Clever People Reveal How To Smoothly Exit Conversations With Crazy People
Clever People Reveal How To Smoothly Exit Conversations With Crazy People
[rebelmouse-image 18347149 is_animated_gif=This thread is dedicated to the moments when out of nowhere, someone's crazy pops out. Ask yourself: could people tell a story about you being crazy?
cookbook54 asked, When did you realize someone was insane during a conversation, and how did you get yourself out of it?
Submissions have been edited for clarity, context, and profanity.
K is not fine...
[rebelmouse-image 18347150 is_animated_gif=My first job was at Target. I was in the food avenue section which is where you would buy popcorn, nachos or soft pretzels (most have been converted to Starbucks by now.)
Anyways, there was this lady K who would come in quite often. She had a little cart with 2 wheels that she pulled behind her, full of stuff. She would wear baggy dresses and hacked the hair up front in jagged pieces to the scalp like a mangy Benjamin Franklin. K would wander around for awhile and then come to food ave and buy a sandwich.
Whenever we exchanged money she would ask me if she swallowed or was choking on any change. I would calmly look at her and say "Nope K, you're just fine," sometimes repeating myself 4 or 5 times.
One day she looked at me and said " Thank you for being so kind and not treating me like I'm crazy. Everyone else does. When I was a little girl I saw my Grandmother choke to death."
Can you F_CKING IMAGINE? This was 15 years ago. I hope K has found peace and contentment wherever she is.
I'd just as soon stay home.
[rebelmouse-image 18347151 is_animated_gif=Back when my mom owned a bookstore there was a woman like this.
Serena was morbidly obese, smelled terrible, and always wore a dirty Santa hat. Normal enough woman just clearly had some maintenance issues. So for years she would come into the store and buy like 1000s of dollars on books. Customers complained every once in a while but the majority knew her pretty well.
One day my mother asks her about the hat. Apparently, when she was in 2nd or 3rd grade her class was being led to the auditorium by their teacher. It was around Christmas time so Santa hats abound. Her teacher wasn't so much in the spirit and was lacking a hat.
Her teacher tripped on the stairs, falling and just destroying her head on the way down. Apparently, an EMT was saying that she would have lived if she had just been wearing a little padding up top....like a Santa hat.
And so Serena refuses to remove her Santa hat, for fear she will trip and die for lack of padding.
Really sweet woman, wonder how she's doing.
When your farts are the special farts.
[rebelmouse-image 18347152 is_animated_gif=So I went into a McDonald's and this woman recognized me from some of the college classes we had together. I think. Well, at any rate, she seemed pretty certain, and she seemed like she might be familiar; two eyes, a nose, some hair, I might've seen her before.
She started telling me that her friend was psychic, could feel people's energy, and could read her mind. Now that's not the weirdest thing I've ever heard and I'd probably have been ok with that.
Then she started telling me about the radio DJ out of the next town over who was watching her in her house with video cameras hidden in her shower. She knew he was watching her because during his broadcasts he would play certain sound effects and tell jokes about her every time she farted.
I told her I had to get going, I was just there for a carry-out and there were some people waiting in the car.
Men who need to fully control women... why?
[rebelmouse-image 18347155 is_animated_gif=Went on two dates with a guy.
I saw some red flags but weren't sure they were red at first. We'd be texting and he'd say I was bad at little things. Basically negging, but sometimes the way it was said, I couldn't tell if he was serious or not.
It was all in my mind that it could be a red flag, but I decided on a second date.
He started saying how I needed to paint my nails, but only certain colors. He was serious. He also ordered a bunch of stuff for me that I told him I didn't like and then tried to get me to drink/eat it.
Basically, my wants were completely ignored and by the second date he had a list of little things he deemed me bad at - like he didn't like the way I hugged.
I decided to nope out. So I told him thanks, but I didn't see us working out.
He flipped shit. Said my insecurities and fear were showing, and he could see why I was single.
So I was like omgnohelpme.
I told him to stay away. I wasn't interested.
He told me I just needed some time to think it over. To calm down (????). Then the best part came: he said I was his girlfriend.
I told him I wasn't. He said no, I was.
He was attempting to force me to be his girlfriend.
So I got the out, blocked him on everything, and 8 months later he's still trying to contact me. Like wtf.
When you're in a manic state, but really good at making a show of it.
[rebelmouse-image 18347156 is_animated_gif=I was at a family wedding, and there was this guy I didn't know that was amazing on the dance floor. He had decent moves, but it was more than he was so dedicated to his dancing, so charismatic, that he really drew the eye. Anyway, my father in law got to talking to him and eventually drew me into the conversation. Dancer guy had been telling my father in law in great detail about a recent manic episode during which he'd emptied his bank account (shared with his wife) bought a boat and sailed it from the US to Denmark, and then stayed there in a drunken stupor for weeks before it finally occurred to him that he needed to tell his wife where he was, and also that they couldn't afford a boat. Partway through the conversation, it became obvious that he was currently in another manic state. But he was very engaging, so we didn't try to extricate ourselves from the conversation. Eventually, his wife dragged him away. We felt bad for her.
Where is she getting her news?
[rebelmouse-image 18347157 is_animated_gif=I have a coworker who's a real chatterbox. It starts innocuously enough; what she had for dinner, how her husband is doing after his car wreck, what happened at church this past Sunday. She'll ramble on and on and on about this for as long as you'll stand there, only barely giving you a chance to say you've got to go do something else and politely end the conversation.
The best way we at work have found to get away is to signal someone over and turn her attention on to the new victim. The funny thing is that no one, not even me, has caught on to this, and we'll always happily trot over to see what the conversation is about only to get caught in the "death chatter".
However, if she ever starts talking about the news, run for your sanity. I don't know what news channel she watches, but every day it seems she finds a new story about someone is murdering an infant. And it's not something she mentions once and moves away from. She dwells on such things, rambling on about them for as much as half an hour at a go if you stand there and let her mouth run.
This family sounds like a good time.
[rebelmouse-image 18347158 is_animated_gif=For a long time, I complained about my best friend's parents to mine. They never believed me and chalked it up to "teens hate parents, when teens are punished they think parents are evil but it's good for kids". Well, then they met her mom. Her mom tried to convince my dad she had cancer and her medical bills were piling up. She and the family were suffering because of the bills and needed money. The rest of the conversation went something like this "Oh what type of cancer do you have?" -my dad asking a genuine question out of curiosity to hopefully help her "Lung cancer it's specific type of cancer that's modestly rare" "Oh that's horrible, what's your doctor's name" my dad happened to be very very close friends with the only people that treat this type of cancer in the state. She responded with a made-up doctor's name. He knew she was crazy for sure after that.
Pretty sure Hurricane Sandy happened.
[rebelmouse-image 18347159 is_animated_gif=The plumber we called was nice enough, but he started explaining to my wife that Hurricane Sandy didn't really happen, and the storms are due to the government "shooting electrons" into the sky.
At some point, the stories stopped adding up.
[rebelmouse-image 18347160 is_animated_gif=It took me an absurdly long time to find out my good friend was a pathological liar. I just didn't have any good reason not to believe him, and my other friends didn't catch on either. He wasn't malicious or anything. He just wanted people to think he knew interesting people. At some point, the good faith of friendship broke down in the face of the collective weight of his fake stories, and I just stopped talking to him. It did cost me some friends once when I repeated something he had said around a new group of people, and they thought I was the one making it up. What a goddamn mess that was.
It's crazy to think women were "created" to be inferior to men.
[rebelmouse-image 18347161 is_animated_gif=During our small talk since I was seated next to him at a dinner party everything seems cool, then the topic of marriage comes up, and he's flabbergasted I let my wife go to work, drive a car, and not be in my presence. He explains God created women to please and serve their men, and to be in the kitchen at all times, and to basically be a slave to their men. Literally went on for about 15 mins and I seriously thought he was just a chauvinist making a joke but he was dead serious. I excused myself and went to the restroom and thankfully someone took my spot at the table so I had to move to a different spot.
It's crazy to think that insurance is going to pay for a non-medical practitioner, especially without a license.
[rebelmouse-image 18347162 is_animated_gif=Everybody has met her: that loud, apprehensive person with a cracking voice possibly due to being in a constant state of self-inflicted crisis. She says more inappropriate things than appropriate things and her personal life somehow always finds itself leaking into her professional environment. The type of person who will leave mid-meeting with a client to go to Starbucks. Her.
Anyway, like two months after hiring her, she informs us she needs to see a person in Miami (we live in LA) due to some undisclosed arm pain issues. She didn't give us a time frame of return but said it may be months to recover. During this conversation, we found that this was not a doctor (or at least not a licensed medical practitioner) but somebody that her friend recommended. In Miami. For "months." Also, she threatened to sue our insurance company because it didn't cover whatever she was doing and she just assumed it would.
We never saw her again, but she seems to keep bouncing back on her feet in pretty solid positions based on Linkedin.
Who's the crazy one now? Jupiter is a real place!
[rebelmouse-image 18347164 is_animated_gif=I was on my first cruise, a three day trip to the Bahamas and back to Florida. I was talking to a dude at the bar, and ask where he's from. "Jupiter!" is his response. Luckily my buddy came around and I just walked away.
Found out years later that Jupiter, FL is a real place and remembered this guy from the cruise that I thought was nuts.
I was hoping he'd guess the PIN tbh...
[rebelmouse-image 18347168 is_animated_gif=I was in line at the grocery store and this guy was talking to me, mostly a normal conversation and then he started saying he knew what everyone in the store was thinking and how he was from another dimension and I said "uhh ok" and he proceeded to continue on his tirade about knowing everything there is to know, he then proceeded to tell me he knew what I knew, so I said, "if you know everything, then enter my PIN number" (I had already inserted my card into the machine and was getting ready to pay). He stared at me blankly and reality came crashing back down on him. Felt bad for him, but I wasn't going to feed his delusions.
"God told me" is a big red flag...
[rebelmouse-image 18346863 is_animated_gif=My, very sweet, elderly next-door neighbor explained to me how God gave her my house.
She casually told me, "Oh, you should have seen how beautiful it was the day we moved in. I touched your door, and I knew then and there that God wanted me to own your house. You may live in it now, but its only temporary."
It gave me the creeps, but I didn't say anything because her husband mows my lawn for free.
Is this crazy? Or amazing? It's amazing.
[rebelmouse-image 18347169 is_animated_gif=I was sent to a client's office overseas to help them get our product set up. At first, I thought I had a problem with our translator because he told me that their database server was "in the monkey room". I asked for clarification several times. Always "it's in 'the monkey room'." Decided to just ignore it, asked IT for their credentials, and figured I'd check out their server at the end of my week.
On my last day of support there, I went to configure their server. The CEO had a f_cking pet monkey that lived in the room with their database server.
I had to ask the guy I was working with why on Earth this was the case. Apparently, it's the only room with AC strong enough for the monkey to be comfortable, and the CEO didn't have A/C at his house, so, obviously.... stick it with your business-critical server.
I mean, I don't see the animal doing any damage to the server, but it was the single weirdest thing I've encountered in my life.
Let's hope the daycare is only a delusion...
[rebelmouse-image 18347170 is_animated_gif=Started volunteering at a women's shelter, first night at the check-in desk for the clients. Talking with a very well-put-together lady who had traveled all over the world, we spoke of very specific site seeing we had both been to in Egypt, etc. She is obviously highly educated, wearing fine clothing so I finally ask how she came to be at a homeless shelter. She says "I left my CFO position at a huge company in Seattle to take care of my dad who had Alzheimer's. His care cost a lot, I got depressed after he passed away, and here I am. But don't worry, I have a daycare up the hill with 25 children who watch tv all Day in a storage shed. All I have to do is feed them one meal and one snack." My jaw hit the floor. Yeah, she had paranoid schizophrenia and she was delusional. Talk about a 180.
Hey, if calling Sarge helped and made her happy, what's the harm...
[rebelmouse-image 18347172 is_animated_gif=Got called to an old lady's condo about her hearing noises in her attic. I went up and looked and it was all good. Went back 3 more times. Finally, I told her that it might be an animal getting in from somewhere that I couldn't see, but that there was absolutely no one up there (It was a wide open, flat space.) Then she told me that she believed it was the government sending agents to spy on her because she had very valuable information inside her head. She was worried that they were planting mind-reading devices in her home. So after some amusement, I told her "Look, we're not really supposed to do this, but..." and then called my Sergeant. "Hey, Sarge, is Mrs. Larsen on the list? ...yes, yes, THE list.....Oh, really? That's a mistake, she's not supposed to be on it. Cancel the operation for her immediately please. Sure, I'll wait...oh really? That was fast. Great, I'll tell her, thanks!" and hung up. I told her "Ma'am, you WERE on the list, but it was obviously an accident. You've been removed, and I promise you nobody else will bother you. You're all good now. :) " Never heard from her again. The funny part, was that I called my Sergeant out of the blue, and while he knew I was on a call at this lady's place, he had NO idea what I was talking about because I was just talking over him. The whole time I'm spewing my script for this lady to hear, Sarge is on the other end of the phone "What the F_CK are you talking about? ...Are you having a stroke or something?.....I don't understand this at all...."
Toxic AND crazy, didn't Jesus have a female friend?
[rebelmouse-image 18347175 is_animated_gif=I met my friend's super Christian girlfriend for the first time. Out of the blue, she starts asking me questions like if I'm a virgin, who I dated before I started dating my SO, why I didn't have a crush on her boyfriend (he liked me in high school), who her boyfriend liked in high school, who her boyfriend liked in middle school.
It got even weirder after that. My friend and I used to game all the time. After meeting his girlfriend, she told me we can no longer game together. We can't Skype together (we were in different states at the time). We can no longer speak on the phone together. We can't be alone together. We can't even text.
She claims that he's a good, Christian guy, and he needs good, Christian guy friends. Since I'm a girl, she told me that Christian guys shouldn't have friends of the opposite gender.
Unfortunately, my friend is blindsided by his girlfriend, and he chose her over all his female friends. We don't talk anymore . . .
You identify as a crazy racist cat, sir...
[rebelmouse-image 18347177 is_animated_gif=I work in customer service. This dude said he identified as a cat more than a human. He also claimed the police were trying to kill his cats. Eventually, the conversation became about how he was going to starve to death because he didn't know how to cook. He also said he couldn't dine out anymore because there were no places to get real food (hamburgers) in his neighborhood because of "all of the gentrification going on" to his neighborhood.
Time and time again, people spreading lies about others for no reason has demonstrated the lack of humanity in our gossip-obsessed society.
People have nothing better to do other than to bring down others out of spite.
What's even more disappointing is that some of us have at one point played a part in perpetuating these rumors without even knowing it.
And other times, we are the subject of a rumor, and that's never fun.
Curious to hear examples of the situation, Redditor PieNo17 asked:
"What’s the worst rumor you ever heard about yourself?"
Kids can be so cruel.
Introduction To Antisemitism
"I was bullied in elementary school for being Jewish. I very much am not Jewish. Apparently there was a rumor going around school that I was a 'Jew boy.' I was utterly confused and didn’t understand why being Jewish would even be something to be bullied about."
– goobermuslim
The Racist
"Ah, I used to get bullied for being Asian....I am not Asian. Turns out it was a rumor started by a kid who was actually half Asian. I think he just didn't want to be the only Asian kid at school."
– tn00bz
Seeking Pleasure At The Buffet
"When I was in sixth grade our whole grade (~100) was on a field trip out of town. We stopped at an Old Country Buffet to eat. I had to poop while we were there, and another kid in my grade was peeking through the stall at me while I was on the toilet. He then yelled that I was pleasuring myself in the stall. This turned into everyone talking about it outside of the bathroom, and now I was the kid who m*sturbated in an Old Country Buffet."
– slob_johnson
Teacher Killer
"When I was a kid, I was in the (for lack of a better term) special ed program at school due to a muscular condition that affected my fine motor skills, which meant I got bullied mercilessly. Determined to change my rep, I worked ridiculously hard to improve my skills so I no longer needed that program in middle school. Somehow, a rumor got started that I'd been kicked out of that program because I'd tried to kill the teacher, and that became the rumor that defined me until the day I graduated high school."
– jessthefacts97
These Redditors' friends thought they'd seen a ghost.
Wreck Survivor
"I had a car wreck on a country road. Black Cow and calf in the road, and I hit both of them. My mother called into school the next day but pretty much just told them I was in a wreck and nothing else. Word got around that I was dead in a car wreck."
"Showed up at school 2 days later because car wrecks hurt and a couple of buddies actually cried when I showed up saying they thought I was dead."
– DisGruntledDraftsman
Name Mixup
"Once, at work, we came across the obituary of a former coworker. Due to the long hours we were working on this project none of us managed to go to the wake or funeral, but we sent flowers. Months later the dude turned up on another job site, very much alive. Apparently this dude that died was totally unrelated, had the same name and was also an industrial painter… we sent flowers, that must have been confusing for his family."
– trijkdguy
Different Coworker
"Similar story happened to me. Had severe covid at the very beginning of the pandemic. Was out of work for 6 months. Someone with my exact name and in the same town passed away my coworkers thought it was me. Some people didn't even know i was alive until I was back to work for three months"
– ZombieLebowski
The Friendship Test
"That I had died. I woke up one morning to find about 50 messages on my phone and dozens of missed calls (my phone was on silent). It was my ex girlfriend of all people who I spoke with first as she was freaking out because (as it turns out) someone with my name had died. It got lost in translation and next thing you know a lot of my out of state friends thought it was me. It was nice to know they cared so much."
– Yeeaaaarrrgh
Rumors about crushes, love and relationships seem to be a commonality.
Some "Friend"
"My friend introduced me to a girl at his high school and we were into each other. She was having some friends over for a sleepover and took the opportunity to invite me over, cuddle and make out while everyone else was asleep. The next morning we groggily hung out for a bit and made plans to hang out again soon. I’ll never forget how she hugged me and kissed me before I left. I ran into our mutual friend while walking home and I told him where I’d been. I didn’t know that he had a crush on her and he was pissed. By the time I got home, she had blocked and deleted me. I found out later from another friend that our mutual 'friend' had told her that I had an STD and only wanted to use her for sex."
– regnarbensin_
Friendship Destroyer
"Hey, this same thing happened to me! I moved around a lot as a kid and ended up in the same place for 7th to 12th grade. The first few people I met were some kids in the neighborhood, 1 girl and 1 guy. They weren't mutual friends, but I became good friends with both of them and ended up introducing them to each other. The girl and I would stay up late texting on old flip phones and sneak out with each other over the summer. Then, almost out of nowhere, she just stopped talking to me. Turns out the guy developed a crushed and spent literal weeks trying to convince her that all I wanted was sex. Luckily, I was able to find out and defend myself, but unluckily, I found out later that he did that with many, many people. He probably ended up ruining at least 30 friendships with people throughout my time in high school."
– LycheeTrash
A Bad Romance
"i think the only rumor that i ever really heard back in highschool was that i communed with satan. and when a few people asked, i just went with it. i was just like ya, satan and i talked last night, hes doing well. we have dinner plans for the weekend. just stupid stuff like that."
– another-redditor3
We never know how the rumor mill picks some of these out and seemingly distributes them to everyone in our community, no matter how big or small or far away. But we're glad these Redditors were willing to share!
It's a teacher's job to leave a lasting impression and set a good example for their students.
With this in mind, particularly in this age of viral videos and social media, teachers have to be very careful of what they say during class hours.
Even so, there are very few teachers who haven't said something they've regretted when teaching a class.
Sometimes to control unruly students, other times when they've simply had enough.
Then too, sometimes teachers leave their students baffled and perplexed by what they say in their classroom, well aware of what they were saying.
Always making for a memorable story.
"What’s the wildest thing you’ve ever heard teacher say in class?"
And Anyone With Such Closed Minded Views Shouldn't Be Teaching...
"Had the Head of the Department in college claim in class that anyone who actually needs accommodations for mental health issues should not be in college to begin with."
"This was while we were discussing 'Death of a Salesman' and the discussion had veered over to unhealthy pressure and social standards for success."- RavensQueen502
Wait what?!
"My very well-respected Biology teacher in college spent almost an entire lecture telling us that Jamie Lee Curtis was a hermaphrodite."
"It seemed oddly personal to him."- Urbane_Cowboy
Sad On So Many Levels
"Not heard but my freshmen year high school teacher once pulled a bottle of Jack out of his desk and took a shot during class."
"He was dying so towards the end I think he just stopped caring."- Mangothefello
Can't Take The Heat, Then Stay Out Of The Classroom...
"High school science teacher told my class that a kilometre was longer than a mile."
"Refused to budge when refuted and kicked out several students for doing so."- SupersonicDebris13
"5th grade teacher: 'Mount Whitney in California is the tallest mountain in the world'."
"5th grade me blurts out: 'No it isn't, Mount Everest is."
"Whitney is not even the tallest mountain in the USA, which is Mount McKinley in Alaska'."
"I got in trouble for 'contradicting the teacher'."- gtmattz
get out GIFGiphyIt's Not Just Students Who Are Bullies...
"I had a teacher ridicule a fat kid about his lunch choices in front of the whole class."
"He ran out crying as she was making fat guy blimp gestures and telling him he was going to be huge as an adult."- SnooOwls5859
Some Dramatic License It Seems...
"I had a literature teacher who told the class that he didn't believe in dinosaurs, because the universe is only a couple thousand years old."
"The bones were put there by Satan."
"Thank f*ck he wasn't a science or history teacher."- AllBadAnswers
of montreal dancing GIF by Polyvinyl RecordsGiphyEveryone Deserves Nice Acomodations...
"My English teacher told us that he genuinely believes that the Rothchilds own a hotel for aliens in the Bermuda triangle."- TroyLear77
Well, Then...
"We had this kid in our 6th-grade class."
"Very dark skinned kid from Africa."
"His name was Tajak."
"Every now and then when we'd line up to go to another class or lunch and the lights would go out some of his friends would go 'where Tajak at?'"
"Anyway one day we had a sub and we we're lining up for lunch, the lights went out and there went the 'where Tajak at?' and the SUBSTITUTE TEACHER who was also black went 'Boy you darker than night'."
"6th grade was f*cking wild."- 11221mikew
Sad Premonitions
"Psych teacher in high school told us that 1 in 10 of the people were friends with in high school would be dead within 5 years of graduating."
"At the time I thought it was hyperbole, but it turns out he was being conservative."
"3 of the people in my high school friend group were dead by the time I was 22."- Reddit
Do They Really Need A Reason?
"'Now girls, don't you let them boys touch your breasts'."
"'It'll give you cancer'."- jondru
Maybe Should Have Checked With The Geography Teacher?
"A teacher in Elementary school claimed during history class that the Colosseum was in Greece, as an Italian kid I was very confused, this was in Mexico."- Spascucci
So Much For Instilling Hope...
"Didn't hear this personally, but read in a book about a guy who recalled his teacher skipping chapters in a textbook and saying 'You will not need to know this when you are down in the mines'."- futanari_kaisa
The mark of a good teacher is that students will take everything they hear from them with them for the rest of their lives.
Though, the less-than-wonderful teachers may also say things their students will never forget.
People Who've Had A Serious Illness Describe The Exact Moment They Knew Something Was Really Wrong
As a kid, I never raised alarm bells even when I started to feel sick. My mom got stressed easily and was busy taking care of my younger brother, so I never wanted to be a burden by making her take me to the doctor only to find out nothing was wrong.
However, in fifth grade, my ears started to hurt and I knew something was wrong. I told my mom, she took me to the doctor, and I found out I had an ear infection.
Now, an ear infection isn't serious at all, and it was easily treatable. Still, I learned something from that experience: no one knows your body better than you. You know if and when you're sick and how serious it is, even if you don't now exactly what is wrong.
Redditors can corroborate this. Many of them have experienced symptoms that told them they were sick in some way -- usually with a very serious illness -- and are ready to share those experiences.
It all started when Redditor thelearner18 asked:
"People who have had a serious disease (cancer, MS, organ failure, etc) when did you realize something was really wrong?"
A Lesson Learned
"Hust found out i have rectal cancer. 42 yrs old. multiple stools per day, not fully emptying, thin poop. so got a colonoscopy. bam! cancer. starting chemo next week. lesson learned for everyone....if your stools or stool schedule changes, go see a doctor"
– shawngee03
A Lucky Break
"I had been having a lot of pain in my midsection, and all around my torso for several weeks. I went to the doctor and it was dismissed as gynecological cramping (menopausal?). It remained. After several weeks (6-8) I couldn’t take it anymore. I went to emergency in the middle of the night. I got a CT scan that showed a large kidney stone. They also found a mass on my ovary. The kidney stone lead them to finding a rare ovarian cancer. If not for that stone, I wouldn’t have known about the cancer and might not have caught it in time. I have been in remission since September 2021."
– peachsqueeze66
Cause For Concern
"My kid, who was 14 at the time, kept throwing up in the morning and having weird headaches. Her doctor thought it was migraines. She went back a couple of times, but the doctor was not concerned. Then one day she complained of a whooshing noise in her ear. Went to the children’s hospital and found out it was a brain tumor near her cerabellum. She was in ICU for a month, but turned out it was non cancerous and it never grew back. She is doing great now."
– Evilelfqueen
"I heard a whooshing noise in my ear a few years ago I only really heard it at night when it was quiet it would sometimes switch ears now I basically never hear it. I'm pretty sure it was just pulsatile tinnitus but still scary."
– fallen-summer
It Was The Salt
"I have Cystic Fibrosis (terminal lung disease) and it was found out when I didn't sh*t for 3 days after I was born and then my mother gave me a kiss and said I tasted REALLY salty."
"Now I'm on a gene modification drug called Trikafta and this is some serious witch craft a** sh*t because I no longer feel sick to death and I basically feel like a normal person. It's f*cking wild!
"Went from 19% lung function to 87% in 3 months. I no longer cough my a** off or feel like I'm suffocating from mucus. Go science!"
– Sudden_Blueberry_477
A Funky Optic Nerve
"I was diagnosed with MS when I was 22 after having blurred vision in one eye after a ski trip. I went to the optometrist and they said I had a dry eye probably from not wearing goggles while snow boarding. So they gave me steroid drops. After a week it kept getting worse, so I went back and they told me my eye looked much better so they did a field of view test, which showed I couldn’t see anything out of the lower half of one eye. They sent me straight to the emergency room since nothing was wrong physically wrong with my eye. They did some tests and I was diagnosed with MS and ended up going completely blind in one eye. My vision eventually came back and I got on medication within a month so haven’t really had any symptoms or issues since thankfully. I’m only 29 now though."
– johnjohn9312
Caught It In Time
"This isn't me, but this happened to my best friend VERY recently. Like in the last couple of months."
"Was perfectly fine and healthy one day. Then the next he started feeling a little bit of pain in his kidney. He'd had kidney stones before, so he figured it was that again. Then he started peeing blood. He thought it was still part of the kidney stone thing so let it go for a couple days, but he was still peeing blood and the pain was getting worse."
"That's when he decided to go to the doctor. They did an X-ray and found a mass in his kidney and told him that based on where it was located they can't remove the mass, and they can't do a partial kidney removal, and it's about a 90% chance it's cancerous, but they wouldn't be able to do a biopsy without removing the kidney first. They did the whole insurance dance, but it went fast and within two weeks he was in surgery having his kidney removed."
"He's still recovering at home right now, but they got the biopsy results last week. It was indeed cancerous, but they caught it before it spread."
– SweetCosmicPope
Happily Ever After
"I couldn’t walk anymore with my crutch I had been using to get by. Had Been on Percocet for 8 months because of the extreme pain. Nobody was finding answers to my pain but I knew something was wrong, badly. After finally having an ultra sound on my hips at the age of 26 I found out I had to undergo a double hip replacement to walk again due to a serious rare disease. I was stage 4 Avascular Nercrosis. Took a year to recover from both. But Happier ending, I’m doing good now. However it was very very upsetting news to get over a phone call at 26."
– heartpathetic
It Really Sneaks Around
"My wife started getting numbness in her right arm. The breast cancer had spread to her right shoulder and the tumor was crushing the nerves. She has stage four breast cancer in her bones."
– zenos_dog
A Turn For The Worse
"For me, it started May 14, 2014. I went to work and was having a good morning. Then, at about 9:00 in the morning or so, I started to feel some lower abdominal pain. Not to be crude, but it felt like that cramp you get when you really need to go to the bathroom. I did so, but the pain didn't go away. It got worse. I started to feel chills, was sweating, and felt nauseated. My employer has a clinic on site, so I went there. After some poking and prodding, the nurse asked me if I wanted to go home or if I wanted to go to the emergency room. I decided to go home, and if the pain didn't subside, then I'd go to the emergency room. As I was saying that, though, I noticed that my pain had gotten a LOT worse. They always make you rate your pain on a scale of 0 to 10, with 0 being no pain at all and 10 being the worst pain you've ever felt. When I went into the clinic, I was mostly uncomfortable, maybe a high 2 going into a 3. On that very subjective scale, I was now a 6 or a 7."
"I changed my mind and decided to go straight to the nearest emergency room. My boss drove me, and by the time we got there about 15 minutes later, I was now a 10. This was the worst pain I'd ever felt. My previous definition of the worst pain I'd ever felt was when I broke 7 bones in my wrist, it was misdiagnosed as a sprain, and I had to have them rebroken 2 weeks later. The pain in my abdomen was now worse than that. The emergency room admitted me and put me in a wheelchair. They wheeled me to a room, I curled up on the bed they put me in, and passed out."
"At some point, a nurse came in and gave me some morphine. Great stuff. No pain at all anymore. A doctor came in and told me they suspected a kidney stone. He wanted me to get a CT scan to confirm it, and I agreed. An orderly wheeled me off to imaging. I got scanned without contrast and was wheeled back to the room. My wife had arrived while I was getting scanned. Shortly later, the doctor who told me he thought it was a kidney stone came into the room. With another doctor. And two nurses. They all crowd around me with solemn looks on their faces."
"The first doctor told me it was a kidney stone. A 2 to 3 mm kidney stone had been lodged in the ureter of my left kidney. That's the tube that goes from the kidney to the bladder. It passed into my bladder when they gave me the morphine, but they could see evidence of it on the CT scan. Then the other doctor said they were more concerned about the 6 cm mass they found on my right kidney. They had my attention."
"They did another CT scan, with contrast this time, and it was impossible to see anything but a tumor in the pictures they showed me. They made an appointment for me with a urologist for the next day, as well as an appointment in a few days time to get it biopsied. It was an after-hours appointment for the urologist, but he was nice enough to stay late to see me. He looked at the CT Scans and cancelled my appointment to get it biopsied. He said there was nothing else it could be but cancer, and the kidney would have to go."
"Two months later, I had the kidney and the tumor removed laparoscopically. I was incredibly lucky. They caught it in stage 1. The doctor said there were signs it was going to start moving soon. I have no idea how doctors can look at a softball sized lump of cancer and tell anything other than 'gross', but that's why they're the doctors and I'm not."
"My recovery was smooth, and I've been cancer-free for 9 years. I was incredibly blessed. I didn't have to deal with chemo, or radiation. While those can save your life, they are also horrible experiences with nasty side effects. I didn't have to deal with any of them. I was bracing myself to have to. They said it was a possibility. But I didn't. I have every respect for those not as fortunate as me, and wish them all the best in recovery."
– mnementh9999
Reason #5,622 To Start Exercising
"I started jogging again to try and get back into running shape. I kept noticing that just after a mile or so, I'd stop and get REALLY lightheaded. Kept thinking, "oh, I'm really out of shape" and kept going. Went in a few weeks later for my annual physical and doctor said "you ever been told you have a heart murmur?", no. Two months later I spent Christmas of 2017 in the ICU after having a section of my aorta cut out and a new valve put in. Surgeon said it was bad. Said it wouldn't have made it too much longer."
"Edit: for clarification, it was an aortic dissection."
– Itsawlinthereflexes
Slow And Steady
"My dad's friend went on a hike with a doctor who knew him and he was winded not far from the car. The doctor clocked it right away and told him to get his heart checked. He had 98% blockage in his heart arteries."
"He tells my dad so my dad gets the test to see how his arteries are doing and they found a massive aneurism on his aorta. He is getting it removed tomorrow. He had no symptoms but the doctors said if he had overdone it he would be dead before anyone would even know what was going on. Crazy how a random friend's hike may have saved his life."
– Pencilowner
It Takes A Village
"I never did, my teacher and parents did."
"I was seven, usually an active kid and my first grade teacher noticed that rather than running around at recess I sat down and took a nap. It happened a couple more times and after I fell asleep in class (totally out of character), she gave my parents a call, we had been visiting the doc fairly regularly cause I was also complaining of joint pain and frequent ear infections combined with the new symptoms and a new doc at the practice I was finally diagnosed with leukemia."
– greenmachine11235
Thank goodness for that teacher (and of course, the parents)!
When in the beginning stages of dating, it's important to know as much as humanly possible.
The element of surprise is no longer a fun aspect of romance.
Ask the small questions. Ask the hard questions.
Interrogate. Grill. Investigate.
Of course, you should do it with a subtle hand instead of an interrogation lamp.
The truth is all we have.
Ask everything.
Redditor RedditPenguin02 wanted to make a list of the best inquiries to make when starting a relationship, so they asked:
"What is a good question to ask before you start dating someone?"
From what I've learned in my past, always ask... "Are you into Buffy the Vampire Slayer? The TV show."
If it's a no, then it's a dealbreaker.
I Do
Shocked Schitts Creek GIF by CBCGiphy"Are you married?"
wrenchmonkey135
"I would ask that. If they said no, the next question was 'Would your wife agree?'"
"If they laughed, they were telling the truth. If they got indignant and pissed off that I thought they were lying…they were married."
"Worked every time."
Squibit314
We Lived!
"Do you clap when the plane lands?"
dont_u_know
"I swear people used to do this all the time when I was a kid (early 2000’s), and I don’t think I’ve heard anyone do it in 5+ years. I guess 9/11 really made people afraid of flying for about 10 years and then most folks decided they didn’t need to applaud when the plane landed safely?"
jmims98
Family Planning
"Do you want kids in the future? If one person wants kids and the other wants to stay child-free, then they are not compatible. And it is better to try dating someone else."
GoodAlicia
"It confuses me whenever some couples who disagree on this end up in a conundrum because one expected the other to change their mind. This is something I bring up early cause I see no future with someone who wants kids when I do not."
GoodAlicia
"You should always put childfree on your dating profile. It's not a small thing. Either you agree on it or not. If I had to date, I would put childfree on my profile too."
GoodAlicia
Carb it on...
"Do you like bread? That is the extent of my flirting skills."
HumpieDouglas
"Being German, bread is like a frickin' cultural phenomenon here, we have around 300 kinds of bread, there's a bread museum, every time I go on vacation I'm like yeah it's nice here but the bread ain't it yall, never as good as home lol. So yeah, valid question and the only answer to this is an enthusiastic yes."
Nayeliq1
Room Temperature
Frosty The Snowman Winter GIF by filmeditorGiphy"What temperature do you set the thermostat to throughout the year?"
OneFingerIn
"Haha this one always gets me as someone who needs low temps - you can always put on more clothes, I can't peel my skin off to get cooler."
djdante
The thermostat is a dealbreaker for me.
It's gonna be 60. Love it or move on.
Discovery
Blown Away Wow GIF by AminéGiphy"When was the last time you changed your mind about something?
"Opens a window to how they think."
youcantkillanidea
"If that was really early on in the dating I’d think it was a bit of a head-f**k question. I’d probably find that question a red flag, tone dependent, although I agree with the sentiment."
LivestockMarc
Personal Time
"Aside from major differences about finances, kids, politics, or religion, a big one is; What are your hobbies? If they don’t really have any, you may be the next hobby, which isn’t going to work unless you’ve got that kind of time. If the hobbies are time-consuming ones generally done with a SO."
"But you have no interest in them, that could be an issue as well. If only one of you likes camping, wanted to spend vacation lounging instead of exploring, didn’t like sports, etc either that partner is annoyed or the other feels like they don’t get to enjoy what they love."
Githard
Past Issues
"Ask them about their exes. If they think every single one of them is an a**hole... they are likely the real a**hole."
CantTakeMeSeriously
"I have mixed feelings about that - I've been in three previous relationships and all three were emotionally abusive towards me (one wasn't nearly as bad as the other two, though) in various ways. I know this is a common sentiment and it always makes me afraid that people won't believe me or something.
"I mean, I realize in your comment you said 'likely' and not '100% sure' and there's plenty of room for nuance."
phiore
Values
"I would try to take care of any dealbreakers. If I find out that she has different political values than I do, it's not going to work out in the long run, so I wouldn't bother. Same thing with other factors (religion, financial values, etc.). I would also ask how much cuddling she likes to engage in, as I prefer a lot."
SkullKrusher9000
Essentials
Tell Me More To Do List GIF by Disney ChannelGiphy"When I was dating my three essential questions were always kids, sex, and money. If you're not on the same wavelength for any of those three things, just don't even try."
KhaosElement
TRUTH PLEASE!!
"So, how much personal debt do you have?"
"Source: the guy who dated a woman with huge debts and was asked to pay for everything and then some".
"After that, I'd go with, 'Have you ever been diagnosed with borderline, narcissistic, or histrionic personality disorders?"
extracensorypower
The questions are basic.
Just ask for the truth.
Do you have any good Qs to add to the queue? Let us know in the comments below.