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Woman discovers her husband's been leaving love notes in her shoes for over six years

The patience he displayed in orchestrating this adorable prank is incredible.

via Anna Mellor/TikTok
Anna Mellor can't belive she never noticed.

Anna Mellor is a popular TikTokker best known for making videos where she pranks her husband, Rory. In one hit video, she forces him to dress as Mrs. Claus for the family Christmas card. In another, they plan a romantic movie night and she pretends to fall asleep just as Rory's entering the room with popcorn. Basically, they're couple goals and it's extremely obvious to anyone watching that they are best friends, even soulmates — despite the lumps Rory takes along the way. But poor Rory may have got the last laugh after a secretive long-con he played left her stupefied.

The secret? He’s been leaving her love letters in her shoes for years.


sneakers, shoes, fila, love, marriage, relationships, love storiesWe should all make sure to double check our shoes for hidden messages. Photo by Mehdi-Thomas BOUTDARINE on Unsplash

Anna took to TikTok to share the tale with her near one-million followers.

“I just discovered a six-year secret my husband has been keeping from me,” Mellor captioned a post with the big reveal. The video has over 2.6 million views since it was posted in March.

Anna got hip to her husband’s secret joke after she purchased a pair of used Fila shoes and found a secret message written in black Sharpie on the inside: “I Fila lot better when ur around." (A love letter and a dad joke, to boot. We love to see it.)

After making the discovery, she called her husband to tell him the strange news.


“I was like, ‘I just found a love letter in my shoes,'” she explained. Rory acted confused to hear the news. “He's like, 'Are you being serious?' Acting as if I should know what's going on,” Anna said.

But he couldn’t keep up the charade for long. “We have been married for six years. I have been writing in your shoes for six years and you just noticed for the first time” he admitted.

Anna then opened up another sneaker that had "If your feet get tired I will carry you" written on the tongue.

@mellorlite

Me thinking it was a love letter for someone else has same energy as when Rory was proposing and I thought the ring was somebody else’s that got lost at the beach😂😂

It makes you wonder how many pairs of shoes that she’s thrown out had secret messages in them?

Anna was clearly shocked by the revelation and thought it was a wonderfully creative way for her husband to show his love. It also shows that the man has an incredible talent at keeping a secret. Not to mention the outstanding patience on display! Commenters on the video thought that Rory is definitely a keeper, with all the makings of an all-star husband and dad.

"Immediately getting a divorce… none of my shoes say stuff!" TheMrsGarcia1111 wrote. "Where did you find him and how do I get one…asking for a friend," Keelyn added.

"Ughhh *getting up to take my shoes to my husband and start and argument*" another user joked.

"It’s so much sweeter that he kept doing it even though you never praised him for it" added another.

This isn't the first time the couple has gone viral. Back in 2020, Anna posted a video on TikTok where she sent her husband a dirty text message, but it was intercepted by her mother-in-law.

In the video, a horrified Anna can be heard saying, “Wait, wait, no… oh no” as she watches Rory’s mother reaching for the phone. “Did you read that?” Rory asks after taking a look for himself. “I thought it was my phone,” she responds. “That is so gross!”

Talk about embarrassing.

But, mostly, viewers love the pranks. They can't get enough of the pranks.

@mellorlite

What was he dreaming about?!?!? #sleepprank #fellasleep #prankingmyhusband

Research shows that good-natured ribbing, like the type that Anna and Rory share in their videos, is great for a couple. A meta-analysis of 39 studies found that couples who “create humor together” though inside jokes are more likely to last than those that don’t.

“People say they want a sense of humor in a mate, but that's a broad concept,” Professor Jeffrey Hall from the University of Kansas said according to The Daily Mail. “What is strongly related to relationship satisfaction is the humor that couples create together.”

And little love notes and other small displays of affection? They're key in a happy marriage. They seem small and maybe even silly, but they communicate a lot: Commitment, effort, and love. Anna and Rory are such an inspirational couple because beyond even love, it's so obvious that they like each other. That's a highly underrated aspect of a great relationship. If you're trying to inject a little more of this playful fun in your own relationship, well, shoes might be a good place to start.

This article originally appeared three years ago.

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Woman breaks down just how much work it took change her last name after getting married

She still stands by her choice.

@chiknnuggiesinmytummy/TikTok

Newlywed Delanie Kristek breaks down the lengthy process of changing her last name

Though the age-old tradition of wives taking their husband’s name after marriage has dwindled somewhat, it is still very commonplace. According to a Pew Research Center survey taken this year, 79% of women reported taking their spouse’s last name when they got married.

But would this custom still be so mainstream today if women were made aware of just how drawn out and mentally draining of a process it can be? Having just gone through it, 27-year-old newlywed Delanie Kristek doesn't seem to think so.

In a now-viral TikTok clip, Kristek recounts the lengthy tale of getting her last name changed, breaking down the stress involved.

Still in the “beginning stages,” as she calls it Kristek has successfully changed her social security and is now onto changing her driver’s license. Even with the “exact instructions” given to her on her NewlyNamed box (a special kit that helps newlyweds keep track of what documents to change), it was “incredibly time consuming."

@chiknnuggiesinmytummy Dont even get me started on our digital footprint and all the places our names are online. #changingyourname #namechange #namechanged #newlastname #lastnamechange #newlymarried #newlywed ♬ original sound - Delanie Kristek

Why? Because "everything's on the government website, which we already know is trash," Kristek explains, adding that "now, post-COVID, I can no longer just show up to the DPS [what Texas calls the DMV], I have to make an appointment. I go to schedule an appointment...all the DPS's near me, in DFW? There's no openings until January 2024. Guess what? I have a flight in December 2023...the name on my ticket is my new last name."

This left Kristek with no choice but to schedule an appointment at a DPS over 40 minutes away.

But that wouldn’t even scratch the surface. She continues, “at that point, I've only changed my social and my driver's license. I've still gotta change my insurance cards, I've gotta change my bank accounts, I've gotta change my passport...Global Entry, which means I'm gonna have to go to the airport."

But wait. There’s more.

"You've gotta change your name in all the systems you're in. Most of us have multiple doctors. I have primary care physician, I have a gynecologist, I have a therapist. There's so many places where my name appears, and now I'm gonna have to go change it. The mental load that it is taking on me...every time I see my name, I'm like, 'Oh my god, that's ANOTHER place I'm going to have to change my name,’” she says.

Understandably, Kristek can’t help but acknowledge that this is a special inconvenience reserved almost exclusively for women in heterosexual relationships, and says that most of their male counterparts "will never understand the mental load and time investment of changing your last name.”

And this is in part why Kristek posted her TikTok.

In an interview with Buzzfeed, she shared her hopes that it would ”shed some light to hetero men so that they can better understand,” and inspire them to help their partner during the process where they can. Whether that's helping directly in the name-change process or even taking on a different task that maybe their wife typically managed. In turn, freeing their wife up with some time and brain space to go through this name-change process."

Still, she stands by her choice to take her husband’s last name. And other than maybe the amount of time it took to get there, she has no regrets being Delanie Roselle Majors Kristek. She just wants others to be fully informed, and therefore more empowered, when going the traditional route.

As she told Buzzfeed, "each couple and person is different, so they need to decide what works for them versus just changing their last name because that's 'the thing you do.' It's time-consuming, it costs money, and there are pros and cons to whatever decision you make. Changing your name after marriage shouldn’t be an automatic yes, it should be a thought-out, conscious decision.”

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Husband's secret checklist for his wife's daily tasks has people debating healthy boundaries

Where do you draw the line?

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Was he in the wrong?

A husband anonymously sought out the help of the Reddit community to see if he was in the wrong for keeping calendar reminders to ask his wife about stuff going on in her life.

On the popular “Am I The A**hole” subreddit, he explained that checking in and staying aware was something his wife was really good at, but something he struggled to maintain. He attributed part of it to what he called being “a fairly self-centered person.”

“I wish that weren't the case,” he wrote. “But in retrospect a lot of bad behavior on my part was not corrected and even enabled when I was young. By the time I realized this character flaw I was already well into adulthood and I have found that old habits die hard.”

And now, in adulthood, this man found himself “getting lost in his own stuff” and forgetting about his partners. So in an effort to be better, he started secretly making reminders in his calendar.

It was a strategy working “really well,” the man wrote.

That is, until his wife found out.

“She definitely found it weird and off-putting that I would need a system like that when she doesn't,” the OP lamented. “I kind of agree with her. It never felt like a deep dark secret, but on the other hand there's obviously a reason I never told her or anyone else I was doing it.”

“Still,” he concluded, “taking action to make sure I show consideration and concern for stuff that matters to her has to be better than continuing to forget, right?”

marriage, husband, pleasing your wife, relationships

"Taking action has to be better than forgetting, right?"

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People who read his story were inclined to agree.

“I think it's really sweet that you took the steps to help your wife feel valued,” one person wrote, suggesting that the situation might just need further communication. “I'd sit your wife down and let her know that this has helped you engage with her more and to learn more about how she's feeling.”

Quite a few noted that forgetfulness isn’t always something people can control, especially for those who are neurodivergent. So putting systems in place like calendar reminders isn’t actually a moral failing, but simply a different way of organizing important information.

“I’m married and have ADHD. I write EVERYTHING I can down bc I will not remember until it’s too late if I don’t…I would try to frame it as a tool you have used to try to better yourself for your relationship. Tell her you reflected on yourself and didn’t like what you saw. Then tried to do something to correct it so you could be a better partner,” one person commented.

One person even noted that they wished their partner did something like what the OP did.

“I'd love if my partner did something like this. We have had multiple arguments, because I remember everything, while he cannot remember the time he works the next day. So sometimes if I don't remind him, he will forget things, and it hurts,” they wrote.

husband, ADHD marriage

Putting in the effort is never a bad thing!

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All in all, folks agreed that this husband was not in the wrong (or “Not The A**hole, in Reddit speak) for his check-in reminders, and that it would probably just take another conversation for his wife to fully understand where he was coming from.

As one person put it: “I think we can all tell that your wife and your relationship means a lot to you, and I think it's great that you came up with something like that, and hopefully your wife will after this, too. It shows you care. Most people never develop systems for that, and their relationships deteriorate because of it.”

No two brains really think alike. And boy do we realize this in relationships. Even when we’re lucky enough to find that soul mate that seems to “get” us on a deeper level, there are still going to be ways our partners operate that seem completely foreign to us. But that isn’t nearly as important as whether or not a partner can take accountability, and put in the work to be the best partner they can be.

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Widow who lost her husband soon after marriage shares valuable lessons about grief

#1: "Moving on" is a fallacy.

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A grieving widow shares lessons on how to live after loss.

True
Prudential

This article originally appeared on 02.14.17


Amelia and Manny made clear plans when they got married.

They planned to travel around the world. They planned what they’d want their family and their futures to look like. It was all so normal and real.

And then something they couldn't have planned for happened: Manny unexpectedly passed away soon after they'd tied the knot.

When the doctor in the emergency room told Amelia that it was time to say goodbye, she was in disbelief. "How do you even do that?" she wondered.

Instead of being a young, happy newlywed, Amelia became a young, grieving widow.

It turned her life upside down. In the months that followed, she could barely wake up and get out of bed, let alone put on clothes and walk to work. Every day felt harder than the last while the world continued on around her.

"I wanted so painfully for everything to just stop," Amelia said in an interview for Prudential's Masterpiece of Love series. "I was so tired. I just wanted it to stop." But it didn't stop. Life kept going and so did she, at times reluctantly.

Amelia has come out on the other side of the most difficult journey she could have imagined, and it's taught her a lot about herself, the grieving process, and how often life doesn't go as planned.

In hopes of helping others, Amelia wrote down eight things she learned about living after loss:

1. "Moving on" is a fallacy. Amelia prefers to call it "moving forward."

"Moving on" implies letting your person go, and that's an unrealistic expectation, Amelia wrote.

"Instead, you simply swim through it until the water clears up a little more, until the profundity of the depth is less terrifying, and until it feels a little easier, because you've gotten good at swimming."

Skydiving helped Amelia to commemorate the six-month anniversary of Manny's passing. "I guess some part of me felt like I could get closer to Manny somehow by stepping into the sky," she said.

2. "Try to remain open to life."

Amelia took a chance and met someone again who turned out to be a wonderful man. Having your heart broken again after loss is a nasty slap in the face, she wrote, but you should not let it shut you down.

"Practice kindness and graciousness when others are kind to you," she said, "and compassion when they aren't. That's a good practice for any relationship,."

3. Hers is not a "success story."

The peaceful person Amelia is today has "clawed, gasped, screamed and survived." She fell in love again and had a child, but those are not successes she can claim. She says that getting to raise her baby has been a wonderful blessing, and new life gives loss slightly more perspective. Every day, as her baby learns, she is reminded that life continues.

4. This is a big one: "Release any hostility or jealousy."

"Friends will get married and have children, celebrate anniversaries and successes, all while you are alone in the dark," she wrote. "They will forget to be sensitive to your heartache, or think that you're 'over it' enough so you won't mind if they gush. They might think that it's easier for you to show up with a smile than it really is. Let that go, too."

People are going to say the wrong things. They will say unbelievably tone-deaf things. It's important to not take hurtful words to heart, as hard as that can be. She advises trying to imagine a time when it will be easier to be happy for others again without feeling heartache yourself. Doing this will be healing.

5. "It will take longer than you expect."

Amelia wrote, "Because it doesn't go away, or stop, and because you don't get over it, that old heartache keeps creeping up long after you thought it should have gotten easier. Be compassionate with yourself. Life is not a round trip voyage; why should your grieving process be? You will get better at navigating the new normal."

6. "Only you know what you're really going through."

Amelia points to how well-meaning people will come out of the woodwork, desperate to tell you about when their somebody died, for three reasons:

One, they want to be helpful. Two, society shuns them from talking about their lost loved one and they want you to be a person whom they can commiserate with. Three, see number one.

Some people will say helpful things. But every grief is different. Every relationship is different. Every person who has passed is different, and every grieving person is different. If you grieve in your own way, you're doing it right.

7. "The right partner will actively keep the memory alive with you."

"Be careful not to get so swept up in escaping your grief that you choose someone who wants you to get over it," she wrote. "Don't you dare let anyone take your grief from you."

The right partner will hold your hand on the anniversaries (if that's what you want), will wish that they could have met your person, and will admire how you still love that person today.

8. And finally: "You can do this."

"There may be times you're pretty sure I'm wrong on this point," she wrote. "That's ok, rest when it's too hard. Find something — anything — and hang on like hell. These peaks and valleys gradually get less steep. It takes a long time, but they do. And there is sunshine again out there somewhere."

As many of us know, life often doesn't go according to plan.

It's still hard for Amelia every single day. But she says it also makes her experience things on a deeper level. Whether it’s raindrops on her skin or the feeling of breath going in and out of her lungs, everything is more vivid.

She says Manny's passing has a lot to do with that; he reminds her that every single day is a gift.

This article originally appeared on 02.14.17

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