We all have bad moments, bad days, bad phases in life. It's been said that everyone is the villain in someone's story - and sometimes we are the villain even in our own.
Being a flaming turd of a human being happens to the best of us. The important thing is that we are able to recognize it when it happens and learn from it - aaaand maybe also share it on Reddit. Let's be real.
Reddit user TheJawsDog asked:
Looking back, what's a situation in your life when you were the a-hole?
Some of these are hilariously innocent (like the vampire incident) and some of these are absolutely deeply and terribly cringeworthy acts of purposeful meanness. Hopefully, though, everyone has been able to move on to being a better person.
Happy Halloween
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A friend brought my group of friends to a bar on Halloween weekend. I was dressed up as a cowboy. I noticed that pretty much everyone else at that bar was dressed as a vampire. I went around and complimented a lot of them on their awesome vampire costumes.
We eventually left and hopped over to another bar. I'm telling my friend i thought it was weird that everyone there had chosen to dress as a vampire. He tells me that we were actually at a goth bar, and none of them were wearing costumes.
Hated It
Moved to live closer to my best friend and work with her. Ended up hating the town, taking it out on her, spending all my energy complaining about how I'd ruined my life and not gave any thought to her feelings. I moved away and we've kinda repaired things but it definitely left an impact and I was 100% in the wrong.
Because of Religion
I was adopted by lovely and caring parents, but throughout my entire childhood and teenage years I wanted nothing but distance from them for the sole reason that they were religious.
They weren't even the fanatic types. They were incredibly tolerant and respectful towards just about anything and anyone. They had the belief that they not only couldn't judge anyone, but also would be punished if they did.
When I was 11 I told them I didn't want to go to church anymore and then accepted it. I mean, I was 11 and they already respected my decision.
That just made it all the much harder for us to connect at any level. 90% of everything they did was to talk about Jesus and whatnot. In hindsight, I used to be kind of a prick about it, while they were always perfectly calm and friendly, even when I downright offended them.
I lost both of them in a car accident when I was 18.
Now I see that whether someone is religious or not, old or not, male or female or neither, black or white, from your country or a foreigner, being jerk is just that, being a jerk, where you come from and your general philosophy of life can't really do much to make it better or worse.
No matter how right you think you are, don't be a jerk!
The Paper Towel Compulsion
I think about this pretty often honestly. I had to be about 7 or 8. I'm in the mall with my mom and sister and it is just about closing time. On our way out of a department store we stop at the bathroom before the ride home. My mom sends me into the men's room on my own. Nobody in the bathroom. For some reason my stupid little brain thinks "I'm gonna poop on a bunch of paper towels and slap it against the mirror....".
I try to think back to why I would ever have this compulsion and I got nothin'. Having since worked many service jobs over the years I am profoundly sorry to that custodian.
To Look Cool
When my best friend was bullied I sometimes joined along, wanting to look cool in front of the "cool kids."
- Derolyon
I remember feeling so betrayed when my best friend turned on me in second grade so she could be cool. I went to gifted school part time so I was bullied heavily at regular school. I also had an abusive dad so I cried a lot when they bullied so that didn't help. One day she just joined in and soon after told me she's not my friend anymore. She was the first betrayal in a long line of "best" friends being a-holes to me. That leaves a mark.
I have been on the receiving end of this and man does it suck. My first "boyfriend" threw me in some bushes in front of his friends and called me "vaca muy gorda" - which translates to "very fat cow" I guess.
I am a big girl so it stung. He thought it was so funny. After I dumped him, I went on to have body issues some 20+ years later and refused to date guys who said they liked me because I was sure they were going to do something similar.
"Nice Guy"
I used to pull that nice guy bull. Ask a girl out, get rejected, desperately plead my case about how nice I was even though trying to guilt trip your way into a date is not a nice thing to do at all, then get frustrated when she avoided me and unfriended me on Facebook. Pretty embarrassing to look back on, but if you can't look back and realize you were a total a-hole sometimes, you're probably still one.
Sprinkled Quarters
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When I was a teen I went to a restaurant with several of my friends. We had been at an arcade earlier so I had a pocket full of quarters. My tip that night was quarters sprinkled in glasses, in food, and on plates. Thought it would be funny, but I look back on it now and it wasn't. It's something for which I'm deeply ashamed and it fills me with regret every time I think of it. Now I am extremely nice to the wait staff.
The Christmas Losers
Setting up for a huge artisan trade show that involved a massive vetting process (It was very difficult to be selected) - we had a day to set up, and as we're all working our butts off trying to make the BEST display of our goods, one booth across from us remained a total ghost town, to the horror and shock of the rest of us 'hard working' artisans.
Fast forward to the opening day of 10 days of this massive Christmas artisan show (as in HUGE!!) and the empty booth owners show up, set up a basic Costco table and dump cardboard boxes around - we're all rolling our eyes and snickering at this point, I mean...come on??? What LOSERS???
Yeah...those 'losers' were selling authentic Peruvian sweaters and hats - sold out in 3 days, packed up their Costco table, humbly leaving with WAY more than we could ever hope to make. Meanwhile, the rest of us schmucks had to kiss butt and keep our pathetic grins on for another 7 days.
I will forever look back on that experience as a lesson of making assumptions and being a total ass. Which I was.
Sorry Omar
Definitely the time my friends and I bullied the new kid on the block. Nothing physical, but we made fun of him and excluded him for not having a scooter. Then one day he showed up with a new scooter and we bullied him for having a cheapo one.
Years later it became apparent that his family wasn't as well off as ours. None of us realized we were picking on the poor kid, and when the family bought him the trendy toy, it just wasn't good enough for us. We were mean to him and I feel awful about it. Sorry, Omar.
- Rezzone
An Alien
Back in 7th grade, this really shy girl used to have a HUGE crush on me. Her friends told me she would leave PE early to go to the changing room in order to look pretty for the next class that were both in. Then, her friends kept asking for me to talk to her and ask her out but I refused because to me, "she looked like an alien". Unfortunately, her friends told her and she was devastated. I was honestly just stating why I didn't want to "date" her but I realized how mean and terrible my comments were. I apologized to her for being an insensitive jerk and she forgave me. We managed to become friends in 8th grade and all throughout high school. I still feel bad about whenever I think of her.
The World's Cringiest Breakup
My first boyfriend and I started dating in high school. We were absolutely inseparable as we'd been best friends for years before we started dating. We were there for each other through the death of a parent and a sibling, and so many firsts. We were going to live in the same dorm in college the next year. A pair, for sure.
Our senior year I decided I wanted to go to prom with some random guy that I'd developed a crush on during our senior trip. Because we'd been friends so long, I decided that instead of breaking up with him (which felt cold-hearted) I'd soften the blow by just being incredibly mean to him. This way he wouldn't be as upset when I finally told him.
I was HORRIBLE to him for DAYS - just didn't let up. Everything he did was wrong. Nothing was funny. His new haircut was ugly. Why was he so stupid? I finally said something that broke him while we were watching a movie one night and he asked why I was being so awful. I decided that then was the best time to tell him that I was breaking up with him, specifically because I wanted to go to prom with someone else, who I barely knew. He started sobbing, which teenage brain could NOT understand. I kept asking why he was so upset, but he wouldn't tell me.
It turns out that after years of friendship, I'd blindsided him with the world's cringiest breakup, on his birthday, which I'd completely forgotten. 20 years later I still wake up in the middle of the night feeling guilty about it.
The Dead Dad
When I was in elementary school there was this kid who lost his father to cancer during the school year. One day after he came back to school (can't remember how long after) we got into some sort of dispute on the playground. I don't remember exactly how it came to me saying "at least my dad isn't dead" but that's exactly what came out of my mouth. I spent the day in the principals office. To this day this is one of the biggest regrets of my life and I'm 23. I still feel terrible about it because I never got to apologize to the kid because we moved away shortly after. I don't even remember his name but I'll never forget saying that.
Project Manager
Many years ago I was just starting out on a new position as a project manager. Things weren't going smoothly on this project, not really in anyone's control but it added stress to myself and my team.
One day one of my teammates made a minor and fixable error, but I still screamed at them in front of about 10 people (all employees). Like a good 2 min tirade about what a mistake they were. They were a summer student, making minimum wage and I just laid into them. The worst part is they made the mistake because *I* labeled something incorrectly. It was really *my* mistake.
10 years later I still manage small to medium teams and I think about that moment a lot. It reminds me to keep my cool in stressful situations and you can provide discipline without being an a-hole. Also, owning up to your own mistakes as a leader I feel actually helps the team grow long term and establishes trust with your employees.
The GIF
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My BFF and I have a GIF we send on the first day of our periods, the one from The Shining with the elevator doors opening and the blood everywhere. After her first miscarriage I spaced and sent that to her and have hated myself ever since. Pretty sure she doesn't remember, but I'll never forget.
Tommy
Was hammered at a bar; the bar server was called Tommy - I was making him say "Tommy want wingy" whilst waving cash in his face (it was his tip.)
Sober me realized I looked like a huge ass that would have only tipped if he said what I wanted.
- pyth0ns
I'm No Help
It wasn't quite long ago, maybe early last month. I was coming back from a friend's place and I saw a girl who I knew was staying close to my place but we actually don't talk. She was carrying a ton of luggage in both hands including a cooking gas (it looked like she was just coming back to school after the semester break) and she was sweating like crazy. She looked like she needed all the help she could get.
We actually locked eyes and I think she was expecting me to help her, but I didn't. To make matters worse I actually walked almost side by side with her without saying a word to her or even helping her with stuff. I just let her struggle with everything while I walked next to her empty-handed.
SO I THINK I AM THE A-HOLE
R.I.P. Mom
My mom was really sick for a few years and it was just part of my life and something I was used to. I was sitting in her room while she napped, browsing the internet on our laptop and talking with friends on AOL. I spent 45+ minutes whining and complaining about how weird the sounds she was making while she slept were and how I hated her snoring and just a lot of really awful things to say about your mom (I was 14).
I stood up to go get water and glanced at her and saw she was laying in a puddle of vomit in bed. The sounds I was hearing was the oxygen tubes blowing bubbles into her vomit. The snoring was air from the oxygen machine pushing out. At some point in the time I was sitting there in her room complaining about her, she'd died in her sleep. No idea how long.
She obviously never knew about my sh*tty attitude, but I felt awful for ages. I still look back on that time and think about what a little prick I was to her and my step dad.
Mean Guys
When I was in school, my friend group consisted of 3 guys and me. None of our conversations were about anything other than basically roasting other people. We'd even go over and talk to "weird" people and act completely normal and nice to them but then when we were alone we would just go over the "session" and take the piss out of the person.
It did make me a bit uncomfortable, but I just went along with it. Looking back I really was the equivalent of one of those popular mean girls in American high school movies.
- hoejoexo
"Constructive Criticism"
When I was a kid I would always have "constructive criticism" for my mum about her cooking.
"This would be better like this."
"Something doesn't taste right."
But once I moved out I realized that cooking for myself is quite a lot of effort and I usually just put something in the microwave or in the oven. She would put in a couple hours of effort EVERY DAY only for me to complain about it.
The Glass
I dropped a glass in my back garden and didn't bother cleaning it up. My dog was running outside and stepped on the broken glass. We had to take her to the vet to get it removed. I had never felt like a bigger piece of crap in my life.
Lonely
Harassed a female friend due to being lonely. I texted her to no end and when she didn't reply, my anxiety would trigger and it caused me to text her even more while trying to explain that I wasn't in a good place in that period of time.
Caused the friendship to crumble entirely and I may or may not have left her with some trauma because of me harassing her. I've tried to make amends since I deeply regret the stupid things I did; but I don't think she will end up forgiving me for this and I'm worried if I keep reaching out it'll be just harassing her more.
Chuck E. Cheese
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When I was like 12 I was at chuck e. cheese and I did the ultimate assh*le move. I took tickets from a machine that someone had won, and the little girl came back and caught me. I said something mean to her (I can't remember, but it was really bad) and took the tickets and took off.
She bought her grandma with her to see what she won. If I could go back, I'd slap the hell out of younger me and give them back. If she's somehow reading this, I want to apologize for my behavior. 76 tickets from the monkey climbing game that's near impossible to win. You know who you are, and now you know who I am.
I apologize.
- Sthepuma
Phobic Irony
When I was a part of GamerGate, and heavily transphobic.
Ironic, because I'm now both heavily into social justice and also trans.
- Andreus
WTF Was Wrong With Me?
I was in the hospital for a while as a kid. I had some terrible habits like stealing puzzle pieces from the other kid in the hospital room and washing them down the toilet to feel good about myself. Also dissolving toothpaste in their clothes. Some f'd up stuff, I know. Also some animal torture like squashing frogs with boulders and kicking cats around. It felt 'exciting' back then but I always look back with a 'WTF was wrong with me' look on my face.
Grandpa
My grandpa was very sick and was prepping to undergo surgery. My parents told me and my sister that he would be fine soon, but in reality he only had few week left to live. I was too busy playing video games and was very entilted and angry at that time. I had a few of those moments a month, when I was getting so angry that I acted out against my family because of the anger.
I was 16 at that time.
So one day after surgery my sister came into my room with grandpa, which was pretty big achievement since he could barely walk. She playfully said "look who made it heeeeere."
I just got very angry because they interrupted me and shouted: "GET THE F*CK OUT OF HERE!"
It was one of the last times my grandpa was able to move without being carried in someone's arms and one of the last moments when he was still rational.
That thing haunts me and I still regret it 8 years after. It was probably worst thing I have ever done.