It is not real. It is satire. Mousetrapnews.

I am so sorry. The whole situation stinks. But the one thing remains, you cannot force him to get care, and he does have a responsibility to get help and make his marriage better because he is capable of doing that. We can lead a horse to water...and all that jazz. So in the absence of any motivation on his part to try, I hope you will consider separating and forging space for yourself so you can be mentally healthy. This is very important for your children, even if they do not understand that at this time. My husband comes from a marriage in which there was NO way his dad was willing to work on his issues and have a less dysfunctional marriage, and all three children wish their mum had separated if not divorced. As an adult daughter in law, I can say that we ALL would have benefited from the two of them leading fairly separate lives. The dysfunction and mental issues of the unhealthy person, reticent to make an effort to get help, can end up eclipsing the whole family. We needed to be able to visit with her in long, "grandma gets to spend time with the grands" and has fun ways while also only seeing him in short bursts. Having them in the same shared space was a nightmare, and lead to her not getting such to spend much time with us or her grandkids when they were little. Please do not let that happen to you.

The fact that this is a problem is just mind boggling. Sigh. All the other humans...what in the world is wrong with them?

I think you are right that depression which begets irritability and anger, being stuck in a rut, could easily be part of the issue. Sadly,none of us can make another person get help.

We enjoy our base model Chevy Equinox. We get 32 mpg routinely on the highway, and 28 around town. I sometimes get 34 on the freeway because I am a more sedate driver than Mark.

Mark hates undermount because replacing them is a pain in the arse. Hard water deposits are much harder to get out of there, and if the foundation under the kitchen settles, there can be issues with them. He is really not a fan. My big issue is I am quite the clutz when it comes to washing dishes so every time I use an undermount, I manage to crack or break a glass on the countertop edge because it seems like the countertop for these things are always granite or diamond or cement or something.

I can see that. My husband is a project oriented person. He can be an extraordinary mess maker, and at times, it has been hard to deal with for sure. I love him dearly, and he is my best friend. Thankfully, he hears me, and we find compromise. He had a room in the house and full use of the basement for storing all of his pieces parts. And if he wants the use of flat surfaces in the main part of our home, we set a time frame that is a reasonable compromise on how long he has to get that project done and the mess cleaned up OR I box it up and stash it in the basement. I feel like, hate to say it, the best way to make your marriage work given that he is jot willing to compromise and doesn't hear you when you tell him the stress this causes, is to say that IF you are going to remain married and a part of each other's lives, the house must be sold and a duplex or something similar found like a house that also had an apartment, or the current house remodeled to give him and independent project space with an efficiency living quarters so that the two of you can function more independent of each other while also still having time together, especially with the children. I don't think this is unreasonable.

Okay, I know this is an Onion type satire, but honestly, I hate to say it but I have known people crazy enough to try something just about this nuts. I think in general, D.W. workers see an awful lot of insane stuff there.

This. I do know a couple who did not want to divorce because it would be financial mess, and make things super complicated for their adult kids, but did sell their home and buy a duplex. He lives in one side, and she in the other with a joint account for paying mortgage and other bills. They both have a lot more peace since they are not compatible for living together 24/7 and sharing space, but they still love each other and do spend time together. I think people need to think outside the box sometimes to figure out a good solution when personalities clash, yet the desire to remain attached is there.

I just read about raspberry leaves being good for this. So yay, another option!

I think the accepted substitutes are bay leaves and mustard seeds. I am pretty sure if you use oak or maple you will get a funny flavor.

This. I also often baked bread, pies, or cookies right before a showing or openhouse, and left it out for the prospective buyers to sample. That smell works! It evokes a lot of good emotions. We never staged. Ever. Just put stuff in storage, moved things out to make it look more spacious, tried to convince the kids that they didn't need all their toys at once. Fresh flowers in the living and dining room, brownies on the kitchen counter, nice towels in the bathrooms, and if there is a fireplace, a nice neat stack of birch logs, some pine cones for fire starter. It leaves people with a homey, personal feel.

Sigh. We have a zero system. Just a big fat zero. We spend so much money on total crap that congress wants, that state legislatures want, and none on the things that matter most. My only mother suggestion is to ask your closest children's hospital. At one point, we had one in Michigan that had some day camp, day care, drop in care options. I have no idea if those programs still continue. It has been a long time. But when they were operating, they had programs for children with trauma.

Tiggy, would it be possible to advertise for someone she could train to come to her home and learn how to effectively care for C? Are they adopting with subsidy so there is money coming in to help with this? They should not agree to any adoption plan for C that does not include as much subsidy as they can possibly finagle. I cannot emphasize this enough, and she should also come with Medicaid, do not adopt her without that. The state should not be asking people to go bankrupt for medical bills for children adopted from foster care. My friend who adopted SN children always demanded the highest level of subsidy the state would provide plus medicaid, and then used the subsidy for finding folks to train to come into her house to help with care or provide daycare. In the summers, she sometimes was able to employ special ed teachers who needed to make some extra money after school was out. Same for parapros from the school district.

When we were in Iceland, we booked an apartment and did most of our own cooking, packed lunches and snacks for when we would be away for quite a while. When eating out, I ate salads ordered for without croutons, and a vinegar and oil type dressing to avoid gluten. In France, it was easy. My sister has celiac, and restaurants there use entirely fresh ingredients, cooked from scratch. The kitchen staff know exactly what is in every dish, so sis would just tell them she had celiac and that I was allergic, and wait staff would go ask the kitchen what was safe for us to eat. Often the kitchen manager or the chef would actually come out to talk to us about preparation to prevent cross contamination. Very accomodating! My sister also has a favorite coffee shop around the corner from her apartment who let her bring her own GF pastry/snack with her because they do not serve GF pastries. I found the same kind of helpful desire to accommodate in Germany as well as Egypt. One place we stayed in Luxor had a massive breakfast buffet that came with the room rate. The head chef was German, and he was so kind. He walked around the buffet, pointed out everything that would be GF and not likely to have any cross contamination, and then would have his staff prepare a plate for me in the kitchen so I would not have to worry about possible contamination from folks using tongs for bread and then for fruit, or spoons used from one item to the next. It has always been easier for me to eat out in foreign countries than here in the U.S.

In my area, often the patient is sent to an inpatient rehab facility because long hospital stays often end with someone being quite weak. Usually rehab can make excuses to keep them at least 30 days, but sometimes longer, and during that time a social worker looks for a nursing home bed or if there are enough assets to pay for assisted living, they look at that too. I have also heard of police being sent to transport someone to a homeless shelter. Never ever sign for any adult at the hospital that you will pay their bills or anything like that. Even if you have POA. There will be a lot of pressure on you to then house the person because they are going to bankrupt you for the medical bills. Also, if they can get a family member to take them, it often ends any help from the hospital social worker for getting in home PT/OT or CNA, or assistance finding a nursing home bed. I have seen that so many times. They figure the problem is yours now, so no skin off their nose what happens. It isn't because the hospital workers are cold hearted. It is a survival mechanism because the system is so damn broken, and they are overwhelmed as such a huge generation has reached its elder years.

Melissa, I am so sorry! Thinking of your family in this time. 💓

Looks awesome!

Wow!!! That is so impressive.

I am on the Lake Huron side. Yesterday our morning AQI was 33. Today it is 75. But it is going to drop tonight and may be in the 30's again. Detroit and Kalamazoo have had horrible air. Very very bad. So it is going to depend on where she is going. At our worst, we have not been as bad as Detroit, Grand Rapids, or Muskegon.

I thought our kids would have cousins as well. But, my brother did some bad bad things which ended with him divorced, and his kids refusing to have a relationship with him, my sister never had children, and on Mark's side, his sister's kids were already 13 and 11 when our first child was born, and his brother's kids are super close in age, but we lived 14 hours apart the whole time everyone was growing up so they only spent a few hours together once per year at Christmas. I grew up with all my cousins living within 45 minutes of my grandparents, and all summer long, they hosted grandchild camp at their house/hobby farm, and we frolicked and enjoyed life together. The 2nd generation not at all. As adults, we all ended up with jobs and spouses that took us long distances from each other, two cousins broke off contact with the family because my uncle had been an abuser, two cousins had no children, one family of them that we would have loved to spend time with moved to Europe, and that was that. I think the last time I laid eyes on a cousin was at my dad's funeral in 2016, and it was 2012 when I last saw one of my cousins' kids. I am so sorry, OP. Let yourself grieve.

Also, I planted a whole bunch of bell peppers, chili peppers, and jalapenos. I got the chili and jalapenos mixed up, and didn't have them labeled. Now I am getting a bunch of baby peppers, and I am embarrassed to admit, I am not sure which is which. We harvested one light green pepper, and I thought it was a chili...carefully removed the seeds and such. But it wasn't that hot, so it makes me think maybe it was a jalapeno. However, it occurred to me that maybe when chilis are harvested green, they are very very low on the Scoville rating. I guess next month I will know since they will be bigger, and if chilis, starting to turn red. Or then maybe not? Note to self, do NOT mix your plants up, and for goodness sakes, label things if you are a greenfoot that doesn't know what the heck you are doing.

Gorgeous!

I have no idea! Really. These things have been just stupid. And if you look at them, you would wonder if they are healthy. I have never seen a plant, seemingly healthy, with such propensity for weak, pathetic, no spine, stems, leaves drooping and often flipped over, and just ridiculous looking. Never. I spend all my garden time trying to devise ways to prop the dumb things up! They make me crazy. And yet they bloom like mad, and have baby tomatoes all over them. I propped up another branch today. It has easily 1.5 maybe 2 lbs of green tomatoes on it, and can't find the will to hold itself up. They remind of shopping with a toddler, and when you say it is time to leave, they drop to the floor and become dead weight you have to try to drag. I swear these are the most disobedient plants in the entire botanical realm. But, if even half the blooms produce tomatoes and those ripen and are healthy, usable fruits, I am going to have 2-3 bushels. No joke. I have been calculating, and believe this could be in the realm of 51 quarts of tomatoes/sauce/salsa. Now here it the most crazy thing of all. 51 quarts is not enough. I will still need to buy another 2-3 bushels because our bachelor sons, the foodies, want a stockpile of one quart per week. They make award winning chili and beef stew with it. On top of that, they would like me to make up 21 pints of salsa for them. I have been collecting jars at garage sales, and purchased bulk lids (I already have likely 300 rings from previous years' canning). But at 7 quarts a load or 14 pints, I am feeling a bit weak in the knees just thinking about it. I don't trust these plants. I see all of these baby tomatoes, and just feel like these weasel plants are going to just create a whole bunch of useless green fruit that will never ripen. I mean, I have one cherry tomato that has decided to make world record sized cherries - something I do not want because I want to dehydrate them - and only 1 out of 30 or so on that plant has actually ripened. Every last one of them just remain green. My hope is this has something to do with two weeks of wildfire smog, and that now that our AQI is back in the healthy range, they will buck up and start ripening. But I don't know. Every other vegetable plant in my garden is beinf, good, obedient, doing what they are supposed to do when they are supposed to do it plants. The tomatoes may make me balmy in the head!

I picked a pint of black caps yesterday, plus a pint of peas - every time I think those plants are going to give up because of the heat, they surprise me - a handful of blueberries, a tomato for fried green tomatoes, there more radishes, and the first carrot which I regret pulling because it turned out to be too small, and yet, it tasted spoil good. Those Amish paste. Such ridiculous plants. All their leaves hanging stupid wilted like they have given up on life, and yet it is nothing but a tomato rain forest out there, and I easily have given 100 baby paste tomatoes, and 50-100 cherry tomatoes. I don't know what to make of them. I want to scold, but then they are kind of getting the job done finally. It was a mini harvest, and highly satisfying. Tonight I am cutting basil leaves. I will probably have 10 pint size bags of leaves to freeze, and they are so prolific, I would imagine in a couple weeks it will have grown back and can be harvested again. Handling tomato and basil plants makes my hands smell like a fine pasta dish. I don't know why women's perfume is floral. Make tomato and herb perfumes, and then men will come running! 😁😁😁 The grapevine has come back very well from the drought. I hope the grapes will be ready to harvest by the third week of August. I need to cut a bunch of it, shape, and dry it to form the base of a large floral swag for a wedding arbor. I have never dried my own grapevine so that will be another new endeavor.