Did anyone else almost exclusively eat McNuggets when they were a kid? Or was I just the biggest picky eater of all time? Regardless, it's very rare that I voluntarily go to McD's and get some nuggets as an adult. Did I outgrow it? Or did my tastebuds change?
I'm not the only one experiencing the phenomenon of outgrowing childhood foods. Here are just a few examples. Specter6272 asked:
What is a food you no longer enjoy as an adult?
Ah yes, the plight of the childish food losing its magic as an adult.
Spoiler: it spells “adulthood”.
“I can no longer enjoy Alphabetti pasta without my reading glasses on.”
“oooooooo
‘Lois! My Alpha-bits cereal is haunted!’
‘Peter, those are Cheerios.’”
Frosting gets worse as you grow older.
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“Frosting. I would eat the frosting first and then a cake or cupcake. Now, it gives me a stomachache and push it aside when I get cake.”
“I guess, thanks to the food industry there are a lot of examples of this situation. Cake frosting used to be delicious like 10-15 years ago but recently they give nothing but head ache. Have you tried a fully homemade cake?”
Now it’s Coke Zero or bust.
“Soda. I used to chug a Coke every day after school. Now I can't stand them.”
“A part of me hopes I out grow my soda addiction some day... but on the other hand I'd probably turn to booze to get through the day and I'm not sure if that's any better.”
Gross af.
“Cosmic brownies. I used to love them as a kid, but now I find them to be way too d*mn fudgy.”
“Yes! For me, all Little Debbies and Vichon brand snacks. I used to eat them all the time but the thought just makes me queasy now.”
Like the Cosmic Brownies, sometimes even the mention of certain foods are enough to make someone gag.
The unfortunate truth.
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“Pizza pops. It's possible I just outgrew them, but I'm pretty sure they changed the recipe. Now the dough is too sweet, the "cheese" doesn't even melt, and there's way less goo inside”
“Bagel bites are right on that street.”
Crunch Berries are the bomb, tbh.
“Popular breakfast cereals. I can't believe I used to eat that crap.”
“You know you want a bowl of Cap'n Crunch berries. I don't believe your lies.”
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Was milk ever good, though?
“Velveeta Mac and cheese, Subway sandwiches, and milk. Used to drink like two glasses of milk a day, but now I can't remember when I last had a swallow, let alone a glass, of just milk.”
“When I was in high school I would, and this is no exaggeration, literally drink anywhere from a half gallon to a full ass gallon of milk every. Single. Day.
I've also never broken any bones. Just sayin'.”
So far, nothing has topped milk when it comes to disgusting things that we would never consume as adults. What’s next?
Basically just sugar.
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“Zebra Cakes. One of my favorite snacks as a kid, I adored those hexagon shaped pieces of heaven. Then I bought a box was I was in college because nostalgia is a hell of a drug, but I threw it out after eating one cake. They were horrendous, and I have no idea if it's because the recipe changed or my taste buds did. But that was almost depressing, to have something I enjoyed so much turn out to be garbage.”
Sometimes our tastebuds change abruptly.
“Bleu cheese. Loved it as a kid, teenager, and young adult, but one day in my early- or mid-20s I took a big ol' bite of my bleu cheese burger and gagged. Can't deal with it at all ever since. I have no good explanation; it just triggers my gag reflex every d*mn time.”
The most overrated food.
“Macaroni and Cheese honestly doesn't taste like anything to me anymore.”
“Macaroni and cheese is much better home made. My family rarely ever has macaroni though, a lot of the time we use shells instead. It's amazing how much that change can do!”
Thank goodness we eat things now that DON’T taste like cardboard.
Cardboard may not be for everyone, but it is for this guy.
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“Cheesecake, yep ate it so much as a kid, can't even stomach a nibble.
In other news, I'm eating sugar wafers right now and I'm still a huge fan of their cardboard sugary taste.”
Too sugary.
“Pop Tarts. Loved them into my very early 20s. Cut back on sugar then, and didn't try one for fifteen years. When I finally did I couldn't finish it. Too sweet, and tasted like droid droppings.”
A kids-only snack.
“Warheads. As a kid I could eat a whole package and loved them. As an adult I tried them again and was shocked at how chemically they are and how it felt like they left an over-sweet film over my teeth. Sad day.”
Is there such thing as too much cheese.
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“I saw an add for a double cheese burger on top of a pile of fries literally covered (bun and all) with melted velveeta style cheese, and I gagged a bit. Being plant based and seeking to mostly eat Whole Foods has changed my tastes a tremendous amount.”
A one-night stand with Doritos.
“Cheetos, Doritos, Velveeta. Although approximately once a year, I do get some mad craving for Doritos, buy a small snack bag of them, and in that blissful moment, they're awesome again.
Then we return back to our previous relationship.”
The Little Debbie snack cakes are the most depressing ones. The nostalgia for them is real, but on the other hand- how did we ever think those sugary things were good?
Moral of the story is- our tastes in food as children were complete trash. That is all.
Oftentimes when we make mistakes as a kid, it’s because we truly do not know better in that situation. Everything is a learning experience, whether we ask for it or not. But as an adult, there are some things we think about in our childhoods that make us cringe.
The mistakes we make as a child can be regrettable. Tiny222 asked:
What is the worst thing you did as a kid, and still feel guilty about?
It’s best to not beat yourself up about things you did in the past, but sometimes it’s hard not to.
Thank goodness he recovered.
“My friend and I discovered that a lighter and spray paint creates a flame thrower.
Anyway, I accidentally burned the side of my friend's face. He's recovered just fine but I'll never forget how loud my dad yelled at me when his mom came knocking on the door.”
She definitely knew.
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“Stole a quartz rock from my grandmother. I had one very similar and was convinced it was mine and that I had left it there. She told me it wasn't mine, gave me a hug and a kiss. And, as a six year old, I just fixated that it was mine. And I'm 99% sure it wasn't. Nothing is ever 100% but yeah. My grandmother, who did nothing but love me and shower me with love, affection, and attention, did not deserve to get her knickknack stolen by me.
By the time I was a teenager, it totally ate me up. I never confessed and I wished I had. After she died, I had a dream where she came back to see me and the first thing I did was cry and apologize.”
I’m sure the pigeon forgives you.
“I once threw a rock at a pigeon. I didn't mean to hit him - I just wanted to see him fly off. He was pretty.
I hit the pigeon. I still feel bad about that.”
We don’t always understand as a kid.
“I have a mentally ill family member and as a kid I could never make sense of it or why my parents weren't doing more. It was difficult to deal with and I remember one day when I was like 7/8 years old I blamed my mom for it, raised my voice at her and everything.
Almost 15 years down the line I still feel very guilty about it. I don't remember exactly what I said but I can very clearly remember the look on my moms face.”
We all make mistakes when we’re young, and sometimes we think they are unforgivable.
Pickle head will be avenged.
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“My siblings and I called the only other kid at our bus stop "pickle head" because he always wore a green beanie. We were relentless, too, and teased the f*ck out of him. One day he tried wearing a different beanie (red one) and we ramped things up calling him "tomato head".
It's been almost 2 decades and I still don't know what the poor kid's actual name was.”
This is heartbreaking.
“Wrote sh*t like ‘I hate you. You're the worst mummy ever and I hope you die. Have a terrible day’ etc. all over my birthday card to my mum because she said I couldn't go out to play on my bike before we went out for dinner. She died a month later from a sudden brain aneurysm.
8 year old me knew it wasn't my fault and I hadn't meant what I'd said in a temper but I felt bad for wishing it on her all the same and cursed the horrible timing. I feel sad that we never got the chance to talk about it as adults and laugh about it together.”
At least they learned their lesson.
“I shot a bird when I was 5. My mom forced me to watch it die. That had a lasting impression and I became a huge animal lover.”
“Reminds me of my cousin and I running around with a BB gun and we finally hit a bird and ran over excited to find it. It just suffocated slowly and we stood there bawling. Now he's killed humans so I guess it had a different effect on each of us.”
Luckily, usually when we mess up as a child, we almost immediately learn our lesson. Sometimes being an impressionable kid is a good thing.
At least it didn’t have money in it.
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“I stole from a friend of mine.
A while back Burger King had a line of toys with its meals and one of the "toys" was a wallet. I do not remember what the branding was, but I remember it being really really cool.
So one day I'm visiting a friend of mine and I see in his room that he has the wallet. I was insanely jealous so when he wasn't looking I took everything out of it, hid the contents around his room, and pocketed the wallet. I then spent the rest of the day hanging out and playing and at the end of the day left with my new prize.”
Poor Knight Rider.
“A poor large Irish family on my street gave one of their sons a black trans-am model car as his only present at Xmas. They told him it was from Knight Rider, his favourite show. It wasn't, but it was a cool model. Not a small one, but a decent sized effort with opening doors and the like. A good present basically.
We, although mainly me, then told him (on Xmas day) it wasn't Knight Rider. He was really young, like 7, while we were about 12. He got upset and insisted it was Knight Rider. We then told him to prove it. By throwing it, a lot, at the floor, wall etc. Knight Rider was bullet proof so it shouldn't get damaged...
In the end the model was scratched, dented, and doors and wheels were either hanging on by a thread or had fallen off. He was dead upset, and his family gave him hell. Always cringe and feel terrible for being a git at the time. I wasnt really a nasty kid but that was one time I deeply regretted being a bit of a sh*t just to get giggles from my friends.”
It’s kind of Lego’s fault, tbh.
'When I was 8 I studiously watched how my dad filled out checks. So, when the moment struck, I Stole a check from my parents check book, crossed off their names and wrote mine, wrote it out for 80 dollars to Lego, signed my name, and fired it off in the mail with a order form for a giant Lego semi complete with warthog fighter plane.
I forgot all about it until a few weeks later it actually showed up.
What's astounding is that they not only accepted this TOTALLY fraudulent check, but mailed the item off.
Of course my parents were furious. My mom found out when the bank called, laughing. So what did she do? She contacted the police and staged things, took me down there and scared the sh*t out of me. They talked to me about stuff like JV, theft. Then my mom took me to meet the bank manager and I learned about fraud and how it could put me in prison.
What's killer is that Lego customer service tried to laugh it off, but they refunded my mom obviously. But holy hell, the worst part was my dad and mom, for the next for months, to years, would frisk me in check out lines. It was pretty extreme but we'll, I'm no thief and I now work in the fraud department at a bank!"
If you’re like these people and have a memory from something you did as a child that makes you cringe, do your best to forgive yourself. Kids are dumb, and you were dumb too.
Luckily, as we grow up, we learn from our mistakes. That’s the beauty of becoming an adult.
Of course, most of the time, it was “just a phase". And looking back, those phases are regrettable, to say the least. Here are some prime examples of that.
SirGergoyFriendman asked:
What was your biggest/most regrettable "It's not a phase, mom. It's my life." that, in fact, turned out to be just a phase and not your life?
The enthusiasm of a young person can lead to some unexpected changes that parents are just not ready for.
Hi, Wheeljack!
"I was VERY into The Transformers when I was a wee lad in the 1980s. One day, I decided to change my name to the name of my favorite Autobot. My name was lame, and I wanted an awesome Transformer name. And I was VERY insistent that my parents only call me by my new name. Calling me by my 'old' name would cause a big fat tantrum on my part."
"So for the better part of a week, my poor parents had to call me Wheeljack."
Very 2008.
Ariana Grande Shrug GIFGiphy"My cat-ear phase. I wore cat ears every single day. Everywhere. I had like 20 pairs of them. Now everyone thinks I'm a furry."
"I find that very cute and wouldn't have thought you'd be furry. Even if you'd had cat mittens. I think my suspicions would have started if you moved a bit like a cat, displayed catlike grooming habits or got a cat mask."
Not gonna lie, that car sounds cool.
"I went to a car show once as a teen, and the only newer car there was some chick's PT cruiser. It was hot glittery pink, and at the time I was obsessed. I insisted that one day I would have a hot pink car, with pink seats, pink dash, pink carpets, etc. I was pretty heavily goth at the time, so my parents just rolled their eyes."
These phases can often lead to some very strange fashion choices.
That’s commitment.
"When I was a teenager (early 00s), I was waiting for my mother to pick me up and was wearing one of those sh!tty sports wristwatches. It was itching me so I took it off for a second, but then she arrived and because I was struggling to get it back on my wrist, I looped it around the equally sh!tty chain I had around my neck in a rush to get out the door."
"My mom asked me about it in the car, and I told her this was my new style and I planned to wear it like that every day. She rolled her eyes."
"I wore that watch on a chain around my neck every single day for 3 years or so. There are even professional family photos where I'm wearing it because I refused to take it off."
"One day, the chain broke and I lost the watch. I was in high school at that point anyway and it was a major lady repellent, so... phase over."
Not everyone can be Eminem.
slim shady eminem GIFGiphy"Baggy pants, being a rapper someday and being a professional skater."
"When I was about 14 and Eminem was starting to blow up I bought myself a keyboard with a synthesizer. It cost like $200 which was all the money I had saved up. It finally came (this was way before amazon prime and such) and I tried rapping."
"My sister told me "you're effing horrible" and I gave up right then and there."
This should be a sin.
"I used to button the top buttons of polo shirts."
"I must say, this is probably the worst one I've read."
Reddit Users Share Their Best 'It's A Small World After All' Experience
Looking back at our regrettable choices, all we can do is cringe.
An optimistic look at bad tattoos.
check me out season 3 GIF by PortlandiaGiphy"Being a tattooer. Regrettable because of those poor people who have my awful doodles on their bodies."
"Take heart! My favorite tattoo is the one I drunkenly got my buddy to do in his living room one year during March Madness! It's dumb and frankly mediocre? But such a good story and has such good associations I smile every time I see it."
RIP Fredro’s.
"My friend and I decided we were going to open a bar in Jamaica with exotic snakes in glass cages in the walls at each booth. We convinced ourselves it would be amazing for at least two years in college. It was going to be called Fredro's."
"My entire family made fun of me for it. Once we got out of college, we realized it was not feasible and joined the office grind. We're also two white guys with no ties to Jamaica."
Talk about cringey.
"I wore a top hat with an anime pin on it for around a year. Met one of my current best friends while wearing it, idk how he could bear to speak to me after that."
My weirdest phase was probably when I insisted on wearing knee-high rainbow socks to school every day. But honestly, I don't regret it. I rocked those socks, and I wish I still have a pair.
To all the people out there cringing over their past selves, remember that you were just a kid, and to be easy on yourselves. After all, we've all been there