People Break Down The Lessons They Learned From Their First Relationship
Image by Юрий Урбан from Pixabay |
First relationships are tough. Typically they pop up when you're younger, teenager for most, when you're most certainly not mature enough to handle one. You're young, impressionable, and eager to please, unable to see what's really happening. While this could lead to heartbreak, that can be a good thing. You can learn something from that first break-up, a lesson (or lessons) that stay with you for the rest of your life.
Reddit user, u/Departure_Jaded, wanted to hear:
What did you learn from your first girlfriend/boyfriend?
Don't Just Do It Just To Do It
Getting into a relationship for the sake of being in a relationship is the worst reason to be in a relationship.
Likewise, liking someone because they like you is the worst reason to like someone.
You want to date "a person", not "their company".
Doormat Is Not A Good Luck On Anyone
You can't make someone love you simply because you do so much for them.
Doormat is not a good look on anybody! Also listen to your gut.
Protect Yourself
Never send sexy pictures with your face in them.
Doesn't matter how in love you are, people get cruel after break ups.
Sometimes It's Not About You
Sometimes the way people behave in relationships have nothing to do with you, or me in this sense.
I dated a girl who went from guy to guy to guy and I realized that I was a small bump on a road to her finding out who she is and dealing with the things she needs to grow up and be a beautiful person. I've done the same to woman. I hope this makes sense.
You Can Be Angry, Sure, But
That screaming at each other during arguments is not healthy
Do Unto Others, But Don't Expect A Lot From Them
Just because you treat someone well doesn't mean they'll return the favour, and the amount of people you can trust in this world is a lot less than you think
Sometimes The Puzzle Pieces Just Don't Fit
That despite how much you love someone you can be incompatible. At least I know now what I need from a relationship
2 people can be amazing on their own but if they don't have a lot of common interests then it's kinda hard to get a relationship going
Let Yourself Enjoy The Loneliness
Being alone is better than forcing yourself to be with someone you don't love.
You Have More Value Than You Think
Don't ignore the red flags.
Don't let go of your self-respect.
When you're wearing rose colored glasses, the red flags just look like flags.
The Love Is In The Smaller Details
I'll give two lessons:
1. That "feelings" will fade away and what takes a relationship to be strong and healthy is the everyday, conscious commitment to love one another. We've been together for almost 8 years and have crossed various stages in our lives, since highschool, college, and we're still together as she studies for med school and I as I pursue my career as an accountant. We wouldnt last this long if its just due to being "excited" for each other, which we actually still are haha, but its because of always making time and being committed to support each other no matter how busy we are, while still giving enough space.
2. Consistent small things are far more valuable than big monthsary or anniversary efforts. We get so busy and stressed by our own individual "career paths", but we always find a way to squeeze in our love, either through a sweet long message, or even just a simple cup of coffee and staying up late. Love is consistency in small efforts, not by giving grand things that are just once in a blue moon.
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History is shaped by mistakes. Some lead to monumental leaps forward in human understanding. Most do not. Of those in the second category, many are simply embarrassing, and result in a good bar story. Meanwhile, other have simply disastrous consequences. Below are 48 of the biggest mistakes that have been committed in history.
1. He Should Have Accepted the Offer
Google signPhoto by Pawel Czerwinski on UnsplashIn 1999, the founders of Google approached Excite CEO George Bell, offering to sell him the search engine for $1 million. When Bell refused, they lowered the price to $750,000, which he also rejected. Today, Google is valued at over $300 billion.
2. We’ll Pass
person holding black android smartphonePhoto by Dimitri Karastelev on UnsplashIn 2009, Facebook turned down a pair of programmers for jobs. No big deal, right? Must happen all the time at FB HQ...
A few years later, though, the pair developed WhatsApp. Facebook subsequently purchased that venture for a cool $19 billion.
3. Trains Were Too Wide
a silver train pulling into a train stationPhoto by Jametlene Reskp on UnsplashThe French state railway SNCF spent $15 billion on a new fleet of trains, but unfortunately, they were the wrong size and were too wide for their 1300 platforms. The mistake cost them an estimated $50 million to correct.
4. A Case of Bad Timing
File:Napoleon at Fontainebleau, 31 March 1814 (by Hippolyte Paul ...commons.wikimedia.orgJust over 200 years ago, Napoleon’s army attempted to invade Russia.
Whoops.
A combination of factors spelled doom for the invasion. There wasn't nearly enough food for the men and horses. Poor discipline was rampant in the ranks. And, of course, none of the men were prepared for the unimaginable brutality of a full Russian winter.
It was a devastating failure. Napoleon lost 500,000 troops.
5. Infidelity is Expensive
File:Tiger Woods June 2014 (cropped).jpg - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.orgTiger Woods’s admission of multiple illicit affairs with women cost him his wife and $750 million. He also lost his sponsorships with Gatorade and others, but even worse, the shareholders of the companies with Tiger Woods endorsements lost an estimate $5 to $12 billion dollars in the wake of the scandal.
6. Gambled and Lost
selective focus photography of bubblePhoto by Daniel Hansen on UnsplashThe Spanish telecom company Terra took a gamble when they purchased the search engine Lycos in 2000 for almost $12 billion. At the time, Lycos was the third most visited site in America...but that was before the dot com bubble burst. In just about a year, most internet companies in America lost millions in value. And Lycos was perhaps the biggest loser.
Terra would eventually sell the search engine in 2004 for just $95.4 million. That's an astonishing loss of $11.6 billion dollars on their investment.
7. I Accidentally Taped Over It!
Buzz Aldrin on the moon in front of the US flagPhoto by NASA on UnsplashBack in the days of data tapes, it was easy to accidentally tape over earlier recordings. Unfortunately for NASA, that’s exactly what they did, and the original tapes of the moon landing were erased and re-used. Luckily, they were able to restore the original broadcast and offer the world a glimpse of the historic event.
The admission that NASA accidentally erased the original footage had fed rocket fuel to conspiracy theorists, who already believed the entire lunar program that landed people on the moon six times between 1969 and 1972 was staged on a Hollywood set.
8. The Worst Nuclear Accident in U.S. History
File:Exelon Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station.jpg ...commons.wikimedia.orgThe nuclear meltdown at Three Mile Island in March of 1979 was the result of mechanical failures that were made worse by poor training and oversights in the human-computer interaction design. It was the most significant nuclear disaster in U.S. commercial nuclear power plant history.
There are conflicting reports on the cost of the disaster, with some sources stating that the radiation exposure wasn't significant enough to result in additional instances cancer, while others insist the radiation caused thousands of cases.
9. Loss of Cultural Knowledge
File:The Great Library of Alexandria - Colorized.jpg - Wikimedia ...commons.wikimedia.orgThe Great Library of Alexandria was one of the largest and most significant libraries of the ancient world, and was dedicated to the Muses—the 9 goddesses of the Arts.
The burning of the library resulted in an irreplaceable loss of knowledge and literature.
10. Didn’t Understand the Food Chain
File:Mao Zedong 1959 (cropped).jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgFrom 1958-1962, Chairman Mao Zedong of China launched the “Four Pests Campaign,” which would exterminate rats, flies, mosquitoes, and sparrows. What they didn’t realize was that sparrows ate a large number of insects. Without the sparrows to eat them, locust populations grew and created an ecological imbalance that exacerbated the Great Chinese Famine, which claimed the 15-30 million deaths.
That's right, when Chairman Mao Zedong ordered the extermination of sparrows, he accidentally sentenced 15 million citizens to death, all because he didn't realize that sparrows were mission critical for pest control.
11. Is That Leaning?
people walking on green grass field near white concrete building during daytimePhoto by Jainam Mehta on UnsplashThe Leaning Tower of Pisa is a free-standing bell tower in the city of Pisa Italy.
The tower is famous for its lean, but that wasn’t by design. The foundation for the tower was built on ground that was too soft to support its weight, and it started to lean during construction.
12. Threw Away Millions
black and red UK flag pedal trash bin near white wooden doorPhoto by Steve Johnson on UnsplashA lottery winner in England lost $181 million when her husband accidentally threw away her winning ticket. The woman knew the announced numbers were hers, because she always wrote them down on a separate sheet of paper before giving the ticket to her husband.
13. Brought Down by Foam
File:Space Shuttle Columbia launching.jpg - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.orgOn Feb 1, 2003, the Space Shuttle Columbia disastrously disintegrated on re-entry, claiming the lives of all seven crew members. Back when the shuttle launched, a piece of foam fell from the shuttle’s external tank and punctured the shuttle’s wing, causing damage that made the rocket unable to withstand re-entry.
NASA knew about the problem when it occurred, and came under scrutiny for their negligence.
14. Cutting Corners
Deepwater Horizon - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.orgIn April 2010, a BP oil rig burst in the Gulf of Mexico, pushing nearly five million barrels of oil from the well. It was eventually determined that years of BP favoring speed over safety and cutting corners were the true causes of the accident.
15. Couldn’t Corner the Market
white and black striped textilePhoto by Andrew Kliatskyi on UnsplashYasuo Hamanaka, the former chief copper trader at Sumitomo in Japan attempted to corner the market (get enough market share to manipulate the price) on copper back in 1996.
Before prices dropped and the scheme collapsed, Sumitomo controlled as much as 5% of the world’s copper. He was known as "Mr. Copper" because of his aggressive trading style. On June 13, 1996, Sumitomo Corporation reported a loss of US$1.8 billion caused by unauthorized copper trading by Hamanaka on the London Metal Exchange. It was later revealed that the true losses caused by Hamanka totaled $2.6 billion dollars.
16. Should Have Prepared for Winter
File:RIAN archive 301 An attack.jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgIn June of 1941, Hitler was riding high on his victories and was determined to claim the Russian territories to fulfill Germany’s destiny. Convinced that he would easily win, he ignored the warnings of his military, and reportedly told them that “We have only to kick in the front door and the whole rotten Russian edifice will come tumbling down." Thanks to some strategical miscalculations on the German generals' part, and their unpreparedness for Russian winter, the Germans were eventually forced to retreat.
17. That’s Not the System We Used!
a red planet with a black backgroundPhoto by Planet Volumes on UnsplashA group of Lockheed engineers used Imperial units of measurement to build the Mars Orbiter, but the rest of the team used Metric. The use of two different systems caused the spacecraft to approach Mars on a trajectory that brought it too close to the plane. It disintegrated as it passed through the upper atmosphere. The mistake cost NASA approximately $125 million back in 1999.
18. Guitar Groups are Out
File:Beatles ad 1965 just the beatles crop.jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgDick Rowe, an A&R man at Decca Records at the time of the Beatles’ audition, is known in history as "the man who turned down the Beatles." Sources that after Rowe first heard the Fab Four, he told their manager that “Groups with guitars are on their way out.”
After their rejection, he went on to sign the Rolling Stones and several other famous groups, but missing out on the Beatles was a big one: The Beatles have sold 600 million albums worldwide and 177 million in the United States alone.
19. They Defeated Themselves
<a href="http://api.aucklandmuseum.com/id/media/v/93335">commons.wikimedia.org</a>
On September 18, 1788, during their conflict with Turkey, a group of Austrian soldiers bought some hard beverages from a band of locals in the town of Karansebes. They had too much and began to shout that the Turks were coming.
Mass confusion ensued (partly due to language barriers), panicked men began firing at the supposed "Turkish invaders" and by the morning, 10,000 of their own men were dead. With Friends like that, who needs enemies?
20. Safety First.
Free Images : live, equipment, spray, training, flame, fire ...pxhere.comOil workers on the Piper Bravo Oil Rig were evacuated after an explosion killed 167 of the 226 men working on the rig in July of 1988. A safety inspector forgot to replace a valve after a routine check, and when a worker (unaware that a valve was missing) pushed the start button, gas leaked out.
21. Poked the Wrong Bear
File:YuanEmperorAlbumGenghisPortrait.jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgThe Sultan of the Khwarezm Empire in present-day Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, and Iran had agreed to a trade treaty with Genghis Khan, but when the caravan arrived, the Governor of Otrar seized the goods and had all but one of the merchants killed.
Khan then sent a delegation to the Shah to demand punishment, and he responded by shaving the heads of the ambassadors and sending the interpreter home headless. Kahn retaliated by invading and conquering Otrar.
22. A Not-So-Controlled Burn
a large fire is burning in the mountainsPhoto by Mike Newbry on UnsplashIn 2000, the Cerro Grande fire in New Mexico began as a controlled blaze, but things quickly turned into a disaster. High winds and drought let the fire spread rapidly, and soon authorities had completely lost control. The fire burned for more than a month, destroying 48,000 acres, and displacing more than 400 families.
23. Blind Belief
File:Fukushima radiation dose map 2011-04-29.png - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgThe triple meltdowns at the Fukushima Number 1 power plant occurred largely because the Japanese government had a blind belief that the plants were so safe, a major disaster was impossible—despite warnings that the aging plants were vulnerable. The accident will take an estimated 40 years and billions of dollars to clean up.
24. They Should Have Listened
underwater photography of titanicPhoto by NOAA on UnsplashStop me if you've heard this one...
In April 1912, the largest passenger ship ever built began its maiden voyage across the Atlantic from England to New York. It would never finish the trip.
The Titanic was called "unsinkable". It wasn't. The ship sank in the early morning hours of April 15, after crashing into an iceberg and taking on water.
Long before the actual incident, the Titanic's crew received warnings about icebergs in the area. In the interest of saving time, the warnings were ignored. That mistake claimed the lives of 1,517 people.
25. Billion-Dollar Write-Down
File:Sony Movies Logo.svg - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.orgSony thought that they were making a smart purchase when they scooped up Columbia Pictures for $3.4 billion in 1989. The cost of the deal increased when they had to spend $200 million on another production company, and another $500 million to settle a lawsuit. In the end, they were forced to take a 3.2-billion-dollar write-down on the acquisition.
26. They Thought It Was Useless
Sydney Opera House, AustraliaPhoto by Photoholgic on UnsplashDutch navigators extensively explored Australia almost a century before Captain James Cook claimed it for Great Britain in 1770, but they chose not to settle there because it failed to live up to their expectations. The island had been fabled to be overflowing with gold and giants, and they were disappointed by the seemingly barren coastline.
27. Equipment Failure
flying stealth plane during dayPhoto by Matt Artz on UnsplashAmerica’s most expensive jet was destroyed on a practice flight in Guam when faulty sensors caused the plane to stall on take-off and crash. Luckily, both pilots were able to eject safely.
28. They Wished They’d Kept It
brown wooden signage on gray sand during daytimePhoto by Alexis Mette on UnsplashAt the end of the Crimean War, Russia was weakened and had very little money, and they knew that Britain could simply take over their Alaskan territory if they wished. As far as the Tsar was concerned, it was just a useless piece of barren land, so he decided to sell it to the United States, rather than lose it to their British enemies.
Neither party knew about the gold and oil that lay beneath the land. If they had, Russia likely wouldn’t have sold it for 2 cents an acre.
29. There Was No Feast
brown concrete statue under blue sky during daytimePhoto by Azzedine Rouichi on UnsplashIn 1532, Conquistador Fransisco Pizarro lured the Inca ruler Atahualpa to a supposed feast in his honor. It turned out to be a trap. Pizarro’s men massacred 80,000 Inca warriors, and captured Atahualpa. As a final humiliation, Pizarro forced Atahualpa to convert to Christianity before executing him.
30. An Unsuccessful Merger
blue audi coupe parked on green grass field during daytimePhoto by Udo Meyer on UnsplashUnfortunately for Mercedes Benz, their 1998 merger with Chrysler failed to work out as planned, and less than a decade later in 2007, Mercedes sold the company for $7 billion—about $13 billion less than they’d paid for it.
31. Hydrogen Is Flammable
File:Hindenburg burning.jpg - Wikipediaen.m.wikipedia.orgThe Hindenburg disaster marked the end of the airship era, claiming all 35 passengers and one member of the ground crew. The airship caught fire because of a spark that ignited leaking hydrogen. As the Germans discovered, hydrogen is an extremely flammable and dangerous substance, and using it to fill airships perhaps wasn’t the smartest idea.
32. Fire and Blood
silhouette of trees during night timePhoto by Henrique Malaguti on UnsplashA hunter was responsible for starting the biggest fire in California’s history back in 2003. He lost a lit signal flare near the San Diego County Estates and the fire spread. Close to 300,000 acres and 2,322 homes were destroyed. 14 people also lost their lives.
33. Who Left the Gate Open?
brown concrete building under blue sky during daytimePhoto by Raimond Klavins on UnsplashForgetting to close a gate isn’t normally that big a deal--unless you’re the unfortunate Roman who forgot to close the Kerkoporta Gate at Constantinople. That unfortunate soul single-handedly lost a siege.
You see, the walls of Constantinople were generally regarded to be impregnable. This contributed to a sense of confidence and security for the Roman defenders, who were under siege by a much larger Ottoman force.
So when one Roman guard accidentally left the gate open at night, a group of 50 Ottomans was able to sneak in under cover of night, slaughtering the Roman guards and raising their flag on the walls. This caused panic in the Roman ranks, who were left with the impression that the city had somehow been conquered overnight. The resulting loss of morale helped the Ottomans to actually conquer and loot the city with a subsequent invasion.
34. Abandoning the Navy
File:Zheng He Treasure Ship (15832736462).jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.org500 or so years ago, China had one of the greatest seafaring fleets in the world. They boasted 5 times the size of those being built in Europe.
By 1525, the entire fleet had been destroyed. Chinese elites urged the government to destroy their own fleet, concerned about the rising status of the middle class who had benefited from the international trade that the "Treasure Fleet" enabled. The vessels were either set aflame or left to rot at port. Economists believe this act crippled China's economy and drastically reduced its world influence.
35. Serial Infidelity
Mining Magnate Dmitri Rybolovlev allegedly slept with other women on his yacht, leading his wife to accuse him of "serial infidelity." The divorce battle that ensued forced him to sell assets to raise cash for the settlement.
36. A Fatal Wrong Turn
File:HGM Wilhelm Vita Porträt Franz Ferdinand.jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgWho would have imagined that a wrong turn could turn the entire world on its head? That’s what happened on June 14, 1914, when Archduke Ferdinand’s driver made a wrong turn. He turned down the road where the assassin Gavrilo Princip was enjoying a sandwich. The driver, realizing his mistake, slammed on the brakes and caused the car to stall, which gave Princip the opportunity to fire into the car at close range.
37. Great Ideas That Didn’t Work
classic teal sedan near house during daytimePhoto by Peter Secan on UnsplashIn 1957, Ford introduced the Edsel.
The car was a massive gamble. For a year before its release, Ford spent millions on a teaser campaign, which billed the as-yet-unseen Edsel as the car of the future.
Turns out, it wasn't.
The car was introduced with fanfare and excitement... but Ford would stop production in 1959, just two years after the initial sale. Unfortunately for Ford, it failed to live up to the hype created by their advertising campaign. The whole debacle cost them an estimated $250 million.
38. A Strategical Error
File:Pearl Harbor submarine base in the early 1930s.jpg ...commons.wikimedia.orgThe U.S. had three aircraft carriers assigned to Pearl Harbor at the time of the Japanese attack, but they had been displaced on missions on the day of the attack. The Japanese had received intelligence that the carriers weren’t there, but decided that it wasn’t important. This turned out to be the wrong decision, as those aircraft carriers later helped the U.S. win the fight against Japan.
39. A Flaw in the Design
File:IAEA 02790015 (5613115146).jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgOn 26th April 1986, engineers at the V.I. Lenin Nuclear Power Station, a Soviet facility, were testing a new cooling system designed to reduce the risk of a meltdown. Their test caused a meltdown, and the resulting explosion destroyed Chernobyl’s reactor 4.
The Chernobyl Forum predicts that the eventual toll could reach 4,000 among those exposed to the highest levels of radiation. That said, what many people don't know is that the plant actually remained a fully-functioning power plant for years after the disaster.
The disaster destroyed reactor 4, but reactors 1-3 remained open for business. Due to high levels of radiation, plant employees could no longer live beside the facility, but many continued to commute to work to supply power in Europe. The final reactor only ceased operating in 2000.
40. Lost His Hard Drive
gold and silver round coinsPhoto by Kanchanara on UnsplashIn 2009, James Howells bought 7,500 bitcoin when they weren’t worth anything, and by 2013, they had risen to a value of 613 British pounds each, giving him a multi-million dollar portfolio. The only problem was that he’d thrown away the hard drive where the bitcoins were stored.
When he realized his mistake, he went to the landfill to try and recover it, but he was unable to locate it.
41. A Costly Spelling Mistake
Petition to File For BankruptcyPhoto by Melinda Gimpel on UnsplashThe British government was sued for £9 million after a clerical error resulted in the wrong company being recorded as in liquidation. Companies House mistakenly mistook a 124-year-old Welsh company called “Taylor and Sons” for a bankrupt company “Taylor and Son” due to a clerical error that inserted an extra ‘s’ onto a liquidation notice. The mistake cost 250 people their jobs.
42. Too Easy to Copy
Day 250: Summer Addiction | I was first introduced to Snappl… | Flickrwww.flickr.comWhen Quaker purchased Snapple for $1.4 billion in 1994, their goal was to sell it in every grocery store in the country. But Snapple was so successful in the smaller brand-name grocery stores that companies like Pepsi and Coca-Cola made their own copycat brands. Quaker sold Snapple after just three years for significantly less than what they paid.
43. Don’t Drink and Steer
File:Exxon Valdez Cleanup.jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgIn 1989, an Exxon oil tanker was headed to California when it ran aground on the Bligh Reef off the Alaskan coast. The tanker spilled around 760,000 barrels of oil into the water, and the captain was later accused of being drunk at the time of the accident. He was convicted of negligent discharge of oil.
44. A Fat Finger Trade
textPhoto by jun rong loo on UnsplashA Japanese trader cost his company nearly $2 million when he accidentally sold 610,000 shares for 1 yen, instead of 1 share at 610,000 yen. It was a “fat-finger keyboard error”, a mistake in which a trader places a buy/sell order at a far greater size than intended.
45. You Can’t Dock Here!
yellow and blue abstract paintingPhoto by Didssph on UnsplashWhen a storm caused one of the 12 oil tanks on the MV Prestige to burst, the captain called for help from Spanish rescue workers, expecting to bring the vessel into the harbor before it sank. Because the Spanish, French, and Portuguese governments refused to allow the ship to dock in their ports, the ship eventually split in half and sank, releasing over 20 million gallons of oil into the sea.
46. No Heir, No Empire
File:Alexander the Great mosaic.jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgAlexander the Great succeeded in forging the largest Western empire of the ancient world-- only for it to fall apart because he never named an heir.
Shortly before he gave his last breath, Alexander was asked who should succeed him. He responded simply, “the strongest"...as though that was a helpful answer.
As it turns out, men who've spent their lives conquering much of the known world tend to be a little competitive. Upon his passing, Alexander's generals immediately vied to fill the power vacuum... leaving his carefully crafted empire to crumble.
47. Houston We Have A Mistake
January 28, 1986 – Space Shuttle Challengerwww.history.navy.milApproximately 17% of Americans were watching on the morning of January 28, 1986, as the Space Shuttle Challenger launched toward space. Onboard were 6 NASA astronauts, as well as Payload Specialist Christa McAuliffe, who was set to become the first teacher in space.
Tragedy struck just 72 seconds after liftoff. Gasses in the external fuel tank mixed, exploded, and tore the shuttle apart. All 7 crew members were lost.
Prior to the disaster, the builder of the solid-rocket boosters advised NASA that they believed the O-ring seals in the solid-rocket boosters could fail at extremely low temperatures. On the day of the launch, the temperature was 15 degrees colder than any previous launch in history.
48. Rejected Harry Potter
J.K. Rowling’s literary agency received 12 rejections for Harry Potter. When the 8-year-old daughter of an editor at Bloomsbury demanded to read the rest of the book, Bloomsbury finally agreed to publish it...but also advised Rowling to "get a day job" as there was little chance of making any money with children’s books.
We get it adulting is hard.
But there are some things in life that don't require much beyond a high school education, yet so many people are clueless–particularly when it comes to matters of health and safety practices.
Curious to hear from baffled doctors and nurses about dealing with certain types of patients, Redditor babyhippo01 asked:
"Medical professionals of Reddit, have you ever had a patient so lacking in common sense you wondered how they made it this far. If so, what is your story?"
It's not rocket science.
Reading Instructions
"There is a reason the instructions for prescription suppositories say 'unwrap and insert' and not just 'insert.'"
– Artisanal_AF
An Afterthought
"I’m a pharmacist. One evening shift I was working a relief shift (not my usual pharmacy). A man comes in looking distressed."
"Man: I had sexual relations with a woman I do not intend to pursue a long term relationship with. (Yes. He said it just like that)"
"Me: okay. I’m assuming there was an accident or it was unprotected. How long ago did it happen?"
"Man: last night, at 7pm on the couch. (Woah TMI, I just need to know approximate time to know if plan B will work o.o)"
"Me: we have this medication called Plan B, and since the incident happened within 72 hours-"
"Man: oh yes, I got that for her already yesterday right after we finished. We want to know if there is anything we can do to know if she is pregnant now."
"Me: unfortunately not. She’ll have to wait 3 weeks or so to see if she gets her period, and if she doesn’t then she can do a pregnancy test then. Theoretically you could do a blood test for faster results, but that would also not be until a couple of weeks, at least."
"Man: we’re just really anxious because she really doesn’t want to be pregnant. Is there anything that she can take to prevent the pregnancy? Any multivitamin? Minerals? Food?"
"Me: she’s already taken it, which was the plan B. There are some other options but those are prescriptions. And no, there are no over-the-counter products she can take."
"Man: What about me? Is there anything I can take now to prevent the pregnancy? Any multivitamins or minerals?"
"Me:……………………………..No sir. There isn’t anything you can take now."
– V_imaginary
"Improper Specimen"
"73 here, former clinical microbiologist, LONG ago."
"Still, I found myself all over the clinical lab at times, not just infectious disease."
"So, one day, this 20-something guy (wife and mom in tow) walks in with a paper request for semen analysis, pre-computer era."
"Ok, not the most comfortable encounter, but I'm a professional and did this drill many times."
"He had not been briefed by the doc and had no idea how establishing infertility in males was done."
"Well, OK, a challenge, then."
"I took him aside and... using standard medical terminology told him how a diagnosis is made and what he needed to do to provide a specimen."
"He couldn't/wouldn't believe that I was asking him to masturbate into that container. Astonished!"
"Then he played dumb, as if the word was unfamiliar to him."
"We looped through the medical terms and procedure again, and I eventually resorted to every word I knew to describe the 'act.'"
"It was like a George Carlin bit!"
"A half hour later, he emerged from the toilet with two inches of urine in the cup. God Almighty."
"The report went back 'patient provided improper specimen.'"
– BrunoGerace
The following examples are relating to drinking problems.
The Giver Of Life
"Paramedic. Elderly woman complains that her mouth is dry and she felt a bit dizzy climbing the stairs earlier. Go through the whole rigamarole of getting a medical history, vitals, more detail on symptoms. Ask her what she's had to drink today."
"A cup of tea, ten hours ago."
"Any water? No."
"Guess what fixed it within five minutes."
– SpatchcockMcGuffin
Java Junkie
"Physical Therapist - Had a patient with neck pain and spasms, also complained of anxiety and heart palpitations. Asked about caffeine intake and patient revealed drinking and average on 15-20 cups of coffee daily."
– jdotbrone
Oh, you're not ready for these stories.
Man At The Mower
"Had a buddy who was an EMT, he was called out to a location for a gunshot wound."
"Apparently what happened is a father was mowing his lawn when he accidentally touched part of the mower near the engine and burned his hand. He got mad at the lawnmower, pulled out his pistol, and shot it. The bullet ricocheted and hit his son in the leg."
– Kretuhtuh
Immaculate Misconception
"Not me but my mother would pick up shifts as a nurse sometimes in Labour and Delivery and she had met a handful of women who didn’t know the baby was going to be coming out of their vaginas. Like no clue. My mom usually said something like 'how you got it in is how it’s coming out honey'. This was the late 90 early 2000s."
– QuailPuzzled1286
One Small Detail
"Rural ER doc here: 35 year old female walks in with right sided jaw/neck swelling. 'I think it happened because I ate some meat yesterday that my body is reacting to' … 10 minutes later : 'oh yeah, and I accidentally swallowed a bee and it stung me in my mouth right before this happened. Sorry I forgot to mention that.'"
– ThomasToHandle
Parents might be blamed for their kids' intelligence levels.
Some teachers could be responsible for overlooking teaching the basics.
Or maybe it's the rural locale where they were born and raised having something to do with it.
Whatever the circumstances, it's confounding that anyone capable of communicating and thinking for themselves can be so oblivious.
When parents see their children grow aggressive and resort to hitting and throwing things, they often tell their children to "use their words".
While violence is never the answer, this advice might not always be the best advice, as sometimes words can hurt much harder than a punch or being hit in the head by a flying object.
Indeed, some people are still finding ways to recover from things people have said to them in the past.
Be it a demeaning insult or learning news they hoped they would never hear in their lives.
"What's the worst thing that's ever been said to you?"
Also, None Of Your Business!
"'Why did you stay with him?'"
"'Weren't you guys only dating for what, like a year and a half?'"
"Two years you mother f*cker and it was because I refused to leave the love of my life as he was dying rapidly of brain cancer."- Squeakymeeper13
Ugliness Comes From Within...
"I was at a bar to see a friend's band."
"Random woman walks over and tells me, 'People who look like you should stay home so the rest of us can have a nice time not having to look at you'."- ChrisNEPhilly
So Much For Love...
"The reason I want a divorce is because I don't want to spend the rest of my life taking care of someone who's handicapped"- Kervon37
The Truth Can Hurt So, So Much...
“'I’m sorry - there was nothing more we could do'.”
"I was 27, the love of my life had died in my arms."- billdogg7246
Part Of Being A Parent Is Just Showing Up
"My dad left my family when I was a little girl."
"One day after years of unresolved feelings I talked to him on the phone as a teenager."
“'I just don’t feel like you’re my dad'.”
“'We’ll I don’t feel like you’re my daughter'.”- callathanmodd
The Only Dreams That Matter Are Your Own
"When I was like 8 I was a huge dinosaur nerd."
"I remember saying I wanted to be a paleontologist, my mother promptly says 'honey I'm pretty sure all the dinosaurs will be discovered by then...' I was devastated."
"I think she thought she was looking out for me."
"Anyway now if a new dinosaur gets uncovered I send her a clipping in the mail (I make sure it's physical piece of paper so she knows I put work into it)."- twlvfngrs
"I'd say "forget about learning to draw, you will never be an artist anyway" said by both my mother and my younger bro, who are both pro artists who went to art school."
"Still gonna draw though. I'd do it even if it kills me."- RandomDude1801
You Only Stop Living When No One Remembers Your Name
"'You don't have a dad anymore'."
"Said by my mom when I asked how long he's going to spend in a hospital."
"I was 7."
"He died from a heart attack right before my eyes, and mom tried to resuscitate him for forty minutes while waiting for an ambulance to arrive."- NTaya
Not Everyone Is Meant To Be A Parent
"'If you get a girl pregnant, run'."
"Thanks for letting me know exactly how you felt about me 'dad'."
"I hope you've enjoyed the decades of no contact."- CleverName9999999999
News No One Wants To Hear
"'I'm sorry, she's gone'."
"Wife went to the hospital because she hadn't felt our daughter moving in her tummy for a couple hours."
"She calls and asks me to come to the birthing center immediately and I ask if I need to bring the overnight bag."
"She said 'no, just bring our son'."
"I knew then but couldn't believe it."
"Our daughter died from a true umbilical knot at 36.5 weeks and was delivered 2 days later stillborn."
"She was a perfectly healthy baby but was suffocated slowly by her own lifeline."- grievingdad2022
Some People...
"Was in a bad place mentally."
"Decided I am going to start jogging to help how I feel."
"Where I decided to go is a fairly main road."
"A car of young men decided to hang out the window and yell 'going to need to run faster fatty'."
"I have struggled with working out publicly ever since."
"Can’t say my mental state is much better and that happened years ago now."- sirius917
Or, They Could Have Actually Helped Before...
"I had many 'friends' tell me I should have tried harder to get my husband into rehab after he died from alcoholism."
"Ya know yeah I just let it happen."- prpljeepgurl30
Probably Shouldn't Be Teaching Anywhere...
"In high school, one of my teachers told me 'you are the reason I hate coming to work and teaching here'.”
"It was a challenge to stay focused after that."- unicycle-rider
Intimidation Is Not Encouragement
"My Gym teacher in 8th grade while I was running a relay race: 'you don't really try in anything do you'."
"I really was trying as hard as I can."
"F*ck that guy."- oboshoe
Most physical wounds or injuries can be treated and go away or diminish over time.
But when someone says something harmful to us or tells us something we never want to hear, it will linger in our memories for the rest of our life.
It’s not uncommon to tell little white lies, especially to a child or sibling. After all, messing with them is half the fun. Sometimes, white lies and tall tales go beyond the standard Santa Claus or Easter Bunny. Not only that, but often, the person being told the lie goes on believing it for far too long. Here are some of the dumbest lies people believed.
1. This Untruth Got Flushed Away
grayscale photography of two girls closing their mouthsPhoto by Caroline Hernandez on UnsplashMy best friend was a girl, and she thought it would be funny to get all the girls I knew in on a prank against me. She told every girl I knew, including my teacher, mom, and sister, to tell me that girls didn’t poop if I asked. They all went with it for a couple of days and I fell for it. I believed this was the case from about fifth grade up until the ninth grade when my sister forgot to flush.
I went in immediately after her, and the truth suddenly hit me. There they were—four years of lies just floating there, mocking me for being so stupid and gullible. My friend thought it was hilarious when I confronted her at school the following day. She couldn’t believe I hadn’t figured it out. She had also almost forgotten about that prank.
2. A Crock Of Cheese
red strawberry fruit on green leavesPhoto by Justus Menke on UnsplashThere were many times I had been duped, but one stands out. I was about seven years old at the time, and my sister was 13. We were eating strawberries. There was this huge one, and me being the annoying little sister, of course, I had to get it before her. So, I took it and had the biggest bite possible. When I saw what was inside, I just started screaming. The strawberry was filled with ants.
So there were ants running out and my mouth was full of this strawberry-ant-mix. I was hollering in horror at the top of my lungs. Meanwhile, my sister was about to pass out from laughing so hard. She told me to just calm down and eat cheese because the cheese will kill the ants. I was relieved, so I ate almost a kilo of this feta-like cheese. I ate and I ate and I ate.
I ate so much that my mom was scared there wasn’t going to be any cheese left for breakfast. After half an hour of eating cheese, my sister told me, while laughing like a maniac, to stop eating because she had just made it up to calm me down. However, I didn’t believe her.
3. She Drummed Up This Tall Tale
white red and blue umbrellaPhoto by Ana Lucia Cottone on UnsplashWhen I was little, and my mom got me fast food, I would use the straws like drumsticks on the passenger side dash of the car. My mom told me to stop because I could set off the airbag and break my own neck. Fifteen years later, I drove a friend to get food. He started doing the same thing. I told him sternly not to do that because I didn’t want the airbag to go off.
He just stared at me like I was insane. That moment made me question everything else my parents ever told me.
4. Stuck Between A Rock And A Hard Place
multi colored plastic round toyPhoto by elnaz asadi on UnsplashWhen I was a child, I got upset after a button came off of my shirt. My mother told me not to worry and that if I placed the button under a rock in the yard, the button fairy would replace it with a quarter. I believed it, and to my mother's dismay, I took her story to heart. She discovered I had pulled the buttons off of every shirt in my closet.
To this day, 40 years later, shirt buttons can still be found under random rocks in my parents' backyard.
5. It Was A Total Snow Job
snow covered cars parked on snow covered road during daytimePhoto by Katt Yukawa on UnsplashOne time, when I was about five or six years old, I was staying in with my father, when his good friend came by. It was evening and I was doing my own stuff, such as playing with Legos and watching TV. Meanwhile, they were in the kitchen talking, laughing, and generally, doing what adults do, or at least that’s what I thought.
Then, my dad suggested we all go for a walk. It was deep winter, but pleasant out—very snowy but not too cold. So, of course, I was down for the walk. I figured I would get to play with snowballs and mess around. We went and at some point, my dad's friend started to walk sideways and behave funny. A few times he even fell in the snow and started eating it.
It was very amusing, so my dad and I laughed our butts off. When we came back home, his friend just collapsed in the corridor and my dad got him some pillows and a blanket. I asked him, “What's going on?” He said that his friend ate too much snow. We laughed again and I went to sleep. When I was 18 or 19 years old, it finally hit me that they were both loaded.
The walk was to go to a store and get more booze.
6. I Was Out Of Tune With Reality
File:Grammy Awards, Best Alternative Music Album - 2005, John ...commons.wikimedia.orgWhen my sister and I were kids, our mom lied and told us that she was a Grammy-nominated and winning singer. She said that all of the trophies were in our attic, knowing that neither of us would ever go up there and check for them. My sister and I bragged to all of our friends about it for years, only to discover that our mom wasn’t a very good singer at all.
We held this lie over her head for years. We finally gifted her a fake Grammy that had her name and her favorite music category engraved on it, citing her as the winner of it. She laughed until she cried.
7. Her Answer Wasn’t Quite Black Or White
black traffic light turned on during night timePhoto by Tsvetoslav Hristov on UnsplashI was four, and my mom was a stay-at-home mom. One day, she was washing dishes in the sink and I came over and asked her what my dad’s favorite color was. Without turning around, she told me it was grey. I said, “Grey? That’s an ugly color!” She replied, “Well, don’t you know that your dad’s colorblind and can only see black and white and shades between?”
I obviously believed that wholeheartedly because Rugrats didn’t have an episode explaining what color blindness was. I then spent the next four years telling my dad what color the stoplights were when he and I were riding together. I figured because he was colorblind, he didn’t know what color the stoplight was. I never did it when my mom was in the car because I knew she obviously had a secret signal to let him know while he was driving without making it obvious.
So, every car ride would always start out with me telling him the light was red, and then green, or that it was green so he could drive straight through that but the next one was yellow and he needed to hurry up, and so on. His response was always polite at first, but it would escalate until he yelled, “Thanks, thank you, yup, thaaank you, THANK YOU, YES I KNOW YOU CAN STOP NOW.”
I would end up pouting the rest of the ride. Eventually, I stopped and learned his favorite color was blue. I was telling this story at my high school graduation party. My dad overheard and confronted my mom in front of everyone, exclaiming that he had never known why I had done that and how annoying it had been. My mom had never realized I was doing it because I never did it when she was in the car.
8. A Grizzly Tale
brown bear selective focal photo during daytimePhoto by Thomas Lefebvre on UnsplashMy dad always liked to make up silly stories to freak me out when I was little, and this one I believed for YEARS. He would sometimes pick up odd jobs to do for friends. One time, when I was about six, we were at our friend’s house. He was trimming up the bushes in the backyard, while I stayed inside playing. He came into the house with huge scratches all up his arm. I started freaking out. I asked him what had happened.
He told me, "Well I was out in the backyard cleaning things up, and all of the sudden a bear came out of nowhere and asked me to race him! So of course, I did and OF COURSE, I won. The bear was so angry that he scratched up my arm and ran away." I literally believed this story until I was in high school. We were with family and I had brought up that one time my dad raced a bear in the backyard, and I swear I've never seen my dad laugh harder than that.
9. He Was Just Pushing My Buttons
boy sitting on plane seat while viewing windowPhoto by Hanson Lu on UnsplashWhen I was a kid, my dad always told me not to touch the button on the armrest of a plane because it was an "emergency" button. One time, when I was about five, we were flying to visit family. My dad fell asleep, so I pressed it a bunch of times because I was curious. Nothing happened, and I fell asleep thinking it must be broken. I woke up in a stroller with my parents, upset because the plane had to make an emergency landing. I started crying because I thought it was my fault.
10. His Story Didn’t Ring A Bell
green and yellow trees on brown grass fieldPhoto by Lasse Nystedt on UnsplashWhen I was five years old, my dad told me and my nine-year-old sister that telephone poles were actually trees that had been genetically engineered by the power companies to grow straight up into a perfect pole with two little arms on each side to hold the lines. It was just one of the many “dadisms” that he preached when Mom wasn't around.
One day, he brought my sister home earlier than usual from school. He explained to my mom that the principal had called him to come and pick her up. When she asked why he told her that a local power company worker had come to her class that day to talk about power line safety. The power company worker had asked the class, "Who knows how telephone poles are made?"
My sister raised her hand and proudly shared what my dad had told her. The worker laughed and said, "I think your dad lied to you." My sister's response completely threw him. She said, "I think you're a liar." We still quote her at family gatherings whenever we think someone is pulling our leg.
11. This Strategy Backfired
chess pieces on chess boardPhoto by Seri on UnsplashWhen I was younger, I was told that my stepdad traded his watch and all the money in his wallet for our family's chessboard and that he had hiked out of the jungle with it. My mom corroborated the story and it was easy to believe cause my stepdad was a former officer. About a decade later, my then-boyfriend walked into my house and said, “Hey my ex-girlfriend has a chessboard just like this one!”
I told him that was impossible because my stepdad had hiked it out of the jungle. He said, “No, really!” What happened next shattered me. He proceeded to pull the chessboard up on eBay. It was $30. Later, I confronted my mom by sending her a screenshot. She just laughed. I was honestly hurt and felt very stupid.
12. I Was Conditioned To Believe This Tale
black metal appliancesPhoto by Timothy Dykes on UnsplashWhen I was about ten, I was in the car with my father on a hot day. He told me to roll my window up because the air conditioning would run out. Because of this, I believed air conditioning was consumable in a vehicle and if you had it on with the window down you would run out. I was 22, driving in my work truck, and every time my coworker rolled the window down when he lit up, I turned the AC off.
He finally asked me why I did that. I'll regret my answer forever: I told him it was because I didn't want the air conditioning to run out. He laughed for the whole hour's drive back to the shop.
13. My Stuffy Was Away On Vacay
Sock Monkey plush toy on brown panelPhoto by Denisse Leon on UnsplashWhen I was five, I lost my stuffed animal in the Miami airport. It was my favorite, and I was really sad about it. A few weeks later, my mom presented me with a brown dog that otherwise looked exactly like the white one I had lost. She said the workers at the airport had found it and mailed it to us, but he got a tan because he was in Florida. For a few years, I bought it hook line and sinker.
14. A Salty Tale
orange camping tent near green treesPhoto by Scott Goodwill on UnsplashAs a kid, my whole extended family would go camping, and my great grandfather would bring a giant salt shaker for every kid. When we arrived, he would pass them out to each of us and tell us, “If you get salt on a squirrel’s tail, it throws off the squirrel's balance, and he can’t climb the trees anymore. That’s how you can catch one and keep it for a pet.”
We all went running around for hours chasing squirrels with salt shakers trying to catch one while the adults sat around drinking uninterrupted. I never got my pet squirrel.
15. This Movie Was Pure Fiction
File:Inmate in full harness restraints.jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgWhen I was about seven years old, I could not understand how all the gory scenes in action movies seemed so realistic. So, I asked one of my older brothers how they did it. He told me the most disturbing lie possible. He explained that they empty out the state prisons in the area the movie is being made, dress the inmates up, and tell them that if they survive the filming, then they get to leave prison after.
I believed it until I was around ten.
16. I Didn’t See This One Coming
girl in blue and white shirt wearing pink framed eyeglassesPhoto by Zahra Amiri on UnsplashIt was the summer of fifth grade. I was told that if you sit too close to the TV or a computer screen, you will go blind. Then, when I was in sixth grade, I got glasses. As I was trying on my first pair of glasses, all I heard was, “I told you." I was then told that my sister, who was a year younger than me, wouldn’t need glasses because she listened.
She got HER glasses less than a year later.
17. Poisonous Gingerbread
brown cookies on white ceramic platePhoto by Casey Chae on UnsplashBack in elementary school, when I was about seven years old, we would make gingerbread houses with icing and stuff. My teacher told us NOT to eat the gingerbread and the icing because it was poisonous, and we could get really sick. Being the teacher and someone you should listen to, I believed her. So, while I was growing up and for most of my life, I thought that gingerbread was poisonous.
I never ate a gingerbread house in my life nor any of the icing. At 29 years of age, my fiancée and I were making a gingerbread house, and she started eating hers. I freaked out. It was then that she informed me that the teacher probably said that so she wouldn’t have 30 kids hopped up on sugar in her class for the rest of the day. I couldn’t believe I was duped that hard and never realized it.
18. This Lie Stunk
grayscale photo of man making silly facePhoto by Denis Agati on UnsplashWe used to make an annual trip to the mountains in North Carolina for about two weeks starting the day after Christmas. I went through a phase when I was younger where I wanted to know the etymology of every word. We were driving through Jacksonville just before rush hour. At the time, the area used to reek from the mills and the coffee plant.
The smell was so strong that even if you weren’t paying attention to the road, you knew you had reached the area, simply from the smell. So, while everyone in the car was commenting on the odor, I asked my dad how Jacksonville got its name. Not knowing, he did what every good dad does—he made something up. He said it was because everyone passed gas at the same time.
For years, I had this image in my head of business people all over Jacksonville, commuting to work in their business suits and skirts, holding briefcases throughout the entire city, all busting wind in unison throughout the day. It was one of those lies that you believe as a kid, and don't bother questioning it. You don’t even think about the answer until you're sitting in class and the real answer is explained in a book. I'm guessing I believed that one until I hit middle school.
19. My Uncle Milked This One As Much As He Could
brown and black wild cat sitting on brown rackPhoto by Priscilla Du Preez on UnsplashA college nearby has a cougar as its mascot, and they sell cougar cheese. It's delicious. My uncles told me that cougar cheese was made from the milk of cougars. It made sense to me. Then when I got older, I saw a can of that cougar gold and wondered how they milked the cougars. It hit me like a ton of bricks. I realized that you couldn’t have a cougar milk farm with angry cougars hooked up to milking machines.
I got a chuckle out of the image and realized that I was a grown man who believed that they were milking cougars down at the college and turning it into cheese.
20. This Story Was Bearly Believable
brown bear on green grass during daytimePhoto by Rey Emsen on UnsplashWhen I was ten and my brother was seven, we were on a lake trip. I was just wandering around the treeline and he wouldn’t stop following me, so I told him that I was looking for "bear eggs." Since he had recently learned about the platypus in school and wouldn't shut up about them, I also explained to him that the bears in our area were actually marsupials that, "fell off the back of a truck.”
Since the zookeepers couldn't catch them all, they were now an invasive species. I told him that if he found anything brown and oval that wasn't a pinecone it was probably a “bear egg.” We were exploring an area where people walked their dogs and stuff. He found a lot of brown oval things before we left and my mom slapped the daylights out of me when my uncle and I laughed.
To be fair, at the time, I still believed "fell off the back of a truck" was a real thing and not a euphemism for misappropriated goods.
21. Time To Hit The Kentucky Tale
File:Ohio 2021 license plate Montgomery County.jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgI’m from central Kentucky and growing up we would always see tons of Ohio license plates on the road. So I asked why that was. My father proceeded to tell me that Ohio had a state law that was basically a curfew. He told me that once Ohio residents leave the state for any reason, they have a limited amount of time to return.
Therefore, if they didn’t make it back, they couldn’t re-enter the state. So, the Ohio drivers on the road were vagabonds, forever driving the surrounding states until they could go home. He told it so well and with such conviction that I believed it until I repeated it to friends in high school and finally realized what an idiot I was.
22. I Couldn’t Handle The Truth
boy writing on white paperPhoto by Yogesh Rahamatkar on UnsplashI was seven years old, and one of my teachers wanted us to write a letter to a family member, friend, or someone. I wrote the letter, got the envelope and the stamp. My mom worked at the county prison at the time, and she suggested I write to one of the inmates who never got mail, so I did. I wrote something along the lines of, "I'm sorry you're locked up, but I hope you get out." I even signed it with my seven-year-old signature. While I was writing the letter, my mom had left to go to the store.
I asked my older brother what our address was because I needed to put a return address. Unknowingly, he gave me the address to The White House. I wrote it on the letter and put it in with the mail that my mom was sending out. Years later, I went to pick my mom up from work, and one of the corrections officers called me Mr. President. When I asked why he said that, he mentioned the letter I wrote years prior and how it was a joke in the prison any time my mom mentioned me.
23. The Seven Year Myth
green Doublemint packPhoto by Hunter Newton on UnsplashOn my fifth birthday, my older sister gave me a pack of gum. It was my first time trying gum, and I swallowed it. I told my sister, and she told me that because I swallowed the gum, I would pass in seven years. I was so sad. I never told my mom because I didn't want to make her sad. So I lived the next seven years of my life awaiting my tragic end.
My mom couldn't understand what my problem was on my 12th birthday because I was so sad. Finally, before bed, I told her how much I loved her and that I hoped she would miss me. She said, "What are you talking about?" I told her that I wasn’t going to make it through the night. My sister got yelled at, and my mom assured me I would not be gone before the morning.
24. This Was A Bunch Of Blarney
a statue of a man holding a baseball batPhoto by Tim Wilson on UnsplashWhen I was little, I thought that Leprechauns were real. I spent many hours and several iterations designing traps to try and catch one because if you caught one, you would get his pot of gold. A few times I tried, I got a piece of gold, and that's what kept the magic going. It turned out my dad was painting rocks with gold paint and sneaking them into my traps at night.
It is actually a really sweet memory as a kid, but it fell apart when I started asking other kids how their traps were going, and no one knew what I was talking about.
25. This Lie Blew Up
gray and white mini fan on white surfacePhoto by Call Me Fred on UnsplashWe didn't have air conditioning or central air in my home growing up, so we used box fans a lot. They sat on the floor and weren’t all that sturdy, so sometimes they would fall or get knocked over. At one point, my mom told me not to leave them running when they fell over because they would "explode." My child mind, of course, took that to mean the same as it does in movies.
I got spooked and imagined our whole house exploding into a massive fireball. I remember one time a fan fell over next to my dad, and he wasn't urgently picking it up. I went into a panic and was yelling at him while he gave me a confused "what is your problem?" look.
26. Wood You Believe This?
colse-up photo of brown wooden dollPhoto by Kira auf der Heide on UnsplashFrom when I was about five to twelve years old, I believed my father had a wooden plate in his head. Whenever anyone said, “Knock on wood,” he would knock on his head. He would say it was because he had a wooden plate from when he jumped into an empty pool as a kid. He kept the lie going by adding that whenever he went to the doctor, it was because his wooden plate was being replaced due to termites.
27. Mirror, Mirror
a man wearing glasses looking out a windowPhoto by Laurenz Kleinheider on UnsplashMy dad always told me to be good because he said that he could see around corners. Sometimes, if I got told off for being naughty, I would walk out of the room and flip him the bird and he would always know. So, once, when I was around 12, the same thing happened. I had done something wrong and he shouted at me. I then walked out of the room and, clearly out of sight, flipped him a double bird.
He knew it and ran out after me. That's when I had the most jaw-dropping revelation. The door to walk out of the living room was next to the back door for the garden, which was glass. He could always see me in the reflection. I couldn’t believe I was so stupid for so long.
28. Beam Me Up
person holding BMW vehicle steering wheelPhoto by Andras Vas on UnsplashWhen I was seven years old, my mother married my stepfather. He had a really great job, and as a result, had a BMW. One day, I got to ride in the front seat of his car for the first time. I had never in my life experienced anything so modern or so expensive before then. I was in awe of the dashboard, the interior, the seat warmers—everything just blew me away.
I think he must have noticed, because he was like, "Hey, watch this.” He raised his hand in the air, in front of the dash, and made a gesture like he was turning the volume dial for the music, without touching anything. What I didn't see, was his other hand on the steering wheel turning up the music from there. He then told me to try turning down the volume.
When it worked, I was just amazed. I actually believed his car could magically do that until I was 16 years old. I didn't ride in his car very often, so it kind of kept the illusion of it alive. My stepfather couldn't believe that I had kept on believing for so long. Then again, I also thought lacrosse was a big, secret joke that the whole world was in on.
29. I Couldn’t Brush This One Off
blue and white plastic bottlePhoto by 莎莉 彭 on UnsplashWhen I was young, I once asked my older cousins if they also hated the burning after-taste when you swallowed toothpaste. They looked at me with matching expressions of horror. My cousin told me, “Don't swallow toothpaste. You only have like three chances. After that, you've had too much of the chemicals, and you'll be a goner by the time you turn 21."
I was horrified and said, "But I've accidentally swallowed toothpaste in heaps." They grimaced and said, "Oh gosh, I hope not." Several years later, it suddenly dawned on me that they were obviously making it up.
30. I Had My Bubble Burst
white airplane on brown field under gray cloudsPhoto by Anthony Duran on UnsplashWhen I was young, we lived near a small private airfield. My mother told us that if we waved to the airplanes as they passed by, they would throw us bubblegum. We were the idiots waving like goons at all the small planes overhead for far too long. When we asked her later why she told us that she said, "When you have kids, look at the trust and belief in their eyes and see if you'll be able to resist messing with them."
31. His Lie Left Me Sore
woman standing in front of childrenPhoto by National Cancer Institute on UnsplashMy dad told me that canker sores, or “ulcers” as we called them, came from telling lies. He said this to me a few times. In third grade, when the teacher asked if anyone knew why we get them, I raised my hand and proceed to spout out, “My daddy said they come from telling lies.” My teacher's awkward silence and lack of eye contact let me know it was my papa who sat on a throne of lies!
32. The Apple Fell Far From The Tree
a bunch of apples hanging from a treePhoto by Bozhin Karaivanov on UnsplashWhen I was very little, every time I went to visit my grandpa, he would take me out to the garden to pick an apple from his apple tree. Four years after he had passed, when I was 16, we were sitting around sharing stories about him, and I said, “Hey, whatever happened to that apple tree?” My family laughed and finally exposed the truth.
It was just a regular tree, and he would go tie a few apples to it with string before we went over. Looking back, it was a skinny little tree, with big perfect red apples in it.
33. She's A Rich Girl
File:Walt Disney World Resort entrance.jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgWhen I was around eight years old, my family went to Disney World and shared a hotel. On the floor was a vending machine. At the time, I had a habit of looking through the coin slot of vending machines to see if people had left behind their change. On this trip, I hit the jackpot. Every time I passed the machine, there would be a few coins waiting for me—every single time.
I ended up with almost $6.00 during that trip. I thought the machine was broken. Many years later, I was telling this story to a friend of mine, and my dad started laughing. He then revealed the truth, which was that my grandmother would put the coins into the slot before I had the chance to look.
34. The Parent Trap
white power switch on wallPhoto by Steve Johnson on UnsplashWhen I was little, I was just TERRIFIED of burglars. My mind was just wrought with fear over someone breaking into our house. My parents would always try to ease my worry but to no avail. Until one day they came up with this lie to make me feel safe. By our front door, there was an outlet with three switches. Two of them controlled outside and inside lights but the third didn’t seem to connect to anything.
I always asked them, “What does the third switch control?” My parents decided to tell me that it detonates devices buried in our front yard. My dad decided to build upon the story and said that one night he buried a ton of devices under the ground in the front yard and if a burglar stepped in the yard, a signal would go off. He would then flip the switch making the devices detonate and destroy the burglar.
It was definitely a really weird and intense lie to tell a six-year-old, but I never worried about burglars at that house again.
35. I Should Have Ditched This Concept
aerial photography of calm body of water during daytimePhoto by Jukka Heinovirta on UnsplashThere were these ditches dug along the roads so that plowed snow had somewhere to go in the winter. So, naturally, they collect water and are really marshy and grow reeds. I used to think you could sink into them as one would sink into an actual marsh. My sister, who was three years older than me, decided to mess with me—and boy, she did not hold back.
She told me that kids have been lost by sinking into the marshy ditches and that there were trolls who live underneath who ate them. She said that after a girl had been lost, they lowered a bag of chips into it, and they could hear the trolls crunching and munching on them.
36. This Idea Shouldn’t Have Taken Flight
aerial photography of clouds and mountainsPhoto by Daniel Olah on UnsplashI was pretty smart and could deduce some pretty complex things. Well, I figured that in order to turn, there were weights inside the long wings of airplanes that could move from one end to the other. When going straight, the weights are in the middle, and to turn left, the weights shift to the left, into the wingtips, and so on. It was so dumb to think that, but I would like to believe that such a design could actually work in practice.
37. Her Lie Left Me Cold
person holding glass figurinePhoto by Matt Foster on UnsplashMy sister once dramatically exclaimed, "My hand froze off!" She said this while running her hand under warm water after a ski trip where she had lost a glove. I was terrified and hid in my room for an hour. Later, I came out, and her hand was back to normal. I asked her how she got her hand back. She said, "Your hand just grows back if it's frozen off. You only really lose it if you cut it off."
I distinctly remember telling my teachers and schoolmates that my sister grew back her frozen hand. I was only seven years old, but even when they tried to tell me she was messing with me, I just assumed my teacher was dumb and didn't know what I did.
38. This Story Was All Fluff
Better Being Underground | Peanut Butter Rice Krispie Treats… | Flickrwww.flickr.comI was picky about food. One day, I proclaimed loudly that I didn't like marshmallows. Then, someone told me that marshmallows were used to make Rice Krispie squares, so I informed my mother I would not be eating Rice Krispie squares because I didn't want to eat marshmallows. Until I was an adult, she made sure to warn everyone I would come into contact with—whether it was other parents, my teachers at school, basically, every person who she could get to—that her Rice Krispie squares were made with sugar glue.
I was 18 before I learned that was a lie.
39. Switched At Birth Sham
man and woman holding handsPhoto by Austin Lowman on UnsplashI had always had an inkling that I was adopted, and my older brother played into that a lot by making fun of me and telling me that I was. I also was the only member of my family to look Mexican, and people always thought I was, while my family was half white and half Indian. When I was young, we moved to a new city a few hours away.
The people who owned the house before us had a maid service and that company gave us one month free to see if we liked it. The maid that worked for us was a young Mexican woman named Juanita. My brother very cleverly came up with the lie that Juanita was my birth mother and that she had an affair with a very famous person.
Since this person couldn't have the public image of cheating on his wife, he paid her a lot of money to put me up for adoption. He continued, saying that my parents had found out about Juanita being in this city, and we moved there so I could be closer to my birth mother. I believed this story for two years!
40. They Told Me A Historic Lie
brown rock on white surfacePhoto by Anton Maksimov 5642.su on UnsplashWhen I was a kid, my dad got these little arrowheads from some gift shop and put them out in our backyard. He told me that Indigenous people used to inhabit where our yard was and that if I looked around I could find different things that were left behind. When I found those arrowheads, I almost squealed with delight. I thought I had discovered artifacts from Indigenous civilizations in my backyard.
I told people about it every now and again and was pretty proud of it. I bragged about it to friends, teachers, and even people at the local historical society. I really felt stupid for believing it for as long as I did. I should have realized sooner that it clearly wasn’t true based on the fact that the explanations about them were too far-fetched, the placement of them was obviously in places where a kid would be able to find them, and that the concept wasn’t told to me before or after that one afternoon.
41. It Was A Twisted Deception
long exposure photography of hurricanePhoto by Nikolas Noonan on UnsplashWhen I was about four or five years old, I was a really anxious kid. Even though we lived in an area where tornados were rare, but not unheard of, I was really fixated on the possibility of a tornado coming to destroy our house. So, to alleviate my anxiety, my dad told me that those spinning attic vents you see on houses were "tornado stoppers.”
He said that they spin the opposite way to a tornado and cancel it out, with an effective range that went to the end of our street. I accepted this at face value and didn't question it until many years later when I looked at our roof and noticed we didn't actually have a spinning-style attic vent. My dad had just assumed we had one and neither of us had bothered to check.
42. A True Fairy Tale?
santa claus with red backgroundPhoto by krakenimages on UnsplashWhen I was a kid, about seven or eight, I asked my mother if Santa was real. She decided to tell me that he was not. I wasn’t too bothered and apparently felt that this made sense. I then asked if the tooth fairy was real, and my mother, overestimating my grasp of sarcasm, told me that the tooth fairy was, in fact, real. I figured that there was no reason she would lie to me given that she had just admitted to Santa being fake.
Later, my mother caught me explaining to other kids that Santa was fake, but that the tooth fairy wasn’t. Unfortunately, I believed in the tooth fairy for much longer than I care to admit.
43. The Meaning Of "Gullible"
opened book on brown tablePhoto by Pisit Heng on UnsplashMy dad convinced me that the word "gullible" was not in the Merriam-Webster dictionary. I was probably six when he first told me. My mom and sister agreed with him at the dinner table. We had a dictionary on the bookshelf next to the table. I would look it up and find it. Then, I would forget and he would re-convince me of it at random intervals—sometimes a year later, sometimes six months later.
It was probably the fifth time that I looked it up when I finally stopped believing him.
44. There Was Not A Crumb Of Truth To It
bread on white ceramic platePhoto by Alexas_Fotos on UnsplashMy parents told me that eating the crust of bread for sandwiches or toast was important as it contained all the healthy nutrients I needed to grow healthy. I believed that garbage until I was 26, and I saw my wife cut away her crusts. I told her how she was throwing away the healthiest parts of the bread. I'll never forget the look on her face.
She looked at me dumbfounded and thought I was stupid. Of course, she corrected me.
45. A Haunting Tale
gray scale photo of cemeteryPhoto by Vicki Schofield on UnsplashWe were on our way to a volleyball game when my dad told us that there used to be a cemetery where the school now stood. They had tried to contact the families to move the bodies, but any that weren't claimed were still under the school, so the place was probably haunted. As fifth graders are chatty, especially with something as juicy as "the school is built on deceased bodies," his story made it around our school and the competing school pretty quick.
My dad got in a bit of trouble for that one.
46. What A Croc!
crocodile in body of waterPhoto by Shelly Collins on UnsplashGrowing up, I had some family that lived a town over. We would visit them often since they'd host all the family events because they had a big home. Going to their house involved driving over an area with a large pond that had a road built over it. One day, we drove over the pond, and I noticed a log sticking out of the water.
I asked my dad what it was, and since we had watched some Crocodile Dundee, he said, "It's a crocimagator." Even though we lived in Canada, where there aren’t any crocodiles, I believed him. Every time we drove past, that log was in the same place for years. At first, I doubted it, but I watched a documentary that said crocs or alligators could lay dormant for months on end and not move.
Hence, I believed it for years. Eventually, the log vanished. It probably sunk into the pond and I didn't think much of it. I just thought the crocimagator moved somewhere new. Then it hit me that I was an idiot.
47. I Was Sunk By A Titanic Tale
File:Titanic in color.png - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.orgMy mom and I were watching Titanic when I was around four. She obviously didn't want me to see the love scene, so she covered my eyes as she forwarded through it. Her reasoning was wild. She told me that vampires come onto the ship and chase Rose and Jack away. I was terrified of vampires and dumb-little-me believed her.
Not only that, but I continued to believe her for the next three or four years, and was always scared of that movie because of those supposed vampires. In my mind, it had become a horror movie. It was only when I was at my best friend's house and her siblings had that movie on, that I found out my mother had lied to me. I felt so betrayed and as I grew older I was just confused.
When I asked my mother why she said vampires of all things, she said she panicked and couldn't think of anything else. To this day we joke about all of the vampires in Titanic.
48. I Was Neither Older Nor Wiser
grayscale photography of child and toddler while walkingPhoto by juan pablo rodriguez on UnsplashWhen I was a kid, my older brother and I used to fight a lot. He used to insult me and torment me in many different ways. Being a girl, and three years younger, I was too little, weak, and dumb to defend myself against him. So one day, I asked my mom why my brother was older than me. My mom replied, "Honey, you used to be older than him but then you got sick and stayed the same age. During that time your brother grew older and now he is older than you!"
I bought it. Not only did I buy it, but I was so happy that there was a time in my life, even though I had no memory of it, that I was the older sibling and I was the one tormenting him. Of course some years later, when apparently I had overcome that strange disease that prevented me from growing older, I realized that my mom was lying.
49. Soda Jerk
seven assorted-brand soda cansPhoto by Jonny Caspari on UnsplashOne time I was at my dad's house, and he and a friend were hanging outside chilling while I was playing with my plastic ninja sword. My dad never let me have soda. His friend left, and he went inside to do the dishes. I saw a 7 Up can on the deck table and sprinted towards it. I took a huge swig. It turned out they had been putting their cig butts in there.
It was horrible. I ran inside and threw up. My dad asked, “What happened, what happened?!” I lied and said nothing, but he figured it out. So, he came up with the most genius lie: He told me all the soda he buys tastes like that, even if they are unopened. I believed him for a few years until I was about nine.
50. Hot Dog!
hotdog sandwich on white platePhoto by Jessica Loaiza on UnsplashMy grandpa was a country guy, who liked to fish, hunt, and ride ATV four-wheelers. He also liked to lie to kids, and just let you think whatever nonsense he put in your head. When I was young, we traveled to our weekend property in the sticks. I saw a cattail reed out near the lake and asked what it was. He said, “What’s it look like? Those are hot dog trees!”
We usually grilled for dinner. My mom and I went to get stuff, and she asked if we had hotdogs. I answered there were plenty of hot dogs back home. We showed up and started unloading all the groceries. My grandpa was filling up the grill as my mom prepped the food. She asked where the hot dogs were. I went to get a pair of scissors and got my shoes on.
She was very confused and upset after I told her I had to go cut them down and that Grandpa showed me where they were.