Before moving in, I made sure Ted cleared it with Ash that I was bringing my male cat with me. They had a dog who was old, but Ash said he was fine with it. About three weeks after moving in, I started noticing that our bedroom smelled a lot like pee.
We could not figure out where it was coming from. My cat is toilet trained, so I knew it was not him, and the dog could not go into our room because it was on the second floor and he had hip problems. I started finding clothes on the floor that smelled like pee.
I asked Ted, and he said he had no idea. After three months of frustration, with this happening about two times a week, I asked Ash if he was bringing the dog upstairs. He said no.
At this point, I was fed up. I stopped leaving clothes everywhere, but I was still finding pee in my shoes, my throw pillows, and things like that. After breaking down one day, Ash suggested it was my cat marking his territory, as male cats are known for doing that.
He said it made sense that it was only my things and that it was a new place. If any of you have cats, you will know that cat pee smells different than human pee. I trusted my cat with my whole heart, so I set up a camera in our room.
I was paying rent. My boyfriend knew about it, so I figured this was the way to find out where the pee was coming from. Lo and behold, Ash was coming into our room and peeing on my stuff.
When I saw the video, I packed my things and my cat and went to stay with a friend until Ted finished college and we moved. When all of this happened, I refused to confront him, because ew, and Ted dealt with that. I have not really spoken to Ash since.
He was the best man at the wedding, but we tend to keep clear of each other at family gatherings and such. With the pandemic, Ash lost his job and apartment and is honestly struggling financially. He asked if he could move in with us, and I honestly do not want to, because he peed on my stuff.
He was twenty-five years old when it happened. He was a grown man. Now that whole family is calling and texting me that I am awful for leaving him homeless in the middle of a pandemic, but it was not their stuff getting peed on.
Am I the jerk? Am I holding a grudge because he peed on my stuff? He is losing his home, and his cat—I assume dog—deserves a home.
But it was made very clear that I cannot take in his dog and leave him to the elements. I know I am justified, but now Ted said that he could not do that to his brother, and the job market is better here for his type of job. Now, we have an edit to this bit in a minute, and updates as well.
Multiple updates on this one, as I said. It is a saga. That last paragraph said his cat deserves a home, and then it went on to say I cannot just take his cat and leave him to the elements.
I am assuming they are talking about the dog, unless he somehow got a cat in between all this stuff. But how wild is that? Someone going into your room and peeing all over your stuff?
Is that some kind of kink or something like that? That is the only thing I can assume it is. Absolutely not the jerk in the situation at all.
I am wondering where this is going to go. Are we going to find out why he is doing this? Are they going to confront him?
Anyway, we have a lot to get through, and there were some edits on this initial post, so we will cover those. They might overlap with a couple of the updates. I am not sure yet, because I read it as I go with you guys, and I like to give my initial reactions to these things as well.
Edit:
Thank you all for taking the time to read my current dilemma. I am currently at work, so I had to stop answering for a while, but I will get back to everyone in the morning. A few questions that popped up a couple of times:
Is he in therapy?
He was, last I checked. After P-Gate, his mum made him go. That is how we found out why he did this.
Why did he do this? Ash and Ted were, and are, best friends. Me coming into Ted’s life was threatening enough that he wanted to break us up.
Clearly, it did not work, and it only made Ted go no contact for a time. His therapist suggested that Ash had to make amends with his brother, according to my mother-in-law, who is the one who reconnected them, and asked for forgiveness for his actions. They reconnected as long as I did not have to be with him and he never stepped into our home.
I could live with it. Why was he in the wedding? When we were getting married, the party was more for our parents.
We did not mind the courthouse, but my parents wanted a big wedding because I am the first of my sisters to get married. All of my sisters and all of Ted’s brothers were bridesmaids and groomsmen, and we could not exclude him. Ted and Ash are best friends after all, and as long as I did not have to take pictures with P-Man himself and he did not give a speech, I did not care.
Why can’t his family take him? We live on the East Coast. The rest of the family lives on the West Coast.
After many comments, I am starting to doubt this next part, but I will say it because it is the information I have. Ted’s profession is much more enjoyable on the East Coast than on the West, so him moving across would diminish his chances of finding a new job in his field. I am in the process of convincing all brothers—there are eight more—to pitch in a bit, so between us all, he can stay there.
Why do they think I am an ass? His whole family is very, very forgive-and-forget. They have forgiven things that are appalling to me: car stealing, faking a college degree and keeping money, et cetera.
So they really think this was a one-time thing, that he has outgrown it, and that I just need to get over it. Did he apologize? He apologized to Ted, but never to me, which I am bitter about.
I was considering accepting an apology, but you guys are right. That would be self-serving of him and a way to get back into my house and potentially give me P-TSD. I am sorry, I promise I am not making fun.
I just saw a chance, and I had to take it. Did he pay for the stuff he peed on? Well, since I did not know where the pee was coming from, I just kept washing the pee things.
After the video, I did throw out everything I remembered he had peed on that did not hold sentimental value. But there are two pairs of shoes currently in my home that have been cleaned, showered, and saved. He did not pay for the stuff I threw out, and honestly it never occurred to me to ask him to.
I just cut my losses. Where does your husband stand on this? Ted is the best human in the universe, and he honestly puts up with enough of my shenanigans that I would legitimately let P-Man move in if it made Ted happy.
As soon as everything happened, he was disturbed and cut him off completely. But after his mum said that the therapist thought it would help him to make amends, they made up. Ted has never once pressed me to be with Ash or for him to come to our house.
When we got married, he told me it was absolutely okay if I said no to Ash being the best man. But I love him enough to deal with him when it is necessary, such as Christmas—except 2020—and big family events. Can I see the video?
I am sorry to disappoint you, but no. As angry as I might be at the man, I do believe in privacy. When it happened, I only sent it to Ted so he would believe me, because I honestly would not believe me if he told me one of my sisters was peeing in his stuff.
As far as I know, he has only shown it to his parents to provide proof that we were not making things up, and to older brothers, because I do not know, they are guys and curious. I want to thank you for my awards. They are lovely and shiny and make me feel like I just won the Olympics.
You guys are the best. I also want to say thank you for the amazing jokes and nicknames. If I lose this battle and he moves in here, I will be leaving him a litter box and puppy training pads in the guest room, just to rub his nose in it.
You guys are the best, and I promise to keep answering comments and messages as soon as I can. Edit 2 — Mini Update:
So, P has hit the fan in the family, and my day has been awful. Some of my brothers saw this post and all of your comments.
The family did not have the whole story, and apparently neither did I. Brothers three, four, and eight are on their way here to deal with it because I am way over my head. I would like to give a big no-thank-you to the messages telling me that I probably had it coming, that I wanted it, or that I deserved it.
I hope the P-Man visits you and pees in your toothbrush. Thank you for your concern and nice comments. Thank you for the reality checks.
Thank you for opening my eyes to my many faults. Things are awful right now, but hopefully I will be able to give you guys closure, or at least some more answers in a couple of days. Stay hydrated.
This is not the end yet. I have heard the story gets even wilder, so we are going to jump straight into update one. Update One:
Each section that I divided was written at different times throughout the last few days.
I did not want to overwhelm you or make you wait with six thousand edits, so here is the whole story. I showed Ted the post, as you guys suggested, and after reading some comments, Ted understood that he had done wrong by me. Even though I was okay with it, it was still inappropriate of him and the whole family to be how they are.
He apologized profusely for not demanding more from himself, his family, and his brother when the whole thing happened. He said Ash moving in with us was absolutely not going to happen. Being an engineer too, he has some professional contacts.
He asked if there were job opportunities for Ash. One of those contacts ended up being someone who works for the same company Ash did, and told Ted that Ash had not been fired. He had quit, but he was welcome to have his job back.
Ted went to confront Ash about this. We live a couple of hours away. While I was at work—I work two jobs, one at night from four to twelve p.m., and one part-time during the day because I want to and it brings me joy, not because my husband is lacking in any way—he found some stuff that started a chain of events and truth unveilings that, to be honest, just make me sad more than anything else.
Yeah, yeah, I know I am being spineless again and should be outraged, but I am just tired right now. I want to sleep. But I have gotten enough nice and hateful messages that I figured I owed you guys closure.
I am probably going to get criticism for sharing all of this right now, but I do not care. This is a resumed, yet still very long, version of everything that happened since my OP. B stands for brother of Ted’s.
If I say wife number, please refer to the number of the brother, not that any of them have multiple wives. Brother one: doctor with some type of military background, wife, three kids. Brother two: surgeon, wife, two dogs, and a bearded dragon.
Brother three: engineer, fiancée, and dog. Brother four: teacher and researcher, wife, one kid. Brother five: not sure, works in IT, not sure of details, wife.
Brother six: doctor, single and ready to mingle. Brother seven: chef and businessman, has a wife and one kid. Brother eight: car sales, wife, three kids, fish.
Brother nine: Ted, wife, and cat. Brother ten: Ash. I hope we do not have to remember all those.
I sat down with Ted to talk about everything you pointed out. He apologized immensely. We cried together and promised to do and be better.
As you are now all aware, his family is complicated, and not rocking the boat was embedded into his heart. We both agreed to go to individual therapy, and if both therapists suggest couples therapy, then we will do couples therapy too. He ordered a T-shirt that says, The Most Okayest Human in the Universe, to cheer me up a bit.
Anyway, Ted calls his connections and finds out Ash did not get fired, then gets angry about all the drama this is causing and goes to confront him. He goes into his place. Ash is not there.
Ted has a key for emergencies, so he goes in anyway and waits. He eventually has to use the guest bathroom, but it is locked, so he goes into Ash’s room to use that bathroom and found a situation. That was the word he used when he told me.
He called me and told me to stay home. He said he would be home later because he had to involve his family and did not want to subject me to more than he already had, which had me thinking the worst. At that point, I was scared and just told him to come back soon and be safe.
About two hours later, Wife Eight calls me crying to ask if I am okay. I said I did not know. Ted had just told me vaguely about the situation, and I had not heard since.
She asks if I want to know, which I did. Then she starts off by apologizing, saying they did not know the whole story. Brother Five had read my post and called Brother Seven to complain about me sharing the story online.
Apparently, having your brother-in-law peeing on your stuff is not common enough that he knew it was our family by reading it. Sarcasm. Brother Seven reads the story and says there are a few things about my version of events that sound off to him.
He contacts Brother Two, who contacts their mum, and by this point they have all read it. I did have missed calls from Brother Six and Brother Two that I did not answer because I was working. Anyway, as many of you guessed, the therapist part of Ash’s story was sketchy.
It turns out the therapist he had been going to was a friend of his with zero actual training, who just pretended to be his therapist so his mum would get off his back about it. He faked going to therapy, which his mum had paid for, for about three years. My mother-in-law found out and kept it a secret, which she excused by saying she had forgiven other brothers for worse.
All this came to light because Brother Two confronted her about Ash not apologizing to me. They were under the false impression that he had apologized and I had forgiven him, since I have a track record of being a doormat, and because he was best man. That is why they were pushing for him to live with us.
They also did not know the territorial incident had been going on for months. They knew it was a few instances, but not as many as it actually was. Back to why Wife Eight called.
She tells me Brothers Three, Four, and Eight will come because Ted had asked for help, which freaked me out. She tells me to talk to Wife One because she could use some support. I hang up, and Ted has been calling me while I was on the phone.
He just keeps saying he is so sorry and that his brothers will take care of everything. So I tell him to spit it out. I had just spoken with Wife Eight and did not currently have the patience to be kept in the dark.
Apparently Ash has some mental issues and absolutely despises me. He has pictures of me in his bathroom covered in both pee and bodily fluid. He apparently also had some of Brother One’s daughter, female, fourteen.
I honestly do not know what she did to him to deserve this. Ted, disgusted and enraged with this, goes into the bathroom and finds his nightstand photo books that were supposed to be at his parents’ house. You can take a wild guess whose pictures were cut out and scratched off.
All the comments about alarming behavior were more accurate than I would have liked. He drops it out of disgust when he sees our wedding photo yellow-stained. He goes to pick it up, and the cat is under the bed, frightened and malnourished.
When he coaxes her out, she is also covered in dry pee and bodily fluid. At this point, Brother Six calls him because I was not answering. Ted tells him what he found, that Ash is not home, and that he has to take the cat to the vet.
Brother Six tells him to stay there until they find out where Ash is. They start calling each other. Brother One is furious and threatened to seriously hurt him because of his daughter, which is the reason he was not one of the ones to come.
Now all of the brothers know, and there are a lot of feelings going around, ranging from fury to concern, and they do not know where Ash is. Ted calls his mom to confront her about lying, covering, and reuniting them. Although she did not know he was lying about the therapist when she reunited them, she cried and said that she knew Brothers One through Eight had tormented Ash when he was little, and she had done nothing about it.
She said she had failed as a mother, and that she had been trying to protect him now to make up for it. I do remember when we got married, my mother-in-law was very on top of Ash, and I just thought she was being motherly. Later, Ted told me he also remembers his mum asking if it was a good idea to have him as best man, which we were both too naive to notice as odd, as she always pushed Ted to be present in Ash’s life.
She told him in their confrontation that the more present Ash was in his life, the more stable he was. She said she never told him because she did not want to put that kind of pressure on him, Ted, and that by the time she realized he had been lying, he seemed fine and had outgrown his issues. After hanging up on his mum is when he called me apologizing and told me all of this.
I called out to my other job because there was no way I could work like this. I have a lot to think about, but I will keep you posted. I called Ted and told him I was on my way there because someone had to take care of the cats.
He said he did not want me seeing any of that, but I was honestly just worried about the cat at that point. I was numb and wanted to feel useful. About an hour into the drive, I got a notification from our Ring doorbell, the kind that records the people at your door.
It was a delivery of sunflowers, which are Ted’s favorite flower. He is very secure in his masculinity, so please do not make this into a thing. I told the delivery person to read me the card.
With this type of doorbell, you can talk to the person at the door. It was from Ash, saying something along the lines of OP and me did him dirty by sharing our problems online, and anything that comes next will be on her. I just broke down.
I had to pull over and cry my heart out. I called my neighbor to please take the sunflowers, throw them out, and send Ted a picture. I drove back to go to my sister’s place because I honestly do not know what to do.
I am so lost. All of this is so messed up. I had a huge family before all this happened, and I feel like I lost a lot of people who I love and who I thought also thought of me as family.
But not even in my sheltered version of the world can I see or justify any of the things that are happening right now. I do not want to lose my husband. I am worried about the cat.
I am scared Ash is going to hurt himself or my husband. I called Wife One, and she is so scared for her daughter. I do not want her to be scared, but I do not have it in me to console her because I am just as scared.
I rationally know none of this is my fault, but I am the common point between everything that has happened, and I just do not know what to do. I am okay, or as okay as a person can be in this type of situation. I am at my parents’ house, and Ted is here.
He brought me my cat, and life feels less awful with a cat on your lap. Where to start? You will probably be having a thousand questions by this point, and I do not know how to answer any of them, since I have just been sitting, waiting to post all this.
Maybe I will not post it all and will keep you all wondering. I will say that both the situation and some of the messages I have gotten have made me lose some of my faith in humanity, but I guess that is part of what makes us human. Do you want to know the worst part out of all of this?
I have legitimate PTSD, and I do not say that in a quirky way anymore. Every time I hear someone peeing—as in the pee hitting the water—I get a sense of dread in my chest, and the world becomes a bit staticky. Going to the bathroom myself has been a whole experience.
I had my first therapy appointment, though. We luckily and tragically live in a world where you can just throw money at something and make anything happen. Thanks, Daddy, for paying for an emergency shrink.
That was an update on how I am doing, since some of you have asked, but I will get to the point, and the reason why you are all here: what happened to Ash? After the flower delivery, I just could not deal with this anymore and made my way back to my sister’s. Ted immediately left and came to me.
Brother Six is the one coordinating everything else. Out of all my brothers-in-law, he is my favorite, and I do not care if the others see this. Most of them have been trash to me at some point or another, clearly Ten taking the cake.
I have not had it in me to ask what is going to happen to Ash. I think he needs help above everything else. Brother One clearly thinks differently, and I guess he is trying to get the police involved since his daughter is a minor.
I asked Ted to see the pictures. Brother Two said to document everything because I thought it would help. It did not.
It just raised more questions. But hey, I have a therapist now who can talk me through them, I guess. Right now, I do not have anything more to say.
I am sorry to have wasted your time, but I am sure this is not over and I have more to say. Maybe later. Maybe tomorrow.
I do not know. Well, they found Ash. Brothers Three, Four, and Eight showed up at his place, and he was there this time.
Apparently he had not noticed Ted had been there and did not know the storm that was coming. Punches were thrown, yelling, more punches, and one appointment to the ER later, Ash is currently in psychiatric hold being evaluated for a myriad of things. Ted’s mum keeps trying to get in touch.
I do not know if it is to apologize or to inquire about what is happening, because in general everyone is mad at her. But I am done with her. I think it is the worst reality check a person could ever have, but I certainly have learned a lot about people, trust, and families.
From the information we have, Ted’s mum seems to be right about something: Ted not being actively present in his brother’s life is what brought on this madness. I guess with the pandemic and us keeping our distance, that is what started his decline. He will have to work through that with whatever methods of coping they provide him, because Ted has cut off about half of his family, hopefully this time forever, since I do not really see either of us getting over this anytime soon.
Ash’s cat, unfortunately, did not make it. That is something I will forever feel guilty about. At some point in the last year, she developed some kind of kidney problem that went untreated.
While she was being mistreated and neglected, it became too late to help her. The vet said that, after everything he was hearing—because they were calling the police on Brother Four for animal mistreatment, and he had to kind of explain some of the situation—she was not going to make it without suffering, and he decided to put her down. Apparently, the thing with Brother One’s daughter was about Brother One’s severe bullying when they were younger.
Ash never actually had much contact with her. It was about getting back at Brother One in the way he knew best: his daughter. His daughter is going to be attending therapy just in case.
I do not know what or how much they told her, but I assume they had to ask her questions about her contact with Ash, and eventually they would have had to explain why they were asking. I guess that is about it. I am not leaving my husband.
I am not peeing on anybody’s property. I am going to therapy, and I made it very clear to absolutely everyone that I will never have any of them living with us for any reason. I do not care if I hope is with them.
I just feel like I lost a part of me that cared. All in all, I still did not receive that apology, but to be honest, I do not want it either. Perhaps my therapist will convince me otherwise, or perhaps it is for the best.
For now, I guess I do not know. I will deal with it as I can. My word.
There is still more to this story as well. What twists and turns from that initial post. You know, me initially assuming it was some kind of kink, and that was what was going through his mind.
But they have gone to his house now and discovered there are pictures on the walls and all this kind of stuff, and the poor cat as well. My word. As I said, we still have more to this, so I am going to cover the next update as well.
Update Two:
Hello everyone. I just wanted to start off by saying thank you to everyone for the overwhelming amount of love and support I have received from internet strangers. All of the kind messages, and in general the concern you have shown for me and my family, mean a lot.
I will start answering messages soon, I promise. It has just been a hard couple of days. My therapist recommended writing in order to organize my feelings and help me process what happened.
Since some of you have shown interest, I guess this is as good a diary as any. I figured a post update would be a little easier to read for those curious about what happened next in the P-Man saga. It has been almost two weeks since I first opened the Pandora’s box that is my husband’s family, and you all know how that went.
I will be forever grateful to Reddit and all of you for helping me see there were things that needed to be talked about and looked into, even if it did end up turning my life into a P-show. I also do not know how the Twitter people ended up here, but I want to thank you all the same for the support. A lot of people ask the same questions, so here are the answers.
My husband, brothers-in-law, and I:
Right now, I do not really have it in me to deal with any of them except Brother Six. He has always been my favorite, and in general we should have taken a cue from him and distanced ourselves from the family. He truly has been the most supportive and apologetic about the whole ordeal.
I did talk to Brother One and his wife to offer my help in whatever way I could. They politely declined, telling me I had done enough. I do not know if they meant it backhandedly or honestly, but I am still keeping my distance from all of them.
Most of the other brothers apologized for everything. Some owned their parts in this messed-up situation, and some owned up to their past behaviors. I think this whole family is going to be financing the psychology field for a while.
I did recommend that everyone should go to therapy because, as much as I was the one who started it, this is something that affects the family as a whole. My mother-in-law:
Some kind Redditors have pointed out that she has probably been manipulated and mistreated her whole life. I am not denying or agreeing with that, but know that she did have a complicated life.
I will have no contact with her from here on out until the end of time, since she called to berate us for breaking up her family. Her words were something along the lines of: I have worked for years in order to have the lot of you together. I have forgiven every single thing each of you has ever done, and this is how you repay me, by letting a little troublemaker get in the way of our family.
So there is that. Ted, my husband:
He is handling everything as best as he can. He is also in therapy and working through his feelings.
He keeps apologizing over and over, and in general I think seeing what his best bud did to me because of him will haunt him for a while. We read all your comments together, and as much as he appreciates his redemption, he says he does not feel he has earned it. He says he has years to make up for.
He also told me he understood if I wanted to divorce him, that he could not live knowing his family had done this to his wife. I politely declined, as I still love him very much and know this is not his fault. We will see how therapy goes for him.
Where is Ash right now? He is still in psychiatric hold. He did ask to see Ted.
That was a big no-no, and of course Ted declined. He did write him a letter, though. I do not know what it says, nor do I want to know, but Ted assured me that I would never have to see him again.
After it is considered safe, he will be transferred to the West Coast, where the rest of his family can deal with him. We have washed our hands of him forever. Brother Three is the one who has been in charge of his care, and he thinks moving him far away from us is what is best for everyone.
Ted and him have been talking about the doctor’s reports, but I have not wanted to ask, and that is okay. Taking a break:
As many of you suggested, we took a break. I quit one of my jobs, and I have been doing the other one from my dad’s beach condo.
Ted is using some of his vacation time, and his boss has been very understanding. It is the middle of January, so it is not particularly nice outside, but looking at the water is soothing, and being away from all of the crazy is nice. I got a new phone so his family could not contact me anymore, and it has been nice just being the three of us.
Cat goes where I go for a couple of days. Future actions:
I got an order of protection in the meantime. I do not know what precautions Brother One is taking for his daughter.
I do know he may get rid of social media, though. If any further legal action is to be taken, that will come from them. We are also moving.
I do not know where to, but neither of us feels like our place is home anymore. We will start looking at houses closer to my family in the next few weeks. What was behind Door Brother Two?
I am sorry to disappoint you, but there were no human body parts on meat hooks in the locked bathroom. There was, however, more of what we found in the master bathroom. I do not think he is a serial offender in the making, just very mentally disturbed, with unhealthy coping mechanisms and very unhealthy emotional attachments.
But I am not a professional, and I cannot help him. I do think one Redditor had a very valid point about him hating women or viewing us as less, as he only did things toward women—me, my niece, and Sunny, his cat. But again, I am not a professional, so I cannot comment more on it.
How am I doing? Some days have been better than others. I have had therapy every other day.
Thank you to the Redditors who suggested going to the bathroom with headphones or a white noise machine. That was very helpful. My sisters are taking turns coming to visit, so we have someone with us for a couple of hours in case we need anything.
The backstory:
Many people inquired about the type of bullying they did to him in his childhood to justify this kind of messed-upness. So here is Ted’s statement on that:
When you grow up with eight brothers who are much older than you, you grow up very vulnerable to criticism, comparisons, and expectations. Our brothers had many years when it was just them, and when the opportunity arose to take it out on someone else, he was the most vulnerable.
I am not trying to justify anyone’s actions, nor am I defending anyone, but there were some things that I just could not protect him from that now, as an adult, I can see were messed up. With everything that has happened, I know my brothers have too. We all have demons we are fighting and have been fighting our whole lives.
We did not have a supportive family. Everything was buried under the rug instead of providing help. That made us grow up disconnected from reality, from what is proper, and from what is healthy.
Some of us have learned better thanks to our wives, jobs, and life experience. All of us have a lot to learn. But we cannot change the past, only own up to our mistakes and faults and try to be better tomorrow.
A few random things that popped up:
Why did no one check on the cat before? We did not have a reason to. Sunny the cat was not particularly social, so when they video-called during quarantine, it made sense not to see her.
We did not go visit anyone during the pandemic, so we did not know what state things were going to be in. Before the pandemic, he was fine, his house was fine, and the cat was fine. I do not know how we were supposed to know any of this was happening, how we could have prevented it from happening, or how we could have gone to check on the cat.
I am sorry I failed an innocent cat, and I will be forever guilty that I could not help her. What are the odds of there being ten sons and three of them being able to drop everything and go to the other side of the country? There were not always ten sons.
As for them dropping everything to come, I do not know what answer you want. That they identified how messed up the situation was? That their spouses could deal without them for a couple of days?
That they were able to take a day off work and come? That their brother asked for help and they were able to help? I honestly do not know what you want from me with those questions.
How did you not see it coming? There had to be signs. You would have to ask their family, as you already know I am not on good terms with them right now.
Ted says none that he noticed, but his perception might be biased since they were so close and he might have either been oblivious to it or thought that it was normal. So that is where my life is at right now. I am tired and sad, and things still feel awful, but I also have things to look forward to and a very nice therapist who constantly reassures me that I am okay and safe now, and is teaching me how to be normal again.
Sorry for the very long update, and please know that I am grateful for all of your kindness and for taking the time to read through my misadventures. I wish all of you who have been nice nothing but good things, and know you always have a friend here. Once I am ready to be out in the world again, I would be open to having more kind people like you in my life.
Ellie, Ted, and Tortilla the cat. Edit:
Of course, I am sorry I was not clear about the ten-brother thing. Apparently, I might have caused some confusion.
What I meant to say is that there were not always ten sons only. It is not my family or my story to tell. From what I know, they used to have three sisters.
Two of them died when they were little because of health issues. This is where there is a gap between One and Eight, and then Ted and Ash. The other one is a bit more complicated than that.
She used to be between Four and Five. Yes, I am aware they had a lot of children. They do not believe in contraceptives to this day.
Sorry about the confusion. We have further updates on this one as well. I cannot believe how long this one is going on for.
I had a quick look at the initial comments of the update just to get a gist of the vibe and what is going on, and I think it is going to get crazier and crazier. We are going to find out. Update Three:
Hello everyone.
It has been about two months since the P-show started, and I have gotten a lot of messages and comments recently asking for an update. In general, most of them were nice and lovely, as always. There are, of course, exceptions, but at this point of my existence, I am resigned to them and assume they are just part of internet culture.
First of all, I would like to apologize for taking so long to update. I know there are a lot of people very curious about everything that has happened with Ted’s family, but I just needed some time to process things. Here I am, sharing yet another miserable piece of this story so you can all be at peace.
I would also like to welcome the Facebook people. I appreciate people telling me where they are coming from because I did not know the power of Reddit before I made my first Am I the Jerk post. Anyway, Ted asked me for time apart.
He himself is going through a lot of things and has a lot of feelings that my being with him makes worse. He has a lot of guilt, and opening so many closets with skeletons and facing them is a lot to ask of anyone. We are not officially divorced, but we are not looking for new houses together either.
We are still in the process of selling our old place, so he has been staying there while I stay with my parents. I do not know what is going to happen once the sale of our place is finalized, or what he wants to do, but I promised him space. So, yeah.
There is that. He did give me permission to update you all, because despite some hateful messages and comments, most of you are incredibly sweet and helpful. Here is the breakdown of Ted’s family tree, updated.
Counting the sisters, B stands for brother of Ted’s, and S stands for sister. Brother one: doctor with military background, wife, three kids. Brother two: surgeon, wife, two dogs, and a bearded dragon.
Brother three: engineer, fiancée, and dog. Brother four: teacher and researcher, wife, one kid. Sister one.
Brother five: not sure, works in IT, and not sure of details, with a wife. Brother six: doctor, single and ready to mingle. Brother seven: chef and businessman, with a wife and one kid.
Brother eight: car sales, wife, three kids, and fish. Sister two and sister three. Brother nine: Ted, maybe ex-wife, and cat.
Brother ten: Ash. I did not just randomly throw in the sisters to add a little bit of spice to the messed-up situation I am living through. Sorry to disappoint.
I did not count them before because, well, I do not mean to be insensitive to anyone who has lost family members, but I am going based on what I know of that family. All three sisters were born and died before Ted was even conceived. There has not been a single second of his life when he has had living sisters, so he does not say he has sisters.
He only says he has brothers, so I do not count them, because to me and him, he does not have any sisters. You guys are wild. The theories you came up with were some more accurate than others, varying from completely reasonable to undeniably insane.
But based on what you and I know of this family, insane runs in the family. Anyway, no, they were not all murdered. Sisters Two and Three were twins and died of a birth defect.
My bad for saying genetic. I do not know why a lot of people assumed it would be something specific only to women. Their lungs were not developed properly, or something along those lines.
That is all Ted knows, and as you know, I am not on speaking terms with his family to ask more questions. They died a couple of weeks after being born while still in the hospital, so there was no chance of any brothers doing anything to them. As for Sister One, she died in a motorcycle accident when one of the brothers was driving while intoxicated and underage.
Why did I not just say that up front? Because it is none of mine or your business. It was not relevant to our situation, and I honestly think people deserve privacy.
So I am not telling you which brother it was. You can choose whichever one you want to fit your narrative. A lot of people have been asking about the dirty secrets their mum forgave them for.
I will share the ones I can and have permission to share. I am not giving out which brother did what, just Brother Seven because I had already shared that, so there is no point hiding it now. I just copied and pasted the comment I made then.
There are ten brothers total. Brothers One to Four are your stereotypical older-brother golden children, straight-A students. So Brothers Five and under were used to having to live up to the expectations the oldest four had set up.
It was expected that all of them excelled at a sport, had good grades, went to college on some type of scholarship—because paying for ten kids’ colleges is hard—and had a career. Brother Seven did not want to. He is a brilliant guy.
He just thought it was unfair that his life was dictated by competing against his brothers. So when he graduated high school, he said he was studying abroad to become a chef, but that his scholarship would only cover partial tuition and no room and board. His parents were super proud that their son was studying abroad to become a well-known international chef.
They said okay, as long as he kept up the good grades and cooked them his signature dishes when he came home for holidays and stuff. So he moved to New York with four roommates and faked his international life. He is not one to use social media, so he did not have to prove anything.
He just had to make sure to call his parents at hours that made sense with the time difference. Since this was before technology had advanced much, he did not have to video call them or anything. He just made up some really good stories to tell during holidays.
He kept the money he was receiving from his parents to pay his tuition and boarding, and invested in something that ended up making him a lot of money. Then he moved back to the West Coast and said he was managing restaurants now. It all came to light when one of the oldest brother’s daughters said she wanted to go to the same school Brother Seven had, and asked if he could take her there and show her around.
By that point, he had enough money that there were not many repercussions to be had, but he is still the one who cooks Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner, because he does cook rather well. Here is the list of things I know because Ted, their mum, or the brother in question told me they did them with zero repercussions from their parents: stealing and totaling at least two cars—same brother both times; stealing a car—different brother; leaving Grandma alone for a week when they were supposed to care for her; stealing and selling things from the house and from other brothers; getting into fights that ended up with police involved; getting into fights that did not end with police involved but did end with a trip to the hospital; skipping school events like senior trip and others, then pocketing the money; public exposure; inappropriate public behavior; public urination—I guess it does run in the family; one stalking incident that ended with a restraining order; plenty of underage drinking; and plenty of driving under the influence. Where is Dad?
Well, last I saw him, he was in an urn in the living room of their mum’s house, so hopefully he is still there. Growing up, he was an awful man, incredibly misogynistic, and an abusive father and husband. He was a decent grandfather to his grandkids, but take it up with them if you want to say anything about why someone would expose children to such a horrible man.
I do not have children of my own. Ted’s parents were, and she still is, very traditional, and appearances are the only thing that matter to them. Having a perfect family with prideful sons and beautiful daughters is all they wanted.
I am not justifying anything, but the loss of their daughters did affect them and the family greatly. Why did they have two more kids after everything that happened? They really wanted a daughter again and tried two more times before being unable to have any more children.
I do not know if they would have kept trying if the fact that she was unable to have more children had not made things worse. What happened to Ash? I do not know.
I would like to say, do not know, do not care, but I do care from a human standpoint. After being in therapy, I feel a little more empathetic at this point, and I know he is sick. So I do care and hope he is okay and will be able to heal and move forward.
I just wish that to happen very, very far away from me. I do not know if he is still institutionalized or not, but I do have it on good authority that he is staying far away from me. So that is that for the family.
Hopefully, this answers all your questions about them. As always, big shout-out to Brother Six for being great. He has been very supportive throughout everything, and in general he is a good guy and still single and ready to mingle, if anyone is interested.
He made me emphasize that when I told him I was updating again. So if anyone on the West Coast is looking for a cute doctor with a crazy, messed-up family, he is your guy. Tortilla has very much appreciated all the love, affection, and praise.
I mentioned in a comment at some point that I am sorry for not paying the cat tax, but right now I am not comfortable sharing pictures of anything, including Tortilla, with anyone. Nothing against you personally, just me being insecure after everything that has happened, so I do apologize for that. Since I am committing tax evasion, I will tell you that she is a black cat.
She is named Tortilla because I am not great at cooking. The first time I made Ted tacos, I completely forgot the tortillas were in the oven and completely charred them. As for me, everything feels awful, and everything will continue to feel awful for a bit, but that is just life.
I had to quit my job after already quitting my other job, so I am currently unemployed and freeloading at my parents’. But my dad says he does not mind. He just wants me to be okay, and I love him because of that.
It is nice having my sisters around, and even more cats to play with. I am still in therapy, which is basically all I can do with my life right now. On the bright side, I am sure none of these cats have ever been brushed as much as they have been in the past few weeks, so they are all extra shiny and handsome.
That is all for today. Sorry for the long read. Update Four — Return to P-Town:
I have written so many updates throughout the year, some while happy, some while sad, some while drunk, but decided against posting them.
I kept trying to give you a proper end to the P-Gate saga, but I realized real life does not have a proper end. There will always be more things happening. Hopefully, this will be the end of all of it for all of us, and I can move on, and you will get the satisfaction of knowing how things ended up to date.
I truly hope you do. I also hope writing this and giving it to you brings me the closure that I need too. I am writing this update now because I am in a good enough space to open up and appease my guilt about the lack of updates.
It is really nice that most of you have checked in on me throughout the year. It is crazy to me that it is almost a year, and there are still new messages and kind words filling my inbox. I am sorry if I have not replied, but please know that I read every single message.
It warms my heart that there are so many lovely people out there wishing a random stranger such kindness. I will admit, part of me is always afraid of writing an update. Part of it comes from the real-life repercussions of publishing things online, like being identified, which I have been.
The other part is the finality of it. It is odd, but I kind of feel like if I do not tell you guys about it, then I can pretend it is not real. It is not particularly healthy, and my therapist has pointed that out.
So I am putting on my cat-hair-covered big-girl pants and facing the facts. It is a little crazy to think that all this started just a few days into the new year, and just how close we are to it again. I remember spending New Year’s Eve curled on the couch with Ted and Tortilla, wishing for 2021 to be the year filled with adventures and excitement.
I guess I had better watch what I wish for this upcoming year. I do not even know what I will do that day. Perhaps I will pack up Tortilla and go on an adventure, since I certainly do not plan on just staying on the couch reminiscing about the P-show of a year we have had.
I will admit, though, it was a really comfy couch, which I miss terribly. I love Ted. I think part of me will always love him.
I have spent such a long and important period of my life with him that it just feels weird not to have him in my day-to-day life. Short story: he asked me for a divorce. So there is that.
It was as amicable as a divorce under the circumstances can be. We cried during the whole process. He called me to ask for forgiveness.
I begged him not to leave me. But ultimately, as much as it hurts, it is what he needed to heal from everything that happened. We are still friends.
We have been friends for so long that even if that aspect of our relationship is closed off, we are still here for each other. I know you are not here to hear about my heartbreak. You probably just want the hot gossip and juicy details, so I will share what information I have.
Just bear in mind that now we are split, I am not privy to a lot of things. I will break things apart into sections so it is a little bit easier to read, but it will not be in chronological order. It is just to keep things organized.
My ex-family:
Brother Eight, wife, three kids, fish, and cat:
I have not heard from them since the divorce, but prior to that, I know they adopted a kitten. His name is Bob. Brother Seven, wife, and kid:
No idea.
I have not heard from them. I have not asked. Brother Six and his girlfriend:
He is not single or ready to mingle anymore.
I am really happy for him, and his new girl is truly amazing. She is a fellow Redditor and had read the P-Gate saga and still loves him, even with his messed-up family. I have met them a few times throughout the year, and she is truly lovely.
Of course they have their ups and downs and issues with the other brothers, but overall, they are doing great. Brother Six actually came to visit me after Ted asked me for a divorce. He hugged me and told me that I would always be his little sister, no matter who I was married or not married to.
It has been incredibly bittersweet to lose my husband and half of what I considered to be my family. But at least I got to keep a brother, since I only have sisters. Brother Five and his wife:
He has never liked me, and I finally found out why.
He is not particularly fond of Ted. As you know, the brothers were not nice at all growing up, but apparently Brother Five was the worst of the lot and did not like it when Ted would stand up to him or defend Ash. He has not liked him since they were little.
I have had zero contact with him, nor do I intend to. Brother Four, wife, and kid:
They have stayed pretty much the same. They were always nice.
Brother Four did ensure that Ash was on all the do-not-adopt lists of any shelter, shop, or vet around the area where they live. He says that even if Ash does great for the rest of his life, he is not risking another cat or any other animal going through the same thing if his mental health declines. At least I left that family with the reassurance that future cats will be protected from Ash, which honestly did make me feel a bit better.
There is always the chance he will get a stray or someone will adopt one for him, but Brother Four reassured me that he would do anything in his power to make sure it does not happen again. Brother Three, his now-wife, and dog:
They got married. When the saga started, they were just engaged.
It was a really nice ceremony that I did not attend, even though both bride and groom said I was welcome and should come, as I was family. Ted said he wanted me to come, but honestly, I did not want to ruin any more family pictures. I did attend through Zoom, though, so that is how I know it was nice.
Brother Two, his wife, two dogs, and a dragon:
Brother Two was really helpful when everything happened and was one of the first to take action. He apologized profusely to both me and Ted for the original pressure of letting Ash move in, then for what happened, and he was especially apologetic for the role he played in his brother’s mental health. I thanked him for the first two and told him the third was not mine to accept.
He was understanding and said that he would work on helping his family relationships, and that it was not fair that I was the one to pay the price for something that was not my fault. After the divorce, he reached out and told me that if there was anything I needed, he would be there for me. In general, it was a nice sentiment, and I know he is in therapy now too, so that is pretty great.
Brother One, his wife, and three kids:
As you know, Brother One was the most outraged out of this whole situation, since it did affect one of his daughters. Last you guys knew, they had asked me to stay away and give them space. But his older daughter did reach out to me.
She is a sweetheart and told me that she missed how life was before everything happened. I did not ask exactly what her parents told her, but I assume they had to tell her some version of events, since she is old enough to ask the right questions. He did not end up pressing charges, but they did end up moving.
Luckily for Daughter One, they moved to the East Coast, and she found an amazing culinary program. She is very excited about it. Daughter Two, according to her sister, mother, and therapist, is doing great.
Apparently, she never had much contact with Ash outside of big family events with other people. The reason he was taking his feelings out on her picture was more because she is the spitting image of her dad, not strictly about her as an individual, but about who she represents and the fact that she is a woman. I will go into that later.
She is still in therapy but is very annoyed about it, claiming that this has nothing to do with her. She is upset about moving and leaving all of her friends. So, in all, Brother One’s family is safe and adjusting to life on the East Coast, but still keeping their distance from me.
They have not liked the weather so far. I did tell Daughter One that she is welcome to visit any time, and Brother One’s wife and I are friendly enough that she would let her. Brother One and I have not spoken since everything went down.
All the communications have been through his wife and daughters. The Wicked Mother-in-Law of the West:
Some days, for the fun of it, I will go into JustNoMIL and convince myself that at least mine was not as bad. Other days, I will see some and wish I could have one whose worst action was wearing white to my wedding.
We were never best friends, but she was not always awful to me. Living on the other side of the country, there was always a barrier in our relationship that I think we were both comfortable with. We did not have to interact with each other much, and we were okay with it.
She had many other daughters-in-law who lived nearby. I gave her no grandchildren. I just was not important to her.
I still called her on her birthdays and anniversaries, and she always invited me over for the holidays. Whenever we went over for the holidays, the house was always filled with people, so I was just one more or one less, and I was comfortable with that. I think that is where my doormatting with his family started.
I tried to be as much help as I could and do anything to help, which in the long run backfired on me. I think the most time we ever spent together was during our wedding planning. Our wedding was never that important to Ted or me.
We just wanted to be together. Our parents, on the other hand, were dying to have a big wedding. I am the first of my sisters to get married, and with the age gap between Ted and his older brothers, there had not been a big event like this in a while.
I do not regret marrying Ted one bit. I could do without the big wedding, though. I do wish we could have gotten married at the courthouse with just the two of us, or maybe eloped to Vegas and gotten married by Elvis.
I do not even know if they still do that, but it sounds just as, if not more, memorable than a huge two-hundred-plus-person wedding. I remember when we finally agreed to the big wedding, how ecstatic she was. It was like, for the first time, I was more than another daughter-in-law out of the pile.
It is stupid, but it felt nice, you know, to feel like I was finally accepted into the inner family, even if it was at the cost of a huge wedding. I tried to involve her in the process as much as I could. With ten sons, I figured she did not have a lot of opportunities to do girly stuff.
She was lovely to me then, perhaps to get her way, and I was just too naive to see it. I stayed the golden daughter-in-law for a while too, I think until another grandchild was born. Then I was happy to be out of the spotlight, going back to our comfortable coexistence.
It was exhausting to be in her favor with all the expectations that came with it. It is a little crazy to think back. I remember feeling how much I wanted her to like me.
Now, thinking back, I would do anything for her to not know of my existence. After Ash got committed to a psychiatric ward, she did everything within her power to bring me down. I went no contact with her and most of the family for a while, but slowly made amends with some of the others.
Of course, not with her. I saw her once. She came with some of the others to pack up Ash’s apartment.
She went to my parents’ place just to yell at me, which was awful. The worst part is that she timed it so well. My parents were at work.
My sisters were either at work or school. It was just me, sobbing on the other side of the door. I heard the doorbell and went to open it.
I saw her. She did not even pretend to be civil and just laid it out on me. She brought up every single thing I could have possibly ever done to her and her family.
She told me I was a failure of a wife, that she hoped I got ruined during the divorce, and that she would make sure her son took absolutely everything from me. She said she would not rest until I was destitute. She said she was grateful I was barren because she could not stand the idea of tainting her blood with mine.
She said so many awful things that day, but the last one is the one that stuck with me most. Ted and I were never trying to have children, but we were also not trying not to. We figured we were stable enough that if it was meant to be, it would be.
But it never was. Does it make me an awful human for being thankful? My parents’ neighbors called the cops, and they escorted her out of the property.
That is how my sister found me, just sitting on the floor crying with Tortilla. She called Ted, and I guess he got the story from Brother Five, who I guess was the one who drove her, though I just never saw him. I have not heard a peep from her since.
I do not know what Ted told her or what she told him. I just know that after that day, she has left me completely alone, and I am grateful for that. Ted, the Most Okayest Ex-Husband in the Universe:
I could tell you a thousand things about Ted and tell you none at all.
It just feels off to not be with him, but I try to respect his needs and wishes. As you know, he asked me for divorce on the grounds of: I cannot do this to you. I will never forgive myself for putting you in this situation.
I do not want to expose you to my family ever again and let them hurt you. I was upset because he was making a decision on what he wanted for me without taking into account what I wanted for myself. But after a very long therapy session, I came to realize that while he was wording it as doing it to protect me, it was truly to protect himself, or at the very least appease his guilt.
Perhaps not having me around helped him feel like nothing had happened, or he truly thought this was the best for me. It just hurts because I always considered what was best for us, not me or him, but us as a team. Then again, his solution was not to have a team.
There are days when I wake up cursing his name, and some others where I just stare at my phone and consider calling him. Some days, I even lose that battle and do end up calling him. He always answers and reassures me that he is there for me.
Anyway, we sold our house, and of course he moved out. For a while, he moved to the West Coast to fix his family issues while the divorce was being processed. He did come back, as his job is here and he loves his job.
I do not know if I should be glad he is still here in the city that was our home, or if I should resent him for ruining the entire city. It hurts that every place I want to go is filled with memories of him. Perhaps, as many of you said, I should move and start over somewhere else, where people do not know my dark, P-filled past.
I will tell you a bit about Ted’s adventures on the East Coast later. This section is life updates. Some people expressed concern for him and have also been sending well wishes and comments and messages.
I pass them along, and he says thank you. I will copy and paste that bit of the update I wrote, but did not post, the day he came back to town and asked me to meet. This is about you Redditors.
I apologize in advance. It was not a good day. I was never one to use Reddit much.
I wonder where my life would be without you now. I probably would have let his family continue to doormat me, and who knows? Perhaps I would be with Sunny right now, and Ash would have gotten all of his life’s dream come true.
To this day, I still get messages wishing us both well. Part of me is jealous to have to share you with him. Why does he deserve your well wishes when I am the one who ended up alone?
You guys are bigger and better people than I am. I did tell him you guys hoped he was okay. I will admit I did tell him partly to hurt him and make him feel guilty.
Perhaps I will regret it someday, but I just needed him to feel something other than pity for me. Do you know what the worst part was? He laughed.
Admittedly, it was a dead man’s laugh, but the sound still bothered me. It is not fair he gets a laugh. He said thank you.
He said one day he hopes he will be the man you guys thought he was or could be. He also said sorry to disappoint you all, that he knows this is not the ending you wanted for us, although some of you did wish this outcome at the very beginning. I do not know if you all have changed your minds after all the updates, or if you stand your ground that I should leave him.
But, well, he always liked being ahead of things and left me himself. Other than that, Ted is as good as he can be. Just like me, he has good days and bad days.
We meet every so often and check up on each other. He tells me what is going on in his life. I tell him how I am doing.
After his mum’s visit to my parents’ house, I moved out again. I have not invited him over to my new place, nor do I think I want to. I think having a place without memories of him or his family for the first time in a decade is what I need right now.
Tortilla misses him, but I try to convince myself she understands. The P-Man Himself:
I do not even know where to start. When Ash was first committed after the fight with his brothers—when Brothers Three, Four, and Eight first came to help sort everything out at the very beginning—he stayed there for a few weeks.
While he was there, he asked to see Ted multiple times, which Ted never did. But he did at one point write him a letter. At that point, I did not know what it said, but at some point I did ask Ted about it.
He said he had written telling Ash to stop asking to see him, that he needed to prioritize himself and his life over him for once in his life and stop putting Ash above his own needs. After a few weeks, Brother Three arranged for him to be transferred over to the West Coast. I am not sure if he was transferred into a different facility or if he was released into their custody.
Once that was finalized, which took about two months, their mum, Brother Five, and Brother Seven came to pack up his apartment and officially move him back west. As I mentioned, I am not sure of the exact timeline. He moved in with their mum.
Brother Two was the one in charge of overseeing that he undergoes treatment, and I trust that he continues to do so. When Ted went over, I guess to have it out with his family, it was hard. He met with the brothers first.
I am not sure if all of them were there, but I guess the most involved ones were. From what Ted told me, Brother Three told them a bit of what he had been talking about with Ash’s doctors while he was here on the East Coast. He was treated for a psychotic episode, I think.
After that, he has been in treatment ever since. I am not sure what the exact diagnosis is. They did talk about a lot of things.
They talked about their upbringing, how their bullying had an effect on Ash, how Ted’s protectiveness created an unhealthy emotional attachment, and, after a few other things came to light, I do not know if these are conclusions they came to or if they were told by Ash’s therapist or exactly how they got there. But this is what Ted told me when he came back. It was weird listening to him talk about it.
He was so detached, like he was talking about someone else’s family. But I guess it is his way of processing things. I do not know.
Many of you asked at some point or another what type of bullying they could have done to make him turn out like this. Ted answered some of those questions for me. For the sake of being consistent, I will not tell you who did what.
As usual, you can choose your own brother to fit your narrative. Just know that while some brothers are remorseful and regretful for their behaviors, apparently some others are not. Many of you also took a few guesses at the type of tormenting they did, and some were more accurate than others.
Apart from your regular standardized bullying of punching, humiliating, mocking, tricking, and insulting, there was also locking him in cabinets, stealing his clothes, leaving him outside all night long, locking all bathrooms so he would have to wet himself, threatening him with a variety of items and weapons, leaving him at places and making him walk miles to their house in a variety of weather, putting him in diapers, antagonizing him, tying him up and dragging him on ATVs through the property, dumping water on him and leaving him in cold weather, and putting itching powder in his underwear. I could go on, but you get the picture. I know some people do not get along with their siblings and sibling rivalry is a thing, but it seemed so cruel when Ted was describing it.
What could Ash have possibly done to deserve it? I do not get it. It does not excuse his behavior, but it does explain a little bit of it.
His hatred for women comes from a similar place. The general consensus is that he blames his mother for not protecting him from all of that, making his view of women weak and useless. If his own mother could not protect him from his own brothers, who could?
I guess, in general, his brothers did not help with that growing up because they would alienate him from any girls who showed interest in him. That is how his emotional attachment to Ted began. Ted was the only one standing up and defending him.
But we all know how that ended. For now, and hopefully forever, Ash is staying west. I am sorry I do not have more definitive answers for you.
I am sure many of you were expecting them, but I also cannot bring myself to ask any more questions. When this all started, when I was right out of school, I kept two pairs of shoes that had been part of the P incident. I threw almost everything else out, but those two pairs remained.
The first pair does not matter to you guys. The second pair was something I bought with my own money from my very first internship when I was still in school. They represented the very first step—hence why shoes—to my independence.
Having to quit both my jobs, moving back in with my parents, and losing Ted hurt. I just thought of those shoes stashed in a box and how unfair it was that I had lost all they represented. I am slowly building my life back up.
Moving to my new apartment and getting my new job are the first steps, I guess. I will see what the future holds for me and Tortilla. I have not worn them since they were peed on, but maybe I will wear them again someday when I feel like a whole person again.
Happy holidays, Reddit. I do not know how mine will be, but I certainly hope yours are filled with light and joy. Much love from my tattered heart,
Ellie and Tortilla the cat.
I honestly did not expect that story to go on for so long. What an absolute roller coaster. I am exhausted from reading that, so I have no clue how OP would be feeling in this situation with all that going on in her life.
I am going to spend my time while editing this video thinking about my opinion on this story, because there is just too much to process over these next few minutes. I will join you down in the comments below and give my thoughts on this story as well, especially when we heard at the end about the bullying that Ash received. Again, I am not excusing anything he has done.
He has obviously gone through some stuff, though. Then Ted—I am not sure how I feel about that guy. The mother, I am quite disgusted by.
I am just blown away by it all. If you have made it this far, if you are still here, I would love to know your thoughts down in the comments below. OP, if you ever do see this story, much love to you, and I hope you do see some light at the end of this long, dark tunnel that you have taken us through here.
To think this story started off with a typical Am I the Jerk post about—well, it was not that typical, but you know what I mean—and then it went on to all this, unraveling a whole family being torn apart from this one thing. I am not blaming OP in the slightest. It is this person who peed on the stuff and then revealed further drama, pretty much.
Let me know your thoughts in the comments below. Thank you so much for being here today and listening, if you have made it this far. I will see you in the next one.
Take care, guys. Much love.
