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College Resident Advisors Share Their Most Memorable Experience With A College Freshman, And We're Having Flashbacks

Remember freshman shenanigans? Read the tales from the RAs who had to deal with them. There are some gems. College was amazing.

Helperbobby asked, College RA's or Police: Whats the most memorable event you've had with college freshman?

Submissions have been edited for clarity, context, and profanity.


We're starting off on a dark note.

Got a duty call from a worried mom one Saturday afternoon. She hadn't heard from her 18-year old daughter in a few days and wanted someone to check on her. Sure, I said. I go and knock on her door. She's there, just studying. She promises to call her mom.

Next day the student died. She got very sick, called a friend, went to the hospital, and was dead in a matter of hours. I wasn't the last person to see her alive, but I might have been the last to see her healthy. Years later, I can't shake the feeling that her mom had some sort of premonition.

niko81

What could possibly happen to a mattress in a frat house?

I was once notified by one of my residents that her mattress had been "misplaced" and she wanted to know if she would be charged for it or if she was good. I told her she would most certainly be charged for it and then, mysteriously, the mattress reappeared the week before summer closing. I heard through the paper-thin door of her room later that it had been at a frat house for awhile and I dread the thought of what happened to it.

MercilessSoryu

This is how the real learning happens.

I used to catch people playing possum all the time. Basically a bunch of students would climb a tree and drink until they started falling out. Last person in the tree wins.

Found a couple idiots having "lightsaber fights" once. They'd unscrewed the fluorescent tubes and we're having swordfights with them.

One time a whole floor got scabies and were running back and forth from the laundry room washing every single item of clothing and linen they had.

One resident was hiding a homeless person in the TV room. Residents were welcome to have friends on site and they were also welcome to stay in the TV room and the rec center after lockup, they just had to pull the door closed after themselves when they left. This guy was staying in the TV room with his homeless friend until the RAs finished their rounds, locking him in the TV room, going back and sleeping in his own room and then waking up early to go back to the TV room before the RAs came around in the morning unlocking everything again.

I woke up around midnight one night because people were firing Roman candles at one of the buildings. We were having problems with some local kids who kept playing pranks on the residents and naturally I assumed it was them. So I called campus security to deal with it and they ended up rounding up my own residents. After I gave them all write-ups one of them asked me why I didn't tell them beforehand that they weren't allowed to set fireworks off on campus.

Not my hall but still pretty memorable: the RAs from one of the other residences on campus came to us with one of their problems. They kept finding human faeces outside one of their buildings and assumed it was one of our residents playing pranks on them (completely reasonable, we had a weird group that year). I told him that I would keep an ear out. When it kept happening one of their RAs had a stake out and saw the faeces being dropped out of one of the windows. Turns out this resident was setting toilet paper down on his bedroom floor, sh*tting on it and dropping it out the window because he didn't want to use the halls bathrooms.

On the final night in the halls I found a room of people each pouring a beer directly into the carpet for their friends who had left uni before the semester finished.

Best two years of my life.

secondwind93

Your terrible freshman roommate wasn't as bad as this.

My RA friend had a similar strange experience. So the dorm was a big tower. It had sixteen rooms per floor, with four on each side. There was a community bathroom for each floor next to the stairwell and the elevator in the center of the tower. Anyway, despite the simple layout, one of the new students couldn't find the bathroom. His solution? Poop in his own bed and cover it with sheets, and sleep elsewhere. He was discovered about five days after the poop because the smell became unbearable for not only his roommate, but the entire floor. Sometimes I wonder where he is now.

elle_zweig

Legendary.

One of my freshman-year floor mates got kicked out of the dorms before Halloween, so we shotgunned beers and poured some out for him and paraded him out of the dorm. Then we had a candle light vigil for him in the hallway and put up what was essentially a shrine to him hahahaha. Anyone who came to our floor asked us if he died.

TrapLives_Matter

They don't cover this in orientation.

Very first night on call by myself. Watching the news in my dorm room. See my resident's mugshot. The housing staff were unclear on the procedure of what to do when a resident is arrested for murder.

ohheyitsshanaj

I had a fish for like week; knocked the bowl over one day and that was the end of it.

RA a looooong time ago. Group of freshman in a 4 man suite got permission for a pet somehow from the housing office.

They didn't specify it was a f*cking PIG. The smell was unbelievable.

That lasted a couple of weeks until the dean of students finally gave me and the housing office the power to threaten expulsion.

Sittingonthepot

Hoarders: Dorms.

I was neither of those but on my floor (My sophmore year) we had freshmen move in.

This one guy put blankets all over his floor. No big deal I see them do this a lot, the carpet is really ugly and it actually help a lot with cleaning. You roll up the blanket and shake it off outside and wash it. Anyway what this kid did was ridiculous. He had no roommate but he had people over all the time. And whenever he would have people over they made a mess. Instead of cleaning the blankets he just stacked more blankets on top of the old dirty ones. This god so bad and he was so lazy that if he spilled something, or had trash like pizza boxes he didn't want to take out, he put another blanket over everything. This obviously started to smell HORRIBLE so he took air spray and sprayed the crap out of his floor/blanket mattress/room sized couch. So since there was stuff in between the layers of blankets the room was all lumpy and wavy and it started to rise slowly over the year as he piled more blankets.

Christmas Break came. I told the RA about this and he went in to check. The blankets from only one semester had already brought the "floor" to about 6 inches off the ground. You had to STEP UP to get into his room. Something had to be done and he was told to get rid of it or there would be a consequence. I left the building and moved to a closer dorm to the music building for the next semester so I forgot about it.

Come May. I went over to that dorm to pick up a friend to take him back home after graduation. Peeps be moving out of the dorms. I went up to the 2nd floor and there is the grounds team. Using pipe saws and box cutters to cut the dudes now 1foot thick "floor" of blankets into squares to get it out of his room. It was grown through with mould, (of all colors), trash, smelly stuff, and lots of liquid. It was amazing.

Swaglfar

This is peak lazy.

Murderous_Clown had some followup questions: What the f*ck. Where did he even get all those blankets?

Right?

Swaglfar responded: We had a Walmart that sold these multicolored blankets for like 5 - 10 dollars a piece. Pretty large and a decent material.

Crazy or crafty?

Oh god. You just reminded of a resident my ex had to deal with (I was an RA dating an RA lmao) and she did NOT want a roommate. She chose to live in a dorm that required roommates, you could pay more to live alone at a different dorm but I guess she just didn't want to do that.

So what does she do? She pees in her bed until her roommate gets so fed up they move to another room. And when someone comes to check the room? She switches the mattresses so hers is clean and it looks like whoever left, left the pee soaked mattress. It was a nightmare for the RAs of that building to deal with because our Residence Life higher ups were like "we don't care, you have to check the room, it's a safety requirement" but you literally couldn't walk in there without your eyes watering and gagging within seconds.

People are f*cking crazy.

RoomOnFire122

People Reveal The Weirdest Thing About Themselves

Reddit user Isitjustmedownhere asked: 'Give an example; how weird are you really?'

Let's get one thing straight: no one is normal. We're all weird in our own ways, and that is actually normal.

Of course, that doesn't mean we don't all have that one strange trait or quirk that outweighs all the other weirdness we possess.

For me, it's the fact that I'm almost 30 years old, and I still have an imaginary friend. Her name is Sarah, she has red hair and green eyes, and I strongly believe that, since I lived in India when I created her and there were no actual people with red hair around, she was based on Daphne Blake from Scooby-Doo.

I also didn't know the name Sarah when I created her, so that came later. I know she's not really there, hence the term 'imaginary friend,' but she's kind of always been around. We all have conversations in our heads; mine are with Sarah. She keeps me on task and efficient.

My mom thinks I'm crazy that I still have an imaginary friend, and writing about her like this makes me think I may actually be crazy, but I don't mind. As I said, we're all weird, and we all have that one trait that outweighs all the other weirdness.

Redditors know this all too well and are eager to share their weird traits.

It all started when Redditor Isitjustmedownhere asked:

"Give an example; how weird are you really?"

Monsters Under My Bed

"My bed doesn't touch any wall."

"Edit: I guess i should clarify im not rich."

– Practical_Eye_3600

"Gosh the monsters can get you from any angle then."

– bikergirlr7

"At first I thought this was a flex on how big your bedroom is, but then I realized you're just a psycho 😁"

– zenOFiniquity8

Can You See Why?

"I bought one of those super-powerful fans to dry a basement carpet. Afterwards, I realized that it can point straight up and that it would be amazing to use on myself post-shower. Now I squeegee my body with my hands, step out of the shower and get blasted by a wide jet of room-temp air. I barely use my towel at all. Wife thinks I'm weird."

– KingBooRadley

Remember

"In 1990 when I was 8 years old and bored on a field trip, I saw a black Oldsmobile Cutlass driving down the street on a hot day to where you could see that mirage like distortion from the heat on the road. I took a “snapshot” by blinking my eyes and told myself “I wonder how long I can remember this image” ….well."

– AquamarineCheetah

"Even before smartphones, I always take "snapshots" by blinking my eyes hoping I'll remember every detail so I can draw it when I get home. Unfortunately, I may have taken so much snapshots that I can no longer remember every detail I want to draw."

"Makes me think my "memory is full.""

– Reasonable-Pirate902

Same, Same

"I have eaten the same lunch every day for the past 4 years and I'm not bored yet."

– OhhGoood

"How f**king big was this lunch when you started?"

– notmyrealnam3

Not Sure Who Was Weirder

"Had a line cook that worked for us for 6 months never said much. My sous chef once told him with no context, "Baw wit da baw daw bang daw bang diggy diggy." The guy smiled, left, and never came back."

– Frostygrunt

Imagination

"I pace around my house for hours listening to music imagining that I have done all the things I simply lack the brain capacity to do, or in some really bizarre scenarios, I can really get immersed in these imaginations sometimes I don't know if this is some form of schizophrenia or what."

– RandomSharinganUser

"I do the same exact thing, sometimes for hours. When I was young it would be a ridiculous amount of time and many years later it’s sort of trickled off into almost nothing (almost). It’s weird but I just thought it’s how my brain processes sh*t."

– Kolkeia

If Only

"Even as an adult I still think that if you are in a car that goes over a cliff; and right as you are about to hit the ground if you jump up you can avoid the damage and will land safely. I know I'm wrong. You shut up. I'm not crying."

– ShotCompetition2593

Pet Food

"As a kid I would snack on my dog's Milkbones."

– drummerskillit

"Haha, I have a clear memory of myself doing this as well. I was around 3 y/o. Needless to say no one was supervising me."

– Isitjustmedownhere

"When I was younger, one of my responsibilities was to feed the pet fish every day. Instead, I would hide under the futon in the spare bedroom and eat the fish food."

– -GateKeep-

My Favorite Subject

"I'm autistic and have always had a thing for insects. My neurotypical best friend and I used to hang out at this local bar to talk to girls, back in the late 90s. One time he claimed that my tendency to circle conversations back to insects was hurting my game. The next time we went to that bar (with a few other friends), he turned and said sternly "No talking about bugs. Or space, or statistics or other bullsh*t but mainly no bugs." I felt like he was losing his mind over nothing."

"It was summer, the bar had its windows open. Our group hit it off with a group of young ladies, We were all chatting and having a good time. I was talking to one of these girls, my buddy was behind her facing away from me talking to a few other people."

"A cloudless sulphur flies in and lands on little thing that holds coasters."

"Cue Jordan Peele sweating gif."

"The girl notices my tension, and asks if I am looking at the leaf. "Actually, that's a lepidoptera called..." I looked at the back of my friend's head, he wasn't looking, "I mean a butterfly..." I poked it and it spread its wings the girl says "oh that's a BUG?!" and I still remember my friend turning around slowly to look at me with chastisement. The ONE thing he told me not to do."

"I was 21, and was completely not aware that I already had a rep for being an oddball. It got worse from there."

– Phormicidae

*Teeth Chatter*

"I bite ice cream sometimes."

RedditbOiiiiiiiiii

"That's how I am with popsicles. My wife shudders every single time."

monobarreller

Never Speak Of This

"I put ice in my milk."

– GTFOakaFOD

"You should keep that kind of thing to yourself. Even when asked."

– We-R-Doomed

"There's some disturbing sh*t in this thread, but this one takes the cake."

– RatonaMuffin

More Than Super Hearing

"I can hear the television while it's on mute."

– Tira13e

"What does it say to you, child?"

– Mama_Skip

Yikes!

"I put mustard on my omelettes."

– Deleted User

"Oh."

– NotCrustOr-filling

Evened Up

"Whenever I say a word and feel like I used a half of my mouth more than the other half, I have to even it out by saying the word again using the other half of my mouth more. If I don't do it correctly, that can go on forever until I feel it's ok."

"I do it silently so I don't creep people out."

– LesPaltaX

"That sounds like a symptom of OCD (I have it myself). Some people with OCD feel like certain actions have to be balanced (like counting or making sure physical movements are even). You should find a therapist who specializes in OCD, because they can help you."

– MoonlightKayla

I totally have the same need for things to be balanced! Guess I'm weird and a little OCD!

Close up face of a woman in bed, staring into the camera
Photo by Jen Theodore

Experiencing death is a fascinating and frightening idea.

Who doesn't want to know what is waiting for us on the other side?

But so many of us want to know and then come back and live a little longer.

It would be so great to be sure there is something else.

But the whole dying part is not that great, so we'll have to rely on other people's accounts.

Redditor AlaskaStiletto wanted to hear from everyone who has returned to life, so they asked:

"Redditors who have 'died' and come back to life, what did you see?"

Sensations

Happy Good Vibes GIF by Major League SoccerGiphy

"My dad's heart stopped when he had a heart attack and he had to be brought back to life. He kept the paper copy of the heart monitor which shows he flatlined. He said he felt an overwhelming sensation of peace, like nothing he had felt before."

PeachesnPain

Recovery

"I had surgical complications in 2010 that caused a great deal of blood loss. As a result, I had extremely low blood pressure and could barely stay awake. I remember feeling like I was surrounded by loved ones who had passed. They were in a circle around me and I knew they were there to guide me onwards. I told them I was not ready to go because my kids needed me and I came back."

"My nurse later said she was afraid she’d find me dead every time she came into the room."

"It took months, and blood transfusions, but I recovered."

good_golly99

Take Me Back

"Overwhelming peace and happiness. A bright airy and floating feeling. I live a very stressful life. Imagine finding out the person you have had a crush on reveals they have the same feelings for you and then you win the lotto later that day - that was the feeling I had."

"I never feared death afterward and am relieved when I hear of people dying after suffering from an illness."

rayrayrayray

Free

The Light Minnie GIF by (G)I-DLEGiphy

"I had a heart surgery with near-death experience, for me at least (well the possibility that those effects are caused by morphine is also there) I just saw black and nothing else but it was warm and I had such inner peace, its weird as I sometimes still think about it and wish this feeling of being so light and free again."

TooReDTooHigh

This is why I hate surgery.

You just never know.

Shocked

Giphy

"More of a near-death experience. I was electrocuted. I felt like I was in a deep hole looking straight up in the sky. My life flashed before me. Felt sad for my family, but I had a deep sense of peace."

Admirable_Buyer6528

The SOB

"Nursing in the ICU, we’ve had people try to die on us many times during the years, some successfully. One guy stood out to me. His heart stopped. We called a code, are working on him, and suddenly he comes to. We hadn’t vented him yet, so he was able to talk, and he started screaming, 'Don’t let them take me, don’t let them take me, they are coming,' he was scared and yelling."

"Then he yelled a little more, as we tried to calm him down, he screamed, 'No, No,' and gestured towards the end of the bed, and died again. We didn’t get him back. It was seriously creepy. We called his son to tell him the news, and the son said basically, 'Good, he was an SOB.'”

1-cupcake-at-a-time

Colors

"My sister died and said it was extremely peaceful. She said it was very loud like a train station and lots of talking and she was stuck in this area that was like a curtain with lots of beautiful colors (colors that you don’t see in real life according to her) a man told her 'He was sorry, but she had to go back as it wasn’t her time.'"

Hannah_LL7

"I had a really similar experience except I was in an endless garden with flowers that were colors I had never seen before. It was quiet and peaceful and a woman in a dress looked at me, shook her head, and just said 'Not yet.' As I was coming back, it was extremely loud, like everyone in the world was trying to talk all at once. It was all very disorienting but it changed my perspective on life!"

huntokarrr

The Fog

"I was in a gray fog with a girl who looked a lot like a young version of my grandmother (who was still alive) but dressed like a pioneer in the 1800s she didn't say anything but kept pulling me towards an opening in the wall. I kept refusing to go because I was so tired."

"I finally got tired of her nagging and went and that's when I came to. I had bled out during a c-section and my heart could not beat without blood. They had to deliver the baby and sew up the bleeders. refill me with blood before they could restart my heart so, like, at least 12 minutes gone."

Fluffy-Hotel-5184

Through the Walls

"My spouse was dead for a couple of minutes one miserable night. She maintains that she saw nothing, but only heard people talking about her like through a wall. The only thing she remembers for absolute certain was begging an ER nurse that she didn't want to die."

"She's quite alive and well today."

Hot-Refrigerator6583

Well let's all be happy to be alive.

It seems to be all we have.

Man's waist line
Santhosh Vaithiyanathan/Unsplash

Trying to lose weight is a struggle understood by many people regardless of size.

The goal of reaching a healthy weight may seem unattainable, but with diet and exercise, it can pay off through persistence and discipline.

Seeing the pounds gradually drop off can also be a great motivator and incentivize people to stay the course.

Those who've achieved their respective weight goals shared their experiences when Redditor apprenti8455 asked:

"People who lost a lot of weight, what surprises you the most now?"

Redditors didn't see these coming.

Shiver Me Timbers

"I’m always cold now!"

– Telrom_1

"I had a coworker lose over 130 pounds five or six years ago. I’ve never seen him without a jacket on since."

– r7ndom

"140 lbs lost here starting just before COVID, I feel like that little old lady that's always cold, damn this top comment was on point lmao."

– mr_remy

Drawing Concern

"I lost 100 pounds over a year and a half but since I’m old(70’s) it seems few people comment on it because (I think) they think I’m wasting away from some terminal illness."

– dee-fondy

"Congrats on the weight loss! It’s honestly a real accomplishment 🙂"

"Working in oncology, I can never comment on someone’s weight loss unless I specifically know it was on purpose, regardless of their age. I think it kind of ruffles feathers at times, but like I don’t want to congratulate someone for having cancer or something. It’s a weird place to be in."

– LizardofDeath

Unleashing Insults

"I remember when I lost the first big chunk of weight (around 50 lbs) it was like it gave some people license to talk sh*t about the 'old' me. Old coworkers, friends, made a lot of not just negative, but harsh comments about what I used to look like. One person I met after the big loss saw a picture of me prior and said, 'Wow, we wouldn’t even be friends!'”

"It wasn’t extremely common, but I was a little alarmed by some of the attention. My weight has been up and down since then, but every time I gain a little it gets me a little down thinking about those things people said."

– alanamablamaspama

Not Everything Goes After Losing Weight

"The loose skin is a bit unexpected."

– KeltarCentauri

"I haven’t experienced it myself, but surgery to remove skin takes a long time to recover. Longer than bariatric surgery and usually isn’t covered by insurance unless you have both."

– KatMagic1977

"It definitely does take a long time to recover. My Dad dropped a little over 200 pounds a few years back and decided to go through with skin removal surgery to deal with the excess. His procedure was extensive, as in he had skin taken from just about every part of his body excluding his head, and he went through hell for weeks in recovery, and he was bedridden for a lot of it."

– Jaew96

These Redditors shared their pleasantly surprising experiences.

Shopping

"I can buy clothes in any store I want."

– WaySavvyD

"When I lost weight I was dying to go find cute, smaller clothes and I really struggled. As someone who had always been restricted to one or two stores that catered to plus-sized clothing, a full mall of shops with items in my size was daunting. Too many options and not enough knowledge of brands that were good vs cheap. I usually went home pretty frustrated."

– ganache98012

No More Symptoms

"Lost about 80 pounds in the past year and a half, biggest thing that I’ve noticed that I haven’t seen mentioned on here yet is my acid reflux and heartburn are basically gone. I used to be popping tums every couple hours and now they just sit in the medicine cabinet collecting dust."

– colleennicole93

Expanding Capabilities

"I'm all for not judging people by their appearance and I recognise that there are unhealthy, unachievable beauty standards, but one thing that is undeniable is that I can just do stuff now. Just stamina and flexibility alone are worth it, appearance is tertiary at best."

– Ramblonius

People Change Their Tune

"How much nicer people are to you."

"My feet weren't 'wide' they were 'fat.'"

– LiZZygsu

"Have to agree. Lost 220 lbs, people make eye contact and hold open doors and stuff"

"And on the foot thing, I also lost a full shoe size numerically and also wear regular width now 😅"

– awholedamngarden

It's gonna take some getting used to.

Bones Everywhere

"Having bones. Collarbones, wrist bones, knee bones, hip bones, ribs. I have so many bones sticking out everywhere and it’s weird as hell."

– Princess-Pancake-97

"I noticed the shadow of my ribs the other day and it threw me, there’s a whole skeleton in here."

– bekastrange

Knee Pillow

"Right?! And they’re so … pointy! Now I get why people sleep with pillows between their legs - the knee bones laying on top of each other (side sleeper here) is weird and jarring."

– snic2030

"I lost only 40 pounds within the last year or so. I’m struggling to relate to most of these comments as I feel like I just 'slimmed down' rather than dropped a ton. But wow, the pillow between the knees at night. YES! I can relate to this. I think a lot of my weight was in my thighs. I never needed to do this up until recently."

– Strongbad23

More Mobility

"I’ve lost 100 lbs since 2020. It’s a collection of little things that surprise me. For at least 10 years I couldn’t put on socks, or tie my shoes. I couldn’t bend over and pick something up. I couldn’t climb a ladder to fix something. Simple things like that I can do now that fascinate me."

"Edit: Some additional little things are sitting in a chair with arms, sitting in a booth in a restaurant, being able to shop in a normal store AND not needing to buy the biggest size there, being able to easily wipe my butt, and looking down and being able to see my penis."

– dma1965

People making significant changes, whether for mental or physical health, can surely find a newfound perspective on life.

But they can also discover different issues they never saw coming.

That being said, overcoming any challenge in life is laudable, especially if it leads to gaining confidence and ditching insecurities.