It's always earth-shattering when someone you know and trust turns out to have a secret dark side. For some, it may show when a close friend stabs you in the back. For others, it appears when a spouse finally snaps. These stories show it all and bring to light even the most well-hidden personalities.
All posts have been edited for clarity.
“Her Testimony Is What Caused Reasonable Doubt”
“My ex mother-in-law took the stand and lied about her son not abusing me.
She said she had seen me that night when he strangled me and I didn’t mention anything to her. She hadn’t come over that night.
She said she never saw me with severe bruising on my neck when she saw me days after. She never saw me days after.
She said her son never yelled at me on the phone. Her son had yelled at me the whole time and she and I had gone to church the next day to pray about his drinking problems and what he had done the night before to someone at the church. She looked at me when she said no and I shook my head at her. Her testimony is what caused reasonable doubt.
I hope she, her son, and his mistress suffer because they are awful, disgusting humans.”
She Left Her Friend Hanging
“My best friend left me at the top of a mountain with a twisted ankle and no food, no water, and no phone to call for help.
I should have seen something like this coming because of her toxic and selfish behavior, but I was naive and quick to forgive so I didn’t. The day of, she begged me to go on this cool hike with her. I initially refused because I am absolutely awful at hiking and she’s extremely experienced, so I was concerned she’d ditch me. But after several promises on the contrary, I agreed to go.
Come to find out that the hike was MUCH more intense than she described and my dinky sneakers (I don’t own hiking boots) were definitely not up to the task. I fell 8 times on the way up, twisting my ankle the last time. I begged her to help me down but she said that ‘going slow was boring’ and she ‘came on this trip to have fun.’ So she left me, taking our shared pack with her that held all our food, water, and cellphones. The hike down was supposed to be 2 1/2 hours for an experienced hiker, in hiking boots, with no twisted ankle. It took me about 4 hours. She didn’t even wait at the bottom, she met up with some other friends to go get food.
Yeah, we weren’t friends after that.”
He Was A Doggone Liar
“My friend lied to me and basically conned me into taking his dog to be put down because he didn’t want to deal with it.
My friend and his wife moved into a new house with a beautiful backyard. They had two dogs, one small dog and one that was about 60 pounds. One day, about a month or so after they moved in, my buddy calls me and tells me the big dog attacked their daughter (who was 5 at the time). He goes on to tell me he can’t trust the dog and has arranged for it to go to a rescue shelter where it can be adopted by someone without kids. He asks if I will take the dog since I had an SUV that could easily fit the kennel. I say I will. When I get to their house, neither he or his wife will come with me. They have excuses that, at the time, seemed fine. I take the dog, say goodbye to it, and it goes to the shelter.
Jump forward about a year. My buddy is under the influence and telling a story. He ends up talking about getting rid of the big dog because it was digging up the yard. I ask about the daughter and he says it didn’t happen. The dog was just digging up the plants in the yard and he didn’t want to have to deal with it. They lied to me because they didn’t think I would take the dog if I knew the truth and they were too cowardly to do it themselves. To make it worse, I then found out that the ‘shelter’ was actually a kill shelter and the dog was put down about 10 days after I dropped it off there.
When I got very angry, he didn’t understand why. The dude and his wife had basically turned me into their dog’s executioner because they didn’t want to train it to not dig in the flowerbeds.”
“I Was In For The Shock Of My Life”
“I was living in Florida with a friend and we met this guy that we ended up befriending.
We spent a lot of time hanging out together. I moved later that year to Dallas. My friend was killed in a work accident. Afterward, this guy would call me frequently. He wasn’t the smartest tool in the shed, but I tried to befriend him and listen to him. This was 2006. Fast forward to 2015. He was driving his truck and got stranded in the south side of Dallas for a few days. We spent a day hanging out and talking. Sometime after, he stopped calling, which sometimes happened. It got to be over a year. I started thinking about him one night earlier this year. The only thing I could think of doing since he didn’t respond to any of the ways I had tried to contact him was to search his name and his hometown online.
I was in for the shock of my life. He was in jail for murder.
Turns out that in 2012, a few years before I last saw him, he murdered a woman he met at a bar. They found her scavenged remains about a month after she disappeared in piney woods and palmetto outside of Jacksonville. It took the police a year or so to get the evidence to charge him. He ended up pleading for a 20 year sentence. He’s also suspected of others I’ve been told. When I found all of this out, I was physically sick. It really messed with my head. I tried writing him once. He wrote back on how he’d been framed and all of his friends lied to get him arrested. I never wrote back.”
“We All Told Him He Wasn’t Welcome Anymore…”
“My half brother had reconnected with me and my family since he had found out around 18 that he was adopted. He wasn’t coping well with it for whatever reason and asked how I coped with knowing I was adopted. I told him I liked it as my grandparents, who were my adoptive parents, had saved me, as I would have died otherwise if they hadn’t. Other than that, I didn’t think it was a big deal to be adopted.
He came over one night and I ordered pizza for me, him and my daughter. My husband was at work.
My daughter was young and running around and he said, ‘Wouldn’t it be funny to stick my leg out and trip her?’
I said no it wouldn’t be. I took my daughter upstairs and put her to bed and closed her door. I tried to politely get rid of him after that, but he didn’t take the hint. He was weird and said weird things the whole night. Some of them alarming. He finally left.
I locked the door. I called my husband and told him. I called my parents and told them. My husband threatened him. My dad threatened him. We all told him he wasn’t welcome anymore and to not show his face again. Come to find out, one of his sisters, by adoption, had a daughter who mysteriously had fallen down the stairs and broken her leg. My half brother had been upstairs when it happened.”
She Showed Dachshunds But Not Dollars
“I had a friend who, like me at the time, showed dogs.
She rarely travelled for shows, but one time we were both at an out-of-state show. The second night, a group of us went out to dinner, and, as I often did, I offered to take charge of the bill and let people know what they owed for their food and tip. I got to Faye (not her real name), and she handed me money for her food total only. When I told her what she still owed for the tip, Faye informed me she wasn’t going to tip. The service had been great, so I didn’t understand her issue. When I asked why, she said, ‘I never tip when I travel. We’re never coming back here, so what’s the point?’
I was appalled. I started to explain how servers are paid less than minimum wage with the expectation the rest would be made up with tips, but she rolled her eyes, sighed huffily and grudgingly handed me a couple dollars, less than what she owed. I made up the difference, but I vowed never, ever, to eat out with her again.
Our friendship didn’t survive much longer.”
“Who The Heck Did I Marry?”
“My husband and I were on the return layover from our honeymoon.
We were in Atlanta waiting for our baggage so we could go through customs, but there was a delay. It was getting close to our outbound flight to get home and my husband -of 8 days- turns to me and says, ‘If we don’t have the bags in another 15 minutes, I’m going ahead to catch the flight home and you can wait here and take the bags through customs and try to get another flight tonight or tomorrow morning.’
So the first argument ensues right there in the ATL hallway about what’s his rush and ‘why would you leave me here to figure this out alone,’ ‘will I be sleeping in the airport in a chair?’ He didn’t care either way and no, he didn’t have to be back at work. His boss wouldn’t care if his flight was delayed. One week and I looked at this man thinking, ‘Who the heck did I marry?'”
Friendship Is A Two-Way Road
“A girl I knew lost her father and went into intense grieving. I was normal and fine, so I stayed by her side, supporting her.
Over the years, however, it became all she could talk about, which led to many friends dropping contact with her. As a cyclical effect, she then began not only talking about her grief, but also playing a victim card about how everyone abandons her because of it. The thing is, it’s totally ok (and healthy) to grieve and express grief, but after a few years, I started to also want to talk about more light-hearted things than her loss and the ‘bad people’ who had walked out on her. But I stuck by her because I didn’t want to be that person who bailed. I’m a people-pleaser.
As an important side note, my husband and I don’t have children, so our pets are like kids to us.
One sunny, fall day, my dog – the most bonded I’ve ever been with a non-human – got suddenly ill, and the next day we had to put him down. I was so grief stricken that I didn’t eat for days.
I messaged her to let her know what had happened; as someone who had known intense grief, I hoped she might be a safe place. She wrote back with a quick, sympathetic note, but immediately followed it with a list of things she needed help with in the coming days. I could not, for the life of me, believe that someone who had been such an advocate for her own long grief process was expecting me to do anything for her when I could barely breath from my sudden loss.
I quickly pulled away from that self-centered negativity, and now it’s been 8 months since I’ve heard from her. I’d be happy if I never did again.”
It Was Not A Laughing Matter
“I had a friend tell me that when she and her cousin were at the DMV, they witnessed a girl having seizure. She told me her cousin filmed it and that they couldn’t stop laughing about it.
I’ve had epilepsy since I was 13 and she 100% knew about it. I’ve had a lot of trouble with this disorder over the years. There were a couple times she dragged me along to concerts with her that were hours away from where we live. She always insisted I drive us home through the night. My seizures are triggered by sleep, which she also knew, and I told her that it really isn’t safe if I drive when I’m tired. She said she could always just grab the wheel if I started having a seizure. Both of those times I ended up having a seizure the next day, one while riding my bike (I woke up in an ambulance on my way to the hospital), and the other time while at work- thankfully they didn’t happen while driving.
She was aware of all this, yet still proceeded to tell me how hilarious it was that this girl was having a seizure at the DMV and how everyone was panicking. I called her out, asked her to imagine me making fun of her panic attacks (something she had issues with that I was always sympathetic about) and how that would make her feel, and never spoke to her again. We had been close friends for 3 years and it’s been 3 years since. I always knew she was very narcissistic, but this was just too much. Even if she wasn’t close with someone who had epilepsy, how, in any way, is someone having a seizure funny?”
Don’t Bring Your Drama To Work
“I had a mentor at work a few years back who I deeply admired. He took me under his wing, taught me everything he knew and seemed to genuinely care for me. We had a very strong connection and he was the only true source of education and leadership in my workplace.
However, he had an ongoing feud with the owner of the business where we worked, and she began to dislike me by association with my mentor. It started out innocent enough, we spent a lot of time together on various work projects and I became like his unofficial apprentice. Then he started filling me in on things about the business that I had no business knowing such as the owner’s financial irresponsibility and details about her personal life. He would spend over an hour each day venting to me and preventing me from getting work done. Meanwhile, the owner (who was very passive-aggressive) began to catch on and build up resentment towards me, giving me dirty looks yet making no efforts to confront me. The tension built up to the point that I was a nervous wreck torn between pleasing my mentor or my boss and I eventually left my job because I had a nervous breakdown.
Looking back on everything, I’ve realized that my mentor used me as a pawn. Although he never admitted it, I started putting pieces together that he and the owner once had an affair, leading to their mutual hatred, and he probably only worked closely with me to make her jealous (me being a naive and doting early-20’s girl at the time) and used me as a captive audience to vent his frustrations to. If he truly cared about me, he would not have done anything to put my job in jeopardy, but he did exactly that. It sucks because I looked up to him so much during that time and allowed myself to get sucked into his drama.”
His Money Wasn’t All She Took
“My friend’s ex-wife crashed his car when she had their 1-year-old son in the car. I thought she was just sometimes angry but no, she is psychotic and delusional. After the car incident, she assaulted my friend’s mother, continued to assault my friend, stole all of my friend’s money (around $3,000) and tried to run away with the kid. She ended up in jail. The day she was released, she tried to take the kid yet again, went back to jail, went to court and told the judge that the mother was an addict, that my friend had a drinking problem, and that he beat her (committed perjury). She lost the sole custody case and just dropped off the map for about 6 months.
She ended up being able to get visitation rights earlier this year and on the first day, after not seeing the kid for 5 months, she kidnapped him and is now hiding. They’ve been missing for about a week now. The police can’t get involved because it’s a court matter, and my friend’s lawyer doesn’t come back to work until after New Years.
Given the judicial system’s track record with her, I’d be surprised if they give her so much as a fine for kidnapping him.”
A True Party Pooper
“Yesterday was my birthday party and I bought a bottle of Jack amongst other things.
The party’s kind of ending and a friend of mine leaves. 15 minutes later, we notice the bottle is gone (it was still kind of full), so we call him and contact his girlfriend to see if she knows anything – nothing. The dude confesses to taking it about a half hour later. He didn’t ask anyone, didn’t say anything, just took it and left.
He kind of ruined the mood of the party.”
“I Realized I Couldn’t Make Excuses For Him Anymore”
“My ex-good friend was a bit of a hot head and really arrogant, and not a lot of people liked him. I defended him and said he was just putting up a wall, and that he was a different person towards me, and I think people just need to get to know him better to see he’s a good guy inside. I spent years saying that to people.
My first red flag was when he would yell at cab drivers who missed a turn, convenience store cashiers who weren’t quick enough, waiters, etc. I would always tell him to calm down and he would. I thought he was getting better and chalked it up to immaturity or insecurity. I thought he would just chill out eventually.
Finally, one night I was at a party, I invited him to join, and he didn’t know anyone except me. It was a typical scenario for his arrogant side to come up since he didn’t know anyone, and he said really loudly, in a really sneering tone, ‘I make more money than 99% of the people in this city,’ and so many people heard. I realized I couldn’t make excuses for him anymore. I stopped being friends with him.
Six months later, I heard he got arrested because a cashier from a convenience store had called the cops on him for attempted assault.”
He Moved Out and Moved On
“I have a friend who adopted a rescue dog two years ago. The dog was older and was used to breed in a puppy mill. The dog had terrible separation issues and was extremely attached to my friend. I always felt sorry for the dog, because my friend worked long hours and lived alone and the dog was shut in the garage all the time. My friend ended up getting an offer on his house and was in the process of moving.
The dog got very ill one day and couldn’t walk or eat. He took her to the vet and they diagnosed her with congestive heart failure. A few days or a week later, my friend needed to start moving. He knew the people buying his home (very small town). He was staying at his new house with just his bed and the essentials so the people buying his place could get access to move things in.
One day I texted him and asked him how his dog was doing. It took him hours to reply and he said he didn’t know that the dog was at his old house and he hadn’t seen her all day. I quickly realized he left his dying dog in the garage of his old house while he was staying at his new place. I did not ask, but I assume the new owners were tending to the dog. I simply could not believe that he left the dog alone as it was dying. He did not even appear to go over and check on her. He even has a garage at his new house where he could have left her.
He ended up having her put down 3-4 days later. Of course a sad, emotional Facebook post followed about how sad he was.”
She Toots Her Own Flute
“I had a best friend in high school (now an ex best friend) who yelled at me that I didn’t deserve to get a flute solo in our marching band show because I was drum major. Believe me, I didn’t want it or ask for it – I have bad anxiety. Anyways, what makes it worse was that she had a major solo (the whole ballad one year) every single year.
She just didn’t know how to celebrate anyone but herself.”
And She Said He Was “Being Selfish”
“I had a big night out planned with a bunch of friends, weeks in advance. That day my girlfriend was puking and begged me to stay in and take care of her. So I did and missed a fun night that was weeks of planning.
Fast forward 3 months. It was a Saturday and I was sick – throwing up, fever, the whole 9 yards. My girlfriend asks if I want her to stay with me that night because she and her friends made plans to go out the night before. She wasn’t expecting me to say yes, so when I did, she had a look of, ‘shoot! Was not expecting that.’
So she then tells me how it’s kind of a big deal and that I’m being selfish. She goes out and comes over the next day.
I had all her stuff in a box waiting for her.”