A bit off topic and long winded - but relevant lol
My niece is 18 and lives in Queensland (I live in New South Wales - so, two separate states) and I don't get to see her as often as I'd like to but we speak on Snapchat everyday.
I noticed she was hanging around this boy (my niece came out as gay earlier in the year and now feels she is more bi than gay - all of which is no issue whatsoever, I'd love her just the same even if she were a Zebra!) anyway - I asked her about him and she said they were just friends and that he likes her more but she isn't sure. I advised her to just be careful and make sure her boundaries are known etc. because I do see that she is often out late at night with him.
I always send her ugly selfies laying in bed or at work with multiple chins, zoomed in on my face etc. because we are really close and she's like my best friend - we have that kind of bond.
Anyway, one day I was snapchatting her as usual and sending her the uglies and HE RESPONDED with a selfie of himself in her bed with her phone- which to me, was inappropriate and weird, like bro - I don't know you and you are not a part of this conversation- I don't know if she even knew he did it - but I brushed it aside.
Last week she came down to Sydney to stay with me and I asked her a bit more about him and you could see she was a bit uncomfortable and some of the stuff she told me raised massive red flags
Before she was due to leave he bought her flowers because she was having a bad day - but made her come to his house to get them because he "was doing dinner prep" even though she was trying to pack for her flight
Something happened with her work whilst she was here and she was stressing out about it - so he sent her a collage of photos of the two of them in AND I QUOTE "happier times" to cheer her up - THEY ARE NOT EVEN A COUPLE. This dude is 4 years older than her (22 years old vs 18!)
Whilst she was here, he was constantly blowing up her phone, anything I posted on FB with her or she posted on FB with me and my Mum (her Grandma) he was commenting on …. seem familiar?
I ended up calling my sister about it when I knew my niece wasn't at home and telling her about my worries and I went on a bit of a tangent about The Montagews and love bombing - which was something she'd never heard of (lovebombing) I went a bit mad with my arms waving around whilst explaining it, but hopefully she gets the drift and my niece kicks this scrub to the curb! I would hate for her to end up like Shrek & Carrie - whilst my niece is smart, I know she also likes the attention (seem familiar again?) which is also why she didn't listen to me when I was pointing out that these things are not normal
I have paraphrased a lot in here as to not go off on a tangent again (I really did try not to be long winded lol) I was also speaking to a friend of mine (who is a neutral third party and who has been in the same type of relationship as Shrek & Carrie and thankfully got out of!) and she agrees that my feelings are spot on and that it is going the way we think it will - let's just hope it doesn't!
Sorry for the rant - and thank you for reading (if you did haha)
Carrie Hope Fletcher #45 Carrie left Joel on read, so he dressed up in red (flags)
I tried.