Temper tantrums are something we expect from toddlers; they don't always have the language skills to express what they need, and they don't have as much experience being told "No". Most adults, though, should have plenty of skill in both areas.
However, we've all seen that one person who was being a jerk to a cashier or server who had to tell them no, usually for something outside of their control. Sometimes it gets more extreme, and they seem to lose all sense of human decency. They usually manage to make complete fools of themselves while they're at it, which is some small compensation to those who have to deal with their abuse.
Redditor AriaStars asked the question:
"What's the worst adult tantrum you've ever witnessed?"
User responses did not disappoint. Whether because of an overinflated sense of entitlement, or simple lack of emotional regulation, these truly epic temper tantrums show that not every adult has their act together.
Some responses have been edited for content/clarity.
Actions Have Consequences
GiphyI saw my 21 year old cousin toss his monitor out a second story window because of a video game, then proceed to cry about tossing a $300 screen out a window. Was pretty amusing.
We Know How You Are, That's Why You're Fired
Guy at work got fired for being an a--hole after he was told 3 times to stop being one. He lost it when he was informed he was being let go. That they "knew who he was and how he was" and that he wasn't being an a--hole and that everyone was an a--hole to him. Then he started crying about how he was going to die because he wouldn't be able to feed his family to finally as he walked past my desk went into a tirade about how it was my fault he was getting fired (I never once complained about him) we worked well together, or so I thought, come to find out later he was threatened by me and had been underhandedly talking sh!t about me. I was oblivious about it since most people didn't let me know and had gone to HR on my behalf.
On his way out he started throwing items off of people's desks yelling and crying and finally kicked the glass door shattering the glass.
Last I heard he was still unemployed, as our field is a pretty small world.
Not So Shady Cakes
GiphyI worked in a cupcake shop for a year and people get way angrier about these stupid tiny cakes than you'd believe. My favorite story is about a woman who came in to pick up an order that she placed for blue gender reveal cupcakes.
On her order sheet, it said blue frosting, but didn't specify a shade, so we chose a light blue since it was for a baby shower. When she came to pick it up she was furious that it was "aqua" and not "baby blue".
The manager offered to make her new cupcakes with lighter frosting for free. The process of mixing frosting doesn't involve touching or coming close to it, so he wasn't wearing gloves. As he was stirring the dye into the frosting, she said she didn't want it anymore since he was making it with his "filthy disgusting hands".
She proceeded to throw the box with the initial order at the counter, and seeing that it didn't do much, she picked up the individual cupcakes and threw them at the ground and toward the register.
When we tried to give her a refund we asked for the last four digits of her card number to confirm it. She refused, saying she wasn't going to share that personal information in front of "all these people"... two high school cashiers and one manager.
Edit: I wasn't the one who gave her the refund and if it was up to me I wouldn't have. The store manager gave her a refund because he wanted to avoid her making an even bigger scene.
Road Rage
I got on a bus at 5pm, the whole bus was filled with people trying to go home from work. As the bus pulled out, the woman in a car behind us must have felt she had been cut off. So she pulled up beside the bus and started yelling at the bus driver through the window. Then pulled her car in front of the bus and got out to yell some more. The bus driver couldn't drive away and suddenly the police showed up. We all had to get off the bus and wait for another bus or find another way home. I decided to walk down to the ferry so I had to walk past the woman that caused this and I stared at her trying to understand how she could justify screwing up the commute of so many people.
Crocodile Tears
I had a roommate in college who spent money lavishly and liked to buy clothes, wear them once or twice with the tags on, then return them. One time we were at Target doing some grocery shopping and she tried to return a few dresses she had worn. One had a large stain on it and she didn't have the receipt or tags for the others. The cashier said he couldn't take them because they had clearly been damaged. She spent the next 30 minutes crying HYSTERICALLY while he tried to ignore her and check out other people. She sat on the bench outside of the Starbucks (that was inside the store), facing the cashier, and just stared at him while crying. It was so embarrassing and I begged her to stop and just leave with me.
Eventually I said I would go sit in the car, and she grabbed me and said "it's not real, I'm not really that upset. I know how to cry on cue." That really freaked me out, how she stopped so suddenly to tell me that, then started up wailing again. I apologized to the security guard who said he couldn't put hands on her to remove her but had to insist she leave. She kept trying to get other customers to look at her and "see what they're doing to me?" She sat outside the store for another 10 or so minutes doing this. It was ridiculous. I couldn't apologize enough to everyone there, but I sure tried. Thankfully we only had 2 months left of living together, but I'm pretty sure that was a usual thing for her to do. Haven't spoken to her since I moved out.
EDIT: On the way back to our dorms, she did say she would return again another week to try with another cashier, and she did. She got the return. I wonder if she did the same thing again and they just gave in. I refused to go with her anywhere after that, but I'm sure she still does that to get what she wants
No Chicken Bacon Ranch For You
GiphyDon't know about "worst," but I went to a Subway in a gas station (I was hungry, and, never again). The women behind the counter were definitely not happy to be there, and one of them was just absolutely raging to anyone that would listen about how her boyfriend had done f**ked up, and she was going to go home and stab him as soon as she saw him, and that she had been in jail before, and she was fine with going back again.
All of this, she's just alternately yelling this stuff and screaming, all while people are trying to place their orders. So, it was basically like:
"Hi, I'd like to order a chicken --"
YEAH I DON'T CARE WHAT HE SAYS I'M GONNA CUT HIM THE F**K UP
"--bacon ranch, on--"
I DONE BEEN TO JAIL ONCE I'M OK WITH GOING BACK
"--wheat, please, toasted, and --"
HE will AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Your Pizza Doesn't Need Its Own Seat
I was on the bus once and a guy was sitting in the front at the handicap seats, with a pizza in the seat next to him. The bus wasn't crowded when he got on, so whatever, but it quickly filled up and he did not move his pizza nor himself.
Eventually the bus is packed and someone finally asks, "hey, can you move that pizza so I can sit down?"
He doesn't even look up, just says "F**K YOU. No."
So they ask again, and being close to the front the driver says, "you need to move to allow them a seat. That is handicap seating"
"F**k you, too"
Bus is pulled over, and the driver opens the doors. She asks him to move again, he says no again. Doors stay open, she's fussing with the buttons on top and asking for police.
He makes a stink and tells her to move along. She's got her hands folded neatly on the wheel just staring at the road, "not until the police take you off my bus".
He tantrums for a few, but finally does a "f**k this shit" and storms off. As soon as he's off the last step, doors close and bus is back on its way.
I always admired how she just waited. She knew she didn't need to put up with his garbage, and I'm glad I got to see her wait him out.
Have A Nice Day
I worked at an optical store. A man came in with 10 year old nasty glasses (green nose pads that probably weren't changed in the decade he had them). He throws them on the table as the arm came off and demanded we replace them. I told him they weren't under warranty and we don't carry those glasses (not sure if he even bought them from us). Best I can do is solder them for him to get him by but he won't be able to close them and they will be discolored since I was heating them up. Well after a full on tantrum he says fine.
When he comes back to pick them up my coworker dealt with him because she saw how pissed I was. She gives him the glasses and he is pissed they aren't closing and are discoloured (both of which he was told about). He ends up finally leaving and as he is walking out my coworker says "have a nice day". His response was to throw one of our chairs across the room...
We are in Canada. If he needed glasses and couldn't afford them there are government programs in place to get new ones...not sure that was his case but just saying there was no reason to get so upset about old glasses.
Edit: The coverage varies by provinces for low income earners. Some provinces do not cover it.
Computer Says No
GiphyI was at DFW a few years back to fly home. I went to the self service kiosks to print a boarding pass. As I'm waiting to use one, I notice this woman nearly screaming at several employees who were trying to calm her down. She kept saying her flight was about to board and they were going to make her miss it and she wasn't going to do that so they better figure things out. I mean she was pissed.
The employees kept trying to help her but she insisted on typing everything in herself and it kept being unable to pull up her reservation and she wouldn't show the employees her confirmation email because she kept telling them it was their "stupid f**king machine" and they needed to fix it.
Finally an employee talks her into showing him the email. He looks at it as she is still yelling that her flight is boarding in ten minutes and he says, "Ma'am you're supposed to be flying out of Love Field, not this airport."
At this point I'm finished with what I'm doing but I did hear the woman start crying and the first words out of her mouth were, "Well what are you going to do about it?"
Because I'm sure in her mind it was their fault she can't read what airport she belongs at. I have luckily not witnessed too many people treat employees horribly at places, but this one was fantastic because the woman being so horrible had completely screwed up everything all by herself.
There's A Proper Shape?
I watched a grown woman b!tch at a teenager in a Sheetz because her chicken tenders weren't the right shape. She stomped her feet and angrily walked out, trying to slam a door that was on a closer. Then when it wouldn't slam, she opened it and shoved it real hard to try to get it to slam, but the closer prevented it.
So for like 15-20 seconds she was basically in a fight with a door. Like her body was flailing about and her hair was whipping around as she was trying to get this door to slam.
Eventually she gave up and left. The teenager and I just kind of stared at each other in disbelief. She didn't ask for her money back, or another order, she just stomped out, chicken tenderless.
The chicken tender box was opened and left on the counter, while I am no chicken tender-from a gas station connoisseur, they pretty much looked like a standard shaped chicken tender.
Wow...just wow.
My 24 year old sister couldn't find her hairbrush so she completely thrashed the house, accused everyone of stealing her hair brush, said she couldn't use anyone else's because she has lice which no one knew she hadlice, almost broke my Grandmas antique piano, broke glass on the floor, called my dad inappropriate slurs, called my mom a c**t even though she wasn't home or had anything to do with it, and then found her brush in the corner of her room and laughed over how extreme she acted while everyone else was still getting over just witnessing a 24 year old grown adult destroy the house and scream slurs at the top of her lungs.
No Cheese For You
GiphyI used to work at a fast food pizza place, and one of our regulars threw a 15 minute long piss fit because he couldn't get extra cheese for free. He left, only to come back 5 minutes later and screamed demanding a refund for the pizza he ALREADY ATE because of it. Meanwhile I'm just in the back making dough like :I and my manager is threatening to call the cops if he doesn't leave. Never wanted to work that shift again knowing he went there regularly. smh
It's The Electric Kind
Worked for an electrical supply store for years. We mainly serve professionals, but open to anyone, cause money is money amirite? We were open m-f, but open Saturday mornings till 2, because residential stuff. We had a 100k sq ft warehouse. I had probably 10k different SKUs for different light bulbs. The most terrifying request I could get was "I need a light bulb". This weekend in question I was acting manager. Lady gets huffy cause line is long (we took orders and picked em, so it can take a minute). Anyway she steps up, and says the magic words, "I need a light bulb". In order to answer, I need wattage voltage etc. When I ask what kind, I'm told quite loudly "I don't know, its the electric kind you idiot".
Yes ma'am. Go grab a 1000w metal halide [think parking lot light] and bring it back. Say that will be 200 bucks. Started screaming about how its not what she needed. Admittedly my reply of "its the electric kind you idiot" was not the smartest, but I couldn't help myself. Monday was interesting in the boss's office.
Can't Really Blame Him
Worked at taco bell when I was younger, middle aged mom came in and threw a fit, called the cashier a brainless idiot who will never succeed in life and demanded a refund.
All because he gave her the wrong change amount back. He was new and just a kid, working his first job. He didn't come back the next day.
Self Awareness Comes Eventually
GiphyWorked at Papa Murphy's in high school. A guy came in one evening and ordered a pizza. He asked how long it would take and my supervisor told him it shouldn't take more than five minutes. The guy looked a little surprised but said he would be back in a little bit because he had something to pick up next door. A while later he returns to pick the pizza up and upon seeing that the pizza wasn't baked he flips out and demands a refund. He even yelled out "Who the hell doesn't bake their pizzas?" Immediately after he looks up to see the sign, "Handmade. Home baked" to which he then retorted, "Well, I guess I'M the a-hole".
Beagle Is Disappointed By Your Lack Of Planning
Pet store not too long ago. It's an unusually long line for a weekday, and there's only one person checking people out. There was a lady in front of me who was buying some things for dogs - treats, toys, etc.
She asked the cashier if they had any Royal Canin food for Beagles in the back because there weren't any on the shelves. Side note: I have 2 dogs - I buy them "good food" (not the cheapest and worst), but I really don't see how breed-specific food is necessary. But hey, to each his (her) own.
The cashier radios to another employee asking them to check stock. A few seconds later, the employee answers and says they don't at the moment, but there should be some coming on the next truck, which was the next day. This lady was SO not okay with that.
She replies to the cashier in a pretty nasty tone and says things like "I thought this was a pet supply store" and "WHAT IS MY DOG SUPPOSED TO EAT TONIGHT?!" She asked the cashier the latter question multiple times and y'all, bless the cashier's soul. This woman deserved an award for keeping it together while this lady tore into her about them not having breed-specific Royal Canin food.
Meanwhile, I was definitely not helping because I was laughing from how ridiculous it all was. "WHAT IS MY DOG SUPPOSED TO EAT TONIGHT?!" I wanted to say, "I don't know, maybe a filet mignon?"
The lady checking out had brought a "regular" bag of food up there, and the cashier had already scanned it. Once she threw her tantrum, she told the cashier that she decided to not get the "regular" food because "she didn't want to risk it". (??)
Some people have no poise.
Also, forgive my ignorance if there really is some solid logic to breed-specific food. I've just never been in a scenario where I've needed to know about it, if there even is one.
It's All Your Fault
Back when I worked for a bank, we had a customer who would come in every day to buy fifty dollars' worth of dimes. Dimes minted before 1964 are 90% silver, so his thing was combing through dimes looking for silver ones that he could sell. Supposedly, he made decent money doing this.
At one point, he'd had a streak of failures, and had been getting more and more frustrated with us on a daily basis. Surely we were giving him new dimes on purpose, and saving the old ones for ourselves! Fifty dollars worth of dimes and not a single one minted before the 90s! This all came to a head one day when I gave him his tray of dimes as usual, and he insisted on ripping open a roll right in front of me. Not a single silver dime to be found, so he screamed "YOU'RE F**KING HOLDING OUT ON ME!" and threw the rest of the tray at my head. He didn't hit me, but the remaining rolls of dimes hit the wall behind me hard enough that most of them popped open. I would've been hurt pretty badly had I been hit.
He was banned from the bank.
I Forbid You To Save Me Money
GiphyWork in pharmacy. So every day I see adult tantrums. But one stands out more than the others.
Lady comes in every 45 days or so to pick up her Norco, and based on the directions we have to bill for a 25 day supply to the insurance. Well her insurance says they will only cover it if she makes it last 30. So I call the doc to get the ok to say "must last 30 days" on the bottle. The approve, I bill through insurance, and save her about $130.
She gets to the register, and as I'm patting myself on the back for doing a good thing, I walk over and tell her the good news, that it's now a 30 day supply, and since it's through insurance it's $0 copay instead of ~$130. I explain that since she's been picking up every 45 days or so, she won't even notice the difference.
Lo and behold, I have saved the devil herself reincarnated $130, and proceed to have her scream at me for 5 minutes about how she only wants me to fill what the doctor says (despite me getting the doctors approval). She mentions how she always has problems with us (but still comes back) and was screaming so loud at me that all the managers in the store could hear her, even on the opposite side of the building.
Proceeded to change it back to the original 25 day supply, charged her $130, and then spent the rest of my day wondering what it must be like to have the disposable income to just drop $130 unnecessarily.
Nobody Does
Grown woman (between 50-60) gets on the train and proceeds to start hysterically crying. Screaming at the top of her lungs that she did not want to go to work. Her shrieks were so loud they penetrated through my noise cancelling headphones. Mind you this was at 6:45 in the morning. This continued until 8 stops later (the stop before I got off) she wiped her face and got off the train as if it never happened. The entire train car as well as myself looked at each other completely bewildered. I'd like to say only in New York but in this crazy world we live in I would not be surprised if this was a common occurrence in other places.
That woman just vocalized what everyone commuting to work that morning was thinking.
It Was What She Deserved, But Probably Not What She Wanted
GiphyWoman I work with was absolutely awful at her job. She was bad with people, bad with the paperwork. Just overall a really sh!tty person. So she was fired. The day of, she stormed in on each persons individual shifts and screamed at them. Then no one heard from her again until it was time for her to collect her final paycheck.
Now when she was fired, she had the option of working out the rest of the week - that way we didn't have to pay severance. She chose not to come in. So her paycheck was significantly lower than she thought. She freaked out. Dropped to the floor and started crying.
Said that because she didn't show up for her last 3 days it means she quit, not that she was fired, therefore we owe her more money. She only left when I threatened to call the cops.
My manager was on maternity leave but still came in from time to time do payroll and stuff, so the woman who was fired decided to go and break into my managers house and try to kidnap her newborn baby until my manager made sure that crazy lady gets the money "she deserves".
She was arrested. Haven't seen her since.
"I've experienced two."
I've experienced two.
A customer called my bank and asked me to look up his account.. except he didn't have his account nor debit card number. He wanted to use his SSN. Since I work at a branch and not the call center, this was a huge privacy violation and generally a huge no-no (our lines are not recorded so we cannot use an SSN to look up an account over the phone). I tell him this and he tells me that he's blind, what is he to do?
I tell him to call the customer service line instead, since they can look up his account number, and as an alternative, I offer to walk him through finding his account # in the app, which does have accessibility settings that would make it possible for him to retrieve it. IMMEDIATELY this troglodyte starts yelling at me that I'm "discriminating against him because he's blind!" And that I "hate the disabled!!" And I "HAVE" to accept his social. I don't budge, because he's a rude idiot and he threatens to sue and is angry that he "is still talking to me" when he asked for a manager. Now, my manager was busy, but I would have loved to transfer the call over to him because he would have ripped this jerk a new assh***.
He was yelling so loudly you could hear his banshee shrieks a foot and a half away from the receiver. I put him on hold until he hung up. My manager was busy. He didn't call back. I'm afraid there was no justice in the end. Since I never got his social nor account number and he had a common name, I couldn't pull up his profile and submit a request to our regional manager to have his accounts shut down. He got away with it.
The 2nd one was today.
A customer came in looking to get temporary checks, which are free checks on which we print the customer's checking account number. We don't typically give these out unless customers have placed recent check orders and this slimeball never had. But the reason I didn't give him checks was that both of his accounts were overdrawn by at least $200 and he had THREE more accounts that were charged off and in collections. He wanted these checks to commit fraud. I told him I would give him the checks if his accounts were in good standing and they weren't; I didn't even mention the chargeoffs. Cue the yelling Shouting at the top of his lungs that he's been a customer for years and how dare I!!! And "this has never been a problem before!!!!"
I asked him "you've done this before?"
I AM A CUSTOMERRRRR!!!!!!!! I am going to call COR-PO-RATE and telling them about YOU!
"Ok sir. Do you need the number?" (refusing this POS the opportunity to defraud the bank would have earned me brownie points with upper management)
Incoherent screams as he storms out the door.
This one does have a happy ending. I reopened his profile, left a note on his account, reported him to fraud for check kiting, and had his accounts frozen by the fraud department.
"I had two coworkers..."
I had two coworkers argue about setting up a virtual machine as both started working on it and were kicking each other out of it by accident. Finally, 'Tom' walked over to 'Jerry's' cube.
T: I think we're both working on the same server. Do you mind if I finish it.
J: Well I have the ticket, I should finish it.
T: It's really no problem, I see you don't even have the checklist up and I already do. I can finish it.
J: I have the checklist and I have the ticket. I'm going to finish it.
T: I'm pretty sure I took that ticket. Would you pull up the ticket manager and check?
J: No. I'll finish the ticket.
At this point Jerry accidentally clicks on the ticket manager and it shows Tom has the ticket. Tom points this out. That's when Jerry screams 'NO' and grabs the monitor and pulls it down to the desk. He then covers the monitor with his body. The both look over at me since I've been there the longest and start arguing who should take the ticket. All the while Jerry keeps batting Tom's hands away from the monitor. These were both men in their 40s.
"I tell her it's a safety precaution..."
I worked at a kind of prestigious summer camp where high schoolers would stay for a couple of weeks, take college courses, and then leave. Part of our check-out procedure required that the adult checking out a student needed to have photo ID. Standard safety procedure. This woman comes in and one of our staff members reminds her that she'll need an ID to check out her kid. Immediately she has a bad attitude and says "Well My ID is in the car and I'm not getting it. " and then goes upstairs to get her kid. My boss warns me to make sure she shows an ID and When she gets to the check-out table I politely ask for it (even though I know she doesn't have it). This woman flips her lid, in front of her 2 children and starts screaming about how she's not going to get and ID and how she can leave with her kid. I tell her it's a safety precaution and we can't allow her son to leave without verifying her identity.
Then she starts pushing her son towards the door telling him to go to the car and drags her little daughter along and the kids are obviously terrified. My boss has to block the door as this woman is screaming about how nobody told her she needed an ID (she received an email a week prior and a reminder at the door) and how the parking lot was too far (it wasn't) and basically the entire lobby is staring at her. My boss tells her he will walk to the car with her son to get her ID. So that happens, she sits across from me all huffy and glaring and when my boss gives her her ID she throws it on the table in front of me and then snatches it out of my hand.
She made a 5 minute check out procedure last half an hour because she didn't want to make the 2 minute trip to her car....
"Once, while upset..."
My mother throws regular tantrums. Once, while upset, she full-on regressed and started screaming (in public), "I want my daddy!" again and again. My grandfather had died some five years before.
Very weird.
"After decades..."
The worst was an older woman in church who made a big scene because she walked in and found a family sitting in "her" pew.
After decades of sitting in that very pew, she threatened to leave the church and never come back if those people didn't get up and relinquish what she believed to be rightfully hers.
"We had an elderly customer..."
We had an elderly customer at a Starbucks I worked at that had laid claim to a table. And would constantly ask the baristas to ask people to move if they were sitting at "his table". We were all explicitly told by the manager to under NO circumstances ask people to move for him. He would then stand by the bar staring at both the baristas and the people at the table until they left. Even if the table next to his table was available he would refuse to sit. Weird old people claiming public property as their own.
"When I worked in an ice cream shop..."
When I worked in an ice cream shop, we had one day a year with free ice cream. Free scoop day (now you know which shop I ran.) Free cone day is messy and we have volunteer scoopers, as such we had a concern about cross contamination from ice creams that had common allergens such as peanuts. So to solve the issue, we took anything with peanuts off the menu for the day. Pretty simple, we still had twelve flavors including gluten free, dairy free and even soy free for people to choose from.
So one year, this grown-@ss woman comes through the line and orders an ice cream that has peanut butter brickle in it. Well 1) no peanut ice creams on free cone day and 2) that particular flavor hadn't even been made in years. I have no idea why she thought she would find it with us.
When we told her we didn't have it, she started berating us about not having her favorite flavor. Then when we didn't magically produce it (because we couldn't) she started screaming. Then crying. She started ranting to the entire store that this was the worst day of her life and everything always went wrong for her.
Now it should be noted that we accept donations on free cone day, all of which goes to a charity of our choice. Our shop used the donations to pay for the medical care of a girl who was very sick (CF). This little girl, who at the time was about eight or nine, was there with us, watching this go down.
So this woman was screaming and crying about how awful her life was because she didn't get the flavor she wanted on a day when we gave away free ice cream out of the goodness of our hearts while a little girl with CF was listening to the tirade.
I wasn't manager there yet, which is probably a good thing because I would have given her no mercy. As it was, the current manager politely but firmly told her to leave. The woman left, still screaming and crying about not getting a single free scoop of her favorite no longer existing flavor of ice cream.
It was absurd, but we honestly thought that maybe she had something wrong with her. You know, like maybe she wasn't quite emotionally stable. So we brushed it off.
A week later we get a phone call from corporate. The read us an email where this same woman called corporate and told a tale about how we had made fun of her weight and basically said "We have no free ice cream for you, fatso." We told corporate what really happened and the rep said "Yeah, we know you guys, you're not evil or nuts and you would never do this. We already told her to pound sand and to never go into one of our shops again."
"My dad's wife..."
My dad's wife cried, screamed, and threw plates around the house because my dad took me out for lunch after school and didn't drive 25 miles home to pick her up first so he could take her too.
"He would rant and rave..."
My father is competitive, an alcoholic, and a bit of a narcissist. We were trying to have a nice family session of Cards Against Humanity and he just couldn't accept it when his cards weren't chosen.
He would rant and rave every time his card wasn't selected which climaxed when my mom picked a card other than his. He screamed and argued why his card was clearly the superior one and berated the card my mother chose.
It was sad and the last time we attempted any kind of family game with that man-child.
"I wish I had my phone charged."
In Asia, in a popular mall, a grown woman rolled on the ground kicking and screaming when the grown man she was with refused to buy her regional jewelry.
She slammed her hand on the glass counter, then it turned into a shouting match. Then the guy started telling her off about how she needs to be a "traditional Chinese woman." Then proceeded to (childlishly) tease her about how childish she's behaving. Like full on making fake crying sounds.
She cried. Then stopped. Like cold hard stop on the crying. This was the glorious moment when she jumped onto the ground and rolled around kicking and screaming.
I wish I had my phone charged. It was glorious. But I was traveling all day and wanted to see the building's observation deck.
"Then he started screaming at me..."
When I worked at a hotel, I met possibly the most irritable man on the planet. He came to the front desk to check in and when I asked for his name, he said "I'm a regular here." And I said okay, I still don't know your name, he said "I stay here all the time, I'm a VIP. Didn't they tell you I was coming?"
This hotel was a Best Western. If any of you readers are unaware of this particular chain, no Very Important Person has stayed at any Best Western location, ever.
I said, "Thank you for your business, I have only worked here a few months and I apologize if I've checked you in before and didn't recognize you, but I really do need your name to find your reservation." Finally after a little more back and forth verbal abuse, he spits out his last name and I search for it in this system: nothing. I try a few different spellings: nothing. I ask him to spell it.
"Are you kidding me? First you interrogate me, now you're saying I don't have a reservation?"
"No, sir, I'm just having trouble finding it. If you'd please just spell your name for me--"
Then he started screaming at me about how ridiculous this was, how he would never come back, how he was going to sue the hotel, etc. He stormed out and I heard his car peel out of the parking lot. Later on I did find his reservation -- his name had a very odd spelling that I hadn't guessed earlier -- and when I told the manager the story, she said "Well, yeah, that sounds like him." Apparently he was just that irritable all the time. (And I checked his room history, his last visit was three months before I started working there, did he think we kept portraits of all the guests and memorized them?)
I saw many, many adult tantrums at the hotel. We were the first hotel driving into town off a long stretch of highway so many of them I chalked up to people who were tired and cranky from the road. But lots of people just wanted to throw a tantrum to get a better rate on the room, and of course the people who just like to abuse service workers.
"I don't miss that job."
I worked at an airport bookstore. My county had just created a ten cent charge for bags, and explaining this to non-locals (everyone, basically) was hit and miss. Some took it as nothing, others lost their mind.
This lady lost her mind. Blond, mid 30s, midwest from the twang. She bought a pack of gum or something small and I asked her if she wanted a bag. She said no. I gave her her change and she just glared at me and asked me where her plastic bag was. I said we don't carry plastic, we have paper and it'll be ten cents. She is yelling about why and how and this is stupid and I'm stupid and I don't know how to do my job, the works. My shift is ending and my boss is behind me a coworker coming to take my reg and the three of us watch this lady go beet red in the face over ten cents. She eventually takes her gum or whatever and stomped out of the store towards the gates.
I don't miss that job.
So for starters I work at a Subway at a popular amusement park. Said park usually closes at 10 pm and thus all the restaurants and attractions inside close as well. Unfortunately on this particular day we were so swamped that we ended up being open up until 10:30. So it's 10:30 and we are serving our last guests of the day, a middle aged woman with 5 young children, and then a man and older women behind them.
So at this point in time we are 30 minutes past close we and thus have started to run out of items, and it being a REALLY busy day don't have much in the way of prep in the back for the next day. So we make this woman and her 5 kids their sandwiches and get to the very end where we add condiments. ML requests that we put mayonnaise on each sandwich but unfortunately we're out. So I tell her this and at first she is a completely reasonable human being and we offer her light mayonnaise instead which she accepts. So we put light mayonnaise on each sandwich when lo! and behold one of her demon spawn of a child starts screaming.
Apparently the child is so distraught at having light mayonnaise instead of regular that ML demands we scrape off all the mayo off of each sandwich. So we do. She then decides this isn't good enough and demands we throw all 6 sandwiches away and remake her new ones. I'm pretty damn ticked at this point, and so as we go about making them a second time we proceed to run out of even more ingredients. Though when I inform her that we are out of, for example, banana peppers because she wasted the last of it she surprisingly took it well and moved on.
So here we are at the condiments again and she does her famous line, "Now, put mayonnaise on all of them." because for some reason between the time it took to remake her sandwiches she forgot that we are LITERALLY OUT OF MAYONNAISE IN THE ENTIRE FRICKEN STAND. So I tell her again, we are out, to which she proceeds to scream and cuss me out for an impressive amount of time.
So I decide to go in the back to 'look for more again' and to get away from her screaming with another supervisor. We sit back there, staring at each other in disbelief until one of us decides, f*ck it, we take a spare light mayonnaise bottle from the fridge, take off the cap that's labeled "Light Mayo" and replace it with a regular Mayo label. (Now I would usually never give someone some food item they didn't ask for such as coke instead of diet because I don't know their dietary needs but f*** this lady I wanted to go home.)
Triumphantly we bring the 'completely regular mayonnaise' up front and make up some lie about how it fell behind another bottle. She rewards us by screaming some more about how we lied to her all that time about not having any before etc etc etc. we finish her transaction and send her happy ass and her demon brigade on their way.
Humorously the man and older woman behind her happened to be her husband and mother (or mil) who apologized to us profusely and were all around very kind people.
"Apparently this error..."
My boss when I worked at KFC was an angry and immature man. During my first week, he threw chicken at me because I put it in the bucket in the "wrong order." Nobody explained to me that grilled chicken must go in the bucket first so it doesn't drip juices on the friend chicken, making it soggy. Apparently this error warranted the chucking of chicken at a new employee.
It seems that just about anything can set someone off these day. Beware.
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What is it that makes people confess their deepest, darkest sins to millions of strangers on Reddit? While we may not know the answer, we do know that the following confessions run the gamut from funny to salacious to nasty nightmare fuel. In fact, you might want an Ouija board to send some of these skeletons back to the closets from whence they came.
A Series Of Unfortunate Events
On one autumn day when I was 11, I was told to take out the trash. As I was doing this, I noticed the box of matches next to our grill. Since it was fall, I burned a small pile of old leaves for a couple of minutes and then stomped on them to put out the fire. Unbeknownst to me, all that did was push the embers right next to our house.
The next thing I knew, the house went up the flames. It was terrifying—but that wasn’t the worst of it. The firefighters put out the fire and the house insurance covered the damages, but the authorities were very curious about how it started. They suspected someone jumped to the fence and lit up the leaves to burn our house down.
Unfortunately, this caused my parents to think someone was out to get us. Scared for our lives, they decided to move elsewhere. They lost their well-paying jobs and they lost a lot of money on the sale of the house. For the next solid seven years, we lived in stress and poverty. My parents still do not know that I’m the reason they had to live like that.
Lucky Break
I got busted with a lot of computers from my work—about $25,000 worth—and pleaded guilty to grand theft. The authorities spelled my name wrong and put down the wrong birthday. I also never gave them my license or social security number. I just kept saying, “I don’t remember it” over and over during my 90-day incarceration.
That was 34 years ago. Every few years, I still do background checks on my name and I’d be lying if I said that my heart doesn’t race each and every time I do it. Nope. Still not there.
You Do You
I recently quit my job to become a stripper—and it’s had a surprising side effect. First, the only person who knows this is my husband. I have more quality time with my family, I am more financially stable, I’ve gotten into better shape, and I don’t have to worry about budgets or bills as much. If we need something in the house, it can go on the monthly or the weekly lists depending on severity.
If my husband wants a new project, I can give him his guy time. If my kid is sick, I can afford the medicine. I don’t have to worry about money, and neither does my family. During my own childhood, I would agonize over whether we had food, electricity, heat, or tampons. It feels good to be able to provide for my family.
Hate The Game, Not The Player, Right?
I have managed to create a facade that makes it appear as if I have worked full-time on the project I was assigned to but it actually takes only me half of the time. It was tricky but I have managed to organize things in a way that allows me to do anything except my work at the office. On home office days I mostly play video games.
Whenever I get asked how my work is going, I lie to make it look like I am fully swamped with my work and the schedules and deadlines, etc. A side effect of this was that I got really good at lying and could deceive anyone about nearly anything and most people would actually believe it. I’ve been doing this for two years now.
If my coworkers or boss ever found out that I get paid for a full-time job while only working roughly 20 hours a week, I’d get fired immediately. Additionally, I live in a small town, and getting caught would totally ruin my reputation and any chances at a potential new job. I also just want to say that I don’t feel bad about my behavior at all.
The Sweet Smell Of Revenge
person walking beside Golden retriever on the streetPhoto by Andriyko Podilnyk on UnsplashWhen I was around age 10, I was walking home with my dog when he cut the corner and walked diagonally through the yard of this super-mean old lady who lived at the end of our street. She was in her yard at the time tending to some really fancy-looking rosebushes. All of a sudden she sprayed my dog all over with some kind of insecticide or fertilizer.
I should mention that my dog was a very friendly golden retriever who didn’t even go near her and certainly didn’t do anything threatening. I couldn’t believe that she sprayed him with whatever chemical she was using on her roses. I ran back home with the dog and immediately hosed him off. He coughed a bunch but seemed OK.
I didn’t tell my parents because I somehow thought that I was going to get into trouble for letting the dog walk in her yard. I’m glad I didn’t tell them, though, because I decided to get revenge. That night I snuck downstairs, out the half-bath window, and down the street to her yard. Once there, I cut down every single rose bush I could get my hands on.
Putting In The Work
I’ve kept this on the down low, but I used to have a drinking problem. I went to detox, rehab, and an aftercare program. Then I went into a halfway house and finally my own apartment in another state, which made things easier. I’m 31 and, honestly, it sucks. I want to break free from lying and hiding, but things always get uncomfortable if I let anyone know about my journey.
It’s really tough because I believe that anyone I tell will judge me and not want to talk to me. This just makes it easier to lie. Not to mention, lying has worked pretty well so far, so why fix what’s not broken? Unfortunately, I also understand how all of this not only hangs over my head but can also eventually catch up to me. I’m just stuck in the middle, I guess.
What Happens On Vacation Stays On Vacation
I was on a holiday in China, visiting some cousins, and was out riding my bike. It was about 9:30 pm. I turned left, crashed into a stack of trash cans, and got my leg stuck in some hole. I looked down into the alley that I had been about to enter and could see a guy wearing about five face masks, all adjusted so that they covered his identity completely.
It was actually quite comical, and I almost laughed out loud, but by that point, my leg was really starting to hurt. The masked man had a giant, ruler-sized blade and was pointing it at another person’s neck. He was an older man with what I swear was the longest scarf I have ever seen in my life. I just sat there staring as they yelled at each other in Chinese.
Apparently, the old scarf guy owed the masked man a ton of money. I must have made some sort of noise at that moment because they both suddenly turned toward me in a bit of a panic. The masked man shoved the scarf guy to the ground, glared at me, gave me the finger, and bolted into the night.
Just What The Doctor Ordered
After weeks of unbearable cramping and bleeding, I found out at the gyno that my ex gave me chlamydia. I was tested prior to us getting together and I didn’t sleep with anyone in between then so I knew it was him. I also found out that a few people he had slept with prior to me had it. He kept blaming me and saying some messed up stuff and we ended up breaking up.
I had known that the relationship had almost run its course anyway, so that didn’t really hit me hard, but a lot of the things he said to me toward the end did. Anyway, I picked up the antibiotics for the both of us. My best friend had taken them before and told me that they give you a horrid stomachache and the worst diarrhea imaginable.
And they definitely did. I decided to wait a couple of days until I was off work and could stay home to take them. I was pooping every five minutes all day long. When I gave the antibiotics to my ex, I was feeling extra petty that day and told him that he should take the antibiotics before work in the morning because I had taken them at night and they had me so wired I was up all night. I genuinely hope he pooped himself at work.
Road Trip Gone Wrong
When I was in my 20s, I went on a cross-country road trip in an RV just for fun. I would just drive from town to town eating food and checking out cool stores and places. Livin’ the dream, right? It was a fun way to spend the summer. Well, it would have been—if I hadn’t done something stupid in one of the towns I visited.
I don’t know why, but when I was in one of the stores, I took something that was worth a lot of money. I was caught, cuffed, and jammed in the back of a squad car. On my way to wherever it is they take you, the cop got called to something urgent. He left me locked in the back of the car (with the AC on, what a guy) and went into a business.
I tested the door handle for kicks and it wasn’t locked. I got out of the car and ran a couple of streets over to my RV. I got into it and was able to pull one of my hands out of the cuffs. I started up the RV and drove out of town. I had never given them my name and, luckily, I had left my wallet and cell phone in my RV.
They recovered the item I took but had no way of identifying me. Thankfully, I have never heard anything else about it since.
A Very Difficult Decision
toddler's walking on the seashore with adultPhoto by Guillaume de Germain on UnsplashWhen I was 17 and pregnant for the second time, I decided to give the second child up for adoption. I was so scared and I already had a child who was a little over a year old. I didn’t even get to see my son after he was born. I spent the next two weeks bawling. That’s when I made a devastating realization. I had to take him back.
I had to go to this poor woman’s house and get him. Seeing her heartbroken face was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do. In my heart, my heartbreak was worse. Maybe that makes me selfish but he came from my body and I couldn’t imagine a world without him. When I got home, my mom kicked me out and had my stuff on the lawn.
I ended up getting my act together and working 80 hours a week to support myself and my babies. It felt got to figure out my life. My son is now 23 and amazing. I don’t regret my choice at all, but I live in fear of my kids somehow finding this out. I don’t want them to ever know, especially my son. I’m afraid he will think I didn’t want him.
Hot For Teacher
I make good money writing adult short stories—but that’s not the shocking part of my secret. One of my recurring characters is based on one of my professors at university. He recently came across one of my stories and recognized my writing. I couldn’t believe it when he actually sent it to me, offering corrections and tips. He knew it was based on him. He knew I have a thing for him. We ended up hooking up.
Catch Me If You Can
After a semester of community college, I ended up working as a summer intern at a job where even the most junior positions require a minimum of two university degrees. I was given this unpaid position for six weeks as a favor to a friend of mine. And let me just say, I was super-grateful at the time, even though I didn’t know what the future would hold.
I’ve now been at the company for more than 30 years. I’ve risen up the ranks to increasingly complex positions with additional responsibilities. I now supervise people with multiple university degrees and each of them with a wealth and breadth of knowledge in complex subjects where any mistakes will have dire personal, professional, and corporate consequences.
I’ve won multiple regional and national awards for achievements in my field and I’m often called on to mentor younger employees who have more letters and abbreviations after their names than my doctor has. But there’s something that none of them know.
I don’t even have my high school diploma. Nobody has ever asked me about my education.
Time To Face The Music
In my first year of high school, we had a music competition. I think this was an attempt to get kids to not drop the subject when they got to choose which subjects they’d take. I entered the composition category and fully intended to make my own song. I was into techno at the time and was trying to learn tracker-style music sequencing software.
I procrastinated and didn’t have anything worthwhile, so I ended up submitting one of the demo tracks that came with the software. The night of the contest, I discovered that the only other entry was from a couple of special-needs students who just played the same two chords over and over. I was too scared to drop out because it would mean owning up to my plagiarism.
Needless to say, I won the category, but I felt pretty awful about it. To make things worse, the music teacher played the whole song for the class and tried really hard to get me to take music as one of my exam subjects.
Blood Is Not Thicker Than Money
I found out about a year ago that after my dad perished, the will named me as the primary heir to his small accumulation of wealth. I was 15 at the time. My parents were divorced at the time and my mom arranged to have all of his life savings put away until I was 18. The problem was I never received any of that money—and the reason why was twisted.
I found out that my mom secretly hid the money from the family and lied and said he barely left us anything. She ended up buying our family house outright with the cash that was meant to go to me and my brother. She also bought herself some nice jewelry and went on a couple of holidays. For a while, I considered getting a lawyer, but I decided to play dumb about everything.
If it got out that she had done this, it would totally tear the family apart again. So now I’m a broke 23-year-old saving up for my own house penny by penny all while knowing for a fact that there’s about $450,000 that should have been mine. My close friend is married to a lawyer and he reviewed my case and my evidence.
The lawyer said that if I took this to court it would be a slam dunk and over and done within a couple of months. I won’t do that to my brother and I won’t do that to my family. But I still have a plan. When I’m 30 and starting a family, I will sit her down and tell her she can quietly work out a plan with me to give me what is rightfully mine.
For now, she actually thinks she’s fooled me. She even goes so far as to lie and complain about mortgage payments. I don’t hate her, I just feel sorry for her. You have to be twisted up inside to do that to your own son and daughter, but here we are. I sincerely hope the lie eats her up at night.
The Truth Is Out There
man sitting on sofaPhoto by Kelly Sikkema on UnsplashWhen I was a teenager, I had a horrible compulsive lying problem. My “stories” controlled my whole life and I completely ruined most relationships before they even got started. Not to mention, my lying made me worse in the head because I bottled up my feelings for many years. Thankfully, I have recently been getting therapy and meds—but there’s been a dark side to my progress.
As part of the healing process, I chose to upend my life by admitting the truth to those I lied to. Some don’t talk to me anymore, which I can understand. It felt good and also horrible, to tell the truth. If you have a similar issue, please talk to someone. Sometimes I still get the urge to lie, but now after I lie, I throw my shame on the table and correct myself.
Don’t Get Mad, Get Even
A couple of my old roommates decided it would be funny to trash my room while I was on holiday in Vegas. I came home to find pizza stuck on the walls, stained sheets, wet toilet paper stuck to the ceiling, and about four unflushed bowel movements in my en suite toilet. It was definitely not the homecoming I had expected.
Being a rather quiet and non-confrontational man, I laughed all of this off, but on the inside, I began planning. I decided to get them where it hurt. So, when they were out one night, I peed into their orange juice. The next morning at breakfast, I happily watched them dig into it. To this day, no one knows about this.
Kids Are Cruel
I used to get bullied because of severe eczema on my face. I had no eyebrows and my skin was very flaky and red, which earned me the nickname “Alligator Girl”. I am now on medication, which has made me totally unrecognizable. My glow-up has given me a bit of imposter syndrome and I have experienced some pretty privilege. I live in fear of people finding out about my unattractive past.
Coming Clean
I was an addict in my 20s. I’ve been clean for nine years, and no one I work with, or associate with at this point in my life (besides my wife, kids, and immediate family), knows that 10 years ago I was an unrecognizable shell of who I am now. It definitely wasn’t easy, and I still have a lot of baggage from that time of my life.
The hardest part was cutting out all the people that I had been “friends” with (AKA using buddies) for almost a decade. As soon as I stopped using, they quit hanging around.
Take The Money And Run?
I’m a trauma surgery nurse and I found a devious loophole in my job. I’m now making almost as much as some of the doctors. I basically work smarter, not harder. My coworkers, and even my boss, don’t know. My boss just adds up the hours but never sees the amount I’m paid—only the payroll department knows what I’m actually making.
What I’m doing is kind of hard to explain, but nothing I’m doing is against the law. We have about 3,000 employees at my hospital and I’m a casual call employee. I pick up trauma shifts from traveling nurses, but I’ll charge them $100 to 200 a shift for picking it up. They get paid so much that they are happy to pay me that.
As permanent employees, they get paid double to work a trauma shift, plus a bonus and multiple differentials. Since I’m casual call, I get a 15% differential that other employees don’t get. Then I get extra because of my master’s (even though I’m doing a regular RN’s job and not a master’s level job). All of that then doubles when I work a trauma shift.
In 2022, I only worked for about 25 hours per week. My other coworkers, in the same position, working 40 hours per week, make a quarter of what I make for four times the work. If the other nurses find out, no one will want to work full time and the administration will reconfigure how I’m paid. I’m going to quietly ride this out for as long as possible.
Small Slip, Big Consequences
white ceramic mug filled with coffeePhoto by Nathan Dumlao on UnsplashI’ve never told anyone this, not even my therapist, and it’s my biggest regret. This happened over five years ago and it still haunts me that I was even capable of this. My girlfriend was talking about breaking up with me after we had been together for five years. The next day, she said she was just in a mood and told me she loves me and that I should forget about that conversation.
We had makeup nookie. But I had an intrusive thought: “If you get her pregnant, she’ll stay”. I quickly realized I’d made a horrible mistake.
The next morning, I slipped the morning-after pill into her coffee. I didn’t feel like too much of a terrible person because she had always been adamant that under no circumstances did she want a child until she had finished law school. But I was in for a surprise. She still got pregnant. It was a nightmare.
She wanted an abortion. I paid for everything, held her hand the whole way through, and helped her however I could. We broke up a few years later, but it was unrelated to the unwanted pregnancy. I still feel like an absolute jerk whenever I think about what I did to her, and what it ultimately resulted in. I want to say I was a naive young adult, but I had already graduated college by then, and I was fully aware that what I did was against the law.
I’m aware that what I did was monstrous, and I have to live with that every day. I want to say that I had no clue what I was thinking, but I absolutely do, and that terrifies me. If I could take it back I would. While she was emotionally, verbally, and even sometimes physically abusive to me, she 100% didn’t deserve that trauma.
The Heart Wants What It Wants
During COVID, I got so bored during lockdown that I made a Selena Gomez stan account on Twitter. I had a cute anime profile pic and everything. All my mutuals thought I was their babygirl. The funny part is that I’m also a truck driver who looks like a lumberjack and an oil rig worker. In other words, I’ve held my masculinity to high standards, so if this ever gets out…
Putting In The (Self) Work
I am not actually in therapy. Not because I don’t believe it doesn’t work or help me. I am 25 and have spent more than 16 of those years with different therapists, psychologists, and psychiatrists dissecting and analyzing my thoughts and feelings. The problem is that my parents don’t accept any form of self-discovery unless they think it comes from a professional.
I have grown more in the past two years from being 8,000 km (5,000 miles) away from them and just writing down and processing my feelings than I have from any doctor they’ve sent me to. So I came up with a plan to fool them.
My parents never acknowledged my growth until I started falsely using the phrase “my therapist told me to”…
Ever since I started doing that they have had nothing but praise for how hard I’ve been working on myself and how much better I’m doing. They have finally understood things I’ve been trying to explain for almost a decade just because I told them that my therapist said it instead of me.
It isn’t costing any of us any money but if they found out they would definitely freak out.
Snitches Get Stitches
I shared a physics class with twin brothers who were disruptive, nasty, and sociopathic. When they finished school, they were often in and out of prison. One of them even served time for trying to bump off some guy. One time, these brothers burned all of the trees on a sacred plot of land near where I lived.
I knew it was them. One of them took a reel of phosphorus from the school lab. They’d been fascinated with it since we had done an experiment earlier in the week. The authorities knew that the fire had been started with a reel of phosphorus tape. I told the principal. If the twins ever found out that I did this, I hate to think what they’d do to me—even 25 years later.
Thankfully, they’ll never know and I spend the majority of my time in two different countries anyway. so even if they did find out somehow—oh, let’s face it, they wouldn’t be smart enough to find me. Law enforcement was able to prove that it was them and they confessed. Their excuse? They wanted to see how fast it would all burn.
By The Seat Of Their Pants
This happened to me on the job when I was working as a paramedic. We were on the way to a chest pain patient and I suddenly had an intense need to pass gas. There was no way I could hold it in. That’s when disaster struck. Unfortunately, my bottom burp added some weight and color to my white trousers. Since we were on the way to a job, though, there was nothing I could do.
So, during the whole job, I made sure to keep myself turned in a way that ensured no one was ever behind me, including my colleagues, the patient, his wife and son, and later on the hospital personnel. I wore my jacket tied around my hips like an idiot as well. It all worked quite well, but, wow, was that a tough moment.
Cheating Hearts
shallow photography of man hugging woman outdoorsPhoto by freestocks on UnsplashI had a very romantic affair with an older married man. It was awesome. I had known this man for a few years and he was very handsome for his age. He was in his 50s and I was 32. He took care of himself and was exceptional in the bedroom. He would whisk me away to different countries and was always a complete gentleman.
I do not condone sleeping with married men or women, and would never do it again. In my defense, he was a good stress release from the abusive on-again-off-again relationship I had with my ex. His wife was an annoying and emotionally abusive Karen, but I believe they’re trying marriage counseling at the moment. Did I mention that he is a politician?
From Side Hustle To Main Gig
I was recently fired from one of my jobs because they found out I share naughty content on an online subscription service. I told my husband that I was let go because I stood up for myself in front of the wrong people, which was an incident I had been reprimanded for the day before. I paid for my kids' Christmas with that money and I plan to continue so that I can make up for the lost income stream.
Take To The Grave
My father caught my grandfather cheating on my grandmother in the 1990s. For reasons unknown, the lady in question revealed their 40-year affair and gave my father picture proof that she had been dating my grandfather since the 1950s. My grandfather was violent when he was younger, so my father decided to keep the affair a secret to protect my grandmother—but he still used it to his advantage.
My father threatened to show the picture to my grandmother if his father ever became aggressive again. Unfortunately, my father passed before he had the chance to tell her the truth. My grandparents are still married, and this secret would do some crazy damage to our family today—especially since my grandfather now has dementia, and would ironically be blissfully unaware of it all.
Secret Shopper
Almost 20 years ago, when I was about nine years old, I used my mom’s credit card information to buy some toys from a random website. The site was obviously 100% fake but I was a kid and didn’t know much about anything at the time. The next day, my mom freaked out when she found out that there was a $500 transaction she didn’t make.
The people at her bank wanted to look at my computer, but, thankfully, she told them that I couldn’t have done it because I didn’t know anything about credit cards or online shopping. Just a few days before my little mistake, she had been traveling, so to this day, she believes that someone in Perú had taken her credit card information.
Secret Snacker
I had food intolerance until I hit puberty. For the first 13 years of my life, I could only eat chicken, potatoes, rice, beans, and bread. I was not allowed to eat anything else—and no spices either. So every time there was an event or a party, I would bring my own chips and that was all that I was allowed to eat.
Eventually, though, I would eat what the other kids were eating. From there it developed to taking banned foods from the supermarket so that I could them out myself. I did this for many years until the doctor told me I no longer have food allergies. If I had been caught back then it would have backfired pretty hard on me.
Prom Crashers
woman in blue sleeveless dress wearing blue and white floral tiaraPhoto by Todd Cravens on UnsplashWhen I was a senior in high school, I went to prom with a group of friends. I had bought a single ticket, not a couple’s ticket. One of my friends knew a guy who wanted to go to our prom but couldn’t because he went to a different high school, so I let him walk in next to me and pretended he was my date. Thankfully, nobody looked closely enough at my ticket to realize it wasn’t for two people.
You Can’t Pray A Lie
In my junior year of high school, I had to write a six-page paper on The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Ugh. During Spring Break, I found out that my sister had the same assignment two years prior. I asked if I could use her paper, which she had got a 91% on, and she told me it was fine as long as I denied that she had anything to do with it if I got caught.
So I changed about 30 words to better fit my writing style, updated the MLA format to the present (it had changed slightly in those two years), and copied it into a new document (in case the metadata was ever looked into). I ended up getting a 99% on it and aced the course. My sister, to this day, still claims I owe her one.
Unexpected Consequences
A year ago, my secret would have been “people finding out that I’m bi”. I lived 36 years of my life as a hetero man with a wife and two kids. Denying that part of my identity did me no favors. In March, I came out to my partner of 16 years. It did not go well. My already fragile marriage was ruined. I may have lost my wife but I didn’t lose anyone else.
My daughters, father, mother—everyone that mattered understood and accepted me. I now have a new partner who loves and accepts me for who I am. I was able to keep the house and I get to co-parent our beautiful girls. I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. This won’t work for everyone, but sometimes it’s healthier, to be honest.
Savage
I used to get along with most of my coworkers, but not this one particular person. To say I hated her would be an understatement. This one time, she took her wedding ring off and left it on her desk at work. What I did next was absolutely heinous.
I found it and sold it for gold at the pawn shop. Unfortunately, I only got like $60 bucks for it.
Which Witch Is Which
My mother-in-law is hyper-Christian and very anti-LGBTQ+. She is very proud of her relation to a Salem witch trials judge. I am married to her amazing son and his parents have no idea that I’m bi, agnostic-ish, and a witch. My husband knows this and totally supports me but she has no clue. I occasionally attend Bible study with her for the gossip and connections.
All In The Family
women's black shirtPhoto by Ignat Kushanrev on UnsplashLast Christmas I learned that my older sister and I are technically only half-sisters. My sister’s biological father tried to start a relationship with my mom that resulted in a pregnancy and ultimately didn’t work out. That biological father is in heaven now and I didn’t probe into his identity or his demise in case it was painful for my mom.
My mom raised my sister as a widow at my grandmother’s house during the 80s. When she met my father in the 90s, they really clicked. Shortly after, they got married, moved into a new house, and had me. My mom told me to never call my sister my half-sister and just pretend that all of this doesn’t matter. If anyone asks about the 10-year age gap, I just tell them that it’s a long story.
Adult-ish
I feel like I’m pretending to be an adult every day. I do not, whatsoever, feel like an adult. I work 40 to 50 hours a week for a multinational manufacturer in a very fast-paced environment, people come to me for answers all day, I own a vehicle and have my own place, and people say things like “You always have your act together” and “You’re so responsible”. But there’s something that they don’t know.
I have bills and responsibilities like every other functioning adult out there, but it feels like I’m pretending. The absolute truth? Ninety percent of the time I feel like I have no idea what I’m doing. I Google everything. I am incredibly awkward when I talk to people. I feel like I’m just this kid running around playing dress-up with a bunch of real adults.
An Unbreakable Bond
In 2013, it was my first semester of college. I had an anthropology class at 8:30 am and I’m not exactly a morning person. Apparently, this girl I sat next to wasn’t either. It was one of those things where we just saw each other and knew because we were both absolute zombies. We had an unspoken bond: “No one else will understand how much we want to sleep, so let’s just hang with each other”.
We stayed pretty true to that, too. We’d often go for food after class, so, understandably, we got close. But we were both super-religious and thought every form of attraction was some kind of sin. So, as close as we got, we were always kind of awkward with each other. When we got an assignment to go do interviews, it felt natural to go with each other and just help out.
So, we got mine done pretty early in the semester but hers took a bit more planning. We had to drive about two hours to this mountain city where her grandfather lived to talk to him. I didn’t drive at the time, so we took her car. There was about three months’ worth of romantic tension built up between us by then, so the drive was slightly uncomfortable.
Once the interview was completed, we had dinner in a small pub. It was about dusk, and both of us said that we wanted to wander into the forest for a bit before heading back. Just to take in the atmosphere for a while, you know? So we parked by the side of the road and went down into the trees. It was extremely beautiful.
We lived in the desert, where most of the vegetation we were used to was a few palm trees here and there but this was amazing. No sound from the city, no smog from the cars, just people, trees, and silence. She ended up brushing up against me to get past some roots, but in a way that felt almost deliberate. I tested it back by brushing up against her at times when I didn't necessarily need to.
We finally decided to say “screw it” to all our pious fears and just decided to have fun.
I wasn't a virgin at that point, but I had made a lot of really dumb decisions up to that moment, which was why I was as religious as I was. She was a virgin, despite being a few years older than me. There was that feeling that it would last forever and that we would always belong to each other.
Afterward, during our walk of shame to her car, things were obviously awkward. Now, the drive back home was uncomfortable for pretty much the opposite reason as when we were headed up there. The silence gave me a lot of time to think, though. I decided that I was just gonna tell her exactly how much I loved her. Except I chickened out and didn’t say anything.
I don't know why I didn't tell her. I guess because I was freshly 18 and have always been kinda bad with people. It was Friday and I knew I’d see her again on Monday—that would be my moment. Monday came, and I was excited and nervous. I even dressed better than I normally do. She didn't show. We usually didn't question when the other person didn't show, so I didn't think much of it.
When she missed the whole week, I started getting concerned. I tried texting and calling her, but no replies. She missed a second week. That Friday I asked the professor. Turns out, he had just got the news and was going to tell the class before he began the lecture. On the Sunday after our forest escapade, she’d been in a car accident and didn’t make it.
For a while, I didn’t react. I didn’t believe it.
I didn't know anything about her family outside of her grandfather, so I used what I could to find her family. I showed up at her brother’s work. He could see that I was pretty shaken as I spoke, and I could see that he was getting kind of agitated, so we decided to wait until his shift was over to talk. He told me about how happy she was in the days before the accident.
He said that she’d been pretty depressed, but had just started to get out of her room more, was getting along with her parents, and was generally more fun to be around. Then he told me that someone had been driving while inebriated and hit her from behind, wrapping her car around a tree. That was what did it. That was the moment that I really felt the impact.
For days I couldn’t do anything. I didn’t WANT to do anything. I failed all but one class that semester. My entire life was basically falling apart. Through all of it, I never really told my parents, friends, or anyone. All they knew was that I was in a pretty bad place.
I’ve had a few attempts at relationships since, but it was hard for me to not feel guilty whenever I got close to someone because I was still in love with her.
I got rid of my belief in God and His “plan”, because how could I justify her senseless demise at the hands of some irresponsible jerk? Since then, I’ve met someone else who has helped me get over my grief. I’ve been pretty open about my baggage, as she was about hers. I’ve gotten a lot more comfortable with my existential awareness too, I guess. So I’m in a much healthier place overall.
Sometimes They Start Young
I accidentally took a bag of shredded cheese from the store. I was seven or eight months pregnant and I had my two-year-old with me. He was sitting in the seat part of the shopping cart. I gave him the bag of cheese to play with and didn’t realize that he somehow ended up sitting on it. As I was loading my groceries and putting him into his car seat, I saw the contraband.
For about two seconds I considered going back into the store to pay for it. I then realized that I was completely OK with being an outlaw. I was also way too tired to walk back into the store at that point. Sixteen years later I’m still sleeping well at night. I now realize why my mom NEVER took us to the store. I’m one of seven kids, so it was her only alone time.
Nightmare Come True
This happened when I was in the 8th grade. We were taking standardized tests (STAAR, I think) and, as someone who’s both shy and has selective mutism, I’ve never been able to raise my hand in class. Anyway, I had to pee. Badly. There were still about 20 minutes left before the bell would ring, so I figured I could make it. Big mistake.
The pee just started and I could NOT stop it. I just sat there in the classroom, sitting in my own pee, which was also running down my legs. I didn’t move until the bell rang, and everyone left. This one girl I didn’t know stood at the door and really tried to get me to leave. I think she knew what I did and was trying to make fun of me.
Once everyone was out, my teacher asked what was wrong. I started to cry and told her that I had an accident. She told me to wait there, and then she went and got two other teachers. The three of them literally guarded me in the hallway so no one would see my wet jeans as I went to the office.
They gave me a change of pants and I went home. I would just like to give a shout-out to those teachers because, honestly, I’m sure there are teachers out there who have just sent me to the office and not guarded me to save me from the immense embarrassment and ridicule that would have come from getting caught with wet pants.
Potluck Hack
brown wooden spoonPhoto by Jason Tuinstra on UnsplashWhenever I’m cooking for people or bringing something to a potluck, I put a little more than double the amount of salt called for in the recipes. This means I never have to bring home leftovers because the dishes are scraped clean. Yes, my super-secret confession is salt. I don’t want to get the stink eye from my health-conscious friends.
Well, That Was Unexpected
When my sister was going through a mental health crisis she decided to spill all of my secrets to our family and friends. She resented the fact that I was trying to convince her to get help and she felt that exposing me would take the heat off of her. She was trying to deflect attention from herself and if she was going down, she was going to take me with her.
She exposed a lifetime’s worth of sins and regrets that I would change if I could go back in time. Nothing I did was against the law, but some people would consider it immoral. It was very personal stuff that I never wanted to share. Well, everybody knows now! It opened up conversations that I never intended to have with our family.
I offered to have an open dialogue with our family and answer any questions but no one cared. Well, my sister’s plan completely backfired on her.
In fact, I received love and support while she’s been completely ostracized by most of our family. They found her behavior to be self-righteous and deplorable. Being found out didn’t ruin me, it freed me.
Time To Embrace Neurodiversity
I am autistic with hyper emotionalism and near-savant level “hobbies”, which I never tell anyone I am good at. I hate the way my brain is because it has driven so many people away from me. All my life, my mom has told me that she is thankful that she and my dad had me because I’m so difficult that anyone else would have bumped me off.
She says that they love me for my issues and difficulties and cried with me when I couldn’t handle the feelings or sensory stimulation I had. I hate it. I just wish I was normal. I don’t want the IQ or the “Oh wow, you must be a genius”! No, I just have a brain malformation that makes it seem like I’m a genius on an IQ test.
When I have been put in a social situation without my medication, I’ve been called crazy, weird, a bad friend, and egotistical because I can’t stop talking about my specific “hobbies”. My secret is that sometimes I tell people I have Borderline Personality Disorder because I’d rather have people think that I have something that can be fixed.
It sucks that this is actually who I am and I’m just a screwed-up person. The only people who have ever loved me for all my weirdness and craziness, other than my mom, are my spouse and her daughter. Somehow, they just think my weirdness is endearing. They’re amazing actually. I just don’t like to embarrass them and stuff.
The Bad Old Days
Back in the 90s, when I was about six or seven years old, I was abruptly woken up by my mom saying that two kids from my class were at our front door with their mothers. They had told their moms that our teacher had inappropriately touched them and they wanted to speak to everyone in the class before going to the authorities.
That night, my mom asked me if our teacher had ever done anything to me and I told her no. She was so relieved. I will never forget how terrified she was right up until I said no. My dad was with me when I gave my statement to the authorities and I again said nothing happened. I lied. I was just so terrified of getting into trouble and upsetting my parents.
The case went to court and the teacher was found not guilty as there was no evidence. Mind you, this was a long time ago when kids were not believed as easily as they are now. I have spent the past 27 years of my life keeping this secret and trying to block out most of the memories.
Before the accusations, this teacher had wanted to take me and two other girls on a weekend trip to a nature reserve. Thank God my mom refused. I have vague memories, but I always wondered if my testimony would have made a difference. Am I the reason he never went to prison? I am terrified he went after more victims because I stayed silent.
Blame COVID
My husband and I were kept apart for two years during the mess that was the pandemic. During this time I was also waiting for my Green Card which meant that I couldn’t visit him. He came over to visit me once during the two years, and I noticed that he had a dating app on his phone. I decided to sneak a peek into his phone.
I checked his messages and I could see that he had been talking to a woman on there. It was obvious from the messages that they had met up and done the deed. From what I could tell, they only did it once and there weren’t a whole lot of messages after that. I’ve never confronted him about it and I don’t really want to.
Since I’ve been in the US, he’s been super attentive and loving. As far as I can tell there are no dating apps on his phone or computer. I feel that if I told him I know, or told any friends or family, they would push for me to leave him and think I was an idiot if I didn’t. We have a baby boy now and I would never want to disrupt our lives over a meaningless one-night stand.
Get Thee To Therapy
a person in a hospital bed with an ivPhoto by Olga Kononenko on UnsplashThere’s a big gap on my resume—and the reason why is seriously twisted. My wife and I tried to end our lives together and wound up in the hospital for a couple of weeks. I don’t know if it would ruin our lives if it became public, but it would complicate things. After the first month of caring about our mental health, our close family went back to the mindset of “If I can't see your mental illness, it’s not a true illness”.
The Cat’s Out Of The Bag
When I was five, I would regularly get the family cat to attack my little sister when she was in her baby walker device. I hated her and I wanted to get rid of her, so I tried to get the cat to get rid of her.
Ultimately, the cat just ended up scratching at her feet and my parents got rid of the cat. They gave it to one of their friends.
Misplacing The Blame
Once, in high school, I got really sloshed and secretly took a dump in a friend’s car. The consequences were disturbing.
He ended up being so convinced that his girlfriend did the dirty deed that he ended up breaking up with her over it.
Being let go from your job is never a pleasant experience.
Particularly if it comes out of nowhere, without any possible warning that this was a possibility.
Even if it isn't any more pleasant, generally speaking, most people have at least an inkling of why they were let go.
Budgetary reasons, dissolved departments, being told you weren't meeting company standards, or bad blood with the boss.
As well as some less common, highly unusual reasons which at least might make a good story down the line.
Redditor Sweetlo123 was curious to hear from people who were let go from their jobs, and why they were met with this fate, leaving them to ask:
"What did you get fired for?"
For Standing Up For What's Right.
"We were told we get OT for night work."
"The new 'company manager' let it slip that we don't actually get OT for night work, so when I was scheduled for five nights in a row working on a transmission line cell site I mentioned that I expect everyone working from our company on site get OT."
"Once it was said that we won't get OT and that it wasn't an actual policy (was written in employee handbook), I forwarded the email chain to the entire company and leadership at Verizon."
"I was canned, but now everyone gets OT for night work."
"My life is better now anyway and got my people what the deserve."- drklunk
This Was Never Going To End Well...
"Aggressively squeezing breakfast muffins lol."
"I was a few days into working at Mcds and someone complained I gave them a muffin that was too hard-they bake them at like 3 am and sit in a warmer all day."
"This was before they had the full bakery menu, I think muffins was the only thing baked and maybe cookies."
"So my manager told me to squeeze them before I hand them out."
"Me being a dumb teenager squeezed the s*it out of these muffins and got another complaint."
"They stopped scheduling me, haha."- eatmyknuts
You Have To Do The Work To Get Paid...
"I just stopped working and began only attending meetings."
"Lasted almost 9 months that way before they let me go."- frantictossing
martin freeman sleeping GIFGiphyWrong Time, Wrong Place
"I was fired after a month into my first job at a local pizza joint when I was 16."
"They called me during the Super Bowl and said I had to come in."
"I told them I was out of state without a car so no way I could make it."
"They said I should’ve known this was one of the busiest days of the year and I should’ve stayed in the area."
"I came in to work my next shift and they just gave me my paycheck and said they had to let me go for not being a team player."
"10 years later I was fired from a job in tech because I refused to move out of state."
"This one hurt a lot more."- seventyfive1989
Hard Not To Say They Had It Coming...
"The company's timeclock software ran off of the computers time, so when I was late I would just close the software, change the time back to before shift start and then clock in and change it back."
"The supervisor who showed me the trick fired me."
"A day or two later he saw me pulling in late, and when he went over the time info that day, it showed me clocked in on time."
"He knew why."- Grief-Inc
Nepotism Always Screws Someone Over...
"Worked at a gas station and was a sucker for the free soda."
"I would drink a few 24 oz glasses of Dr. Pepper (don’t judge) per shift and had to piss relatively frequently."
"I usually worked with the same lady every shift and every shift my drawer came up short even like $10-20 bucks."
"One day my usual co-worker was off and I worked with another lady who warned me to watch my drawer around the other and hers had been short when she was around."
"That got me to thinking."
"The next shift with the usual lady I stuck some receipt paper into the lip of the bottom of my drawer and hit the bead."
"When I came back the paper was on the floor."
"My drawer was short $20 at shift change and my boss fired me."
"I told her of my findings and asked her to review the security tape."
"She told me to f*ck right off the other lady had been there years."
"I left heart broken and rented some VHS tapes to indulge in and recover."
"One of the movies was Casino and man is that a good movie."
"Come to find out the usual lady was the boss lady’s cousin and they f*ckin told people I knew I got fired for stealing money."
"I though about calling a lawyer but also, I was in high school and was delusional I suppose."
"I got out of that town after high school and rarely return, especially considering all my family moved off."- woohhaa
Snl Smiling GIF by Saturday Night LiveGiphyThe Age Old Story Of Men In Power
"Caught the boss stealing."
"So he fired me."
"His word vs. mine and it didn't go my way."- freezingprocess
People Tend To Get What They Deserve
"Embezzled almost $500,000 from the doctor's office I worked at."
"Oh no, wait."
"That was my former supervisor who did that...26 years after she fired me for taking home a left over slice of pizza after a drug rep hosted a pizza party for the office staff."
"Karma can take a long time, but it always comes through."- YourFront
Late To The Game...
"Being the last hired when they instituted layoffs."- BubbhaJebus
Some Plans Can't Be Cancelled
"1970s YES 'Close to the Edge' tour."
"I had my tickets and had the request approved for time off, they changed their mind at the last minute and would not let me off."
"Pfft."
"Left anyways and was genuinely surprised when I got back on Monday and they informed me that I was fired."-AmandaBRecondwith
Treat Others Like You Want To Be Treated
"My boss was talking sh*t about me to employees, and I confronted her with 'how would you expect the people below me to respect me when you show them that you don’t?'"
"She didn’t like it and literally went crying to the owners, who then fired me for 'causing problems'.”- Successful-Snow-562
For Literally Doing What They Were Supposed To
"I got fired for slacking off and underperforming at work by taking my legally required lunch."- 10leej
Hungry Lets Eat GIF by TRTGiphyThey Couldn't Have Waited One Day?
"Worked as a QA tester for an online game company."
"Found bug while on my personal account at home."
"Came in the next day and reported the bug."
"I was VERY clear I found the bug while playing at home on my personal account."
"It was a nasty bug that let you duplicate very expensive items."
"A few weeks later someone in customer service was checking the logs for people exploiting the bug."
"They found mine and the company decided to fire me on my birthday."
"That was around 15 years ago but it still upsets me every year, on my birthday."- PedanticCyborg
While most believe "ignorance is bliss", anyone handed a pink slip deserves to know why.
Even if sometimes the reason gives no closure whatsoever, and instead only results in even more questions.