He Almost Saw Granny Murder Herself
“When I was around 8, my brother found a ‘toy’ .38 in our backyard and gave it to my grandmother to clean. I kept telling everyone I’d never seen it before and it was not a toy. No one would listen.
My grandmother was cleaning it for him in the kitchen, banging it on the counter to get the dirt out. For some reason, she started telling us about Russian Roulette, put the weapon to her head, and pulled the trigger.
At some point, they finally listened to me and realized it was not a toy. They called the police, who told us it was, in fact, a real .38. It was loaded, too, but must have jammed, which is why it didn’t go off when my grandmother pulled the trigger.
I almost watched my grandmother shoot herself in the head because no one would listen to me that it was a real weapon.”
What Happens When Mom’s Won’t Listen To Their Kids’ Advice
“My mom had a double mastectomy last month. On her first outing after surgery, she came to our house for dinner. She commented that her leg was sore and I said, ‘Have you been walking around enough? It could be a blood clot.’
She waved me off and said it definitely wasn’t. Well, over the next few days it proceeded to get really red, and I told her, ‘Look, I’m positive you have a blood clot.’
‘Nooooo, it’s not a blood clot.’
Finally, I convinced her to let me take her to urgent care by telling her maybe it was cellulitis (my grandma had that and it was gnarly, so that scared her into going). I told the doctor I was certain she had a blood clot and the doctor is clearly annoyed by my self-diagnosing.
They did a Doppler test and by now her whole leg is swollen so the lady has a hard time doing it, but they finally conclude there’s no clot. I had a gut feeling they were wrong.
Two weeks later, Mom could barely walk, so I drag her back to the ER, and, unsurprisingly, they find she’s got fully occluded, deep vein thrombosis. She spent a few days in the hospital and will be giving herself blood thinner injections and wearing compression stockings for three months. She’ll be fine, but if I hadn’t kept heckling her and being obnoxious, I get the feeling it would’ve turned out much worse.”
“I Can’t Forgive Myself”
“During my sophomore year of college, my friends and I were big on trying out psychedelics, and one of our friends always had trouble with opiates and fentanyl, plus a drinking problem. During our junior year, he ended up in the hospital multiple times for an overdose.
I brought together our friends (me plus two other guys) and asked them, ‘When does his life become our responsibility? When do we have to step in and force him to stop?’ My friends knew, his parents knew, but they just blew it off and said he would stop.
They were convinced that he wouldn’t overdose again. I knew he was going to die but I didn’t do enough to save him. I got a call about six months later from his parents after he changed schools saying he died from an overdose. Never again will I stand idle and take someone’s word over trusting my feelings. I miss you man, and I’m sorry I couldn’t save you. I think about you every day.
I told them it would happen and no one listened. I couldn’t and still can’t forgive myself for not listening to my feelings. It’s pointless to blame myself or my friends, but I can’t deal with it any other way. This happened four years ago but I haven’t had a close friend since. It’s hard to think I could let this happen and go through the pain all over again.”
She Was A Beauty, But Also A Danger
“I’m Australian, and was 5 at the time of this incident. Being a precocious kid, and my much older sister wanting to be a vet, we had a lot of books on local fauna, including this mystical, very rare creature known as the blue-ringed octopus. The venom in a single bite is enough to kill 18 adult men.
This thing is tiny, with an adult being about the size of a child’s hand. Well, lo and behold, when a bunch of other kids and I were playing in a rock pool, I saw a strange little octopus sitting around a bunch of small white beans.
It turned out those weren’t beans, and momma was angry. I recognized the bright blue rings and went to the nearest adult, a fisherman nearby, telling him there’s is a cool octopus that can kill people over there, pointing to the bunch of kids playing just as they start screaming and running away.
Without hesitation, this guy leaps up with a fishing spear (think rubber slingshot three pronged spear), picks up the closest kid being chased by the octopus, and lets loose. He sighed as he looked at the dead octopus on the end of his spear, and in hindsight I guess he knew how close to extinction these little beauties were. On the plus side, he stopped a kid from dying. By the way, their venom kills by causing complete paralysis, leaving victims aware of their surroundings as their diaphragm stops working and they slowly suffocate. It’s a pretty horrid way to go.”
She Warned Them About Feeding The Local Feral Cat Community
“I used to walk a trail every day for years that had a few feral cats. People started leaving out food which ticked me off and I would throw it away if I saw it, but the cat population exploded because I obviously wasn’t throwing out all the food that was left out. I also left notes telling people to stop that, too, stating that I bet the huge cat population was going to cause a rabies problem there.
Months into this, I came across a fox in the middle of the day who approached me and swayed while walking. I called animal control, who didn’t quite treat the incident as an emergency. A girl was bitten by it the next day and they managed to kill the fox, whose brain tested positive for rabies.
I stopped going there but kept hearing stories of more and more animals found there with rabies, and then finally a woman got badly mauled by a rabid coyote there.
But you know, I’m just the crazy, anti-feral cat colony harpy who just hates cats. Whatever.”
This Man Was More Than Just A Pest
“I was visiting my mom out of town for a few days and a pest control guy was scheduled to come by at a time when only I would be home. A friend renting the side apartment was going to be home, too, but that wasn’t the problem side, so it shouldn’t have mattered. I said I was fine to let the guy in and what-not.
He arrived and I immediately felt like he was not a good guy. My gut was telling me he was a BAD guy. He kept staring at me inappropriately (I’m a woman), calling me ‘babe,’ standing way too close, etc. I was 19 at the time, and he was middle-aged.
He didn’t really inspect much, just kept asking questions that started with, ‘Where in the house did you see the bugs?’ which led into ‘So, is that your bedroom?’ I was not having it. I got him to leave by knocking on my friend’s door and asking if she had seen any bugs on that side. He left pretty soon after he realized I wasn’t completely alone.
I told my mom and she told our landlady (they’re friends). Landlady said I was overreacting and imagining things. She wouldn’t believe a word, which ticked my mom off for a while. Two months later, the landlady hired him to inspect her own condo while she was home alone.
He tried to force himself on her. Thankfully, she does kickboxing and Crossfit and beat the snot out of him. I’m not sure if she called the police, but she later apologized to me for not believing my warning.”
This Couple Had A Real Bobby And Whitney Feel
“My mom is a super sweet lady and because of that, she tends to attract people who just want to use her. I’m very protective of her as a result. There was a lady at our church that was going from home to home because her husband was beating her (it turned out they were actually beating each other so she wasn’t entirely a victim) and finally she asked my mom if she could come and stay with her.
Mom said yes. I said HECK NO. This couple was…off. They were nice and involved in our church, but something consistently set off mental alarm bells. It was one of a few huge fights my mother and I had. She actually called me a few hurtful things (that I was too harsh, not helpful or compassionate). I told her that she wasn’t looking at the situation from all angles.
Our city has a lot of options for women escaping domestic abuse. I made three phone calls and found the woman a shelter to stay in and a caseworker. These are professionals that can really help with situations like hers.
One of two warning bells was that this woman had four school-age kids, whom she left with her husband—if she was that scared and left, why hadn’t she taken or gone back for them? I know that sounds like victim blaming, but every place she’d stayed so far had had more than enough room for her children.
The second thing that scared me was that at any time, her husband would show up at my mother’s house and bother her. She’s honestly the only family I have left, and I would willingly go to jail if that man thought he could lay a hand on her.
When I couldn’t get mom to agree, I texted the woman that I was sorry for her situation, wished her the best, gave her the number of the caseworker I’d made arrangements with, and let her know not to turn up at my mother’s house. She tried, but I sent her packing without remorse. I had another fight with my mom over that, but I would not back down.
That night, the woman ended up at the home of some more well-off but elderly church members. A couple of days later, the female homeowner caught the husband and wife stealing electronics. They beat her, tied her up, finished cleaning out the house, and left the city.
People that she’d been staying with started noticing valuables were missing, so I guess that was their scam. My mother apologized profusely and changed a bit herself afterward. I’d never want her to stop being selfless and kind, but at least now she’s more cautious about it.”
Not Just Being Dramatic
“I told my mom my four-day fever was more than just the flu. I took my temperature at 102°F. She checks it 20 minutes later and it was back down to 99°. This continued off and on until she got annoyed, thinking I was just being dramatic.
My lymph nodes in my neck were so swollen I couldn’t turn or lift my head. Finally, I threw a massive fit and my father took me to the hospital. My mom was super mad since she thought it was just a fever and I was wasting their time. Once we get to the hospital, the intake nurses take my temperature, and it’s 104°.
Everything is fuzzy from there on. I was hallucinating, screaming, and crying. I had no idea where I was or what was going on. Turns out, I had a bladder infection that rapidly spread to my kidneys. If a bladder infection is bad enough, you can have dementia-like symptoms. I was admitted for 24 hours and, when I came to, started peeing blood. I peed blood for DAYS after that.
The doctor said if I waited another day, I could have become septic. They pumped me with medication so powerful, I kept vomiting blood and pooped myself a few times. My mom listens to me now.”
How One Sauced Up Aussie Caused $5,000 In Property Damage
“It was about 6/8 pm at night on the weekend and I was helping my parents renovate a unit they bought as an investment property down in Melbourne. My mom was driving through the car park of a Kmart and there was this wasted guy staggering around the outskirts of what appears to be a set for a TV show they were filming. Odd situation, I know.
Anyway, this prick had set a bottle in the middle of the road and my mom proceeded to drive over it and knocked it over. I turned around to see this clown running after us and throwing his knocked over bottle at the car from like 50 meters away (it didn’t even travel 5 meters, this dude was so wasted he could barely stand, let alone throw).
Then I saw this guy give chase, slowly but surely. I told my mom we should leave the car park because he was chasing us. But she said, ‘Nah, he won’t chase us across the car park, it’s so big.”
A minute later, we parked. I got out and started to walk towards the store while my mom stayed in the car to organize her stuff. The guy came running, full sprint, at my mom in the car. Luckily, she saw it coming and locked the doors at the literal last second. She later told me it was so incredibly close to being open. The guy then dented the side of my mom’s secondhand Mercedes and broke the side mirror while shouting random obscenities at her in typical tipsy fashion.
I looked to other people to help if he managed to get in the car, but everyone nearby just proceeded to walk on or watch like it was nothing, mere entertainment. Luckily, my mom started the car and sped off, and I went to a nearby store where everyone asked if I was ok and I was able to call the cops. They had already gotten a call about it and were already en route. My mom then called me in a panic to ask if I was okay. I said I was fine, and gave her the biggest I TOLD YOU SO.
I never got much info on what happened to the guy. He was well known to police and was arrested within the next day or so. Also, he did around $5,000 in damages to the car, but insurance covered it, no sweat, and they took him to court. He had a history of inebriated violence. I hope he went to jail, but we weren’t allowed to know the result.
I shudder at the thought of what could’ve been if my mom didn’t lock the door in time or got out with me, it was so close. I would’ve no doubt tackled the guy if he did, but who knows what would’ve happened after that. I was about 16 or 17 then, and not very strong.”
She Always Knew His Reckless Driving Would Land Him In Danger
“When I was 16, I declined a trip to the mall to see a movie with my best friend because her boyfriend was going. They had been dating about a year and in addition to various other reasons (cheating), I also didn’t like him because he was an extremely dangerous driver.
I begged her all the time to stop letting him drive. He sped, took turns way too fast, cut people off…pretty much everything you shouldn’t do on the road, he did. Everyone thought I was overly dramatic about it.
So that day, I didn’t go to the movies with them and instead hung out with another friend. My friend and I got into a fight on the phone because I said I wouldn’t go if he was driving. I got home later that night, hopped onto MySpace to see what had been going on with the world, and my feed was blowing up with news articles about an accident, but no names were mentioned.
The articles mentioned four teens, with one being airlifted to Boston after the jaws of life had to get her out. One kid in the backseat had a broken leg and collarbone, one was in a coma, and the driver had a fractured ankle.
The car had been going down a well known curvy road that had a speed limit of 25 mph. The car was going at least 50, took a turn too fast, hit a historic sign, and flipped several times before hitting a tree on the front passenger side. There were no names in the article, but I had this really horrible feeling in my gut and felt sick.
I started calling my friend’s house over and over with no answer. So I waited. The next morning an article was released with her name. She passed away two days later. The accident was pretty bad and her mom elected for a closed casket funeral due to facial injuries. I don’t want to say that had she listened, she might be here today because it could’ve happened at any time to anyone, but man, do I still miss her.
I only saw him a few times after the incident. He didn’t come to the funeral, but about two months later, he came back to the theatre we all participated in with his new girlfriend and acted like nothing happened. He was only just 18 at the time, so I know he was young, but he certainly didn’t seem to care at all. I know it may have been eating him up on the inside.
He was later in a play with me and during one of the rehearsals, he and I were backstage waiting for our cues when he cornered me, whipped his pants down, and started grinding on me. I freaked out and ran onstage. He didn’t come back after that. I saw him about a year later at some outdoor flea market and he flipped me off and walked away. I’m not sure how much he cares about anything.”
Cat Got Your Hand
“My kid sister was bitten by our cat because she woke up one morning and thought, ‘Today is a good day to die!’ and gave him a bath. I happened to show up at her house by chance, since I didn’t live with her or my dad, and unexpectedly had to stop in for something when she mentioned that her hand hurt.
Immediately after she told me why it hurt, I demanded to see it. Just a few days earlier, someone I knew had ended up in the ER after being bitten by her cat, so I knew how serious it was. I called my mom, who doesn’t live with her either, and told her she needed to get her to the ER right now because her hand was swollen and discolored and leaking an odd fluid. I knew it was already badly infected (I can’t drive and don’t have a car, so I couldn’t take her).
My mom decided I must be overreacting, so she got dressed at a leisurely pace and had some coffee before finally leaving an hour later. All the while I’m freaking out at how bad my sister’s hand is getting. She’s in agonizing pain by now, so I tell her that if our mom does not haul over now, I’m calling an ambulance.
Finally, my mom got there and picked her up, so I thought all is well and she’s on her way to the ER. Then I checked Facebook and saw pictures of my sister AT MY MOM’S HOUSE, and my mom asking people what they think she should do.
Low and behold, she wouldn’t listen to me when I told her it was badly infected and she had to go to the ER right now. She had to hear it from three other people before finally taking my sister to the hospital. She didn’t get to the hospital until hours after I told her to take her. Keep in mind, my little sister has an incredibly high pain tolerance, so if she complains about pain at all, you know it’s bad, and she was on the verge of tears when I had parted ways with her.
It was so badly infected that it required surgery to drain it. My sister didn’t respond to antibiotics at all until after the surgery, and they had her on morphine, her pain was that bad. If my mom had waited any longer than she did, I fear it might have spread and my sister could have died.
When I understandably got angry that I had been blown off, everyone just excused it as, ‘Well, you do have a tendency to exaggerate a lot!’ as if I regularly go around and tell people that someone could be badly injured or dying. I don’t need to have a medical degree to know my sister’s hand was infected because anyone who has ever seen a human hand before should have been able to tell that it wasn’t normal.”
No One Noticed Anything Strange About Him Until His First Restraining Order
liubomir/Shutterstock
“There was a guy in my friend group during college who was pretty socially awkward. After his first (and only, to my knowledge) girlfriend broke up with him, this awkwardness slowly degraded into ‘creep’ territory, to the point where his ex told him to get lost.
Well, he did. However, instead of going back to just being socially awkward, he just kept changing the object of his obsession every couple of months to a new girl. Once this started up, I suggested to my friend group that we might need to have some kind of intervention before it went too far.
Only one other person in my friend group had noticed his behavior. Everyone else told me that I was overreacting to normal social awkwardness. Long story short, creepo now has a restraining order against him, which, of course, no one in that friend group saw coming, and were completely shocked that he would do anything to warrant one.
And I now have a better friend group.”
The Carrot Incident
“My fiancé and I have tarantulas and an anole, all of which eat crickets. We keep the bugs in a bin with holes, like egg cartons, and put carrots in them for the crickets to eat. One time, the carrots had started to go bad, and my fiancé was under the impression that they were very soft, so he went to the bathroom to flush them down the toilet.
Now, these carrots were 6-7 cm long and 1-2 cm thick. I told him not to flush them, as they wouldn’t go down. He said it was fine and proceeded to flush. They went down, but not all the way. The water rose, then settled. One more flush. The water rose again…and stopped. Uh oh.
We were without the upstairs toilet for weeks. People tried using it (our roommates) and eventually, it smelled worse than sewage. There was a collection of feces in it and we didn’t know what to do.
Eventually, it drained enough that we were able to use a bottle of toilet safe Drano-type liquid. That helped, but didn’t fix it. We eventually went with the strongest Drano we could find, dumped the whole bottle in, and let it sit overnight. At worst, the toilet would crack due to the heat, and at best the problem would be fixed.
The morning came, and a few flushes later, everything worked out. It works fine, but now the downstairs toilet acts up due to another roommate flushing garbage down it. But it’s not our problem. My fiancé and I still get a few giggles out of the situation when we remember it.”