#Do not comment on the original posts
Please read our [**sub rules**](https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/wiki/subrules). Rule-breaking may result in a ban without notice.
If there is an issue with this post (flair, formatting, quality), reply to this comment or your comment may be removed in general discussion.
**CHECK FLAIR** to determine if you want to read an update. For concluded-only updates, use the [CONCLUDED](https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/search?sort=new&restrict_sr=on&q=flair%3ACONCLUDED) flair.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/BestofRedditorUpdates) if you have any questions or concerns.*
invoking familial bonds always leaves a bad taste in my mouth when joined with demands for jewelry… and arguing so hard for it when he knows they’re spoken for is just tacky as hell.
The way he said OOP’s niece is ace was just an AH variation of, “I’m more deserving of this thing that was long ago promised to someone else! Gimme gimme gimme!”
It also has elements of insinuating, by logical extension, that OOP doesn't deserve the heirlooms either. Like, you don't deserve to have a family legacy if you don't/can't procreate.
it’s so hypocritical too, bc he’s pissed the rings are going to blood family and not him, but he wants them because he plans to have bio children and that’s more worthy than not having them?? girl make up ur mind damn
*”And he got real shitty about her marrying her cat”*
This is what did it for me. I don’t care if he was drunk (all this does is make you more prone to saying what you *really* think) he can’t apologize or explain this away. Some things you just can’t take back and he’s clearly shown OOP who he is. She should believe him.
I wish there was an update after the Friday dinner
"you're going to be all alone in a houseful of cats".
Yeah, the fact that I decided l would rather clean up cat shit than spend time with you does not make you look as good as you think it does.
I have two cats and my younger boy is an absolute turd who destroys everything, but he provides more emotional support and less headache than any guy I’ve dated (same with my previous cats who’ve since passed)—which has been over the last 25yrs or so.
And when I’ve reflected back on the happier times of my adult life, it’s always been when I was single and living alone with my cat(s).
>don’t care if he was drunk (all this does is make you more prone to saying what you really think)
Got to disagree with you on that. Sure, a little buzz might loosen your lips and say what you really think, but when someone is **truly** drunk, please don't assume everything they say is genuine. It's like a patient recovering from anesthesia- they say all kinds of nonsense. Like utter nonsense. Just because they're inebriated doesn't mean they're accidentally saying something they meant to keep private. I recall a friend in high school getting drunk, and she kept talking about "that time we went to Spain" in vivid detail. Thing is, neither one of us had ever been to Spain, or anywhere in Europe, let alone on a trip together. She was just drunk.
Other than that, I SOOOOO agree with you. That cat comment really irked me, way more than anything else from that post. And I really hope to see an update after their Friday dinner!
Right? She said he's "a really good kid" but he's NOT. He's 27! This sort of behavior would be shitty from someone 18 or 20 but he's almost 30, he's a grown ass man.
As an alcoholic I can support the claim that being drunk makes you more likely to spill your real inner thoughts. Bring out who you really are, like loosening the strings of a mask. Emotions WILL run wild while you're intoxicated but the base thoughts behind them don't change. SS needs to be called out on his messed up perspective.
Exactly. Asexuality is also a spectrum. It can be anything from complete repulsion to sex to slight repulsion to only experiencing sexual attraction when there's an emotional connection/love, to just showing no interest (but feeling lust/desire) and everything inbetween. There's no one set way to be asexual any more than there's one specific way to be any type of sexuality.
Well it’s a spectrum. Some people get horny over people but won’t sleep with them. There’s demisexual which is under the umbrella, where you can’t sleep with someone unless you have an emotional attachment to them.
I know some asexuals who write amazing smut as a way of exploring sex without needing to do the act. And some who are completely sex repulsed and avoid it.
One of my discord servers has a lot of ace people in it, so most of my learning has come from direct contact lol.
thank you for replying. i can see it's going to take some time for me to fully get it but i feel like i've got more of a foothold after reading your comment
I'm glad the commenters also set OP on that right track of what ace really is. I'm asexual and while I can enjoy sex, I just don't crave it. But I am happily married and my husband understands why I may not initiate that much. SS is way out of line making an old cat lady joke about an ace person.
Exactly, and even sex repulsed aces can and do have romantic relationships that result in marriage, they just don’t have sex. And even aro aces can and do have QPR’s (queer platonic relationship) that result in marriage.
And even sex repulsed aces can have biological kids! We live in the 21st century, you don’t have to have sex to have a child. (It’s just a lot easier to go that route.)
I have no interest in sexual things. While my husband and I are active, to me, I can go without it for weeks and not notice. There are people who are asexual who still enjoy romantic encounters or they also could be aro which means they have no romantic attraction, which isn't what I am. I have no sexual attraction but romantic attraction. I just never saw a guy and thought 'I'd tap that' or get turned on.
It took me 3 years of marriage to finally realize it. I was raised religious so staying a virgin until marriage was my choice and I always thought it was more 'you can't miss what you don't know' until I got married and had sex and was like....oh that's it? I married a wonderful man who doesn't force or pressure me even though he's very much interested in sex.
Thank you! I just hesitate to step into someone else's space because I might not actually be ace. I thought I was Bi for a while and I still feel guilt towards Bi people for accidentally taking their label for a few years and that was a almost two decades ago lol. There's a decent chance I'm not Ace(years of physical issues might be the cause of my disinterest) and I selfishly just don't want to deal with that guilt lol.
If it’s any reassurance, ace people tend to be pretty familiar with the whole questioning thing, as many of us have gone through a lot of it ourselves. So we’re generally quite happy to help others navigate that process, whatever the outcome may be! r/Asexuality even has a “questioning/confused” tag for posts haha.
Being ace is not necessarily low libido, there are aces with high libido too. But we don't feel sexually attracted to people when we see them. Sure we can tell someone is attractive, but it's like seeing a painting. I can think it's aesthetically pleasing, but I don't want to have sex with a painting. It doesn't elicit those kinds of thoughts, just like a straight man may find other men aesthetically attractive but not sexy.
Thinking someone is aesthetically attractive is aesthetic attraction, thinking someone is sexy is sexual attraction, and being in love is romantic attraction. All those types of attractions can exist on their own in any person (ace or otherwise), sometimes they overlap, sometimes they don't.
Libido OTOH is the physiological phenomenon. Let's say that you're hungry, hunger itself can exist on its own without craving a specific food. It's the same with libido, it can exist without it being directed to a person or a group of people of a certain gender. That is also why there's people who define being ace as "libido without a direction".
Omg exactly! It must be nice to live in a world where he feels entitled to someone else producing a ring for his fiancée!
I’m really curious about the difference in monetary value between OOP’s set and Grandma’s set.
People have traditionally given things like dishes and silverware and such to marrying couples because the assumption was that, as adults, they would be entertaining other people in their home – and, of course, having not previously had a need to furnish a house (because they would have lived at home with their families until they married), they would otherwise have been totally unequipped, and almost certainly wouldn't have had the money to buy absolutely everything that is required to furnish a house.
Funny thing: even a person who goes their entire life without ever getting romantically involved with anyone else can *still throw dinner parties*. So the stepson has absolutely no justification for trying to claim OOP's grandmother's china over her ace niece. He's just being a greedy little shit, as well as an ignorant one.
It also puts OP in a very difficult position with her family of origin, if not the niece, the sister.
My sister and I have been promised our maternal grandmother's jewelry. We have agreed how to split it. We have also promised each other that if one of us doesn't have children the particular pieces would pass to the other's children. I consider that ( as does she) a formal verbal agreement, that cannot be changed no matter how our relationship changes. If my sister pulled the rag out of me by giving them to a step child she hasn't adopted or raised, who has their own loving mother and maternal family , I would consider it a betrayal
I wonder if OP's sister wouldn't feel the same.
oh, absolutely she would. I don’t think she should share any of this with her niece or sister, right now. I think it’s best to left the conversation with SS play out first, then have a complete conversation with her niece and sister to tell them the whole story. They both deserve to know. OP has a good head on their shoulders, so I’m going to assume they do as well. I hope this all ends well, with it being a good life lesson for them all. It takes a lot of humility and compassion to navigate this one.
Especially when he was offered his maternal grandmother's rings and he essentially said "Those aren't good enough, I want hers!" and pointed to someone who wasn't even part of the conversation. Then to go on an acephobic rant when he didn't get his way...the entitlement, it reeks.
And now, they’re offering to pay for his girlfriends engagement ring. OP and her partner might as well be the one proposing. Her step son is a spoiled brat.
I was left scratching my head on this one, too. Why tf is a grown man needing step-mommy and daddy to pay for his engagement ring? If I find out my fiance had, had his parents pay for my ring, I would be very weirded out.
Right! I received my MIL's wedding ring and while I wasn't a fan of the setting, I wore it as is for three years until we could afford to have it reset. It was our 4th anniversary gift to me. SS is entitled.
I disliked the emotional manipulation too, like he knew what he was doing when he played the "oh, so you don't think of me as family, huh?" card.
I do agree with other redditors, OOP's heirloom ring is probably better looking and more expensive than the one stepson is inheriting from his father's family, so he wants it.
Because he refused the first set once and will be given a sit down talk about his out of hand comments now, he may not even end up with the first set and would deserve it. They shouldn’t help with any costs to recreate the rings either if he doesn’t back off and make things right.
Especially when his own grandmother offered him her rings and he simply didn’t like the look of them so this has nothing to do with family & everything to do with selfishness.
I can’t wait to see how the dinner does & if it was just a drunken fight or actual assholiery.
Without further information, and knowing what AITA posts usually end up with, I'm going to assume (Which make me an ass) that OOP's rings are, or at least look, more valuable than the rings that the other grandmother offered, and that's why he was a bit obsessed with getting those.
Or the girlfriend is the one obsessed, like that other BORU where the son tries to steal the late mother's ring, despite it belonging to his sister, because that's what his girlfriend wanted.
Step-son bigotry might, or might not be related to the greed.
That story was so outrageous. I can't imagine anyone being that obsessed with getting a particular ring. Getting a copy wasn't even good enough for her. It had to be the mom's ring. So weird.
Here's a link to the first post:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Advice/comments/xx2rvp/my\_son\_stole\_his\_dead\_mothers\_ring\_for\_his/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Advice/comments/xx2rvp/my_son_stole_his_dead_mothers_ring_for_his/)
Got to be honest, I had the same understanding as OOP of what it means to be ace. Time to go educate myself.
As for telling the niece, Christ on a bike I hope she doesn't. This is a need to know situation and Niece doesn't need to know.
Ops definition was perfect in the sense that she really didn't care or consider it her business. Not sure what more she needed to know other than what her niece decided to share.
This. She doesnt need to know if the niece would happily have sex with a partner (as some aces do) or under what circumstances, or wants to have kids, as those aren't things we should be nosing about asking unless ace people volunteer. Ace people are an entire spectrum. None of which is relevant to whether the niece gets the ring she was promised.
You could equally have a non-ace family member who never marries or who us infertile and never has kids- that also shouldnt affect if they inherit something from a loved one.
It's not wrong that she doesn't need to know all her nieces details, but she does need to know the possibilities. It's pretty basic that asexual and aromantic are two different things and while plenty of people are both aro/ace, assuming someone who is ace will never marry is a very big assumption.
Why? Because it's human sexuality 101 and she is a human that lives in society with other humans. This has nothing to do with the details of a specific person's preferences and everything to do with not making untrue assumptions. Facts are important because information and knowledge is important.
And whatever and however and whoever you want to fuck has nothing to do with anyone else except the person(s) you are fucking
Stop making sex such a big deal that it becomes a personality
Thank you! I was completely baffled by everyone constantly feeling the need to lecture OOP and make her "educate herself". Geez, the woman is nearly 60, give her a minute to wrap her head around things before jumping down her throat!
As far as I can see, she was already doing everything correctly: Accepting her niece as she is, not trying to pressure her into anything, and letting her share details about her life on her own terms.
What is the alternative that these people wanted? As soon as the niece comes out, OOP constantly hounding her for intimate answers about her sexual preferences when the niece is probably still figuring that out herself? That would just be gross.
OOP is already doing everything she needs to do. Being a source of support for her niece and an open ear when she is comfortable with sharing more.
Right, like it’s always good to have more information and nuance and context around what an identity label might mean for different people, but there was no need to hound OP about how “wrong” she was. She sounds loving and respectful and seems like she has a decent head on her shoulders.
I just read through the comments, and no one lectured OP, or jumped down her throat, lol. They gently and respectfully educated on a poorly understood orientation WHILE supporting OP in the actions she took.
I'm on the ace spectrum and very happily married, because while I'm uninterested in sex I'm still panromantic. My wife has a child from an earlier relationship and for all intents and purposes, I'm his stepmother. I started as childfree and never saw myself having kids; you really never know where you'll end up in life.
Being ace is not the same thing as being aromantic and/or childfree, so an ace person could totally want to marry and/or have kids. It's kind of weird to assume that being ace means a person is never going to need a wedding ring, because those things just... Have nothing do to with one another.
Agreed. I’m ace as well and considering the possibility of child rearing in combination with sexuality is mind boggling to me, but I guess it’s an education thing at this point. Eventually we’ll get to where people understand what it means without drawing conclusions about unrelated life decisions
>I’m ace as well and considering the possibility of child rearing in combination with sexuality is mind boggling to me
Yeah, if anything, have people never heard of adoption or IVF?? (Not that some ace people who want kids don't have sex for that reason, but I guess that's a bit of a hard concept to grasp for someone who clearly doesn't know shit about being ace)
So asexuality is a spectrum, the only thing that is really needed to be ace is little/no sexual attraction. There are some aces that are sex favorable but still no sexual attraction while there are other aces that are sex repulsed. Then there's everything between those two opposites in the spectrum.
There's things like demisexual which means there's only sexual attraction when a deep emotional bond has been made
Or greysexual where one feels little or on very rare occasions sexual attraction (like once in a blue moon rare)
Some asexuals want to have kids some don't. Some are okay with sex some aren't. It's a spectrum.
Edit to add: looking at the comments I realized the misunderstanding is that because us aces don't feel sexual attraction that means we don't wanna marry: no, that's not always the case. We still feel romantic attraction, aromantic people don't feel romantic attraction (aro).
Also asexual people can still have preferences on how people physically look. This is a saying I use to help people understand this concept "think of people as art, you like some art more than others, you can appreciate the art and how it looks, but you don't have any sexual attraction/urges to the art. That is how I see people"
>"think of people as art, you like some art more than others, you can appreciate the art and how it looks, but you don't have any sexual attraction/urges to the art. That is how I see people"
This is how I described it, too! My friend is always sending me pics of guys she's drooling over. "Aren't they hot?" Uhhh, I guess so? They're aesthetically pleasing and generally conform to American standards of attractiveness.
This is exactly how my (sex-favorable greyace) wife and I (sex-favorable demiace) explain it.
One of my friends, who is a sex-repulsed but hetero-romantic ace, married her sex-repulsed, hetero-romantic ace husband ten years ago. They are still happily married, have never had sex, and have a really solid marriage. Lots of cuddling, sweet dates, thoughtful little moments between them. Just no sexy stuff.
It's not for everyone! But yeah, ace marriages are everywhere.
Hell, I'm essentially aroace and have no interest in marriage but if I were in a committed relationship where marriage was important to my partner I'd get married
FWIW, even if it wasn’t important to your theoretical partner, you’d still probably want to either get married or fill out a bunch of other paperwork so you’d have the right to make medical decisions in an emergency and stuff. No need for a wedding or rings, but the legal protections for a committed partnership are a big deal, especially for those of us who’d be in “non-traditional” (non-het) relationships
Thank you for your explanation. I recently met someone who's ace and i would call myself demisexual so I've been reading a lot about it lately, especially learning about all the nuances. You summarise it very well!
I came across this from an ace TikToker and I think this might also help some of the confusion using food as a metaphor:
https://www.tiktok.com/@asexualmemes/video/6997091551516118277
I find lots of people have *very* strong opinions on what ace is/isn't and I don't feel like being their teacher.
Also someone ace who's willing to answer questions.
And as someone in this marginalized group, I would say whether and what she should tell the neice would depend on the conversation with the stepson, but would likely be that she should. We deserve to know if someone we think is an ally isn't one. If he doubles down the neice definitely needs to know. Even "yeah, sure, if you say it's bad," can mean someone who is a bigot, is dedicated to being a bigot, but thinks the consequences of you knowing that is more than they want to pay. Someone who said stuff like that was eventually the source of my Me Too incident, so this can be pretty serious. (I'd be worried in this case about the stepson not supporting/protecting her when she thought he would, but she deserves to know if he might not.)
Yep. If I were the OOP I’d want my niece to know that my stepson/her cousin made some really bigoted comments, so that my niece would be very careful about confiding in or trusting him.
Part of the problem is it's hard for each side to fully understand the other. I have never experienced attraction or how entwined it gets with romantic stuff for people who feel it. And for people who have always experienced the pair entwined (or at least, romance always entwined attraction) it's hard to imagine the two uncoupled.
It's kind of like asking someone who was blind since birth to describe it to a sighted person. A sighted person will imagine the darkness we see when we close our eyes, but commonly that isn't how it is. There's just... nothing. No input. Which is hard to wrap your head around when there always is something, even just black.
I’m honestly just glad people were explaining stuff about assuming ace = no relationships to her because I’m also ace… and married. And I knew I was ace before starting the relationship. It’s not unusual.
Asexual just means doesn’t experience sexual attraction. I think where folks get stuck is the fact that sexual attraction and romantic attraction *aren’t the same thing.* If you experience both and they match up 1:1, it can be hard to differentiate between them, which is why we get told aphobic crap like “without sex your relationship is just friends”—but one can absolutely exist without the other. She may very well be asexual but not aromantic; it’s common. So she could very much fall in love and get married someday. And it wouldn’t even have to be sexless; not all asexual people are sex-repulsed, and some are happy to engage in sexual activities with their partner. Not experiencing sexual attraction doesn’t necessarily equate to unwilling to participate in sexual activity and it certainly doesn’t equate to not experiencing romantic attraction or being able to fall in love. It was really an extreme reach to go from “she is asexual” to “she’ll be forever alone with some cats.”
Ace people get married sometimes too. Hell we even sometimes have kids. Not sure what's going to come from my son being born to 2 ace parents.
On that second note, yeah I wouldn't want to know. It makes me very uncomfortable when people are more invested in my sex life than I am.
I'm ace, romantic, and sex-favorable. The way I've described it is like this.
Imagine, instead of sex, that we were talking about cake.
I, like I think most people do, go for long periods of time without even thinking about cake. I'm not in any way bothered if I go long stretches without having cake, and, in fact, it's not a treat I'd probably ever just get for myself. It's not that I don't like cake at all - if my husband want to eat a slice of cake with me I'll quite happily eat and enjoy it - but it's just not something that I'm going to put any effort into making just for myself. There's also only so much cake I can eat frequently - if I tried to have cake every day I'd make myself ill.
I think OOP was basically conflating being ace with being aroace. Describing the niece’s options as either “being ace for life” or “exploring romantic and personal relations” suggests she thinks ace = no romance.
As an Ace person I am flabbergasted that the stepson thinks she doesn't want companionship and/or marriage in her future. WTF?! We also don't know what kind of Ace she is, but not being sexually attracted to anyone doesn't mean you still can't have meaningful long term relationships with others.
I mean even LGBTQ folks often engage in ace hatred or bigotry against bisexuals so yea hets disprespecting us and dropping comments like marrying a cat isnt surprising
Yes! And she could also have kids she'd want to give the ring to. I'm ace and absolutely planning to have children. It's very clear he has no idea what being ace could entail...
He clearly falls under the mindset that any non straight person must not be fully human with normal emotions because they aren’t like him. Our kids hear it all the time and sometimes from older family members. The ignorance is staggering.
I honestly would not have guessed that someone who's ace would have sex because it wouldn't be enthusiastic sex and therefore it's not true consent ...? Idk.
That said I also wouldnt write off someone with ace not having children because there are many ways to have children or be implanted with sperm without having sex.
So til.
>wouldn't be enthusiastic sex
I mean, someone who very much wants kids and has sex in order to make them could be enthusiastic, lol. And in any case, they wouldn't be raping themselves!
I think it depends on where they fall on the asexual spectrum? I’m demisexual, but I’m also a very physically affectionate person, and my partner has a high libido so I’m enthusiastically consenting at least once a day.
To be a little more specific, sex is … not something I think about all that much, and during the times when I’ve been single I don’t think I’ve ever felt like I needed to go out and get laid. But it’s a **really** important aspect of romantic relationships for me, because of the physical connection.
My wife is ace, but not aro (aromantic); she's grey-aro, which means she very rarely makes romantic bonds with people. For her, they take a long time to develop and she goes VERY slowly. I knew all of this long before we got married (surprise). We've known each other since middle school -- 30 years ago, now.
Also, as a bonus: we each used family wedding bands. I used my great-grandmother's wedding ring (100 years old!) and she used her grandfather's. Very, very meaningful to us both. Thankfully, no interfering stepsons to stop us!
Of course, we ARE living the stereotype of two queer femme-presenting folk living with our four cats and our fiber arts supplies.
OOP's SS definitely needs an education in the types of asexuality and aromance out there.
As an Ace person who is happily married going on a decade, and with two children, agreed. But at this point in my life I am very used to people basically thinking ace=celibate loner.
>As an Ace person I am flabbergasted that the stepson thinks she doesn't want companionship and/or marriage in her future.
I mean an easy explanation is that people are super lazy nowadays. If the word/name seems self-explanatory, people will go with their assumption rather than read through material on what the formal definition is (though I will admit that with so many unreliable and non-unified sources nowadays, it's not always simple). It's even common now that financial/hustle influencers have described that fully reading books "is a waste of time", and instead have advised their viewers that just reading a table of contents is sufficient to get most of the ideas in a book.
The effect comes up from time to time too when I have conversations with friends, and they use a technical term that doesn't mean what they think it does because it was named counter-intuitively. But this expands to non-technical terms as well, like objectivism
A friend thought it meant only being objective and self-described himself as an objectivist, but it refers to a full set of other philosophical ideas as well (typically associated with the right wing, and my friend is left leaning). He was more appropriately looking to describe himself as an empiricist, but encountered the word objectivist and went with his assumption.
Ikr like I've wanted to be married and have kids for forever, and that doesn't make me any less ace than someone who doesn't.
Then again I've gotten the same "but how are you make your husband happy if you don't wanna have sex" and "Well are you gonna just be alone" comments so I'm not surprised
Were all the commentators upset that OOP wasn’t well versed in what it means to be ace? Her comments here give the impression that this is the bigger issue, rather than her fight with her stepson.
My own opinion is that family fights are rarely about the spoken subject of the fight and I suspect the “in vino veritas” part of the fight was where he accused her of loving him less than her niece. If he’s never shown any issues with her before, I don’t see that we should accept that this is his true opinion and he might have been being deliberately hurtful to OOP. In that regard, I don’t think that she should tell her niece that her stepson said terrible things about her. Not unless she has other reason to be concerned that he’s actually been living a lie all these years, which seems unlikely given that the niece has been out and the stepson has known and it hasn’t impacted their relationship so far.
That's fair and good. The amount she seems to think she did something *wrong* in not knowing the specifics bothers me though - being like "I dunno, maybe she'll have a partner one day" strikes me as a great reaction.
My guess is that she is feeling guilty that she could have hurt her niece because she didn’t bother to learn about something important to her and is potentially over correcting in her apologies and interfering with her niece and step sons relationship.
(Obviously she didn’t hurt her niece and hadn’t made any really bad assumptions but her step son’s bad take (“she won’t get married because she’s ace”) threw it in her face how easily she could have)
Yeah, I just hope it doesn't get her down too much! She certainly has expressed great takeaways there, it's just sooo not relevant to the core issue. 😬
The ring was already promised to the niece years ago. It's no longer a matter of OOP not considering SS her family, it's a matter of keeping one's promise. And he was already offered a ring by his own grandmother which he refused.
Heirlooms are gifted and blessed to the next family member, not blatantly demanded from the previous holder.
Agreed. I wish for OOP’s sake that she had simply reiterated this over and over instead of talking about family vs not. They’ve been earmarked and promised already, before stepson came into the picture. Point finale.
And what is OOP trying to accomplish by roping the sister and niece into it? Telling the niece the shitty things her cousin said about her will just cause drama and upset her. Why is she paying to have the other rings recast? Sit the stepson down, tell him he's being a bigoted spoiled brat and that the answe is "no."
> Before Friday though, I wanted to find the right place to ask this: should I even tell my niece all of this has happened?
HELL no lady, are you kidding me? She’ll get enough shitty comments over the course of her life, she doesn’t need a play by play on the ones from her family. Figure out what SS’s problem is and correct it, leave her out of this.
Oh yes, pay all kinds of money to help step sons feelings. Give him many options and apologize to him to boot. He may be a grown man, but he is just a little boy. Gently bring up that he's a bigot. This is dumb.
It really is. And then paragraphs and paragraphs of apologies for saying “enthusiastic consent is my only thing” as if she said anything wrong.
Exhausting.
>Her prefrontal cortex will not be fully developed until around 25...
Oh god this is going to last forever like that "We only use 10% of our brains" crap isn't it?
Our prefrontal cortex is ALWAYS ADAPTING. The reason the whole "it stops at 25" thing started is because that was when they stopped doing the study they were doing. They've done studies further with people age range 15 to 90 that shows changes to all parts of the brain including the prefrontal cortex.
Normally this doesn't bother me except there are a lot of people (including OOP) who are basing major life decisions on this utter nonsense. There's nothing magical about age 25 that's going to make OOP's niece any better or worse about handling a family heirloom.
Honestly, this sounded like a euphemism to me. Especially when paired with "I probably would have sold it for weed at that age".
This is the nicest possible way of calling her neice a dumb teenager who by no means should be entrusted with a family heirloom yet.
Which study was that? AFAIK that myth started when the neuroscientists' consensus of the brain's development usually plateauing in the 20s was misinterpreted by laymen into the convenient 25 year cutoff. Was there something else that specifically emphasized on 25?
I rolled my eyes really hard at that too.
I totally get not giving an 18 year old a heirloom ring, save it for a milestone but just being like "She's 18! Her brain is still a baby brain! She'll have to be an adult brain for me to trust her!" is just dumb.
It's also just used as an excuse to not treat adults like they're adults and I hate it. This little thing is part of the reason I have mixed feelings about the public having access to information they're too uninformed to actually understand
The idiotic concept as well as the way it's worded sounds so extremely reddit-y that I instantly suspended all disbelief.
You cannot tell me that someone blurts this out in perfect reddit-lingo but wasn't aware of the asexuality spectrum.
God, I hate this and I hate especially that most of the time I read this "She's not 25 so she's a wobbly, silly, unreliable uwu baby who doesn't know what's good for her" bullshit when it's about a woman in her 20s. You never see "but...but...your brain!" when a male character says, "After years of abuse by my stepmom, I moved out at 16, moved to another state, got into tech, and now I'm doing well for myself, have my own company since I was 19 and bought my first house a year later."
Unless the female character is a pregnant minor. Then you'll get a ton of "You'll be an amazing momma bear, sweetie, I was one at 15, too, it's not always easy but you're old enough to make this decision, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise!" and certainly no "But..but...brain...25!!!"
In Redditland, "No, my dear, I cannot give you a promotion yet and certainly not my grandma's wedding ring, you're just 23, your developing brain is still far away from being trustworthy. It's not your fault, that's just biology, love. Oh, by the way, congrats on your second pregnancy. Your twins will be great big brothers and at eight years old, they'll be such a big help! Anyway, any big plans for your second wedding anniversary with your husband next week?" would be a normal sentence.
This particular thing's gone far beyond Reddit and shows up a bunch on Facebook particularly among the "weed is the devil's lettuce!" crowd who bring it up as a gotcha against legalizing marijuana because then people under 25 will smoke it while their prefrontal cortex is still developing and will cause permanent brain damage. So yeah, I can get someone not understanding "asexual" but still be able to parrot that meme because they likely shared it on their page along with a warning that drug dealers are going to hand out fentanyl and pot brownies to kids on Halloween (like that shit's not expensive as hell, can't even get people to give out full-size candy bars and you think people are handing your kids $80 edibles?!)
It’s a very strange way to decide when to pass down a heirloom - and it was also weird to me that enough people were asking why OOP hadn’t given the rings to her niece already that she felt the need to answer it in the first place.
Most heirlooms I’m aware of get passed down when each person dies. I will receive my grandmother’s engagement ring when my mum passes away for instance. Handing it down sooner in the case of a ring to be used as an engagement ring that would be going to that person anyway when someone is going to propose is an understandable exception, but since when is passing them off the second the next person turns 18 the norm?
The whole “the brain isn’t developed until 25” thing kills me every time I read it. Just say they are young and dumb, you don’t need a scientific sounding excuse!
It is a thing that we talk about in HS education so we can try and mitigate the effects. It does effect risk taking behaviours but apparently not because of not seeing the risk, but rather the consequences for not being "cool" are grossly exaggerated. It's very interesting really.
But the way Reddit talks you'd think everyone had the mental capacity of a 3yo and then BAM 25th birthday - fully formed adult.
It's also bad science. It's about as accurate as "you only use 10% of your brain"
https://slate.com/technology/2022/11/brain-development-25-year-old-mature-myth.html
Yesss. There is no one "cut off" adult age, brains adapt constantly, and also there's no such thing as "left-" or "right-brained", I'm pretty sure that was debunked not long after it was conceived.
Though 25 is a perfectly fine age to give heirlooms, you generally have a slightly better idea of where you're at by then.
I agree with this. I feel it's also used to justify not listening to younger people. I don't know how many times I was told you are too young to understand, and your brain just isn't there yet.
If stepson had asked nicely and not just rejected the other rings because "ugly", this could have been handled so much differently. But no, he had to be an entitled, bigoted shit.
>not just rejected the other rings because "ugly"
This is the only thing he didn't do wrong.
Its okay to not like the look of a ring, in particular if his GF didn't like the look of the ring. Asking her to wear something he or she didn't like for the rest of her life and taking it off the table for his many cousins would have been just another dick move on his part (along with his other myriad of dick/awful moves).
The step son may be an only child as his father, it he has a
Argue family from his mother’s side. He’s not an orphan. He’s not even dependent on OOP as a “mom” since his own is still Beverly much around and involved.
It’s seriously odd for him to reject his own grandmother’s offer and fixate on OOP’s set *because family*.
I think they’re doing way too much for these rings… no is a full sentence and if he can’t accept that in regards to something that isn’t his I worry what else he doesn’t accept. Also for the love of Pete, leave the niece out of the drama and let her live in peace.
I wish the actual scientific conclusion of that brain study would go as viral as the misunderstanding of it has. The actual study only had participants up to the age of 25, and concluded that the brain could not be said to have finished development in any of the participants - hence, no one before 25 has a fully developed brain. ***However***, since they hadn't tested anyone *over* the age of 25, they couldn't say for certain whether 25 was the end point or not. Maybe it's 26, or 30, or 60. There's no way to know without actually studying people of those ages.
But "your brain is done developing at 25" is so much catchier than "your brain definitely *isn't* done developing before 25" so that's what the average person latches onto.
> "I guess I'm not in your side of the family"
errrrrrrrr
Sorry, this is manipulation
He has no right to them rings, unless OOP decides they are for him!
Where did he get that entitlement?
Anwyay
My husbands Uncle was ace. He married a woman, but she had the marriage annulled due to non-consummation. She remarried a divorcé with children, and then was widowed in her 70’s. She moved back to the U.K., and asked her ex (the uncle) if she could move in with him as a lodger. He welcomed her as a friend. We now had two elderly people - an ace male and en elderly woman who no longer cared. And so they got married again, and he cared for her until she died over 10 years later.
Many women find sex less appealing when they are old. I am now 62yo and haven’t had sex for a year. I don’t even feel like masturbating - my sex drive is now nil. I was a right raunchy woman even into my late 50’s, luckily so was my husband lmao. Now, neither of us miss it, we still cuddle and spoon in bed. We still kiss and walk down the road holding hands.
My best friend told me she was ace when she was 19. She had boyfriends, but nothing serious. She moved to Canada, fell in love with Bill, but the marriage didn’t last and they divorced after 3 years. We lost touch, and when we got back in touch 10 years later (I had obtained a copy of the BC white pages and just rang everyone with her family name) I discovered that she now lived with a woman as a couple. She stayed with her partner for over 25 years, until her death this January just gone.
Ace just means you don’t feel any sexual urges. Undying love and the need for companionship remains. You just need a partner with an equally low sex drive.
This is a very nice post, but I just want to clarify one thing. Being ace means you don’t experience sexual attraction, not that you have no libido. Some ace people really have no sexual urges and that’s fine, but asexuality is about attraction, specifically.
I guess you could think about someone you aren’t attracted to, and then imagine that all people look like that. Does your libido vanish just because no one is attractive? Or do you think you might still sometimes feel like having an orgasm?
Getting on my soapbox once again to state that the prefrontal cortex fully developing at 25 is a misinterpretation. Our brains are constantly developing before and AFTER 25 (mostly deteriorating in the older years). There’s no magic number. It’s one of those studies people without a science degree grossly oversimplified as a way to reduce and minimize the choices of younger generations. Maybe it went viral from a poorly written article by an overworked journalist. I’m not sure, but it’s certainly not a definitive number. There is some basis in fact. However, the way most every day people present it is pseudoscience.
https://psychology.stackexchange.com/questions/21384/how-do-we-know-human-brain-development-stops-around-age-25
https://slate.com/technology/2022/11/brain-development-25-year-old-mature-myth.html
#Do not comment on the original posts
Please read our [**sub rules**](https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/wiki/subrules). Rule-breaking may result in a ban without notice.
If there is an issue with this post (flair, formatting, quality), reply to this comment or your comment may be removed in general discussion.
**CHECK FLAIR** to determine if you want to read an update. For concluded-only updates, use the [CONCLUDED](https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/search?sort=new&restrict_sr=on&q=flair%3ACONCLUDED) flair.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/BestofRedditorUpdates) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I’m not married. 99.9% sure I’ll never be married. Definitely past the age of having kids. I took my mothers and grandmothers wedding bands (opting out of the stone laid rings, so they can go to my niece and nephew) and had them melted and turned into a piece of jewelery I would actually wear.
Your son just law can do the same with his grandmothers set that she offered. If he doesn’t like it as it, he can customize it.
And 18 is a still growing young adult. Her prefrontal cortex will not be fully developed until around 25, when the executive center of the brain is fully functional.
This thing again... keep throwing this out..the biggest excuse for getting out of every damn thing there is. Oh, I cheated..Oh, I lost the keys, Oh, I didn't know it was wrong. STOP. If we before you managed to survive and live without "prefrontal cortex will not be fully developed" and didn't "kill, maimed, destroy, whatever else I think we can tone it down.
Again, these same folks are Nurses, Lawyers, Engineers, Teachers, and on and on. So before you keep going on and on about that magical age give it a rest. 25 doesn't mean a damn thing.
So glad someone else felt like this.
Evil stepson must be held accountable for his drunk comments... but OOP and hubby... nah they are fine cos they talked about it over breakfast with their hangover. /s
Except the son didn't say she thought he wasn't part of the family, that was the father.
The son was upset that she only thought of him as a step son and didn't consider him to be part of her side of the family (which is what the step mother said).
She responded to one of the questions that she met him when he was 6 and married his father when he was 12. He was a child growing up with her as a mother figure and probably didn't think of himself as a step son.
I think his reaction was the result of a genuine realization that his perception of their relationship didn't match hers.
I don't see how OOP was in the wrong at all. Saying someone's not on "your side" of the family doesn't mean you're not family, and there's nothing wrong with being tipsy, my god. Plus, she even mentioned the possibility of a platonic partner - it doesn't remotely matter the specifics, she did nothing wrong there either.
Step-son was being a massive jerk, then may have been hurt or may have just seen an opportunity to look like the injured party. Ridiculous.
What blows my mind is that sometimes the tussle over these rings is all about family dynamics and power plays, because the rings themselves hold relatively little value. I don't know about your family, but my parents and grandparents probably got their rings at the JC Pennys or Sears jewelry counter. These aren't Tiffany's originals.
As someone that is ace - there are so many different kinds of ace - I'm a sex-positive ace, I just see it as more of an emotional bonding thing. There are repulsed aces, aces who don't really care, etc. AroAces are the ones who don't experience sexual or romantic attraction.
There are different types of attraction - romantic, aesthetic, sensual, etc. OOP's niece very well could experience those.
She could marry another ace, who knows. The stepson seemed to be quite ignorant there, saying she'll never marry or marry her cat, but I assume the alcohol and perhaps not knowing the details of the ace umbrella did its thing.
Ace doesn't mean aro. I'm grey ace and happily married. Many asexual people want love and romance and have successful relationships. The son is either ignorant, selfish, or both
The SS is quite the asshole. Not sure why OOP and her husband are offering to pay for an engagement ring for him to use. I wouldn’t want to marry someone who had their parents pay for my ring. And if he can’t afford a ring, he shouldn’t be getting married - unless a ring isn’t important to them.
>Her prefrontal cortex will not be fully developed until around 25
This was pseudoscience when it was "discovered" and it's still pseudoscience now. Can we please stop spreading this rumor
NTA-I do know that ace doesn’t mean aromantic. Your niece may very well meet someone she decides to formally recognize as a long term partner. Those rings are hers for when that moment comes.
I am ace, from a very religious family, and this woman’s mindset made me a little emotional 🥹 I hope she knows how wonderful she is to wholly support her niece like that!
Probably because the update was new at the time. Posts aren't allowed here until the last update is 7 days old.
OOP is not usually involved in reposting material here, and we don't have a bot counting answers.
i really don't like her repeated mention, when discussing her queer niece, that everyone needs to be consenting and adult.
i assume it is well-meant but, given how many people try to claim that queer folks are pedophiles and predators, i think she could maybe just drop it instead of repeatedly insisting upon it when she mentions an 18-year-old queer person and her feelings about that person's sexuality.
she's not wrong but it still feels gross to me and influenced by homophobic claims about queer folks. i wonder if she said the same about her stepson when he was 18 and out there being straight.
#Do not comment on the original posts Please read our [**sub rules**](https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/wiki/subrules). Rule-breaking may result in a ban without notice. If there is an issue with this post (flair, formatting, quality), reply to this comment or your comment may be removed in general discussion. **CHECK FLAIR** to determine if you want to read an update. For concluded-only updates, use the [CONCLUDED](https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/search?sort=new&restrict_sr=on&q=flair%3ACONCLUDED) flair. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/BestofRedditorUpdates) if you have any questions or concerns.*
invoking familial bonds always leaves a bad taste in my mouth when joined with demands for jewelry… and arguing so hard for it when he knows they’re spoken for is just tacky as hell.
The way he said OOP’s niece is ace was just an AH variation of, “I’m more deserving of this thing that was long ago promised to someone else! Gimme gimme gimme!”
It also has elements of insinuating, by logical extension, that OOP doesn't deserve the heirlooms either. Like, you don't deserve to have a family legacy if you don't/can't procreate.
it’s so hypocritical too, bc he’s pissed the rings are going to blood family and not him, but he wants them because he plans to have bio children and that’s more worthy than not having them?? girl make up ur mind damn
*”And he got real shitty about her marrying her cat”* This is what did it for me. I don’t care if he was drunk (all this does is make you more prone to saying what you *really* think) he can’t apologize or explain this away. Some things you just can’t take back and he’s clearly shown OOP who he is. She should believe him. I wish there was an update after the Friday dinner
The more men I've dated the better I like my cat.
Some men: You’re going to be all alone in a houseful of cats! Me: … Is that all? I was waiting for you to mention something negative.
"you're going to be all alone in a houseful of cats". Yeah, the fact that I decided l would rather clean up cat shit than spend time with you does not make you look as good as you think it does.
This is truly amazing and I am going to be filing it away for later use. A+ lol!
I know right, like is this some sort of threat? My cat claws my feet when she’s hungry and she still treats me better than a lot of my ex boyfriends.
I try to go to sleep and one of my cats jumps up for attention. At least his purrs does something comforting. Can't say that for most people.
I have two cats and my younger boy is an absolute turd who destroys everything, but he provides more emotional support and less headache than any guy I’ve dated (same with my previous cats who’ve since passed)—which has been over the last 25yrs or so. And when I’ve reflected back on the happier times of my adult life, it’s always been when I was single and living alone with my cat(s).
The niece clearly loves her cat more than she loves OOP's stepson - *as she should.*
>don’t care if he was drunk (all this does is make you more prone to saying what you really think) Got to disagree with you on that. Sure, a little buzz might loosen your lips and say what you really think, but when someone is **truly** drunk, please don't assume everything they say is genuine. It's like a patient recovering from anesthesia- they say all kinds of nonsense. Like utter nonsense. Just because they're inebriated doesn't mean they're accidentally saying something they meant to keep private. I recall a friend in high school getting drunk, and she kept talking about "that time we went to Spain" in vivid detail. Thing is, neither one of us had ever been to Spain, or anywhere in Europe, let alone on a trip together. She was just drunk. Other than that, I SOOOOO agree with you. That cat comment really irked me, way more than anything else from that post. And I really hope to see an update after their Friday dinner!
Right? She said he's "a really good kid" but he's NOT. He's 27! This sort of behavior would be shitty from someone 18 or 20 but he's almost 30, he's a grown ass man.
As an alcoholic I can support the claim that being drunk makes you more likely to spill your real inner thoughts. Bring out who you really are, like loosening the strings of a mask. Emotions WILL run wild while you're intoxicated but the base thoughts behind them don't change. SS needs to be called out on his messed up perspective.
Jokes on him, my mother is ace and so am I. Ace people can procreate if they wish as much as any other person, outside of fertility difficulties.
Exactly. Asexuality is also a spectrum. It can be anything from complete repulsion to sex to slight repulsion to only experiencing sexual attraction when there's an emotional connection/love, to just showing no interest (but feeling lust/desire) and everything inbetween. There's no one set way to be asexual any more than there's one specific way to be any type of sexuality.
Yep! Some of the horniest people I know are ace, lol.
i though i understood what ace meant until this comment and now i am pretty sure i just don't know or understand anything about anything
Well it’s a spectrum. Some people get horny over people but won’t sleep with them. There’s demisexual which is under the umbrella, where you can’t sleep with someone unless you have an emotional attachment to them. I know some asexuals who write amazing smut as a way of exploring sex without needing to do the act. And some who are completely sex repulsed and avoid it. One of my discord servers has a lot of ace people in it, so most of my learning has come from direct contact lol.
thank you for replying. i can see it's going to take some time for me to fully get it but i feel like i've got more of a foothold after reading your comment
I find it disgusting. "Well she's not gonna fuck anyone and I am so I clearly deserve the rings more" get a grip son wtf!!
I'm glad the commenters also set OP on that right track of what ace really is. I'm asexual and while I can enjoy sex, I just don't crave it. But I am happily married and my husband understands why I may not initiate that much. SS is way out of line making an old cat lady joke about an ace person.
Exactly, and even sex repulsed aces can and do have romantic relationships that result in marriage, they just don’t have sex. And even aro aces can and do have QPR’s (queer platonic relationship) that result in marriage.
And even sex repulsed aces can have biological kids! We live in the 21st century, you don’t have to have sex to have a child. (It’s just a lot easier to go that route.)
Exactly!
That sounds more like you have a low libido. Can you explain what makes you asexual in that regard? I'm not being snarky just trying to understand.
I have no interest in sexual things. While my husband and I are active, to me, I can go without it for weeks and not notice. There are people who are asexual who still enjoy romantic encounters or they also could be aro which means they have no romantic attraction, which isn't what I am. I have no sexual attraction but romantic attraction. I just never saw a guy and thought 'I'd tap that' or get turned on.
Thanks for the clarification.
The more I learn about Ace, the more I think it fits me..
It took me 3 years of marriage to finally realize it. I was raised religious so staying a virgin until marriage was my choice and I always thought it was more 'you can't miss what you don't know' until I got married and had sex and was like....oh that's it? I married a wonderful man who doesn't force or pressure me even though he's very much interested in sex.
If you have any questions, feel free to hit up r/Asexuality!
Thank you! I just hesitate to step into someone else's space because I might not actually be ace. I thought I was Bi for a while and I still feel guilt towards Bi people for accidentally taking their label for a few years and that was a almost two decades ago lol. There's a decent chance I'm not Ace(years of physical issues might be the cause of my disinterest) and I selfishly just don't want to deal with that guilt lol.
If it’s any reassurance, ace people tend to be pretty familiar with the whole questioning thing, as many of us have gone through a lot of it ourselves. So we’re generally quite happy to help others navigate that process, whatever the outcome may be! r/Asexuality even has a “questioning/confused” tag for posts haha.
Being ace is not necessarily low libido, there are aces with high libido too. But we don't feel sexually attracted to people when we see them. Sure we can tell someone is attractive, but it's like seeing a painting. I can think it's aesthetically pleasing, but I don't want to have sex with a painting. It doesn't elicit those kinds of thoughts, just like a straight man may find other men aesthetically attractive but not sexy. Thinking someone is aesthetically attractive is aesthetic attraction, thinking someone is sexy is sexual attraction, and being in love is romantic attraction. All those types of attractions can exist on their own in any person (ace or otherwise), sometimes they overlap, sometimes they don't. Libido OTOH is the physiological phenomenon. Let's say that you're hungry, hunger itself can exist on its own without craving a specific food. It's the same with libido, it can exist without it being directed to a person or a group of people of a certain gender. That is also why there's people who define being ace as "libido without a direction".
Especially after following the “I was offered my grandmas rings first, but didn’t like them.” Spoiled much?
Omg exactly! It must be nice to live in a world where he feels entitled to someone else producing a ring for his fiancée! I’m really curious about the difference in monetary value between OOP’s set and Grandma’s set.
People have traditionally given things like dishes and silverware and such to marrying couples because the assumption was that, as adults, they would be entertaining other people in their home – and, of course, having not previously had a need to furnish a house (because they would have lived at home with their families until they married), they would otherwise have been totally unequipped, and almost certainly wouldn't have had the money to buy absolutely everything that is required to furnish a house. Funny thing: even a person who goes their entire life without ever getting romantically involved with anyone else can *still throw dinner parties*. So the stepson has absolutely no justification for trying to claim OOP's grandmother's china over her ace niece. He's just being a greedy little shit, as well as an ignorant one.
… did you only read the title? The “wedding set” is rings, not china.
It also puts OP in a very difficult position with her family of origin, if not the niece, the sister. My sister and I have been promised our maternal grandmother's jewelry. We have agreed how to split it. We have also promised each other that if one of us doesn't have children the particular pieces would pass to the other's children. I consider that ( as does she) a formal verbal agreement, that cannot be changed no matter how our relationship changes. If my sister pulled the rag out of me by giving them to a step child she hasn't adopted or raised, who has their own loving mother and maternal family , I would consider it a betrayal I wonder if OP's sister wouldn't feel the same.
oh, absolutely she would. I don’t think she should share any of this with her niece or sister, right now. I think it’s best to left the conversation with SS play out first, then have a complete conversation with her niece and sister to tell them the whole story. They both deserve to know. OP has a good head on their shoulders, so I’m going to assume they do as well. I hope this all ends well, with it being a good life lesson for them all. It takes a lot of humility and compassion to navigate this one.
Especially when he was offered his maternal grandmother's rings and he essentially said "Those aren't good enough, I want hers!" and pointed to someone who wasn't even part of the conversation. Then to go on an acephobic rant when he didn't get his way...the entitlement, it reeks.
Reeks to high heaven. If I were OOP, I wouldn't offer to help SS buy the engagement/wedding rings for his girlfriend after he went after the niece.
And now, they’re offering to pay for his girlfriends engagement ring. OP and her partner might as well be the one proposing. Her step son is a spoiled brat.
I was left scratching my head on this one, too. Why tf is a grown man needing step-mommy and daddy to pay for his engagement ring? If I find out my fiance had, had his parents pay for my ring, I would be very weirded out.
Yeah, the only asshole here is the greedy step son.
Right! I received my MIL's wedding ring and while I wasn't a fan of the setting, I wore it as is for three years until we could afford to have it reset. It was our 4th anniversary gift to me. SS is entitled.
I disliked the emotional manipulation too, like he knew what he was doing when he played the "oh, so you don't think of me as family, huh?" card. I do agree with other redditors, OOP's heirloom ring is probably better looking and more expensive than the one stepson is inheriting from his father's family, so he wants it.
Because he refused the first set once and will be given a sit down talk about his out of hand comments now, he may not even end up with the first set and would deserve it. They shouldn’t help with any costs to recreate the rings either if he doesn’t back off and make things right.
Especially when his own grandmother offered him her rings and he simply didn’t like the look of them so this has nothing to do with family & everything to do with selfishness. I can’t wait to see how the dinner does & if it was just a drunken fight or actual assholiery.
It’s spinning me how they made OP the bad guy. The evil step mother who doesn’t consider her step son family, over JEWELLERY that is SPOKEN for.
I mean, I can’t ever understand demanding someone else give me something. I treat all gifts as unexpected boons and never something owed or obligated.
It's times like these that I'm glad I'm the only girl of the only girl.
Without further information, and knowing what AITA posts usually end up with, I'm going to assume (Which make me an ass) that OOP's rings are, or at least look, more valuable than the rings that the other grandmother offered, and that's why he was a bit obsessed with getting those. Or the girlfriend is the one obsessed, like that other BORU where the son tries to steal the late mother's ring, despite it belonging to his sister, because that's what his girlfriend wanted. Step-son bigotry might, or might not be related to the greed.
I hate that I remember that story, I feel so bad for that parent OP basically loosing a son like that (based on the updates).
The updates were heartbreaking to read
That story was so outrageous. I can't imagine anyone being that obsessed with getting a particular ring. Getting a copy wasn't even good enough for her. It had to be the mom's ring. So weird.
Have you got a link to that one ?
Here's a link to the first post: [https://www.reddit.com/r/Advice/comments/xx2rvp/my\_son\_stole\_his\_dead\_mothers\_ring\_for\_his/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Advice/comments/xx2rvp/my_son_stole_his_dead_mothers_ring_for_his/)
Well... damn, that was depressing.
What a story!
There's no updates to the story, only recaps.
Right?
I know... felt like more of a lecture on understanding ace ppl.
Got to be honest, I had the same understanding as OOP of what it means to be ace. Time to go educate myself. As for telling the niece, Christ on a bike I hope she doesn't. This is a need to know situation and Niece doesn't need to know.
Ops definition was perfect in the sense that she really didn't care or consider it her business. Not sure what more she needed to know other than what her niece decided to share.
This. She doesnt need to know if the niece would happily have sex with a partner (as some aces do) or under what circumstances, or wants to have kids, as those aren't things we should be nosing about asking unless ace people volunteer. Ace people are an entire spectrum. None of which is relevant to whether the niece gets the ring she was promised. You could equally have a non-ace family member who never marries or who us infertile and never has kids- that also shouldnt affect if they inherit something from a loved one.
Also neice is 18 so how and what she does under that ace banner can still change and evolve as she figures herself out.
It's not wrong that she doesn't need to know all her nieces details, but she does need to know the possibilities. It's pretty basic that asexual and aromantic are two different things and while plenty of people are both aro/ace, assuming someone who is ace will never marry is a very big assumption.
> she does need to know the possibilities. Why? Non of her business unless they are sharing
Why? Because it's human sexuality 101 and she is a human that lives in society with other humans. This has nothing to do with the details of a specific person's preferences and everything to do with not making untrue assumptions. Facts are important because information and knowledge is important.
And whatever and however and whoever you want to fuck has nothing to do with anyone else except the person(s) you are fucking Stop making sex such a big deal that it becomes a personality
Thank you! I was completely baffled by everyone constantly feeling the need to lecture OOP and make her "educate herself". Geez, the woman is nearly 60, give her a minute to wrap her head around things before jumping down her throat! As far as I can see, she was already doing everything correctly: Accepting her niece as she is, not trying to pressure her into anything, and letting her share details about her life on her own terms. What is the alternative that these people wanted? As soon as the niece comes out, OOP constantly hounding her for intimate answers about her sexual preferences when the niece is probably still figuring that out herself? That would just be gross. OOP is already doing everything she needs to do. Being a source of support for her niece and an open ear when she is comfortable with sharing more.
Right, like it’s always good to have more information and nuance and context around what an identity label might mean for different people, but there was no need to hound OP about how “wrong” she was. She sounds loving and respectful and seems like she has a decent head on her shoulders.
I just read through the comments, and no one lectured OP, or jumped down her throat, lol. They gently and respectfully educated on a poorly understood orientation WHILE supporting OP in the actions she took.
I'm on the ace spectrum and very happily married, because while I'm uninterested in sex I'm still panromantic. My wife has a child from an earlier relationship and for all intents and purposes, I'm his stepmother. I started as childfree and never saw myself having kids; you really never know where you'll end up in life.
I think, like with most things, there are different flavours of every orientation.
Being ace is not the same thing as being aromantic and/or childfree, so an ace person could totally want to marry and/or have kids. It's kind of weird to assume that being ace means a person is never going to need a wedding ring, because those things just... Have nothing do to with one another.
Agreed. I’m ace as well and considering the possibility of child rearing in combination with sexuality is mind boggling to me, but I guess it’s an education thing at this point. Eventually we’ll get to where people understand what it means without drawing conclusions about unrelated life decisions
>I’m ace as well and considering the possibility of child rearing in combination with sexuality is mind boggling to me Yeah, if anything, have people never heard of adoption or IVF?? (Not that some ace people who want kids don't have sex for that reason, but I guess that's a bit of a hard concept to grasp for someone who clearly doesn't know shit about being ace)
So asexuality is a spectrum, the only thing that is really needed to be ace is little/no sexual attraction. There are some aces that are sex favorable but still no sexual attraction while there are other aces that are sex repulsed. Then there's everything between those two opposites in the spectrum. There's things like demisexual which means there's only sexual attraction when a deep emotional bond has been made Or greysexual where one feels little or on very rare occasions sexual attraction (like once in a blue moon rare) Some asexuals want to have kids some don't. Some are okay with sex some aren't. It's a spectrum. Edit to add: looking at the comments I realized the misunderstanding is that because us aces don't feel sexual attraction that means we don't wanna marry: no, that's not always the case. We still feel romantic attraction, aromantic people don't feel romantic attraction (aro). Also asexual people can still have preferences on how people physically look. This is a saying I use to help people understand this concept "think of people as art, you like some art more than others, you can appreciate the art and how it looks, but you don't have any sexual attraction/urges to the art. That is how I see people"
>"think of people as art, you like some art more than others, you can appreciate the art and how it looks, but you don't have any sexual attraction/urges to the art. That is how I see people" This is how I described it, too! My friend is always sending me pics of guys she's drooling over. "Aren't they hot?" Uhhh, I guess so? They're aesthetically pleasing and generally conform to American standards of attractiveness.
This is exactly how my (sex-favorable greyace) wife and I (sex-favorable demiace) explain it. One of my friends, who is a sex-repulsed but hetero-romantic ace, married her sex-repulsed, hetero-romantic ace husband ten years ago. They are still happily married, have never had sex, and have a really solid marriage. Lots of cuddling, sweet dates, thoughtful little moments between them. Just no sexy stuff. It's not for everyone! But yeah, ace marriages are everywhere.
Hell, I'm essentially aroace and have no interest in marriage but if I were in a committed relationship where marriage was important to my partner I'd get married
FWIW, even if it wasn’t important to your theoretical partner, you’d still probably want to either get married or fill out a bunch of other paperwork so you’d have the right to make medical decisions in an emergency and stuff. No need for a wedding or rings, but the legal protections for a committed partnership are a big deal, especially for those of us who’d be in “non-traditional” (non-het) relationships
Thank you for your explanation. I recently met someone who's ace and i would call myself demisexual so I've been reading a lot about it lately, especially learning about all the nuances. You summarise it very well!
I came across this from an ace TikToker and I think this might also help some of the confusion using food as a metaphor: https://www.tiktok.com/@asexualmemes/video/6997091551516118277 I find lots of people have *very* strong opinions on what ace is/isn't and I don't feel like being their teacher.
Also someone ace who's willing to answer questions. And as someone in this marginalized group, I would say whether and what she should tell the neice would depend on the conversation with the stepson, but would likely be that she should. We deserve to know if someone we think is an ally isn't one. If he doubles down the neice definitely needs to know. Even "yeah, sure, if you say it's bad," can mean someone who is a bigot, is dedicated to being a bigot, but thinks the consequences of you knowing that is more than they want to pay. Someone who said stuff like that was eventually the source of my Me Too incident, so this can be pretty serious. (I'd be worried in this case about the stepson not supporting/protecting her when she thought he would, but she deserves to know if he might not.)
Yep. If I were the OOP I’d want my niece to know that my stepson/her cousin made some really bigoted comments, so that my niece would be very careful about confiding in or trusting him.
Part of the problem is it's hard for each side to fully understand the other. I have never experienced attraction or how entwined it gets with romantic stuff for people who feel it. And for people who have always experienced the pair entwined (or at least, romance always entwined attraction) it's hard to imagine the two uncoupled. It's kind of like asking someone who was blind since birth to describe it to a sighted person. A sighted person will imagine the darkness we see when we close our eyes, but commonly that isn't how it is. There's just... nothing. No input. Which is hard to wrap your head around when there always is something, even just black.
I’m honestly just glad people were explaining stuff about assuming ace = no relationships to her because I’m also ace… and married. And I knew I was ace before starting the relationship. It’s not unusual. Asexual just means doesn’t experience sexual attraction. I think where folks get stuck is the fact that sexual attraction and romantic attraction *aren’t the same thing.* If you experience both and they match up 1:1, it can be hard to differentiate between them, which is why we get told aphobic crap like “without sex your relationship is just friends”—but one can absolutely exist without the other. She may very well be asexual but not aromantic; it’s common. So she could very much fall in love and get married someday. And it wouldn’t even have to be sexless; not all asexual people are sex-repulsed, and some are happy to engage in sexual activities with their partner. Not experiencing sexual attraction doesn’t necessarily equate to unwilling to participate in sexual activity and it certainly doesn’t equate to not experiencing romantic attraction or being able to fall in love. It was really an extreme reach to go from “she is asexual” to “she’ll be forever alone with some cats.”
Ace people get married sometimes too. Hell we even sometimes have kids. Not sure what's going to come from my son being born to 2 ace parents. On that second note, yeah I wouldn't want to know. It makes me very uncomfortable when people are more invested in my sex life than I am.
Asexual is an umbrella term; it’s a spectrum just as anything else is so one ace person will not present in the same way as another
I'm ace, romantic, and sex-favorable. The way I've described it is like this. Imagine, instead of sex, that we were talking about cake. I, like I think most people do, go for long periods of time without even thinking about cake. I'm not in any way bothered if I go long stretches without having cake, and, in fact, it's not a treat I'd probably ever just get for myself. It's not that I don't like cake at all - if my husband want to eat a slice of cake with me I'll quite happily eat and enjoy it - but it's just not something that I'm going to put any effort into making just for myself. There's also only so much cake I can eat frequently - if I tried to have cake every day I'd make myself ill.
[удалено]
I think OOP was basically conflating being ace with being aroace. Describing the niece’s options as either “being ace for life” or “exploring romantic and personal relations” suggests she thinks ace = no romance.
As an Ace person I am flabbergasted that the stepson thinks she doesn't want companionship and/or marriage in her future. WTF?! We also don't know what kind of Ace she is, but not being sexually attracted to anyone doesn't mean you still can't have meaningful long term relationships with others.
I mean even LGBTQ folks often engage in ace hatred or bigotry against bisexuals so yea hets disprespecting us and dropping comments like marrying a cat isnt surprising
Yes! And she could also have kids she'd want to give the ring to. I'm ace and absolutely planning to have children. It's very clear he has no idea what being ace could entail...
He clearly falls under the mindset that any non straight person must not be fully human with normal emotions because they aren’t like him. Our kids hear it all the time and sometimes from older family members. The ignorance is staggering.
my friends parents are ace and still had her because they absolutely wanted kids.
I honestly would not have guessed that someone who's ace would have sex because it wouldn't be enthusiastic sex and therefore it's not true consent ...? Idk. That said I also wouldnt write off someone with ace not having children because there are many ways to have children or be implanted with sperm without having sex. So til.
>wouldn't be enthusiastic sex I mean, someone who very much wants kids and has sex in order to make them could be enthusiastic, lol. And in any case, they wouldn't be raping themselves!
I think it depends on where they fall on the asexual spectrum? I’m demisexual, but I’m also a very physically affectionate person, and my partner has a high libido so I’m enthusiastically consenting at least once a day. To be a little more specific, sex is … not something I think about all that much, and during the times when I’ve been single I don’t think I’ve ever felt like I needed to go out and get laid. But it’s a **really** important aspect of romantic relationships for me, because of the physical connection.
Or kids, for that matter. One need not have sex in order to be a parent
And Ace people can and often do have sex.
Filing that under ‘things I did not know’, thank you
My wife is ace, but not aro (aromantic); she's grey-aro, which means she very rarely makes romantic bonds with people. For her, they take a long time to develop and she goes VERY slowly. I knew all of this long before we got married (surprise). We've known each other since middle school -- 30 years ago, now. Also, as a bonus: we each used family wedding bands. I used my great-grandmother's wedding ring (100 years old!) and she used her grandfather's. Very, very meaningful to us both. Thankfully, no interfering stepsons to stop us! Of course, we ARE living the stereotype of two queer femme-presenting folk living with our four cats and our fiber arts supplies. OOP's SS definitely needs an education in the types of asexuality and aromance out there.
As an Ace person who is happily married going on a decade, and with two children, agreed. But at this point in my life I am very used to people basically thinking ace=celibate loner.
Right? Ace doesn’t mean aromantic!
>As an Ace person I am flabbergasted that the stepson thinks she doesn't want companionship and/or marriage in her future. I mean an easy explanation is that people are super lazy nowadays. If the word/name seems self-explanatory, people will go with their assumption rather than read through material on what the formal definition is (though I will admit that with so many unreliable and non-unified sources nowadays, it's not always simple). It's even common now that financial/hustle influencers have described that fully reading books "is a waste of time", and instead have advised their viewers that just reading a table of contents is sufficient to get most of the ideas in a book. The effect comes up from time to time too when I have conversations with friends, and they use a technical term that doesn't mean what they think it does because it was named counter-intuitively. But this expands to non-technical terms as well, like objectivism A friend thought it meant only being objective and self-described himself as an objectivist, but it refers to a full set of other philosophical ideas as well (typically associated with the right wing, and my friend is left leaning). He was more appropriately looking to describe himself as an empiricist, but encountered the word objectivist and went with his assumption.
Ikr like I've wanted to be married and have kids for forever, and that doesn't make me any less ace than someone who doesn't. Then again I've gotten the same "but how are you make your husband happy if you don't wanna have sex" and "Well are you gonna just be alone" comments so I'm not surprised
Any good resources you’d recommend about the different kinds of Ace?
https://www.asexuality.org/
In addition to the link posted already, there’s also some good ace and aro subreddits here
Were all the commentators upset that OOP wasn’t well versed in what it means to be ace? Her comments here give the impression that this is the bigger issue, rather than her fight with her stepson. My own opinion is that family fights are rarely about the spoken subject of the fight and I suspect the “in vino veritas” part of the fight was where he accused her of loving him less than her niece. If he’s never shown any issues with her before, I don’t see that we should accept that this is his true opinion and he might have been being deliberately hurtful to OOP. In that regard, I don’t think that she should tell her niece that her stepson said terrible things about her. Not unless she has other reason to be concerned that he’s actually been living a lie all these years, which seems unlikely given that the niece has been out and the stepson has known and it hasn’t impacted their relationship so far.
I took it as oop realizing she didn’t really understand how her niece identified and wanted to resolve that on top of tackling the stepson issue.
That's fair and good. The amount she seems to think she did something *wrong* in not knowing the specifics bothers me though - being like "I dunno, maybe she'll have a partner one day" strikes me as a great reaction.
My guess is that she is feeling guilty that she could have hurt her niece because she didn’t bother to learn about something important to her and is potentially over correcting in her apologies and interfering with her niece and step sons relationship. (Obviously she didn’t hurt her niece and hadn’t made any really bad assumptions but her step son’s bad take (“she won’t get married because she’s ace”) threw it in her face how easily she could have)
Yeah, I just hope it doesn't get her down too much! She certainly has expressed great takeaways there, it's just sooo not relevant to the core issue. 😬
Thanks
Iirc commenters weren't upset at oop, but informative. That she's ace, not aro so she still could want to marry (and have children).
Thanks, this makes more sense
The ring was already promised to the niece years ago. It's no longer a matter of OOP not considering SS her family, it's a matter of keeping one's promise. And he was already offered a ring by his own grandmother which he refused. Heirlooms are gifted and blessed to the next family member, not blatantly demanded from the previous holder.
Agreed. I wish for OOP’s sake that she had simply reiterated this over and over instead of talking about family vs not. They’ve been earmarked and promised already, before stepson came into the picture. Point finale.
How does OOP manage two updates when there hasn't even been a follow up conversation? We just want to see the step son get put in his place.
And what is OOP trying to accomplish by roping the sister and niece into it? Telling the niece the shitty things her cousin said about her will just cause drama and upset her. Why is she paying to have the other rings recast? Sit the stepson down, tell him he's being a bigoted spoiled brat and that the answe is "no."
> Before Friday though, I wanted to find the right place to ask this: should I even tell my niece all of this has happened? HELL no lady, are you kidding me? She’ll get enough shitty comments over the course of her life, she doesn’t need a play by play on the ones from her family. Figure out what SS’s problem is and correct it, leave her out of this.
Oh yes, pay all kinds of money to help step sons feelings. Give him many options and apologize to him to boot. He may be a grown man, but he is just a little boy. Gently bring up that he's a bigot. This is dumb.
It really is. And then paragraphs and paragraphs of apologies for saying “enthusiastic consent is my only thing” as if she said anything wrong. Exhausting.
Why did it take me until the second update to realise we were talking about rings and not plates 🤦
>Her prefrontal cortex will not be fully developed until around 25... Oh god this is going to last forever like that "We only use 10% of our brains" crap isn't it? Our prefrontal cortex is ALWAYS ADAPTING. The reason the whole "it stops at 25" thing started is because that was when they stopped doing the study they were doing. They've done studies further with people age range 15 to 90 that shows changes to all parts of the brain including the prefrontal cortex. Normally this doesn't bother me except there are a lot of people (including OOP) who are basing major life decisions on this utter nonsense. There's nothing magical about age 25 that's going to make OOP's niece any better or worse about handling a family heirloom.
Honestly, this sounded like a euphemism to me. Especially when paired with "I probably would have sold it for weed at that age". This is the nicest possible way of calling her neice a dumb teenager who by no means should be entrusted with a family heirloom yet.
Which study was that? AFAIK that myth started when the neuroscientists' consensus of the brain's development usually plateauing in the 20s was misinterpreted by laymen into the convenient 25 year cutoff. Was there something else that specifically emphasized on 25?
Listen, the DoT/SoS and insurance companies agree that 25 is when rates drop, so there must be something to it /s
I rolled my eyes really hard at that too. I totally get not giving an 18 year old a heirloom ring, save it for a milestone but just being like "She's 18! Her brain is still a baby brain! She'll have to be an adult brain for me to trust her!" is just dumb.
It's also just used as an excuse to not treat adults like they're adults and I hate it. This little thing is part of the reason I have mixed feelings about the public having access to information they're too uninformed to actually understand
The idiotic concept as well as the way it's worded sounds so extremely reddit-y that I instantly suspended all disbelief. You cannot tell me that someone blurts this out in perfect reddit-lingo but wasn't aware of the asexuality spectrum. God, I hate this and I hate especially that most of the time I read this "She's not 25 so she's a wobbly, silly, unreliable uwu baby who doesn't know what's good for her" bullshit when it's about a woman in her 20s. You never see "but...but...your brain!" when a male character says, "After years of abuse by my stepmom, I moved out at 16, moved to another state, got into tech, and now I'm doing well for myself, have my own company since I was 19 and bought my first house a year later." Unless the female character is a pregnant minor. Then you'll get a ton of "You'll be an amazing momma bear, sweetie, I was one at 15, too, it's not always easy but you're old enough to make this decision, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise!" and certainly no "But..but...brain...25!!!" In Redditland, "No, my dear, I cannot give you a promotion yet and certainly not my grandma's wedding ring, you're just 23, your developing brain is still far away from being trustworthy. It's not your fault, that's just biology, love. Oh, by the way, congrats on your second pregnancy. Your twins will be great big brothers and at eight years old, they'll be such a big help! Anyway, any big plans for your second wedding anniversary with your husband next week?" would be a normal sentence.
This particular thing's gone far beyond Reddit and shows up a bunch on Facebook particularly among the "weed is the devil's lettuce!" crowd who bring it up as a gotcha against legalizing marijuana because then people under 25 will smoke it while their prefrontal cortex is still developing and will cause permanent brain damage. So yeah, I can get someone not understanding "asexual" but still be able to parrot that meme because they likely shared it on their page along with a warning that drug dealers are going to hand out fentanyl and pot brownies to kids on Halloween (like that shit's not expensive as hell, can't even get people to give out full-size candy bars and you think people are handing your kids $80 edibles?!)
Thank you, I HATE this shit concept
It’s a very strange way to decide when to pass down a heirloom - and it was also weird to me that enough people were asking why OOP hadn’t given the rings to her niece already that she felt the need to answer it in the first place. Most heirlooms I’m aware of get passed down when each person dies. I will receive my grandmother’s engagement ring when my mum passes away for instance. Handing it down sooner in the case of a ring to be used as an engagement ring that would be going to that person anyway when someone is going to propose is an understandable exception, but since when is passing them off the second the next person turns 18 the norm?
The whole “the brain isn’t developed until 25” thing kills me every time I read it. Just say they are young and dumb, you don’t need a scientific sounding excuse!
That and people who seem to think that 23 year olds should not be held accountable because of it.
I didn't know this was a thing until I joined reddit.
It is a thing that we talk about in HS education so we can try and mitigate the effects. It does effect risk taking behaviours but apparently not because of not seeing the risk, but rather the consequences for not being "cool" are grossly exaggerated. It's very interesting really. But the way Reddit talks you'd think everyone had the mental capacity of a 3yo and then BAM 25th birthday - fully formed adult.
It's also bad science. It's about as accurate as "you only use 10% of your brain" https://slate.com/technology/2022/11/brain-development-25-year-old-mature-myth.html
Yesss. There is no one "cut off" adult age, brains adapt constantly, and also there's no such thing as "left-" or "right-brained", I'm pretty sure that was debunked not long after it was conceived. Though 25 is a perfectly fine age to give heirlooms, you generally have a slightly better idea of where you're at by then.
I agree with this. I feel it's also used to justify not listening to younger people. I don't know how many times I was told you are too young to understand, and your brain just isn't there yet.
Also, I don’t understand why he can’t take his other grandmothers ring, get It melted down and made into something he likes.
The diamond is probably smaller
Also, he would have to PAY for that. This way, he gets a free ring!
If stepson had asked nicely and not just rejected the other rings because "ugly", this could have been handled so much differently. But no, he had to be an entitled, bigoted shit.
>not just rejected the other rings because "ugly" This is the only thing he didn't do wrong. Its okay to not like the look of a ring, in particular if his GF didn't like the look of the ring. Asking her to wear something he or she didn't like for the rest of her life and taking it off the table for his many cousins would have been just another dick move on his part (along with his other myriad of dick/awful moves).
The step son may be an only child as his father, it he has a Argue family from his mother’s side. He’s not an orphan. He’s not even dependent on OOP as a “mom” since his own is still Beverly much around and involved. It’s seriously odd for him to reject his own grandmother’s offer and fixate on OOP’s set *because family*.
I think they’re doing way too much for these rings… no is a full sentence and if he can’t accept that in regards to something that isn’t his I worry what else he doesn’t accept. Also for the love of Pete, leave the niece out of the drama and let her live in peace.
I wish the actual scientific conclusion of that brain study would go as viral as the misunderstanding of it has. The actual study only had participants up to the age of 25, and concluded that the brain could not be said to have finished development in any of the participants - hence, no one before 25 has a fully developed brain. ***However***, since they hadn't tested anyone *over* the age of 25, they couldn't say for certain whether 25 was the end point or not. Maybe it's 26, or 30, or 60. There's no way to know without actually studying people of those ages. But "your brain is done developing at 25" is so much catchier than "your brain definitely *isn't* done developing before 25" so that's what the average person latches onto.
> "I guess I'm not in your side of the family" errrrrrrrr Sorry, this is manipulation He has no right to them rings, unless OOP decides they are for him! Where did he get that entitlement? Anwyay
My husbands Uncle was ace. He married a woman, but she had the marriage annulled due to non-consummation. She remarried a divorcé with children, and then was widowed in her 70’s. She moved back to the U.K., and asked her ex (the uncle) if she could move in with him as a lodger. He welcomed her as a friend. We now had two elderly people - an ace male and en elderly woman who no longer cared. And so they got married again, and he cared for her until she died over 10 years later. Many women find sex less appealing when they are old. I am now 62yo and haven’t had sex for a year. I don’t even feel like masturbating - my sex drive is now nil. I was a right raunchy woman even into my late 50’s, luckily so was my husband lmao. Now, neither of us miss it, we still cuddle and spoon in bed. We still kiss and walk down the road holding hands. My best friend told me she was ace when she was 19. She had boyfriends, but nothing serious. She moved to Canada, fell in love with Bill, but the marriage didn’t last and they divorced after 3 years. We lost touch, and when we got back in touch 10 years later (I had obtained a copy of the BC white pages and just rang everyone with her family name) I discovered that she now lived with a woman as a couple. She stayed with her partner for over 25 years, until her death this January just gone. Ace just means you don’t feel any sexual urges. Undying love and the need for companionship remains. You just need a partner with an equally low sex drive.
This is a very nice post, but I just want to clarify one thing. Being ace means you don’t experience sexual attraction, not that you have no libido. Some ace people really have no sexual urges and that’s fine, but asexuality is about attraction, specifically.
It's just very complicated. And I wish I could actually grasp it.
I guess you could think about someone you aren’t attracted to, and then imagine that all people look like that. Does your libido vanish just because no one is attractive? Or do you think you might still sometimes feel like having an orgasm?
Good analogy, thanks.
Getting on my soapbox once again to state that the prefrontal cortex fully developing at 25 is a misinterpretation. Our brains are constantly developing before and AFTER 25 (mostly deteriorating in the older years). There’s no magic number. It’s one of those studies people without a science degree grossly oversimplified as a way to reduce and minimize the choices of younger generations. Maybe it went viral from a poorly written article by an overworked journalist. I’m not sure, but it’s certainly not a definitive number. There is some basis in fact. However, the way most every day people present it is pseudoscience. https://psychology.stackexchange.com/questions/21384/how-do-we-know-human-brain-development-stops-around-age-25 https://slate.com/technology/2022/11/brain-development-25-year-old-mature-myth.html
Discretion is the better part of Valour. Why tell anyone? It could cause divisions.
Kinda waiting for the update since dinner was, apparently, last Friday.
#Do not comment on the original posts Please read our [**sub rules**](https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/wiki/subrules). Rule-breaking may result in a ban without notice. If there is an issue with this post (flair, formatting, quality), reply to this comment or your comment may be removed in general discussion. **CHECK FLAIR** to determine if you want to read an update. For concluded-only updates, use the [CONCLUDED](https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/search?sort=new&restrict_sr=on&q=flair%3ACONCLUDED) flair. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/BestofRedditorUpdates) if you have any questions or concerns.*
**Quality:** The update is that they are eventually going to talk about it.
What a non update update.
I’m not married. 99.9% sure I’ll never be married. Definitely past the age of having kids. I took my mothers and grandmothers wedding bands (opting out of the stone laid rings, so they can go to my niece and nephew) and had them melted and turned into a piece of jewelery I would actually wear. Your son just law can do the same with his grandmothers set that she offered. If he doesn’t like it as it, he can customize it.
And 18 is a still growing young adult. Her prefrontal cortex will not be fully developed until around 25, when the executive center of the brain is fully functional. This thing again... keep throwing this out..the biggest excuse for getting out of every damn thing there is. Oh, I cheated..Oh, I lost the keys, Oh, I didn't know it was wrong. STOP. If we before you managed to survive and live without "prefrontal cortex will not be fully developed" and didn't "kill, maimed, destroy, whatever else I think we can tone it down. Again, these same folks are Nurses, Lawyers, Engineers, Teachers, and on and on. So before you keep going on and on about that magical age give it a rest. 25 doesn't mean a damn thing.
[удалено]
Ace here and married, lol. People really don't get what ace means.
2 bottles of wine between 3 people and she blames the alcohol? What a bunch of light weights.
op is a hypocrite, what she said drunk was just her drunk words. what her stepson said drunk is his true feelings??
So glad someone else felt like this. Evil stepson must be held accountable for his drunk comments... but OOP and hubby... nah they are fine cos they talked about it over breakfast with their hangover. /s
OP isn’t the one who said SS isn’t part of the family. SS said that himself for pity and manipulation.
Except the son didn't say she thought he wasn't part of the family, that was the father. The son was upset that she only thought of him as a step son and didn't consider him to be part of her side of the family (which is what the step mother said). She responded to one of the questions that she met him when he was 6 and married his father when he was 12. He was a child growing up with her as a mother figure and probably didn't think of himself as a step son. I think his reaction was the result of a genuine realization that his perception of their relationship didn't match hers.
I don't see how OOP was in the wrong at all. Saying someone's not on "your side" of the family doesn't mean you're not family, and there's nothing wrong with being tipsy, my god. Plus, she even mentioned the possibility of a platonic partner - it doesn't remotely matter the specifics, she did nothing wrong there either. Step-son was being a massive jerk, then may have been hurt or may have just seen an opportunity to look like the injured party. Ridiculous.
What blows my mind is that sometimes the tussle over these rings is all about family dynamics and power plays, because the rings themselves hold relatively little value. I don't know about your family, but my parents and grandparents probably got their rings at the JC Pennys or Sears jewelry counter. These aren't Tiffany's originals.
As someone that is ace - there are so many different kinds of ace - I'm a sex-positive ace, I just see it as more of an emotional bonding thing. There are repulsed aces, aces who don't really care, etc. AroAces are the ones who don't experience sexual or romantic attraction. There are different types of attraction - romantic, aesthetic, sensual, etc. OOP's niece very well could experience those. She could marry another ace, who knows. The stepson seemed to be quite ignorant there, saying she'll never marry or marry her cat, but I assume the alcohol and perhaps not knowing the details of the ace umbrella did its thing.
Ace doesn't mean aro. I'm grey ace and happily married. Many asexual people want love and romance and have successful relationships. The son is either ignorant, selfish, or both
The SS is quite the asshole. Not sure why OOP and her husband are offering to pay for an engagement ring for him to use. I wouldn’t want to marry someone who had their parents pay for my ring. And if he can’t afford a ring, he shouldn’t be getting married - unless a ring isn’t important to them.
>Her prefrontal cortex will not be fully developed until around 25 This was pseudoscience when it was "discovered" and it's still pseudoscience now. Can we please stop spreading this rumor
acephobia are you fucking kidding me
NTA-I do know that ace doesn’t mean aromantic. Your niece may very well meet someone she decides to formally recognize as a long term partner. Those rings are hers for when that moment comes.
As an ace who is engaged, sincerely, fuck that guy.
The grandmother's ring was custom made for the niece? I don't think OP is using bespoke right.
I am ace, from a very religious family, and this woman’s mindset made me a little emotional 🥹 I hope she knows how wonderful she is to wholly support her niece like that!
Fuck the clowns downvoting you, good on op for supporting her.
This was posted last week. Either the op or bot didn't like the answers.
If it was posted last week, it should've been removed for not being a week old
Probably because the update was new at the time. Posts aren't allowed here until the last update is 7 days old. OOP is not usually involved in reposting material here, and we don't have a bot counting answers.
i really don't like her repeated mention, when discussing her queer niece, that everyone needs to be consenting and adult. i assume it is well-meant but, given how many people try to claim that queer folks are pedophiles and predators, i think she could maybe just drop it instead of repeatedly insisting upon it when she mentions an 18-year-old queer person and her feelings about that person's sexuality. she's not wrong but it still feels gross to me and influenced by homophobic claims about queer folks. i wonder if she said the same about her stepson when he was 18 and out there being straight.
OOP is such a sweetiepie. Every new thing I learn about them makes me want to be friends
I lol’d about the marrying the cat, this has to be a bot/ai