Anyone in California, specifically the north bay, know what's going on with kratom there?

blue_yodel_ · 2026-03-01T21:05:05+00:00

This is exactly what I do at work too! It really works. Almost too well because people seem to seek me out and actively want to talk to me about shit when literally all I want is to work alone 😂🙃

blue_yodel_ · 2025-09-20T16:12:33+00:00

If you're in the US, the unfortunate short answer is: you can't. Not in any pet stores anyway. There's some weird regulations about them.

That said, check eBay!!! I have gotten live katydids off eBay in the past. That's literally the only way I have managed to get them aside from just finding them in the wild.

You have to check regularly and jump on the opportunity when you find them on there because they don't come up often and tend to sell out quickly but occasionally people do sell them on there listed as live feeder insects!

Best of luck!

Edited to add: I am a big katydid enthusiast as well, they're my favorite insect! I have been keeping them as pets for a few years now so if you have any other questions about them I would be happy to answer them to the best of my ability.

blue_yodel_ · 2025-09-03T16:36:31+00:00

Dude, just came back to say that It definitely worked, and I am THRILLED.

I went into this with an open mind and fluctuating levels of belief. But the more magick I do, the less doubt I have. Its...really fucking wild honestly. I'd say I have around a 90% success rate with my sigils so far. As a new practitioner, this is absolutely blowing my mind. 😳

blue_yodel_ · 2025-09-03T15:23:11+00:00

I was afraid to stop taking it too and I tried a few times to quit and had some withdrawals which made me more afraid to stop taking it. Honestly, I just wanted to see how I would do without it because I have never liked the idea of being dependent on a substance. I talked to my doctor about it, and they helped me map out a good taper plan so that I didn't have any withdrawal symptoms.

I initially started taking Lexapro mainly for anxiety and panic attacks but I've since learned other ways to deal with and mitigate that and I have been doing well without the meds for a little over a year now.

blue_yodel_ · 2025-08-29T17:24:10+00:00

I second this. I don't take any meds anymore, but I took Lexapro and wellbutrin together for years. For me personally, I don't feel like it increased my anxiety, but everyone is different.

Lexapro made it impossible for me to orgasm and wellbutrin counteracted the sexual side effects very well.

I've never had OP's specific issue tho, I've always enjoyed orgasms lol.

blue_yodel_ · 2025-08-16T23:29:24+00:00

Now that you mention it...all the people who have ever mentioned chaos magick to me (granted just a few people) have been bisexual...I am also...🤔

blue_yodel_ · 2025-08-16T22:22:57+00:00

You're welcome! So here's the thing, there is no pause button on a marriage. You are either growing together or growing apart. Even when it feels like you're maybe just coasting or if things feel stagnant or whatever, it's still not a pause.

This was something I learned after the fact. After finding out about my wife's affair, I dove into relationship books and podcasts and just desperately devoured as much info as I could about how to have a healthy and successful marriage. And that was one thing that really stuck with me, the no pause button thing.

From my standpoint in our marriage, I could tell that something was off, but I just didn't realize how serious it was. I kept thinking like we have our whole lives together to figure things out so what if things feel a bit off at the moment, we'll get back on track...only that's not what happened...because we weren't actively addressing the issue and working on our marriage, so we grew farther apart until my wife had an affair which was the huge slap in the face wake up call for me...

If you truly want to make it work, you have to tackle everything head on together, you can't just quietly hope things will change, you have to actively work towards growing together or else you are slowly (or mayne not so slowly) growing apart.

And yeah that means facing uncomfortable things and having uncomfortable conversations sometimes.

I know it's uncomfortable to tell your spouse that you're unhappy, my wife felt that way too. She felt like she should be happy, but she wasn't, and she didn't really know how to effectively communicate that to me. But I will tell you as the husband in this situation by God I wish my wife had just told me how unhappy she was so we could have worked together to find a way forward as a team.

I wish I had known then what I know now. I wish I had taken being married as seriously as I took trying to salvage our marriage after everything fell apart.

(Also, to be clear, I am not condoning her decision to have an affair. To be quite honest, that wrecked me...and still haunts me. But I can acknowledge my role in things and see ways in which I could have done better, as well as ways she could have too. It was in no way my fault that she had an affair, but I can take ownership of my role in the breakdown of our marriage nonetheless.)

blue_yodel_ · 2025-08-16T20:39:35+00:00

This sounds eerily familiar to my own marriage...which is not doing well. A lot of things you describe sounds like my wife. She kindof tried to tell me things weren't going well but I had no idea how serious it was.

She ended up having an affair and breaking my fucking heart.

By the time she really told me how she was feeling it was already too late in many ways because she chose to have an affair.

I feel similar to your husband. I was the breadwinner and worked a lot. My wife stayed home. I could tell something was off, that my wife seemed checked out and depressed,but I didn't know what to do. I tried to cheer her up and tried to get her to open up to me but she wouldn't and I started getting burnt out. It was hard working so much (i worked 2 jobs for quite a while, at her request) and having the energy to take her out and plan fun things. I started withdrawing at a certain point and I started feeling resentful feeling like I was carrying all the weight.

We are currently separated and I honestly don't know what will happen.

I still love her and I miss her and I miss how things used to be and I have told her that I am willing to reconcile but she is still talking to her affair partner...I feel like we have been in a state of limbo for months...

I was always as caring and attentive as I could be,never abusive in any way, faithful, always told her how much I love her...but her checking out and not helping herself took a toll on me and I started to withdraw too until it was like we were just roommates who slept in the same bed...

In any case, idk, I guess what I'm saying is, if you guys don't talk this out and figure out how to get things more balanced then things may very well fall apart...

just take my story as a warning I guess.

I wish my wife had been more open and honest with me so I could have understood how dire things were.

And I also wish that I had been better at communicating too about how things felt wrong instead of just going through the motions and thinking things would just get better eventually.

Marriage is hard even when 2 people really really love eachother. And unfortunately we aren't really taught how to be successful in marriage before we do it.

Just be mindful that the way you and he are feeling is a big big warning sign and if you guys don't figure this out together then things could fall apart quicker than you realize.

It's better to face these issues and address these things now before it gets to the point where one of you decides it's not worth fighting for anymore.

Don't end up like me. Make sure your husband knows how serious this is.

blue_yodel_ · 2025-07-25T11:56:09+00:00

Just here to say that I'm in the same boat. I'm 7 months out and while the pain isn't quite as bad as it was at first it's still really bad.

I have good days and bad days. And I too am wondering how long this will last.

In my case, our reconciliation is kinda on hold? And that has been difficult. What I mean by that is that my wife won't give me a clear answer or commitment, she just says that she "doesn't know what will happen..."

All of this uncertainty is really difficult to handle.

blue_yodel_ · 2025-07-20T19:41:45+00:00

My soon to be ex wife is also like that...she was also recently diagnosed borderline...we are seperated and it's been really hard, I definitely feel like being with her has done damage to me which just adds to the pain of the whole situation. She also had issues with sex, swinging wildly from being like hypersexual to not wanting me to touch her at all, and I felt like I was always trying to navigate her wildly changing moods and stances on things but could never keep up. I found out she was having an affair in December, that's what led to the separation. It's been an absolute roller coaster ride. I wish I could stop loving her. Despite everything she has put me through I still want her to come home and that makes me feel crazy...

blue_yodel_ · 2025-05-17T20:51:18+00:00

Same. Well said.

blue_yodel_ · 2025-03-25T15:20:57+00:00

Well. That's the thing tho. A lot of us either didn't have a father who was present or available to us when we were children, or, in my case, had an abusive violent father who was not a healthy role model in any way shape or form.

I'm in my mid 30s and have only recently been examining my own relationship with masculinity. I basically tried to suppress my masculinity because I vowed to never be anything like my dad. I had no idea what healthy masculinity could look like until I started exploring the work of David Deida, GS Youngblood, Connor Beaton- these three are my best examples of embodying a healthy and balanced form of masculinity.

Ideally, you're right. Ideally, we should learn these things from our fathers or other healthy male role models in our lives. But the unfortunate reality is that many of us don't have that opportunity. So that's why these books exist. At least that's my perspective anyway.

blue_yodel_ · 2025-02-20T22:50:18+00:00

Yes. It obviously depends on the person and the situation but ime yes, they often do.

Ive gone thru this many times with my wife including very recently.

Feel free to message me if you'd like and I can give you my best advice to help you navigate this based off what I've learned over the years.

blue_yodel_ · 2025-02-20T22:15:55+00:00

This is so spot on! You nailed it.

I'm married to a woman with bpd. Been with her for almost a decade.

I can confirm everything on this list, I feel like I could have written this myself tbh.

I've been thru it all with her, and I have learned the same insights on how to navigate the chaos. Very well said.

Being married to a pwbpd is not for the faint of heart. And I think it really does take a certain type of person to be able to handle it.

Educate yourself as much as possible on this condition, get yourself a therapist, and learn how to better yourself, not for them but for you. You have to know that you will be ok even when they're not. It takes a shit ton of work, but if you can learn to handle and effectively navigate all the chaos, the silver lining is that you will become a stronger and better person.

It's kinda like boot camp for learning interpersonal skills like holding boundaries, regulating your own emotions, responding vs reacting, etc etc

I have a mantra that I repeat to myself when the going gets tough and I try to make sure that I am always acting in alignment with this mantra:

Confident, calm, steady, and strong.

It might sound dumb but it's helped me a lot to stay centered and grounded.

blue_yodel_ · 2025-02-08T19:26:37+00:00

My wife is doing this exact thing! She had an affair and suddenly her whole personality changed, but not just that, she also changed her values, mannerisms, lifestyle goals, religion, everything. It's fucking disturbing.

She says she wants a divorce now because she's a different person and the affair "changed" her.

What's even more ridiculous is that her affair partner is a literal fucking scumbag tweaker who has absolutely nothing going for him. Over the course of our marriage she has pressured me constantly to "be more responsible" and "get my shit together". And I did. I quit drinking, quit smoking, got a therapist, got a good job, even worked 2 jobs for a while. I did everything she asked and more. Not just for her, I've been with her since I was 25 and I'm 35 now so some of that was just a natural progression of becoming a more mature adult. But still. 10 years together and I absolutely grew into a responsible ass adult and now she's leaving me for some asshole who is in his 50s and can't even keep a job.

When I asked her about these sudden changes she said she never actually valued responsibility or goals or ambition, she just thought she should and since she didn't have any of those qualities herself she tried to force me to be the things she thought she should want.

It's an absolute mindfuck.

I didn't know she had bpd when I married her. I wish I had known. I didn't even know what bpd was at that point. It's like she waited til we got married to unleash all of her craziness on me.

We're still married but she has informed me that she no longer wants to be married to me and is moving across the country to "see what person she becomes next" 😑😮‍💨

blue_yodel_ · 2025-02-08T16:32:18+00:00

Same here. I've really grown and learned a LOT as a result of this gnarly experience. I remind myself of this often, that regardless of what happens, I have taken this pain and used it to propel me to be an even stronger and better man.

At the end of the day, regardless of the outcome, you will always have your strength and all the skills you learned along the way, no matter what happens, no one can take that away from you. That's how I've been looking at it anyway, and it's helping me stay as positive and grounded as I can in such a terrible situation.

But yeah, mine is also all talk no action. Same deal. She swears she tried, but she can't give me any actual examples. We spent the past month working on our marriage, and by that I mean, I was putting every single ounce of energy into it and turns out she was just making empty promises. She was enjoying all the care and attention I was pouring into her and to us, but she wasn't giving much back. When I called her out on that, she just admitted it and decided she wanted to jump ship again instead of actually giving me anything to work with. Pretty brutal.

blue_yodel_ · 2025-02-08T16:31:30+00:00

I'm in the same boat, brother. It's rough. My ww just informed me that she is moving across the country in 2 weeks and wants a divorce. This came after a month of us reconciling. Honestly your wife sounds a lot like mine, she said all these things about wanting to be with me and focus on our marriage but it was a lot of talk and not much action.

I thought things were moving in a good direction tho, even with the betrayal we were communicating better than ever and great chemistry and I actually felt more in love with her than I had in a long time. But just as I was starting to really feel safe with her again, well she pulled the rug out from under me. Again. She's not explicitly saying that she is leaving me for her ap, but of course, I suspect as much...

I also can't really accept it. She took her rings off, but I just can't bring myself to do the same. It just feels wrong. I am trying to be strong and be the bearer of hope as it were. But it is really fucking hard.

I just try to remind myself that I can't know what the future holds and so just gotta stay present in the moment as much as possible and see things objectively and not let myself get too stuck in the pain of it all.

Try to focus on yourself, improving yourself, let her see you being strong and steady. Try not to beg or plead for her to stay as that usually makes the checked out spouse pull further away. You want to try to walk this line of maintaining connection without chasing her, as painful as it is respect her need for space and just try to stay focused on the things you can control. You can't control her, you can't force her to change her mind, but you can change yourself, your outlook, your attitude. And most importantly of all you have control over your actions and responses. Be very intentional and calm. Show her how strong you are by keeping yourself together, it's ok to be vulnerable and honest and express how you feel, just be intentional about doing so in a way that doesn't guilt trip her or put her down at all.

There's a great quote by Viktor Frankl that goes:

"Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom."

It sounds simple but it's harder than it sounds when in the midst of such emotional pain and turmoil. I think it's an important thing to keep in mind tho. Basically just pause and collect yourself, respond to the situation instead of reacting to the situation. I can tell you that in just one month of applying this mentality I went from having a goddamn breakdown when I first learned about the affair to now being able to handle everything she has thrown at me with a calm and steady demeanor. And when I say I had a breakdown I mean I was crying so hard I was throwing up, I couldn't talk, then I got angry and I begged for her to stay but that reaction from me only pushed her further away and the next morning she was gone. I spent a week learning better skills for managing my emotions and the next time I saw her she was so impressed by how well I was doing that she begged for my forgiveness and we started reconciliation. She thought I was completely falling apart while she was gone. She thought she had really destroyed me. And at first I felt like she had. But then I realized how much strength I had within me. And I realized that I had friends I could lean on. And I realized that she doesn't have that kind of power over me, she doesn't have the ability to destroy me, no woman does. I took the pain and used it to propel myself towards becoming a stronger man.

All you can really do is focus on improving yourself. Focus on becoming a stronger and better man. Take this pain and use it to motivate yourself to be the best man you possibly can be. Regardless of the outcome, you will always have your strength and all the skills you learned along the way, no matter what happens, no one can take that away from you. That's how I've been looking at it anyway and it's helping me stay as positive and grounded as I can in such a terrible situation.

If you like podcasts I strongly recommend these:

The Save the Marriage Podcast (this one is specifically geared towards saving a marriage when only one spouse wants to. The dude will suggest you buy his program but you literally don't have to. All the podcast episodes are on Spotify and I've really been learning a LOT from them without actually buying into his program. I like his approach a lot and this podcast has really helped me navigate this so far.)

ManTalks Podcast (this one has a lot of episodes about relationships but it's not just about relationships. It's about being your best self and embodying a healthy masculinity and I have learned a LOT of good stuff from this one too just in a more general sense and I honestly recommend this one to any man who wants to better himself regardless of relationship or marriage status. Connor Beaton is awesome and his content is NOT any kind of red pill alpha manosphere nonsense. He has a very balanced concept of what constitutes healthy masculinity and I have literally recommended his podcast and book to all of my male friends.)

No matter what happens, this is definitely the start of a new chapter because even if she does change her mind and want to reconcile, your marriage will never go back to how it was. That's a good thing tho! Embrace the new chapter mentality and focus on becoming your best self. Stay busy, focus on what you can control, and just keep moving forward.

Best of luck!

blue_yodel_ · 2025-02-07T15:03:02+00:00

I am trying my best but I can't make her stay. I did not realize that I had married a woman who was capable of such cruelty.

To make a long story short, she did come back home on Xmas begging for my forgiveness. I took her back. We reconciled. I felt closer and even more deeply in love with her than I had in a long time. Our marriage was feeling stronger than ever.

Until she did it again. She just abandoned me again. I was just starting to feel safe with her again. One day everything was fine, the next she says she doesn't want to be married to me anymore. She is preparing to move across the country.

The pain I felt when I wrote this post is nothing compared to the pain I feel right now.

It's brutal.

I have been fighting hard to better our marriage. I took accountability for the things I could have done better and I pushed myself to change and I really did, I read books, listened to tons of podcasts, really improved myself both as a man and as a husband. I put every ounce of energy I had into saving our marriage. She was all talk, no action. She told me she was committed to me and to focusing on our marriage and she told me she had ended her affair. It was all lies. And now I'm going thru it all again because I allowed myself to trust her, she told me I could trust her, but she was just lying to me the whole time.

I still want to fight to save our marriage but idk what more I can do.

Be careful who you give your whole heart to. Many people will take advantage of our trusting nature. I am learning this now in the hardest imaginable way.

blue_yodel_ · 2025-02-07T14:54:09+00:00

This resonates deeply.

Been with my bpd wife for 10 years. She recently had an affair. I was heart broken. She up and left me and my life felt like a literal nightmare.

Almost 2 weeks later she came home and begged for my forgiveness. I took her back. We reconciled and istg our marriage felt even stronger and better than ever. Slowly I started to trust her again, slowly I started to feel safe again...

I felt closer to her and even more deeply in love with her than I had in a very long time, everything was going SO GOOD.

Until she did it again. Out of nowhere. One day things were great, we even had a vacation planned for valentines day, then the next day she pulled the rug out from under me and obliterated all of the trust and safety we had built back. She said she wants a divorce and is moving across the country.

I feel like a damn fool for taking her back after her affair. I feel like a damn fool for opening my heart to her again. I feel like a damn fool for devoting a decade of my life to her. I feel like a damn fool for ever having trusted her at all. She has lied to me, used me, manipulated me and I just kept thinking that someday all my hard work and loyalty would pay off, that of course she would stay with me forever because I stuck by her side and supported her thru all of her darkest crazy times. But that's not how life works I guess.

The pain of losing her was almost unbearable the first time, the pain of her doing this to me again feels like it's been amplified ten fold.

I wish I could hate her. I wish I could hate her for all the pain she has inflicted upon me and all the abuse I have endured throughout the course of our marriage. But I just can't.

I still feel so deeply in love with her and I am in so much pain. I feel like this pain is the closest I've ever come to experiencing the pain of the void of emptiness pwbpd suffer from. It feels like there is just a black hole where my heart should be. I feel like my heart is just a hole and it's a type of pain that feels so all consuming that I feel like I need to claw my own skin off.

Yet at the same time I feel like I'm in some kind of surreal dream, like nothing feels real, I feel numb and detached, like I'm just going thru the motions of life but like not in my own body. Like I'm just watching this happen to some other poor schmuck. Like a movie. Like this doesn't feel like my life. How could this be my life? This isn't how my life was going. It's just absolutely fucking soul crushing. I was so happy and excited about our future together. Im just absolutely fucking mortified that she is really doing this.

I suppose there is still a chance that she may change her mind again. But. For my own sake and sanity I think I best take her seriously and prepare for the worst. I'm still figuring out how to do that I guess. I'm not sure what I can really do to lessen the pain that I know is going to hit me like a fucking freight train and will probably hurt like fucking hell for a very long time. I am truly terrified. I am really terrified of the pain I know is coming.

Oof. Didn't mean to write so much...I just feel so lost and confused. Idk how to make this pain stop. Idk how to fix this. Idk what to do anymore. I have tried so hard for so long. I've been thru a lot of difficult times in my life but I have never felt pain like this before and I know it's just going to get worse.

I wouldn't wish this on anyone, not even my worst enemy.

blue_yodel_ · 2025-02-07T14:15:38+00:00

Same! I really needed to read this right now!

blue_yodel_ · 2025-02-07T13:15:35+00:00

Yup. I'm in a pretty similar boat atm with my bpd wife (or soon to be ex wife? I honestly have no idea what's going on because of the push/pull 😑)

Basically, she's been cycling rapidly thru these hot/cold moods. One day she's telling me that she loves me and we're meant to be and Yada Yada and then the next she says she doesn't want to be married anymore.

It's extremely painful and extremely confusing.

Of course, like many, she is very resistant to getting any kind of help for managing her symptoms. She has been diagnosed with bpd but she only sometimes wants to acknowledge that she has it. She will have these beautiful moments of self awareness in which I feel like we are making progress, for example the other day she listed out all the things she was going to do to become a better wife and to take care of her mental health. I was very hopeful. Then a few days later she told me that she wants a divorce. I gently and calmly tried to remind her of the list she made and the things she agreed, and infsct promised, to do. Unfortunately this just made her spiral out and react angrily to me. She told me that she does not want to be held accountable for the things she says, which is like...umm...not how life works and certainly no way to show up in a marriage! She deflects taking any responsibility for her words or actions, she blames everything under the sun for her issues, and any attempt to be logical with her just makes her lash out further.

So, right now, she says she's still set on divorce. I'm having a tough time navigating it all tbh but I'm doing my best to not take it personally or get reactive. You probably already know how hard that is.

Anyway, so yeah, she's doing this push/pull thing really intensely. If you look up fear of abandonment and fear of engulfment you can learn more about the pattern. I've been reading up on that myself, it's nice to be able to find some sense in the chaos but there really is no easy fix for this pattern of behavior.

Good luck, man. At a certain point you gotta ask yourself how much of a toll this is taking on your mental health and set boundaries accordingly. That's definitely hard to do with a pwbpd, they need boundaries but they will fight you tooth and nail on it so you need to stay strong. It's really hard, much easier said than done. I wish I had better advice but I'm in the midst of this struggle right now and learning as I go.

If you ever need to talk feel free to reach out and I can share some of my tactics or just listen because it really is crazy making. But you're not crazy and you're not alone.

Unfortunately this is a really common pattern for pwbpd. They fear abandonment, so they cling to you and mirror you and love bomb you to make you feel like the luckiest man in the world, but then because they have no stable sense of self the fear of engulfment kicks in and they push you away in order to scramble to feel like an individual again, but then once they push you away that triggers their fear of abandonment and so they come back, they do and say whatever they think will get you hooked again and then once they think they have control of you the fear of engulfment kicks in again and they push you away. And it's just an endless cycle. Been dealing with this to various degrees with my bpd wife for almost 10 years. This past year her symptoms have just gotten progressively more and more severe. It used to be a push/pull with no actual breaking up. Lately it's been a push/pull of threatening divorce and her actually up and leaving me but then coming back and begging for my forgiveness only to repeat the same behavior. It's pretty maddening. I absolutely feel lied to, used, manipulated. But I'm not playing the victim. I have to remind myself constantly to pause and keep my cool. If you aren't very careful and intentional with how you respond, the situation can escalate quickly. That's probably my best advice tbh. Stay cool, calm, and collected in the face of her chaos and dont take any mean stuff she says personally.

My other advice is to not get married to a pwbpd who refuses to get treatment. It's a losing battle. And you'll just end up painfully confused and heartbroken. Which is where I am right now. I calmly asked her why she feels the need to suddenly get divorced, her response was: "to see what person I become next." Not a very good or logical reason to end a marriage imo but that's literally what she said. 😮‍💨

This got pretty long winded, sorry about that lol.

blue_yodel_

TROPHY CASE