HeritageDad

Huh? Of course it is password protected, and all my stories are also on an external harddrive. But an IT person can easily surpass password protection to get in to fix the computer.

I am a writer, meaning all my devices are filled with unpublished/not-yet-copyrighted stories that I do not want seen by people outside my family. One family member of mine has had a tragic experiences with their creations being stolen by quite notable people, and so, I am paranoid about people having access to my work before it's copyrighted and published. With that, I don't like taking my computer to repair shops for this exact reason, and if I have to, I move my stories from my laptop to some other device, and load them back after it's been fixed. Recently, my 16-year-old daughter needed to borrow one of my smaller laptops for school. It's an older laptop, but it was working fine until she had it, and somehow, it died on her, with all my stories on there, too. I learned all this later, because my wife and my daughter decided to not tell me about the damage (they later said they were afraid I'd get "mad") and secretly brought it to a computer repair shop and had it fixed. But my wife felt bad about the sneaking and hiding, so when my daughter brought my laptop back to me, they told me what happened and what they did. And I admit: I got very, very upset. In my anger, I called my daughter a ***. My wife rightfully flipped out at me. I later apologized. But I am still reeling at what they did––all the sneaking and lying––and how my stories were exposed. I regret calling my daughter what I did, but after our blowup, I've been the only who's apologized and no one has taken accountability for what they did to me....as if I have no right to be upset.

They said our brand is all over the place. (We have many different ideas, so we split our t-shirts into various categories so people can quickly find the themes that they want.) They said our visual content looked outdated. My daughter explained in the post that we can't do away with designs/t-shirts because we spent so much money on them from illustrators (some of them up to $300-400 to pay for an illustration), but people ignored that and said do away with them anyway because "no one wants them", despite the obvious of my daughter asking for marketing advice, so we don't even know if anyone wants them yet. Other marketing advice...online ads, which we've tried before. Trade shows, which we can't do, because we rely on a print-on-demand printer, not an at-home press.

1) I simply do not see how I overreacted. 2) It may not be a profitable business--yet--but it is viable. My wife and I are new to entrepreneuriship and we are still learning. 3) My children help, yes, but 1) We clearly don't make enough in revenue to pay anyone, including ourselves, and 2) If we began making money, we would pay our children, but it would be part-time pay, which exceeds the amount of work they do in the first place.

I seriously have to ask: do you all see no problem with what she posted?

But who said we are not doing this? She already knows what school she's going to as she got her acceptance letters not too long ago. It's close to home, but she got a good scholarship and is excited to start her life as a music major. I hope you're not making the assumption we're not investing into our children's lives, because that is simply not true.

I just created this account today. I'm genuinely looking for feedback. That she disclosed that the business isn't doing well. We pay designers out of pocket from our day job earnings. Aside from that, we can't afford to pay ourselves, including our children. We're working on getting them involved in groups more. What she did was akin to posting our credit card information, PIN and CVC info included. I didn't say that comment to hurt her, but to genuinely express my feelings to her. I think her disclosing something so private and equally embarrassing is immature and short-sighted. It also ended hurting our business. Do you honestly see no problem with what she posted?

I retired some time ago due to an injury, and my wife has a comfortable day job and is the main breadwinner of our home. My children are homeschooled, primarily by me being the stay-at-home parent, but they are on top of their schoolwork and doing fine.

Yes, the information is true––and highly personal and humiliating, thus why it was such a shock and disappointment that she posted it. Our children are happy to help. I don't understand what you mean by your "productive" comment. It doesn't eat into their schoolwork. We tell our children practically everything about the ins and outs of our business. I would expect her to have more discretion on what she reveals to the public about our business. This shows me I can't trust her and it calls into question her judgment, thus the "respect" comment. I don't know if she was angry or resentful while making her post, but it's so unnecessary and humiliating. We are still working on bringing in revenue so we cannot pay anyone right now.

2-3 years ago, my (56M) family started a t-shirt business. As much as it's been a joy, it's also been a struggle. Paying designers, finding quality printers, marketing and so on is not an easy feat, but we're glad to have our children's (18F, 12M) help and support. All that said, I Googled our business name and stumbled on something that made my heart drop. A few months ago, my daughter (18F) went on a t-shirt merchant forum and wrote a post about our business, asking people to take a look and give advice. She gave out the brand name, link to the website, and mentioned specifically "We've made less than $100 in two years", extremely embarrassing and private information that is nobody's business. Needless to say, when I found it, I was irate. I get she was trying to help, but it was anything but helpful. We called her down and told her what I found. For me, I was equal parts shocked, heartbroken, angry, and disappointed. Along the way, I told her, "I've lost my trust and respect for you." Was that too harsh? The worst thing is, we can't even erase the post as posts made after a few days are permanent on the website. My wife and I are seriously considering closing up shop because the brand name is tarnished––anyone can easily look it up and find that humiliating info.