Work holiday parties are a delicate concoction of forced holiday cheer and awkward social experiments. Case in point: the infamous White Elephant gift exchange. For those who've never played, it's a game where everyone brings a wrapped present, and the fun begins as gifts are opened, stolen, and swapped in a battle for glory—or, at least, the coolest gift under $20. Sure, seeing who ends up with what is fun (bonus points if you get to steal from the office food thief ), but let's not sugarcoat…

This husband wasn't prepared for the response he got from his wife! After 21 years of marriage and raising 6 children together, this couple's relationship is crumbling. After spending nearly half of their lives together, this relationship is coming to a close, and it's getting messy! This husband sounds like a complete tool, treating his wife badly throughout their marriage (including while his wife gave birth to those 6 kids). His wife found out that he's still been pining for his ex. They bro…

Having relatives stay with you is difficult for everyone; the person visiting is displaced, and the person hosting has their life and normal routines disrupted with someone else always suddenly present. And in a small home or an apartment you really begin to feel the effects of this. This is further complicated by the needs of any babies, children, or pets who live at home with you, adding another often less predictable element to the mix. The trade-off is that you get to spend a whole length o…

Stealing is stealing

When talking to new parents, one of the biggest changes they would mention about becoming a parent is how they are no longer only living for their own sake. Having a kid means that your existence and purpose in life do not revolve around you anymore, but it revolves around this completely separate human being. This creates a firm distinction between good and bad parents – Good parents see this change as beautiful and meaningful, and bad parents teach themselves to resent their kids for it. It s…

"They hand me all their work and leave the office at 2pm"

It's generally accepted that you should let kids win at things there's nothing more embarrassing than watching a grown adult demolish kids in sports or games. (The iconic “Billy Madison” scene of Adam Sandler playing dodgeball with children comes to mind.) Of course, there are exceptions to this rule—like if you're an uncle—and there's more of a grey area around how long this should go on. When they're really young, it's more about maintaining their interest in the game you're playing together.…

You won't find many people who would argue with you for wanting a child-free wedding—except, of course, those parents who think their little darlings are the exception to any and every rule. It can get a little harder to sell this idea, however, when you try and pass the “child-free” rule for one specific individual: your “bad apple” 9-year-old cousin. Let's consider here that in most cases, for a kid that young, the problem is actually the parents themselves… regardless of what “attempts” they…

Let's check in on today's parents: How are they handling things lately? When it comes to kids, some things never change. All babies have the same needs, more or less. They get hungry and cry, they sleep for a while, then wake up and cry some more. Once your kid gets a little older, though, the toddler stage can be both really fun and completely insane. Having a toddler in your home is like trying to care for a tiny velociraptor. You spend a lot of your time watching as your tiny beloved child d…

How can one differentiate between people who act and make decisions out of selfishness and people who simply try to look after themselves and their own needs? As a society, we are constantly being flooded with contradicting messages when it comes to self-love and care: ‘Be kind to others’, ‘Love thy neighbor’, ‘Put yourself first’, ‘Love yourself before loving others’, etc… These messages make it impossible to know when we're supposed to put ourselves first and when we need to put ourselves asi…

We all have the idyllic When you grow up and realize that your kid's grandparents are also your in-laws, everything gains a new perspective. What's somehow even stranger, though, is coming to find that you're either “dad's side” or “mom's side” of the family for your sibling's kids. If a kid is telling you in earnest that they don't feel comfortable going to grandma's house, that alone is saying something.

As the saying goes, the punishment must fit the crime, and if the repercussions are too severe, no one is learning anything, and you're simply going to create a bad memory and lifelong resentment that will get brought up in 20 years at tense family dinners and when your kids attempt to talk to you about the trauma that you unintentionally caused them. Of course, as a parent, even if you have the best of intentions, you're not going to get everything right all of the time . And as teenagers, we'…

One older sister has ruined her own chances of getting cheap gifts this year. She could've easily gotten some excellent prices through her younger sister's job, but she insisted on being impolite. Some people, like the older sister in this story, think that retail work isn't “hard work." That couldn't be further from the truth! Of course working at a store is a real job, and employees might even break a sweat while working. There are clothes to fold, customers to assist, boxes to unpack, floors…

This person is clearly an entrepreneur, but they may not have gained their money in the most ethical way. Some people just make money with ease. It seems like no matter where they go, they're picking up a side gig or talking to someone who has a quick job for them, earning them $20 or $100 here and there. Up next, this woman invited herself on her sister-in-law's 8-day-long vacation, leading her SIL to think that “ We don't need to be around each other 24/7 .”

Memories are a funny thing in that each memory is shaped and reformed every time you recall it, making them easily susceptible to suggestion. Essentially, every time you recall a memory, you destabilize it and partially “destroy” it with your brain, then completing a process called reconsolidation to re-store it with your current thoughts and emotions added. As a brief tangent, this one one of the reasons why witness testimony is so problematic. This fluidity and fallibility of memory and abili…

It really should go without saying that you can't just go around renaming people just because you don't like their name for some reason. Even if—no, especially if—that person is a foster kid under your care. Some things like this are so outrageously laughable and out-of-pocket that they would be silly if they weren't so cruel… This 16-year-old foster child found himself facing hostility from his new foster family's extended family, who apparently came to the decision that his name, “Nico,” was…