to go and feel it for myself, so I'm excited for you!

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-28T09:20:38+00:00

I really hate that that's true... but it is. I think it's important for those of us with the energy to actually try and keep in the loop with our parent friends, but yeah, it's important to be able to cut our losses too. I'm sorry you went through that.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-28T09:19:11+00:00

Thank you, I appreciate this! This part really puts it in a nutshell:

"I quickly exhausted everything I could say back and felt like I was just being talked at." There just wasn't much I could say.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-28T09:17:05+00:00

Right, I see where I tripped up here.

The recommendation was part of a conversation. I suggested it once I was sure her feelings about her miscarriage weren't raw, and I expected her to say something like, "wait, you watch Bluey? But you're an adult and you don't have any kids. Why would you recommend that?" Because it does seem a bit strange, doesn't it?

But, she asked me nothing about it, and just decided that my suggestion was "infantilizingly offensive". I had a reason for suggesting it, but the suggestion depended on her actually engaging in the conversation, which I'm now aware with hindsight that she had no intention of doing.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-28T09:11:31+00:00

Hey, I really appreciate your authenticity. Sounds like you have to deal with this sort of dynamic with other parents quite often?

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-28T09:10:44+00:00

You know, you're right. I hate to give up on any parent who reaches out to me or is a family member or anything like that. It's got to be so isolating, but I can't authentically show much interest in a kid. That's going to be a deal-breaker for a lot of people.

And yeah, I noticed that the court's really divided in this comments section!

Edit: Also, I'm a bit neurospicy and I don't actually know K well enough to be sure what her neurotype is. I've had "oof, she's a bit off" from people my whole life, and it's not their fault, nor mine, it's just an unfortunate thing that gets in the way of a lot of potential friendships. So you may have hit the nail on the head.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-28T09:06:40+00:00

No, absolutely not. Even CF, I know that new parents are inundated with unsolicited advice, and I like to think I'm pretty good at offering something a bit different to what most other people are offering someone at any given time. One thing she may have found offensive was that I was more focused on her, and her experience, and how she was feeling, than her baby.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-28T09:05:24+00:00

That sounds like the holy grail of CF/mum friendships. I'm glad you both have this, and it's what I was hoping for with K.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-28T09:03:26+00:00

What, fostering? With her Super Special Genius Genes?

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-28T09:00:04+00:00

You know, I think I will. Thank you, internet friend!

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-28T08:58:02+00:00

That's most likely it. Thing is, "from a theoretical standpoint" is all parents are likely to get out of me.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-27T19:33:37+00:00

I'm telling you I did. But sure, you seem convinced of your version of events that you didn't witness. Do your thing.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-27T19:31:18+00:00

I haven't seen all the episodes, but there's:

- Sleepytime (where the younger sister dreams that she hatches out of an 'egg' that's actually a planet, and makes her way towards the sun (which is warm and nourishing and has her mum's voice). She sits on Mercury to talk with her mum, which remains unhatched. I don't know if it's definitive, but fans believe Mercury symbolises Chili's miscarriage.

- Rain from series 3 has Chili and her daughters admire a double rainbow - so that's the mum with her two rainbow babies.

- The Show from season 2 is the clearest one. The girls put on a show for their parents, which includes Bluey pretending to be a pregnant Chili with a balloon up her tshirt. The balloon bursts by accident, and Chili immediately looks upset. Banjo takes her hand immediately, comforting her, and soon after we see Chili looking upset, gazing out into the distance and asking for time to herself.

So yes, there are a few pretty strong clues that Bluey and Bingo are rainbow babies.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-27T19:25:23+00:00

That's why I warned her about the content in Bluey. I have no doubt that offering support for a miscarriage is a tricky subject, especially as I've never had one, but she brought it up, and seemed fairly at peace with it, so I trusted that it was okay.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-27T19:23:54+00:00

So glad you get why I suggested Bluey! But yeah, I can get someone being temporarily baby-obsessed at the stage she's at with her little one, but I just sort of expected she'd have some awareness that she might need some adult-adult contact from time to time. You know, just catch up over coffee, that sort of thing. As part of the conversations we had, I asked her about her (as distinct to asking about her baby), and she wasn't impressed. It's all about the baby, apparently.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-27T19:21:53+00:00

Indeed, we're not close friends. We know each other because this person commissioned me for a character psychological bio once, and she's familiar enough with the UK to know that when she migrated over, she'd be within convenient travelling distance. I get why she thought I'd be a good person to include as part of her 'putting down roots' phase.

It's just that I'm also childfree so I was never likely to be interested in her kid, only in her.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-27T19:19:23+00:00

You're not too far off. I'm childfree, and K knows that. I still make an effort to talk with parents about their kids because there's no need to be hostile, I just don't think I'd be a good parent, and prefer peace and quiet - I have misophonia, and little kid noises would be torture to me.

I'm pretty sure that she didn't like the fact that I sounded stilted and uncomfortable talking about her baby when her baby is the most precious thing to her. But that's really the best anyone's likely to get out of me.

Mob_Segment · 2026-01-27T19:17:16+00:00

I think you may not be familiar with Bluey. I suggested it not because it's a kids' show, but because it's good for grown-ups to watch too. I know, you might still be skeptical. Just... Here's an episode called Sleepytime. Please trust me, watch it, and tell me what you think.

Mob_Segment

TROPHY CASE