I have never been a fan of haunted houses. I even skip the Haunted Mansion ride at Disney World. I think it's because there was a "haunted" townhouse that was on the block I lived on in childhood.
It languished there for years.
Sometimes local crazies and addicts would break in and set up shop. And then there would be an onslaught of insanity.
Of course during summer nights playing we kids would always dare one another to go in. I never could.
So I got labeled a coward. But hey, better a coward than a corpse.
Redditor whales-are-cute wanted to gather up tales about the times some houses got us spooked by asking:
"Redditors who lived in old/haunted houses, what's your mysterious story?"
I do believe spirits roam the halls of buildings. And that is just freaky.
That's why I like to research places before I move in. There is this fabulous luxury building on the Upper West side of Manhattan. People would kill to live there.
But that's because they don't know people were killed trying to leave there. It was an insane asylum shutdown by the city.
So I'll skip it thanks.
"I need sleep"
I was staying in an apt over an old theatre in a mining town. Apt was easily 60' above the street.
Halloween Lights GIFGiphyWoman, blue hued, in long dress... just appears in my peripheral vision. I turn to look... And she does the same. We meet eyes while she pauses there watching me. She then walks across the room and out the front wall of the apt over the street. I look out the window and nothing.
I'm like "I need sleep."
I mention this to owner and he explains there was a balcony there but it was lost in a fire decades ago where a woman died trying to escape said fire. Now it's a solid wall where a doorway was. He just added "long blue dress?"
Like bro... things you could have mentioned in the housing ad!
"You are in my realm"
We live in a 150 year old farmhouse. The first week we lived here, my iPhone was sitting 5 or 6 feet away from me, hadn't been touched in a while (like 20 minutes or more) and Siri just said "You are in my realm." There was no history of the phone saying this, or of any activity.
A few months later, my cat woke my up, waited at the foot of my bed and kept meowing until I got out of the bed.
She went to the top of the stairs, and waited until I followed. Followed her downstairs and she just sat in the middle of the room. I checked a few things to make sure something hadn't caught fire or whatever, while she just sat in the middle of the room looking up the staircase.
The house was SO quiet it was eerie and disturbing, usually something makes a noise in this place. I turned around to go upstairs, and thought I stood in something wet and bent over to check, but it was just a weird spot that was so cold, I thought my socks were wet. When I stood up, I felt a hand on my right shoulder. Nobody was there.
Doors occasionally open, and TV remotes constantly go missing. We've lost I think 5 now, and have never found one. Every single piece of furniture has been removed from the TV room during renovations, so it's not like something ended up in a void under the couch.
Two years ago, I was at a flea market and bumped into a former co-worker I hadn't seen in quite a while (who ended up living just around the corner). She pointed at a couple and said to go introduce myself, as they lived in our house in the 80s. I introduced myself, said I live in their old house and they immediately asked how the ghost was doing! Apparently it had a thing for TV remotes back then as well.
Former Flat Earthers Explain What Finally Made Them Come Around | George Takei’s Oh Myyy
Science is science. Fact is fact. Truth is truth and simple is simple. These are things we must now attest to in 2021. Can we please all get onboard with wha...Be Not Afraid
My Dad was killed before I was born. When I was still in elementary school, I would feel someone tightening the cover on my bed at night. I would look around the room and didn't see anyone. When I told my Mom, she told me it was my Dad tucking me in. She said that he wanted me to be a girl.
Also sometimes I would be out flying in the sky like the birds on his back. He would bring me back home when it would get dark. Then I would wake up and look around the room, and go back to sleep. It didn't scare me.
Just Run!
I moved into a house built in the 1890s several years ago. A few weeks after moving in, before meeting any neighbors, I heard heavy footsteps coming down the attic steps outside my bedroom. I then heard footsteps on the staircase for the first/second floor, and someone say my name.
My husband was 30 miles away, nobody in town knew me or had access to my house, and there was nobody outside at the time. I grabbed my baby, phone and keys, and ran outside to wait. We searched the house top to bottom and never found anything, but I've heard the footsteps multiple times. We have no upstairs plumbing or hvac, so it remains unsolved.
I've also heard music playing downstairs, talking to previous owners this was common. It's just commonplace now, and we don't always have stuff going on. A lot of major remodeling has been done, so I guess maybe that's why it's happening. Honestly the repairs are scarier than anything else.
He left a bunch of furniture including a rocking chair with a matching rocking leg rest.
So one night I came downstairs for a late-night snack had to been after midnight and I was the only one down there, and there is this rocking chair and leg rest just rocking away all by themselves in sync.
See now I think some of y'all need some good sage. Or some nice mantras and perhaps an exorcist. Or a shaman. Try a few different things. See what works. Because that is all a lot of nonsense right there.
He's Here
We would hear foot steps downstairs or upstairs when no one was there.
Some guy died in the house.
Nothing else weird though.
ghost hunters gh GIF by SYFYGiphyI Hear Her
I lived in an old house with my dad after he was divorced. Money was tight, and he lectured me many times to not leave any electronics on so the electric bill wouldn't be outrageous.
In the mornings, I would stand in the living room looking out the window, waiting for my ride for school to drive by.
Only one home, house totally silent. Suddenly start hearing a woman talking, but very muffled. I would compare it to the sound of someone talking on a phone way on the other side of the house.
I thought the TV was on. Bent down and hit the power button only for the TV to turn on. Wtf? I look at the phone, thinking maybe it was on. Nope. Checked radios, etc. Nothing is on.
Walk back into the living room and listen closely. Sounds like a woman having a conversation with someone.
They're talking about sewing needles and materials. Sounds like it's coming from the other side of the room, so I walk closer to hear better. The voices now sound like they're on the other side of the room I just came from.
That was when my hair stood on end. That moment you realize something isn't normal. Quickly ran outside and waited for my school ride lol.
Got home and told my dad about it. He told me he also heard a woman's voice one morning while working out, but it sounded distant and conversational. He didn't want to tell me because he didn't want me to be scared by myself in the house.
I still think about it today and it was a very baffling experience.
Back in the Day
My sister and I were just reminiscing the other day about this house we grew up in. We lived in a townhouse in a complex of low income rental homes for most of our childhoods. Very bad vibes in general, none of the three of us kids were ever alone in any part of the house at any time because we were dead terrified to be.
I peed the couch once because my mother refused to accompany me upstairs to the washroom, and I was too scared to go alone. The house was built more upwards that outwards so it was a long tall steep staircase and long hallways. The bathroom was at the end of the hallway, and you had to cross the hall at the top of the stairs to turn on the hall light.
We've collectively experienced a few events ranging from bad feelings, recurring nightmares, strange occurrences, to apparitions. Strange events include my sister sleepwalking to the top of the stairs and screaming at the top of her lungs that I was going to die. She never did sleepwalk again and to her chagrin, I am alive and well.
Apparitions include the man sitting at the dining room table the morning of my birthday, and the child in the stairwell window that had no landing to stand on beneath it.
That was the only time we saw our parents acknowledge we had a problem, because we were looking at it from outside the house. We were the driveway, all 5 of us and our dog in the car after a camping trip. We stayed with family friends that night.
The Black Mass
There were poltergeists in the apartment where I was living. We were three flatmates, one guy that did not believe in anything paranormal, and me and my best friend. I started hearing noises at night, our two bedrooms were side by side and there was something knocking from her side, like something made of glass. We investigated, turned out it was the bottles she kept in her room shaking by themselves at night.
Got worse later. Some of her clothes were teleporting to my room when we were outside together. One day I was spending a week alone there, I heard my keys shaking on the door when I was trying to sleep. The morning after, I found the strap (5 centimeters long?) of my keys completely and tightly wrapped around the ring that was holding my keys together.
Same day, there was a black mass in the corridor and the curtain of the bathtub was moving by itself, I still remember the sound it was making on the metal pipe. Nearly got an anxiety attack, I called my best friend and she came back early from her holidays to stay with me. My dad called a medium and a lady to make a spiritual cleanse.
Not the Basement
I actually lived in a house that was haunted, but I don't know if it was a "bad" haunted.
Tobe Hooper Poltergeist GIFGiphyMy mother told me when I was kid, she was getting me ready to go out and I was looking at something and talking. I said it was my great mother, mentioning her name. She was deceased before I was born so I never met her or knew she existed at that point in my life... (it was her old house).
Light bulbs used to pop and shatter every once in a while. The sinks and bath tubs would start running (with the knobs turned) every once in a while. The house is still in my family but nothing weird has happened in years.
I frequently have dreams about that house though, and it's always me being scared of the basement!
Moooo!!!
100 year old farmhouse.
I used to hear an odd bell like noise once in a while.
We lived in an old house around that age about 16 years ago. Lots of weird stuff happened in that house. Your comment reminded me about our really old mechanical doorbell that would randomly ring without anyone around it.
MJ?
Martha Jane (the woman who built the house in the 1800s) would creep up the steps every night to check on her 6 kids. I would yell at my mom and she would say... "Its just the ghost..." like this was completely normal.
ghost library GIFGiphyLight a Candle
An apartment I lived in years ago, was the scene of a triple homicide (drug thing). It had been about a year from the time of the murders and when I moved in. The place was professionally cleaned and building owner gave me a great deal due to what had happened. GF at the time, who I never mentioned the circumstances to me getting a great place always said she was cold, especially at night.
It could be dead of summer and if she slept over, she would be under a blanket while I was on top of the covers sweating like a dog. She bought a candle from a Botanica and lit it because she said something bad must have happened there. I never told her about the killing.
Those Screams!
When I was about 4 yrs/old? My parents lived in an farm house. My two older brothers shared a bedroom upstairs. I slept in my parents room (I believe) which was downstairs. Both of my parents, and both of my brothers, claim that the story is true.
On various nights, in the dead of night, the window in my brother's room would suddenly fly open. The room to their door would open and shut. Then there would be footfalls on the landing (think open walkway that looks down onto the living area) towards the stairs. The footfalls would then go down the stairs.
When my parents heard my brothers scream, then the footfalls on the landing, they would rush towards the stairs just to see... nothing. The footfalls always ended at the bottom of the stairs.
We didn't live there long and finally moved into another house.
Woof!
I don't live in an old house, I live in an apartment building that is 11 years old. There's a ghost in my apartment.
White Dog GIFGiphyDon't experience it very often but on occasion it will turn on my iPod. Occasionally there will be scratching coming from the craft room door. And every now and then you will hear a growl. Once saw what seemed to be a small white dog dash behind my sofa; I checked and both of my doggos were sleeping on a chair on the other side of the room.
Same time, Same Place...
My house and my house before this, both were very old, my best friend's great grandpa lived in my current one. I'll just say what happens here. Everyday, at 2:30PM to 3:00PM, I'll hear banging underneath my floorboards as if someone is under the house and trying to get help/trying to get me underneath to kill or kidnap me. I constantly feel watched through my windows as if my neighbor is looking at me while I'm dancing or getting dressed or anything.
My dogs will be walking out of my room and just randomly look down the hall as if someone is walking there, but nobody would be in that vicinity/would be home with me. And just last night, I put my hand near the edge of my bed and something that wouldn't move if my hand moved had moved and touched the palm of my hand.
Not Funny
Currently live in "haunted" house, and we have had the usual happen: doors opening/closing by themselves, voices when no one is around, shadow people. The one thing that takes the cake though is the damn pizza! We were having dinner and watching television when a slice of pizza lifted up and flipped over toppings down and then flipped back over the other way! I'm still scratch my head at how or why this happened.This sounds like a bad joke but trust me it isn't.
What I See
A light in my house kept coming back on when I had turned off-couple who formerly had that room were dead.
Felt Someone brush past me in condo, former tenant had died.
Saw a man's face with long hair and old style clothes on my TV, realized the TV was off.
Had a problem with my son, saw him in front of me on a sofa smiling at me, that spooked me!
When my oldest brother died, I was not able to attend his funeral, he appeared, smiling in a blue shirt. He was buried in a blue shirt. Was very comforting to me. ❤️
I don't know why I see and dream things.
the old gal...
My grandparents house has a ghost of an old lady that literally sits in the corner of the guest room and knits. I've only seen her twice and both times only frightened me because I never expect to see her.
old lady ghost GIF by South Park GiphyThe Crying
I lived in my parent's guest house when I was younger one night my kids were crying in the other room and I got up to check on them and they were on a bunk bed when I went in their room 2 shadow figures were leaning over them and turned to me I screamed and ran towards them grabbed them with the shadow figures beside me and ran out I never screamed like that or felt fear like that before.
I will never understand how people actively seek out places like these to live in.
Some people get excited at the prospect of living in a haunted space.
No thank you. My sleep schedule is already bad enough.
Go spook someone else please.
Easter eggs are those brightly colored festive decorations and treats hidden for the Spring holiday.
Right?
Well, yes, but they aren't just that.
According to the dictionary, an Easter egg is also:
- in digital technology, an extra feature, as a message or video, hidden in a software program, video game, DVD, etc., and revealed as by an obscure sequence of keystrokes or commands
- in movies and television, a hidden message, as a cryptic reference, iconic image, or inside joke, that fans are intended to discover in a television show or movie
Redditor akumamatata8080 was referring to those alternate definitions when they asked:
"What was the best 'Easter Egg' you’ve found in any show, movie, video game, etc...?"
Ringu (The Ring)
"Within the DVD menu of 'The Ring' you can watch the cursed video footage."
"The best partwas that it disables the DVD controls, forcing you watch the footage."
"(But I guess you could yank the power or shut off the tv...)"
- Gelgoogilly
"Better/worse, if you do watch it then the DVD menu will also play the sound of a ringing phone right after you've finished watching it."
- res30stupid
GiphyBeetlejuice, Beetlejuice, ...
"Community. They mention Beetlejuice and on the third time he actually walks by in the background."
- Scofish91
"Might i add they say beettlejucie over several seasons. Then yes the third time he can be seen in the background"
- Nothingspecial2do
Batmobile
"In The Dark Knight, Bruce Wayne drives a Lamborghini Murcielago."
"Murcielago is the Spanish word for bat. He was driving a batmobile the whole time."
- Goatmanthealien
Duke Nukem
"I was young but the original Duke Nukem 3D had a secret where you found the guy from Doom impaled on a spike and Duke quips 'Damn, that’s one doomed space marine' - young me thought that was the most clever thing ever"
- PVGames
"All the YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE HERE messages in hidden areas were great, too."
- GatoradeNipples
Adventure Time
"I've had a lot of fun finding the little snail that waves to you from every episode of Adventure Time."
- Level238
Metal Gear Solid 3
"In Metal Gear Solid 3 you can kill a guard in a certain area with vultures, after which a vulture may start eating him - and then you can kill and eat the vulture yourself."
"After this there's a boss fight against The Sorrow who forces you to walk past all the people you've killed throughout the game, one of them being that guard who repeats over and over 'you ate me, ate me, ate me'"
- bawdeagle
"My favorite one is also in MGS3. If you get captured by The End you are put in a jail cell. If you save and quit the game there and then load it again, a completely different game called Guy Savage will load up. You play it for a few minutes and it eventually stops with Big Boss waking up from his nightmare."
"This happened to me the first time I played it and it confused the hell out of me. I thought I put the wrong disc in the PS2, and then thought 'Wait, no, I just loaded the game... What the hell is this??'"
- sumgine
So Much Monty Python
"Found Holy Hand Grenade from Monty Python and the Holy Grail in Fallout"
- snoodletuber
"In witcher 3 you come across the entrance to a cave littered with bones and body parts covered in blood."
"And a cute little White bunny outside."
- Kriss3d
"Wasn't also a holy hand grenade in Worms? I always thought it was a reference to Monty Python as well"
- cabezaneitor
"Yeah, sings "hallelujah" and then a big explosion. Spent so many hours blowing up my friends with that."
- copuncle
"In Fallout 2 I'm pretty sure there's an encounter with the bridgekeeper"
- Overlord3456
Borderlands
"I always found the Minecraft easter egg in Borderlands 2 pretty cool. They added Creepers as an enemy to fight and they all had a chance to drop special minecraft themed guns and cosmetics. IIRC there was a shotgun that shot the minecraft fire "block" in a 3x3 pattern and a sniper that just shot minecraft arrows."
- Blackstone611
Doctor Who
"Doctor Who: in episode "Face the Raven", there is text on a wall written in Aurebesh, the lettering system from the Star Wars universe. When translated into the Roman alphabet, the text spells "Delorean", the model of car famously used as the time machine in Back to the Future. These two worlds represent time and space, the fundamentals of Doctor Who."
- LR-II
Jungle Book
"In the live action version of 'The Jungle Book', Mowgli enters the hall of King Louie and is amazed at the heaps of trinkets the monkeys have been stealing from the man villages. He casually picks up the top item from a heap - a cowbell - looks it over, and puts it back."
"King Louie was voiced by Christopher Walken."
The funny part is that I didn't even notice until my 8 year old son, upon hearing the name of the voice actor, remarked, 'oh, the cowbell guy?'"
- I_Byte
Uncharted
"Hotel Guest: (on seeing Nate and Chloe coming out of the ocean) Whoa! What the hell happened to you two?"
"Nathan Drake: Fell out of a car that fell out of a plane."
"Hotel Guest: Huh. You know something like that happened to me once."
"The hotel guest was Nolan North. The voice of Nathan Drake in the Uncharted video game series."
- RJD1977
Friends
"It’s not exactly the most creative or anything, but I loved the episode of Friends after Courtney Cox and David Arquette got married when she was first credited as Courtney Cox Arquette the rest of the cast was credited as Arquettes as well.
- stephers85
Drillbit Taylor
"This is minor, but I remember it making me laugh when I saw it."
"In Drillbit Taylor, when they're interviewing potential bodyguards, Adam Baldwin (Firefly, Full Metal Jacket, and some others) makes an appearance and says that hiring a bodyguard to protect them from a bully was the stupidest thing he's ever heard of. He was in a 1980 movie (that I saw several times as a kid) called My Bodyguard, where he gets hired to protect a kid from a bully."
"I watched the movie in a room full of people born in 1980 and after and felt pretty old laughing at it."
- well_honk_my_hooters
Heretic
"Just remembered another one: in the game Heretic, which was an FPS put out by id software, it would punish you for trying to use the famous cheat codes from Doom. If you put in the God mode code it would kill you and if you put in the code to get all the weapons it would take all your weapons away. For both it would display a message on the screen taunting you for trying to cheat."
- bubersbeard
Skyrim
"I’m sure a lot of people know this one but, in Skyrim as you’re making your way through Skuldafn, in one of the fireplaces, you can find a potato with a boiled cream treat and some pieces of charcoal, made to look like PotatOS (GLaDOS in potato form)."
- MooseNizzle
"I'm actually close to going to Skuldafn on my most recent playthrough, so I'll have to look out for that."
"Another Easter Egg that I'm sure is even more well known, but might as well be mentioned for those who still haven't heard... is that at the very top of The Throat of the World, there's a Notched Pickaxe embedded in some rocks that has a unique enchantment that adds +5 to the smithing skill. This is an obvious reference to Minecraft and its creator."
- MaxG623
Easter eggs may not be part of the main story of a piece of media, but they can definitely increase audience enjoyment.
internet what GIFGiphyPeople Describe The Most Expensive Mistakes They've Ever Made
We all make mistakes.
It's an unfortunate part of life.
But some mistakes are worse than others.
Some blunders can be extremely expensive.
Redditor dewan_art asked:
"What is the most expensive mistake you have ever made?"
Housing Market
"Wouldn’t budge from $62,500 for a downtown loft. Owner wanted 65k."
"Unit sold for $275,000 1 year later."
- EMH55
"Same backed out of buying a house for about $400k about 10 years ago, now worth about $3 million."
- reubenmitchell
Grad School
"For me, grad school. Realized I went for the wrong reasons about half way through the courses and decided that I should keep going so I wouldn't waste any money."
"I had a hard realization a few months after graduating that I could only survive paying my loans back and not thrive. I relocated to the oilfield and have been working a niche job of a niche blue collar job ever since. After working in Temps from -43f to 105 I can finally say that I paid off my loans."
- roustajoe
"The old sunk cost fallacy. Seems to be wired into our DNA as a species."
- SeraCarina
Day Drinking
"Getting day drunk with a friend to celebrate me getting a new job, the day before I started the new job. Decided to go for a walk, blacked out when it started raining."
"Woke up in the hospital handcuffed to a bed with a felony charge for assaulting an officer because apparently I fell asleep under a storefront to get out of the rain and kicked the cop who tried to wake me up in the shin, so he did the cop thing and slammed my face into the concrete while he handcuffed me."
"Had to pay thousands of dollars in attorney's and other legal fees to get the charges dismissed, went to my first day at my new job with a cut-up face that I had to figure out how to explain, and now I'm stuck at that job because despite it being dismissed, the charge still shows up on background checks so nobody else will hire me, and I can't get it taken off my record until it's been 8 years because it's a charge for a violent offense against a police officer."
"Yeah, I don't drink anymore."
- ErikPanic
Hiring Movers
"Trusting a moving company...cost me $1000, was a straight-up scam. The grand was my down-payment on a contract that accounted for all my stuff. A guy from a different company showed up and wanted a new contract with an extra ridiculous charge for my gun safe, and when I turned basically a random person away BECAUSE I HAD NO REASON TO BELIEVE WHO HE WAS, the first guy stopped answering calls, claimed I turned away service, and kept my down-payment on those grounds. Their company said "yep" and my bank couldn't get the money back on a fraud claim. I fully believe that if I'd let the 2nd guy take my stuff, they'd have extorted me for thousands of extra dollars."
"Mitch from Roadrunner Movers in Florida is a giant piece of sh*t, and I hope he loses an equivalent to what he's stolen from people."
- onebatch_twobatch
"In my first real move after residency the company tried to hold my stuff hostage for double the money. Luckily most of the stuff we had was crap and I told them to keep it and I’d see them in court. They miraculously were able to cover the 'overweight fees'"
- BladeDoc
Not A Glitch
"I was around 8 when I thought I discovered a cheat/glitch that gave me unlimited gold in a mobile game. Turns out I was just buying the gold with money.. I costed my family $800 that day."
- Badilol
Insurance Lapse
"Not paying my car insurance on time. Then proceeding to slide through an icy intersection and hit another car. No one got hurt, just my wallet. Almost $7000"
- sews4dogs
Fried Circuit
"Was troubleshooting an windshield de-icing test set used for F/A18's and had made an error in my set up. The error caused me to fry a non-procurable circuit card; leading to the entire test set, which was around $180k, to have to be replaced."
- squid1891
Calculation Error
"Made a calculation error at work during my first few months there which led to the firm undercharging ~$130k on a project...how I wasn't fired/written up I'll never know"
- zombiehitler_
Should Have Gotten The Insurance
"Didn't get insurance on a Polaris Razor. Side by side off roading vehicle. Had it less than 3 weeks and someone stole it from my driveway Christmas night. Had taken out a loan for 5 years.... Making the payment every month hurt knowing I didn't have it anymore."
"Only took it out once. 14k for the trailer and vehicle. Still hurts a decade later."
- lastone23
Co-Signing
"Signed onto a mortgage with my ex when I was 21 because he 'just needed a little signature, it’s not a big deal!' Spoiler alert….. it was a very big deal."
- noodlemom72
$13 Million Wrench Drop
"Not me thank God, but a new hire I fired his first day out of training for 3 safety violations. The last involved dropping a wrench from 100 feet up on a work platform onto the left OMS pod of Atlantis. 13 million in damages and inspection/launch countdown time lost. Xrays, borescopes, replaced the cracked tiles, etc."
- Bobmanbob1
Gotta Turn The Freezer Back On
"At my old job, I forgot to turn back on the freezer after cleaning it (I got pulled mid clean to go do something else) so I didn’t notice. Neither did my three managers."
"Over $10,000 in frozen product lost 🤷🏻♀️ but that place was the worst place I’ve worked so f**k Freddys Frozen Custard"
- suhryna
"Freddy's defrosted custard"
- tills31
Wrong Vendor
"I transferred $500k to the wrong vendor."
"I practically had a heart attack, but the 'wrong' vendor was another huge one so it was more like we paid an invoice a day early. Also, my boss was more in a 'everyone makes mistakes mood' and not her usual 'I'll yell at you for 30 minutes over a one penny error' mood."
- webhick
Laser Destruction
"I destroyed a $250,000 laser by shorting the capacitor bank (charged 50,000 V) to the control electronics (5 V)."
"Flash of white light, instant smell of ozone and burnt plastic, a bunch of smoke, and that was that."
- Aeolian78
"I shorted 65vdc to the 5v bus one time but only did about $8k in damage. That was an awkward phone call to make."
- Grat54
Not Buying Bitcoin
"My cousin works in finance and has been interested in investing since he was like 10 years old."
"When we were both fresh out of college (2009) I asked him what he thought about investing a bit of some money I had come into in bitcoin, which was $1 per coin at the time."
"He talked me out of what would potentially been over $100,000,000 in profit, assuming I had cashed out at the peak. I still rib him about it."
- sam_neil
Mistakes happen, that's a fact of life, but let's all hope none of ours end up being the expensive kind.
When it comes to romantic relationships, especially when marriage is talked about, it's good for the two people in the relationship to share similar values, principles, and beliefs.
Maybe you discuss whether or not you want children, and if so, when. Maybe you'll talk about how to split household duties or whether or not to combine finances. And of course, you'll talk about religion.
Religion can play a large role in life for people of faith. The rules or recommendations of their faith help them to decide what's right and wrong, what to do in any given situation, and maybe even how to raise kids.
However, if one partner is religious and the other is atheist, it can be difficult to find a middle ground. It's not impossible, but it may not always be easy.
Atheists on Reddit know this first hand, and have shared what their relationship is like with a person of faith.
The stories were as diverse as religion itself.
It all starte when Redditor Actual_Sprinkles1287 asked:
"Atheists who married a person of faith, how is that going?"
Some people found it didn't matter, and their relationship was successful.
Good With Them, Bad With The In Laws
"With her? Great, it never really comes up, she does her thing (She's Christian), we agreed the kids get to make their own choices, and that we can both explain our faith, or lack thereof, when appropriate."
"Her parents, on the other hand... Just glad they live on the other side of the country. Was worse before we got married"
– Constantyne13
"Got an identical situation here but her parents are ten minutes down the road. I used to be a Christian. They don’t know I’m not, so that reduces friction."
– 7Welds
Sunday Morning
"Had our 25th wedding anniversary last year."
"She's a member of a very liberal (even for Canada) congregation and I share most of their beliefs about things like how to treat other people, just not the supernatural stuff. She does her thing, I get to sleep in on Sunday mornings."
– YVRJon
"Last sentence is relationship goals."
– phalangepatella
Heritage Over Religion
"Well, I am the non-atheist in the relationship, but it doesn't come up at all."
"I don't believe in an interventionist deity, so there really isn't a reason to discuss it."
"Since we are Jewish, my husband is fine with the kids going to Hebrew school because he wants them to know about our history, language, and traditions. That's why I want them to go as well."
"Mainstream Judaism is not very deity-focused and Hebrew schools mainly teach language, history, and about rituals and their meaning. Faith doesn't really come up, and everyone having their own way of doing things and believing is an integral part of Judaism. So, I am not worried about them becoming indoctrinated in that way."
"We both think that it's up to the kids to make their own decisions about theism and religion, and we should give them the materials to make an informed decision."
– zazzlekdazzle
Believe
"Great! Sometimes I go to church with her, I like the content (be a good person, live simply, etc.) She believes all the science, she just also believes in some other stuff."
"My opinion is this: as a human you're going to have questions about life, the universe, and anything else. If a belief system answers those questions for you, great."
– SpaceOttersea
Perfect As You Are
"When we first met, I saw she was a "problem solver" by nature. She's religious, I'm not. I asked her early if she saw me as a problem in need of a solution. When she said, "no," I decided I'd keep seeing her."
"She still holds her beliefs, though perhaps not as strongly as before we met. We each know where the other stands, and we're both respectful of the other's views. She doesn't try to "convert me" and I don't try to change her mind."
"We're 13 years in, and doing just fine, I think."
– akluor
Others found it impossible to remain married because of religious differences.
Keeping It A Secret
"My ex husband never acted religious. Not necessarily atheist, but didn't go to church, and never prayed that I was aware of."
"We hit a really rough patch and I wanted a divorce. I found a notebook (I wasn't snooping, I was cleaning and it was in a stack of random papers and whatnot) where he'd made some list of demands to save our marriage (laughable since I was the one who wanted out due to how he was treating me). I started to read it and one said "accept Jesus into her heart." I rolled my eyes just as he walked into the living room and freaked out that I had it and yanked it out of my hand. We never talked about it amd we did eventually divorce."
– stealth_mode_76
"Hmm. It seems like for him to not have expressed religious beliefs or convictions but desires for you to “accept Jesus into your heart”—according to this list of his—seems to suggest that there were some things about him that he kept secret from you throughout your marriage. Your hands are wiped clean of him now though!"
– VibrantVirgo96
Bad Idea
"Divorced. Don’t know what I was thinking."
– Misanthropic-bug
Big White Lie
"Divorced for that reason"
– CommunityGlittering2
"If you don't mind me asking, why did it only become an issue after marriage?"
– Forever-Alone-1
"Because she lied about be religious, before marriage she said she was only acting to please her mom because she lived at home. And we would bring up any children without religion and they could chose when they were older. She lied."
– CommunityGlittering2
Some people found that their partner's faith changed, or they even switched around who was a person of faith and who wasn't.
Hard To Keep The Faith
"She’s not Christian anymore. I never belittled or attacked her faith throughout the years. Between cancer taking her sister and simply aging, her belief slowly eroded away."
– heH0rnyRobot
"This. I prayed for a few years for my husband to come to faith. After crippling mental health issues and having special needs kid, Now he believes in a god and I lost every ounce of faith I had."
– Interesting-6743
Some people are still together but still find religion a topic of contention.
Trying
"Not swimmingly well. But we're hangin' in there."
– owdoidothiz
Exhaustion Comes With The Topic
"I'm a person of faith who married an " I dnt believe in God but I believe in something"
"We love eachother but when this topic comes up it's so f*ckin draining"
– ShruteFarms4L
"do you mind sharing why it's draining?"
– lunafxckery
"...well we talk a lot, as you can imagine that means the Convo often drifts to God. When we talk about God usually we end up also bring up past traumas and we both have a lot. I believe God gave me the strength to get through it, she believes she was abandoned."
"She also brings history into it too (where was he during slavery, holocaust)."
"and we never ever come to a conclusion we just move on lol start watching a movie or playing with the kids, maybe drinking and whatever comes with that."
"But sometimes the covos last a little longer than usual, we have never argued about this tho, but somestimes the convos can drain me mentally."
"Short version: it's like two walls talking when God is the subject."
– ShruteFarms4L
A Bit Of A Strain
"This will probably get buried but anyway."
"My wife is Christian, Anglican in Church of England. They’re fairly liberal in their views and acceptance of what people believe, even within the church. So she doesn’t mind that I don’t believe in a single God, and the church isn’t as ‘firm’ in the UK as it seems to be in the US. So I’m not ridiculed or seen as a bad person by her or the church for my lack of faith."
"She studied to become a priest over the past few years and was ordained. I told her I would support her studying but I didn’t want to discuss God or religion with her in the way she debates with some of her other religious friends. I largely struggle with the idea that she believes something that is at odds with so much of what we know about the universe. The further down the religious path she goes, the more bitter I’ve become towards ‘religion’. (I can only see religions and The Church as a business these days, especially knowing the processes she went through to become a minister.) The values of the Anglican church are mostly good, but you can live that way without god in your life. I don’t see why religion needs to play a part of being a good person."
"In terms of how it’s been for our marriage, it hasn’t really been a factor for most of 25 years together. It’s frustrating that she usually wants to go to church on Sundays, which leaves me to do everything else that falls on Sunday morning (notably kids’ sports commitments). I’d also certainly say we have far less in common and have less to talk about these days than we used to. She bends every possibly interesting conversation back to religion or God, and I just want to enjoy chatting without it becoming a debate. But that’s the main topic of conversation she knows and pretty much all she reads. She reads a lot about religion and theology and ‘church’ has become such a huge part of her personality, and her biggest ‘hobby’ that she is much less interesting and has fewer passions or interests in life that she can share. It doesn’t leave much for us to discuss when I have no interest in religion and have become so bitter towards it."
"So no discussion of separation or divorce - we’re not miserable - but religion has more recently played a massive part in us having far less in common."
– Arrow_King
But ultimately, it seems people can make it work.
Love And Honor
"I'm still married after 30 years. She has her religious beliefs, and I support her as best I can. She doesn't push anything on me. When she wants to do her thing, I give her space. If I have to be involved, I just stay quiet and be respectful. It's not that hard to do. No need to hate someone because of differing beliefs."
– Live_Ice8502
What a great attitude to have!
Though there are many things in life that are worth being thankful for, there are also aspects of life that are really hard to work through.
But when we had our hopes up about a person, event, or way of life, it can be really hard to accept that they were not all they were made out to be.
Redditor tomhigham asked:
"What in your life has disappointed you beyond words?"
Poor Friendships
"Probably unpopular, but personally true for me: friendship."
"Growing up, my group of friends was pretty toxic. After high school, we naturally went our separate ways, but there was a bit of an emotional scar."
"In college, I found a new group of friends… who actually ended up being even worse and almost ruined my life. It has left me with such severe trust issues that I struggle to form meaningful friendships now."
- WaterFlew
"I had a friend from high school that I thought would be with me for life. I had never had a closer friend ever in my life, and part way through college, it blew up in my face. She turned on me, and all communication broke down."
"Losing someone I considered close enough to be family was gut-wrenching. I have trust issues now because how can someone you loved like a family member be so cruel in the end? I lost ties to all but one friend over the years."
"People would come into my life and we’d connect deeply and it always ended. Not as bad as my best friend had but still nothing ever sticks. People would end up with differing views on life or just get busy. Now I rely on family and my husband for friendship. These are the people who stick with me through the years."
- Increasingly_Anxious
"I've been posting about this lately: my former best friend and neighbor. He's a single dad of two special needs kids. I did a lot to help him out much of last year."
"Late last fall, he either broke into my house (or had someone else do it for him) and stole quite a bit of money from me. When I confronted him about this, he physically attacked me."
"After everything I did for him, it hurts so bad someone could simply turn on you. The beatdown he gave me didn't make me cry, I took it, but later on, when I realized our friendship was a sham and he was only using me, I completely broke down."
- llcucf80
Start Saving Up When You're Five
"House prices. I really should have been buying up real estate in grade school, lol (laughing out loud)."
- astickyworm1
"2000s Adults: Oh no, the economy!"
"2007: Oh no, the economy again!"
"Not one f**king adult acknowledged the growth that took place. Meanwhile today…"
"2016 - 2023: The housing market will crash any day now…"
- Hurrington
Older Isn't Always Better
"I realized in my 20s that 'older' people were just as immature and dishonorable as kids, only permanently so."
"Very scary moment. You grow up looking up to those people, and when the pedestal you put them on falls, you are looking down on them, still powerless to change the world."
- litetravelr
"As a kid, I gave the adults in my life a lot of passes for their behavior. I figured I was a kid, and they acted that way for reasons I was just too young to understand."
"Now that I’m in a similar age range as they were when they hurt me, I realize they’re just s**t people who choose to be this way."
- whirlyworlds
The Lack of Agency Was Stifling
"Childhood."
"People kept telling me it was the best time of my life and that adulthood was a misery of obligations and responsibilities."
"Well, my experience of being an adult and able to have much more control over my own life, who I associate with, and what I do with my time is a welcome exchange for my responsibility-free life where I had comparatively little agency."
- zazzlekdazzle
"Oh boy, do I agree with this one zillion percent. I HATED being a kid. You are at the absolute mercy of the people around you."
"I can’t count the number of jobs I’ve quit or the people I’ve kept out of or cut out of my life. I have a boring, mediocre life. It’s still better than being a kid."
- GreatFortune5630
Rose-Colored Glasses
"Love."
- Hot_Wine_2004
"I dreamed of my wedding day and having kids and living happily ever after. I didn't dream about him cheating and leaving me three weeks after our son was born... A**hole."
- tryingtofitin_d**mit
"I almost always never get the love I give."
"Sometimes it's fine, but when it becomes routine, life just gets depressing."
"Still doesn't stop me from being kind. You never know what the other person is going through."
- HydroVector
The Lull After College
"How f**king awful life after college is. In college, you're always learning new things and meeting new people. You have a lot of fun and friends and, sure, you work a s**t job that pays squat and you have to study all the time, but you have this sense of accomplishment all the time and you have goals in front of you."
"Once you graduate, everyone moves to different cities. You get different jobs. It’s way harder to make friends and time seems to go by at light speed."
"Additionally, any third space you want to hang out in costs a ton of money, and no one wants to actually talk and become friends. If I’d known life got this lonely and boring, I’d have tried to savor every moment of college."
- fatboyfall420
"Chr**t, I’m going through the same thing. It feels like the months pass by in seconds. My friends all have relationships and are moving away."
"Trying desperately to be friends with people at work and other places yet nobody wants to be?? I won’t even mention trying to get into a romantic relationship."
"Hopefully joining clubs and taking up hobbies with people my age would enjoy will bring me closer to making friends. Oh, and vacations. Lots and lots of vacations."
- AudioIsland
Shocking Siblings
"My siblings. Never expected them to turn on me and then try to prevent me from getting my share of the inheritance."
- California_Sun1112
"My aunt did that to my dad. He can't bring himself to talk to her anymore. It was less about the money and more about the fact that she pulled that stunt."
- Lokeze
'Murica
"The American government, hands down."
- NoMournersNoFunerals
"Not so much the American government but society as a whole."
"The American government has actually worked out pretty well for me (my family came to the USA as refugees, my parents worked minimum wage jobs, I got a college degree and I'm making well above the median household income), but as I've grown older I've just grown disgusted with how stupid and easily manipulated people are."
"The pandemic was a fine example, like, I may not morally agree with someone doing evil s**t for personal gain but at least that makes sense. Doing stupid s**t to make their lives worse is a level of stupidity that the logical side of me can't handle."
- Zerole00
Using Resources for Good
"Call me a (former) optimist, but there was a time when for some reason, I thought the Bezos and Zuckerbergs of the world were going to use their brains and wealth to do good things for the world. Instead, they are contributing to its demise."
- devilsmile7
"I’m right there with you. This generation of billionaires has thrown away the opportunity to help the world, or possibly, even save part of the world with the wealth we have not seen individuals ever accumulate in history, which could be focused on everything from the climate to poverty to medicine and beyond be remembered as heroes."
"Ironically, it’s only Bill Gates that turned his money to helping to save an entire continent. It just wasn’t ours, so many people don’t know about it."
- Whatstheretosay44
Survival Mode
"Gestures broadly. Honestly, I think life is more about making peace with your failures than it is about racking up accomplishments."
"Most of us are never going to do the amazing things we hoped for as children. It's like the Rolling Stones said: 'You don't always get what you want, but if you try, sometimes, you just might find, you get what you need.'"
- Yak-F**ker-5000
A Rude Awakening
"When I was a teenager in the 80s, struggling down to the library to do the research for my homework, I dreamed of a day where everyone would be able to access libraries from a terminal in their homes. They would have unlimited, free access to all the information and knowledge they need."
"How much better would the world be if everyone could be informed of facts at the touch of a button? Ignorance and stupidity would be left behind on a superhighway of information."
- Major_Twang
No Reciprocation
"Other people."
"I've done everything I could to try and make right with people, to help them, to give them support when they need it, to make sure they never feel the hurt and loneliness I feel every day in my life."
"And then people take advantage of it and only see me as useful in transactional situations. It's never reciprocated in any way."
"I just want one unconditional-love relationship from one other person, or at least something that resembles something of a friendship."
"The last time someone reached out to me via text/phone call, was back in October 2022, and the last time someone reached out to me, without needing anything as the primary motivation of them reaching out, was July of 2022. I've reached out plenty of times to check on people I knew, and offered to hang/chat."
- okimlom
The Unfairness of Infertility
"How easy it is for some people to have kids that they don’t give a s**t about and how impossible it’s been for me."
"I really hope to be a foster parent someday but I wanted to practice on my own kid first before I go screw up someone else’s. I say that very cavalierly, but I genuinely wanted some practice before jumping in with a kid that, no matter what, is dealing with trauma from the separation of bio family."
"It’s precisely because I don’t take that lightly that I hesitate to become a foster parent. I knew before my infertility that I wanted to foster but my trauma also holds me back. It’s unfair shoes for a foster kid to fill when their foster parents are looking for a kid they couldn’t have one their own."
- BreakingCupcakes
Crossfire Commercials
"Crossfire wasn’t half as intense as I thought it was going to be…"
- 2Anon4uAnon
"The Crossfire commercial promised quite a lot. You didn't get to fly into the ring upon the game pieces. And there was no actual fire or lightning, nor the chanting horde of post-apocalyptic children. And worst of all, when I beat my opponents, they didn't spin off into fiery oblivion."
- litetravelr
Though there's a lot of good in the world, there are troubling things, too. What makes it worse is that the things that are often the most disappointing are sold to us as children to be the things to really look forward to. It doesn't add up.