Ds is 20 and has never been particularly close to his dad, a lot of this is due to distance but in 20 years he’s only seen his dad a dozen times but they do chat on the phone.
His dad has another family now and has found it difficult to spend time with him.
However his dad has said he’d now like to come and visit him and ds has agreed.
Ds would like him to come over and see his house and where he lives and spend time with him here but Dh is saying he doesn’t want him to come in and that Ds is old enough to meet him somewhere without him needing to come over which would be uncomfortable for him.

On the other hand this is also Ds home and he wants his dad to come and visit so I am torn while I see both sides I don’t want to make Dh feel uncomfortable in his own home but I also don’t want Ds not to feel he can have his dad to visit in his home especially as he’s never come to see him before and he’s exited that he’s making the effort as it’s only ever been ds going to visit his dad until now.
I feel torn as it’s all of our home and everyone should have a say in who comes here.

I’ve started looking for a wedding dress - not booked yet but very, very low key next year - 2nd marriage for us both and likely a family meal and night in a hotel for us.

I’m 45, 5ft6, hourglass size 14, grey hair and olive skin/brown eyes. Suit bodycon (appreciate not in fashion rn!), midi or maxi length and like structured, modern looks. Ideally sleeves or shoulders covered, though could add a caplet or similar if sleeveless.

I found this Roland Mouret which is a bargain, and assume I would need to size up to a 16?

Or if anyone has other dresses/designers to suggest -
My budget is around 1k (my dream would be this 5k Vivienne Westwood or this). The only other I have liked online is this (bit ott)

I would like to take my daughter to Africa on holiday. For context, I am Black British and my husband is white. He does not like long-haul flights and is refusing to agree to the trip. His view is that because I visited South Africa four years ago, there is no need for us to travel to Africa again, and that we should choose a closer destination such as Europe instead.
My daughter, who is of mixed African heritage, has never been to Africa and is devastated that she is not being allowed to go.

My husband is threatening to divorce me, should I go ahead and book the holiday?

I sympathise with people who genuinely did not know but hiw many was this? And how would we know who to compensate even if the money were available?

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/waspi-latest-compensation-legal-challenge-pension-b2976014.html

Just to update you all who were so lovely last night - I was even worse overnight so called 111, they said to wait to GP appt this morning.

At the appointment GP did my vitals, checked my ear (which is now fully closed shut) and advised me to go straight to A&E to get IV antibiotics.

Still waiting as need to be assessed by ENT but they are taking great care of me. Decent pain relief, have fed me and going very regular obs. They’ve also done swabs to see what infection we are dealing with.

People moan about the NHS but honestly, I cannot fault the treatment I’ve had, even if it is taking a bit longer to be properly admitted than I thought.

Hi all. I've got an 18mo DD who is just, a firecracker. She's always called a happy baby by everyone, and she is, but she's also absolutely savage and insane. Everything is a delight and a game and a reason to get overexcited.

Sometimes she gets handsy, other times she throws toys or pulls hair. With us, we don't mind so much but nursery have now put her on a behaviour plan! I never heard of such a thing.

When she started to be like this around 12-14mo we used to firmly tell her not to, remove her from the situation or toy or person, but not over labour the point so as not to give her attention over it. She loves the attention. We also got given a sticker chart and a set of laminated cards with red stop signs or happy or sad faces etc to help her identify her feelings or to know when to stop.

I know all toddlers can get this way but my older DD who's now 6 was never this bad. She's now on a behaviour plan where the nursery tries to track any triggers or particular people but they're not spotting any pattern. They ring us almost daily now with something she's done, and mostly she's not hurting other kids though there have been a couple of occasions of pushing or pulling. She knows how to say sorry and does it well, so understands the concepts of no or kind hands. But the thing is, for her, it's never a tantrum or upset or malicious behaviour it's the opposite- she's just happy and overexcited and misplaces the energy. She doesn't realise when she could hurt someone, she just has this thrilled look in her eye like it's all play.

At this point I genuinely feel like my little happy girl might be the first ever baby to get expelled from a nursery! I half feel indignant because, why are the nursery staff ringing me to check if I've been using the sticker chart properly when I'm at work... she's literally a 1 year old baby who can't speak yet. She's just about starting to pick up single words now. On the other hand, I know she's more demanding than my first and handsy and I'm starting to feel like a bad mum. But I literally don't know what else I can do? If I tell her off even more she just wiggles away or gets happier from the attention and eye contact. She's kind of feral but we love it and think it's just her baby nature and will grow out of it. But is there something I'm missing? Could we be trying something else? Any advice much appreciated! At this daily rate I'm sure they're going to tell us they can't handle her and we need to leave soon!

Help welcome and desperately needed.
I’ve been seeing a man for the past 5 years. We don’t live together, live about an hour apart and each have one DS from previous marriages. I’ll be honest it’s been very up and down relationship, mainly because he’s always been very secretive and evasive - as humiliating as it is to admit he’s not yet introduced me to a single person in his life, and has never told me where he lives. Always seeing me at my home. He has refused to meet my son or allow me to meet his for context. Despite this I’ve continued to believe he was committed to me.

About two months ago he told me his ex wife was diagnosed with an aggressive breast cancer that’s spread to her liver. He has said this is terminal and she’s on end of live care. This deterioration of health is in the space of less than two months.
Since he revealed this he has pulled away from me more than ever (he has always blown hot and cold), continually reinforcing that his son is his only priority and his words yesterday “I’m irrelevant”. We had a date planned yesterday as he’s not seen me for two weeks (not uncommon and always driven by when he can see me around his shift work and hobbies - cricket, having his son etc) and he stood me up just two hours before claiming he needed to be there for his son (13) as he wasn’t going to school. He didn’t apologise, made no attempt to call me to reschedule, pretty much blanked me. He then ignored my attempted calls in the evening and when I asked him he refused to call me back saying I could wait all night as his phone was charging.

His messages yesterday evening were very hurtful and filled with contempt towards me. He said he didn’t know when he could reschedule seeing me given it’s a “waiting game” referring to his ex wife. All of a similar dismissive and avoidant vein. Just two days before he was saying how much he was looking forward to seeing me and ended his call with “love you”. Hence why I’m reeling now.

Whilst I’m compassionate towards his ex wife and completely appreciate his son is his priority in such difficult circumstances and that it’s alot for my partner to deal with too. I’m still deeply hurt by the fact I just feel discarded and abandoned by him. Surely a partner of five years, albeit in not the best relationship driven by his secrecy and evasiveness, still feel he owes me some respect and care and would not just disregard and pretty much discard me. I can only imagine if roles reverse I’d never treat him in this cold and cruel way, I’d lean into him, want his support and still want to see him.

I’ve fully invested 5 years into this relationship where he has said alot about wanting to progress, how committed he is to me, how he’s my best friend as well as partner etc It’s not just making me question everything, my anxiety is through the roof and I feel heartbroken and like a fool, that he’s been stringing me along for years. Haven’t a clue how to proceed now given he’s refused to see me indefinitely and even not calling me.

Any advice?

Not stylish AT ALL but I have finally found a housecoat after months of searching. I have a white cat with longish fur and a black cat so everything I wear in the house is instantly a cat fur magnet and I have spent a fortune on sticky rollers and invariably go out looking like a furry mess....lovely.
I had given up hope of ever finding one. I remember my grandmother wearing one round the house. She was incredibly stylish and well dressed and would never have exposed her nice clothes to children, animals or housework but would take it off if she was going out or expecting visitors.
I think they are due for a comeback 😀

www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B09RPX62RS/ref=syn_sd_offsite_mobileweb_50?ie=UTF8&psc=1&aref=z12Im60v0s&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zZF9vZmZzaXRlX21vYmlsZXdlYg&tag=dradisplay0bb-21&th=1

I work as a manager in a catering/hospitality business, small local chain.

I had a call from a senior staff member about a negative review we were given online that essentially said they didn’t feel that the staff member on duty (not me) was smiley enough. I have now been tasked with pulling up this staff member on this.

I am very much not someone who is easily offended or quick to jump to misogyny but something about this feels..irritating to me. (The person complaining was a man and all the staff are women). They didn’t say the staff were rude, unpleasant or ignored them, just that were weren’t smiley and ‘welcoming’. I know the staff member and they are always polite and helpful but they do have a bit of a ‘resting bitch face’ when not intentionally grinning like a Cheshire Cat!

Something about this is rubbing me up the wrong way. It seems the main complaint is the staff not smiling while doing her job perfectly competently. Should I reprimand her for this? I understand that when customer facing sometimes you need to fake it a bit but is just her natural face position so offensive to someone that she should be forced to plaster on a fake smile? I’m torn!

The Priory charge £160 per session which seems outrageous to me but wanted to ask what others pay for private therapy?

I cannot believe that the people who were on board the cruise ship and who have contracted/been exposed to the hantavirus are all being repatriated! Why on earth were they not all kept on the ship until medical personnel were sure they were not infected? I don't care if they wanted to get home to their families - they are a potential danger. So now we have people in France, the UK and I think Japan who have travelled with other people back to their own country. It's madness.,

As I’m trying to cook dinner one decides to empty both toy boxes onto the floor. I then discover an ant infestation from an abandoned lunch box. Younger one then tries to drag me from the kitchen when I’m dealing with boiling water so I nearly scald my arm and then lose it with everyone. DH then complains I disturbed his meeting. Fml.

I am desperate to find a pinky nude matte-ish lipstick similar to the ones Lucy Punch wears in Amandaland. I’m quite pale and find Pillow Talk comes out REALLY orange on me.

Does anyone have any ideas?

My husband has been acting strange/secretive with his phone for a couple of weeks now so I took it on myself to look at his phone. Yes I know it’s morally dodgy but we have each others log ins and I looked at it whilst he was feeding DS dinner (it was charging upstairs).

There is a woman who is obviously a co-worker. I only had time to look at messages from the past two days. He was in the office today. He messaged her to say please walk past my desk again so I can look at your arse. She said she’d be back up in an hour and she will walk slowly this time. He then messaged again (after about an hour) to say that was the highlight of his afternoon to which she replied she knew her trousers would get attention today and sent a peach symbol. That was the last message.

I confronted him straight away and he stormed off and hasn’t come home yet. Said how dare I look at his phone. I have tried to call him and he just declined the call. He sent a text to say I’ve betrayed his trust and he can’t believe I did that instead of speaking to him.

Am I wrong to have done this, I think that if you know something is up then it’s within your right to investigate?

What were they?
i have two girls, and I’m a fan in different names - but not made up names, IYKWIM.

when I was pregnant with my first I watched Moulin Rouge, and for quite a while I was convinced that Satine would be the perfect name, but my partner said no.
my second I was desperate for Vivienne, which in in itself is a gorgeous name, but combined with Satine seemed to follow a trend of ‘ladies of the night’ (pretty women) so my partner said no again.

whats the most out there names you considered for your children?

my top boys name was Moss. Not sure I’d have gone through with it.

About once every few months I need to take the train from London down to Penzance. It’s a minimum 5 hour train, often 6 hours.

I work full time and long hours, usually 9am-9pm. This means it’s pretty much impossible to get down to Cornwall for a proper weekend without travelling very early before work or in the evening after work. I used go get the sleeper train but this has genuinely tripled in price in the last few years.

I usually need to work on the train or I would need to use annual leave for the time off. There simply is not enough space or privacy to use a laptop for work in standard class. First is just a bigger seat and some tea and coffee really, but it makes all the difference.

DP thinks I’m precious about disliking standard class on the train. I’m v happy with standard for 2 hours or so, but can’t do it for 5 hours.

Hoping for a handheld. I am pretty sure I have made up my mind but want to hear other people's experiences.

I am pregnant and my screening test has come back with high chance of downs. 1 in 21. I would never abort no matter what let's state that at the start. I also won't risk an amniocentisis.

However this is an IVF pregnancy and the blastocyst was PGTA tested so the chance of downs is probably fairly low.

I think that I don't want to do further testing but will accept a more in depth abnormalities scan.

If I do the NIPT test then whilst a negative would be reassuring a positive would still leave uncertainty and just be stressful.

Youngest DC starts reception in September, he's already attending the school nursery. There is a stay and play session upcoming to meet the teacher and you are invited to book a slot for the (optional) home visit whilst there.

I'm choosing not to have one, primarily because my eldest with ASD and ADHD (who goes to a different school) gets disregulated when unknown people are in the house. The duration of the time spent would be dominated by me having to manage him.

DH thinks it might look "dodgy" refusing it, as though we have something to hide - we don't.

WIBU not to? Has anybody else opted out and did it raise any eyebrows?

Coming to London from NI this coming weekend (Sat - Mon).

Will be Ryanair hand luggage only so really limited.

Live in NI and atm its flitting between absolutely freezing and jumper/tshirt weather.

Going to Chelsea/Belgravia to see the on street floral displays and to 1 show. Shopping, some nice food and a bit of wandering about.

Had hopes for nice dresses but think it's possibly a bit too cold?

Atm planning to bring

Slightly mad trousers, tshirt, long denim shacket

Jeans, vest, shirt

Jeans, tshirt/jumper, denim shacket

Trench coat.

Trainers.

Too hot/too cold? Thoughts?

I love my partner and they’re amazing in every single way except one thing.
except they sometimes drink and drive. Not so they’re blind drunk of course but sometimes 1 or 2 drinks more than they should or such a small amount that they may not be over the limit but verging on it and skating think.
I’ve told them categorically how this is wrong and the risks of this, car crash, hurting other people, losing their license etc etc.
my partner doesn’t have a drinking problem (alcoholic etc) but this really pisses me off.
I just don’t know what to do now and how to deal with this. I feel like I’m not being heard when I say I don’t like this and how serious it is.
I don’t want this relationship to end as it’s perfect in every other way but this has to stop. Please don’t ask me to “shop” them but I need some advise about how to get this through to them.

I think he might. But who knows. He must know he can't possibly stay until the next General Election. It's very disrespectful to the electorate to not listen.

Just had a quick read of the main points.

The Times: https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/kings-speech-2026-summary-key-bills-highlights-new-laws-ncvrqpp3b

Archive of same: <a class="break-all" href="https://archive.is/20260513150738/www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/kings-speech-2026-summary-key-bills-highlights-new-laws-ncvrqpp3b" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://archive.is/20260513150738/www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/kings-speech-2026-summary-key-bills-highlights-new-laws-ncvrqpp3b

It looks pretty sensible to me. I realise the European alignment, while minor, will be controversial. I don't think we can reasonably manage our economy without it - and, further, I feel we really need more rapprochement in light of developing threats.

The other sticky point is about SEN provision. Can see that getting derailed. I very much like the policing reforms, housing policy changes, and abolishment of NHS England (though unsure about ministerial control).

So my partner of about 6 months - his son is getting married in about a months time but he told me I’m not invited. Im thinking it’s because we are only “new” ? I mean it hasn’t really bothered me but he wants me to go with him to pick out a new suit and I’m hearing about it nearly every day obviously my partner is excited and I was thinking it would be nice to get dressed up and be included- even if they didn’t want me in family photos which I would understand of course. Is this normal - not to be invited.

If you’re close to your siblings, or your teen/adult dc are close
What do you think has helped?
What did your parents/you do to encourage that?

This is starting to drive me a little bit mad.

DD is almost 12 and from being a baby I’ve always read to her at night. I don’t mind doing this but I feel like she should now really just read to herself and say good night to me.

It’s just us at home and usually I’ll send her off for a shower about 8pm. Once she’s out I go in. Then I read to her and try to say good night. This is where she then goes to the toilet 4 or 5 times to ‘get it all out’ which drives me mad too.

I thought by this age she would read to herself for 15 -20mins and we could just say good night to each other and that be it.

Have I got this wrong? I can’t seem to just send her off to bed, I feel like I’m still involved with a much younger child. Is 12 too early to expect this?

For background bedtime has always been tough, never slept through and has been on melatonin since she was 8, we are going to use the last of this box and stop as she’s on such a low dose now I do think it does much. She’s always messed about at bedtime to some degree.

Any words of wisdom?