Veterans Share The Most Horrible Thing They Experienced While Serving Their Country.
Veterans of Reddit were asked: "What is the scariest thing you saw in your service?" These are some of the best answers.
1/21 For me it was sitting in a windowless basement office helping to plan death and destruction 12-14 hours at a time for months on end.
Apparently, despite never being shot at or actually having my life in danger (unless you count the possibility of dying from sleep deprivation) that was still enough to give me PTSD. I'm still not completely convinced that this is possible, but several psychiatrists and therapists disagree, so I'm doing my best to deal with it.
coprolite_hobbyist
2/21 Round flew right by my head and hit the ANA guy who was standing next to me in the face. While that might sound scary just on its own, let me give you a bit of background on this guy. His name was Ahmad Durrani, he was 22 years old (same as me at the time), and was born in Kunduz.
He had joined up because he wanted to protect his family while saving up to afford visas and passports for his sisters and mother. This guy was sharp. His English was great. And he was a hell of a soldier. I remember this one time we were on patrol when we came under fire: his ANA buddies all started doing that pose where they fire from behind cover without aiming (see Liveleak if you have no idea what I'm talking about) and he ran up to them yelling "Aim like they taught you! Aim like they taught you!"
He had dreams of going to America and getting into law school, he wanted to "fight injustice across the world". He had this little 'catchphrase' I guess... "For the good of all" For the good of all...
All that potential. All that promise. Gone. Just gone. That beautiful soul wiped away in a split second. And I watched it happen. After the dust settled I made my way back to him.
This was the first time I had ever lost a friend. I mean a few guys in my unit had gotten hit before, but up until that point I had never seen a comrade laying in the dirt. It's a haunting feeling. Just a few seconds ago, you were talking about some [stuff, messing] around and making jokes that were often lost in translation.
And then they're gone. Reduced to corpse lying in the dirt with your once beautiful mind beginning to clump in the blood-soaked mud.
TheDomesticOG
3/21 I wasn't a line troop, but I supported an Infantry Battalion directly through two different tours in Iraq (06-07, 08-09) and we got some pretty gnarly AOs. While I never had any I'm Gonna Die moments, everybody sees messed up things...things that just make you think. I remember the first time I saw a HMMWV melted down - an automatic transmission liquefies like the T-1000. Seeing some poor [guy] who got smeared all over the inside of a truck by explosives is pretty gruesome. Same thing for VBIEDs (car bombs) - an Opel loaded with 155mm howitzer rounds shakes foundations for miles.
The scariest thing I think I can answer for...is human transformation. We had one guy who was an awesome guy - funny, joking, helpful...until he finally just saw the wrong damn thing. Our awesome guy received and scrubbed an MRAP (truck) after it got hit by an Explosively Formed Penetrator, which is downright scary in every possible way it can be. The EFP slug ended up going right through the driver of the vehicle and splattering him all around the truck.
Very few individuals are prepared to handle that situation with aplomb, some just don't have the coping mechanism to handle it at all. Our Awesome Guy was in the latter group - he was a changed man immediately after that incident: quiet, bottled up, slept little, etc. After that tour he got into drugs really bad and trashed his career...but he was done anyways.
So ya...human transformation. It shows just how vulnerable our personalities and psyches are.
kanonfodr
4/21 I worked on a sling-load team in Afghanistan in '10-'11. When the order came in for 50+ bodybags to be shipped immediately, got a little sick to my stomach. Then they called for more while we were flying back from dropping them off, because they ran out not putting more than one identifiable man's parts in each bag, I cried. Still do.
Baddest dudes in the world got scattered, all at once. Still catches me some days, chokes me up.... and I was barely associated with it.
deakon
5/21 I was deployed in Iraq in 2007, and ever since I haven't been able to bring myself to relieve myself on a squat toilet. I think this all began when I was taking a dump and the building I was in got hit by a mortar. So yeah, literally scared the [crap] out of me.
xKilgore
6/21 It's an entirely different universe. You spend so much time preparing to go to war and go through so many drills to really make sure you know how to react to anything, from a lone sniper to a complex ambush with IEDs, secondary explosives and an enemy squad.
When I actually had to use the things we'd practice, it was second nature. I wasn't thinking that the person I'm shooting at may have had a family or they were firing a pot shot just to earn money. I wasn't thinking about whether or not I was dying, to me it was just shoot back.
But they never trained you on the downtime. You had down time, you were always prepared for something. Hyper vigilant, is an appropriate term for it. It's been years since I came back, but I feel like I'm still ready to fight at a moment's notice. Relaxing is hard. They didn't teach us about how to readjust to a non combat environment.
mctacoflurry
7/21 I miss the war. Honestly, it's such a heightened experience. You know how you wonder if your friends are fake or not? They're not during war. They're as close as ever. You fall into such a daily habit of things you kind of overlook it. I remember just loading up the humvee everyday, we all knew our jobs, we all knew what was outside the wire and it just became a daily process. To be honest, it's just so simple. Everyone wants to do their portion because everyone knows someone could die if they don't.
It's weird for me to be around civilians (I am still in) because people are just so damn selfish. No one wants to do things to make others lives easier. Over there, everyone will do their best to take care of their task daily.
Everything is increased to a level you won't experience again. Friendship. Love. Hate. Suffering. Happiness. I've never had such friends as the ones I've had on my deployments. I never really cared for any men as much. I have suffered greatly due to my deployments. I have never experienced such happiness than knowing some [jerk] tried to kill me and completely failed.
Yeah, it was a rough couple of years. Those years was my youth though. Now that I'm a Drill Sergeant, I just try to pass on to my men that war is a heightened and truly different experience for everyone. It can be brutal but some things in it you'll always remember.
TheClownofRenown
8/21 I'm a combat veteran with PTSD. War is extremely boring. Several months of preparing, sleeping, playing golf in the sand, writing letters, drinking water, singing songs with guitars people brought along, pooping out in the open, playing football, freezing at night, burning up during the day, wishing you were home, and
.... several hours of pure terror, your heart pounding so hard you think it might leap out of your chest, your best friend on fire, running as fast as humanly possible, pure luck, sleeping with one eye open and your hand on your weapon, laser focused on the task before you, the world melting away as the only thing you observe is a heart beating and breath being taken in, then silence.
You walk along with the rest of the group. Everyone celebrating that we're going home, but you just give a fake smile. All you can think about is not having been there 5 minutes earlier, or why didn't he duck, or why him...
And the sound still stays muted even through the great yell being given by everyone as the plane lifts off the ground and heading home, the high fives given are half hearted and unenthusiastic as we stop at several airports on the way to the states. Everything quiet and just as dead as your best friend. Then you finally see your beautiful wife...and it hits you. That you were lucky enough to be here, now. That incredible moment when you finally hold her and kiss her deeply and forget everyone else there to meet you. Then remember that other beautiful woman not kissing her hero. Not making love to her prince - and the guilt starts again.
Then the real war starts. The yelling and screaming - you left the door open! What is wrong with you! Don't you know anything about security??? The feeling of fury over a burned sandwich-that smells like death. The anger over someone being sweet to you. The murderous rage over being woken up in the middle of the night by that sweet someone wanting to make love. The anguish of having experienced a break in and beating that person only to find out it was an elderly man with Alzheimers having accidentally walked into the wrong home and the blind fury over her having not locked the front door - again.
War itself is hard, sure. But the training and the adrenalin and the focus makes it all a blur. It's After war where we aren't trained and don't have an outlet for the adrenalin and the only focus is the pain and fear and guilt and sleeplessness that makes it last decades. Decades.
mherick
9/21 It's very surreal at times. It's boring and we know an idle mind doesn't help any. Every now and then you have bullets whipping by your head, pieces of concrete smacking you in the face, and dead bodies laying on the floor. How would I describe war? It's a different world, nothing like the movies, highly morbid and boring.
BeanGallery
10/21 I was in the USAF as a 2T2. Essentially I was the guy that helped get people and supplies flown into and out of the AOR. I mostly stayed on the passenger side booking people into flights and making sure they get on the right aircraft.
For us it's mostly a fight against boredom. It was 12-14 hour shifts 6-7 days a week. When off work there was essentially nothing to do besides go to the gym. I spent a lot of my free time reading my kindle at the smoke pit. We did get attacked damn near everyday but after the first month or so it didn't really phase us anymore. You'd hear the siren. Then sometimes walk over to a bunker and wait it out then go back to what you were doing.
That was my experience being in a war zone. Logistical support is necessary but it can be boring. There were a few occasions that were fun. When musicians or comedians came through on USO tours id get to meet and talk with them since I was going out to meet their plane and get them off the flight line. But for the most part it was an exercise in dealing with boredom.
nimieties
11/21 Watched, via ISR footage while deployed in Iraq, a kidnapping of a man by Al Quaeda and then the eventual execution in a rural field. It stuck with me how they tossed him in the car trunk, drove miles out to the rural area outside Baghdad, dragged him out of trunk like a sack of potatoes, then stood him up in the field and executed him with their Ak-47's.
And there was nothing we could do about it.
nimbusdimbus
12/21 I was a Navy Sailor who went out to sea many times for weeks at a time. One of my jobs was being a lookout to spot boats, planes, things in the water or air pretty much and report it back to the ship. My Lookout rotation could have me standing watch during the day or night sometimes both and it was during the nights where I was pretty afraid especially if you were at the back of the ship alone. For anyone who hasn't been out in the middle of the ocean in the middle of the night should realize you see many more lights in the sky than you would ever in a city. And on Navy ships they like to have very little lights on at night so standing watch around 1am feels very alien sometimes. And during the nights without a bright moon to help with your vision, you may as well be on a different planet.
There was this one time I saw bright green color moving in the water slowly and I didn't know what it was. My mind told me maybe it's a USO or something else. Eventually I was told it was just plankton but it sure looked freaky to someone who wasn't aware of the glowing plankton produces. Another time me and another guy were standing watch together and I decided just to look up during 2am and see what things I would come across the midnight sky. I would see meteors streak across the sky but a couple of times there were bright lights moving slowly way out there. Perhaps a satellite, maybe who knows. But I stared for a good 20 minutes in the sky and encountered approximately 15 of those slow moving lights in different areas of the sky perhaps many millions of miles apart. Either way those were the few times I saw for myself how vast space really is and that there was so much unknowns out there that humans have yet to discover or explain.
terrificheretic
13/21 Yeah Iraq sucked for many reasons but that wasn't the scariest thing I saw. It's what we did to each other when we got back. Each month it got worse and worse. Sexual assaults, rapes, vicious fights, bureaucratic backstabs, mental breakdowns, and medical discharges.
My boss, I'll call her lieutenant M. was one of our battalion's SHARP (Sexual Harassment/Assault Response & Prevention) reps. This wasn't her only responsibility, just an additional one. Every week she had to face hell all the while showing a brave face and signing paperwork like it was just any other job. I saw and helped with only a fraction of the work and it disturbed me. This went on for a year but I saw in her eyes she had aged a decade.
I finished my contract and got out before she did, but not long after I left she was out on medical grounds, in rehab fighting severe alcoholism. Watching colleagues, friends, and family breaking all the while breaking myself was the real nightmare.
Slyfox00
14/21 Incoming was always scary, but it was also scary to watch a B-52 strike. The ground shook for miles around. Napalm was also scary to watch, especially when it was close; and it usually was close.
truthseeker444
15/21 I was part of Desert Fox/Nobil Anvil. I have a hard time putting it into words. I'm sad for those that had to die because someone on their side put them on a path that took them against our side. I spent a fair bit of time contemplating my existence and what I would do once I was out of that situation. Then I went and did my job.
I didn't have to worry about bullets because I was on a submarine. I had to rely on the actions of the ~100 other guys to keep me alive. It wasn't so much Band of Brothers, but I really do look back on those guys with a lot of respect. I don't put myself in the same class as the infantry guys though. It's an entirely different experience.
nontheistzero
16/21 Marine vet with 100% PTSD here. War was 99% boring as hell with some sporadic excitement thrown in whenever some Iraqis felt froggy. It is tons of driving and doing [stupid] work while being shot at. Then if you're lucky you go back to your base at night and get a shower and some hot food. Back on base you get to [defecate] in a luxurious porta-potty while listening to another man abuse his [penis] next door. Then you get attacked with mortars. Part of your building was destroyed but go ahead and try to sleep. You eventually get so tired that you're able to ignore the sound of a generator operating directly outside your window. Imagine sleeping with a lawn mower next to your bed.
As [crappy] as baselife was, raiding was much worse. At 2 in the morning we would drive or fly into towns and then raid them. We would stay for about a week and raid houses and shops during the night and hide out during the day. It is so damn hot that you can't sleep during the day. You end up going for days without sleep while being shot at with rifles, rockets, bombs, grenades and mines and then standing gun watch all night. War is incredibly stressful. Having to take another human's life is awful. I think the majority of veterans would oppose most military involvement.
[deleted]
17/21 It's kind of scary when the indirect fire (mortars, rockets, etc.) alarms go off and you run to a bunker.
While you're sitting in the bunker, which is really just a few slabs of concrete, there's this feeling of complete impotence. In all the war movies you've ever seen, an enemy attacks and the soldiers rush forward with their weapons to meet the attack head on. In reality, when the Taliban is firing mortars at you, there's nothing you can do except sit there and wait.
So you sit down in the bunker, with a loud alarm screaming at you, and you know you're completely powerless to do anything. You sit there and you listen for small arms fire, you listen for people screaming (if they got hit), and you listen to the explosions coming closer and closer to you as the Taliban adjusts their aim and tries to land rockets on your head.
The worst part is that when you come back home, everything sounds like that IDF alarm. Somebody scoots their chair back on a tiled floor, and your heart rate shots up to 120 and you reach for a weapon that you're no longer carrying.
[deleted]
18/21 Former Army infantry here so I'll chime in. Losing friends is hard but actually having to carry their bodies after they've been hit by an IED is the worst. Those things are scary in themselves, but when you can't recognize someone because their entire face is missing, that will [mess] anybody up.
notpersianbro
19/21 It varies from boring and mundane to heart racing adrenaline filled moments. Depending on your job, unit, and pure dumb luck the amount of time you spend on one side of the scale changes. It eventually becomes very routine and blends together, we worked 7 days a week with every day being the same thing. For me it went like this. You wake up, get chow, go to daily briefs, plan the mission, do the mission, come back and try to eat something, go to the gym, eat again, and try to occupy yourself until you get tired and start all over again the next day. The only variance in the schedule is what time you go on target, and if anything happens while there. If the mission gets cancelled for whatever reason that time is filled with classes of different topics. Everyday for months and months you see and live with the same people, eat the exact same food, go to the same places at the same time and watch the same movies, tv shows, or play the same games. All while 100% sober and celibate.
This monotony is dotted by your daily mission involving multiple hour long firefights, clearing buildings, S vests, various forms of IEDs, and sprinting through the mountains at several thousand feet above sea level, wearing 100lbs of [stuff] chasing people that are wearing normal clothes. Friends die, innocent people die, enemies die and the only distinction between them is where they happened to be standing on the planet when supersonic chunks of metal happened to also be there. Training, equipment, and planning all tilt the odds in your favor, but anyone that has seen real combat will tell you a bunch of it is pure dumb luck. You happened to be on the drivers side of the vehicle, you didn't step on the ppied the person ahead of you did, the rpg that hit the wall 2 feet from you was a dud, etc.
The worst part of all of that is coming and going from the states. Most units deploy and sit in Kuwait for a month waiting for their stuff, or have a 2 week layover in manas on the way out, not mine. I said goodbye to my wife, got on a bus to the airfield 10 minutes away, loaded up had a 3 hour layover in Germany and then touched down where ever we were going. With the expectation we were mission capable in 24 hours after landing. With all the time zone changing and flights the average time from kissing my wife to loading a helicopter to hit a target was ~48 hours, with 72 being the latest. For the trip to go home you stand down 24-48 hours before you leave to pack, clean, and do customs. Load the plane, fly to Germany for a 3 hour layover, then fly straight back to the base, turn in sensitive items break the pallet down and get released for a 48 hour pass. Average time from the last mission to kissing my wife was right around 4 days. That's the real [problem], going from being a normal citizen to a war zone in 2 days and then going from a war zone to citizen again in 4.
FMLRegnar
20/21 Going to shower, hearing the incoming fire siren go off. You continue to shower as the 122mm Russian made BM-21 GRAD rockets start hitting the area around you - because there's nothing you can do and nowhere within range is safe. A piece of shrapnel hits the outside of the field-shower, and you still do nothing.
Just lather and rinse.
ash286
21/21 I saw two mid-level Taliban leaders get shredded by the 30mm cannon off of an A-10. Body parts just scattered everywhere. About 10 minutes later, a pack of wild dogs showed up and ate what was left of them.
Reploid345
We may not like it, but getting older is pretty inevitable.
With age may come wisdom, but it also comes with lots of responsibilities.
And some days, we're just over it.
Redditor brick_layer asked:
"What tasks are you tired of doing as an adult?"
Decisions, Decisions
"Deciding what to make for dinner."
- PortiaEss
"I would eat people kibble if it tasted good. Bachelor Chow (just add beer) needs to be a real thing."
- chaos8803
Hi, Ho, Hi, Ho
"Going to work and acting like a functional person."
- ovelanimimerkki
"Yep, I hate trying to work when I'm not emotionally stable or just exhausted. And you literally can't tell anyone or they tell you to go get a coffee which just makes the week go downhill over time."
- gg_ff_42069
Manners
"Being polite to other adults who don't deserve it."
- 25_-a
"Also known as the 'I am too old for this sh*t' phase of life."
- Zintao
Cleaning
"Cleaning the fridge. 🤢 when I find something way in the back that’s been forgotten."
- joydobson
"I finally cleaned out ours today because it was trash day, and the husband isn’t home to argue with me about how that sauce from 2015 is 'still good!!' 🤨 Now I have an empty fridge with just the bare essentials. Worth it."
- Grizelda_Gunderson
Circle of Life
"Working. Paying bills. Getting up early. Doing stuff."
- guyfromcroswell
"Agreed. Such a mundane cycle indeed."
- Emotional_Ratio_3251
Is Naked So Bad?
"Laundry grrrrr."
- FewPizza7880
"I tend to put the laundry in, hear it beep, forget about it for 6 hours then remember it needs to dry."
- marvel_is_wow
Traffic
"Anticipating the morons on the roads that change lanes without signaling."
"Or merging into 70mph traffic while doing 45..."
- haveyouseenthebridge
"Or being stuck behind those people as we're merging, I get pissed. Like speed up to the flow of traffic, being behind them merging puts me in danger too."
- Nigel_IncubatorJones
Maintenance
"Buying a house is an endless list of shit that needs fixing or improving."
- muffbiscuits
"This is one of the many reasons I bought a condo. The majority of the maintenance is somebody else’s problem. I haven’t cut grass, raked leaves or shoveled snow in almost a decade."
‐ yogaballcactus
Teeth
"Brushing my teeth. It's annoying."
- scottevil110"
"I feel this deep. It’s flossing for me."
- brick_layer
"Wait until you're in your 60s and all of a sudden the perfect teeth that never even had a cavity now all of a sudden have tiny cracks and need porcelain crowns and you have constant pain and Delta Dental only covers cleanings and x-rays and a single crown is like $1500 and they're telling you that you need four and you think, well, we don't really need two cars, I could sell my old Subaru."
- Nobody_Wins_13
Alarming
"Waking up to an alarm clock."
"I've been waking up to an alarm clock almost every day since 1985, and I'm fucking tired of it."
"I want to wake up when I'm done sleeping."
"I don't want to wake up and find that I've slept through/turned off my alarm(s) yet again, and have to choose between packing a lunch and taking a shower."
- thisbuttonsucks
What part of adulthood are you tired of?
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I would love to know how people don't fear death.
I mean, it's the end. Life will be over. That kind of sucks.
Yet there are people who find tranquility in it.
Can you teach the rest of us?
Redditor deensuk wanted to hear from everyone who has a calmness about the heading to the afterlife. They asked:
"People who are not scared of death, why?"
I have a constant fear of death. I wanna perfect the ending of "Death Becomes Her" so I can live forever.
Before
"I'm not scared of death because of working in health care I was around it so much. I AM scared of what leads to death, however."
Full-Mulberry5020
Why now?
"Why should I be scared now of something that's only going to happen at the end of my life?"
User Deleted
"I did this cult thing called the landmark forum and I actually did like their “meaning of life”: the meaning of life is that there is no meaning. Life is empty and meaningless. There is no answer."
"Life is what you make of it and every persons answer is equally valid because there is no meaning to life. Life exists as, basically, an accident, we are all here by complete accident, there’s no great mystery, it’s all biology and you are 100% free to make life about whatever it is you want."
Conservative_HalfWit
Death and I are good friends...
"I was very sick as a child. Spent ages 7-20 in and out of hospital due to kidney issues. Lost a kidney at 28. Almost died during the surgery to removed the dead kidney due to blood loss. Had 5 surgeries back to back during the next 2 years. Twice they had difficulties bringing me out of anesthesia."
"Found my favorite aunt dead in her bed when I was 22. Watched my best friend die from a brain tumor at 30. Death has been a constant force in my life. Sometimes just on the edges waiting, sometimes unexpected staring me in the face. I'm not afraid because it's always been there. I now work in healthcare. Death and I are good friends."
Tiny_Teach_5466
No Worries
"Because it's coming for us all, sooner or later. So there's no point in worrying about it. I am much more concerned about day to day minutiae. The Lars von Trier film Melancholia starring Kirstin Dunst portrayed this perfectly. If there was an asteroid hurtling towards the earth, I'd probably be more preoccupied with worrying about whether I left the back light on or not."
Giallo_submarine
It's Over
"Because no one has ever made it out alive, and I was dead for an eternity before I was alive, and didn't suffer the slightest inconvenience because of it."
MarshallApplewhiteDo
I never thought about the before much. I hope the before is quick.
The Effects
"I hope that when my times comes it will be merciful. My uncle had a stroke, he is paralyzed. My grandmother is 91, but is losing all her memories of her life. Death does not scare me, what could be left of me before I die is what terrifies me."
M1ssy_M3
No Terror
"It’s like when the writer Nabokov said that he saw a picture one time, a picture of before he was born. It was a picture of his mother, his brother and sister that were older than him, but he had not been born yet. He said that when he saw that picture there was no terror in him, even though he was looking at a picture where he didn’t exist."
im_on-the_can
state of nonexistence...
"I'm not afraid of death, I'm afraid of dying. Death is just the state of nonexistence I experienced before I was born. I don't remember it because I didn't exist yet. Death will be the same way. I just don't want the transition to be marked by pain and sorrow at things left unfinished. I want it to be quick, painless, and with me surrounded by love."
Wazula42
I'm Gone...
"Because once I die, I won't know it. I won't miss people or regret things or feel pain or sadness about anything. I might fear being sick and slowly dying, just having to live with the knowledge that it's all going to end and this is the last time I'll ever see the people I love or taste good food or hear good music. That sounds almost unbearable. But death isn't even a thing, it's just having done something (died)."
"It's like virginity, it's a made-up state of being that just says whether or not you've experienced a specific occurrence. Once I die, I'm gone. My corpse will be the empty wrapper I used to be in, just garbage to be disposed of in whatever way makes my survivors feel better. I'll be switched off. If I don't worry about what the light feels after the bulb burns out, why would I be afraid of being dead?"
SallyHeap
At Peace
"I’m scared now because I have young kids. Once my kids are old enough to be on their own I imagine the fear will subside and I’ll have a more relaxed approach."
User Deleted
Some very interesting perspectives. May it all calm peacefully and with great mercy for us all.
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Dating and the search for love and companionship... What a nightmare.
This journey plays out nothing like in the movies.
Every Prince or Princess (or everything in BTW) seems to have a touch of the psycho.
The things people say during what should be simple dinner conversation can leave a dining partner aghast.
Like... do you hear you?
Redditor detroit_michigldan wanted to discuss all the best ways to crash and burn when trying to make a romantic connection. They asked:
"You're on a date and it's going really great. What can another person say to ruin it completely?"
I once had a guy ask me if I was willing to follow him into the woods, depending on the price of the meal.
Yeah. No steak is worth that.
Plans After...
"Thanks for the ride but I have a date with someone else, I figured you wouldn't drive me if you knew I was going on a date with someone else and I really needed a ride."
"Online dating, talked to her for a while, finally got the courage to ask her out and then she said that as we got there."
iareyours
Mirror Image
“'You look just like my wife!'”
catalinachild
"I did have a guy tell me I reminded him of his son. I don’t believe English has a word to adequately describe my feelings at that time."
UnicornMagicRainbow
"That would definitely do it."
chaotica78
Third Wheel
"'Hope you don't mind if my mother joins us.'"
ofsquire
"Actually had a girl do this on a first date because she had anxiety issues. Honestly wasn’t bad except that 90% of the time she was silent and her mom talked over her."
"I didn’t mind that much and wouldn’t have minded trying again when she was more comfortable except that she was let go at the company we worked at and she deleted her social media profiles and she never responded on her number. Ah well."
Seightx
Liar
"'Hey bro aren't you gay? I made out with you last night.'"
"Random dude I've never seen before in front of my (f) date."
JHXC16
Was he lying though?
Filter Issues
"'You looked better on Tinder.'"
waqasnaseem07
"Isn’t it basic knowledge that everybody looks slightly worse than the worst picture you can find?"
no_user_ID_found
The Past
"'My ex used to do that too.'"
xxIvyOF
"Yep. I’ve definitely had two otherwise-decent-guy date-situations sour because the ex-comparisons just would not stop flowing. No woman wants to be seen as interchangeable—I’m not here to perfectly fill that ex-sized hole in your life. Focusing on the present moment and a future we could build together is a courtesy we need to grant each other in earliest dates of dating."
LarkScarlett
Powerless
"'I'm an alpha, you cant handle my top energy.'"
Midnightgay28
"I actually left a dude in the middle of dinner, in part, for saying this. I ordered an Uber under the table while pretending to listen to him. Went to the bathroom, and never came back. That was when I was young. Now I’d just say, 'How about we enjoy this meal in silence, before we head our separate ways.'”
UnicornMagicRainbow
Mommy...
"'Mother says I should be back by 9.'"
"Saying 'mother says' just feels weird."
bunnyrut
"That gives me Norman Bates vibes."
Werewolf_lover20
"'Mother says alligators are aggressive because they have an overabundance of teeth, but lack a toothbrush.'"
sodaextraiceplease
Obvs...
"'If you were going to be murdered, what method would you prefer. Purely hypothetical. Obvs.'"
Specific_Tap7296
If it looks anything like a Dateline NBC episode... RUN!
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Despite the advancement of technology rendering people left to their own devices–literally–to entertain them, there are some leisurely activities that will never go out of style.
Or so you would think.
Do people still knit to pass the time? Are people actively collecting stamps?
It depends on who's asking.
Curious to hear about hobby trends, Redditor gizehgizeh asked:
"What are once popular hobbies that are slowly dying these days?"

Before we've become conditioned to living on our phones, these activities used to keep people occupied.
Before Texting, There Was This
"Letter writing."
– littlekingMT
Literal And Tangible Joy
"Well the internet killed pen pals for sure. I do remember I had a Japanese girl for a penpal maybe back in 2007 or so. I honestly don't remember how it started, pretty sure some website, but that was a fun experience. But now I can just straight up talk to foreign people real time, lol. But yea getting a physical letter that someone took the time to write and mail still is hard to beat feelings wise."
– skyburnsred
Model Trains
"When I was growing up, every town had a model train store in it. Now I have one in region and everything else has to be bought online."
– Hairy_Effective1172
Pretty Rocks
"Don’t see anyone playing marbles anymore, I had an awesome collection in school."
– sheeple85
"I had some marbles as a kid in the 90s. My grandma got them for me and I had no idea what I was supposed to do with them. I always imagined them as a thing kids in the 40s played with."
– Ryoukugan
People Were Moving Canvases
"Paintball has been dying a slow death since 2006. Sad, really."
– hobo_recycler
Before the general population began hating clutter, collecting was once a "thing."
Precious Coins
"Coin collecting... I'm a silver/gold nut and I'm always hunting for precious metal coins. whenever I go into a shop they get all excited because 'no one under 70 collects coins anymore.'"
– ThatFishySmell99
Post It
"Stamp collecting."
– spooky_scully_mulder
"Collecting in general, really. Of course there are still prominent collectors but it's slipped more into enthusiast and niche territory than being a popular hobby that you might expect anyone to have."
– iuytrefdgh436yujhe2
What A Gem
"Rockhounding was immensely popular back in the 1950's and 1960's. Personally, I think it's a fascinating and fulfilling hobby, but when I go to a meeting at a rock and gem club, I'm usually the youngest one in the room by several decades."
– filthy_lucre
People once enjoyed making things.
Admiring The View
"Stained glass. I learned how to make it from my old man, and my junior high art class teacher also taught it. Very few artisans are still around."
– brobeanzhitler
Metal Vocation
"Black smithing."
– kenworth117
"I bought a forge to try. It’s insanely hard work, and crazy expensive. I still haven’t finished a piece."
– DSentvalue
Scrapbooking
"Yeah. I'm watching the arts and crafts stores around me completely uninstalling their racks for specialty paper. Now the only thing they have is mega packs of repeating colors/images. To boot all the inclusions like papercraft/die-cut things, washi tape, scissors, stickers, etc have gotten so expensive I would rather go buy $5 bags at value village to get an assortment of things versus buying anything new. I really, really miss yard sales for the same reasons."
– Phantasmai
I envy people who have jobs that are basically their hobbies.
Not everyone gets paid doing what they actually enjoy and have a profound level of passion for.
If they do, kudos to them.
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