Sometimes it feels like adult humans completely forget how to act their age. When you see toddlers with better manners than the forty-year-old lawyer, you know humanity is a mess. Now granted, sometimes people are in situations where their emotions take their common sense hostage, but more and more it feels like society is just starting to live in that stasis.
For example, if your order is wrong, don't throw a tantrum or food, simply send it back. If someone cuts you off in line or on the highway, don't chase them down and scream racial slurs, send them peace for their own lives. The list goes on. Let's go through a little of it.
Redditor u/doyoushrubclick wanted some adults out there to listen up and realize... people are watching, they asked... What is the most immature thing you have ever seen an adult do?
Hello Karen...
Karen GIF by moodmanGiphyA customer literally hung out in the middle of our store and started screaming "DOES ANYONE WORK HERE?!" when the only employee in her current line of sight asked her to wait till she finished with another customer first.
It's Wrong!
My husband got a sandwich thrown at him by a middle-aged woman because he apparently "made it wrong" according to her arbitrary standards that she failed to disclose before ordering the sandwich. We later saw the same woman on a viral video yelling at the cashier in a Starbucks because some customers in the Starbucks were speaking Korean.
My husband also got the police called on him by a 30-something man for not giving him a free pickle.
Poor Woman...
My manager had two dudes blow an airhorn in her ear after she leaned out the window to hear them better. Almost blew her ear drum. Same manager also had to report a dead body on shift, call an ambulance for a suspected drug user, had a sandwich thrown at her many times and was generally abused by customers and other managers.
Customer Dearest
Mommie Dearest Quote GIF by Top 100 Movie Quotes of All TimeGiphyI saw a grown man throw his burger at the cashier at McDonald's because it had onions on it and he didn't like/want onions.
So Ignorant
I had a customer recently complain to me that they were, and I quote: "Absolutely sick and tired of all these companies using COVID as an excuse. They need to pull up their boot straps and get their sh!t together and get to freaking work."
I want to say I was baffled by their ignorance, but it's par for the course right now and the handicap on the game keeps getting higher.
Veggie issues
Having my vegetables weighed at the supermarket, and some guy cuts in line and just plonks a zucchini on the scales to be weighed (I'm in China and line cutting is a huge issue here). I don't say anything. I simply pick up the zucchini and hand it back to him. He throws it on the floor and storms off.
Forget that guy!!
Exactly at 4...
Probably not the MOST immature thing I've seen but it's what came to mind. I worked in a hot dog joint that was actually pretty popular but it closed at 4 o clock every day on the dot. Exactly at 4. We would prep for closing 30 mins in advance, keep enough food out to sell if someone came in before closing and then spend 5 mins after 4 finishing up and then leave for the day.
Well, one day my manager (great gal) and I were the only ones there.
No customers, so we get all our work done and some more and then close the signs. Manager is counting the drawer when this dude barges in. I recognized him because he had been parking RIGHT in front of the store for a solid twenty mins and I assumed he was just waiting on someone.
Dude comes in (front door is only exit so we didn't lock it but the multiple closed signs were up) and looks around. My manager says, "Sir we are closed. You'll have to go elsewhere."
This grown a** man then POUTS, proceeds to STOMP HIS FOOT and say, "But I'm Hungry and I want to eat here!"
"Sorry, sir, but our food is up and the drawer is closed. No more sales." The way she spoke to him was fitting; like he was a toddler.
Then this dude just sighs real loud and says "Fiiiiinnnnneee I guess I'll starve."
Grown man. Like not exactly a boomer but older than my dad for sure. Old enough to not act like that. Some adults are entitled AF.
You Suck!
I Hate You Lol GIF by LifetimeGiphyIn whole foods. Whole foods worker drops and spills a tray of produces he's transporting.
Middle aged lady stops, looks me in the eyes and says (loudly so everyone can hear) "SUCKS TO BE HIM". Like we were all supposed to laugh at this guy trying to do his job. Forget that foolish lady.
The Cancer Card
So... my daughter is a cancer survivor. As we've been on this journey I've discovered parents of children with cancer fall into 3 broad categories.
- Parents who are in it for themselves.
- Parents who are in it for their kids.
- Parents who are in it for the community.
I should point out that last group makes up 98% of the people, but holy sh!t do those 2% split between groups 1 and 2 are literally a cancer.
I've seen parents finagle multiple make a wish trips for their kid.
Pull the cancer card to get free everything.. then bad mouth charities when the charity realizes they're grifters just using their kid for benefits.. your kid doesn't need 4 ipads..
Getting invited to meet professional athletes and then begging for autographs and souvenirs.
I've watched parents have a melt down because their kid wasn't on the front page of a flyer promoting an event.
Piss and moan because their kid got more time on TV then they did.
It's eye opening when you see how petty and exploitive people can be.
I WIN!!
donald trump snl GIF by Saturday Night LiveGiphyAdults arguing with children and then get even more mad when the child has a valid point.
"The director..."
The director of the company.
Someone asked him a work-related question. Because of this "distraction", he messed up the repair project, blamed guy asking question, and threw a wrench across the room. At someone else's head. For "distracting him."
"If you can dodge a wrench, you can work here. If you can dodge the blame for things you didn't do, then you can work here (until you get hit by a wrench or 3 write-ups, whichever comes first)."
"Shouted at an employee..."
Shouted at an employee to the point of making her cry because the employee ACCEPTED to refund the product...
"Had a temper tantrum..."
Had a temper tantrum because I was sitting in "her" seat on the bus.
"I'm in a wheelchair..."
I'm in a wheelchair and have been for all of my life. One old lady told me and I quote, "Don't worry, you'll learn to walk one day." My dad and I were baffled and didn't know what to say.
"Scream at her grandkids..."
Scream at her grandkids at the park because she wasn't paying attention and a basketball hit her.
"He refused to admit..."
He refused to admit that people liked some other guy better and didn't even show up to the party when the guy got promoted.
"I see adults pay thousands of dollars..."
I work in probate law. I see adults pay thousands of dollars to fight their siblings over trash. These items are not even of sentimental value, it's just to win some decades-old beef with a sibling.
"Ironically..."
Fast food worker here.
A couple of years ago we hired a 14-year-old girl to take drive-thru orders and run them out to cars. A few weeks into training she ended up making a few mistakes on an order in the middle of a rush. No big deal and an easy fix but my boss, a 40+-year-old grown adult, decided to yell at her in front of everyone and throw some plastic food trays at her.
She ran to the back of the restaurant crying and all of our kitchen staff stepped off the line mid-rush to comfort her and offer to be her job reference if she decided to walk out that night, which she did.
Ironically, my boss's fit ended up causing a major backlog of orders that night and we were all giving him hell the entire night for treating her that way. It was one of the few moments that I felt really proud of my kitchen crew for refusing to tolerate that s***.
"My uncle got irate..."
Was at a restaurant with my uncle and cousins from far away. First time visiting with them in years. At the end of the dinner, one of my cousins snuck off and paid for everyone as a nice gesture.
My uncle got irate yelling and complained that he wanted to pay his share because, and I s*** you not, he has a movie ticket points Visa card and he was close to getting a free movie. He argued and told off our cousin loudly in the restaurant over a few free movie points. He would not drop it until he got our cousin to apologise to him for costing him movie points.
I don't think those cousins are going to fly down again any time soon.
"Eventually..."
When I worked in the bakery at Whole Foods, we had a customer who kept asking us to make banana muffins with A LOT of pecans on top for her - but only a few at a time, like two or three. In general it was a request we could accommodate, but we had a few considerations we had to account for, like the fact that if we made them and she didn't pick them up we couldn't sell them to anyone else because pecans weren't on the ingredient list.
The problems started arising when she would call us while she was on the way to the store, expecting to pick them up when she arrived. She was about twenty minutes away and they took 45 minutes to bake. Even if she had called us while she was an hour away, we were on a pretty tight production schedule and someone would have to interrupt the work they had to get done that day for an unexpected special order for this one customer.
First, she got mad that we couldn't magically make them in twenty minutes because of chemistry. I was, unfortunately, the supervisor on shift when she called most of the time, so she'd keep me on the phone for fifteen minutes raging about how the customer is always right - even though she was factually incorrect in this circumstance. She started saying we should just make them her way all the time so that we always had them on hand for her. I explained to her that we could get heavily fined by food inspectors if we did that, but that only made her angrier because f*** the man, I guess?
Eventually, my team leader said that we had to put our foot down with her and tell her that she had to put in special orders two days in advance just like everyone else. When we told her this, she of course got like sputtering infuriated (along the lines of "How am I supposed to know when I'm going to want them?!?!"). We were able to just say "well management says so, sorry," and we thought that was that. She went along with it for a couple days, sending her poor mother to pick them up for her because she was too angry to step foot in the store - her mom always looked so apologetic.
Finally, though, she came in personally to berate my team about how rude and inconsiderate and generally s***** we had been to her. Then she asked to speak to our store manager, who had been made aware of the whole Banana Nut saga. He escorted her outside and told her she was banned from the store. We found out later that she had also been banned from the three nearest Whole Foods locations over this exact same set of circumstances.
"On the morning of my son's 1st birthday party..."
My mother-in-law doesn't handle stress very well, she tends to start lashing out at people and starting fights for no reason.
On the morning of my son's 1st birthday party, she started to lose it as we were running around getting everything ready before the guests arrived. She first cornered my wife and started freaking out over the thermostat and some other unrelated pointless crap, then found me and started a fight over the garage door (it needed oiling and I hadn't done it because I was busy setting up the party). Volume of the voice steadily increasing.
My wife marches up to her and actually sent her to her room to calm down, and she did it! She stayed up there for an hour while my wife and I finished putting up decorations. It is a memory I will cherish forever.
"I was a kid in a mall..."
I was a kid in a mall when I was able to shop by myself and saw a lady blow a fuse at some guy behind the counter. Calling him names and what not just losing her s***. He just puts up the palm of his hand and says, "Mam, I believe you are too irrational to deal with." And then just pivots 180 degrees not facing her and ignores her. Waits for her to leave and when she does, he just proceeds to say to the next person, "May I help you?" Like nothing even happened. I learned a lot from that guy in 1.5 mins.
"After three hours..."
Old job. One day, we had a huge tech overhaul they didn't prepare anyone for. Entire machines we're used to using were just gone, sometimes replaced, sometimes not. After three hours of literally everyone asking the manager how they were supposed to do their jobs now, he walked to the middle of the room and turned in a slow circle, screaming at the top of his lungs and gesturing wildly, saying, "EVERYONE JUST DO WHAT YOU ALWAYS F****** DO."
...So I went to my workstation and waggled my fingers in the air where a keyboard had been the day before.
"Not surprisingly..."
The parking garage near my work is a frustrating place. The monthly customers have a parking pass that lifts the gate to get in and to get out. The thing is, the pass and their sensor don't work. You have to creep up to where you think the sweet spot might be, wave your pass around, reverse and try again, curse a bunch, endure people behind you honking despite them going through the same thing..... frustrating.
Not surprisingly, I witnessed a grown man throw the most excellent temper tantrum I've ever seen. The gate wouldn't go up, and he just started screaming in his car and smashing on the horn, straight out of a movie. The worst part is is that the gate always seems to go upright when you reach peak rage. So he's yellin' away, and then the gate is just like "Alright, man. I'll open. Jeez."
"When I was in high school..."
When I was in high school, my boyfriend was planning on joining me and my friends for an indie movie night at my house. Boyfriend called me up to say that he couldn't make it because he had to watch his siblings, and I overheard his dad screaming, stomping, and yelling at the top of his lungs. He kept calling me a 'stupid little wh*re' and a 'f****** waste of time'.
I should mention that I was 14. Who calls a 14-year-old girl that?!
I ended up calling the police on him twice later; once when he punched his son in the face and another when he followed my mom and brother home. He wanted to 'teach her a lesson', we found out.
I don't wish pain on anyone, but if he died in a car fire I'd probably do a little dance.
"We called the police."
When I was working at Petco, I used to see all kinds of adult temper tantrums. People needed to take care of their animals but hated how much that costs. Of course, they would take it out on the store employees. People that wanted fish were the worst. They would try to get away with spending so little on fish and never wanted to clean their tanks or buy the stuff to do that. Then they wouldn't properly introduce new fish to their tanks and would bring in samples of their water that were just terrible and be pissed when they couldn't get another fish for free to replace the one they killed.
However, the biggest adult temper tantrum was from a guy that bought Flies Off (really cheap) in an attempt to get rid of fleas (relatively expensive). He used the whole bottle and came back expecting a refund because his dog still had fleas. He was told no and things went south quick. He was yelling by the check lanes about how he deserved a refund. Screaming at the manager in front of everyone making a huge scene. He then kicked over this spinning rack holding dog collars and yelled that he was going to come back and shoot up the windows. We called the police. He never actually came back, but what a total piece of garbage over like 5-10 bucks.
"He asked a clerk to come help..."
kevin smith dancing GIF by FilmStruckGiphyI was at the pharmacy around 8 pm, waiting in line behind an older lady. The pharmacist tells her she'll have to pick up her prescription tomorrow at 10 am because this location doesn't carry this particular medication. The following ensues:
Lady: I'll wait
Pharmacist: No ma'am, we physically don't have it in this store. You have to come back tomorrow at 10 am.
Lady: Let me speak to the manager.
Pharmacist: I am the manager, I'm the pharmacist and this is my store. I'm telling you, we do not have this medication right now.
Lady: Can you just give me one pill and I'll get the rest tomorrow?
Pharmacist: Ma'am, we don't have any of the pills here.
Lady: What if I pay you for the cost of that one pill right now, and I get the rest tomorrow?
Pharmacist: Ma'am, I can't give you one pill because we have zero pills in this store. You'll be fine until tomorrow at 10 am, I promise.
The woman proceeds to go WILD. She begins throwing stuff on the shelves onto the floor, stamping on them, screaming about how she will sue this pharmacy and how she's never seen such terrible customer service in her life. She even started kicking the partition between her and the pharmacist, threatening to go back there and fill it herself. It didn't even seem like she was upset about the medication itself, it was more that she didn't get her way and didn't want to come back. He asked a clerk to come help and the whole time, she's grabbing for things and throwing them onto the floor in fury. She gets escorted out and we could still hear her yelling outside.
"Then it gets bad."
A 60ish-year-old man was getting gas and the pump allows you to pay for a car wash at the same time. He adds the car wash to his bill.
Drives around to car wash, big huge large see from space type sign "Temp Out Of Service"
Goes inside starts screaming that this mother f***** tried to steal his $7.99. The guy explains that the ticket is good for 90 days and he's sorry. Slams his fist on the counter screaming that if the car wash was out of service the pump shouldn't have offered it to him in the first place. Demands a full refund including the gas for wasting his time.
Then it gets bad.
He starts calling the guy an ISIS member and throwing things off the shelves before storming out. Calls the guy all sorts of names. I thought his head may have exploded with all of the veins showing.
This man is my father. We don't speak anymore.
"We explained..."
I worked as a bra fitter in a department store. We had an older lady, probably late '60s with her rich old husband (80's) come into the store wanting to buy bras after she had 2 weeks earlier gotten a boob job. We explained that because of swelling she should wait to buy bras and she became so enraged she literally started yelling abuse at us and pushing over entire racks of underwear. Picture a thin, somewhat wrinkled woman in rhinestones, losing her s*** and tossing around undies. It was glorious.
"One time..."
I used to work at McDonald's. One time a guy came through the drive-thru and ordered chicken nuggets. We gave him his food and he drives off. A few min later, he comes into the store and runs up to the counter ranting about how we forgot his BBQ sauce. My manager meets him at the counter, apologizes profusely and gives him some BBQ sauce packets (extra too, maybe 6-7 packets). He proceeds to throw them at her and the rest of us workers behind the counter. We all had BBQ sauce splattered on our uniforms, on the walls, equipment etc. After he ran out of ammunition, he ran out of the store and drove away like a coward.
I was 15 then and I pretty much lost my faith in humanity.
"It was my last week..."
I worked in a grocery store and a woman asked me to slice her organic bread. She flipped out when she discovered that non-organic bread was also sliced on the machine. She stomped her foot and yelled, "But that messes up the organic integrity!" It was my last week working there, so I simply told her, "Ma'am, please understand, I'm not emotionally involved in the situation." She froze and just walked away with the bread.
"I told a grown woman..."
I told a grown woman she could not pet my service dog while he was working. She got herself so worked up she started shouting, and told me that if I didn't want people to pet my dog I shouldn't bring him into the grocery store. I expect this sort of behavior from young children, and I also expect their parents to keep them under control.
"Needless to say..."
I worked the front desk at a hotel a few years ago. A guest came to check in around 10 pm and asked if he could get a room with 2 beds (he booked 1 bed). I told him we were sold out of rooms with 2 beds. Before I could offer him anything else, he took the bowl of apples we had at the desk and threw it against the wall. Then he took his OWN laptop, threw it on the ground, and started kicking it around the lobby. Security came out promptly and told him he needed to leave, which obviously prompted more screaming and kicking. Needless to say, he didn't stay at the hotel that night.
"I work in a small boutique hotel..."
Hospitality industry nightmares. I work in a small boutique hotel with no security and a couple of years ago a guest had a nervous breakdown that lasted for about two hours. Her husband left her in the city center and she somehow couldn't get back to the hotel, started blaming us. Accused us all of being racist because she's Iraqi, accused the taxi driver of wanting to assault her, got in my face to the point I thought she was going to hit me. She was screaming so loudly the other guests locked themselves in their rooms. It was the worst thing I have ever witnessed from a human being.
"When I worked at Starbucks..."
Oh good lord. When I worked at Starbucks there was a very well-dressed man who came in and ordered a latte with the following customizations: whole milk, no foam, 200 degrees. We had just run out of whole milk, which I told him and apologized for. He didn't get S***** with me or anything but was sort of weird and soft-spoken. Okay, whatever. So I handed his cup down the line for his drink to be made. 200-degree no-foam lattes are a bitch to make, but my best barista was on duty so I wasn't worried at all. She hands off his drink. He takes the lid off and looks at it.
Customer: "I said no foam."
Barista: "Oh, I'm sorry, I must not have been paying attention. Give me one moment and I'll remake it for you."
Customer: "No, it's fine."
The customer walks away in the middle of my barista explaining that it would only take a few seconds to correct his drink. Suddenly, but also very silently, he takes the lid off of his drink and pours it all over the condiment bar in a sweeping motion.
Not really a temper tantrum, but obviously the dude had some very VERY weird ways of dealing with dissatisfaction.
"When I told her this..."
I'm in retail, so I witness my fair share of adult temper tantrums, but ever since I became a manager it's 10x worse because now I'm the one that gets called up to deal with the tantrums. A few weeks ago a woman wanted to return a curling iron that had clearly been being used for years and wasn't even a brand that my store sold so she obviously had no receipt and no original packaging, meaning it wasn't eligible for a return anyway whether or not it's something she had bought at our store.
When I told her this, politely, of course, she puffed up and asked to speak to the manager. Okay, I'm a manager, but the store's general manager will be here tomorrow if you want to leave your number and I can have her give you a call. Nope, not acceptable, she wants cash for it today. Even if I somehow was able to accept the return (my system literally won't let me) it would be store credit only, never cash. I tell her this, and she flips the f*** out.
Screams at me (literally, not figuratively), tells me she's calling the cops and corporate and the Better Business Bureau AND the attorney general (wtf are they going to do about it?!), calls me a wh*re, and then she tells me karma is going to bite me and I'm going to have a stillborn baby. Which was really fun to hear considering I'm currently nine months pregnant. All because she couldn't return her used curling iron for meth money. I had no doubt in my mind she was on some sort of substance, but the significant amount of teeth missing from her mouth tipped me off that it was meth she was after, and you obviously can't pay your dealer in-store credit.
"I was an intern..."
This was back in 2010 or so.
I was an intern at an ad agency in Boston and commuting into the city every morning. I'd get off at North Station and then transfer to the orange line. That stop has a decently large entryway.
One day, the woman ahead of me as I walked down the stairs had a large folder in her hands. She was reading what looked to be a fairly technical financial or legal document, and you could tell she was really stressed out about it. Like, rubbing her temples, cursing under her breath, etc.
Anyway, we get through the turnstiles and are about to head down to the train platform and she stops and just kind of looks at her stuff...and then screams at the top of her lungs I HATE WORKING!!
Then she starts sprinting back and forth and screaming (in a crowded T station during rush hour, mind you) I HATE WORKING!!!
She does this for about 30 seconds or so before eventually tossing her file up and the papers filling the air. She then sprints back up the stairs out of the station.
The wildest part was people paused for like two seconds then went back on their way as if nothing happened.
[deleted]
The Crush
smash it with a booster! GIF by Candy CrushGiphyCry when I jokingly told them that Candy Crush has crashed and lost all their level data.
COOKIE!!!
Back when I worked at a bakery a grown woman came back in a few minutes after picking up her order and she baseball threw the whole package at the cashier I was working with, luckily she dodged though it almost knocked the bread wall over.
This bakery made giant oreo-like sandwich cookies shaped like butterflies as part of the normal menu, and where called Chocolate or Vanilla Butterflies depending on the flavor.
Around easter the bakery made cookies with rainbow pastel frosting in the shapes of flowers, bunnies, eggs, chicks and butterflies, they where called Rainbow Bunny Cookies or Rainbow Egg Cookies...you get it.
They are also either chocolate or vanilla flavored.
So the lady called in an order for 2 dozen of each flavor of Butterfly Cookies. The order was filled accordingly, however the customer didn't know she had to specify the Rainbow Butterfies and instead of asking us to exchange pr something she stempts assault and ruins 48 3inch in diameter cookie sandwiches.
How High?
A guy down the street from me growing up, built a huge fence, like 10 or 12 feet high on one side of his front lawn and not the other. He said he hated his neighbour so much he didn't want to risk ever seeing him.
"invading her privacy"
I had a woman absolutely lose her mind with me because she thought I was "invading her privacy" at the bank by looking at the screen, which had nothing on it but a screen with the teller in the upper-right corner. (It wasn't like most banks where you interact with a teller in-person--you use some kind of video-chatting service to do whatever you need to do unless you do need to meet in-person with the teller.)
In reality, I was looking at it because my mom had sent me to wait in line and cash her check while she met with another teller about her debit card and I had absolutely no idea how it worked and didn't want to seem awkward in front of the teller (social anxiety sucks ass). Didn't even look for more than 5 seconds and I could care less about what she was doing, but that didn't stop her.
I feel sorry for all the employees working at the bank that had to step in and get involved and try to get this woman to calm down. And I mean all the employees. All six of them currently working at the time (it was near closing time).
Eventually the woman stormed out and peeled out of the parking lot with her husband in tow, and we apologized to the teller my mom was speaking with, who was pretty chill about the whole situation.
D-I-V-O-R-C-E
remote control raymond GIF by TV LandGiphyMy husband and I were bickering over what to watch which led to physically (play) fighting over the remote. That bastard threw it into the next room cuz he knew I was too lazy to get up to get it.
You're 40!!
Playing against a 40+ year-old man in a WHFB tournament who got upset at some horrendous rolls and threw his own models across the store.
Useless...
Use a sharpie on a weather map to double down on a completely stupid and baseless claim that wouldn't have even gained him anything if it were true.
(Honestly, there are dozens of actions of our former White House occupant that could and should make this list.).
The Segway
I worked in a warehouse and my manager was the owner's son.
So this spoiled, rich, soft, white, country club man is being shown how to operate these new ridable order selectors we have. Basically a baby Segway with a basket for small boxes. He's standing on it and the sales rep from the company was explaining the buttons and about safety.
Obviously.
He reaches over to show my manager the buttons on the handle and my manager slapped the guys hand like he was a child. We all, including the sales rep, looked at my boss like he was outside of his mind.
Eat a hot dog...
My ex started screaming and crying when his dad wouldn't eat the hawaiian pizza (he didn't like pineapple on pizza, fair enough) that i paid for. My ex then decided to pack up the rest of the pizzas so nobody else could have any, and storm out. He didn't return that night so i had to stay in the spare bedroom at his dads, (this was a rural area and our house was like an hours drive away and we had been drinking).
He then told me when i made it home the next day he ate all the pizzas in a bush and then walked home.
Ex screamed and cried coz dad wouldn't eat pizza i'd paid for so then decided nobody was having any, stormed out and left me at his dads in the middle of nowhere and took all the pizzas with him. Dude had serious issues and i still think about the bullet i dodged to this day.
I Admit!
Nbc Gwen GIF by The VoiceGiphyThis is me. I remember I was pregnant and something on the banking website wasn't working. Over and over I kept trying and nothing. I got so pissed off I hit the laptop a couple of times with my hand. Hard enough because I broke the hard drive. Whoops. 🤦🏻♀️.
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Curious about what constituted low points, Reddit user beesechugersports asked:
"What was the worst year of your life?"
Childhood Trauma
"1987. I was 13."
My dad was killed when he was hit by a car. Total accident."
"I think about the driver sometimes. I hope he forgave himself."
"I honestly don't recall ever feeling anything toward that guy. I think I was more upset with the neighbor who came to our door to tell us he thought my dad was in an accident."
"My mom piled us in the car and we drove down the street to the scene. My dad's body was under a sheet.
"That night I was numb until my mom hugged me and I bawled in her arms. After that I pretty much shut down emotionally for a couple decades."
"Took me a long time to get help for my own PTSD."
~ surfingonmars
Losses
"2011 - Lost my job, girlfriend, friends, had to move back in with my folks where I fell into a deep depression."
"That went on on until 2014 when I was able to turn the ship around."
~ max-peck
"People underestimate how horrible those 2-3 yrs of depression feel."
"I was in rock bottom depression for 2 yrs and it felt like a decade passing by."
~ secondhand_bra
Future Derailed
"2012. The year started out great. I met and befriended an adult film actress on my birthday and had an active sex life for the first time ever."
"I was finally off the night shift at my job. I applied for grad school. I was accepted into a program for veterans at the Writer's Guild of America."
"I had finally arrived."
"But by September it was all over. My relationship with 'Nadia' had turned toxic and ended in a huge fight."
"I was rejected from grad school. The WGA program didn't pan out for me."
"Worst of all, I was fired from my good job. I nearly became homeless and had to go back to working the night shift guarding a gated community in Beverly Hills."
"By the year's end, I was alone and broke (I would declare bankruptcy early the next year) with no hope for the future."
~ SgtSharki
Economic Downturn
"2014. My business suffered a 4 million dollar loss."
"Then my fiancée who I was with for 6 years left me for her boss just 3 months before our wedding."
"I wasn't able to find another partner but I did recover from the absolute shambles I was in."
"Just the fact that I'm able to function normally and interact with people again without breaking down is a big win for me."
~ S_MZ
Post College Struggles
"2014—the year I graduated college and was looking for work and had bad acne and unrelenting pressure from my parents and a poor social life and I worked Uber while studying for the Chartered Financial Analyst exam that I ended up failing."
~ Damerman
Friends Lost
"2017. I lost my best friend that year.. we met during our first year of university and immediately hit it off and became close."
"We were inseparable for 7 years. I’ve never been the same since then.. I died with him."
"I wish I could’ve helped him.. I wish I could just take one last drive and smoke one last cigarette with him ,and tell him how much I love him and how much he means to me."
"Please tell your friends that you love them whenever you get the chance.. you never know when will be the last time you hang out together."
~ Syouf
Seeing the Light
"2018. Realized I was part of a cult."
"It was called the Great Commission Churches when I attended though they’ve changed their name multiple times over the years when they’ve been accused of abusive practices."
~ Consistent-Way-2018
Long Road to Recovery
"2019. Last straw at my job, where the management team turned on me, resulting in me putting in my 2 weeks after my complaint against a lying supervisor was dismissed."
"Had no more income, so I couldn't pay rent, and thus had to move out of the shared house I had with a friend and his fiancée (wasn't on lease, had no obligation to stay, and the fiancée even told me "you know, you don't have to live here" during an argument)."
"Said fiancée convinced him to turn on me and drop me as a friend, which resulted in him going off and convincing the only other friend I had to do the same."
"Covid hit."
"My cat developed a genetic illness that paralyzed her and my step-father put her down behind my back. My childhood dog developed cancer and was suffering so she was also put down, but I was able to hold her while she passed."
"Great aunt died of cancer, great uncle (other side of family) died of cancer."
"That was the lowest I've ever been, and I haven't even recovered 20% yet."
~ Whatsa-Throwaway
Pandemic Pandemonium
"2021 was the year when my mental health was worse than ever."
"Looking back I'm proud of myself that I just survived."
~ Master-Mood1816
"Well done on that and also, same."
"2021 can go straight in the bin."
~ sicklything
GiphyAftermath
"On the flip side 2021 was probably one of the best years of mine as an adult."
"My girlfriend and I were able to spend so much time together because she was only working maybe 1 day a week and I worked at an empty warehouse from 7 to 3 Monday to Friday."
"When everything went back to normal we both were working so much we ended up splitting up, so I guess 2022 sucked pretty bad."
~ ofTHEbattle
"2023. By far the worst year of my life.
"Got laid off, took forever to find a new job, fiancée got pregnant then lost it then she got cancer, hated my new job, went heavily into debt to survive, fiancée beats cancer, she gets a life insurance payout from her father's passing, she gets pregnant again."
"Then I find out after she up and vanishes suddenly that every single thing was a lie. She faked it all from top to bottom for two years and pulled the rug out from under me, suddenly running off with our dogs."
"Since then I guess she needs some sick gratification that she’s not getting from just all that and continues to stalk me on social media/Reddit as well as spoof her phone number to text me sh*t with purely the intent of trying to hurt me."
"Losing the dogs hurt and still hurts, won’t lie, but being rid of her has been nothing short of a blessing."
~ Ok_Outside_4650
"This year—2023."
"My dog died in June."
"My wife died in July."
"My cat died in August."
"I have 5 kids."
~ MichaelHoncho
Dear whatever doesn't kill me, I'm strong enough now.
"Every year seems to beat the previous."
~ BenChodABQ
Oof, that's a lot to take.
While some are still going through it, many have already come out on the other side.
Here's hoping better days are ahead soon for everyone.
Giphy
BFFs don’t always last forever, and even the best of friendships can end in the worst ways. From unpaid debts to spreading gossip, these people took to Reddit to share the most memorable and infuriating reasons why they broke off a friendship.
1. Wild Support Payments
I lost close to $5,000 to a friend. He was going through a bad breakup and needed to pay child support. He told me that the first child support payment had gone out of his account without him expecting it and he had nothing to cover his expenses and rent for the month. I loaned him a total of $5,000 over about three weeks, and this was also when my wife and I were planning our wedding so we had a heap of expenses, but a bro needs help and that was a priority. Later, I found out the dark truth about him.
Some mutual friends confessed to me that he’d used the money on living large and a few big weekends out with girls. I confronted him, he told me he couldn’t pay, then started ducking me. I moved away after I got married and he ended up no longer speaking to our group of friends once they all found out about it. Ten years of friendship, gone.
2. Son Of A…
I went on a mini-vacation, which was supposed to be four days, with my best friend in 2021 to New Jersey. She brought her then-eight-year-old son, and I brought my then-four-year-old daughter. Her son was so disrespectful, dropped curse words, had a nasty attitude, and was so mean to my daughter the entire trip.
The last straw was on the morning of the third day when he ripped a box of cereal out of my daughter's hand. She started crying and he slapped her across her head. I tried disciplining him and my friend blew up at me and proceeded to DEFEND her son, as she called my daughter a "whiny baby".
We started arguing, I packed our bags and said we were leaving. I drove 4 hours home without saying a single word to her or her son. Got to her house, threw her bags on her front lawn, and peeled out of her driveway.
3. Jurassic Snark
Jurassic World | A New Vision on Vimeovimeo.comI cut ties with my friend due to lots of little things that eventually became too much. For example, 7-8 years ago, he bought 15 tickets for a midnight premiere of Jurassic World for our entire friends group to attend.
The day of the show, he texted me to tell me that he forgot to buy "my" ticket, so I couldn't go. Of the 15 he bought, how did he decide it was "my" ticket that he didn't buy? Well, it turns out, he gave my ticket to a girl he met the week prior so he could take her instead.
That was just one of many things.
It's all truly minor stuff like that, but when you have 100 minor things, it becomes clear that they aren't actually your friend anymore.
4. Two In One
My mom’s friend had a son that was 3-4 years younger than me so we became friends by default. Honestly, I just tolerated him because was a foul-mouthed little instigator whose mom let him get away with everything and never disciplined him—but then he went too far.
One summer day we had all just gotten back from going somewhere, I had gotten myself in trouble with Mom and was given a time out on the front porch while our moms went inside.
He proceeded to get my toy cars out, and while I’m sitting there he starts throwing them at me and calling me names with every throw. I’d had enough of being pelted and threw one back. And he screamed his head off and started bawling. But I wasn’t the only one who lost a friend that day.
His mom came out of the house, scooped him up, yelled at me, and took off in her car. My mom asked me what happened and I told her. She didn’t blame me for not taking it, and called up his mom to explain everything. She wouldn’t hear it, hung up on my mom and that was it.
5. A Friendly B&E
It was my last year in a country I previously lived in and at the time it was during summer vacation which we normally spend in our home country. We had to cut our vacation short because we got a phone call telling us that our house had gotten broken into and robbed. We came back on that day and my friend was talking to me, telling me he saw the authorities by our house and he hopes everything is OK.
It was horrible. There was stuff stolen, furniture destroyed, closets torn down, and fully emptied. My family decided to accelerate the move from that country and that was that. A year later, he sent me a long email explaining how sorry he was and that he was responsible for it, that his friends were the perpetrators, and that he knew who did it but didn’t want to expose them.
When we showed the email to the authorities and they questioned him, it turned out he was part of that group as well.
6. DU Why?
man holding steering wheelPhoto by Luke Ellis-Craven on UnsplashMy friend got a D.U.I. while driving my car and then lied about it and lied about why my car was towed—but he didn’t stop there. He lied about losing his license. Suddenly, he just wanted to walk everywhere for the exercise. He lied to my friends and told them it was my fault because my registration had lapsed. And when I finally confronted him about it…he kept lying.
7. Neutralize The Threat
My friend’s girlfriend got mad at him for being at my birthday party. He was my best buddy ever since second grade, my parents and even my grandparents adored him. The day after my birthday, I got a call from him. I could hear her voice in the background, he was so loud telling me to delete all the photos we took on my birthday and cut ties with him.
She made him block me everywhere and I was sad for some weeks. I'm still tearing up typing this. I was the first one he opened up about his relationship with. I used to ask how she is every time I saw or called him. I tried to be friends with her but she didn't care. The thing is that he has other female best friends too—but she has a problem with me. And we don't even see each other often after graduating because of the distance, and don't text or call often because of our studies. It was after months I got to see him on my birthday. I miss him but I have to respect their relationship.
8. Ultimate Betrayal
My friend was telling my girlfriend at the time she should break up with me—but that’s not the most twisted part. This was happening a few weeks after my mother’s death and I was still dealing with the trauma. He successfully managed to talk her into dumping me, only for me to find out they'd been sleeping with each other a week beforehand. To add to this, he didn't even have the balls to tell me to my face, I had to find out from a mutual friend. I'm glad I haven't seen that jerk again.
9. She Wanted A Maid, Not A Bridesmaid
woman in white dress holding bouquet of flowersPhoto by Jonathan Borba on UnsplashMy friend told me I was her best friend, but didn’t put me in her wedding party. But then she continued to ask me for wedding styling advice for her bridesmaids. It all stung but I got over it. She then told me she needed me at her bachelorette and I was helping her brainstorm ideas.
We talked daily. One morning we talked like normal and that evening I saw posts of her on her bachelorette. We’d been best friends since high school, but she had a girl she’d only known for six months on the trip with her. Her response when I asked about it? “Oh someone surprised me with it, sorry you’re upset”.
I blocked her and haven’t looked back—and I’ve been a bridesmaid for better friends multiple times since.
10. Escaping The Friendzone
This one friend I had in particular seemed to be giving me real signals. She was being really flirty, saying things verbally that were almost flat-out saying she wanted it, and touching me on more than one occasion. But then later, she would go on about how we are just friends.
All this happens, then I hear her talking about one of her other friends one night—a guy I also know. What she said made my blood run cold. She told the other girl: "Yeah he would love to get a piece of me but I'll never let him, I always make him think he has a chance though. When we go out to a club I will grind up against him and turn him on", and she was also encouraging the other girl to try and turn this dude on/tease him too.
Forget that. That guy isn't your toy, and neither am I. Being flirty is one thing, but purposely turning guys on just for your own ego trip is another. I haven't been friends with her since, and I don't regret it one bit.
11. Office Space
My best friend since high school chose her Microsoft coworkers from five years ago to be her bridesmaids over her actual best friends. We had always talked about how I would be in her wedding party, and of course, she had been in mine. I was hurt and confused. I messaged her on Insta asking what I did wrong a few months before the wedding, and then promptly unsent it. The aftermath was brutal.
She saw the message pre-delete and then proceeded to ignore me and be totally rude to me at the wedding. She pretended I didn’t exist. She didn’t invite me to the pre-wedding hike. Her other best friends didn’t know who the heck her bridesmaids were either & came up to me & said they were shocked I wasn’t in the wedding party.
She came up to me crying at the after-party, buried her head in my shoulders, and told me how sorry she was and that she loves me. She thought I didn't like her fiancée. I never expressed such a thing. Apparently, that’s why none of her best friends were included. And these random Microsoft people? She thought they “worked well as a team”.
Somebody who can be that cold to their closest friends is not somebody worth keeping around. I still talk to her a ton because we have a lot in common and there’s obviously a lot that I like about her. But I’ll never come to her with real things again, and our actual deep friendship is over.
12. Best Man To Worst Man
selective focus photography of Pinocchio puppetPhoto by Jametlene Reskp on UnsplashMy friend was seeing a woman and moved in with her. We'd hang out when we went there to visit and everything was fine, but he would come to our city and visit and would cheat on her. He kept claiming everything was on the up and the girl he was in a relationship with was fine with that.
Well, at some point my wife friended her on Facebook and my friend lost his mind over it. He was saying my wife was meddling in their relationship, etc. But here's the thing, if everything was on the up, why would that have bothered him? Clearly, he had been lying to us. And a shame because the girl he was seeing was so sweet.
We had to cut ties because it was just so hard to watch him mistreat someone. We were the best men in each other's weddings and all, but he changed after his divorce. He treated people around him terribly. Our friendship of about 20 years ended just like that.
13. Just Own Up
I loaned my friend $250,000 to pursue his real estate dream and six months later he ghosted me. He ignored about 50 emails/texts/calls/postcards and two certified letters. Infuriating!! He also stopped paying real estate taxes on it without telling me. I lived across the country so it was extremely hard to manage the resolution. I eventually got all the money back but no help from him.
I think we could have still been fine if he had kept communicating, and acknowledged the errors. We finally talked—but what he said on the call broke my heart.
We were trying to patch things up, but he admitted only to the taxes part, not to all the other stuff. I had known him since college, like 30 years. Sheesh
14. Friendus Disappearus
My 16-year-old sister got me tickets to the Harry Potter exhibit in New York City when I was 13. She spent her own money on it for two tickets. Me and her. My best friend found out and threw a fit at her mother that “She should be going because she is a bigger fan” and the mother massaged my sister to tell her to give her ticket to her daughter because “It’s the right thing to do”.
My sister told her to get lost.
15. Not-So-Sober Companions
people gathering on street during daytimePhoto by Ehimetalor Akhere Unuabona on UnsplashI cut off my friends when I realized that all we had in common was binge drinking. They offered no support when it came to my attempts to cut back. Instead, they got irritated when I didn’t want to go to the bars. I kept saying no and explaining I wanted to avoid situations with drinking—but one guy was so much worse than the others.
He told me that I couldn’t be part of “our” friend group if you don’t like going out drinking as some sort of intimidation tactic.
16. No More Free Therapy
I didn't realize that slowly, over 20 years, my friend had basically turned me into her own personal therapist. Every single day, almost 24/7, she'd be calling and texting, expecting me to sort out every single one of her problems, and validate her hurtful behavior.
Then one day at the end of last year, I got into an accident that left me hospitalized. Whilst I was mostly fine functionally, I had a lot of scarring and was told that I might need skin graft surgery later down the line, depending on how it healed.
My best friend since we were 11 didn't even ask how I was. Not once, not for two whole months. The only time she acknowledged that I was even injured was when she said, "That's a bad way to start the morning" when I told her that I was in emergency.
She just...didn't care.
And once I realized that, walking away was easy. I haven't missed her at all, the best decision I ever made.
17. Dear John…
I had a friend that was with me since we were three years old. Let’s call him “John”. About ten years after we met, we were going to this youth camp together. I’m so excited that John’s coming with me. But he seems…different. There’s another friend coming along with him, and now John is constantly avoiding me. This went on for about a day at the camp…before the avoidance turned into being nasty. He was constantly insulting me.
At some point, I had a panic attack at the camp—not related to John being a jerk and all—and here’s how our conversation went, with a few other friends watching:
John: “So where even were you last night?? You weren’t at the dorm”.
Me: “I had a panic attack, so I was told to sleep somewhere else. I dunno why”..
John: “Oh, so you have mental issues. Haha”.
Later, as I was playing with another friend that I had met at the camp, John came over to me with his other friend. The new friend that I was playing with said: “Oh, are you one of his friends too, John”? John’s answer was devastating.
He said: “Nah, he thinks we’re friends but I’m just forced to watch him all the time”.
That was the last straw. I was done talking to him from that point on.
But then, weeks later, I received a call from John. I picked up, and he was just talking to me as if he had never been mean to me. Ever. He was just talking about some random stuff about Minecraft. I just mumbled some “okay”s and went on with my day, confused.
I decided to call him later, and I confronted him about what happened at the camp. He said he never said any of those things. I said I’m pretty sure he did. He said: “I was just kidding about the mental issues thing”. He denied that he ever said the stuff about not being my friend though.
Throughout the entire call, he never apologized. And the worst part is, I almost believed him. I almost thought that I was just imagining it, and that maybe John was a good friend after all. Keep in mind I wasn’t very mature yet, despite my age. So I just…sort of…continued thinking of him as a friend. But as I did mature, I just started cutting contact with him, and we never spoke again.
18. Kissing Cousins
silhouette of man and woman about to kiss on beach during sunsetPhoto by Annette Sousa on UnsplashMy BFF’s cousin made a pass at me while I was visiting her. The cousin was in a long-term, committed relationship at the time. I never saw or spoke to the cousin before or after the pass he made at me. He kissed me out of nowhere that one night.
My BFF called me a week later because the cousin dumped his girlfriend and asked my BFF if she could call me and connect us. She blamed me for ruining her cousin’s relationship and life. She was angry at me. We never spoke again.
19. Brunch Is On You
There was a lot that led up to it, but the straw that broke the camel’s back was a trip where I went out and visited her after a year of her guilting me for not coming. I was a classroom teacher, so paid time off during the school year was hard. I was also working on my MA thesis.
When I arrived, she left me at the airport for five hours because she decided it was a good time to break up with her boyfriend. Nothing big had happened, she just wasn’t feeling it and wanted to do it when I would be there for support. That was the first red flag—but there were more.
The next morning she took me out for an EXPENSIVE brunch where she drank a whole bunch. When it came time to pay she’d forgotten her wallet.
The next day was a Monday. She was also a classroom teacher and wanted me to visit her school. I told her I could, but asked if she could take me to a coffee shop on my lunch break because I needed to work on my thesis. She did but told me not to go anywhere cause it wasn’t a good area. She said she’d pick me up at 3:00. At 3:30 I tried calling and she didn’t answer. She ended up finally coming at 5:00, saying she’d had a phone interview for a new job.
She asked me to take a cab (this was before Uber) that evening to get to the airport because my flight (which left at 9:00) was too late and she’d be tired for work. I also had to work the next day.
I didn’t hear from her for six months until she came back to town and texted “Hey! This is your estranged best friend. Maybe we could reunite and you could pick me up from the airport and we could get lunch”? This airport was an hour away, in the middle of the school day. I told her no.
20. Wake Up, Sheeple
My friend went DEEP down the conspiracy theory rabbit hole. I’m talking flat earth, Columbine false flags, Lizard People, and 2012. Obviously today, he’s on the “the jab is going to kill us all”.
If it was just an interest of his he liked to talk about, I’d be fine with it. But it was a thing where he couldn’t stop talking about it and berated anyone who disagreed with him. He turned into a complete weirdo.
21. Food Fight
person in white shirt standing in front of foodPhoto by CDC on UnsplashMy best friend in high school started hanging out with the wrong crowd. I distanced myself from her and she started trying to spread false rumors about me because she was mad.
One day at lunch in the cafeteria, she came up behind me, picked up my tray—that had fries, nuggets, and two big puddles of ketchup and BBQ sauce—and smacked me across the face with it. Well, I wasn’t about to let her get away with it.
I immediately got up and set up in a fighting stance. She tried to lunge at me, so I did what any normal petite girl would have done…I side-kicked her so hard in her abdomen that she fell back and got laid out on a lunch table.
Thank goodness I had endured years of fighting my older brother and male cousins. Anyway, years later I ran into her. She had taken up boxing.
22. Time To Socially Distance
The pandemic ruined my friendship. I have been friends with her since I was in diapers but I am also disabled and highly at risk of dying. She drank the Kool-Aid. The last straw was when she kept saying only people with pre-existing conditions would die so the rest of society should continue on as usual. Except I’m one of those people that would die…
23. Bye, Soul Sister
My former best friend and I were together 24/7 for like 7 years. He was my soulmate but not in an intimate way, like a “soul sister”. He’s gay, so we would call each other sisters. We moved to a different city together and everything was great for a few months then he started asking for help for his portion of the rent—which I was okay with AT FIRST—but he would take longer and longer to get it back to me and eventually, I wouldn't receive it for months.
It was his first apartment but I had been living on my own for a while already, so I was used to the rent payments and utilities, but I guess he wasn’t. But he would still buy weed and go out for drinks with friends. I finally confronted him about it and said that he can’t be spending money on these “luxuries” whenever he has debt to pay me. His reaction was insane. He completely blew up on me.
One month after renewing our lease—I know, stupid of me—he told me that he wanted to live alone. Little did I know he was actually going to move in with another friend of his. He left very suddenly and when I tried contacting him about his part of the rent and utilities for the last month, he blocked me.
So I called up the friend he was now living with and he refused to speak with me. His new roommate said sorry, hung up, and blocked me too. I was stuck paying almost $3,000 by myself—thankfully I was good at saving money—and he still hasn’t paid me back any of it four years later. I’ve given up on getting my money—but I didn’t expect him to act the way he did when I saw him again.
About a year ago, I was hanging out with friends from our hometown—they were mutual friends because we were always together—and he showed up randomly. It was a good evening but I knew in my head that I wasn't doing this again. He said it was just like “old times” and he missed me but I wasn't going to get caught up in that again.
To this day, he sends me memories on Snapchat and says “We were so cute” and I just reply with a heart emoji and that’s it. I would delete him off Snapchat but I don't want there to be any drama between my friends and him because he's definitely one to cause drama if something like that happens… and he likes to make people choose sides. I really don’t know how I didn’t see any of this when we were besties but I’m glad it’s over,
24. Time To Cut Ties
men standing while salutePhoto by Luemen Rutkowski on UnsplashMy old Navy buddy got into some trouble involving a girl. He got detained and falsely charged. The girl lied to the authorities about the whole thing. He was so depressed about it that he tried to hang himself with the bedsheets in cell after his initial arrest. Then he spent years trying to clear his name.
During that time the girl was in and out of rehab and had been caught lying multiple times. Nothing went his way and I was nothing but supportive toward him. Then he started lashing out at me regularly. I would try to joke around with him like we used to and he would accuse me of talking down to him or trying to mess his life up when all I would ever do is be an ear for him to vent to.
I would listen to all of his problems and frustrations, and basically, whenever I would have any type of input he would immediately take it the wrong way and lash out. I finally had enough and snapped on him one day and called him an unbelievable jerk.
He immediately shut me out of his life and probably to this day still thinks I was the bad guy. I still never understood what I did, I think he was just using me as an emotional punching bag. He was my best friend for 10 years and seeing him so broken was incredibly heartbreaking.
Luckily he’s a lot better now and we talk from time to time but not in any way like before. We might as well just be casual acquaintances who barely know each other now. Maybe it’s for the best because I couldn't imagine ever treating a close friend the way he treated me. A good life lesson I guess, sometimes you just need to cut nasty people out of your life.
25. No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
There was one guy I was good friends with back in middle school. Everyone in the school hated him and I was scared for his mental health back then, so I decided to become friends with him, not wanting to see him take his own life. He eventually moved away but we were still on good terms—but then he took a dark turn.
Cut to a few years later and he’s now big into politics, claiming things about Latinos and religion—both groups of which I am a part of—that are hateful and just flat-out untrue. Needless to say, I cut all ties with him, I can’t believe this is what I get for sacrificing my social life for him.
26. Just Married
My friend no-showed to my wedding. We had been drifting apart already for a few years due to work and other life things getting in the way. But I made an effort to still invite him because he had been an important part of my life and helped me through some hard times. He never responded to the RSVP. I called him up to see if he had lost it, gave him the date, and told him I was excited to see him there and celebrate.
He didn’t show up, didn’t even send a text or call with a reason, and never even offered a single congratulations.
He instead messaged me a few weeks after with the audacity to ask if I wanted to take some photos of his dad’s car that he was trying to sell. When I confronted him and told him how disappointed I was, he gave some nonsense about how we’ll always be friends no matter what. No bro. Not cool. Actions speak louder than words.
27. Stuck In The Past
woman in orange blazer standingPhoto by Etty Fidele on UnsplashMy friend’s now-boyfriend and I hooked up once in 2018. I talked with him and told him I wasn't interested in that happening again. He starts dating my friend in 2020 and it's a volatile relationship. I guess my name gets brought up when they are fighting and he bragged to her about hooking up with me. Her reaction was devastating.
She blocked me off everything and I was left wondering what had happened until someone else told me. Oh well. She really could have talked with me about it and I would have been happy to set her mind at ease.
28. False Positive
My friend always talked about herself, never asked about me. She didn’t see any problem with hitting on/pursuing men in relationships but would lose her mind if a girl even looked at the guy she was with. She faked a pregnancy to get a guy to commit to her. And last but not least, chewed me out for being nice to her new boyfriend—the first decent person she had ever dated—because she thought I was interested in him.
29. Sleep On It
I was really good friends with a coworker of mine. That's how I met my significant other. We went on vacation together with one other couple at one point. For context, we went on vacation and my spouse and I had to sleep in a room with twin bunk beds while the other two couples got queen/king-sized rooms.
We ended up resorting to sleeping on the pull out couch simply because there was more space. Before said vacation, me and her had spoken of this already, my spouse mainly being the unhappy one regarding the sleeping arrangements. We giggled about it mostly because I hardly cared and my spouse chilled out about it. It wasn’t an issue.
Maybe four years ago now, a few months after the vacation, I spent the 4th of July with my alleged "best friend" and everything went completely normal. We had fun, and things were great. I tried texting her a few days later and no response. Weird...I didn't work with her anymore because I had gotten a new job in the city I live in. I thought maybe she was just busy as she wasn't that great of a texter. Tried her again a day or two after that, but again, no response. Now I knew something was up. I reached out to her a half dozen more times after that and continuously asked her what was wrong or if she was even okay because maybe something terrible happened to her and I just didn't know.
She just completely ghosted me. I get a random text one evening from her—and what it said left me in shock. It was rather confrontational asking me about how my spouse and I weren't happy with our sleeping arrangements during the vacation we took together. I responded to her and said it wasn't something me and her hadn't already talked about and it wasn't that big of a deal. Never heard from her again.
My spouse and her husband are childhood best friends. Cut to me seeing her for the first time four years later this past Thanksgiving. I was dreading the situation because she's rather confrontational, but we're adults, and I'm not afraid of her. I was almost thinking we would just hash it out as I have been genuinely confused this whole time why she's so upset and can't even offer me an explanation. She said zero words to me. Didn't even look in my direction.
I guess I may never know, and I've come to terms with that. There are just some people that are petty and can't communicate I guess.
30. Some People Always Change
welcome to fabulous las vegas nevada signagePhoto by Zalman Grossbaum on UnsplashThis is dumb but sometimes…people are dumb. We went to Vegas, dinner, and a show. After dinner, my dress felt tight so I wanted to change into more comfortable clothing—from a dress and heels to a sweater/jeans and flats.
My best friend was annoyed that I “always do this” and “didn’t show up for the night” by getting dressed to the nines. She didn’t speak to me or the rest of our friends for the entire night. Weeks later, she called to tell me we’re just different people and after 17 years we can’t be friends anymore.
All because I changed my outfit. Good riddance girlfriend!
31. Heard It Through The Grapevine
My friend spread rumors that I took some of her things. She never confronted me over the supposed theft even though we were seeing each other daily and doing our normal friendship things. I didn't even know anything was going on until another friend, from a different friend group, overheard one of the stories and came to me to ask me what was up with that. That’s when I learned the deranged truth.
It turns out she had been talking badly about me behind my back for a while so I ended up cutting ties. And that theft she had accused me of? It turns out it never happened. Her sister had recently moved out and had boxed up some things that belonged to her by accident.
32. Jealousy Hates Company
My best friend from middle school stopped talking to me after I started becoming successful around 20 years old. I excitedly told him I finally landed a good job and he asked how much I was making so I told him, thinking he'd be happy for me. Nope. He went silent for a bit, got cold, and we ended the call shortly after. I called him sometime later and his girl answered and I could hear them arguing. She was saying "Pick up the phone and talk to your friend" and stuff like that. Then click, the line went dead.
That was the last time we ever spoke. I was ghosted by my best friend of like 8-9 years because he was jealous of my success.
He had a pretty rough life in a lot of ways, really struggled in school, and as he got older had a hard time adapting to women as they got more mature. Back in the day, immature girls couldn't get enough of him, but as they grew up they were less impressed with him. They had all already dated a guy like him and his game just wasn't up to snuff anymore. By that time I was already settling into a long-term relationship with a beautiful girl. Between that and not seeing any prospects for a more successful life, I guess he felt like I was rubbing it in his face.
33. No-Flex Zone
white Maul type-C motorhomePhoto by Hanson Lu on UnsplashFor my friend, EVERYTHING was a flex on Facebook—how much money she'd made that day doing Instacart, her husband buying her a car, her full refrigerator, being able to stay at home and not work a 9 to 5 (she was also an occasional MLMer), her new RV, her spoiled tween son playing Xbox in the new RV, pictures of her plastic surgery, vacations, etc. Every conversation somehow, magically, turned the focus back to her, her life, her family, her possessions, and her struggles. Finally, I decided to say something.
I called her out on it. She said it was because she had anxiety and depression issues, she and her husband didn't go to college, and she was afraid of being judged.
Her constant need for attention grossed me out and I wasn't interested anymore.
34. A Short Fuse
I wouldn't necessarily say the guy was my best friend, but I'm pretty sure I was his best friend, if that makes sense. We met in middle school, and we had some common interests and some mutual friends. As we got older, he got a really bad Napoleon complex because he remained on the short side while the rest of us got taller.
A lot of our mutual friends distanced themselves from him, I was the last holdout because I felt bad for him and because I'm too nice. His arrogance and anger issues peaked in eighth grade. In the span of two weeks: he broke up with his girlfriend, punched two girls in the face, got dodgeball banned in our Phys Ed class, tried to choke one of our school's soccer players, and then got beat up by a girl behind the school. I had to give it to him straight when he started venting about his situation to me; he was kind of a tool. He disappeared the following week and I haven't seen him since.
35. Bridezilla
I got pregnant; my due date was the month of her planned wedding. I said I'll try to be there but I couldn't be her maid of honor anymore. Her reply was unforgettable. She said: "I wish you would have waited".
This was after my first pregnancy ended as a miscarriage. Well, she ended up postponing her wedding anyway…
36. Keeping Up With The Jones
silver foil on white ceramic platePhoto by Tom Radetzki on UnsplashI had to cut ties with my friend when she became an early Alex Jones convert. The sweet, wonderful person I knew turned into a paranoid nutjob.
37. What A Gas
My former best friend needed a place to live during the summer and I let her move into my tiny room in my apartment. I told her beforehand that I needed her help to pay rent and she said that she could. So fast forward, she moves a ton of stuff in my room that is already full of my things, doesn't give me a single cent, and doesn't even show any gratitude. She constantly told me she had no money to pay rent while she would talk about how she went out every night spending $80+ on drinks.
Anyway, we were supposed to move into another apartment together. She bails at the last minute and I have to find another one fast; being in college, everyone leases way ahead of time so it was really hard to find a place. I was mad but I shook it off. Big mistake.
The next day, I needed a ride to the bus stop because I was taking the Greyhound home. This bus stop was literally 5-10 minutes from my apartment. She has the nerve to say "I only put enough gas in my car to get to work and back"...seriously?
I packed her things up and kicked her out. Haven't talked to her since.
38. Why So Shellfish?
I had to dump one of my oldest friends. Finally, the penny dropped, and I realized that he was some kind of sociopath, constantly taking advantage of me, talking down to me at any opportunity, causing problems for me for No reason, except that he could. That was a very difficult (and painful) thing to realize—and I think he never did realize that he did it, even when I told him about some of the crazy things he'd done to me.
One time, he ate all the food I'd cooked for us both to eat that evening, apologized, and then did exactly the same thing the following evening.
He was also constantly borrowing small sums of money from me, not bothering to pay it back or keeping track of how much he'd borrowed—saying that was my responsibility.
He would also claim he "could throw me out on the street" whenever he wanted to, from the apartment I paid 50% of the rent for, to sleep on the sofa. This was when I finally gave up on him.
He riled up a common friend because his ex had flirted with me; he was trying to split that friendship up.
Once, he called everyone who I'd invited to a dinner party, saying the party had changed location to another city.
Weirdest of all? He brought me a gift of a big frozen crab. I've never eaten shellfish, during all the years I've known him. He put it in my freezer box and didn't close the door properly, so I had a big pile of water in the kitchen the next day and had to throw away everything in the freezer.
He also bricked my bank card PIN by entering the wrong code three times, saying he "thought it was his because they were similar". The card was at my apartment.
39. I Thought You Knew
woman whispering on woman's ear while hands on lipsPhoto by Ben White on UnsplashMy "best" friend from high school spread rumors about me because he wanted my then-girlfriend. When I went off to college I kinda left him behind, not really thinking much about it—but it wasn’t over yet.
Fast forward four years later, he storms into my apartment in a rage that I slept with his wife. Which is true, but I slept with her a year before they even met. After that incident, I knew our friendship was over. He pretty much just viewed our "friendship" as a competition of who can get the most women.
40. Don’t Be Late
My friend took advantage of me and would sabotage me constantly. She would embarrass me or be rude to my other friends. I would put up with it because I felt bad for her. She had bad relationships with family, no boyfriend, etc. The straw that broke the camel's back was the time she chewed me out on the phone for being 10 minutes late and said—I kid you not—"You being late is the same level of disrespect as giving someone AIDS"!
Yup. AIDS. The lateness wasn't even my fault, it was a designated driver I had arranged to take us to a bar. I wanted to cheer her up.
41. Stop The Car
I met a really cool chick at university who was doing the same course as me. We hung out most weeks and did all kinds of cool stuff. We became good friends really quickly.
I lived with my two best friends, a gay couple, and decided to introduce them all to each other so we all went out one evening and had an amazing time. I ended up staying at her place that night.
The next morning she was driving me home and she decided to tell me that she didn't like my friends because they were gay and she was brought up as a Christian. In the same paragraph, she went on to tell me that she didn't like Asians, poor people, or people that went to public school. I got out of that car and I have never seen her or spoken to her again.
42. Wore Out Their Welcome
low angle photo of buildingsPhoto by Agustin Lara on UnsplashMy significant other and I bought a condo and invited our mutual friend to move in with us. He got a girlfriend right about the time when we bought the house. Now, we were good friends with this guy and hung out quite a bit.
So he starts dating this girl as we begin to tear apart and redo the entire townhouse. Peeling off wallpaper and sanding down every crack and cranny. My boyfriend and I are working our behinds off on this huge investment. We keep asking him to come and help us, since, you know, he'll be living here too. He shows up exactly twice in two months of non-stop work, and one of those times, he left an hour later "just to drop off some keys to her" and obviously never came back. They had been fighting the whole time he was with us and he was summoned elsewhere I guess. So that's pre-moving-in.
He moves in and the girlfriend is immediately there every night and most days. She has no job and no car, so he goes to work and she just sits around at our house. She just hangs out at our place all day, with her one-year-old. She eats our food. She uses our electronics. She never leaves. She contributes nothing and asks us to buy her milk for her baby.
Our roommate can contribute nothing for food or anything other than rent, because of his new little family that he is responsible for. Our friend defends this, saying her kid is his son now. They'd been dating for five months and the child was not his, but he referred to him as his son.
There's way more, but those are the basics. She once told me, as she was eating a meal that my boyfriend and I cooked with the food that we bought and kindly included them in, that she "forgets that food costs money". This is the person that basically lives rent-free in my home.
She sat around all day and her kid ran around unsupervised. One very memorable time he picked up a knife that we were using to do a project. She didn't notice. God, I could go on for ages.
He, who was once an adamant atheist, is now wearing things that say, for example, "JESUS 4 LIFE"! That was hysterical. She was very religious.
Anyway, they went on vacation and were mad that we didn't pick them up at the airport last minute. The second they returned to the house, we argued—and what an argument it was—and then we sat them down and told them to get out. He is no longer friends with us. It felt awesome.
43. Talk About Paranoid
For background there is me and my boyfriend Dan, and then my friend Tiff and her boyfriend Todd. Two couples, all friends.
When we first all started to go out I was really good friends with her, but as time went on I saw more and more that she was selfish and egotistical, she once complained that her parents bought her 24k gold diamond earrings for Christmas when she just wanted the money, and so on. There is a long list of faults with her.
We roll around to a friend’s 21st birthday about a year ago. Her boyfriend cannot go anywhere without her except for work. No lads night out, he can't even look at other women and you can tell it grates him if I mention that Danny was going away for the weekend without me, or we'll be rating the lovely beer providers of our local pubs. But that’s not the most ridiculous part.
At this party, Tiff drinks and gets paranoid that a girl, who is a friend of ours, at another table is talking about her and decides to demand that none of us talk to her anymore. At this point I've had enough of her nonsense, tell her “She's free to make HER boyfriend do whatever she likes and he can be dumb enough to follow it but she does not have the right to try and control MY partner, so she better shut up, sit down and stay away from me for good”, and walked away.
I haven't said more than five words to her since, and only see her when Danny and Todd want to go to the pub.
44. Request Denied
A couple of people in high school stopped speaking to me for going to the prom with a lesbian friend. They have tried to add me on Facebook since, which is hilarious since I haven't spoken to them since 1996.
45. Friendship Is Magic
woman standing near body of waterPhoto by Lau keith on UnsplashMy friend was just like a brother to me; I'd never had that kind of relationship with someone before, especially since my direct family is quite dysfunctional. Ergo, I value my friends (the ones I have left) highly. This kid is about a year older than me, him being 17 now. We met at a meetup in our city and sort of hit things off from there.
After a long time of talking and relating, we decided that we were the best of friends and hung out as much as we possibly could. Due to distance, this was limited to each weekend. Our platonic relationship sort of pushed me to develop feelings for him—we were already acting like we were dating anyway, although it was just holding hands. He asked me one day if I liked him and I said yes, but I don't want a relationship because I'd just come out of an ugly one.
Here's the weird part. He goes off his nut and starts going on about how he'd be cheating on his girlfriend in Japan…whom he doesn't have on Facebook, whom he talks to once a month at best, whom he had only brought up once and didn't even reference her as his significant other at the time. He said that if he continued to see me, now knowing my feelings, it would be wrong. He claimed that he was an honorable man and had morals, and would dislike it if his "girlfriend" was hanging out with a guy who had feelings for her…not even my farthest rationalization could convince him to see reason.
He deleted me, ceased all contact with me; lived each day after as if nothing had happened. It was, to say the least, one of the most painful things I've had happen to me. I still love him as a brother/close friend and I still miss him. This was in May.
46. Nice Knowing You
My best friend got a girlfriend, so he had less time for me. After a few years, I got home and saw them moving stuff out. We lived in the same apartment, but a different floor. They never said anything to me at all, no hint. They just left, not even a card or an invitation. That was the end of the friendship.
47. Benign Tumor, Malignant Friend
I had a friend for maybe three years, she had originally been the girlfriend of one of my guy friends. I listened to all her tears and agony when they split up, all her depressing stories, and so on.
One day I went into the hospital for a biopsy, I was terrified I had cancer. I came home and looked at my phone—and what I saw made my blood run cold. It was full of texts from her about having a bad day, and a huge email about how she wanted her ex back. She didn't ask how I was, or how the tests went, all she wanted was someone to listen to her. That day I put her number on the block list, and blocked everything of hers online.
48. Best Friend, Worst Roommate
woman standing near gray concrete building during daytimePhoto by Jaclyn Moy on UnsplashI moved in with my “best” friend, her horrid boyfriend, and her antisocial sister. The friend and I had been incredibly close throughout all school, but over six months that deteriorated. The boyfriend wouldn't let her go out unless he could come too. He was pedantic and argumentative for the sake of “winning” a fight.
The sister wouldn't let me invite people over (my boyfriend included) unless she knew about it a day or so in advance. She claimed she had a severe phobia of “outside” people. But the final straw was when their mother came to visit. She stayed with us for two weeks without anyone informing me in advance, who I knew yes, but had decided to tell me what to do (no drinking, etc) as if I were her child as well. At one point I remember the mother told me it was a bit too late and loud to have friends over.
The friendship fell apart, she would side with her sister and boyfriend. We became bitter, there was note writing on their part, and she put dirty dishes on my bed, etc, to the point I would avoid going home. They decided to move out without telling me. I had overheard them discussing movers. In the end, the girl and I sat down and decided it would be for the best. But my nightmare wasn’t over yet.
The evening that she moved out there was a complication with money, my friend couldn't pay the movers. I decided out of respect for what we had, I'd loan the money and take it out of her share of the lease, along with the remainder of the bills, etc. In total, it was $600. She had government aid in paying the lease (which she knew about but hadn't informed me) and her share went back to the Department of Housing.
I was unable to properly contact her again. I had been spat on constantly for six months and then when she was crying and begging I thought I was doing a good thing, only to have been ripped off by my “best friend” I had known since I was 10 years old.
49. Snitches Get Stitches
I was 17 and my older girlfriend was staying with me while I had the house to myself. This friend was jealous and decided to tell my parents what we were doing. The aftermath was brutal. It resulted in a huge fight with my dad involving broken glass, screaming, lies and threats. I had to talk to the authorities and got threatened by them as well.
My friend tried to claim she had nothing to do with it…but I knew it was her. I cut off all contact and haven't spoken to her in 10 years.