
There are good interviews, and there are bad interviews. And then there are these interviews. Get ready for some second-hand cringe factor as bosses share stories of the most horrible interviews they've ever conducted.
Thanks to everyone who contributed! If you'd like to read more stories like this, check out the source link at the end of this article. Comments have been edited for clarity.
I became the hiring manager for a mom and pop restaurant at 18. I looked really young too, most people put me at about 16 at the time. At any rate, I'd exchanged some emails with a woman wanting to become a server. I was planning on hiring her, as she had lots of experience and seemed really nice. So I scheduled her an in person interview. Keep in mind that I had never actually seen her in person.
So, the day of her interview comes and I just happen to be at the hostess station when she arrives. When I greet her, "Hi, welcome to _____!" She cuts me off with what has become one of my favorite instances of self sabotage I've ever witnessed.
"Alright, listen. I'm about to get hired her as a server. So what that means is that you, as a little hostess, are going to sit me with all the big tables and give me all the good regulars or I won't tip you out at all and I'll make your life living pile of crap. Got it? Good. Now, run along and tell your hiring manager, that I'm here."
I smiled back sweetly and said, "Actually, I'm the hiring manager. I'm sorry to have you come up here for no reason, but I've already filled all of our open serving positions. You have a nice day."
There's no way I'm going to hire someone with that much stupidity AND that poor of an attitude.
I was friends with the hiring supervisor at a job once, who told me this one.
A guy dropped a bag of methamphetamine while taking something else out of his pocket at an interview. He actually could have gotten away with this, as the interviewer is something like 80% blind. However, he said, "Oh, sorry," to which the interviewer replied, "For what?"
His answer? "I dropped my meth."
"You guys would be lucky to have me, Google is trying to recruit me too."
I wished him the best of luck at his job with Google.
A guy once confessed that he was a convicted felon for drug trafficking, and that he actually had no experience in the industry we were in. That guy turned out to be the best employee I've ever had, out of around 200 people I've hired. Unbelievable.
A colleague of mine called this guy in for an interview. He didn't show and about 2 hours after he was due in, he called and said he'd been hit by a car. My colleague decided to give him the benefit of the doubt and they arranged another day. The day arrives and he didn't turn up again. We got a call from him a while later saying he'd broken his tooth on an almond and couldn't come as he'd had to rush to a dentist. My incredibly trusting colleague decided to try one more time another day. The guy turned up drunk.
Me: You mentioned on your application that you are a good leader, could you give me an example of your leadership abilities?
Candidate: "Absolutely! At my last job we hated our Chef and I organized the kitchen staff to walk out during the Friday night rush."
Resume included a startup he founded.
I asked about it: "Tell me about your startup, sorry, what was it called again?"
He forgot.
He forgot the name of the startup he founded a year prior.
It went downhill from there.
I had to interview a guy for some contract labor and when I showed him our work vehicle he shook my hand and said, "I'm sorry but I refuse to drive a chevy" and left. I was speechless... he had been giving me the story of how hard he was having it, so I decided to give him a shot and because we had a Silverado for the work vehicle he turned it down? Man....
Kid was in high school. He put down his friends as references. He had to fill out the application twice because the first time he screwed up.
Me: What made you apply? (I ask this question more to see what type of response that can create on the spot. I like to see if they can formulate a decent response while thinking on their feet)
Kid: Well....umm....all my friends work here so I don't think it would really be like a job to me. More like kickin' it with the homies.
Me: Would your friends being employed here get in the way of you working?
Kid: Maybe. I mean our Auto Class teacher makes all of us split up in class and we can't work together.
I work in software development.
As part of the interview process at my company, our candidates interview over Skype using a code-sharing website for them to complete a small and relatively simple problem to help weed out candidates who are dishonest on their resumes.
In one of my interviews, I started with the usual introduction of myself, my role within the company, so on and so forth. I introduce her to the task and explain that it'll be on a code sharing website and that she'll need to follow the link I will send her to access it. I paste the link into the text window and explain to her how to access it (some people haven't used Skype before and don't know how to access text chat in a video call). She smiles and nods and asks me when I'm done, "will you be writing the link on the whiteboard?"
What whiteboard? I look behind me and remember that yes, there is a small whiteboard behind me, and this woman was expecting me to handwrite the (not so short) link and she would read it off the webcam to type it into her browser. "No," I explain, "I sent you the link within Skype itself. If you'll just click..." I'm forced to trail off as she reaches forward and picks up her webcam (which I'm assuming was mounted to the top of her monitor). I get a nice close-up of her eye as she peers inside the camera, then turns it on its side to observe it some more. I ask her what she's doing. "Trying to find the link," she replies.
Dumbfounded, I once again explain that the link was sent over Skype and wouldn't appear behind me nor on the webcam. She resumes the smile-and-nod routine as I ask her to follow my directions to access the Skype text chat window. I ask her to wave her mouse cursor over my face until she sees some buttons appear. She takes her hand off the mouse, raises it, and waves it over the screen. I explain to her again that she needs to use the mouse and she smiles and nods again.
After about 15 minutes (of a 30 minute interview), she did finally discover the link in the Skype text chat, but she proceeded to type it into her browser by hand.
She did not make it to the next round.
Not the worst, but the weirdest. Guy applied for a warehouse/delivery position. Had emailed back and forth with a few questions before the interview, and it sounded promising. He comes in, sits down and says, "So, what is this position? Delivery? Oh, I can't lift anything. Also, I lost my driver's license a few months ago. I guess we're done here." And then just got up and left. No thank you or goodbye, just got up and left. It was the shortest, most bizarre interview I've ever done.
Back when I was HR Manager for a market research firm, one of the most awkward interviews was with my candidate and his mother.
This 19 year old who apparently had previous work experience in customer service brought his mother into the interview with him. I politely questioned his mother as to the reasoning of her joining in on the interview and I was told, "I'm just making sure this is the right company for him and making sure you're asking fair questions."
I decided to roll with it (why not, this is the most interesting thing I've had all week) so I asked my first question.. she answered for him. I politely explained that the interviews I conduct are with the candidate only unless special accommodations are required. I was told, "I'm not going anywhere."
I thanked them both for coming out and explained that the position requires problem solving and critical thinking on an individual level. Unless I am hiring the both of them under one salary working together as a "full time equivalent", this wouldn't work. I was then told I would be sued and to F myself.
A person who was about 15 years older than I was and clearly didn't understand that I was the one actually interviewing her for the job. This was an engineering position on my team making ~$175K. She was very candid with me regarding her overall personality and actually put her purse on her lap at one point and doing her makeup while we were talking. I guess she thought I was the secretary and she was making small talk before meeting with my boss?
I asked a guy when would he be available to begin work if offered the position... his response was that he would have to put down his dogs in order to begin work as soon as possible but was willing to do that to get the job.
We called him almost immediately after the interview to tell him he wasn't selected and hopefully save his dogs lives.
Interviewing for an international sales rep. in a rural area. Boss' nephew invited himself in and his question was, "what is your blood type?".
I was mortified. Glanced at him then across to the candidate, who had travelled 200klm/120mi for the interview and was better than we'd hoped for.
Annnnnnd you guessed it: best candidate rejected our subsequent offer and boss' nephew said he "wasn't suitable anyway".
Idiot.
Had a girl sit across from me put her elbow on my desk then rested her head flat on her hand so that her head was now sideways. She stayed that way through the entire interview.
Another time I asked a guy if he had any special skills, he replied "Keepin' it real with y'all"
I was once interviewed by a company that wanted an IT god who could do about a dozen jobs solo. We're talking things like security engineer, programmer, database administrator, and more.
Wanted something like 200-300k worth of technician out of one guy. Wanted to pay 12/hr for it.
Guy told us that he applied so long ago he forgot which position it was for. We then proceeded to show him the job description and he said "I don't even know what this piece of equipment is" (it was a maintenance job). He apologized for wasting our time but he got a free bottle of water, so I guess it worked out for him.
When my dad was going through applications, in the "reason for leaving last job" part, a man wrote that he had shot his previous boss in the head. They had told him to be honest.
I've got tons of these. This one is my current favorite.
I had a guy come in for a CDL and site work (truck driving and earthmoving equipment) position. After the initial pleasantries he went on to inform me that he didn't like small talk, his pet peeve is people who socialize too much on the job when there is work to be done, he likes to get right to it and get hammering away on that work he just doesn't understand these people who just talk talk talk instead of getting on with it not like him, he's not interested in chatting no he's got a better work ethic than these darn kids and he's not going to stand around gabbing about nothing when time is wasting etc etc etc.
He went on like that, no exaggeration, for an hour and 20 minutes. A solid hour and a half including the initial question and answer bit at the beginning. I wasn't even mad, I just let him ramble on. At the end of it he asked if he would be starting that day or if I needed to "do some of this paperwork stuff" for him.
He hadn't even filled out his pre-hire information forms.
Absolutely majestic.
A person I know had someone come in for an interview wearing gym shorts and a tank top, fresh from playing tennis in the summer sun.
Another candidate came in with their mother and asked if she could sit in on the interview and help answer questions. The interviewer asked if the mother was the one applying for the position. Without a word, the mother got up and left to sit in the waiting area.
One time an applicant told me that he was temporarily placed in charge of a team, and one of the team members spoke mostly French so he told him to "learn English or get the eff out of here," and then subsequently sent him home when he did not immediately learn English.
The question was "Tell me about a time that you worked well under loose supervision."
I interviewed an Italian girl who couldn't speak English. She had only moved to the country a few weeks prior and I think this was her first interview but it was all so painful. Nearly every question was answered with "si, ...**pause**...yes". Even questions that you shouldn't answer with a yes. I decided to be nice and go through all of my questions but it was ridiculous, like I nearly called an Italian speaker to come and translate for us.
"If you had multiple asks coming from different parts of the business and they were all due today, but you couldn't finish them all in time, how would you try to balance this?"
"si, ...**pause**...yes"
"No, say it's not possible to do them all by today, what would you do?"
"si, ...**pause**...yes"
"So you don't have time to do them all. Would you see if you could re-prioritize any of these, or would you just not do them or something else?"
"si, ...**pause**...yes"
"What I'm normally expecting here is something along the lines of you either asking the someone for more time, or looking for help from a colleague, or even speaking to your manager and asking for a list of priorities from them. Which of these would you be most likely to do?"
"**longer-pause**, si, ...**pause**...yes"
At the end of the interview I was then just asking her general "shoot the breeze questions". She said she was currently learning English. So I asked her where was she learning it, and told me "only for a few weeks". So I said, 'no, the location of the school? Where is it located?' and I get a blank face. I eventually started naming streets, and she goes "ahhh! Dove!" and she tells me the street name.
After the interview I told our recruiter that she can't speak English and we won't be proceeding further. The recruiter told me that she had spent 40 minutes with her on the phone (in English) making sure she understood the role. When I asked her if the applicant said anything more than "si" or "yes", she looked a bit embarrassed.
Just a few weeks ago I interviewed a person for a healthcare position. The question was something like "tell me about a time you were forced into a new situation and how did you deal with it" she proceeds to tell us about the time she was forced to move to an area with "colored people" and how she learned to "deal with them".
We needed an appliance repair guy; they didn't need to have any formal training, but they needed to know what they were doing. The standard test was we tossed 'em in a room with a broken whateverwehadaround and asked them to diagnose it.
One guy completely dismantled it, and couldn't put it back together again. I walked in, and he's got his hat off, he's rubbing his head, muttering to himself surrounded by parts. I asked him to leave.
So the next guy to apply for the job got shown to the same room, and was told 'put this back together'.
I sat in on interviews with a manager at the restaurant I worked at. I remember this application he pulled specifically cause the kid was from the same rough part of town the manager was. The manager comes in on a 5 minute rant on how much he hates scam artists trying to get money off decent people in the streets. Upon hearing this the kid launched into a story about telling people he locked his keys in the car with his wallet and just needed $20 for pop a lock. Explains he could make $300 on a good day. The kicker? He doesn't have a car! He laughs while all of us stare at him dumbfounded. Manager kicked him out he got a job down the street.
I was working as a front end supervisor for a big box retailer going into the holiday season. This was the beginning of November.
I get this girl who came in for an interview and I let her know it was seasonal work, but that we would be keeping some of the seasonal hires after January and inquired as to whether she was looking for seasonal or long-term.
She replied, "Well, I basically got in trouble for bad grades and staying out too late, and my parents are making me pay for my own car insurance this month."
That was it. She just stared at me expecting her to hire her on the spot.
I did not do that. I do still wonder if she ever got a job that helped her pay her car insurance for that month, though.
We had an applicant for a teaching position who stated on his resume that he held a Master of Music degree from Yale.
When interviewing him, I asked what he thought of Woolsey Hall (Yale's primary concert hall) and its renowned pipe organ. By his answer and facial expression, I could tell he'd never been there.
After he left, I called contacts at the university who confirmed that they'd never heard of him and no one by his name had received a degree there.
"I want to begin by stating that the call center I work at is seriously top notch. We pay extremely well, we have extremely flexible hours and we pride ourselves in our local reputation.
Part of this is because of our extremely deliberate hiring process. We get about 100 applicants every week, of whom we will end up hiring 3 to 5.
We really don't hire just anyone, and as a company, we take a great deal of pride in that. So do our clients, all of whom are really high-profile, on a national scale.
So, this morning, my boss, Al, called me into his office and asked me to conduct my very first interview.
Now, I'd very recently accepted a promotion to trainer - so recently, in fact, that I'm not even done with my training - but interviews are the purview of managers and shift supervisors. I mentioned as such, but Al told me that this was a 'special case.'
"We are counting on you," Al said. "With tremendous, tremendous gravity.
"[OurCompany]'s reputation depends on our hires, Derpleberry. I expect a great deal from you.""
With that, he handed me a clipboard with a list of questions and a pen and ushered me into another manager's office to wait for my very first-ever interviewee.
About three minutes later, the kid walked in.
Oh my gosh, did he ever walk in.
I am going to take my time about describing this kid, because I do not want to leave a single thing out.
(And please, keep in mind, like everywhere else, we require business casual and there is no way this kid got this far in the hiring process without being told at least three times.)
He was wearing: * Skinny blue jeans that were so tight I could easily see tendons and bone structure, pulled down around the hips and crotch to avoid mashing his balls into paste. * Beat-up old Converse sneakers covered with what appeared to be homemade Rageface patches. * A red, hooded sweatshirt over a freaking My Little Pony t-shirt. * Black, lensless eyeglass frames and about six facial piercings * A Naturo headband.
A Naruto Headband.
""You're wearing a Naruto headband,"" I said.
Now, to me, my tone said, and quite clearly, 'How the heck did you make it past the first two stages of the vetting process, you ridiculous child?'
He, however, assumed that my tone meant 'Gosh, how completely appropriate!' and said, with an expression of such sheer smuggery I wish I could adequately describe it, "Oh, you recognize my headband. Plus one to you! I was almost worried I'd have to deal with some lame-arse suit!"
And then, he handed me his 'resume'.
I want you to understand how very loose I am being with that word, here, because what he actually handed me was about four pages of prose beginning with the sentence "I was born on [Date], 1988, in the small town of [suburb]."
I stared at this Facebook-profile-styled autobiography in numb shock for about five minutes while he rambled on about 'suits' and how they just don't 'get' anything about anything and I don't even friggin know.
As I flipped through the pages, I noticed two really important things about it:
1) I had initially assumed the kid was about 18, 19 tops, but he was actually twenty-five.
2) There was no work experience in it.
Anywhere at all.
He'd gone to college and that was it, that was his entire resume, everything else was random musings on the books, TV shows and bands he liked and what they'd taught him and how he basically felt that college was completely beneath him. He'd never even held a paper route.
I looked up at this kid and I said, ""Do you think, maybe, you'd like to reschedule this interview for another time?""
"No. Why? Is there a problem?"
"Yes," I said. "Several."
I asked him if he'd received the multiple calls setting up and confirming the interview, all of which had stated, very clearly that we expected him to be dressed 'business casual', and, in fact, had very carefully defined what was meant by 'business casual'.
He said, "Oh, were you serious about that?"
I had no words.
"Well," he continued, in that very same ludicrously smug tone, "I figured, you know, this is me. This is who I am. If you can't 'deal' with that, then maybe I don't even want this job."
"That's extremely convenient," I said. "Because I don't see any reason to continue this interview."
"Well great!" he said with a gigantic smirk. "When do I start?"
What. Holy unbelievable. I am staring at this ridiculous man-child and there is zero irony on his pierced, fake-glasses-wearing face, he is patiently waiting for me to tell him when his first day of work will be and I still cannot stop staring at that effing Naruto headband.
"You don't," I managed to say. "You don't start here. Not today, not tomorrow, not ever. When I said 'this interview is over', I did not mean that in a good way. "
He is still not understanding. "But you didn't even ask me anything," he says. "There wasn't even an interview."
"Yes," I said and explained to him that our request for him to dress like a professional adult was one hundred percent mandatory, and by failing to do so, so very flippantly, had told me everything I needed to know about him.
"You don't know anything about me," this kid says and his face goes beet red. "You don't know me, you don't know anything about me. You need to give me an interview. I know my rights, give me my interview."
For the sake of not causing a physical incident, I did not explain that I knew more than enough about him already to warrant never ever hiring him ever in the world, forever. Instead, I carefully explained that his 'rights' here consisted entirely of leaving the building before I had him removed for trespassing.
And now this kid starts shouting at me, screaming that I am an arsehole, that I don't know about anything, that he's a billion times better than me and when he's a millionaire he'll buy this company just so he can fire me.
When that somehow fails to procure immediate employment, he then, with tears in his eyes, begs me for a job.
His mother, he says, will boot him out onto the street if he doesn't get this job. If I don't give him this job, he will be homeless, he shouts at me, and it will be my fault.
"I'll cope," I tell him as security finally arrives to escort him out.
So there's me, sitting in the empty office, with this kid's ridiculous 'resume' in my lap, chairs all knocked over, staring off into space and wondering what the heck just happened.
And then Al, my boss Al, pokes his head in. His face is stony-serious as he asks me, "What did you think?"
"You know," I said, "I don't think he'll be a good fit."
"Okay," Al says and nods with the kind of gravitas you don't see outside of Shakespeare. "Keep up the good work, Derpleberry."
And he walks away.
Thanks for reading!
Sometimes the most outlandish ideas sound totally plausible.
In this day and age when 'Saturday Night Live' and 'The Onion' sound like credible news sources, anything is possible.
It feels like a lot of humans will believe literally anything.
Redditor Jeffery_DahmerTV wanted to discuss the ideas that sound too crazy that they have to be true, so they asked:
"What is the most believable conspiracy Theory?"
In this day and age of alternative facts, it all seems like lies and truth.
Enlighten me.
Infection
"That computer viruses are made by antivirus companies to test their antivirus software."
astarisaslave
"Parents bought a new computer recently, the McAfee stuff was in there pretty deep to remove. The staff bogged it down, way faster afterward."
lt12765
War
"We are being goaded into waging culture wars that don't matter to keep us from waging class wars."
virgilreality
"Is this a conspiracy theory though? It would be if you assume it was engineered from the start, but this would also make it very unbelievable. But that existing conflicts had been fueled and taken advantage of by people in the position to for millennia is well evident I'd say."
Leseleff
Double Down
"Mattress Firm is a front for laundering money. There is no other reason for there to be so many. No one is ever even in there."
Free_Bingo
"Double down on this one! I have a Mattress Firm next to my job and I have never seen anyone in there ever. It’s been six years!"
cbcmama781
"I’m not convinced of this. Our local Mattress Firm is clearly baking $1k+ into their margins and then aggressively selling credit-based financing. Selling two or three a month probably covers everything."
Agloe_Dreams
Weather Issues
"Those climate protestors that glue themselves to the road are hired by oil giants to make climate activists look stupid."
milanvlaman
"I feel this way about a lot of 'extremist' groups on both sides, that there are plants from the other side doing really stupid stuff just to discredit the idea."
Herr_Poopypants
The climate is changing. We have to come together. How is that a conspiracy?
That's All
"That the fashion industry purposefully doesn’t put pockets in women’s clothing so they have to carry purses."
diceunodixon
Financial Clean Up
"That the only reason that the US government doesn’t do anything with student debt loans is because then people would stop signing up for the army."
Brotastic29
"That and healthcare.
"When you join up you get healthcare fully covered for you and your family, and you can get a full college education.
If the government started providing either of those for civilians, no one would need to join the military anymore."
redF5veStandingBy
"I think so too. I know and agree with what that dude was saying but when I see or hear people use 'Army' as a way to generalize the military, it usually means that what they said is something they’re just repeating what they heard."
chefboiortiz
The Commission
"There's definitely more to JFK's assassination than the Warren commission made it out to be. Whether or not LHO was the sole killer, I find it fishy that the CIA was so desperate to hide information from the public."
Bitter-Record-3831
"There is a very well-done documentary that concludes it was an accidental discharge from a Secret Service agent in one of the cars ahead of him."
Babstana
"CIA probably considered the assassination a declaration of war against Russia. They’re probably covering up that they were about to start WW3 over it."
tangcameo
Dairy Pounds
"The Great cheese conspiracy. Each year the US government buys more and more milk to make more and more cheese. The US government is sitting on something like 2 billion pounds of cheese. Just to artificially inflate milk prices."
worfhill
"Not even a conspiracy, just an example of the government controlling the economy in favor of dairy farmers."
Glass_Pies
"I watched a documentary about this. It's actually true."
PreferredSex_Yes
They're Listening
"That the CIA posts questions like this on Reddit to measure their past and current work, brainstorm for future projects."
ZRX1200R
Ominous
"I have a conspiracy theory about conspiracy theories. I believe the governments and 'leaders' of the world are actually rather incompetent, so much so, that they require the illusion of them being an ominous all-powerful all-seeing entity in order to remain in power."
"And to accomplish this they allow conspiracy theories like the Illuminati and etc to spread around to add a bit of urban myth to how 'powerful' they are."
"It's probably all a bunch of garbage Europe can barely communicate within itself you expect there to be some secret global order??? Oh, stop it haha."
SparkNoJoyThrw01
Sifting through what could and could not be true, could take forever.
Life is full of mystery.
When we were in our early twenties, most of us felt like we were officially adults, untouchable, and essentially unstoppable.
But looking back, most of us made some pretty cringy decisions when we were that age.
Redditor ALLEYWAYwithanS asked:
"What's the dumbest thing you've done in your twenties?"
Free Money
"Decided against contributing to my company's matching 401k. It cost me hundreds of thousands of dollars."
- orange_cuse
"This can't be stressed enough. If your company is matching 401k contributions, the single best thing you can do is contribute up to their match. That is an instant 100% return on your investment."
"Social Security benefits will not be enough for you to retire comfortably, and when you're over 50 it gets real tough to find work that pays more than minimum wage. Make saving a priority now. The sooner the better, because it is a cruel world for unprepared retirees."
- gishnon
Much-Needed Routines
"Everyone wants to hear about dumb stuff like driving eight hours to get with someone you liked only for it to end up being a booty call."
"However, I personally think it was my general lack of effort to build any good habits like exercise. Your body likes routines, and my routine of gaming for 15 hours a day was not one I should have cultivated."
- stormscape10x
"This is such an important one! I'm 25 and have wasted the last eight years of my life being a typical Asian young adult, focusing solely on education and career instead of doing more to take care of my fitness and mental well-being."
"My culture brainwashed me into thinking of it as a good thing to sit at my desk and study for six hours straight instead of building a good habit of eating a balanced meal and exercising every day. I'm paying for that mistake now."
- ListernerSaraf
Dental Hygiene
"Not looking after my teeth."
- pgraczer
"Second best time is now! Start taking care of them and get into the dentist, a dental school even for free cleaning and check-ups."
- Weazy-N420
"I'm still playing catchup. I let my teeth go in college and didn't get them looked at until after I finished AIT in 2020. I had them in a good spot for a while, deployment in 2022 f**ked them up again though. It's so godd**n hard to fix your teeth once they're on the downward slide."
- MonsieurLinc
"I have weak teeth, too. That's not a reason to give up, it's just a reason to absolutely lock down your routine. You'll save yourself a lot of time, money, and pain!"
"Here's what I do:"
"I only eat two times per day (intermittent fasting is not for everyone but it's great for limiting acid exposure on your teeth). And don't drink anything sugary. If you have to, do it while you're eating and not between meals."
"Swish with water and/or mouthwash immediately after meals/drinks."
"Wait 30 minutes before brushing. Your enamel is softest directly after eating so brushing too soon can be harmful."
"Get really good toothpaste with fluoride or hydroxyapatite for remineralization. Your dentist can give you a prescription high-fluoride toothpaste."
"Do your brushing routine in this order: floss, then mouthwash, then brush. Use a soft-bristled toothbrush and don't scrub too hard. Don't rinse after brushing so the fluoride can stay on your teeth and do its work."
"Get a tongue scraper and do that once in a while too."
"If you're away from home (work, friend's house, driving, etc) and don't have a toothbrush, xylitol gum is great for a quick cleaning and breath freshening. Xylitol helps kill plaque-causing bacteria because they think it's sugar."
"Might seem like a lot but it's worth it! My mouth always feels clean and I get compliments from hygienists."
- pmvegetables
Deep Burnout
"I worked way too hard and burnt out. Sacrificed family time. Sacrificed health. Need to pace yourself at the age of 20-30."
- big-bad-bird
"This is me right now. 29 and totally burned out. I refused to pace myself even with my chronic illness, I refused to address my traumas because 'I am a functional member of society so why would I seek a therapist,' and I refused to say no to things because I was afraid people would dislike me."
"Last year, I slowly started collapsing under all that. Things I repressed wouldn't stay repressed and because of nightmares, I had constant panic attacks when I got home from work and eventually bordered on agoraphobia where I would try and flee the grocery store because 'everyone can see you are feeling unwell and is judging you' and started making excuses to work from home because the office would overwhelm me."
"I really wish I started addressing stuff sooner. I tire so easily now and am constantly anxious about not being productive enough now that I'm at home. Which is super counterproductive when your body is saying, 'Yo, slow down. Please go find a nice hobby and relax.'"
- Melvarkie
Chasing Love
"Begged to be loved."
- SystemNovel7112
"I’m still in my early twenties and I feel like this is what I’ve been doing. The worst part is that other people are good at detecting desperation so they move away from you, which just hurts more."
- Jakov_Salinsky
Roommate Status
"I moved in with a girlfriend before finding out more about her preferences. We had been dating for a year but I didn’t realize how much of a problem she had sharing until we lived together."
"We lived together for five years and never shared a bedroom, had everything split down the middle, including the pantry and fridge. Even when it came to spices, she insisted on me getting my own. She hated it when I would be in the same room as her unless it was on 'her terms.'"
"Whenever I asked to make our relationship more of a shared experience, I was gaslit into believing I was wrong for not allowing boundaries. She moved out a month ago, and I couldn’t believe how quickly my mental health improved simply by not having that toxic influence around anymore."
- Char10
Sobering Up
"Fell into a debilitating drug addiction. I have 26 months sober on the fifth!"
- pumpe88
Motorcycle Insurance
"I took a $12k loan to buy a motorcycle. I didn’t want to pay for comprehensive insurance, and the bike got stolen four months later."
- toyotasquad
Mental Health Assistance
"Not getting help for my depression sooner. Spent the entire first half of my 20s in the darkest place I can imagine, and all I needed to feel better was some meds once a day."
- badgirlkayy
Lackluster Love
"I got into a half-hearted relationship and wasted three years of my life."
- plutorollsvanillaice
Receiving an Education
"Not studying properly."
"At the time, studying for two to seven years seemed like a lifetime, but now at 30, I wish I had done it. Don't have the money or flexibility to do it now."
- MarmateW
Early Alcoholism
"I drank my way through my entire 20s. After 25, it wasn't really fun anymore, but that didn't stop me. I drank for another five years."
"My 20s are a total blur splattered with some fun times here and there. But mostly it was just me running away from things with alcohol."
"Almost 17 years later and not one drop. My 30s and 40s are exceptionally better."
- Blackbeltchicken
#GolfCartLife
"I crashed a golf cart at 29. I was so f**ked up with road rash, both ankles were rolled and f**ked up, and one Achilles was messed up pretty bad."
"It took two years for one ankle to feel normal again. I still have a bunch of scarring. I have never f**ked myself up so badly before. The road rash and treating it all over my body was one of the most painful things I’ve ever dealt with."
"I am so careful in those things now and honestly just everything in general. I'm lucky I didn’t hit my head."
- ochief19
...But How?
"I went to Italy and forgot to eat pizza."
"I still can't believe that happened. I had pasta there, gelato, took some amazing photos, explored a lot, and when I came back, I was like, I missed something?"
"Then I was like, 'F**K! I forgot to eat pizza, IN ITALY!' LOL (laughing out loud)."
- TheStraightishGuy
An Unexpected Life
"I remember when I was that age and desperately wanting the kind of job you work for the same place your whole life. Instead, I was in a dead-end job, working the third shift, going to school, and worrying constantly about what I was going to do with my life. I was lost and without any real direction."
"20-some years later, I still don’t have many traditional accomplishments. I’m a stay-at-home dad, and I was diagnosed with Crohn's at 21/22, so that ended school."
"All the things I thought I’d need to get through life, I don’t have."
"What I DO have is a wide array of experiences. I’ve worked in retail for decades, childcare/teaching/mentoring/etc., had kids for almost as long, worked on a shrimp boat, and tree farms, I’ve seen and been around every state except for Alaska."
" I know a ton of people and I’m generally on good terms with them, I’m healthy enough to exercise every day, I have a loving family, and all our basic needs are met. I’m still directionless but I’m no longer lost."
"Anyone else out there feeing like I did, just do the best you can with what you’ve got. Never stop trying to be better, and if you need to, just point in a direction and go that way."
"If you need a degree but you don’t know what you want, just pick something you think you’ll like. Some jobs that need a college degree mean they need someone with a Bachelor's degree."
- altxatu
When we think of mistakes made in our twenties, we might think of dating mishaps and drinking or partying too much.
But the reality is that the mistakes made in our twenties are far more serious, like creating routines that help us take care of ourselves or completing tasks that will help us reach our dreams.
Fortunately, we're young in our twenties, and we have a lot of time to come back from those mistakes.
It's also never too late to commit to doing better right now.
Time and time again, people spreading lies about others for no reason has demonstrated the lack of humanity in our gossip-obsessed society.
People have nothing better to do other than to bring down others out of spite.
What's even more disappointing is that some of us have at one point played a part in perpetuating these rumors without even knowing it.
And other times, we are the subject of a rumor, and that's never fun.
Curious to hear examples of the situation, Redditor PieNo17 asked:
"What’s the worst rumor you ever heard about yourself?"
Kids can be so cruel.
Introduction To Antisemitism
"I was bullied in elementary school for being Jewish. I very much am not Jewish. Apparently there was a rumor going around school that I was a 'Jew boy.' I was utterly confused and didn’t understand why being Jewish would even be something to be bullied about."
– goobermuslim
The Racist
"Ah, I used to get bullied for being Asian....I am not Asian. Turns out it was a rumor started by a kid who was actually half Asian. I think he just didn't want to be the only Asian kid at school."
– tn00bz
Seeking Pleasure At The Buffet
"When I was in sixth grade our whole grade (~100) was on a field trip out of town. We stopped at an Old Country Buffet to eat. I had to poop while we were there, and another kid in my grade was peeking through the stall at me while I was on the toilet. He then yelled that I was pleasuring myself in the stall. This turned into everyone talking about it outside of the bathroom, and now I was the kid who m*sturbated in an Old Country Buffet."
– slob_johnson
Teacher Killer
"When I was a kid, I was in the (for lack of a better term) special ed program at school due to a muscular condition that affected my fine motor skills, which meant I got bullied mercilessly. Determined to change my rep, I worked ridiculously hard to improve my skills so I no longer needed that program in middle school. Somehow, a rumor got started that I'd been kicked out of that program because I'd tried to kill the teacher, and that became the rumor that defined me until the day I graduated high school."
– jessthefacts97
These Redditors' friends thought they'd seen a ghost.
Wreck Survivor
"I had a car wreck on a country road. Black Cow and calf in the road, and I hit both of them. My mother called into school the next day but pretty much just told them I was in a wreck and nothing else. Word got around that I was dead in a car wreck."
"Showed up at school 2 days later because car wrecks hurt and a couple of buddies actually cried when I showed up saying they thought I was dead."
– DisGruntledDraftsman
Name Mixup
"Once, at work, we came across the obituary of a former coworker. Due to the long hours we were working on this project none of us managed to go to the wake or funeral, but we sent flowers. Months later the dude turned up on another job site, very much alive. Apparently this dude that died was totally unrelated, had the same name and was also an industrial painter… we sent flowers, that must have been confusing for his family."
– trijkdguy
Different Coworker
"Similar story happened to me. Had severe covid at the very beginning of the pandemic. Was out of work for 6 months. Someone with my exact name and in the same town passed away my coworkers thought it was me. Some people didn't even know i was alive until I was back to work for three months"
– ZombieLebowski
The Friendship Test
"That I had died. I woke up one morning to find about 50 messages on my phone and dozens of missed calls (my phone was on silent). It was my ex girlfriend of all people who I spoke with first as she was freaking out because (as it turns out) someone with my name had died. It got lost in translation and next thing you know a lot of my out of state friends thought it was me. It was nice to know they cared so much."
– Yeeaaaarrrgh
Rumors about crushes, love and relationships seem to be a commonality.
Some "Friend"
"My friend introduced me to a girl at his high school and we were into each other. She was having some friends over for a sleepover and took the opportunity to invite me over, cuddle and make out while everyone else was asleep. The next morning we groggily hung out for a bit and made plans to hang out again soon. I’ll never forget how she hugged me and kissed me before I left. I ran into our mutual friend while walking home and I told him where I’d been. I didn’t know that he had a crush on her and he was pissed. By the time I got home, she had blocked and deleted me. I found out later from another friend that our mutual 'friend' had told her that I had an STD and only wanted to use her for sex."
– regnarbensin_
Friendship Destroyer
"Hey, this same thing happened to me! I moved around a lot as a kid and ended up in the same place for 7th to 12th grade. The first few people I met were some kids in the neighborhood, 1 girl and 1 guy. They weren't mutual friends, but I became good friends with both of them and ended up introducing them to each other. The girl and I would stay up late texting on old flip phones and sneak out with each other over the summer. Then, almost out of nowhere, she just stopped talking to me. Turns out the guy developed a crushed and spent literal weeks trying to convince her that all I wanted was sex. Luckily, I was able to find out and defend myself, but unluckily, I found out later that he did that with many, many people. He probably ended up ruining at least 30 friendships with people throughout my time in high school."
– LycheeTrash
A Bad Romance
"i think the only rumor that i ever really heard back in highschool was that i communed with satan. and when a few people asked, i just went with it. i was just like ya, satan and i talked last night, hes doing well. we have dinner plans for the weekend. just stupid stuff like that."
– another-redditor3
We never know how the rumor mill picks some of these out and seemingly distributes them to everyone in our community, no matter how big or small or far away. But we're glad these Redditors were willing to share!
It's a teacher's job to leave a lasting impression and set a good example for their students.
With this in mind, particularly in this age of viral videos and social media, teachers have to be very careful of what they say during class hours.
Even so, there are very few teachers who haven't said something they've regretted when teaching a class.
Sometimes to control unruly students, other times when they've simply had enough.
Then too, sometimes teachers leave their students baffled and perplexed by what they say in their classroom, well aware of what they were saying.
Always making for a memorable story.
"What’s the wildest thing you’ve ever heard teacher say in class?"
And Anyone With Such Closed Minded Views Shouldn't Be Teaching...
"Had the Head of the Department in college claim in class that anyone who actually needs accommodations for mental health issues should not be in college to begin with."
"This was while we were discussing 'Death of a Salesman' and the discussion had veered over to unhealthy pressure and social standards for success."- RavensQueen502
Wait what?!
"My very well-respected Biology teacher in college spent almost an entire lecture telling us that Jamie Lee Curtis was a hermaphrodite."
"It seemed oddly personal to him."- Urbane_Cowboy
Sad On So Many Levels
"Not heard but my freshmen year high school teacher once pulled a bottle of Jack out of his desk and took a shot during class."
"He was dying so towards the end I think he just stopped caring."- Mangothefello
Can't Take The Heat, Then Stay Out Of The Classroom...
"High school science teacher told my class that a kilometre was longer than a mile."
"Refused to budge when refuted and kicked out several students for doing so."- SupersonicDebris13
"5th grade teacher: 'Mount Whitney in California is the tallest mountain in the world'."
"5th grade me blurts out: 'No it isn't, Mount Everest is."
"Whitney is not even the tallest mountain in the USA, which is Mount McKinley in Alaska'."
"I got in trouble for 'contradicting the teacher'."- gtmattz
It's Not Just Students Who Are Bullies...
"I had a teacher ridicule a fat kid about his lunch choices in front of the whole class."
"He ran out crying as she was making fat guy blimp gestures and telling him he was going to be huge as an adult."- SnooOwls5859
Some Dramatic License It Seems...
"I had a literature teacher who told the class that he didn't believe in dinosaurs, because the universe is only a couple thousand years old."
"The bones were put there by Satan."
"Thank f*ck he wasn't a science or history teacher."- AllBadAnswers
Everyone Deserves Nice Acomodations...
"My English teacher told us that he genuinely believes that the Rothchilds own a hotel for aliens in the Bermuda triangle."- TroyLear77
Well, Then...
"We had this kid in our 6th-grade class."
"Very dark skinned kid from Africa."
"His name was Tajak."
"Every now and then when we'd line up to go to another class or lunch and the lights would go out some of his friends would go 'where Tajak at?'"
"Anyway one day we had a sub and we we're lining up for lunch, the lights went out and there went the 'where Tajak at?' and the SUBSTITUTE TEACHER who was also black went 'Boy you darker than night'."
"6th grade was f*cking wild."- 11221mikew
Sad Premonitions
"Psych teacher in high school told us that 1 in 10 of the people were friends with in high school would be dead within 5 years of graduating."
"At the time I thought it was hyperbole, but it turns out he was being conservative."
"3 of the people in my high school friend group were dead by the time I was 22."- Reddit
Do They Really Need A Reason?
"'Now girls, don't you let them boys touch your breasts'."
"'It'll give you cancer'."- jondru
Maybe Should Have Checked With The Geography Teacher?
"A teacher in Elementary school claimed during history class that the Colosseum was in Greece, as an Italian kid I was very confused, this was in Mexico."- Spascucci
So Much For Instilling Hope...
"Didn't hear this personally, but read in a book about a guy who recalled his teacher skipping chapters in a textbook and saying 'You will not need to know this when you are down in the mines'."- futanari_kaisa
The mark of a good teacher is that students will take everything they hear from them with them for the rest of their lives.
Though, the less-than-wonderful teachers may also say things their students will never forget.