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Blatant Lies Patients Have Told Medical Professionals

Doctors Share Telltale Signs That A Patient Is Faking

Doctors Share Telltale Signs That A Patient Is Faking

Paramedics load a patient into an ambulance

People Reveal The Dumbest Reason They Ever Had To Go To The E.R.

Medical Professionals Divulge The Funniest Things Patients Have Said Under Anesthesia

Medical Professionals Divulge The Funniest Things Patients Have Said Under Anesthesia

Real-Life Hospital Horrors

Real-Life Hospital Horrors

Medical Professionals Share The Most Obvious Case Of A Patient 'Faking It'.

Scrub in


This article is based on the AskReddit question: "Doctors/nurses of Reddit; What is the most obvious case of a patient 'faking it' you have ever seen?"

Let's scrub in, shall we?

Hard To Fake It Through The Pain

Had a patient fake guillain-barr syndrome - ascending paralysis. She ended up in the ICU and I was her nurse. I was a new grad and had to put a catheter in her bladder. She had to pretend she couldn't feel a thing and I could see the pain in her eyes. Turned out she got into a fight with her husband and as he was walking out of the house she fell on the floor to make him stay. I don't think she meant to take it so far, but she didn't know how to back out.

Another ICU pt - she was a nurse on disability and would fake seizures, which are really hard to fake. She would hold her breath and shake and roll around on the bed. Her O2 saturation dropped to the 70s from not breathing (and maybe the sensor wasn't picking it up well as she was shaking) and we told her we'd intubate if she couldn't protect her airway and she would miraculously stop seizing. Never acted postictal and could remember the whole seizure and everything that was said..She told me she would call my manager since I said during one of her "seizures" we didn't need to give her ativan.

-queenkittenlips

The Exorcist

Guy came into the ER the other day FORCEFULLY trying to get himself to vomit. I'm talking over one hour of Exorcist-like wretching to get any stomach contents out. It was amusing for the first minute but then became really sad to realize how far this guy was going to get his fix for morphine.

-SATW121310

Judgey And Jury

Get called for an unconscious intox's at a bar. Get her out to the ambulance, she shouts "I'M HAVING A SEIZURE" and starts waving her arms around. I tell her "people who have seizures generally don't announce it first." Her response? "You're being very judgemental, I was getting ready in case I had a seizure."

... gotta stretch, I guess.

-Notourown

That's Not How This Works

My mom's an ER nurse and she said once some crazy lady came in and complained hat she had the whooping cough. And whenever she coughed she followed it with a loud woooOOOP!"

-KingJonathan

We All Scream For Ice cream

5/15. Oooh that's a toughie. It's either:

12 or 13 year old kid was having "seizures," would have another every time the ER tried to discharge her, magically woke up when her father proposed getting ice cream with no recollection of what happened. Video EEG was negative of course.

Old lady pretending to be catatonic, was helping us transfer her from wheelchair to bed (i.e. was not limp) and when we held her hand over her face and let go she dropped it to her side (if she were truly out it would have smacked her)

A lot of pain fakers are obvious too but pain is a bit more gray area while the above have objective findings.

-MoobyTheGoldenSock

Too Far

6/15. My partner at work is an Administrator with an ED Nursing background. She was called in to the ED one night last year to deal with a patient who was complaining of severe headaches and nosebleeds but was refusing to go for any kind of examination in favor of being admitted. They are pretty sure at this point that she is drug seeking as she refused to even lie in the bed. My friend left the room and was standing a few feet outside the patient's glass bay talking with the Charge Nurse when she noticed the patient turn around and hunch over. She subtly stopped the conversation so they could observe.

The patient turned around with more blood on her nose and blood on her fingers from where she had been reaching into her underwear and smearing period blood all over her face to fake a nosebleed.

-spacemiles

Can You Hear Me Now?

I'm an audiologist, and it's fairly common to have people fake a hearing loss. With adults, it's commonly for worker's compensation/benefits. Children do it for attention or to get out of school for a day.

They are fairly easy to spot...patients will come in, conversing with me very normally, but the audiogram will show a profound hearing loss. We all have our tricks to get them to slip - I like to lower my mic volume to a normal range and mention that they dropped something when they're in the booth, they instinctively reach for it, forgetting that they shouldn't have heard it because of their "loss." We can also do an auditory brainstem response, bypassing the need for patient responses. A Stenger Test can identify those fakers that only have a "hearing loss" in one ear.

My favorite is when testing kids that are clearly faking, part of the test requires me to have them repeat words. So I present them at a normal volume and the kids are REEEAAALLLYY straining to hear them, then I slip in funny words like "buttcrack" and watch to see them smile because they clearly heard it.

-Mynameiskelli

Stroke Of Genius

Work in a hospital for prisoners. They will frequently fake chest pain to get in to the hospital, but sometimes they will try to fake other things instead.

Had a guy trying to fake stroke symptoms. Claimed he couldn't move his leg, docs examine him and he insists he can't move it. 5-10 minutes later I look in the room and he is walking to the bathroom. When he sees me, he immediately starts limping and acting like its hard to walk. Pretty sure he was discharged shortly after.

-dumperking

Oh Baby

9/15. A nurse friend told me this one, this happened about a month ago. A woman and her boyfriend are rushed in by ambulance after being in a car accident. My nurse friend is with the boyfriend, who keeps yelling about his baby. It takes a minute to calm him down, but my friend gathers that the guy's girlfriend is pregnant. So they check for a heartbeat but don't hear anything. The woman keeps asking the doctor to check again. Both her and her boyfriend are in tears. Finally another nurse comes in with some of her tests results and announces that the woman wasn't ever even pregnant. The woman starts arguing, saying that yes she was pregnant and has been for a while and that the results are wrong. Turns out a few months back her boyfriend tried to break up with her so she lied to about being pregnant to get him to stay.

-Carabou11

AMA

10/15. A girl came in complaining of 20/10 abdominal pain. Lab work all normal, pelvic normal, CT normal. I closed the door and curtain in her room, but kept a little crack where I could see her. Within 5 minutes she stopped yelling and screaming about her pain. I saw her on her phone, eating McDonald's, and walking around. This went on for almost an hour. She then heard another staff member outside her room and began screaming again. After being left alone for 5 minutes, she would stop. When I went in to discharge her, she said she was having a AAA and was going to die. She tried to rip down the curtain and then intentionally smacked her head on the computer.

Security escorted her out... She was back the next day.

Another one was the guy that said he was at a different hospital where they told him he was having a heart attack and needed morphine. But just before they could give it to him, someone came into the ER and started shooting, so he got up and ran. We called over to that hospital and they just laughed. Guy signed out AMA 10 minutes later.

-ChapInGrillSgt

Psych Out

There are some fun ones in psych.

The patient went into her room and, in a very obvious stage-voice (just loud enough for us to hear her in the main area), started saying random, unconnected sentences/phrases. Then she immediately came out, walked straight up to us and asked, "How do I know if the voices are real?" She would act perfectly normal when she thought we weren't looking, but as soon as we walked loudly up to her door she'd start "talking to herself" again. Yeah, no. That's not how psychosis works lol. Good try though.

Also there was the girl who "strangled" herself unconscious. There was no pressure whatsoever on her throat/neck. The doctor quietly snuck up to her, then smacked his hands together in a single giant clap. She jumped.

And another patient who had "seizures". She lay in bed, twitching, when I called her for lunch. I said all right, but if you lie there for too long you're going to be stuck with the vegetarian option. The seizures magically stopped.

-Merceri

Walk Away Shontay

When I was a resident, I had a patient in clinic that was doing that round-about thing patients do when they want narcotics but aren't going to directly ask for them. She would hint at having arthritis pain that "just doesn't seem to get better except that one time she took lortab" and that "you know, her friend gave her a Percocet once and it helped a lot" (never mind the fact that this lady was 100% functional despite "debilitating pain").

At the end of the clinic visit, when I offered a physical therapy referral and stronger NSAIDs (the actual treatment for osteoarthritis), she suddenly sat straight up, looked me in the eye, and said, "Doctor, I don't know how...but I'm totally paralyzed."

Seriously. She pretended that, all of a sudden, everything other than her mouth was totally paralyzed. She made us send her to the ER (but not before she had my nurse unwrap a peppermint and literally put it on her tongue because "her blood sugar felt low"). We had to lift this nutcase into a wheelchair (during which we could all feel her shifting and repositioning...not something a paralyzed person would do) and roll her to the ER to be evaluated for "sudden paralysis".

While in the ER, she suggested to the ER doc that maybe Lortab would fix her paralysis, and when the ER doc rightly refused this treatment, she got out of the stretcher and walked out.

-tovarish22

Allergies, Man

Had an employee that was "allergic to everything" and a huge hypochondriac. She was such a headache that we ended up moving her desk way away from pretty much anyone else so she would stop complaining. One day, a lady walks by with a strong perfume, and our lovable hypochondriac falls out.

Predictably, EMS is called, and by this point our employee is laying on the ground rolling her eyes back in her head. Scary stuff if you didn't know she was literally insane.

So EMS arrives and they come over, put the O2 meter on her finger, and she's choking through her speech when they're asking her if she can breathe or not. O2 saturation was at like 97% or something like that. Medic goes "ma'am, there's no reason why you should be having trouble breathing right now."

They hung around for another couple minutes, then bounced.

-ryan-m

Oh Canada

Had a mother come in and INSIST that her child had Silver-Russell syndrome. You can go read on it. It's not that easy to fake, as it's a bunch of metabolic conditions mixed with congenital abnormalities.

The kid was small, but not that small (around 6th percentile). He didn't weight much (5th percentile). All of this, with a right arm length 2 cm more than the left side, were borderline criteria for Silver-Russell. Did genetic testing, which came back negative, but 30% of cases are negative.

So the deciding factor was one of the "soft" criteria of hypoglycemia. Once she heard about this (she printed out 30-40 articles on the disease), she came back with the kid in a coma. But when the kid was in the hospital, he was never hypoglycemic. He went home, and came back in a coma a few weeks later. Again, as soon as he was eating normally at the hospital, he was never hypoglycemic.

She starved her child into comas repeatedly for the diagnosis of Silver-Russell. She was also a "bougon", people who live off welfare and make a game out of it. By the way, she was in a wheelchair when at the hospital. Once I had enough of her bullshit and walked into the room after only knocking once. She was walking around normally and jumped into the wheelchair as soon as she saw me.

I believe it was for money since in Canada/Quebec, you get money when your child has a genetic disability.

-uberpath

Bills, Bills, Bills

Paramedic here.

Gentleman called 911 from a restaurant claiming he had a migraine and was unable to see properly. He was literally 2 blocks from a hospital.

I've had migraines, I'm sympathetic. On the way to the call I was planning my treatment plan so he would be more comfortable during the wait in the emerg.

He was waiting outside, in full sunlight, waving at us. Thanked us politely for coming "to his rescue". Sat in the well lit ambulance, chatting up a storm, making inappropriate jokes, and laughing. Stating the whole time he has 10/10 pain from a migraine, and that only Percocet works to reduce the pain. He has them frequently, and wouldn't you know it, he's run out of his prescribed medication, and his doctor is on vacation.

The chef from the restaurant he called from came out and asked for his information. Our patient was "unable to pay his bill, due to the pain." He conveniently had no ID he could leave with the restaurant, and only had his debit card with him. He promised to come back, once he was feeling well enough to tap his PIN into the machine, but right now he couldn't. The chef knew 100% the guy was lying, but couldn't do anything.

As someone who has had a vomiting, shaking, vision effecting, migraine in the past, he did nothing to convince anyone he was in actual discomfort. I actually would greatly prefer if he had said, "I ate a meal I can't afford, and I'm addicted to pain killers, can you please take me to the ER." Honesty would have gotten him better treatment from everyone involved.

Edit: We took him to the ER. He waited in the loud busy waiting room reading magazines. I'm from Canada, so his ambulance bill is mostly paid by the Ministry of Health. Physicians can sign a patient as "non essential" which would cause the patient to be charged for the whole cost. The MOH has no guidelines surrounding what is essential and what isn't, so the MD/Hospital opens themselves up to a lawsuit if someone decides to sue because the MD signed their ambulance trip as non-essential. So this rarely happens.

Add to that if the patient is receiving social services from the government or has no fixed address, they are charged nothing at all.

The studies have been done, Paramedics/EMTs in other countries can tell you, charging people does not reduce the frequency of illegitimate 911 use.

-Fusion_Chamberlain

(Source)

[Image credit: Denis Pepin / Shutterstock.com]

Infamous Internet Rumors That Ended Up Being True

Reddit user strakerak asked: 'What started out as an internet rumor that ended up being infamously true?'

boy playing at laptop inside room
Photo by Ludovic Toinel on Unsplash

In 2017, I returned to my office after my lunch break to hear my supervisors discussing Tom Petty. This seemed like a random topic to me until one of my supervisors told me Tom Petty had passed away. He was a huge fan of Petty and spent the next hour or so combing through the internet to get more information.

He came back into the room my other supervisor and I were working in and announced that Tom Petty wasn't dead after all. News outlets had jumped the gun to announce his death, but he was actually still alive.

The next day, I came in to find out that Tom Petty was dead; the news may have been premature, but true.

This is a classic example of the rumor being started on the internet. Sometimes, like with the news of Tom Petty's death, the rumor can run wild and appear everywhere. Other times, the rumor can be seen by just a few people and dismissed. However, a lot of times, these rumors turn out to be true.

Redditors know a lot of internet rumors that turned out to be true, and are eager to share.

It all started when Redditor strakerak asked:

"What started out as an internet rumor that ended up being infamously true?"

The King Of Pop

"Michael Jackson writing the music for Sonic 3."

"He actually did, but was never credited on the game because it would breach his contract with his record label."

– -WigglyLine-

"He did the same when he appeared on The Simpsons. He appeared under a pseudonym, and the Producers said it was an impersonator."

"Only years later they confirmed it really was Michael."

"His singing voice was actually done by an impersonator, though."

– given2fly_

The Truth Comes Out

"In 1998, US Men’s National Team captain John Harkes was shockingly cut from the team right before the World Cup. The coach claimed it was because Harkes wouldn’t fit into his new preferred formation, but rumors flew on the early internet that it was actually because he had slept with his teammate Eric Wynalda’s wife. The rumor was so well-known in soccer circles that Harkes expressly denied it in his autobiography the next year."

"Fast forward 12 years to 2010 and Wynalda admits it’s true. The coach then came out and admitted it was why he dropped Harkes, but that he’d planned to keep the secret as long as Wynalda did."

– guyfromsoccer

Video Evidence

"The Tim Burton Hansel and Gretel that aired once on halloween in the 80's."

"I heard for years that it was fake but I knew it was real because my dad recorded everything in the 80s and he recorded that. We let a good friend of ours borrow it and switch it over from VHS to DVD and soon after that it made its way on to the internet , and there it is now. I know it's our copy because the tracking in the beginning is screwed up. Still have the VHS."

– Frozenthickness

"There was a similar story with a Nickelodeon movie called Cry Baby Lane. It was supposed to be so scary that Nickelodeon got complaints and denied its existence for years. Someone uploaded a taped copy to youtube about a decade ago."

– PattiAllen

The Movie Business

"That North Korea hacked Sony Pictures because of The Interview movie."

"I worked in the movie business at the time and the account managers at Sony all basically needed to get new identities as all of their personal information got leaked online."

– OldMastodon5363

"My partner worked on that movie and the production bought all the crew 1 year of an identity theft tracking service."

– CMV_Viremia

Keep Away From The Ears Of Kids

"Some banned episodes or scenes of cartoons."

"For example, I remember there was a Dexter’s Lab cartoon where he clones evil versions of DeDe and himself and they swear like every other word (censored of course), and people debated whether it even existed cause they only aired it like once. Now it’s pretty accessible online."

– Spledidlife

Yes, It's True

"Echelon, a massive electronic espionage system by the US and allies to intercept all electronic messages, especially emails."

"In the mid-nineties it was a topic on conspiracy BBS boards. A lot of people in my bubble at the time (mainly uni students in Europe) were including fake threats to the US in the their email signatures as a way to "protest" and "fill the system with false alarms" (obviously useless)."

"Then, in 1999-2000 came out to be true and a lot of security service agencies from UK and other US allies started to admit they were part of the espionage network."

– latflickr

How The Mighty Fell

"John Edward’s love child."

– ACam574

"A reminder that he was cheating on his wife while she was hospitalized for cancer treatment."

– Fanclock314

Ugh...

"Carrie Fisher's heart attack. Some a**hole who was on the same flight was livetweeting the whole medical emergency and justified it by insisting she was just making sure the family was informed."

– everylastlight

It Actually Happened

"Every year around her birthday there was a rumor that Betty White died. When I heard she died, I scoffed, saying that dumb rumor is back.... then saw it on the news. I was in shock."

– Known-Committee8679

"The fact that Betty died literally right before she turned 100 is such a Betty White way to go out."

– Paganigsegg

Big Actor, Small Roles

"I distinctly remember some rumors about the reason why Bruce Willis was taking so many roles in sh*tty movies before it was announced he has dementia."

– KampferMann

"RedLetterMedia did a deep dive on his recent movie activity to try and work out why exactly he was taking part in basically scam-movies. They noticed he had an earpiece in one of the scenes and joked that the director was feeding him lines. I remember they even disclaimed over the rumours at the time, and possible made a follow-up vid when it was revealed to the public."

– CardinalCreepia

What To Do Next?

"That the writer of LOST were making it up as they went."

"Turned out to be absolutely true."

– homarjr

That last one was kind of obvious!

Do you have any to add? Let us know in the comment below.

internet rumors

People Share Their Best 'Don't Ask How I Know That' Fun Facts

Person holding large stack of books
Photo by Jay Lamm on Unsplash

Whether you're naturally interested in fun facts and trivia or not, it's always nice to know a few that you can pull out of your pocket at a moment's notice as a nice conversation starter.

But there are some fun facts out there that are so weird, people become more preoccupied with how the teller found out that information rather than the information itself.

Redditor Dry_Bus_935 asked:

"What is your 'don't ask me how I know' random fact?"

Nuclear Fail Safe

"You have quite a lot of time, certainly more than ten seconds, to turn back on the main pumps of a nuclear reactor once you have accidentally turned them off."

- egorf

"I'm not surprised. The amount of fail safes, redundancies, and emergency scenario planning for nuclear power plants is insane."

"I toured a nuclear plant and wrote my high school senior thesis on the plans put in place to ensure the Fukushima disaster would not happen at that plant."

"I'm sure the secondary pumps are plenty capable of handling the reactor until the main pumps are repaired or just turned back on."

- Borderlandsman

Happy Cat

"If your cat chews on fresh eucalyptus, they might start hallucinating and fall over repeatedly, leading to a $400 emergency vet bill just to be told she’s just kinda high."

- oddidealstronghold

"And, that's part of why koalas love it. Little stoners."

- littlebluefoxy

Archaeology: Do Not Lick

"Old human bones are very porous, so if you lick them, they’ll stick to your tongue."

- clanculcarius

Sharing is Caring

"A pigeon will only eat a Starburst if you chew it up a little bit first. Just to clarify: chew the Starburst, not the pigeon."

- OhTheHueManatee

"Instructions unclear. Pigeon unhappy."

- Wild-Lychee-3312

Intriguing Anatomy

"Everyone is here with the creepy crime stuff, and I'm just like, 'A soft fur rat has 22 nipples.'"

- horroscoblue

"Okay, so either they have really small nipples, their nipples overlap, or they have nipples in places where there shouldn't be nipples."

"(I've never written the word 'nipples' so many times in a singular sentence before.)"

- GdeGraaf

'Don't Ask Me,' Indeed!

"Turmeric can be used as clothes dye. It is capable of permanently dyeing cotton cloth even after it has passed through the digestive tract of an adult male."

- SlefeMcDichael

"You s**t your pants, didn't you?"

- PMmecrossstitch

"I'd prefer not to answer that question."

- SlefeMcDichael

High-Risk Survival Skills

"If you ever trying to survive in the Arctic, don’t eat polar bear liver. It is so high in vitamin A, it will kill you."

- WrongWayCorrigan-361

"It's also surrounded by a lethal amount of angry polar bear."

- horanc2

Real-Life Spies

"TV shows and movies go out of their way to make military/intelligence officers look bada**."

"But real-life 'spies,' by design and training, are boring. They have regular houses and standard second-hand cars, they dress down, and they have vague, boring job titles (accounts receivable) as cover, and they do not draw attention to themselves. Most come from specialized academia."

- Ok_Worth_1093

Haunting Reality

"Your muscles can keep twitching for several hours after you die."

- JustDave62

"Also, beards can appear to grow. This is however not because the beard itself grows but because the skin shrinks."

- RRautamaa

"I worked at a morgue for over eight years. If you grasp the hand of a dead body to move the arm, the hand will grasp back, but that's just muscles and tendons reacting to the tension."

- goneferalinid

The Sneakiness of Drowning

"When a drowning victim is revived, get them to a hospital as soon as possible. Drowning is the leading cause of death of kids from the age of one to seven and is ruled as accidental drowning when it comes to secondary drowning or dry drowning."

"Basically, your lungs are full of water despite being revived. Your lungs will absorb the liquid, but not before your body acidifies from high levels of carbon dioxide. The only chance to survive is to have the lungs pumped with oxygen via CPAP machine and time."

"Also, drowning is extremely quiet. You don’t hear the victim go under. And if you see flailing, do not attempt to save the victim otherwise you’ll become another drowning victim. Throw them a lifeline and hope their amygdala realizes that a rope or something is floating near them and grabs on it."

- Dfiggsmeister

Not Everyone's Favorite Chocolate

"Hershey’s chocolate has the strong smell of vomit or feces to some people (me), and that’s because they use butyric acid as a preservative. Butyric acid is the compound that makes vomit smell so bad."

"Edit: Digging further into it, there are some claims that they may not be “adding” the butyric acid, but rather it is occurring from essentially spoiling the milk in their milk chocolate. Either way, the butyric acid and putrid smell remains a part of their product."

- hefewiseman1

"That explains the weird aftertaste I always get! I don’t smell it but their chocolate always has this super unpleasant sharp/acidic aftertaste that I find repulsive. I assume this is why!!"

- PomegranateNo975

Do Not Lick the Asbestos

"Asbestos tastes like chalk. And if you lick it, it has the texture of extremely gritty sandpaper. Which is actually the feeling of microscopic asbestos needles piercing your flesh!"

- TooYoungToBeThisOld1

Mapping Out the War

"Beginning in 1911 in anticipation of the outbreak of WW1 in 1914, two statesmen, one from England and one from France, began visiting locations in France that they believed would be the settings for a number of major battles that would occur during the great war."

"Long bike rides through these future battle zones in the countryside and weeks spent building a foundation for a French-Anglo codebook that would later prove important in helping win the war."

- fjordperfect123

Avoiding Lawsuits > Protecting Patients

"Doctors, or surgeons more specifically, that make too many mistakes during surgery, ie, leaving instruments in patients, frequently gets ‘quietly traded’ to other hospitals where they continue their path of destruction with the patients not being aware of their past record. Hospitals tend to keep quiet about the matter to avoid lawsuits."

- Kittytigris

Bonus Points: Do This While Having Lunch in Your Car

"If you overfill a fast food gravy cup and then put a lid on, it will create a pressurized gravy stream that sprays all over your face and uniform while your coworker looks on in horror."

- thechaosjester776

This subReddit thread was so a roller-coaster of random facts, we've surely all walked away learning something.

But the biggest takeaway might just be: Maybe don't lick so many things.

dont ask

People Break Down The Times They Had To Sober Up Real Fast

Shocked woman covering her mouth
vaitheeswaran Nataraj/Unsplash

When we're intoxicated, or even the slightest bit tipsy from having a little too much to drink, our immediate perspective on things is hazy.

But there's nothing like a bit of alarming news or a jarring incident to snap us out of the fog and focus on the moment.

Sometimes alcohol isn't always to blame for our impairment.

It can be a state of mind, like a perpetual numbness from being complacent in life, and all it takes is one shocking moment to rattle us back to our senses.

Curious to hear from strangers online about this type of scenario, Redditor Known_Challenge_7150 asked:

"What’s one thing that sobered you up real quick?"

These individuals were witness to shocking events that sobered them up right quick.

Bleeding Out

"Got out of a taxi and found a naked man profusely bleeding from his head crawling up the driveway in my condo. Called him an ambulance completely forgot I was absolutely wasted until 45 minutes later when I'd helped him translate and in to an amublance and stepped in my front door."

"Later a few days later learned he'd slipped in the tub and literally crawled out for help. Poor dude. He was fine but I genuinely thought he was going to die there."

– DongLaiCha

Tragic News

"At a bachelor party and we got a phone call that the groom’s father had suddenly passed."

– accountnameredacted

Bottom Of The Barrel

"I went to visit my parents back in July. I was homeless and deep into fentanyl addiction so I lost a lot of weight. My folks could see it. They knew something was up. Anyway, I spent the night and I was getting ready to leave in the morning and I looked at myself in the mirror for a good long time. I finally had enough and told them everything. They took me to detox, from there I went to rehab. Graduated in August and been living with them ever since then. I have 160 days clean and sober."

– Crotch-Monster

A reality check can be enough for some people to snap out of it.

Like Father, Like Son

"Was driving a drunk friend home, he had been on a bender again and was smart enough to call me for a lift rather than try and drive. As I helped in to his house his mother came down the stairs and said 'your as drunk as your father' and went back upstairs. I haven't seen him drunk since then, he still drinks but the thought of turning into his dad scared him out of hard drinking."

– psycospaz

Busted

"Flashing blue lights."

– FiddleOfGold

"This sobered me up just thinking about it."

– redmaple_syrup

Losing Sight

"Woke up to no sight in one eye. I had cataract surgery so just thought one of the lenses had slipped and it was an easy fix. Eye doc says nope, you had a stroke. I loved soy sauce, teriyaki sauce and salty food, which caused high blood pressure, which caused retina damage. Over six months was able to get most of my eyesight back with medication, and all back within a year. Trying to navigate life with one eye was very sobering. Started taking HBP much more seriously."

– MissHibernia

Quitting The Bottle

"Looked up someone I went to highschool with who was an awesome guy. Found out he had been dead for 3 years from alcoholism, at age 33. I made an overnight change. I hadn't started drinking that night yet, 10 months ago. Haven't touched it again since."

– omgtater

These disturbing moments were enough for Redditors to immediately come to their senses.

Unplanned House Guests

"Me and a buddy Woke up in someone’s living room, realized neither one of us knew the people, they were just nice and let 2 drunk guys sleep on their living room floor. We didn’t even say goodbye."

– Oneinsevenbillion75

Serious Health Warning

"Elevated liver enzymes."

"And the knowledge that this sh** was gonna kill me and I just couldn't orphan my family over it."

"So I opted for recovery, instead."

"Clean and sober since June 5, 2009."

– Far_Meal8674

The Joyride

"Grew up in a rural area. The little town hosted dances at the hockey arena, everyone (adults and kids) went and they overserved everyone, regardless of age. I was maybe 16 or 17 and was absolutely sh*tfaced, and jumped in the back of someone's truck with about 8 other people to go back to someone's cottage for after dance drinking. The driver (still don't know who it was) started racing one of his buddies and we whipped around small dirt roads, flying around blind corners on the wrong side of the road, going god knows how fast. It was basically a disaster waiting to happen. It was crazy scary and I was sober and thankful to be alive when we finally arrived."

– foxfood9116

The human psyche is a fascinating thing, isn't it?

How we can automatically focus on something urgent at a crucial time, even after getting buzzed from drinking too much alcohol.

But as we're in the thick of the holidays, it's a good reminder to drink responsibly and stay off the roads if you drive to your celebratory destination.

Cheers. Stay safe. And happy holidays.

The Most Ridiculous 'First World Problems' People Have Heard Someone Complain About

Woman holding multiple shopping bags
Photo by freestocks on Unsplash

We've all complained or vented about something in our lives which, in the grand scheme of things, wasn't exactly a problem, or is very easily solved.

Then there are those who complain about things that others almost hope will happen to them at some point in their lives.

These are known as "first world problems", as they are problems that pretty much only the world's one percent faces.

From having to fly business class instead of first class, or being served Roederer instead of Dom Pérignon, these complaints are often met with amusement, bewilderment, or even anger.

Redditor jennimackenzie was curious to hear the most absurd "first world problems" anyone ever complained about, leading them to ask:

"What’s the most ridiculous 'first world problem' you’ve seen people get worked up over?"

"Tale As Old As Time..."

"I once knew a mom who was legitimately devastated, to the point of tears/grief, because a doctor predicted her 8 year old daughter's final height to be around 5'2","

"Which wasn't tall enough to get cast as Belle at Disney World."

"That was the child's (and her mother's) only dream in life, apparently."

"Didn't appreciate my suggestion that she could be Minnie or Mickey."

"Lol!"

"Only a face character would do!"- TravelLovingMom

"Must Be Funny, In A Rich Man's World..."

"My boss from about a decade ago was this insanely rich dude who always went to the bank to get fresh and crisp currency."

"He'd call the bank in advance to make sure they had some on hand."

"I think he was a germaphobe."

"He had a trash can that he'd throw $1 and $5 bills in that he thought was 'dirty' and regularly just donated it vs spending it."

"I asked him why he did this and he said it was too much trouble and asked if I wanted it."

"I said f*ck yeah dumped it into my bag and when I got home it was close to $400 in singles and fives.

"Another time, he wanted to upgrade all the computers in his studio, so we went to a store and bought 10 PCs."

"They all had $150 mail in rebates and he wasn't bothered to go through the trouble of mailing them in."

"3 weeks later I received $1500 after spending a whole afternoon filling out all those goddamn forms."- azninvasion2000

Money Burn GIF by nog Giphy

Who Wore It Better?

"When I was about 19 years old, I was at my boyfriends family BBQ."

"I was wearing this pretty floral sundress."

"His cousins girlfriend showed up in the same dress and she was SO mad that she went and changed."

"I will never understand being upset when someone is wearing the same thing as you.'

"Did you really think that your shirt you bought off the rack is going to be unique to you?"

"No."- mertsey627

Seeing Red! Or Blue In This Case...

"The blue of the balloons wasn't quite the same as the bridesmaid's sashes."

"Years ago my wife and I attended a wedding."

"It was very low key."

"The dinner was in the dining hall at the university where the couple met, cinder block walls and all."

"It was a Baptist wedding - no booze and very serious."

"The dark blue balloons attempting to liven up the hall were a slightly darker shade of blue than the sashes on the bridesmaid's dresses."

"The bride lost here sh*t and absolutely raved for nearly an hour."

"I can't remember how they finally managed to talk her down."- mechant_papa

south park wedding GIF Giphy

See You In Court!

"Rich neighbors who end up in expensive court battles because they disagree about where a tree can be planted or whether the color of a fence fits in with the street’s 'amenity'."

'These disputes get really heated and rack up huge lawyers’ bills."

"The most pathetic part is after the judgement when they are arguing about who should pay the other party’s costs."

"Lots of affidavits filed citing the 'emotional distress' they had to endure, or painting themselves as brave warriors who were forced to take a stand to fight for 'justice'."

"Also lots of pompous litigants insisting that the judge refer to them by their 'Dr' title."

"An absolutely insane dumpster fire of entitled rich people problems."- ElectrocRaisin

It's Always People With Money Who Don't Want To Pay!

"I work in a public library."

"People will get so so mad if they have to be put on a wait list for a book."

"A popular book that just came out."

"Ok our services are not only free but so are the books."

"You’re welcome, a**holes."- Switchbladekitten

A Warm Butt Is A Happy Butt!

"My own."

"We have a bidet toilet seat (Fabulous! Everyone should have one!) and not only does it wash your bum and blow dry it, but the seat's heated!"

"It's shocking how much a heated toilet seat makes the whole process more agreeable."

"Except: We had a power outage and I went to use the toilet and the seat was cold!"

"Unacceptable!"

"This shall not stand!"

"I was really upset because it didn't feel good."

"Then I stopped and thought: This is the most first-world problem anyone's ever had."

"I was really pissed because my heiny was tepid."

"I got over it."- DeathGrover

homer simpson episode 23 GIF Giphy

Holy Matrimony!

"Weddings are a gold mine for this question."

"People get so hyped up over their 'most important day of their life'."

"They'll destroy friendships, go into debt, and have crazy expectations."

"It's not always the couple who go crazy, either."

"Sometimes, it's the parents or another family member who feels entitled to control the wedding."

"It's just a party."

"Be considerate of guests, have plenty of food and drinks, and enjoy it."- magicrowantree

When Fast Food Isn't Fast Enough...

"Having to pull off to the side to wait for a drive-thru order to be brought out to you because your food isn't ready and there's a line building up behind you."- demanbmore

In Case You Don't Think Customer Service Employees Are Undervalued...

"I was working the return desk at a Target next to a military base so I have so many stories."

"One of my favorites was a lady who had her baby shower before revealing the gender and was livid that she had received floral newborn diapers when she’s having a boy."

"It was a huge box of super expensive, all organic diapers, that we didn’t carry and therefore could not return."

"I cannot accurately express her fury and disgust."

"How dare either suggest her boy could wear feminine diapers."

"I suggested she donate them if she didn’t want to use them and she instead threw away the entire box."

"When she left we pulled it out and threw it in our donate bin."

"There have also been multiple times where mom’s order massive toys and when we bring them out to the car they get furious that they aren’t wrapped."

"We don’t offer wrapping services."

"Here’s the thing, if you don’t want your kids to see the toys you got them for Christmas or their bit to day DON'T BRING THE CHILD WHEN YOU PICK IT UP."

'I’ve had multiple women scream and curse me out that I had ruined their kids Christmas by bringing the toys they ordered out to the car like they requested."- clever-mermaid-mae

Customer Service Waiting GIF by Juno Calypso Giphy

Happiest Place On Earth!

"I used to work for Disney."

"That in itself should tell you everything."

"However for fun I'll give you two specific stories one form our tech department and one from my wife who worked bookings."

"I specifically worked for their call center to help with technical issues with magic band and the website."

"Suddenly got worse huh?"

"A right of passage call everyone has at least one story of is the 'Dome call'."

"Basically there is a subset of Disney Guest (TM) that believes if it rains at Walt Disney world there is someone that will push a button to encapsulate the whole of Disney property in a dome to keep out the rain."

"I'm not kidding."

"If this button is not pushed they call our tech department to angrily ask why."

"My wife worked booking."

"Pretty much everything including Bibbidi Bobbidi boutique and Pirate's league."

"These two things did roughly the same thing difference being price and theme."

"BBB was expensive did more and was focused on princesses, pirates league did a bit less and focused on mermaids and pirates."

"Lady called up my wife, and got pissed about BBB being booked up (It goes FAAAAST)."

"Karen: 'Im going to give the phone to my daughter and I want you to tell her how you are ruining her vacation by not letting her do BBB'."

"Wife proceeds to explain how pirate's league is so much cooler and how she can be a mermaid or pirate and basically gets the kid to start demanding to their parents about how they want to be a mermaid instead of a princess."- trollsong

Disney World GIF Giphy

The horror!

Being booked into a junior suite at Disney World instead of an executive suite!

It's almost as bad as having no money for groceries, or no food to feed you children...

Said absolutely no one.


problems