Police Officers Describe What Happened When Calls They Responded To Turned Paranormal

Being a police officer can be a pretty scary job at times. Officers just never know what you're going to run into, so they're always on high alert.
But do they ever expect to run into the paranormal?
No, not really. Until it happens, of course, as we learned after Redditor Boert9 asked the online community: "Law Enforcement of Reddit, what was the most scary/paranormal call you have responded to?"
Warning: Some sensitive reading material ahead.
"Once we arrived..."
I am a police officer working on an emergency response team on a busy London borough. We took a call to a suspected domestic incident in a block of flats. The informant said that she could hear screaming and sounds of disturbance coming from the flat above her own.
Once we arrived my colleague and I knocked on the door of the flat the informant said the noise was coming from. I had heard nothing on my way up and certainly couldn't hear any disturbance coming from the address. To be honest I heard nothing at all. After knocking twice we had no response. My colleague left me to go downstairs and speak directly to the informant.
I stayed by the door. I knocked again and after some time it was answered by an elderly woman. She had clearly been asleep and was alarmed to see me standing outside. I told her that someone had called saying that they could hear a disturbance coming from within her address. I asked her if there was anyone else inside with her. She looked bemused and told me that she lived alone and had been sleeping. I asked her if I could come in to satisfy myself that no one else was there.
She invited me in and I walked into what was a small 2 bedroom flat. The flat was in darkness apart from her hall light and her bedside lamp. I began searching through the flat. As I approached the final door (the living room) my colleague called me up on the radio. He told me that he was on his way and asked if I was okay. I told him everything was fine wondering why he sounded so flustered. He told me that he was with the informant and could also hear screaming and loud thuds coming from the flat I was in.
I told him that he must be mistaken as I was almost done searching the flat and that I had heard nothing whatsoever. I have to admit a feeling of unease as I opened the final door. Like all the other rooms it was in darkness but was freezing cold. My breath misted immediately. There was no one in the room and no signs of disturbance. No window was open. I called my colleague and asked him to listen out for my footfall. He said he could hear my feet as I stamped them but said that the screaming had stopped. This coincided with me opening the door. I left shortly after apologising to the elderly woman for waking her.
I have no rational explanation for this at all. My colleague and I left feeling very creeped out.
Late evening maybe a decade ago, I ended up running silent to a call with additional units in tow. The caller reported hearing "footsteps" on her second floor when she was in the kitchen. She lived alone, middle aged, divorced, no kids, and had no expected company. She is outside across the street when we arrive, obviously unnerved and being calmed by her neighbor.
Other units showed up almost as I did and set up a perimeter at the corners of the property. We talk with her, get permission to enter, so we decide we'll announce ourselves and clear the house. Three of us stack up on the front door, announce and make entry while the other officers are viewing the windows from a distance under concealment. She was in the midst of making a really late dinner so the house smells really good. I remember how good it smelled. Anyway, we clear the ground level and make our way to the stairs when we hear it.
Obviously footsteps on the wood floors above us. Not a panicky "oh shit I'm caught footsteps" and running to hide or escape, no, these were calm, methodic and almost pace like. We announce ourselves again and no response, except the pacing just starts to sorta fade away. Quietly I make my way up the steps, adrenaline pumping, and concentrating on pieing the corner at the top. I stop a few stairs shy of the corner, breathe, and proceed up.
"The hallway..."
The hallway at the top was pitch black and after successfully clearing the top/ corner we make our way down the hallway clearing rooms. Nothing. Nobody. Not even a critter. Not that any critter would ever make what I describe as human footsteps on hardwood. After the initial search, a few of the other officers involved also checked every nook and cranny, bed, closet, rack, hell, even the washer, dryer, appliances and cupboards were thoroughly searched. Nothing was out of order. Nobody was hiding anywhere.
Eventually we invite the lady back into her residence and reassure her that there was nobody in there and we equated her noise to maybe wood shrinkage or expansion in the home.
None of the officers outside and after our initial search had seen anybody leave the top or bottom floors or windows. The house had no indications that anybody tried to force open a window or door.
I stayed behind for about 30 minutes once the other officers cleared the call and waited while her friend showed up to stay the night with her. I went over basic security measures with her and double checked all her windows and doors were not compromised. She fed me well done lasagna as I waited, and to this day, I'm convinced that I interacted with another dimension of life that day.
"Anyways, I approached Lucy..."
About 4 years ago, a lady who I'll call Lucy, called our non-emergency line and said she locked herself out of her house. I responded to take the report in case FD needed to force entry.
I arrived first and immediately noticed a burning candle and some "jesusy" statues in the upstairs window. The light in this room was also on. I can't explain it, but it seemed a bit odd to me.
Anyways, I approached Lucy who appeared to be about 65 years old, and asked what happened. She said she walked to her car to get groceries for her and her mother but forgot her keys inside and the door had locked behind her. I asked if her mother was home and Lucy replied in the affirmative. Lucy went on to say she technically lived alone because her mom died 6 years prior but she still "lives" with her in the bedroom with the lit candle and makes her presence known by turning on/off lights, opening/closing doors, and turning on the bathroom faucet.
I then walked the perimeter of the home and found an unlocked window into the kitchen. Since Lucy never actually left home and knew no one else was inside, I radioed dispatch and climbed in through the window with her consent.
As my boot touched the kitchen floor, I heard an audible click. At the same time, the lights in the stairway and upstairs hallway to my left turned off. I quickly walked to the rear sliding door to my right and advised Lucy what had happened. Lucy laughed and said that was just her mom saying hello. I told Lucy that although I genuinely believe what she told me was true, I still had to do my due diligence and ensure no one else was inside. I radioed for a back and within minutes my buddy arrived. The first thing he asked about was the lit candle in the window.
While clearing the upstairs, we came upon the room where the candle was and immediately noticed it was blown out. There were no open windows, fans, vents, or other obvious source that could've extinguished the flame. We just looked at each other with a bit of unease and went back downstairs to leave. click the upstairs lights turned off behind us. We talked to Lucy for another 5 minutes and suggested getting a battery operated candle just to be safe....
Well Lucy clearly thought "f--- the police" because to this day, that candle burns in the open window most nights when I drive by. And every now and then I'll stop and talk to Lucy to see how she and her mother are doing.
"Early in my career..."
Early in my career, the elevators in the older section of CIA Headquarters (known as the Original Headquarters Building or OHB) were known to have quirks (I think they still do). Occasionally, the elevator would stop and the doors would open at a floor with no one there, and no one on the elevator had requested that floor.
I heard second-hand that the "thing to do" when that happened was to say "Good day, Mr. Director," because it was assumed that the doors opened for the ghost of Allen Dulles. OHB was his project, as many know, but he never was able to move into his office, having been replaced as CIA Director just before it was ready.
"I've been in law enforcement..."
I've been in law enforcement for several years now. I serve a small, rural town. During the summer of 2015, I had one of my most unsettling experiences.
That evening my partner and I were called to investigate a potential trespasser on some residential property out in the sticks. A young girl, about fifteen or sixteen years old, had called 911 and reported that a person wearing a clown costume was loitering around her backyard. I'll refer to her as Sara. She was extremely frightened when we arrived. Her mother had to work late that night, so Sara was home alone.
She explained that a tall person in a clown costume had repeatedly emerged from the woods in her backyard. She first saw him when she went to let her dog out. He was peering at her from behind a tree, beckoning her to come over. "I could hear him laughing," she said. She ran inside with her pet, locked the door, and immediately called 911. She watched from a window as the clown reappeared several times from the woods, exhibiting erratic behavior.
She described the clown's appearance as "really scary," not at all like the silly, colorful characters typically seen. He had a quintessential red nose, but wore a dark-colored jumpsuit. She thought his face was painted white with dark shapes around his eyes. No hair or head accessories, according to her.
After investigating inside the home, we checked the perimeter of the house. My partner stayed behind to monitor the doors while I approached the tree line. No sooner than I shined my flash light into the woods that I heard the sounds of snapping tree limbs, as if someone was walking through the forest about twenty yards away. I called out, announcing myself as a police officer—no response, no more sounds.
Not sure what we were dealing with, we did not venture into the woods. It was the middle of the night with limited visibility. I focused my attention on investigating the property for anything suspicious while my partner patrolled around the house. Nothing of interest was found.
Over the next couple of months, our department received several more calls about clown sightings. Not only did these sightings occur within a five mile radius of each other, but all of them were reported by young people. Because it's a small community, we initially thought this was all some kind of prank/hoax orchestrated by a bunch of bored kids. These kids, however, seemed genuinely frightened upon investigation and their descriptions were consistent. We really didn't know what to think.
No one or nothing was ever found in these cases, with the exception of one. Around sunset one evening, we received a phone call from an elderly woman I'll call Helen. She was a sweet lady who played the organ at a church in town. Although she was devoutly religious, like the kind of person who'd quote scripture in the middle of a conversation, she meant well.
Anyways, Helen called and said that her grandson (whom she was raising) saw a clown in their yard. She was concerned and wanted the police to investigate. Her grandson was only five and getting details out of him proved difficult. In a rather matter-of-fact kind of way, Helen said, "Officer, those clowns are devil worshippers. I know it because right after my grandson saw that clown, my mother's nutcracker—that one right there on top of the fireplace—fell and broke. I've been praying hard ever since." Sure enough, her nutcracker was broken into two pieces. I did an internal eye roll and redirected the conversation.
"Let me walk outside and check things out," I said. Helen followed behind me as we walked out the backdoor. Everything was still and quiet. I asked if there were any places on the property where someone could hide. She said there was an old, overgrown shed about a hundred yards behind her house. I radioed in for support, and another officer arrived soon after.
Thankfully it was a lightly wooded area so the shed was easy enough to find. It was quite dilapidated and half falling down. The door was slightly ajar. We called out but there wasn't a response. We had flash lights in our left hands and our right hands on our weapons. The door creaked open and slowly we walked in. There was no one inside.
Besides old, rusty farm equipment, we noticed a couple of strange items scattered around the floor. The first thing we saw was a brass cow figurine. Second, we found a bible with burn marks all over it. We later learned the entire book of Leviticus had been torn out.
Helen adamantly swore she had no idea who the items belonged to or why they were in that shed. The whole thing was very overwhelming for her. We brought the items to the station but nothing ever surfaced. That was the last clown sighting. Maybe it was a series of pranks, an odd fad that came and went. Whatever the case, it all sticks out to me as something incredibly strange. I always feel uneasy whenever I think about those events.
"A few weeks ago..."
A few weeks ago I'd gotten dispatched to a 911 call that involved a female frantically screaming at the dispatcher "she's going to kill me, she's going to kill me! Come quick I'm at [address of where she was at]!"
Naturally, every unit within range of my sector and myself had radioed in a response and we were all hauling ass to get there. Once we got there we discovered the house was abandoned for some years now and so we set a cordon around with officers watching all exits, as my shift partner, myself and a female officer announced ourselves and made entry into the residence.
We cleared all of the first floor and proceeded to the second and as soon as we got to the top of the stairs a slight movement spooked us and me and my partner immediately raised our weapons into a room where there was only a noose. Both he and I thought we saw a body on it at first glance, there was nothing there. We cleared the rest of the second floor and took a closer look at the noose, some dried up blood and what i think was peeled off skin on it from an earlier suicide that occurred over a dozen years ago, we thought it might've been recent, but we didn't know at the time.
Anyways, immediately after we cleared the house we determined that it was way too dead, for lack of a better word, to have been used recently however we called in some detectives. But before we all stepped out, we all agreed we didn't see what just happened. Reason why is my Service has a policy on what could be constituted as "paranormal instances", where the second something like that happens you are immediately suspended from duty, and give in your badge, your gun, your duty belt and your vest. Before being taken on the spot to a psychiatrist/psychologist, for a full comprehensive evaluation. Needless to say I immediately called my supervisor at the end of shift and told him about it and did the right thing by going in for evaluation. Something to be said about integrity.
I've driven past that house multiple times in the past weeks and I've always sunk deeper into my seat as I've driven past. Something about it, it's like you could actually feel there was something off about it. City seems to agree with me, as of 3 days ago the house is the #1 demolition priority in my sector and will be down by the end of the month. I'm just not happy that I'm going to have to go back inside next week to collect anything that might be of interest to both the city and my superiors. Luckily I won't be going in alone.
Also, the female who called in the 911 call was charged for Public Mischief under the pretext of misuse of 911 and misleading Peace Officers.
"It's probably drug related..."
Not really scary, but possibly paranormal, and a case I was never able to solve.
Three years ago, I was called in to an investigation of a burglary in a cemetery. When the forensics guys and I finally went out there (it was a slow morning), none of the responding deputies had actually gone inside yet. Four deputies and a sergeant were busy "securing the scene" from the outside, because it was still dark out and they didn't want to go into the dark mausoleum that had been broken into. Apparently they felt much safer with us overweight non-sworn employees around, so we went inside together.
The exterior door to the mausoleum had been forced open, and we started looking around for signs of anything stolen or vandalized. Eventually we did find that one of the grave sites in the mausoleum, almost 15 feet off the ground, had the cement plaque shattered and the coffin was pulled out and left sprawling on the floor. All contents of the coffin were missing, which including the cremated remains of three people, the last one who died in 2004. A person would have had to bring their own ladder to pull this out, or been at least 12-13 feet tall.
According to the forensics guy, it looked like the plaque for the coffin had been shattered from the inside, due to water damage. Still, it seems oddly coincidental that a plaque would simultaneously break on the night of a break-in to the mausoleum. It hadn't been accessed since 2004, so almost twelve years prior. The people in the grave site had a single living relative. I called them, exchanged pleasantries, and then when I asked about the mausoleum they said "No habla English" and hung up.
It's probably drug related, somehow, but this is the exactly the kind of thing that would happen at the start of a vampire or zombie apocalypse movie.
"When you step inside..."
There is this abandoned day care that we have to patrol...VERY spooky. Temperature is different in each room. Sounds can be heard. Toys found in the roof panels...sometimes those toys are seen moved from the roof to the floor in the rooms. Some rooms have more pressure than others like being at the bottom of a swimming pool. When you step inside all you want to do is leave..some said a child died at that daycare...
"I have no rational explanation..."
I am a police officer working on an emergency response team on a busy London borough. We took a call to a suspected domestic incident in a block of flats. The informant said that she could hear screaming and sounds of disturbance coming from the flat above her own.
Once we arrived my colleague and I knocked on the door of the flat the informant said the noise was coming from. I had heard nothing on my way up and certainly couldn't hear any disturbance coming from the address. To be honest I heard nothing at all. After knocking twice we had no response. My colleague left me to go downstairs and speak directly to the informant.
I stayed by the door. I knocked again and after some time it was answered by an elderly woman. She had clearly been asleep and was alarmed to see me standing outside. I told her that someone had called saying that they could hear a disturbance coming from within her address. I asked her if there was anyone else inside with her. She looked bemused and told me that she lived alone and had been sleeping. I asked her if I could come in to satisfy myself that no one else was there.
She invited me in and I walked into what was a small 2 bedroom flat. The flat was in darkness apart from her hall light and her bedside lamp. I began searching through the flat. As I approached the final door (the living room) my colleague called me up on the radio. He told me that he was on his way and asked if I was okay. I told him everything was fine wondering why he sounded so flustered. He told me that he was with the informant and could also hear screaming and loud thuds coming from the flat I was in.
I told him that he must be mistaken as I was almost done searching the flat and that I had heard nothing whatsoever. I have to admit a feeling of unease as I opened the final door. Like all the other rooms it was in darkness but was freezing cold. My breath misted immediately. There was no one in the room and no signs of disturbance. No window was open. I called my colleague and asked him to listen out for my footfall. He said he could hear my feet as I stamped them but said that the screaming had stopped. This coincided with me opening the door. I left shortly after apologising to the elderly woman for waking her.
I have no rational explanation for this at all. My colleague and I left feeling very creeped out.
*The following article contains discussion of suicide/self-harm.
There are those who say that going through a hard or unpleasant experience is what makes you stronger, and able to live your life more happily.
But there are very few people who don't have one memory of an experience that they wish they could forget... or even wish never happened in the first place.
Redditor Lord_Lazignac was curious to learn of experiences people had which continue to traumatize them to this day, leading them to ask:
"What event in your life still f*cks with you to this day?"
Parents who still from their children.
"There was a girl next door to my grandparent’s house that I had the biggest crush on."
"Her name was Becca."
"We had known each other from the time I was really little."
"We were both coming into the ages of liking the opposite sex at the same time and we had similar troubled childhoods (Becca lived with her grandparents, too)."
"Somewhere after holding hands, but before a first kiss, Becca gave me a ring."
She ‘borrowed’ it from her grandpa and needed it back the next day."
"I was on cloud 9."
"With excitement I showed my mom the ring."
"She asked my grandparents to borrow their truck and told me to get in and make sure I brought the ring."
"I had no idea what was going on."
"We pulled up to the 'jewelry store' at Eureka and Telegraph and she asked to see the ring."
"She went inside,'no kids were allowed', and came out about 20 minutes later."
"Then, we went to Mcdonald’s."
"The first time I’d eaten anything but food pantry food in at least a year."
"She said the 'jewelry store' needed to borrow that specific ring for a few weeks to clean it up."
"I asked what I was supposed to tell Becca had happened to it, and she said to tell her that I had lost it."
"I never saw the ring again, and Becca never talked to me again."- Davidsilak
A heartbreaking moment of false hope.
"My father was in hospice dying from cancer."
"He had stopped eating and was barely communicative."
"We knew it was just a matter of days."
"Mom and I went to visit him every day for a few hours so he wouldn’t be alone."
"One morning we get a call."
"Fearing the worst I answered it- expecting them to let us know he had passed."
"My father was on the phone and he sounded well."
"He even said he was hungry and asked for breakfast!"
"He told me he was looking forward to our visit!"
"I was stunned."
"Had all these emotions and thoughts- maybe it was a miracle and he was going to beat this!"
"Hopped in the car and started driving over."
"Got another phone call, this time it was the hospice folks."
"He had just passed."
"The rollercoaster of emotions from that morning haunt me."
"I was numb for a long time."
"There was a period where I thought maybe I hallucinated and never spoke with my dad that morning."
"To put my mind at ease I met with the hospice nurse who was with my dad that morning."
"She explained this concept called terminal lucidity."
"She says it’s not uncommon at all and is usually a sign that someone will pass soon."
"That helped, but it still haunts me."- bondsman333
Losing a loved one to suicide.
"I lost a friend to suicide in autumn 2017."
"He was the first person I loved and he was also the first, and only, person to properly break my heart, which happened some years before he died."
"His mental health was always chaotic and in the months before his death l’d distanced myself because I was finding it overwhelming."
"Something I regret now but also understand I needed to do."
"I never wanted to not be his friend, I always saw a future with us in a place were we’d be old friends who could joke about him breaking my heart when I was 20."
"Our friendship never recovered to what it was without the messy love thing, but it was getting there."
"Since his death I have realized how much he influenced me to be the person I am today."
"I really miss him."
"I understand and accept his death."
"However even now this life without him feels off balance, like something went wrong with the universe."
"I had so much faith in him getting better."- CryptographerWeak873
"My brother committed suicide when I was about 12 years old."
"A few weeks after his passing, I was half asleep on the couch and heard my family talk about how he actually had cancer but took his own life as to not be a burden on the family."
"The problem is, I was only 12 and half awake when I overheard all of this, so I'm not sure whether it's even true or something my brain made up in it's semi-conscious state."
"To this day, I don't have the balls to confront my family on the topic."- dirtycommie123
Not getting there in time.
"Was a normal Friday."
"I had taken an early day to help my father with haylage."
"Earlier that morning my father brought my mother to the hospital because she was dry heaving a lot."
"When I got home the home phone rang and I picked up."
"They said it was the hospital and that they were going to transfer her to a bigger hospital because she had just had a heart attack."
"So I tell my father and he goes to the bigger hospital to fill out forms and stuff."
"3hrs later I get a call saying that they are going to airlift her to the city with the best cardiac doctors."
"So I start to pack bags for everyone."
"Then my father calls me one more time to tell me to go get my brother from his pre-prom party because moms not going to make it."
"So I'm driving like a bat outta hell trying to find my brother's party."
"Then speed all the way to the hospital praying that the cops have a huge drug bust or something."
"I get to the hospital with my brother and we see our father outside the room crying."
"My father is an emotional man when it comes to death."
"I have never seen him cry so much."
"I look to my right and there's 7 people in my mother's room."
"Doctors nurses the helicopter crew that was going to transfer her."
"It was about 45 minutes it felt like and they said there was nothing else they could do."
"My mother died that day without a warning."- Puzzleheaded_Cap174
Never getting to repay generosity
"A friend in HS loaned me 200 dollars right before we graduated."
"We lost contact and I still often wake up in the middle of the night wishing I could have the opportunity to pay him back."
"I'm 50 this year."- Genbu7
Lack of consequences
"My mom was hit and killed by a driver on her morning walk."
"My dad stood right next to her and was almost hit himself."
"It happened in a public park in an unmarked crosswalk."
"The guy never got out of his truck to help as my mom bled out."
"My dad watched the whole thing."
"They were married for 45 yrs."
"I can’t ever get the call from my dad out of my head."
"He called me while on the scene to tell me mom was dead."
"The guy that hit her never received even a ticket."
"He got off Scott free because the DA ruled it an accident."
"Even witnesses at the scene said he failed to yield."
"My mom was killed within two steps of the curb."
"Literally one second later she’d have been ok."
"The dude hit her in the shoulder."
"Even the police stated this."
"He broke laws and faced no consequences."
"My dad is a shell of himself."- thecazbah
Car accidents
"When I was 16 I was on my way to take my SAT on a Saturday morning."
"I pulled up to a 4-way stop on a quiet street and looked both directions."
"Glanced to my right and saw a car way down the road, didn’t look for more than a second and thought I was good, since he had to stop at his stop sign."
"I enter the intersection and look to my right again and the car is already at the intersection."
"He was going 55mph on a 25mph road."
"He was not stopping."
"Time slowed down as I realized 'oh he’s about to t-bone the side of my tiny pickup truck."
"So I look away from the window to keep my face safe from any potential flying shards of glass, I white-knuckle grip the wheel and just hope for the best."
"He flipped my truck, I rolled onto my side and nail a telephone pole with the top of my truck."
"As I’m laying there on my side I’m feeling all over my body just expecting to be badly hurt and just in shock but amazingly, my worst injury is a scraped elbow."
"This was nearly 10 years ago and even today I drive like a grandma when it comes to intersections."
"I’ll wait an extra few seconds every time if I feel like a car is approaching too quickly."
"There have been times where a car is coming up quick and my heart rate will skyrocket because I think I’m about to get hit again."
"I have never trusted another driver ever since that day and being that defensive has never steered me wrong."
"On the bright side, the guy who hit me immediately called the police, then shoved his shirt through a crack in my door so I could cover myself while the cop broke the window and pulled me out."
"He broke several bones, admitted fault to the police the second they got there and personally apologized to my hysterical mother any myself multiple times."
"As sh*tty as I was that he hit me, at least he wasn’t a sh*tty person."
"I still took my SAT too, my hand was shaking from adrenaline the entire time."- HallucinatesOtters
Choosing to pull the plug
"Having to make the decision to take my mother off of a ventilator."
"Making the decision to end her life."
"I tell myself that it was the right thing to do."
"I have no doubt her quality of life would have been nonexistent."
"However, no amount of rationalizing can make me feel okay as a daughter."- dontonefingerme
Some horrible experiences are just a right of passage.
While others are experiences no one should ever have to go through.
Both are extremely difficult to recover from.
If you or someone you know is struggling, you can contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255).
To find help outside the United States, the International Association for Suicide Prevention has resources available at https://www.iasp.info/resources/Crisis_Centres/
Dear parents born in the 80s/90s :
Your child is probably (we never really know for sure) not a weed dealer.
Probably.
So if you hear them talking about "mids" - they're not talking about average grade or potency cannabis. They are, in fact, probably talking about your lame old self and/or something you own or tried to give them.
Reddit user Kengriffinspimp asked:
"What slang word did you hear that let you know you are no longer young?"
Now, the reason I can give you this lesson is that my 15-year-old looked me dead in the face and told me I needed to stop buying mids because it was bumming her out.
So I'm all:
"First of all, how did you get into my lockbox? Secondly, my cannabis is medical grade, prescription, and grown on a small batch boutique farm and probably blessed by the rains down in Africa or whatever, thank you very much. And third of all, when did you become a budtender???"
... You know those moments where you're blankly staring and the other person is blankly staring and then you suddenly realize you two are absolutely not talking about the same thing?
Yeah.
Turns out my teenager was bummed that we had purchased some non-Eggo waffles and, while they were chocolate chip so not TOTALLY unacceptable, the quality was "meh" and she wanted her high-grade waffles back.
Waffles. Not Weed. Just waffles.
"Mid" is just what the young people now call anything of mediocre/average quality now.
Turns out I'm old, and also that my children are bougie and need name-brand waffles.
Oof
" 'Oof.' All the Roblox players thought they invented it."
- theoptionexplicit
"Oh. My. God. My partner and I can't work out why her 11 year old niece says oof all the time. But she is a Roblox player - we know that. Is that where it's from?!?"
- J321J
"This whole time I thought 'oof' as a Reddit thing."
- 8B3B383B
Is There A Fire?
"Lit has changed meaning from when I was young. Couldn't understand the context when I started hearing it again."
- pmpmd
"Is something on fire??"
- merelycheerful
"Lit af bro"
- SleepyBear3366911
"We used to use it a lot in Counter Strike to indicate the amount of damage someone took."
"An example would be , 'he’s lit 90'."
- SmokeSatan_HailMeth
"Bonfire lit?"
-Navasxdxd
Negative Visor
"For me it was 'no cap'."
- Kengriffinspimp
"you bussin'."
"...actually I have no idea wtf that means either..."
- future_sport_pilot
"Was going to say this exact thing. What does it mean?"
- letsmoseyagain
"Even knowing what it means immediately based on the context, the phrase just irrationally irritates me."
"Idk what it is. I just have a small urge to smack whoever says it."
- User Deleted
"I went to ask a coworker if he had left some product in my designated loading area (forklift certified). "
"He told me 'that's cap'. I had to look over to a buddy and asked if that meant it was true or not true. I'm only 28 and this happened last year to me..."
- galax667
Pogs Are Back?
"When my son is impressed by something, he says it is 'poggers' which I guess means "pinnacle of gaming' according to him."
"This is true and gets used even if the impressive thing has nothing at all to do with video games."
- HawaiianShirtsOR
"It's not actually an acronym (people always think it's 'play of the game' as well)."
"There was this twitch streamer who was actually playing pogs - like that chip game thing from the 90s? He got excited and made a goofy face, which got turned into a meme/twitch emote. So like, a zoomer meme that is built off a millennial game? I dunno."
"But yeah you basically got the actual meaning down."
- awfulrunner43434
"Omg I thought poggers was a joke? They actually say it? Lol well here’s my answer!"
- TreClaire
"It's like proclaiming "f*ck yes", being very impressed, whatever they saw is awesome."
- Kirkonvaki
Who Has A Mop?
" 'Drip.' "
"My kids explained it is akin to the 'bling ' or 'swag' of my youth."
- solipsisticfantasy
"Drip is swag"
- yesbutlikeno
"I first encountered 'Drip' watching WWE wrestling a year or two ago."
"One of the characters was calling himself the 'Drip King' and the announcers kept going on about it, and I was wondering if they were talking about his long, wet hair or if I was now too old. "
"It was the latter, of course. Not a surprise, though - I've been a regular Internet user for 25 years and have been made to feel old on pretty much a weekly basis for 15-20 of them."
- Chris_Buttcrouch
When Did Public Transport Get Cool?
"Listening to my 10 year old son talk: 'Mom, this food is BUSSIN GOD ON GOD'."
".. What?"
- Halloween_Barbie
"Did you learn what the hell bussin means?"
- Kaiser93
"Watched Joshua Weisman on YouTube for a bit, he uses this term now. First time I heard it was a year ago from an ex inmate cooking prison food on Facebook."
- coolcrushkilla
"I work in the industry."
"Bussin' is something you do to tables."
- jayemadd
"I'm broke. Bussin' is something you do when you don't have a car."
"Why is it popular? When did public transportation get cool?"
- [Reddit]
Yeet Stays
" 'Yeet' - meaning to throw something hard/far."
"I like the word, but I still feel weird whenever I use it. My 6 year old plays lacrosse and I instantly regretted when I yelled 'Yeet it'" at a game ... cringe moment for me, honestly."
- MiaMae
"My five year old has never known a world without "yeet." When talking to old people he uses the formal word throw.
- DarrenEdwards
"I'm team 'yeet' for sure!! In my mid 30s and as a coach I love it. I'm young enough to impress with my skills (experience) yet old enough to make them cringe when I say it. It's a dad's perfect storm."
- BigTurnin
"As a 30-year-old, yeet is the perfect word I didn't know I needed until I found it. There wasn't anything nearly as snappy to shout that meant "I'm throwing something" before. We had "think fast" back in my day, but yeet is so much better."
- kore_nametooshort
"I'm 43, but I'm all in on yeet. It's a great word. Past tense is yote."
- Crunchycarrots79
"Of all these, I kind of like yeet. It’s almost onomatopoeia. When something gets thrown unexpectedly or absurdly far, describing it as “getting yeeted” cracks me up."
- DMala
Context Clues
"Fam. I understood what it meant by context, but that's when I realized I'm no longer part of the youngsters."
"Went directly to the mall and bought me a tweed jacket."
- ImInJeopardy
"Did you tell the shopkeeper that tweed apparel was sick?"
- Strain128
"I feel like this word will get integrated into the middle class lexicon in about a decade, my Dad is as white as they come but now says 'Where you at?'."
- LochBodminMothFoot
It's A Fight?
" 'Slaps'. Took me so long to figure out if it meant good or bad so I had to look on urban dictionary"
- ClassyJacket
"Back in my day, and in my country/city, 'slaps' used to mean someone was about to get a beating"
- dnc_1981
"This is so far down. First time I really truly felt my age, also the urge to become the one who slaps."
- TarryBuckwell
Meh
"Mid"
"I still don't get what it means"
- Luna_17134
"Yah saw that somewhere recently in that Pam meme and inspired this post haha"
- Kengriffinspimp
"To say something is mid, is just like saying it's mediocre."
- yoiliketopramen
"It's an insult, it's saying its medium, middle, or medicore, but mainly used to describe things/people that people dislike. I think it got popular after everyone hated jellybean"
- AIex-Shaw
Welp, now that I'm nearly 40, it's very probable that I will never again understand the majority of what gets talked about when this question comes up.
I need to go sit with that and feel my e-mortality now.
The body is an amazing thing.
There isn't enough time to learn everything there is to know about it.
And of course there is some knowledge most of us can do without ever knowing.
That is why I dropped out of anatomy... no thank you.
Redditorsammbhav01 wanted to discuss a little anatomy while they had our attention. They asked:
"What is a nsfw fact about humans?"
I hate body facts. I'm sheepish.
How about Dinner First?
"Doctors will press on the penis glans while having one finger in the anus, if by pressing the gland the sphincter of the anus try to close, it means the reflex is still alive, it is sometimes used to check if theres any damage to the spinal cord after an accident."
HallowedBuddy
Bad to Worse
"The most f**ked up human fact I know is: generally, during a kidney transplant, the old kidneys are not removed from the body, they are left inside after the transplant. There is actually a gentleman in the Netherlands who holds the world record for number of kidneys inside his body, which is currently 7."
MugiwaraLee
"I’ll make it worse. The native kidneys shrivel up like raisins. So they’re just little beans hanging around uselessly once the transplant has been there awhile. They have such a complicated vascular system, it’s easier to leave them in — and it helps that they won’t take up too much room for long."
miimo0
Quite a Load
"The average human poops close to 400lbs per year."
Outrageous_Ad_9310
"My guess is it’s calculated by looking at throughput volume in sewage systems and dividing by the number of people in the service area using census data."
"Could also be a very long series of laborious collections from individuals, but I personally wouldn’t want to participate in that work (as the pooper OR the scientist). Now what would be really interesting if we did have individual-level data would be to examine the median, mode, range, error, etc. to determine if the average is 'normal' or skewed by a small percentage of insanely high-volume poopers."
Gumbyizzle
Sexy Time For All
"Some people achieve orgasm getting their nipples pierced."
actuallizard42
Going Down
"Human vaginal secretions contain hyaluronic acid and squalene, which are both used in skincare for hydration and elasticity. Squalene is also produced in high amounts in shark liver, so vaginas and sharks have that in common."
ConnoisseurOfDanger
Clots
"If you continue to have an erection for several hours, blood will start to clot and harden, which decreases oxygenated blood flow to the tissue and can cause ischemia in the penile tissue. If one has an erection for longer than 24 hrs, the chances of having Erectile Dysfunction afterwards are exponentially higher statistically, from my understanding."
Denslow82
Finding Room...
"Toddler's adult teeth are stored right under their eyes at some point."
DramaticChoice4
"Can confirm. During my studies the first time we were shown a child x-ray and asked for diagnosis, everybody was freaking out that there is something seriously wrong (we didn't know it was a child). Turns out we were completely bamboozled and it was a healthy child. That day I learned where and when adult teeth develop during childhood."
TheEsiu
Unsafe/Unclean
"There are traces of human fecal matter pretty much everywhere."
M-Test24
"Mythbusters did a test where they were trying to see if putting your toothbrush in the cupboard would keep it cleaner. They had controls in other rooms that they expected to stay 100% poop free, but every single one tested positive for poop. There is no escape, there is nowhere safe."
safety_thrust
Let it Burn
"The stomach acid in humans is so strong it could eat through most metals. However we're protected because of the mucus lining our gut."
Pfroggy1
The body is crazy. What a design.
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Living life without fear is an admirable belief within reason.
After all, fear can block us from opportunity, and abandoning the thing that terrifies us most can be liberating.
That being said, we shouldn't be reckless.
It's important to note there are a few things in life we should be cognizant of–for they can seriously contribute to our demise if we choose to be blissfully ignorant.
Curious to hear examples of the things we should be cautious of, Redditor Specktakles88 asked:
"What do most people not realize can seriously f*ck you up?"

Out in nature, we should never be too arrogant about our greatness as a species.
The Air Up There
"Hiking at altitude you're not used to."
– walkswithdogs
Solo Climb
"I tried to climb a 5000m peak totally alone, without telling anyone but this nomad dude what my plans were. Got to 4800m or so and started to feel like I was going blind, followed by HAPE symptoms. I've climbed mountains my whole life, so I knew to get the hell outta there, but wow was it a stupid idea. I'm lucky to have made it out unscathed to eat some totally bangin' nomad momos."
– stillcantfrontlever
Don't Underestimate Cuteness
"Kangaroos. On my tour of the blue mountains in New South Wales, the guide got on the microphone and announced to the group 'if you see a roo, stay away. They are dumb and will f**K you up.'”
"Apparently they have a claw on their hind leg similar to a raptor that can slice your abdomen so deep that your guys fall right out."
– shallow_kunt
When On Their Turf
"The wild animals in national parks. Those aren't tame, they will hurt or kill you. They don't exist as a photo prop."
– mrfat187
You may want to avoid these in you know what's good for you. Like, your well-being.
Artificial Yum
"sugar free gummy bears."
– LandoBlendo
– IcyBeary
Heed The Drowsiness Warning
"Benadryl overdose."
– charlie-ratkiller
"I was once a stupid kid who wanted to get high at any cost, so I took a dozen Benadryl pills at once. The only research I did was reading others experiences and checking the LD50 was higher than my dose."
"I have never had such vivid, believable audible hallucinations. I had a full conversation with a friend who walked in, only to realize I was talking to myself. I closed my eyes and multiple streams of different people talking flooded my mind. I don't remember what they were saying, but I remember being able to tune in and out of the different conversations and thinking they were so real. It almost sounded like my own radio station in my head."
"It was incredibly stupid and I'm lucky nothing bad immediately happened."
"Edit: LD50 was higher than my dose, not lower!"
– quetejodas
Toxic Particles
"Cement dust. If you're ever around a construction site and notice cement dust in the air, mask up or move the f'k on."
"Silicosis. Bad news."
– freestyle43
We typically take our physical health for granted.
Don't do that.
Dental Dangers
"Ignoring teeth problems. I had a filling that fell out and I ignored it, worst pain ever. Cost me a lot too."
– klisto1
Prevent A Fatal Progression
"An infection in your gums can easily migrate to your heart."
– Emily_Postal
Can Be Mind-Blowing
"I think tooth abscesses (or something like that) can even extend into the brain and just f'king explode it."
"Sh*t's terrifying."
– vizthex
Assault On Our Ears
"Listening to loud music or being exposed to loud sounds daily. Can cause permanent tinnitus or hearing loss issues down the road."
– ThunderAlex_89
F Cancer
"Hear me out, but cancer treatment."
"You all know about the basics like vomiting and hair loss, but it's so much more than that. The whole point of chemo is that you're betting that your cells can last longer in a toxic environment than the cancer cells, so oyu poison your body. I have permanent nerve damage in my toes from where the chemo f'ked up my nerve endings. I had a fissure up my ass about 10 inches, so sh**ting was a 9/10 pain experience. Only pain that was worse was when the mucositis got so bad I couldn't tolerate drinking water. Imagine being in such pain that you can't drink water even after chugging 20mg of hydrocodone, with the glass right in front of you. I got hospitalized twice for dehydration that way."
"I'm cancer free now, and I hope I never have to go through that again. F'k cancer."
– Stryker2279
Many of the examples listed above are easily taken for granted.
We shouldn't cower in the shadows, however, and be fearful of life's many mysteries.
But if you continue to be inquisitive and keep learning–at any age–newly acquired knowledge can potentially save your life.
And for goodness sake, visit the dentist office from time to time, and ease off on those sugar-free gummy bears.