Hurt people hurt people. But because you're a hurt person doesn't mean you have to take it out on the rest of us. Sorry, but if you come for me, I'm coming for you. Most bullies will retreat once you let them know.... your wrath is to be feared.
Redditor u/VinceDeezer wanted to hear some stories about taking down the coward that is Goliath by asking.... People of reddit, what was your revenge on a bully?
50. From Enemies To Allies
A "bully" from my class used to tell me that i wasn't her friend, she often told me to sod off, and she told me she didn't like me. So at some point on instagram the people in my class created an instagram messaging group with all the people from that class and the bully was in there too. at some point she told me to shut up, as usual, and i start like freaking out and at some point i tell her "why don't you like me?!" she responded with "who told you that you like me?!" and i said "who told you that i don't?!" and at that point i think i got her thinking. from that moment we became friends. pals. chums, whatever.
49. Life's Own Comeuppance
I went to university and got a beautiful smart amazing partner of now over 3 years, got a sports car, a bachelors degree and I'm two months from having a masters. He has to see my periodic posts of sheer progress and happiness. He is still a fat aggressive jerk with a job at McDonald's and the only girlfriend he's had in the last two years cheated on him regularly until it finally ended because she'd rather be with the person she was cheating on him with.
48. Sexism Is Inherently Dumb
Got accepted to college before he did. It was my dream school too, and his scores were abysmal. He actually had to take it himself since his mom couldn't take the test for him. His dad tried to get him in the other way, but he didn't have enough money for the school to ignore the scores, so he was packed off to a satellite school in the middle of nowhere.
It's no secret he graduated college by the skin of his teeth. And he always claimed he was smarter than me, a stupid female. This stupid female has a masters and a career, he lives at home with mommy and daddy.
47. Immobulus!
I had a guy steal from me, a second time as well as other drama, and I had been made aware he had a warrant out for him so when me and a few friends were driving up the local main street and I saw him I jumped out of the car. Then went to the police station a half block away to say that I just saw so and so, when he came to he went back inside the bar he was out in front of and the police showed up and arrested him
46. Revenge Via Broken Heart
When I was in high school there was this one kid I didn't get along with. Not exactly a bully just bad blood, we would always get into fights and curse each other out. Eventually I got sick of it and I had realized that his current gf was a girl that used to have a a crush on me back in middle school and one day something he said pushed me over the edge so at the end of the school day I talked to his girlfriend about how she used to have a crush on me and asked about how she felt about me now, And well she ended up dumping him for me. Me and him don't fight anymore.
45. Germ Repellant
When my brother was in first grade, he came home from school upset because another kid was messing with him.
When he told my mom, her response was to "give that kid a good licking!"(meaning fight back)
The next day my mom got a call from the principal because my brother took her advice literally and licked this other kids face when he started messing with him again.
Well, I guess it worked cuz the kid left him alone after that.
44. Corporal Defense
This girl (i am also a girl) used to bully me in school, calling me names, made fun of my siblings etc. One say i had enough. Shoved her and pulled her hair in front of her gang of bullies. They never bothered me again after that.
Im not proud of this. It's sad that i had to do that in order to survive school. Snitching would only make the matter worse. This was the norm in my school. Stand up for yourself or be trampled by the bullies. We used to do this between the ages of 10-14. My school was messed up.
43. Whoops! Sorry About Your Face!
Not me but my mom. Thought her years in school she said she always dealt with bullying and that's why I should stick up for myself now.
One day the bullying was too much for her and decided it was enough. My mom and the girl that had been bullying her were both on the school field hockey team. My mom waited and at the perfect moment.
She broke the girls nose and her wrist with her hockey stick in a game.
Unfortunately the bullying continued. But she said she felt better after that.
42. The Anti-Umbridge League
Kid bullied me in summer camp, I organized a network of other kids who also hated him and he was soon punished. I wanted to beat the heck outta that guy but this was probably a better option.
41. Useless Adults
I was on the receiving end on bullying quite a bit. A pair of guys wouldn't stop touching me and I had enough one day. I just about broke the one guy's arm before the worthless teacher finally stepped in. Then, the next year, I ended up stabbing another jerk with a pencil right in the hand when the teacher just kept watching him stealing my stuff. After that I was finally left alone.
40. Fooled Ya
When I was younger I wasn't particularly tough but I sure was good at acting. Some kid in my class that was giving me a hard time threw a couple of soft blows at me, one of them grazed my neck and to show him a lesson I pretended he damaged my oesophagus and lay on the ground gasping for life. He started panicking. I eventually got up and started laughing
39. Bully Vs. Sociopath
I found a dead rat behind the school gym, I proceeded to learn his locker code and placed it in there over a 2 week holiday, the thing stank real bad. When he found it he actually squealed
Two years of constant torment concluded the same day when I said his dog would be next in that locker.
38. Dangerous With Utensils
Not revenge, strictly speaking. More like preventive measure. Guy in my class was messing with me and trying to take stuff from my table. I was trying to get some work done and the constant interruptions were pissing me off. Among the items on my table was a plastic fork (some kid was bringing cake for his birthday). So I told him that if he touched my stuff one more time I would ram that fork into his hand. He touched my stuff one last time.
The fork did not really penetrate his hand because it shattered into dozens of little pieces. But it gave him a good scratch and some minor bleeding.
Months or years later another kid was bringing something for his birthday and I was holding a plastic spoon in my hand. Turning it around and just looking at it. Some kid piped up "Good Lord! Who gave him a spoon!?". People remembered ...
37. Knocked The Music Out
There was this one guy that was pretty much a stereotype of the word bully. He also was just generally a pain in my behind and an all around jerk. One time, I had a really bad migraine and he was standing behind me while we were trying to change classes in middle school. He was singing this really annoying song at full volume, from less than 6 inches from my ear. I asked him nicely to stop and he screamed NO in my ear. I was on my way to math class. Our text book was about 6 inches thick and weighed in about 5 lbs. I also had a big notebook. I whirled around and whacked him in the stomach HARD. He left me alone for the rest of the year..........Ahhhhh silence.
36. Going For The Jugular
My first bully was this kid that always made me cry in elementary school, every day during recess. Last day of elementary I told her she took all her problems out on me because she had no friends, and because she was insecure about her weight. That one I regret because that was too mean even for an 11 year old.
My second was in high school to a girl that had not only been a bad friend to me, but came up with rumors about me obsessing over her and wanting to be her girlfriend. After we had fooled around once before.
After that I found out that at the time we had fooled around she had started dating a good friend of mine again, and I outed her cheating to the friend. I felt really guilty in the end and I felt like I had to tell the friend, it wasn't so much of a revenge thing, but more of a "damn I inadvertently hurt someone else" due to being a horny teenager. The end of high school was really lonely because I was made out to be a lying jerk, but I came out of it with some wonderful friends because the bad times cleared out the bad people in my life. I came out of it with a better understanding of my sexuality as well, so it was worth it.
35. Butt Pins
My bully was my 4 grade teacher (I was the quiet kid) he would belittle me and treat me like I was stupid and an idiot. So I decided to put pins on his chair, best day of my life. 8 years later, I still hate him.
34. Revenge In The Workplace
Not me but my dad:
This one kid bullied my dad when he was little, right now my dad works for a very successful firm as a supervisor. The bully was hired as a programmer, my dad gave him almost impossible tasks, the bully quit and now works for a very small rivaling company
33. Don't Mess, Princess
In school I was picked on a lot. One day, as I was bending over, a kid kicked me and I fell flat on my face, making the whole class laugh. I turned round, picked him up by his ears and banged his head against the wall saying "just leave me the hell alone".
At that moment, the teacher opened the door for us to go in and saw me. He called us both into his office and asked what happened. Gently told me he understood why I'd done that but it wasn't a good idea, and gave the other kid a detention and a letter home. People left me alone for a while after that!
32. Aaaaaand FLIP
Guy was trying to push me around and I tried to do a move out of some movie i saw and judo flipped him. Remembered that it was from a movie and as casually as I could walked away without looking at him.
Felt amazing.
Btw this was like 5th grade, at recess.
31. Getting Served
Some classmates of mine were throwing snowballs at older people in front of the school so I said they had to stop (what if they fell). Then they threw snowballs at me (i liked that because then they wouldn't throw at old people). Later that day I went to the McDonalds with some friends after school and they were there too. So I walked outside, grabbed snow, made a snowball, walked back in and just when he went to take a bite of his fries I threw a snowball in his face.
30. Who Wears Short Shorts
This kid (16/17) at school was awful to me. He would bully me every day without fail, call me names, throw stuff at me pull my clothing, put chewing gum in my hair etc. He would always position himself somewhere behind me on the school bus for optimum throwing/gum hair capability.
One day the planets and the stars aligned and I had somehow got on the bus first and he was in front of me for a change and I just so happened to have a tube of Nair in my bag (for unrelated reasons). Now this kid admittedly had a nice head of hair. I wanted my payback. The amount of sketchy haircuts I had to endure because of this clown was unreal. So like I said...he had a pretty nice head of hair. Until I managed to drip Nair onto the back of his head for a 35 minute bus ride. He came to school the next day with a sketchy haircut. It was glorious. I should probably feel worse about it that I do/did but this guy made my daily life a living hell.
29. Scot Free
Typical every day bully, I was targeted for being friends with a person for being gay and standing up for them. Day to day I just let it go by, but one day he tried to pull me off my chair in math class so I turned around and rammed my pen into his side.
Teacher noticed it and sent me out the room and asked me what happened. I got 0 punishment as they were aware of the problem and he filed it up as an accident. Bully needed 2 stitches and never bothered me or my friend again.
28. Veronica Mars Worthy Revenge
All through 7th and 8th grade, this girl made fun of me for being a "prude." At our 8th grade graduation party, I pushed her into a pool fully clothed with her new phone in her pocket. I was grounded for a month but it was worth it. 10/10 would do again.
27. Hulking Out
There was this guy bullying me for years and one time he got physical. He hit me in the face with his elbow and laughed when I covered my face in pain. He turned his side to me to laugh with the other classmates and that's when I lifted him up, started running to the wall with him, and threw him again it. He looked like a beaten boxer bleeding everywhere in the face and pissed his pants.
26. The End Of The End
My bully in elementary was a year older than me. Let's call him Howard because that's his name and he sucks. Would beat me up on the way home from school regularly. I knew he had really strict parents too. So one day, with a fresh scrape on my arm from him pushing me and a ripped backpack from him tearing it open, I went to his house and talked to his mom detailing all of the times he beat me up, harassed me, or otherwise tormented me over the year. Two weeks later they pulled him out of school and sent him back to Korea to go to some kinda military/disciplinary school. Apparently, he had been in trouble like, a lot. Never heard from him again.
25. Who Got The Real Revenge?
When i was in grade 9 some kid used to bully me. Things like always talking over me in class on purpose, embarrassing me in front of girls, tripping me over etc. One day i snapped after he kept pelting tennis balls at my face from about a meter away in PE. I got so angry i grabbed him by the throat and proceeded to start laying into him and punched his face till his nose broke and started bleeding. At the time i had long hair and i saw there was blood in my hair and i freaked out and ran home. Got expelled.
24. Braids Will Take You DOWN
When I was 7 there was this annoying dude in my class who wouldn't stop following me around at school and annoy me.
One day I had braids and he thought it was funny to pull them. I didn't, so I decided to do what would hurt his pride the most and tackled him to the ground.
He was one of the biggest guys in our class and everyone thought it was hilarious that he was knocked to the ground by a girl. We were in the same class for 5 more years after this and he never did anything else to me.
23. Diverted Threats
He was older, taller, bigger. So I told him that every time he bullied me, I would beat up his little brother. (Not true, btw.). The bullying came to a full and final stop.
22. Baseless Rumors
This guy in college harassed me and made my life miserable for a semester (weird phone calls, vicious rumors, serious bull) until he had the nerve to approach and threaten my mother on campus. Dumb face texted me later telling me if my mom ever talked to him again he would have public safety throw her off school property. Took those texts and the whole story to the president of student affairs. Of course she was appalled and immediately called him in. Turns out he had applied for a prestigious study abroad in Italy. After that his fate was essentially placed in my hands. If I reported that he even looked at me wrong he would lose his study abroad placement, period.
I took great pleasure the rest of the semester watching him turn pale and run whenever I entered a space he was in, although it certainly didn't make up for what was essentially a missed year of socializing, friend-making, and networking. I was still debunking rumors he spread by the time I graduated.
21. Properly Told Off
Had two.
Fourth grade, two boys were jumping over my friend and I. We told them to stop multiple times. They continued. I stood up and made one of the kids fall. Felt so proud of myself.
Eighth grade. Lectured my class on being jerks and was pretty blunt with them. I said what I had been wanting to say for two years at that point. Was a lot of fun, even though (according to my friend) some kids laughed about me. But news got around quick. Lots of kids in my grade knew, and I was proud for that too.
20. Take it All....
GiphyI had a bully who'd call me Hitler only on the base that I'm Austrian, so asked out the girl he liked (she said yes) and became best friends with his brother. Rog3rcat
19. Snacktime....
I showed this boy in my first grade class this cool rock I found, as I was convinced it was a moon rock. He asked to hold it to admire it so I let him, and then he proceeded to launch it into the forest and laugh at me.
So I did what I had to. I grabbed my chocolate pudding container and put it in the pocket of his sweater and smacked it so hard it exploded all over him.
Even though I lost that cool rock and my afternoon snack, I kept my pride that day. orangecrushh99
18. So Hollywood...
It was like out of a movie.
He was making fun of me and I taunted him back. He came at me and when he got close I put my hands up in a "don't hit me" position, but he slipped on a wet piece of wood and fell.
That's not what the other kids saw. Everyone else saw him come at me and then my hands flew up at his face and he hit the ground. They thought I was a god that decked him in the face.
I didn't even get in trouble because the recess teachers saw how the whole thing actually played out and he got in trouble.
We became recess buddies after that. coscojo
17. The Sidestep....
In a high school soccer game, this jerk I was guarding kept sneaking in dirty shots (kicks & elbows) when the ref wasn't looking.
After that had gone on for a while, he turned his back to me so he could receive a pass. He kept banging his body into mine (right behind him) to clear out space.
I timed it just right, and as he tried to hurl himself backward into me one more time, I sidestepped and gave him a little shove... and he stumbled out of control, arms flailing, and fell flat on his back.
I wasn't a very physical player, so my teammates who saw that were surprised. The best part was when some of them just cracked up laughing. MisterBigDude
16. Weeded....
GiphyGave 3 guys a half ounce to beat him up and tell him to leave me alone.
They did. He did. Wrong_Answer_Willie
15. JUSTICE!!!
He destroyed my math project and pushed me down the stairs a bunch of times. I got his black belt taken away. snakyman
As a dojang mom of twelve years, this gives me a raging justice erection. Any kid wearing our name who bullies would meet exactly the same fate because OH HECK NO!!
Courtesy. Integrity. Self-control. Perseverance. Indomitable spirit. Bullying violates every tenet and shames the martial artist and the art alike. philemonslady
14. The Lawn Fanatic.....
Not me, but a friend. She had a neighbor from hell (is there a /r/JustNoNeighbor? If not, there should be). Decades of bullying, calling the cops when her kids played basketball in the driveway after school, yelling at her whenever leaves from her tree blew into his oh-so-perfect lawn, you get the picture.
This guy was a fanatic about his lawn. Out every day weeding, raking, mowing, fertilizing, whatever.
She played the long game. Planted mint several feet from the property line where he couldn't see it. That stuff can send roots a long way. It took a couple of years, but eventually mint started popping up in his lawn. She said the look on his face the day he noticed it was priceless. He's never going to get rid of it. capilot
13. Life will take care of it....
Not a bully really, but this older girl in high school loudly announced to the cafeteria that my thighs were "so huge" as I was wearing my cheerleading uniform. A few years later, I was going through my rebellious teens and dating this older crappy guy who ran in the same circle as her.
First time I saw her I was shocked that she introduced herself to me. Then she cried about how her boyfriend just went to jail for dealing and she didn't make enough money to keep the apartment and that was all the revenge I needed. am_lady_can_confirm
12. By the Hairs....
Not me, but my mom. At the place where she worked this guy liked to pick on her. So one day he decided to take her car keys and drop them down his pants. My mom was slightly embarrassed but needed to get home, so when he proceeded to challenge her to get them, she did. While she was grabbing them she may or may not have grabbed some of his pubic hair and twisted and yanked. He didn't mess with her again. LunaLovegood05
11. How Walter of You!!!
GiphyMy ex was emotionally manipulative. When we hung out he was always logged into Netflix with my brothers account because he refused to buy his own. After we broke up I saw that he was watching Breaking Bad. So we waited until he got to the last season and changed the password. PoeMeACup
10. Every Visit.
Going to college and becoming successful. She bags my groceries everytime I visit my hometown. I know its wrong to take satisfaction from this, but I can't help it. EmeraldEmesis
9. The Punch.
This kid on the bus in middle school always used to make fun of my friend for being gay. One day he was grabbing him by the hair and slamming his head into the window while calling him gay slurs.
So I tapped him on the shoulder and gave him a really bad punch in the face that didn't feel satisfying at all. But it was enough to break his glasses and make sure he never messed with my friend again so it was a win and my first real physical confrontation. lafleurricky
8. Cats....
GiphyThis kid at my brother's middle school once cut the whiskers off of a cat's face with some friends and bragged about it. Cutting the whiskers off a cat is like torture, leaving it unable to navigate and sense things around it. The whiskers are incredibly sensitive.
My brother loves cats.
When my bro found out, he grabbed the kid by the shoulders and head butted him as hard as he could, leaving the bully crying on the ground with a broken nose, blood covering his face.
Afterwards, my brother was known affectionately around school by the nickname "Head."
And of course he got in huge trouble for it, but he didn't care. SirMauriac
7. The Floooooooor....
We had a debate (for class) and I pretty much wiped the floor with him. Dude barley even practiced plus I was the quiet kid so people expected me to be passive. LateForTheTest
6. Waddle Away....
It wasn't my doing, but the girl who harassed me and hit me in the locker rooms after gym class got pregnant and quit bullying me... in the 7th grade. I still feel weird about the all-consuming schadenfreude I experienced when I saw her waddling through the halls of our junior high. foul_dwimmerlaik
5. Damn 8th Grade....
In 8th grade there was this guy in my class who just enjoyed mocking me. I was quite chubby, shy and insecure at that time.
One day he got my school laptop somehow and played a porn video on it in the middle of the hallway with the speakers turned to 11. He was screaming "Look everybody what (my name) is watching." Everyone was looking, laughing and begged me to take back the laptop from him.
I tried taking it back be he wouldn't have it. We had a small fight over it, all this while I was really embarrassed, sad and angry as well as people filming it all.
In the end I snapped so I grabbed one of his fingers and pulled & bent it so hard I broke it. I remember he left crying after that and all the kids around us walked away like nothing happened. He never mocked me again after that. Bonnarp
4. #2020.....
GiphySigned them up for mormon home visits online and specified that they should be persistent. toxic_pantaloons
3. Sister got it!
Not me but my sister.
There was this girl on the bus who kept messing with her everyday. No one would do anything about it. The other girl got off first and my sister followed. She put the fear of Satan into that girl. Didn't mess with my sister again. LouTenant6767
2. One. Good. Shove.
My friend, but at the end of the year he shoves his bully into a door and the teacher arrives as he is about to fight back. Friend didn't get into trouble. Mr_Chevalier
1. Just Chew....
GiphyGave him a stick of gum covered in laxative. He was out for three days. homerbartbob
Experiencing death is a fascinating and frightening idea.
Who doesn't want to know what is waiting for us on the other side?
But so many of us want to know and then come back and live a little longer.
It would be so great to be sure there is something else.
But the whole dying part is not that great, so we'll have to rely on other people's accounts.
Redditor AlaskaStiletto wanted to hear from everyone who has returned to life, so they asked:
"Redditors who have 'died' and come back to life, what did you see?"
Sensations
Happy Good Vibes GIF by Major League SoccerGiphy"My dad's heart stopped when he had a heart attack and he had to be brought back to life. He kept the paper copy of the heart monitor which shows he flatlined. He said he felt an overwhelming sensation of peace, like nothing he had felt before."
PeachesnPain
Recovery
"I had surgical complications in 2010 that caused a great deal of blood loss. As a result, I had extremely low blood pressure and could barely stay awake. I remember feeling like I was surrounded by loved ones who had passed. They were in a circle around me and I knew they were there to guide me onwards. I told them I was not ready to go because my kids needed me and I came back."
"My nurse later said she was afraid she’d find me dead every time she came into the room."
"It took months, and blood transfusions, but I recovered."
good_golly99
Take Me Back
"Overwhelming peace and happiness. A bright airy and floating feeling. I live a very stressful life. Imagine finding out the person you have had a crush on reveals they have the same feelings for you and then you win the lotto later that day - that was the feeling I had."
"I never feared death afterward and am relieved when I hear of people dying after suffering from an illness."
rayrayrayray
Free
The Light Minnie GIF by (G)I-DLEGiphy"I had a heart surgery with near-death experience, for me at least (well the possibility that those effects are caused by morphine is also there) I just saw black and nothing else but it was warm and I had such inner peace, its weird as I sometimes still think about it and wish this feeling of being so light and free again."
TooReDTooHigh
This is why I hate surgery.
You just never know.
Shocked
Giphy"More of a near-death experience. I was electrocuted. I felt like I was in a deep hole looking straight up in the sky. My life flashed before me. Felt sad for my family, but I had a deep sense of peace."
Admirable_Buyer6528
The SOB
"Nursing in the ICU, we’ve had people try to die on us many times during the years, some successfully. One guy stood out to me. His heart stopped. We called a code, are working on him, and suddenly he comes to. We hadn’t vented him yet, so he was able to talk, and he started screaming, 'Don’t let them take me, don’t let them take me, they are coming,' he was scared and yelling."
"Then he yelled a little more, as we tried to calm him down, he screamed, 'No, No,' and gestured towards the end of the bed, and died again. We didn’t get him back. It was seriously creepy. We called his son to tell him the news, and the son said basically, 'Good, he was an SOB.'”
1-cupcake-at-a-time
Colors
"My sister died and said it was extremely peaceful. She said it was very loud like a train station and lots of talking and she was stuck in this area that was like a curtain with lots of beautiful colors (colors that you don’t see in real life according to her) a man told her 'He was sorry, but she had to go back as it wasn’t her time.'"
Hannah_LL7
"I had a really similar experience except I was in an endless garden with flowers that were colors I had never seen before. It was quiet and peaceful and a woman in a dress looked at me, shook her head, and just said 'Not yet.' As I was coming back, it was extremely loud, like everyone in the world was trying to talk all at once. It was all very disorienting but it changed my perspective on life!"
huntokarrr
The Fog
"I was in a gray fog with a girl who looked a lot like a young version of my grandmother (who was still alive) but dressed like a pioneer in the 1800s she didn't say anything but kept pulling me towards an opening in the wall. I kept refusing to go because I was so tired."
"I finally got tired of her nagging and went and that's when I came to. I had bled out during a c-section and my heart could not beat without blood. They had to deliver the baby and sew up the bleeders. refill me with blood before they could restart my heart so, like, at least 12 minutes gone."
Fluffy-Hotel-5184
Through the Walls
"My spouse was dead for a couple of minutes one miserable night. She maintains that she saw nothing, but only heard people talking about her like through a wall. The only thing she remembers for absolute certain was begging an ER nurse that she didn't want to die."
"She's quite alive and well today."
Hot-Refrigerator6583
Well let's all be happy to be alive.
It seems to be all we have.
Trying to lose weight is a struggle understood by many people regardless of size.
The goal of reaching a healthy weight may seem unattainable, but with diet and exercise, it can pay off through persistence and discipline.
Seeing the pounds gradually drop off can also be a great motivator and incentivize people to stay the course.
Those who've achieved their respective weight goals shared their experiences when Redditor apprenti8455 asked:
"People who lost a lot of weight, what surprises you the most now?"
Redditors didn't see these coming.
Shiver Me Timbers
"I’m always cold now!"
– Telrom_1
"I had a coworker lose over 130 pounds five or six years ago. I’ve never seen him without a jacket on since."
– r7ndom
"140 lbs lost here starting just before COVID, I feel like that little old lady that's always cold, damn this top comment was on point lmao."
– mr_remy
Drawing Concern
"I lost 100 pounds over a year and a half but since I’m old(70’s) it seems few people comment on it because (I think) they think I’m wasting away from some terminal illness."
– dee-fondy
"Congrats on the weight loss! It’s honestly a real accomplishment 🙂"
"Working in oncology, I can never comment on someone’s weight loss unless I specifically know it was on purpose, regardless of their age. I think it kind of ruffles feathers at times, but like I don’t want to congratulate someone for having cancer or something. It’s a weird place to be in."
– LizardofDeath
Unleashing Insults
"I remember when I lost the first big chunk of weight (around 50 lbs) it was like it gave some people license to talk sh*t about the 'old' me. Old coworkers, friends, made a lot of not just negative, but harsh comments about what I used to look like. One person I met after the big loss saw a picture of me prior and said, 'Wow, we wouldn’t even be friends!'”
"It wasn’t extremely common, but I was a little alarmed by some of the attention. My weight has been up and down since then, but every time I gain a little it gets me a little down thinking about those things people said."
– alanamablamaspama
Not Everything Goes After Losing Weight
"The loose skin is a bit unexpected."
– KeltarCentauri
"I haven’t experienced it myself, but surgery to remove skin takes a long time to recover. Longer than bariatric surgery and usually isn’t covered by insurance unless you have both."
– KatMagic1977
"It definitely does take a long time to recover. My Dad dropped a little over 200 pounds a few years back and decided to go through with skin removal surgery to deal with the excess. His procedure was extensive, as in he had skin taken from just about every part of his body excluding his head, and he went through hell for weeks in recovery, and he was bedridden for a lot of it."
– Jaew96
These Redditors shared their pleasantly surprising experiences.
Shopping
"I can buy clothes in any store I want."
– WaySavvyD
"When I lost weight I was dying to go find cute, smaller clothes and I really struggled. As someone who had always been restricted to one or two stores that catered to plus-sized clothing, a full mall of shops with items in my size was daunting. Too many options and not enough knowledge of brands that were good vs cheap. I usually went home pretty frustrated."
– ganache98012
No More Symptoms
"Lost about 80 pounds in the past year and a half, biggest thing that I’ve noticed that I haven’t seen mentioned on here yet is my acid reflux and heartburn are basically gone. I used to be popping tums every couple hours and now they just sit in the medicine cabinet collecting dust."
– colleennicole93
Expanding Capabilities
"I'm all for not judging people by their appearance and I recognise that there are unhealthy, unachievable beauty standards, but one thing that is undeniable is that I can just do stuff now. Just stamina and flexibility alone are worth it, appearance is tertiary at best."
– Ramblonius
People Change Their Tune
"How much nicer people are to you."
"My feet weren't 'wide' they were 'fat.'"
– LiZZygsu
"Have to agree. Lost 220 lbs, people make eye contact and hold open doors and stuff"
"And on the foot thing, I also lost a full shoe size numerically and also wear regular width now 😅"
– awholedamngarden
It's gonna take some getting used to.
Bones Everywhere
"Having bones. Collarbones, wrist bones, knee bones, hip bones, ribs. I have so many bones sticking out everywhere and it’s weird as hell."
– Princess-Pancake-97
"I noticed the shadow of my ribs the other day and it threw me, there’s a whole skeleton in here."
– bekastrange
Knee Pillow
"Right?! And they’re so … pointy! Now I get why people sleep with pillows between their legs - the knee bones laying on top of each other (side sleeper here) is weird and jarring."
– snic2030
"I lost only 40 pounds within the last year or so. I’m struggling to relate to most of these comments as I feel like I just 'slimmed down' rather than dropped a ton. But wow, the pillow between the knees at night. YES! I can relate to this. I think a lot of my weight was in my thighs. I never needed to do this up until recently."
– Strongbad23
More Mobility
"I’ve lost 100 lbs since 2020. It’s a collection of little things that surprise me. For at least 10 years I couldn’t put on socks, or tie my shoes. I couldn’t bend over and pick something up. I couldn’t climb a ladder to fix something. Simple things like that I can do now that fascinate me."
"Edit: Some additional little things are sitting in a chair with arms, sitting in a booth in a restaurant, being able to shop in a normal store AND not needing to buy the biggest size there, being able to easily wipe my butt, and looking down and being able to see my penis."
– dma1965
People making significant changes, whether for mental or physical health, can surely find a newfound perspective on life.
But they can also discover different issues they never saw coming.
That being said, overcoming any challenge in life is laudable, especially if it leads to gaining confidence and ditching insecurities.