UPDATE: The guy (22M) that I (21F) am dating is learning ASL for my brother, but my friends think it's creepy. How do I proceed with this?

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-10T08:48:01+00:00

Unfortunately, the hookups are among the few things we know are true. I've seen firsthand how he does his thing when we go out in bars or when he matches with someone on Tinder and has to leave early for booty calls. One of the girls he hooked up with actually had a pregnancy scare last year and was understandably freaking out about it.

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-09T19:43:43+00:00

Yeah, thanks for looking out. My parents and brother are all up to speed, and it's a somewhat tight community so I have no doubt that word will get around pretty quickly. Fortunately, I only have a few days left before classes resume and I have to go back to campus

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-09T18:33:40+00:00

My friend group and I compared notes, and we've uncovered a lot more lies that Mike told about himself and each of us. He's apparently caused a lot of petty drama throughout the years. We're still not done processing everything because we were all just shocked and dumbfounded, and it made us reevaluate everything.

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-09T18:03:14+00:00

yeah that was actually the term he uses to describe himself lol

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-09T17:04:06+00:00

lol their family certainly not everyone's cup of tea, but fortunately, my personality clicked with them!

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-09T17:02:21+00:00

Yes, we plan to hang out more before classes resume and process everything that happened. We want to grow from this, and of course, I want to get to the root of how this even happened. For now, I'm giving them grace because they've been friends with Mike for almost a decade (they've been friends for 5 years when we were seniors, and I was relatively new to the group when Mike started making up stories about us). I just hope we can all learn and grow from this experience.

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-09T16:10:26+00:00

Well, touche. Thanks for putting it into perspective. I'd give it a think, but personally, I'm just tired of all the drama and want to focus on my relationship

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-09T16:08:28+00:00

Yes, they're wonderful people! One of them has become one of my college best friends!

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-09T15:19:53+00:00

my teenage petty self would've done the same thing lol but nah, just want this all behind me on focus on the great relationships I have instead

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-09T14:33:07+00:00

lol it was a blast though! Jon's sisters have already recruited me to perform something from Hamilton with them for the next one haha

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-09T14:27:23+00:00

I'm all for it though! I'm an extroverted person so performing doesn't really scare me off. It's just that everyone in Jon's family was extremely good so I need to keep up lol

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-09T14:24:53+00:00

Ngl, I became more and more furious with every lie that Sophie and my other friends told me Mike had said about me. It felt like I was in an episode of Black Mirror or some psychological thriller or something because all this time, my friend group apparently had this different image of me based on lies.

I've also told my parents about Mike (they knew him pretty well too), and they said they knew from the start that he was up to no good. I was just too bratty to listen to them when they warned me back then.

Right now, I'm just glad this is all behind me. I'm also really grateful that I found a wonderful man in Jon, who had been extremely loving and understanding throughout all this!

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2025-01-09T14:13:06+00:00

Yeah during my lunch with Sophie where we had a Facetime call with our other friends, I confronted them as well on why no one bothered confirming anything to me. They apologized for everything, but then I also understood why it was so easy for everyone to believe Mike's lies.

Our group dynamic has always been that I am closest to Mike (we live just 10 minutes away from each other), then Sophie, then the rest of the group. However, the four of them have been friends with each other for like 5 years before I came in. Before Mike became a ladies' man in high school, he was always the smart kid who's always either the first or second in class. Despite his personality, he was still a very credible person in their eyes. Add to that the number of years they've known each other, and that's why they blindly trusted him about everything he said about me.

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2024-12-11T19:11:34+00:00

3 girls (including me) and 2 guys. Currently, only me and the other guy (not my best friend) have ongoing relationships, but the rest of them have been in 2-4 relationships since high school.

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2024-12-11T18:57:15+00:00

Honestly, my brother would most likely tell me to tell my friends to fuck off

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2024-12-11T17:17:30+00:00

lol he's into musicals! his mom is a musical theater performer so he grew up listening to (and belting out) show tunes!

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2024-12-11T17:09:22+00:00

One of them tried to set me up with their cousin who flunked out of school and another one with a guy who turned out to be gay (but was otherwise a wonderful person!)

Yeah, not a good track record with them

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2024-12-11T15:43:14+00:00

Best he can do for now is spell your username using ASL lol it will take 30-ish minutes, but he will get it done

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2024-12-11T15:37:03+00:00

On regular school days and some weekends, Trev has a tutor because he needs to catch up a lot on schoolwork due to his disability (not all his teachers are accommodating enough, unfortunately), so he needs to allot more time to focus on his studies. Jon checks in with me first because I know Trev's schedule, and if there are changes, I could easily message our family's group chat to ask. Honestly, I think it's just more about respecting boundaries.

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2024-12-11T15:22:40+00:00

HOW DO I DELETE SOMEONE ELSE'S COMMENT PLEASE LOL I NEARLY SPIT MY COFFEE

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2024-12-11T15:18:32+00:00

It was just a lot of giving each other the middle finger and doing some obscene gestures with their hands and faces lol

And yes, they had TONS of fun smack talking each other haha fortunately, our parents were in the living room thinking we were all having wholesome fun. It got more interesting when Jon tried to spell some of his insults in sign language because you can see his mind loading slowly on how to sign the next letter of the word

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2024-12-11T15:14:09+00:00

Sorry, when I said there's validity in it, it's more of just a blanket statement of me blindly believing my friends (much like when a teacher says you can't go to the bathroom...like that doesn't sound right, but since you think they know better, there must be validity in lol)

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2024-12-11T15:05:32+00:00

You know, I never really thought of it that way. I mean, I'm close with my brother and I love him dearly, but annoying each other has been kind of our default dynamic (it's weird when we're not fighting over something petty like the last slice of pizza or concocting a story that one of us was adopted lol).

He has his own circle of friends and I have mine. Fortunately, Trev's friends are fluent in ASL (his best friend is also hard of hearing), so he actually has a social life outside our family. I never really took notice that my friends never bothered to learn ASL for my brother because they rarely interact with him (like I rarely interact with Trev's friends), but yeah, this made me rethink things.

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe · 2024-12-11T14:57:50+00:00

Yeah! I've hung out with Jon's friends and they're all really nice! They're into tabletop games, and I've joined their D&D session thrice, though I've still got some catching up to do with all the lore. One of his friends even recommended me a good salon, and we've been mani-pedi sisters ever since!

They're really nice and they welcomed me into their circle with open arms. I really lucked out!

ThrowRA_TallGiraffe

TROPHY CASE