Lilly14

I've known equally as many judgemental men and women in my life. I had girls bully me and they do it discreetly and do it because they were insecure about some trait I had that was better than theirs, but when boys have done it they did it for no personal reason and don't care about being discreet, which to me is worse. "I'm not sitting next to hairy" as he scrambles quickly away. Tells all his friends "look she has a monobrow" Him to his friends: "don't talk to her!" and also "look at fatty" while making disgusted face.

When I was a teen several years ago, my mom didn't let me even pluck my monobrow either, despite the fact that we lived in the west and a monobrow is grounds for bullying especially, in my teenage years where all girls had almost razor thin eyebrows. When I was 18/19 I ended up triming the center of my eyebrow to make it seem less noticeable, which mitigated her her problem with me plucking my monobrow. I'm actually glad she didn't push me to pluck my eyebrows when I went to college like some aunties have insisted I do, because those who overpluck their eyebrows have trouble growing them back if they can grow them back at all. And thicker eyebrows make women look more youthful. And besides the monobrow problem, I truly believe a woman's natural eyebrow shape matches her face the best.

Agree 100%

Lots of girls have low self esteem because of western society's beauty standards or because of childhood abuse/neglect so they'll easily accept a sub-par guy because they don't believe they deserve better, or they're naive and believe their spouse will change one day, or the people around her encourage her to put up with the bare minimum effort her spouse puts into their marriage or encourage her to put up with the abuse/cheating because in certain cultures women are expected to tolerate more bad behavior from their spouse, compared to men. Plus bad boys and/or covert narcissists are good at manipulating/finding naive or low self esteem girls who they know will tolerate their bad behavior long term.

In my own life I agree with all of these pointing since I'm seeking a spouse too. I grew up with very low income dad and inshaallah I don't want to subject myself to the horror my mom faced trying to care for a family with so little and very little modern appliances like dishwasher and washer and dryers for years while other families had them, that accumulated to her poor health, and I don't want to deprive my kids completely of a strong educational foundation that you can't build for your child without money for a good private school or top notch tutors, unless you have the ability and time to always tutor your child yourself on advanced topics. And a strong educational foundation is required in such an increasingly cut throat competitive day and age, and being deprived of it, I am still immensely struggling as a result. But alhamdollilah I have health and Inshaallah me and everyone's problems and health get better bekhayr.

Planning/promising going to college is not always enough. Anyone can say they are planning to do something to get their someone to accept them, but not everyone will follow through with their promise... And a broken promise can lead to resentment.

Louder for the people in the back!

You misunderstood. I'm saying single and married men talk about their problems less to other men or their families, in comparison to how much single or married women talk to their families or other women about their problems.

Growing up in the west as a Muslim girl, we get socialized to desire romantic relationships by our society, meanwhile in our family and religion we can’t seek romance until we are married. So, for many such girls, the strong desire for marriage and romance is there from when are preteens, teens etc, but obviously we are not getting married at 12 or 14, so we resort to things like books or manga etc for preteens/teens that include romance as a genre. So some of us girls do want romance, but we have learned to deal with it.

I'm talking about men and women in general, not limited to married ones.

I think maybe it has to do with communication at least partly. Unfortunately, men are less likely to speak to others even privately about their problems. So I guess an anonymous place like shiachat has that appeal of venting/asking for advice with less judgement. I wonder if the long term bottling up of problems instead of expressing them is the reason why some men have underdeveloped emotional intelligence, which is important to have when married.

Strongly disagree with your opinion. I truly hope your words don’t break this already suffering OP's heart. And I'm in two domestic violence support groups, I know very well what the term gaslighting means, or else I wouldn't use it.

Mental illness doesn't need to be crippling. Many seemingly normal people can have narcissism as a trait, which can be a symptom of certain personality disorders, and are mental illnesses that can cause horrible outcomes in families, and I wouldn't be surprised if OP's husband has that trait considering how he doesn't care how his actions affect his daughter (separating the daughter from himself and his wife to a distant country, having no problem with his child seeing women's nudes, wanting to raise their baby with another woman, inappropriately chatting with many women without being married to them knowing he has no right to and it hurts his wife). And yes he is responsible for going to therapy consistently and fixing himself, but many people like this don't think they have a problem at all. She has mental illness? That accusation sounds like gaslighting. The long message and nature is not surprising to me, considering how many Muslim women are encouraged by their community and families to support their husband no matter how abusive the man is, for years upon years. A few of my female relatives being the closest examples to me.

I'm not a mom or a lawyer. But judging by his behavior, I wouldn't be surprised if you have another baby he'll try to take it away from you and give your baby to his sister to raise since legally in many western countries usually they give joint custody to both parents, and he knows he can't always keep the baby away from you. He can easily take your child home for on a weekend he has custody, and fly your child to his sister. If you divorce you're going to have to make a case against him having ANY custody of his child because he's mentally ill and he already took your first child away to a foreign country against your will. You'll need as much evidence of both of those things as possible. You're going to have to talk to some experienced lawyers. Inshaallah best of luck to you.

1.) OP said the father has left their child with his sister in another country and is not raising her himself 2.) the comment below yours stating a Marja's ruling proves that the situation is not as clear cut as what you say 3.) if the father is mentally ill that might have an effect on the ruling of this matter. Add into consideration how he is fine with exposing his child to nude pictures of women to his child. 4.) How can you easily tell a mother to give up on her child who is said to be suffering from being away from her parents?

Alhamdollilah you have no kids or are pregnant. Of I'm understanding correctly, you already know you're married to a liar that doesn't respect you, and trampled your rights because he broke the condition of your Nikah with him. Go to a trusted local Imam and explain your entire situation, show all the proof, and how you are thinking about divorce. I'm almost certain the Imam will agree that you are in the right, if I'm understanding your situation correctly. Make sure you have multiple copies in different places of any proof that can be used against him, just in case say your phone breaks or gets stolen.

I wish we were all picky about improving our own iman as we are picky about other's iman at the very least.

I'm in many Muslima only groups on social media and I have never seen pictures like that. But it might be trend in some places like muzmatch if you see it a lot. If it bothers you that much, why not try to find a wife in real life from your mosque or nearby cities?

I'm not a scholar, and I'm only a few years older than you so please take my opinion, stress on the word opinion, with an open mind, and not as set in stone. I mean no disrespect since no human is perfect, but perhaps that girl was a physical manifestation of your sins or a particular sin. If it truly was the Imam AS (since no one can 100% confirm or deny it was him since it's a dream) perhaps this was the Imam's way telling you to undo a wrong thing you did to someone and/or ask Allah swa for repentance for a certain sin or sins you do or did, and never do it again, in order for you to inshaallah be forgiven by Allah swa. With dream interpretation, I personally think the best dream interpreter for one's dream is oneself, so dwell on this dream for a while and try to figure it out. Others can only guess for you. Dream meanings are often not literal, instead they're metaphors. But perhaps talking to a sheikh might provide more insight if you can't find the metaphors. Take care sister! Again it's only my opinion!

No worries, I have no money to give her, and wouldn't even if I did. There is a nearby Sunni Mosque, but I'm weary because even Muslim men might want to take advantage of her bad situation.

She said she lives in Nigeria, where there a Muslims but the region (Igbo) she lives in is dangerous for them. Her current city says Calabar, though I'm not sure how current that is. There is a facebook group for Shia Nigerians that I just found but I'm not sure how helpful they would be to her since most of the active members seem to be men and women in bad situations are prime targets if a man is predatory.

Thanks! No worries I'm not working right now and I have college debt so I don't have any money to give, even if I wanted to!

Hello! ***I'm not looking for member advice***, I am hoping someone will message me an email of a wise sheikh for this situation, you'll see why I'm asking for it below. Jazakallah khayr... A sister in a Muslim women's group on social media was asking about Islam so I said of she needed help she could message me, but I feel like I'm way in over my head with her situation!!! I can't relate to any of her problems and I'm not an Islamic scholar, so I don't know how to advise her properly. She just had a child out of wedlock with a man who provides for her and her baby. Her family disowned her because of that. Her boyfriend hates Muslims. And she lives in a region in Africa that is extremely dangerous to be Muslim. She was ready to take her Shahada and face the consequences of the public finding out and her boyfriend stopping providing for her and the baby... Which makes me think she's not in a good state of mind right now. I told her she needs to live and take care of her baby because a child's life is so hard growing up without a mother! I told her perhaps she could hide the fact that she is Muslim from her boyfriend since she says he would stop supporting her and the baby if he knew... Plus he could expose that she is Muslim to the public. He expects her to take care of the baby so she can't just put the baby with someone and find a job and leave him, at least while the child isn't at school age. Ya Allah swa this situation is so dangerous and messy... Please keep her in your duas!

Men should also be modest in behavior by lowering their gaze. Also, Shia women are not required to travel with a male Mahram.

Financial abuse is a nasty thing. You can't always know someone's intentions before marriage though. They might appear like good people, but that can change after marriage, regardless if the couple is from the same financial background or not. Discussing finances on prenuptial agreements and on the marriage contract are a must these days.