Listen up men! Don't do any of the strange and mean-spirited things the men in these stories do, and things will be fine. These women deserve a medal for putting up with such nonsense! Content has been edited for clarity.
The Most Excruciating Few Hours With A Date She Ever Had
“A guy, who I was kind of debating going on a date with, turned up at my house at nine at night, invited himself inside, and then proceeded to nit pick my technology. Apparently, he expected me to have surround sound, gaming consoles, and a DVD set up for whatever reason. Excuse me for not rolling out the technological red carpet, I had no idea that he was even coming that night! He told me that my tattoo I have on my wrist was awful and must have been done by an amateur. Then he proceeded to explain in detail all of his tattoos and why they were clearly superior. He also said he looked younger then me because he’s a fitness freak.
He got into my kitchen and offered me a coffee in my very own home! Then he proceeded to tell me how he really wanted someone to take care of him, including after work massages and preparing meals for him. I tried to tell him that I wasn’t a big cooker, but he still stated that we could work well together. He basically wanted a mother figure in his life. Eleven o’clock at night hit, and this guy didn’t pick up on any of the hints I was dropping about him leaving. Instead, he once again offered me a coffee or a tea in my own home. When I declined, he just got up and made himself one! That was also when he brought out his own gaming system and all of the videos games that went along with it. He explained each and every video game to me. It was such a nightmare. This was the worst few hours I have ever spent with a potential date. I found out later on that he had already been seeing someone else when he turned up at my house. He somehow blamed me for him cheating on her? How did that one work out in his mind?! Dude, you turned up at my house without notice, talked in length about yourself and never about me, and I am the one to blame? Good grief! I was so over dating at that point.”
An Angle Sent From Heaven
“He would call me his ‘beautiful angle’. He really didn’t know how to spell angel, so for five months I just put up with being an angle. For the record, I tried to tell this man how to spell ‘angel’ correctly numerous times. But this guy would simply laugh it off and say how I was so smart, as if it took an intelligent person to spell that word correctly! This guy also smoked a lot of weed, which may or may not have had an effect on his spelling abilities. But also, I should not have to be this grown man’s teacher. If he doesn’t know the difference between angel and angle, then he would be beyond any sort of help that I could offer. We definitely weren’t meant to be.
I also dated this guy once who wanted to move a single wide trailer on his parent’s front lawn. He thought that I was being unreasonable for not wanting to move in with him once he did so. There was no way that I could do this. I could understand if the parents were elderly and couldn’t live alone or they were ill, but his parents were completely self sufficient and healthy. I didn’t understand why he wouldn’t want to have his own house and privacy. Then his mom told me she still did his laundry and cooked him dinner and cleaned his room, and I understood it all. No thanks! I do not want to be dating a complete man-child! I know I deserve better. I think sometimes we put up with stuff we normally wouldn’t because we want a relationship to work so much, or we are tired of being alone or whatever. But thank goodness for the moments of clarity when we ask ourselves, ‘What the heck am I doing?!’
Never Forget That Nightmarish Smell
“We only dated for about a month. I met him once in person through a mutual friend, and then we hit it off through phone calls and text messages. Also for context, I was fourteen and he was fifteen. He lived one town over, so almost all of the relationship consisted of texting and phone calls. I noticed how he was always wearing a beanie and avoided smiling in photos. This will become important very soon. About three weeks into this process, I showed up about ten minutes early to his house for a first date to see a movie. I was waiting on him to get out of the shower, or so I thought. I glanced in his room, and I noticed that his pillow had this massive grayish-brown stain on it. That was super weird, but maybe it was just old and worn out?
Well, he quickly came out of the bathroom, bone dry but reeking of axe body spray. I guess he felt comfortable enough to be like this around me, but I have absolutely no idea why. This guy just straight up told me, ‘Yeah, I hate showering, and toothpaste makes me nauseous. So I just stand in the bathroom and run the water for about twenty minutes so my mom doesn’t yell at me.’
I should have called my mom left right then and there. He even kept trying to make out with me during the movie, and not enough gum in the world could have covered his breath, or the literal layer of grime all over his teeth. Also, the axe just mixed with probably the weirdest and worst body odor I had ever smelled. It created this new, nightmarish smell that I will probably always have burned into my memories. I never told him why I was dumping him. I just noped out of that one as soon as I got home and knew he would try to pick up the phone and call me. No way he didn’t know!”
Get Away From Me!
“His entire back was covered in acne. I don’t mean small patches, or even a few trouble spots. I mean from top to bottom, there were full cysts and bubbling whiteheads everywhere. I also realized that very same day that the shirt he had taken off actually had pus stains from infected acne that had popped or burst while he wore the shirt! I dropped him that same day, and he caught on as to why. He said he didn’t need to see a doctor, and I disagreed. I still feel bad about it, but it was honestly a massive turn-off. Hw many more arguments could we have gotten into in the years to come if he refused to seek medical help in treating any other conditions? No thanks! We went to the beach with a HUGE group of friends. I arrived separately with a handful of friends, and while we were all spending time together, he took his shirt off. It was impossible to miss, and he kept trying to hug me. A full body hug. It was maybe our second or third ‘date’. We were young and were still testing the waters, and this was maybe fifteen years ago. I couldn’t handle it after the third time he attempted to give me a full body embrace. I couldn’t even put my hands on his sides or hips without feeling them. Thankfully, my best friend made an excuse up so we could leave early. I let him down the next day after he asked me if it was about his back. I told him honestly that it was, and that he needed to see a doctor, and that he was not respecting my boundaries when I told him I didn’t want to hug him the first two times he attempted. It escalated from there, and I never talked to him again.
It was all very awkward, because we had mutual friends, but alas. Thirty-one year old me would have handled the situation much better than sixteen year old me did, but it was definitely my pettiest reason for ending a potential relationship. But the boundary pushing, in hindsight, was definitely a good reason to cut things short though. He was very nice, and very romantic, minus the boundary pushing with the hugging. I’ve always felt bad about the situation, but his total dismissal of it, on top of continuously trying to get me to touch the area, was just too much. He definitely was aware of the issue, since he asked if that was why I pulled away from the situation, but even at sixteen I knew he should have been seeing a specialist already with how bad it was. It really wasn’t normal acne, at all.
I was only sixteen at the time, and I definitely had some growing up to do, but I wasn’t a complete monster. Most of the time, anyway. But I was quite young, dumb, and superficial. He is now happily married to a wonderful woman, who is the sister to a good friend of mine. I married the boy I met right after dating him, and we have been together for fifteen years now, so it all turned out all right. I will forever feel guilty for that moment of utter pettiness though.”
Was This Too Petty Or Spot On?
“After our first date, he called me and asked me what I was up to. I told him how I was cleaning my house and getting some chores done. This man replied by saying, ‘Oh! You like cleaning? I have a house cleaner who comes every other day, but if we got married, we could get rid of her and just have you clean!’
Sometimes a guy makes it very easy for you to decide if there will ever be a second date. Being objectified for various reasons is nothing new to women. We are just chess pieces on the board in their brain sometimes. I assumed that he was making a bad joke at first, but he continued and made it a conversation about how he likes to clean, but his kids don’t. He simply gave up on chores and hired this cleaning lady. So I slowly realized, this wasn’t a lame joke he was trying to make. Me cleaning was an actual solution to his family’s mess and laziness. Yup, he never had his kids clean up after themselves, no chores, and a big house to clean, so they were spoiled a bit. He wasn’t joking. This man had been divorced about two years, had three boys, and I think he was desperate for a wife. I thought we would be a good fit before this, since I am divorced with three boys as well. But I am not that desperate, and he moved way too fast for me. I actually wanted to get to know each other and take things slowly. It turned out that we were only compatible on paper. I
I felt really petty that night for thinking how I did, because this guy really did seem nervous and was trying to make a god impression. I tried to give this guy some leeway, since maybe he blurted this thought out without thinking. We have all said bone-headed things at some point in our lives, right? But in the end, I had to trust my gut and end things right then and there. We continued to be friends, but I knew that my gut instinct was completely right. This guy was pretty decent, and he was a good father, but there was no way that we would have ever worked out. I am so glad he blurted this out, so that I didn’t have to waste my time in a miserable relationship!”
The Most Toxic Man Imaginable
“So I had this friend who was a gnarly control freak. He went on a date with this girl one time and brought her to the restaurant I worked at, and he sat in my section. So I got a front row seat to all of the madness! When I came over to take drink orders, he ordered his drink, and without hesitation, ordered for his date. AS she opened her mouth to ask for another drink instead, he told me, ‘That’s it for now,’ and pushed me away. I noticed that once she went to the bathroom, he quickly swapped his cheap drink for her more expensive one. He was never even going to tell her that he was secretly drinking from her drink!
It was time to get their food orders. He ordered brussel sprouts because he was a health freak. She asked for the poke bowl, to which he told me to scrap that order and to get her a salad instead. She was sort of uncomfortably laughing, until she realized that I was staring at her for confirmation. She didn’t say anything, and this guy was being very pushy, so I made the change to the order. I came back later for the main entree orders. The guy ordered a cheap steak for himself, and he ordered the most expensive surf n’ turf we had for the woman. I brought the food out while the woman was in the bathroom again, and he started just going to town on her dish while she was away! As I was checking on my tables, I actually saw this woman was at the bar, downing four shots in a row. She then returned, only to find that her food had been tampered with!
The lady asked me why her dish looked half-eaten, and I looked at my friend, who had destroyed it all in the name of supposedly wanting a taste. He was looking at me like I was the one to blame! I had a choice in how to treat this friend right then. I totally threw him under the buss and confessed to the woman how he had eaten much of it already. When the check came, she wanted to split down the middle, but he pulled a fast one on her and said he was not going to pay for her end of the meal, as she got a $20 glass, a $20 salad, and a $70 entree, whereas he spent a total of $45 on his side of the ticket. Nevermind the fact that he was already eating and drinking her orders that she didn’t even want in the first place! The poor woman paid and left immediately, and the two never saw each other again. This guy turned up at my house the very next day crying, because she apparently never wanted to talk to him again. He told me how he had apparently treated her like a queen, and she hadn’t even kissed him afterwards. It was one of the most pathetic things I had ever witnessed. At various points, he also tried to micromanage my life to better suit his needs. Needless to say, I finally came to my senses and cut him out of my life entirely. We definitely are not friends anymore.”
Sort Of A Date, Sort Of A Weirdo
“So I was living and working overseas. One of my coworkers was kind of cute, and I think he was into me too. Score! We were each given apartments with some basic furniture and housewares in them, but we still had to go shopping to set up the houses. I was prepared for this. He wasn’t. He had money, but he refused to spend any of it. He asked if we could share some items. Fine, whatever. As we were working our way through the store, I’m buying a lot of things, but he’s got barely anything in his cart. He starts talking about how it’s pointless for ‘us’ to buy two of everything. Can he borrow some items? Fine, whatever. Yes, you can borrow my clothing drying rack when I’m not using it. Same thing with the mop, bucket, and broom. It was kind of annoying, but whatever. We have to get along to work together, right? Then he wants me to buy a bag of laundry detergent for us to share. He said he would buy the next one. Somehow, the people who propose these arrangements never are willing to be the first one to pay. By this time, I’ve learned he’s the youngest of four children, and all his older siblings are sisters who totally coddled him. I was suspicious that this was stage one of a plan to get me to do his laundry. I don’t know if that was indeed the plan, but I did learn later that he didn’t know how to do laundry, so I’m pretty sure that was the plan. I was glad to teach him how to do laundry, but fortunately for him he was never bold enough to ask me to do his laundry. I told him no on the detergent. We would be here at least a year, so he would be going to go through more than one bag of laundry detergent. If he won’t buy any laundry detergent today, I would gift him one load’s worth of laundry detergent, and after that he had to buy some for himself.
I finally lost it in the soap aisle buying a dish brush and dish soap. He wants to share them. ‘They’ll just be sitting in your house unused 95% of the time!’ according to him. We’re not in New York or Shanghai, where everything costs the earth. These items are very affordable. You’re not going to be popping across the hall every fifteen minutes to borrow something. I know how much we both make. We can both afford dish soap and dish brushes. He starts acting like a kicked puppy and says he’ll buy soap later. Come to think of it, I never actually saw dish soap in that apartment. That’s not completely alarming, because he had zero ability to cook, so I don’t think he every dirtied any dishes. This guy had a million weird things about him, but the other one that stood out the most was his preferences for food. He and I (fortunately) weren’t the only ones who worked in that job post. We would get a group together and all go out to dinner pretty regularly. Since we were overseas, there’s a lot of new and different foods. We’d discuss what we wanted to order. If you asked this guy what he wanted to eat, he’d say he didn’t know. If you asked him what kind of foods he liked to eat, he’d say he didn’t know. If you got past all that and managed to eat, if you asked him whether he liked what he’d eaten, he didn’t know. And of course he had no idea if he wanted to eat that dish again or go back to that restaurant!
I kind of felt bad for this guy, because he was obviously way out of his depth. I don’t think he’d ever been entirely responsible for himself before, even though he was in his thirties. But he seemed to think that because I was the nearest friendly woman, that I would just default to doing everything for him, and taking care of him, and telling him what food he likes, apparently. Obviously nothing ever came of the initial flirtation. I was sick to death of him by the time that work assignment ended, and I’m sure he felt the same about me.”
Evidently He Had Been Living Under A Rock
“This man just stared at me blankly when I said the word ‘republican’ when describing one of my family members. I followed up my hunch, and sure enough, he literally had no idea what the word ‘republican’ meant. He had zero clue about our largely two-party political system. He was in his late twenties. If you aren’t into politics, that is one thing. But this weirdo had managed to live for nearly three decades in our country without knowing basic information about our political system. He acted like this was the first time he heard of these concepts, which it probably was! My brain had a lot of trouble comprehending this fact, and I was genuinely quite worried about what other basic information he had managed to avoid. What had his parents been teaching him? I asked him point blank how he didn’t know this stuff and what his excuse was, and he simply shrugged and said something non-commital. It was definitely a hard no from me, and that was the very last time we ever went out!”
The Worst Possible Response
“This man kept repeating everything I said! I would be trying to have a conversation with him and would be making my point, and he would literally word for word repeat my point back to me. I hate bad conversationalists. I understand a lack of understanding here and there, or even not completely tuning in. but word for word repeating is such a turn off for me. It’s like he didn’t have any of his own thoughts and opinions, he was just telling me what he somehow thought I wanted to hear!
Another thing that made me unable to stand him is how he made everything about him. Like I told him my mom had recently passed away two months prior. I really just needed to talk about it, since it had happened so recently and I was still processing everything. He just kept on repeating, ‘I can’t imagine losing my mom, like I just don’t know what I would do if that happened to me.’
Like good grief dude! I am still in this state of shock and limbo. I can barely breathe at the thought of losing her right then, let alone explain how much pain I am in. I just needed to vent and needed someone to listen, not butt in with their own thoughts on the matter!”
He Was Bad News From The Very First Dinner
“I somehow upset this guy I was dating because I had never heard of the university that he went to, which was Texas A&M. He would not stop bragging about this school for the rest of the night. He was completely bewildered that I had never heard of it. He asked me what school I went to, which was a very small state school that nobody has actually ever heard of. He then proceeded to loudly judge me about it for the next few hours. A couple of weeks later, he wanted to show off and play me some music on his drums. He started a not-fun-for-me-game of playing the first one or two notes of a song, and when I couldn’t recognize it, he would get outraged and switch to a new song instead of finishing the current one. The final straw for me was a few months in, where mid conversation, he mentioned something about me being ‘almost as smart as him’. Now I thought he was joking, since I never really understood his humor. I prodded him and nope, he just thought I was genuinely dumber than he was. This was mostly because he went to a more prestigious school, I think.
There is nothing wrong with not being as smart as your partner, or even not being ‘academically smart’, but I realized he was never going to see me as an equal. That would have been so terrible to deal with long term, so I ended things as quickly as I could. I absolutely do not miss his weird self!”
She Chose Correctly
“So I invited a guy over to my house to cook for him the first time. I love cooking, so this is a big deal to me. I was in the kitchen cooking while he sat on the couch watching television. Just then, my cat strolled in the room. I see what I think is a look of fear in his face, so I mention how my cat is really friendly. As I’m saying this, my cat jumps up on the couch beside him. This dude jumps off the couch and exclaims, ‘Stay away from me, or I’ll throw you outside!’
I immediately threw this dude outside instead. What a horrible person! My cat lives here, and he does not. I ended up eating dinner by myself and gave my cat some extra treats that night. He absolutely knew that I had a cat. We had already discussed it several times. This was our fifth date! It was the weirdest thing. I talked about how good my cat was with my very rambunctious nephew. When he had a scared look on his face, I almost thought he was trolling me, so I was chuckling when he jumped up really quickly. I can only assume either he wasn’t listening when I talked about my cat before, or he thought he was going to much more ‘in charge’ in our relationship. Part of me thinks it’s a mix of the two.”