{"id":132019,"date":"2025-08-09T15:22:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-09T15:22:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/132019\/"},"modified":"2025-08-09T15:22:10","modified_gmt":"2025-08-09T15:22:10","slug":"i-found-my-dads-reddit-account-i-wish-id-never-read-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/132019\/","title":{"rendered":"I found my dad’s Reddit account. I wish I’d never read it."},"content":{"rendered":"

Care and Feeding is Slate\u2019s parenting advice column.\u00a0Have a question for Care and Feeding?\u00a0<\/strong>Submit it here<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dear Care and Feeding,<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019m a 15-year-old girl, the older of two siblings. I was using the family computer and wanted to check my Reddit, and that\u2019s when I found out that Dad has a Reddit account too. I didn\u2019t snoop then, but I did write down his account name and then checked it out on my phone later.
I shouldn\u2019t have done that. I should have realized it was private because he had never mentioned it.<\/p>\n

A lot of his posts were heavy. They consisted of complaints about his life, how he resents his family, and then feels guilty about feeling so resentful. How he can\u2019t stand Mom anymore but thinks it\u2019s important to put up a good front for us kids, and how he wishes just once his kids would come to him with something other than a problem we expected him to solve. He said some nasty things specifically about me, too, about some personal incidents I don\u2019t want to share here, but that I had shrugged off as just normal interactions\u2014I hadn\u2019t realized how much I had hurt his feelings.<\/p>\n

I feel like I\u2019d know the answer to the question of what to do about this (NOTHING) if that was all there was to it. It wasn\u2019t meant for my eyes, I know. But the thing is, there\u2019s also this undercurrent about how terrible he feels for having these thoughts and feelings and how he needs to \u201cstay strong\u201d for his family. It makes me really uneasy and worried about him. I had no idea he was going through any of this. I feel like I pried open his diary! I don\u2019t know what to do now. Should I just pretend I saw nothing? Or should I tell him?<\/p>\n

\u2014Really Stepped Into It<\/p>\n

Dear Stepped,<\/strong><\/p>\n

Is there an adult you feel close to, who knows and loves your father\u2014but who is not your mother\u2014with whom you could talk this over? It\u2019s really beyond the scope of what a 15-year-old should be doing for a parent for you to take responsibility for your father\u2019s mental health\u2014and to carry the burden of guilt you now feel for having \u201csnooped.\u201d Of course, if your dad put all of this on Reddit\u2014and your whole family shares one computer\u2014he had to know, at some level, that someone (if not everyone) in the family would read it. At the very least, he was making his confessions in a public space: Reddit is not a diary, as much as it may sometimes feel like one.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\n Jen\u00e9e Desmond-Harris and Logan Sachon
\n Help! I\u2019ve Cheated on My Wife for Over Two Decades. But a Nasty Surprise Just Changed Everything.
\n Read More<\/b>\n <\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. \n <\/p>\n

    My Son Came Home With a \u201cFunny Story\u201d From His Teacher. I\u2019m Not Laughing.
    \n <\/a>\n <\/li>\n

  2. \n <\/p>\n

    I Let My Daughter Move in So She Could \u201cGet Back on Her Feet.\u201d But I Didn\u2019t Sign Up for This.
    \n <\/a>\n <\/li>\n

  3. \n <\/p>\n

    Grandma Was on Camp Pick-Up Duty. I Don\u2019t Know How to Fix What Happened Between Her and My Son.
    \n <\/a>\n <\/li>\n

  4. \n <\/p>\n

    I Did a Crossword Puzzle at Work. My Colleague\u2019s Reaction Has Floored Me.
    \n <\/a>\n <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    I don\u2019t know why people reveal their most private thoughts to strangers on the internet (this may be a generational blind spot of mine; I am acquainted with a number of 40-somethings who seem to share everything, no matter how private, on Facebook), but I do know that writing about (what sounds like) one\u2019s depression on a shared computer is a not-so-subtle cry for help from those who have access to it. You are not the right person to help him, but his best friend or a sibling of his might be. (And for all you know, he is just using Reddit to blow off steam. Some of those 40-somethings I mentioned definitely use Facebook that way. I read their posts and become alarmed\u2014then learn that they\u2019re just fine, really; they were just having \u201ca dramatic moment.\u201d Again, I\u2019ll acknowledge that this mystifies me. But it is apparently a thing.)<\/p>\n

    In the meantime, can you make every effort to be kind to your dad? You might even approach him with something other than a problem for him to solve. It won\u2019t fix him\u2014as I say, it\u2019s not for you to fix him\u2014but it certainly couldn\u2019t hurt.<\/p>\n

    \u2014Michelle<\/p>\n

    More Advice From Slate<\/p>\n

    Up until two weeks ago, my husband \u201cJeff\u201d (39) was a model family man and father to \u201cJenny\u201d (8) and \u201cKyle\u201d (6). About the only problem in our marriage was his insomnia, and while it was difficult to deal with him getting up 5-6 times a night, every night, it was hardly his fault. Still, after over a decade of trying to treat the insomnia with nothing working except for drugs that had side effects worse than the insomnia itself, we eventually decided on adding a bedroom annex to the home office, and Jeff sleeping there instead of with me. Ever since then, he\u2019s been half-assing as a father.<\/a><\/p>\n

    The latest sex, parenting, and money advice from our columnists delivered to your inbox three times a week.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Care and Feeding is Slate\u2019s parenting advice column.\u00a0Have a question for Care and Feeding?\u00a0Submit it here. Dear Care…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":132020,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[600,246,210,251,4757,67860,5597,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-132019","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-advice","9":"tag-family","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-kids","12":"tag-parenting","13":"tag-single-q","14":"tag-slate-plus","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114999495586735618","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132019","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=132019"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132019\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/132020"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=132019"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=132019"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=132019"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}