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People Describe The Most Traumatizing Thing They Ever Experienced As A Child

People Describe The Most Traumatizing Thing They Ever Experienced As A Child
Image by Anemone123 from Pixabay

Life is hard. It's a miracle to make it through with some semblance of sanity. We are all plagued by grief and trauma. More and more people of all backgrounds are opening up about personal trauma and its origins. Finally! For far too long we've been too silent on this topic. And with so many people unable to afford mental health care, the outcomes can be damaging.

All of our childhoods have ups and downs and memories that can play out like nightmares. We carry that, or it follows us and the first step in recovery is talking about it. So who feels strong enough to speak?

Redditor u/nthn_thms wanted to see who was willing to share about things they'd probably rather forget, by asking:

What's the most traumatizing thing you experienced as a child?

I am claustrophobic. It paralyzes my life. I can't ride elevators. I freak out at amusement parks. And don't get me started on trains in New York that get stuck in the tunnel. Why am I like this?

The Uncle

"I was about 7 or 8 when I heard some noise coming from the garage. My mom was at work and I was being babysat by one of my uncles. I went to open the garage to find my other uncle strangling his girlfriend up against the car. She had blood coming out of her nose and mouth. I just froze and stood there staring and my uncle didn't even notice and continued choking and strangling her."

"My other uncle came to the door where I was standing saw what was happening and grabbed me. He called my mom and then the police who later came and arrested my uncle. There's more to this story I wasn't privy to at such a young age. But yeah my other uncle is crazy. He's been to jail a few times, has anger and control issues."

- RedTWL

Filth

"Going to another person's house and realizing that living in filth and decay and having breathing problems isn't the norm. Having dinner every night and a clean room was just a regular day in their household. Grass is always greener right? Especially when yours is dead and everyone from school thinks your house is haunted. Smh good riddance."

- gizmogirl0

Grandpa

"Watching my grandpa slowly waste away on our living room couch. He had a paraganglioma on his pancreas, and there was nothing (especially in 1980) that could be done for him. I was four, and he was my favorite person, and I couldn't sit with him, or hug him, or anything. I miss him even after 40 years. Either that or my best friend dying over Christmas break in 1988. I miss her too. I pretty much hated everything after that."

- thisbuttonsucks

Swept Away

"I saw my Dad get swept away and drowned when I was 11. It's really something I've never recovered from. It's been 16 years and not a day goes by I don't remember it. I live with it. I think we have to for those who we've lost. I always kind of imagine it as a sort of like an emotional loss of a limb. I haven't lost a limb, but I imagine you adapt to not having it. You learn. But you never forget you are missing an arm or a leg."

- DoctorNerdly

It's taken me years to confront my struggle. Finally a little while ago, I tried hypnotherapy and I was able to recover a childhood memory that manifested into my phobia. I was trapped in handcuffs as a joke by my babysitter's brother. Six hours.

I wish...

"The older I got through my teens, the more my step-father's alcoholism spiralled out of control, and the more I was biding my time until I was 18 and would head off to college. Education was my only escape in my mind. Every instance of physical and emotional abuse had to be met with, "just shut up and take it, it'll be over someday." Really wish I could give that kid who slept on the floor of a three-bedroom trailer a hug and say that he'd make it out and get a master's degree. I feel like I just won a decade-long war."

- LostCanadianGoose

Bouncy

"I had a dog that I absolutely loved. I begged for this dog in a Walmart parking lot a week before my 3rd birthday, my mom said I could have the dog but that meant no birthday presents or cake just the dog (she lied, I got presents, cake, and dog.) This dog went everywhere with me and did everything with me. Despite being a tiny mutt he would do his best to protect me from our Doberman who did not like me."

"In fairness to the doberman, as a 2 yr old I did stomp on his nuts for some unbeknownst reason so no hard feelings on not liking me. When I was 5 my mom became a truck driver so we moved in with my grandparents on their farm. While I was at school one day Bouncy had gotten into the fence with the donkeys and was kicked in the head."

"When I got off the bus I couldn't figure out why he wasn't waiting on me. My grandparents met me outside and told me what happened, then walked me in to where he was. He died 30 minutes after I got home like he was waiting to see me. I haven't been able to bond with a pet since."

- DtownBronx

911 Operators Break Down The Strangest Call They've Ever Received | George Takei’s Oh Myyy

The Collie

"I saw our neighbor's collie killed by a driver speeding through the neighborhood. As a young boy, it had real impact because I loved her, and it hurt when he stuck his head out the driver's door window, grinned, and just sped off - leaving the dog dead in the road and me - a kid - in tears. As I once commented, how anyone could be so callous and cruel was beyond my imagination."

- Back2Bach

Flames

"I actually don't remember the event much, but when I was really young (~6years old) I was playing outside and I heard a woman screaming. I was curious so I went across the street to see a bunch of smoke coming out of the cracks in the front door. Didn't see any flames initially so I didn't put two and two together right away. My Dad saw me across the street in the driveway just staring at the house and when he investigated what I was doing he realized the house was on fire. Whole house burnt down."

"Older woman fell asleep on her couch with a lit cigarette. I was traumatized by fire as a kid and I was petrified about burning alive in my sleep for quite some time. Dad had to install a fire escape ladder in my room, fire extinguishers, etc. I was obsessed with what to do in case of fires as a kid. No longer an issue, but my parents still tell me stories about how they knew that messed me up."

- grob33

Kitty

"I was 12 and sat down at the edge of a sidewalk to pet a cat crossing the road. I lived on a very quiet, but wide street. Even if a car drove by, there would've been a lot of room, as I was in an area reserved for parallel parking. (No cars were parked though). All of a sudden a big red car sped up and swerved to hit the cat. It missed me by inches, and instantly killed the cat. It was decades ago, and I still think about it often."

- bravosarah

Mom

"Oh, hands down, my mother alcoholism. It really messes you up in ways that you cannot imagine. And you don't even realize that until years after. I still can't drink alcohol because of it, it terrifies me to even entertain the possibility to become something close to her."

- Matrozi

Blackout

"My mom was helping me with my homework in kindergarten. I needed to identify letters. Eventually we got to a lower case 'a' which I couldn't identify, because in that typeface lower case 'a' is different from how I had been taught to write that letter. My mother must have had a bad day or maybe she really didn't like helping me."

"Rather than correcting me, she just repeated told me to identify the letter and she got more and more frustrated as I failed to answer correctly. She began screaming at me, saying that I was being stupid on purpose and that she wouldn't accept that one of her children could be this dumb."

"Eventually she grabbed me by the neck and lifted/choked me as she slammed me into the wall and continued screaming at me. Things started going black, but she released me before I lost consciousness and I collapsed to the ground. She yelled at me more and pinched my ear hard, pulling me up by the ear and forcing me back into the chair. She told me to finish my homework by myself and left."

"I didn't ask her for help on my homework again. Unfortunately the work my school gave me in elementary school pretty much required adult supervision, so I just do as much as I could and lie if my mom asked. This of course made my grades suffer. My grades recovered around grade 7, because I had taught myself to study and didn't need adult help."

"She choked me like that on several occasions, because she really didn't need a reason to be violent. At some point I realized that she never touched my brothers. She stopped once I had grown to be taller than her at around the age of thirteen. Then if she was angry she'd scream at me, and threaten to call the police and tell them that I attacked her."

- dring157

Comatose

"I woke up during surgery when I had cancer, the vein they were using for the anesthetic collapsed and I wasn't being dosed. I woke up, punched a nurse in the head, yanked out my intubation equipment, aspirated, then proceeded to fight 11 doctors nurses and guards while they fuzzy cuffed my cancer riddled self to the bed. Stayed in a 6 day induced coma after that."

- Stryker2279

The Bad Guy

"Mine wasn't as traumatising as others I'm reading in this thread but here we go: my dad knows some dodgy people. That's because when he was younger he dropped out of school to play guitar and do drugs etc, until he hit 30 and changed completely lifestyle, when he met my mother and started getting into religion etc. My town is fairly small, so when you went around the centre you'd often meet these people, and although my dad wasn't friend with these people anymore, he'd still stop and say hi."

"One time, I was about 6-7 yo, we meet one of them, and after he take my hands and compliments me, he grabs me and start running. My dad runs after him and eventually stop him by grabbing him by an arm and almost getting him on the floor. My dad told me he just wanted to play with me, like a game. Thinking about it now, it gives me chills."

- tommymila

Slammed!

"Mild for most people, but trauma is trauma. My third grade teacher slammed the lid of the piano down on my little hands and screamed in my face "nobody wants to hear you play!" I am still struggling with that as a 61 year old musician. The crap sticks in your head."

- electric29

Crash

"When I was 7 my dad, sister, and I got into a motorcycle crash. We were passing by a curve and there was a dog crossing the road, my dad didn't want to hit the dog so he swerved right. For some reason the dog decided to run back to the other side of the road, and it hit the back wheel of the motorcycle. My dad lost control and the motorcycle ended up falling. We were going a bit fast and I was in front, so when the motorcycle fell it kind of just kept drifting for 6 more feet with my face being dragged."

"I ended up with so much wounds on my face and arms, most of the scars remained years. I'm 17 now and I only have one scar left on my face. I've thankfully gotten the courage to ride motorcycles again, but whenever we pass by the place we crashed, I get really anxious."

- nyxnobad

Burns

"Well, when I was 11 a fellow boy scout playing with fire panicked threw burning camp fuel around which landed on me and lit me on fire. I was in the burn ward for a month before they peeled skin from one side of my leg to graft onto the buns. That was pretty traumatic."

- ClownfishSoup

Permanently...

"Probably my parents divorce. It was messy. There were several months where my mom won custody of my brother and I (except on weekends) but our dad won the house so we were homeless and living at my nan's place (grandmother on my mom's side, we called her Nan or Nanny)."

"It certainly effected us, mom worked full time to buy a new house, which wasn't paid off till like last year (I was 10-12 at the time, I'm 29 now) and that time alone really caused my brother and I to develop as completely different people. My dad, while never physically abusive, was very verbally abusive, regularly screaming at both my brother and I that we're stupid, worthless, lazy idiots."

"He didn't really realise that he'd completely alienated his only children till a few years after my brother cut off all contact with him, when I too snapped at him and cut off contact. Since then he's tried to change to get back into our good graces and while we're willing to forgive, both of our tolerances for his old rage BS is at an absolute ZERO. He yells at us one more time, that's it, he's done. Permanently."

- QuestingMILF

I survived. But, I'm still haunted. I think I always will be. But I have learned to manage. We all struggle with the past. We were too young to process. But now we have to try. You're not alone.

If you or someone you know is struggling, you can contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255).

To find help outside the United States, the International Association for Suicide Prevention has resources available at https://www.iasp.info/resources/Crisis_Centres/

From Your Site Articles
childhood

Old Wives' Tales People Still Believe For Some Reason

"Reddit user the_spring_goddess asked: 'What is an old wives tale that people still believe?'"

Close up of an owl tilting their head to side, looking bewildered
Photo by Josh Mills

The old wives' tales.

They are the stories of legend.

I think we all need a big DEEP Google dive though.

Where did they originate?

WHO ARE THE OLD WIVES!

You don't hear about them as much anymore.

It's like science and logic are suddenly a thing.

But they sure are a good way to keep your kids and their behavior in line.

Redditor the_spring_goddess wanted to discuss the tall tales we've all been fed through life, so they asked:

"What is an old wives tale that people still believe?"

"Wait an hour to swim after eating."

What a crock!

So many summer hours wasted.

I want revenge for that one.

Say Nothing

Giphy

"An undercover cop has to tell you he's a cop if you ask him."

LonelyMail5115

"Pretty much most advice when it comes to cops are old wives tales. I’m not even a cop but most of the advice you hear is pretty off."

I_AM_AN_A**HOLE_AMA

Say Something

"That you have to wait 24 hours to report someone missing."

Severe_Airport1426

"I really think this one is important and should be the top regardless. As it’s a piece of advice that needs to be relearned and the only way to do that is through awareness."

crappycurtains

"This used to be true. I think they changed it after some guy named Brandon went missing back in the '80s or '70s. You used to have to wait 24 hours if the missing person was an adult because they had 'a right to be missing' and then everyone realized that was stupid and stopped doing it."

AlbinoShavedGorilla

Body Temps

"That drinking ice cold water after eating oily foods will solidify the oil and permanently remain in your body. I informed my coworker that if your body temperature ever reached that point, you’d have bigger problems than weight gain."

chriseo22

"Oh, I have a cousin who 100% believed this. One of those guys who believed every early 2000s internet rumor and old wives tale. One night I chugged a big glass of ice water after dinner and he started freaking out and saying my guts were gonna harden."

"I sarcastically told him to drive me to the hospital if that happened. Obviously, nothing happened and the next morning I said something like 'Thanks for being on standby in case my guts filled with hardened oil.' He just walked off muttering under his breath."

apocalypticradish

Arms Down

"When I was pregnant, I was told by young and old alike that I should NOT raise my arms above my head or exert myself in such a manner because it could cause cord strangulation to my unborn sons and daughters."

Fatmouse84

10 Years Actually

Unimpressed Uh Huh GIF by Brooklyn Nine-Nine Giphy

"Chewing gum stays in your stomach for 7 years."

REDDIT

"I remember accidentally swallowing a piece of gum when I was a kid in like 1995 and just accepting my fate like welp, gonna have this in my stomach til high school I guess."

Gecko-911

I was so afraid to sallow my gum when I was young.

This tale is haunting.

High/Low

Hungry Debra Messing GIF by Will & Grace Giphy

"You can tell the sex of the baby by how you carry."

LeastFormal9366

"Pregnancy certainly wins awards for the most old wives tales. So much absolute BS was repeated to us by everyone we talked to."

IllIIIlIllIlIIlIllI

The Cursed

"If you’re a woman and you wear opal jewelry but opal is not your birthstone (October), you’ll never be able to have children, or will be widowed, or just generally have bad luck or something. You can counteract this by having a diamond in the same piece of jewelry as the opal, though."

"I have a nice opal ring that my parents gave me years ago, and I’ve had other women give me this 'advice' unprompted more than once when I’ve worn it. I have absolutely no idea where it started, but I’m pretty sure this little chunk of silicate rock has no concept of what month I was born in, let alone of how my reproductive organs work."

SmoreOfBabylon

Stay In

"Going outside with wet hair will make you get pneumonia. Or an earache. Or maybe arthritis. Depends on which old wife you listen to."

"Jokes on them - I haven't blow-dried my hair in decades and usually leave the house with wet hair in the morning. On winter mornings, the tips of my hair get frozen. No ear infections or pneumonia or arthritis yet."

worldbound0514

Dreams and Facts

"You never make anyone up in your dreams you've seen everyone in your dreams somewhere else before and never make anyone up entirely."

"How would you possibly prove that to be true? My partner adamantly believes this and tells me this 'fact' whenever I have a dream about someone I've never met before."

mattshonestreddit

"My late wife used to tell me that before she met me she would have dreams of standing at an alter on her wedding day but could never see the guy's face, no matter how hard she tried. After meeting me the face was filled in with mine. Don't know if it's true but one of those things I like thinking of every now and then when I miss her."

Darthdemented

Cracked

Getting Ready Episode 2 GIF by The Office Giphy

"Some people still believe cracking knuckles causes arthritis."

Choice-Grapefruit-44

"There's a doctor (Donald Unger) that cracked his knuckles a couple of times a day for 60 years, but only on one hand, just to prove it. Both hands remained exactly the same."

MacyTmcterry

I love my knuckles.

Do you have any tall tales to add to the list? Let us know in the comments below.

old wives tales

People Who Wouldn't Quit Their Job If They Won The Lottery Explain What They Do

lottery tickets
Erik Mclean on Unsplash

A lot of workers daydream about some day winning the lottery and being able to say goodbye to their job.

Far too many workers are unhappy with their job duties, workplace dynamics or company culture.

But with a taste for luxuries like housing and food, they keep plugging away, year after year.

However not everyone feels that way about their job.

So what are these compelling careers?

Keep reading... Show less
work

People Break Down The Biggest Bombshells Their Therapist Ever Dropped On Them

Therapist talking during session
Photo by Mark Williams on Unsplash

Some people stand firmly stand behind their beliefs that everyone would benefit from therapy and that therapy is life-changing.

It's because of the totally life-changing truth bombs their therapist had dropped during their sessions.

Curious, Redditor anonymiss0018 asked:

"What is a little bombshell your therapist dropped in one of your sessions that completely changed your outlook?"

Communication Issues

"'If you don’t have these problems with any other person in your life, why do you think you’re the problematic person in this one?'"

- maggiebear

"I love this. I have a 'friend' who I always seem to run into misunderstandings with. Every time we had a conversation, it somehow turned into a debate even if it was me talking about my day. The conversations were never easy."

"I always evaluate myself first and take into consideration his critiques. He was very good at convincing me that I was contradicting myself or wasn't good at communicating my thoughts."

"I NEVER had this issue with ANYONE else in my life. I kept trying to figure out where the miscommunication was coming from. In the end, I just minimized contact and now I don't run into this issue."

- chobani_yo

"I read this quote somewhere once (and probably have it a bit wrong): 'It's a waste of time arguing with someone who is determined to misunderstand you.'"

- Reddit

Emotional Regulation

"'You can’t control your emotions, but you can control what you do with them.'"

"At the time, I was a young adult who had learned zero healthy emotional regulation skills (only suppression and shaming) growing up, so this blew my mind."

- lil_mermaid

Tough Relationships

"'It sounds to me like you are trying to convince yourself to stay with your girlfriend. I'm not so sure it should be so difficult.'"

"At the time he said this, I remember it was like he said, 'The earth is flat.' I thought he was crazy when he suggested relationships don't need to be difficult. But eventually, I started to realize I was trying to change myself to stay with this person rather than just being who I am."

"It took me three more months to finally break up with her but from that day on, I vowed to never again abandon myself just to be with someone I had convinced myself was better than me."

- metric88

High-Stress Situation

"I was at a high-stress time, and I asked her how people live like this."

"She replied, 'Oftentimes they have cardiac events.' She said it as an urging to care for myself as much as possible."

- KittenGr8r

The End of Alcohol

"I was struggling with my alcoholism, and we were discussing how I had been cutting back."

"She asked what I would consider success, with regard to my drinking."

"I said I wanted to get to a point where it wasn't interfering with my daily life. I wanted to just be able to have a glass of wine at holiday dinners or family gatherings."

"She simply asked me why. Why was it important for me to drink at those times?"

"It was as if she'd turned on a light. Alcohol had always been a key ingredient in every family function, for my entire life. When I smell bourbon, I think of my uncle. When I smell vermouth, I think of my dad. Alcohol ran through almost every happy childhood memory."

"But, even more than that, I was very afraid of the explanation I'd have to give when family and friends asked why I wasn't having a drink. I had tried to quit before but failed. What if I admitted my problem, only to fall off the wagon?"

"When she asked why I didn't want to completely quit, it was the first time I saw that last part of the big picture. I'd be willing to drink myself to death in order to avoid being scrutinized, or judged for possible future failures."

"That was the day I quit. I've been sober since May 6th, 2017. 2,407 days."

- sophies_wish

Acceptance vs. Enjoyment

"'Accepting something doesn’t mean you have to like it.'"

"That took away a lot of my inner conflicts about situations because I could accept a situation without expending energy internally fighting against the injustice of it."

- alibelloc

Emotionally Immature Parents

"You are not responsible for your parents' emotional wellbeing. They are independent adults who have been on this earth for many more years than you."

- SmokedPears

Not So Lazy

"'Why do you think you're lazy?' Then she listed off all the things she knows I'm doing for my family, my job, and my life."

"It kind of blew my mind when I struggled to come up with an example."

"She also described family dysfunction as water. Some families are messed up in a way that everyone can see the huge waves across the surface. Others are better at hiding it, but there's still a riptide that you can't see unless you're also in the water."

"It made me realize that trying to keep the surface from ever rippling doesn't erase what is happening underneath."

- flybyknight665

The Harm in People-Pleasing

"'Why do you make people more comfortable when you are uncomfortable?' when talking about people pleasing and fawning."

- ERsandwich

Agree to Disagree

"'Stop trying to get everyone to agree. When you need everyone to agree, the least agreeable person has all the power.'"

This really changed my outlook on planning family events."

- freef

Grieve and Start Anew

"For context, I had a major TBI (traumatic brain injury), seizures, strokes, and all around not a fun brain time when I was 28."

"They said, 'You have to grieve the loss of yourself.'"

"Most people wanted me to go back to how I was. The f**ked up truth is that part of my brain is dead. The person everyone (including myself) knew died. I needed to grieve the loss of myself."

- squeaktoy_la

Multifaceted Identity

"They told me that my job and career is just a way to make money; it's not my life or identity. That took a lot of pressure off me."

- unfairpegasus

Breaking the Cycle

"They validated me."

"'You always talk about not wanting to do to your daughters what your mom did to you. You worry about it so much in every interaction you have ever had with them."

"But your children are 19 and 21 now. They are happy and healthy and they trust you because you’ve never abused them in any way. So I just want to validate for you that you really have broken that cycle of violence."

"You did that. And you should be proud of it. I’m proud of you for it.'"

- puppsmcgee74

The Grieving Process

"I was constantly bringing up how I felt like a completely different person after my mom died... like there was a marked difference between before and after her death."

"But once, she was asking about my hobbies, I got really into describing all the things I loved to do or at least used to do before I got into a deep depression."

"She was like, 'Wow, you seem very passionate.'"

"And I just sat there like, 'Well, I mean, I can't change what I like to do, they're still fun to do.'"

"And it's like she knew when to take a step back, because it was like, wow, I may be super depressed about my mom passing, but I'm still me. I'm still my passions and those don't go away."

"I don't know, maybe it only makes sense to be, but it really started getting me back on track."

- Hannibal680

Sharing the Load

"I've never really had friends. I've had colleagues and classmates and housemates and people who have hung out with me, but I never really felt close to any of them."

"And I did that thing you see on here sometimes; I stopped reaching out to see if I would be reached out to, and I wasn't, which I took as confirmation that they didn't really want me around, or at the very least, that they wouldn't mind my absence."

"I was talking to my therapist about people I'd been close to in college, and she told me to pick one and talk about him. So I did. After I shared some basic stuff like his name and his major etc., and a couple of anecdotes, she asked me what else I knew about him."

"And I couldn't answer. It wasn't really a broadly applicable bombshell, but she said, 'What else?' and I started crying because I realized that for as simple as the question was, my inability to answer spoke volumes."

"I've never had good friends because I've never been a good friend. I'm withdrawn and reserved and I always made others do the work to drag me out, without ever extending my own friendship in a meaningful way in return. If I wanted to have meaningful relationships with other people, I would have to build them."

"I'm still working on this, but I'm trying to make more offers and extend more friendliness to others in my daily life."

- Backupusername

The discoveries in this thread were incredibly touching and profound; it's no wonder these were lasting concepts for these Redditors.

It's important to keep ourselves open to inspiration and insights from others, as we have no idea how their experiences could help us, or how we could help them.

therapy

People Describe The Most 'Small Town' Thing They've Ever Witnessed

Aerial view of a church in a small town
Sander Weeteling/Unsplash

There's something comforting about living in a small town.

It's characterized by close communities where neighbors know each other by name and there is an abundance of kindness extended to others.

Gift-giving is a commonality, as is the sharing of recipes, and people going out of their way to help each other in a time of need.

The pace of living in small towns is also a striking contradiction to city life, where crowds of people go about their busy lives without much interaction.

Curious to hear more examples of what small town living is like, Redditor official_biz asked:

"What's the most 'small town' thing you've witnessed?"

These are positive examples of a tight-knit community.

Live Updates

"We have a village Facebook page. Every time the ice cream man drives into the village, the entire page goes ballistic. People send live updates of where the van is and which direction he's heading. The ice cream man has started accepting DMs so he knows which streets to go down."

– PyrrhuraMolinae

Brush With The Law

"I’m from a town of less than 2,000 people. When I worked at the grocery store there people would often drop off stuff for my family members because they didn’t want to drive all the way down to our house. I no longer live there but recently got a call from my daughter. She had been stopped for speeding and handed over her license and insurance which happens to be in my mother’s name. The officer goes 'Hey, you’re Donnie’s granddaughter! I ain’t gonna write you a ticket but I’m telling Donnie when I see him tomorrow cause we’re going fishing.' She replied 'I think I’d rather have the ticket.'”

- Reddit

Roadside Catchup

"The traffic on the 'main street' of my town is so sparse, two drivers going opposite directions can stop and talk to each other for a few minutes without causing any problem."

– anon

When things go wrong, people take notice without incident.

Bank Robbery

"A guy robbed a bank and everyone knew immediately who he was and the teller got mad at him."

– AlexRyang

"A local bank was robbed and one of the tellers told the police to bring her a yearbook from about ten years earlier and she would be able to point the robber out. He had been in the grade before hers in school."

– Strict_Condition_632

Wise Woman

"When I worked at the bank in town there was an older lady that had worked there through 5 mergers."

"She knew everyone, there was a young guy yelling at me one day. She walked out of the back and he immediately quieted. She went off about telling his grandmother that he was treating young women like sh*t. She also said that if he didn’t straighten up not one girl in town would ever marry him she would make sure of it."

– ilurvekittens

Intoxicated Local

"Town drunk was paralyzed and used a motorized wheelchair to get around. I was driving home one Saturday night and said town drunk was passed out in his wheelchair doing circles almost directly in the town square. Had to call his brother who came and picked him up on a rollback truck. Strapped him down and drove off into the cold dark night."

– DoodooExplosion

Grazing Over To The Bar

"In my former small town, there was an older guy who'd lost his license after getting a few DUIs. Every day, he would ride his John Deere lawnmower to the corner bar around 3PM and sit around watching TV and sipping his beer well into the night. Then he'd head the couple miles back home on his mower. He even had a little canvass shell he put on when it rained or got too cold."

– brown_pleated_slacks

It's not surprising how small town people behave differently than those who are from metropolitan areas.

Welcoming Committee

"I lived in a small town. When I moved there, people would ask, 'Whose house did you buy?'"

–MoonieNine

"Move to a small town. 30 years later, you are still the new guy."

– impiousdrifter

"I lived in a small town for most of my childhood but I wasn't "from there" because my grandparents weren't from there."

– raisinghellwithtrees

"Worked with an older guy, relative of the owner of the business, he was 73. I asked him if he was a local, he said 'no his parents moved here when he was two.'"

– realneil

A Busy Day

"Lived in a town of about 5,000: A woman walked into the DMV on a Friday, saw that there were 3 people ahead of her and left to come back another time when they weren't so busy."

– KenmoreToast

Who Let The Dogs Out?

"My dogs got out while i was working. the police called my niece's elementary school (she was a 5th grader) to get her to round them up and take them back home."

– mediocrelpn

"There was a small kennel behind the police station for runaways. They called us saying they had our dog, and moments later our dog showed up home. He broke out of jail."

– Worried_Place_917

While life in a small town sounds appealing, I don't know if I can ever live in one.

I'm so used to life in big cities, I think it would be quite unnerving to adjust in a neighborhood where everyone literally knows your business.

I would be paranoid.

And I'm sure the same could be said of life in the big city.

Would you consider making the switch to life in a different setting?

living