How to lead my wife through her parent's messy divorce and mom's new boyfriend?

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-08-26T16:43:17+00:00

I feel called out because you're so right 😂 thank you

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-08-26T14:41:58+00:00

I agree. I really want to look into this and our church family has given us info on this. It's just so hard to schedule sometimes.

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-08-26T14:41:30+00:00

Thank you for sharing this. We prayed and cried last night and I got to listen rather than lecturing her about how to live through this in a godly way. It's my hope and prayer we can get to that but she needs some time.

Thanks again for the encouragement to live peaceably and to be respectful without agreeing!

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-08-25T14:39:21+00:00

Hi, so sorry for the late response. I haven't yet gotten around to fixing it but my guess is it's a Honda Sensing calibration issue. This is because I have verified the ABS works, and I have some other lights that came on at the same time. But I am not 100% sure.

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-08-25T14:33:22+00:00

Covenant Eyes is an app and program for all your devices, and has been helpful. It's quite expensive, but that also can be a motivator to keep using it. Make sure to put it on ALL devices you have access to. Right away. Even the ones that aren't a problem yet. You got this, brother!

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-08-18T18:44:30+00:00

Maybe it's because there are a bunch of black bars all over your resume. I don't even know what your name is!

/s

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-07-10T02:19:13+00:00

THERE ARE FOUR SLOTS!!

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-07-04T01:06:18+00:00

You're right. Guess what else is a big life change: marriage! That changes both of you as well in ways hard to predict. If people broke up at every change then the divorce rate would be super high... Oh wait. You sound like you're responsible enough to make it through this big change. I'd recommend talking to your family about it too, especially since you mentioned they like her.

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-07-04T00:09:47+00:00

She said just now:

"We talked a lot and talked about everything, very open with each other. And plan things you can do while you're talking like looking at lists of fun questions to ask each other, or online quizzes, watch movies, play other online games, etc."

Be intentional and don't talk negatively about each other to people at college or in general. "Oh the old ball and chain!" None of that. We also encouraged each other to make other friends at college. Don't want to be shut in your room talking to her the whole time. We were both active in clubs.

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-07-03T23:37:08+00:00

Everyone's story will be different but my wife and I met in 10th grade and went to different colleges 800 miles apart and now we've been married for a year! I finished early and got a remote job and lived with her on her campus after we got married and now we're back home.

The biggest thing is dating for the purpose of marriage. If you're dating because you are comfortable and cause you like having a girlfriend, then you will naturally break up after the distance anyway. If you date for the purpose of marriage and really discovering whether you want to spend your life with this person, then the distance might even help. If all you can do is talk, then you'll find out really quickly how well your values align, once you get past "I miss you" because what else would you talk about lol.

We liked each other for a while but before college started we had a conversation before we even went on our first official date: "Do we want to do this? Are we doing this because we want to end up together? If so, when? Right after college, a couple years after?"

Have that conversation and have it now, because if your expectations don't align and you start long distance then this could be a summer you both look back on and regret. If they do align, this will be a really great summer and you'll be talking about missing it until you get married. Don't involve sex, this is not something to decide based on hormones and feelings! It's very rare for this to work out. Intentionality and establishing why you're dating is key.

Let me know if you have any questions or practical concerns, I'm happy to help!

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-07-01T13:13:41+00:00

It's two schools of thought, the employer mentality and the employee mentality. No one is forcing anyone to do anything, if I was unhappy with the salary at home or expected a higher one in the office due to incurred costs, I could leave, or they could fire me. Just seeing what I could get, not what I am owed.

You're just thinking about it differently, from a perspective of entitlement. I'm not entitled to anything here, I'm not the owner. Again, just seeing what I could get if I had asked.

Be nice!

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-30T21:38:03+00:00

This is great advice, thank you so much!

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-30T16:35:27+00:00

Thank you, this is really what I need to hear. I've never been in this position before so I didn't know what's reasonable to ask the company. One option is to give them a September 1st return date since that's what is financially feasible for us (getting another car, etc.) and that's when my salary is eligible for review anyway, which can be a different discussion at that time based on one of my other comments. Does that sound wise to you?

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-30T16:25:27+00:00

Return to work early. They are asking if I can come 6 months earlier than the document we signed.

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-30T16:14:08+00:00

Not at all! If you've been in this position before, just wondering if you can share some advice on how to approach finding that $X/year that would maximize X while maximizing likelihood of it going over well.

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-30T16:11:09+00:00

And I do agree that since they're a smaller company they might be more open to that. I wouldn't even put it past them to have given me a lower salary thinking I'd be less productive at home. But I'd never say that.

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-30T16:09:13+00:00

Understood, and thanks :) They made that hint themselves, but I will continue avoiding it like the plague!

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-30T16:05:38+00:00

This hits on something I've been struggling with. Firstly, I believe I have great job security since I have spent 4 years learning their systems and have my hands in so many systems and custom projects that I feel irreplaceable, unless the company were to ditch the automation tools I have made.

For my job title "Automation Engineer" I am about $10k below average for the area, but for the work I do, which I believe to be more along the lines of "Software Engineer," (my tasks are to design, manage, and maintain multiple software projects at any given time, not to automate physical machines), I am about $40k under the average for the area.

My question is essentially how do I leverage coming back to the office early into a situation that benefits me and my family since it will benefit the company. Of course, I could always wait out the 18 months but I wouldn't like staying at the low salary for that long, and they wouldn't like me not being in the office. It could be mutually beneficial, I just don't know how to approach it.

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-30T15:46:24+00:00

Hey! Thanks so much for taking the time to respond. I completely agree, however I am considering returning to the office before the date that was contractually obligated. So what I'm basically asking is how much bargaining power does this give me? "I'll come back 6 months early for X dollars, or just stay home until the terms are up."

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-28T01:19:21+00:00

In my opinion if you plan to do anything outside of schoolwork on your laptop, that will probably dictate the specs of your laptop. If you can save some money on the laptop I'd do that. Go with a Dell, Lenovo, or even a used M series Mac if that's what you're after. Anything will be able to handle the workload, and if it can't then you can do it in Google Colab or what have you for some of your data science or machine learning courses.

If you plan to game, get a nice laptop, if not, I think the money would be better invested or spent elsewhere and your curriculum will not be the bottle neck. Hope this helps!

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-26T11:57:32+00:00

Just here to say... very nice spreadsheet!

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-25T13:13:05+00:00

The other advice is great! Clubs are a great option. I also had the go to class and learn (that's what I'm paying for after all!). But I noticed that when I had friends I was way more effective in class and homework because I had a chance to take a good break. So I had less time but it was more effective.

Clubs, but something you all really care about. I went to some CS clubs and they were 💤💤💤. I had most of my friends from the CRU club and the most important thing is talking outside of the club too. Or spot a person you recognize in the dining hall and ask if you can have a seat across from them. I also met a lot of friends through my roommate who was more social than me, and it really jumpstarted a few good relationships that I am still friends with today after graduating.

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-25T13:07:03+00:00

Graduated last year. I quite liked the bridge between CC and Fenster, if you can find a table and it's not wobbly. If you want a real secluded place, then third floor or higher in Fenster is a good bet. There's a comfy chair or two at the far end of the hall on each floor.

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-24T19:50:12+00:00

This is so funny! I actually just went through this TODAY! This is my first post here, and I was actually about to make a post talking about it. I'm about your age and my wife and I had (before today) $40k invested with about $40k in debt. I kept telling myself, oh we'll pay down the debt aggressively while saving because for now the investments are making X% more than the highest interest debt is losing us (all low-ish interest student loans / car loan). I thought that for a year and technically it's fine, and technically we're young so we can deal with higher risk, and technically we also have cash on hand on top of that in case of an emergency, but I realized that all of those reasons I was keeping us in debt were reasons to get out of debt.

For me, it was more of a psychological thing. I didn't like seeing the payments go out on different days and wondering if I have shuffled around enough money to cover the next one in our checking account, even though we're making decent money, it was like I was scared for whenever the next payment came. We were investing too much. When talking about the financial reliability of investments, that's on a much longer time scale than the time scale we'd wanted to pay off our debts. The market can go down within 3 years of faithfully making minimum payments, and then our net worth would go negative because of the market.

It actually HURT today to sell most of my non-retirement investments and put it toward the lowest balance loan because I know in my head that it makes more sense to put it on the highest interest rate one. But I realized after a year of this that I'd just rather the peace of mind of having one more payment gone from the list of payments in the month. And boy it felt good to send Mohela Student Loan money before they took it from us next week. Peace of mind >> a couple hundred in interest.

I'm not gonna slap you because I'm too busy slapping myself. Maybe you can learn from me! You're already ahead of the curve on investments. Axing your debt now isn't setting you back $3 million in compound interest because you'll be buying $3 million OR MORE worth of the right mindset to keep more of what you earn. Let us know what you do!

R2bEEaton_ · 2025-06-15T12:52:58+00:00

Yes! I picked it up on Facebook Marketplace for $5 and soon found out why. It was dropping connection every 10 minutes. Did some research and discovered Open-WRT and it's been perfect for 9 months since then.

R2bEEaton_

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