Sorry but it’s true. He works full time and helps around the house but has no interest in family life, days out etc. We had a holiday this year that he was miserable for. Didn’t really want to leave the resort as it would be ‘too much hard work’ with our youngest. If ever he can get out of opting out of something he will. When he has our youngest on his own there are a select few activities he might do like the park or NT but would never dream of taking her to the cinema or swimming because it’s too difficult. Whenever I suggest getting in the car and going somewhere he will huff and claim he has too much to be doing at home or that he’s ill/tired/skint. I don’t want to be busy every weekend but feel as parents we have an obligation to do stuff with our kids when we can and give them a good childhood. He is just lazy and disinterested.

There is an age gap between us - he’s in his early 50s now with a 3 year old and I understand it’s difficult. In hindsight he probably didn’t fully appreciate what having a child later in life means. But she’s here now and I’m finding his lack of enthusiasm for anything quite a turn off. I have resolved to start doing things alone with dc (I have an older child from previous marriage) but I find it sad that I’m with someone who doesn’t share my values around this stuff.

Leaving isn’t an option for me at the moment but I just need to vent. If I bring this up with him he will list a load of excuses and/or sulk so it’s not worth it. It’s bank holiday coming up and I said I might take the dc away for a night and he is practically gleeful about the prospect of being left alone. I don’t get that opportunity because he’d never offer to take them anywhere himself.

I'd like to ask for people's thoughts about this situation involving my DM. She is in her early 60s. She hasn't had a holiday abroad, or even a domestic break somewhere in the UK, for 12 years. The main reason she hasn't is that she is worried about her house being empty and unattended for a prolonged period of time - anything more than a couple of days basically. She doesn't have any close friends or relatives who live close enough to allow them to keep an eye on the house, or house sit for her, if she was to go abroad. I myself live around 80 miles away, so it just wouldn't be practical for me to travel there and back every day, which is what she seems to want.

I would assume that most people who go abroad on holiday, or are absent from their home for any other reason, have someone who can either stay in the house or at least keep an eye on things by visiting the house once a day or so while the owner or occupant (my DM in this case) is absent. As mentioned, my DM doesn't have anyone who is able to do this for her. She also doesn't speak to her neighbours, so she wouldn't feel comfortable asking them. Her house is flanked by two other houses on each side, and backs on to another house at the rear. She's had some difficulties with the neighbours on one side, has barely spoken to the neighbours on the other side, and only speaks to the neighbour in the remaining house once in a blue moon. I'm not quite sure what the solution is. I feel sorry for her as I think she could use a break. What would you suggest?

I’m almost starting to think I’m being crazy. I’ve known a guy I’ve been seeing for about 8 months. Life got in the way while we was dating so 2 months of that 8 we wasn’t talking. we started talking consistently again for 3 months. We very rarely speak on the phone, he doesn’t ask any intentional questions to get to know me, he’s very busy and we’ve not once had a conversation about where the relationship is going.

Ive asked him what’s going on as a feel like it’s strange. Usually by now I’ve experienced casual chats about how much you and the other person like eachother and we’ve had none of that. Either my way of dating is unconventional or something is up

is this normal?

We have moved house recently and our parents have been wanting to visit. We have said they can but that they will have to book a hotel as the spare bedrooms aren’t ready yet, or they can wait another couple of months and everything will be done in the house so they can then stay with us.

They asked if there are beds in the spare rooms, which there are, so they suggested one of our children (adult and teenager) could sleep in there and they could have their room. I said no as the spare rooms are messy and being used for storage. They have now messaged our children to ask if they mind sleeping in another room so they can have their bedroom. I called my mum and told her not to do that, we had said no and if they want to visit, they need to get a hotel or wait.

Were we unreasonable to say no to this? My parents plan to visit for 2 weeks at the start of September. My oldest child is only here til just after they plan to leave as he is going back to uni and my teenager needs her own space for studying as she is starting year 13.

I wonder who the private artist is?
Definitely not my style, I love antique and vintage furniture though.
Anyone snapping it up?

https://ebay.io/m/akmDlp

Last year, I did something towards an extended family member that I am deeply ashamed of. There is no excuse for what I did and I have spent a long time regretting it and hurting her the way I did. It wasn't physical abuse from me but still. I eventually admitted what I done to the person involved and apologised sincerely.

My family, however, did not know the truth. At the time, I wasn't emotionally ready to tell them. I was working towards being honest with them in my own time, when I felt capable of having that conversation myself.

Unfortunately, someone who is an ex friend for more than a decade, identified me from online on a different site, found a vulnerable post I had written online while trying to work through the situation. This is someone with whom there has been a very long and painful history and someone I believe has remained extremely bitter towards me. Our falling out was different to the situation above. This person is just a drama queen and she can't cope with anything beyond herself and her own emotions and ego.
She identified me from the post, printed it, and sent it to members of my family.

So now the conversation I had been trying to prepare myself for has effectively been forced upon me.

What I am struggling with is the fact that I wanted to tell my family myself, after having time to process what I had done and find the courage to be honest.
Instead, someone else took something I had written when I was vulnerable and exposed it to them.

I am now facing a very difficult conversation with my family, and I am absolutely terrified.

I feel ashamed, overwhelmed and emotionally exhausted.

I suppose what I am looking for is some perspective from people who have had to admit something they deeply regret to their family. How did you find the courage to have that conversation? How did you cope with the shame afterwards?

I know I cannot undo what I did. I just want to find a way through this honestly and hopefully eventually find some peace.

I recently started a new job. Everything great so far, but I've become painfully aware of how often I need to use the loo and top up my water bottle - probably around once an hour. This is due to a medication I'm on (high dose of Spironolactone); it is a diuretic so there is a constant cycle of going to the loo and then being thirsty and needing to fill up my water bottle.

While it's not getting in the way of me completing my work - it's the type of job where as long as you met your deadlines, it's fine, we're not chained to our workstations - I do feel a bit awkward about popping off desk so frequently, and don't want it to be seen to be avoiding work or being restless (or have people come up with their own theories about what's going on).

It's also not the kind of thing that gets in the way of meetings - I can "hold it" - but when it comes to tasks I need to focus on, I can get so much more done when I'm not dying for the loo/water/both, so often feels counterproductive just sitting there for appearances' sake instead of doing what I need to do and getting back to the "real" work.

My manager has been very nice so far, but he's not the kind of person I'd feel comfortable having this conversation with; certainly not at this stage!

What's the best way forward with this? Should I let HR know? Do nothing? Swallow my pride and speak to my manager?

Editing to add: I started this medication between my last job and this one, so it's my first time navigating this in a work context.

My husband and I have a long standing group skiing trip with our school friends, every February. This year has been hard financially, particularly for my DH, who is in a low paid job and has little disposable income. He has a little bit of debt and no savings. My financial position is slightly better, and I have always prioritised holidays as a use of my disposable income, unlike my DH.

We have no children and have always had separate finances. Obviously we help each other out where we can.

Our ‘plan’ for next year was a 2 week long haul holiday sometime in Spring. We will have no significant plans prior to this due to DHs finances. I have savings to cover my half of this set aside.

Upon discussing the ski trip today, my DH expressed disappointment that he wouldn’t be able to afford to go, although he wanted to try and ‘make it work’ and would consider going into further debt to make it happen. When questioned about the knock on effect to our planned trip, he stated he would rather go on this group trip than our couples holiday. He also stated he would be ‘irritated’ if I went on the ski trip without him, which I was not significantly considering (for financial reasons), but I don’t think is his right to decide on my behalf. (It’s worth mentioning I attended this trip alone several times before DH and I were serious, and other solo friends attend).

AIBU to be annoyed he would prioritise a group trip he can barely afford, get into further debt OR tell me if he can’t go, I can’t go?

Series 3 started today on Netflix. Anybody else going to watch it?

I need urgent help with severely matted hair. My teen dd is housebound, hasn’t been out for over 2 years and has severe OCD / anxiety and autism.
Her hair has become severely matted due to not washing it or brushing it. We tried to have a go at detangling it dry, it didn’t work, so looked up advice / videos online and said to try olive oil to give it enough slip…tried that, no good, tried conditioner, no good. She ended up putting a tiny bit of shampoo on the mat to get rid of some oil but then after that she was exhausted and distraught, so gave up.
With her OCD, she hates having stuff on her hair or skin, so this is like her worst nightmare.
Her hair is really long and fine, there was split which we managed to undo a bit but the rest is just swallowed up in the matted bit.
She won’t go anywhere to see a professional hairdresser and I’m finding it difficult to find someone to come to the house.
I’ve ordered some African pride moisture miracle pre shampoo and also some
cowboy detangler after looking online.
Can anyone help? Any suggestions? I’m just devastated it’s gotten this bad and I just feel awful for her. I dont want her to lose her hair, it’s literally the only bit of her she ever liked 😔

As above really, myself, DH and 3 DC went to our friends’ house yesterday on the promise of some drinks in the garden and a BBQ.

They said they were having issues with their BBQ so would do an ‘indoor BBQ’. This consisted of beige food from Iceland!!

AIBU to find this a woeful alternative?

Just turned 40 and low and behind I notice I have light brown pigmentation appearing on my forehead. I am normally quite freckled on my face so I didn’t quite clock it.

i am by far the opposite of a sun worshipper. But i don’t have a real skincare routine

how do i fade these marks before things get out of hand 😭

My parents moved back to my dad’s home country in March. We plan to visit them in October in the school holidays.

My sister has asked us if we will take her children and step child with us so that they get to see our parents but mainly to help with childcare as she and her partner have to work. Her partner is away with work that week and the week after.

My parents are ok with us bringing them all but I know it would end up with us looking after the youngest. Our children are 16 and 14 so we are at the stage where we can relax on holidays. My sisters kids are 15 and 13, step child is 7 so she still need looking after and more supervising.

Are we unreasonable not to take them with us or only take the older 2? We haven’t had a summer holiday this year so we were looking forward to relaxing holiday. We suggested just taking our nieces but got the usual stuff about treating them all the same. She’s not the same because she is 7 and needs looking after, and yes, also, she isn’t our niece so it is different.

DS can’t take the week off as she is too busy at work with a project at that time apparently. My husband says we may as well stay home if we aren’t going to be able to relax properly and it’s gone from something we were all looking forward to, to something that we don’t want to do. We are all reasonable happy to take our nieces as they don’t need looking after as such and they won’t change the vibe of the holiday.

My sister insists step child is ‘easy’ so we will be able to relax. That won’t be the case as I will feel very responsible for her and obviously she may miss her dad, my sister and her mum. She lives 50/50 between her mum and dad. Her mum is on holiday and this is her dad’s time. He’s away with work which annoys me more. I also find it strange that the little girls mum is fine with her coming away with us when we have only met her mum twice. I feel sorry for the little girl quite honestly, but we really want a break.

Sorry if it’s all a bit jumbled but hope I’ve explained it all. What do you think?

So, I have woken up this morning to a fairly devastating message and my husband is not helping at all.
To cut a long story short, I have woken up to a message from one of the mums at DS's school telling me that both on Friday when she dropped her DD off (Scotland so we went back last week), and yesterday when she dropped her DD off at Gymnastics and went to sit in her car (DS goes to gymnastics too), my DH made some sexual advances on her.
She didn't elaborate, I have asked her to but she messaged around 9pm last night and I only just saw it when I woke up this morning, so she might be busy this morning and just hasn't seen my reply.
I asked DH for more info, and he said thats just not true. He claims he hardly spoke to her on Friday, and yesterday when he saw her parked up offered to buy her a coffee, so he did then they sat in her car together, he claims nothing else happened.
However last year he did make a joke about some of the mums of DS's friends being "smoking hot, 10/10s".
I know this woman fairly well, she is married, but much younger than us, maybe mid-20s, DH and I are knocking on 40. I actually went to school with her older brother and remember her when she was very small!

AIBU to think DH is just lying to me? What would she get out of sending me that if it wasn't true?

Private school GCSE decline.

What happened? Is this an example of what’s to come?

Fees are rising well beyond inflation annually yet, results are in decline.

State schools prioritising, ‘reserving seats’ in house for 6th Form. Risky investment?

https://schoolsweek.co.uk/gcse-results-day-2026-6-key-trends-from-this-years-data/

There are some very wealthy folk we know & some I'm acquaintances with on fb from college. All seem to run off similar schedule for holidays... Christmas skiing in France/Switzerland (same place every year) Midterm said place again, summer is always spent somewhere in France ,Italy or Greece (but always the same town)
That's it never different countries... it seems to me they are not well travelled & that familiarity is more important than going somewhere new for the heck of it! Aibu?

Flying through these threads at a rate of knots! A shiny new thread for yet more Sussex shenanigans!

I thought Sézane was planning a major relaunch - rediscovering their mojo and upping their game. Did I miss something, nothing seems to have changed with today’s offering. Such a shame.

I have posted about DD before. Broken by lockdown, anorexia age 12, school drop out, burn out, self harm extreme. We are five years in.

we have repeatedly been told she doesn’t qualify for help and have tried various therapists ourselves.

she is out of school and self learning. Very lonely. Seems ok recently ot so I thought.

due to intense sadness last night she took an overdose of aspirin. I suspect a cry for help and she phoned childline who got her to phone 111. (She didn’t think to wake any of us). I suspect A and E will just kick us out soon.

we are a loving family but this is a huge setback.

we are Edinburgh based, desperate desperate for the right help.

private psychiatrist? Do we suggest sertraline? Anyone in Scotland have any good suggestions?

thanks from a broken mother

Hello, looking for suggestions for a "day bag" to take on holiday
It needs to fit water bottle, cardigan, food, other stuff for my kid! So fairly big
Not a handbag or feminine style. I'd like a rucksack style
Strong so it lasts and can hold a heavy bottle of water etc, but not a hiking bag or solid shape, I want to be able to squish it under the seats on the plane!
Waterproof would be great too!
Any suggestions?

Hi,

Im getting married in early October. Really simple wedding: me, my partner and my parents.

Im really struggling to figure out what to wear. I fully intended on just going in jeans but my partner is keen to dress smarter, so I feel like I should too.

I do NOT want to wear white/ivory and I don't do floral prints. Apart from that im pretty open to anything, im 35, size 6-8 and 5ft 4. It doesn't have to be a dress either, open to trousers etc. Budget £100, but will also be scouring vinted for bargains 😅

Anybody got any ideas?

Help me find it?

Every year I stand on the side of a pitch in the rain & wind watching DC do “sport” and shiver/get wet/overheat/feel bedraggled

There is always a stylish mum looking amazing - where is the perfect coat?
i need it to be well below knee length with a decent hood that comes well over my head (blooming Schoeffel and their stingy hoods!)

I have looked at Didriksens, Ilse Jacobsen and Rains - anywhere else to try? I’m thinking Nordic/Scandi brands might be best for this?

(please don’t suggest Seasalt - I’m tall and their long coats aren’t long enough)

Need some help please! I am torn between Puerto del Carmen (Lanzarote) and Corralejo (Fuerteventura) for a holiday with DH and DS12.DS hates sand but loves spending all day in a great resort pool.
We want to visit Rancho Texas or Oasis Wildlife but want to avoid the rowdy strip vibe. We don't want it too quiet though!
Which town would everyone go for?
Any hotel recommendations that are within walking distance of pubs/Restaurants but won't get too noisy?
TIA 🍷

I have no idea about style! I saw a Lovely one from Michael Kors but was told by my very stylish younger sister it’s very outdated so I’m put off.

My budget is £500. I’ve never splashed this much on a bag but have been gifted this for a milestone birthday. Could someone please help me pick a nice bag please? I would like a named designer one but also will consider a nice non branded one. I’m in my early 40’s.

This is a bit light hearted but definitely an element of truth to it.

My eldest dd is visiting this Xmas - first time she’s been home in years in that period of time. Her sisters (school age) are very excited. She lives in another country basically on the other side of the planet.

In preparation for this last year I offered ex the chance to have the kids all day last Christmas Day so I could have them all day this year. He said no that he already had plans. That visiting DD was a me problem - not his problem 🥴

Dropped the kids off at 4. The previous year he was supposed to pick them up from mine at 4 but he decided that actually 2pm was better so the kids had to rush their dinner as he was already on his way.

It’s a fucking liberty that I even have to do this - when we separated he didn’t have the kids over night for 2 years because of shit excuses . It was me who stayed solid and just plodded on doing the boring mum things like making sure they had their stuff for school, winter coats, sports clubs, warm home to live in, clean clothes - all the boring stuff that parents are supposed to do - whilst he took them to the odd trampoline park for few hours a weekend.

Now he has a GF and the kids actually have a bed to sleep in we’ve got to share Christmas 🧐

Yes I do have a running tally.

As parents we are not equal so why do we have to do equal Christmas’s? Why can’t it be made on merit?

12 full payments of CSA ✅
Sticking to the divorce stipulations ✅
Paying fair share of uniform & school costs✅

But no it just goes of DNA apparently

Both kids want to stay all day here because their older sister is here. One of them feels guilty - the other doesn’t give a shit.

It’s going to be the hill that I die on.

Bit shit init?