Not everything in life always goes according to our plans.
Sometimes, whether we like it or not, we find ourselves in situations we’d rather pretend never happened and refuse to acknowledge the awkward reality of. As long as everyone involved feels they can’t handle the truth either, what’s the harm in just moving on and indefinitely locking the unwanted incidents away in our vaults?
Here are 43 stories about people’s worst “never speak of this again” moments.
43. The Limp
This little event took place about a year ago, and it is by far the most embarrassing moment of my life. I was at university during lunch hours, and I suddenly felt an urge to release the chocolate hostages. This is actually a rare event, as I’m not really comfortable pooping in public, but as the university was almost empty, I figured the situation was at least as good as it could be.
In my search for the most abandoned bathroom on campus, I eventually found the perfect spot. It was clean and big, it even had some fancy armrests on each side. I sat down and enjoyed one of my best poops ever. It was huge, it was liquid and it smelled fantastic (from my POV). I sat there pondering, and started reading the newspaper. After about 20-25 minutes, I had to get ready for a lecture and started finishing.
The lecture room was nearby so I wasn’t really in a hurry though. I folded the newspaper neatly and put it my bag, washed my hands, and opened the door. You probably guessed it, but no, not only one person was waiting, TWO people were waiting, IN their wheelchairs, each of them with their personal handicap assistant (this is normal in Norway). In a moment of shock and embarrassment, I realized I had chosen the only handicap wheelchair accessible bathroom on the entire campus.
The floor was swallowing me. It felt like a blackout. I was traveling through distant galaxies, and then I just froze. I stood still like a model posing for a painter. It was the longest seconds in my life. Well, this is where it gets uber awkward; some part of me thought, “Hey, we got this bro, relax.” and then I decided to walk with a limp, without saying a thing. The worst part was that when I first started dragging my right foot in the most over-exaggerated manner you can imagine, I knew it was too late to stop, I had to finish my act. I have never been so embarrassed.
42. Big Things Come in Small Packages
My high school girlfriend asked if she could have some underwear she was ordering mailed to my house instead of hers, because she did not want her parents to discover it when it arrived. Fine with me, my family is very serious about privacy so I thought it would work out.
However, the mailman accidentally delivered it to my neighbor’s house—who was not quite as serious about privacy. She opened it not realizing it was addressed to my house. She panicked, not knowing what to do, and brought it to my house. I wasn't home, so my older sister collected it and left it on my bed.
When I returned home, all my sister said was "There's a package on your bed, and we're never speaking of this again." I found it hilarious. My girlfriend was mortified.
41. Basket Case
When I triumphantly scored in a basketball game when I was eight in front of a whole crowd—only to realize it was on the wrong hoop. I have considered asking my sister to formally sign a non-disclosure agreement.
40. We Have So Much in Common!
I was really getting into this girl and finally managed to ask her out on a date. When we get there, things are actually going really smoothly. Then I bring up the fact that my grandparents are straight out of Sicily. She says oh that's cool. Then I say they're from a certain town, and she says her parents are from the same town. She goes home and, surprise surprise, she's related to me! Needless to say, we don’t ever talk about that date we went on. As a matter of fact, we don’t talk much about anything since then…
39. You Need Winter Tires
Once, my dad took me and my two siblings out for a spin in his new car in late December. Along the way, we went around a corner and slid on the ice. Next thing we know the car starts to tilt to about 50 degrees right beside a long drop. We're all thinking we’re about to tumble to our demise.
We just kinda awkwardly waited for a bit, until my dad was somehow able to slam the car back onto the main road. He made us promise to not tell mum, with the warning being that we wouldn't ever get to do anything fun again.
38. Walking After Midnight
I got up one night to get some water, and found that my teenage son was in the kitchen getting food. He was behind the kitchen counter, so I could only see him from the waist up. When he came around the counter into the hall, two things happened simultaneously: He noticed me and his eyes grew wide in horror; and I saw that he was completely undressed except for a pair of socks.
He tried to panic-run backward on the tile floor, but ended up slipping and taking a hard seat on the tile. Worst of all, he dropped his Hot Pocket. I made sure he was ok, then went back to bed and laughed my backside off.
Years later, we were driving and reminiscing about funny memories. I said, "Do you remember that night when..." and he cut me off with, "Yes." I didn't even have to specify which night. We knew, and we were silent.
37. Cuddle Up a Little Closer
One night, my best friend and I stayed at a friend's apartment because we got way too plastered to drive. Our options were the floor or a loveseat. We fought over the loveseat before finally agreeing that we would share it. At some point in our drinking haze, we started absentmindedly cuddling. Waking up in the morning to discover that was weird. We both tacitly seemed to agree that the best way to deal with this was to pretend it never happened.
36. Life is a Highway
When I was 17, a huge photo radar ticket came in for my truck. I had been going something like 40km over the speed limit. My mom was furious at me. HOW DARE YOU DRIVE LIKE A MANIAC! I RAISED YOU BETTER! The whole ordeal.
Then it turned out I wasn't the driver that day! My dad had borrowed it to pick something up. I asked him how desperately he needed me to take the fall for him, knowing she'd turn on him with the fury of an angry mama bear. And that's how I got myself a new HDTV that year!
35. Plenty of Fish in the Sea
Me and the wife were out on the lake fishing when all of a sudden, I felt a vicious rumbling in my gut. My stomach was hurting and I was about to poop my pants. I looked around and noticed we were nowhere near a dock, and there was nobody else on the water.
So I looked my wife in the eye and told her I was sorry and loved her very much. I then proceeded to hang my behind over the side of the boat and do my business. It was over quite quickly thankfully. My wife passed me a few old receipts from her purse so I could wipe. She told me she still loved me and we kept on fishing as though nothing had happened.
34. Mistaken Identity
My husband and I work at the same small office. We were the first ones in that morning and the other employees usually don’t show up for another hour or so. There’s only one bathroom on our floor, as it’s a small business.
Anyway, I had just had some habanero spicy thing the day before and I was in for some punishment on this particular morning. I’m talking doubled over, clutching your stomach, your farts are fire punishment. I suddenly hear a knock on the bathroom door and I assume it’s my husband.
“Hang on, I’m having the habanero squirts—I’ll be out as soon as I can!” I groan out between awful sounds. I hear a female voice awkwardly reply, “Oh...okay.”
Sorry, Stacy, for pulling you into my terrible morning...
33. Accidents Happen
I peed myself on my friend's bed once out of nowhere during a sleepover. I realized it and just went back to sleep because I didn't know what to do. When we both woke up again, it had dried and she casually told me that the stain on that bed was from when she went to bed with her hair wet one time. But it was on my side, and hadn't been there before. I don't know what her reason for offering that explanation was, but I know it was me and I still feel awful about it. Either way, neither of us has ever brought it up again.
32. Happily Ever After
My brother had an imaginary girlfriend with an imaginary Facebook profile. She would post loving, imaginary messages on his wall. I asked about her a few times, then got a little more persistent. After a while, I got suspicious and did an image search for her photos. They were for another person in another country. Also, no one ever saw the imaginary girlfriend in real life.
If someone asked me about her after seeing their loving Facebook exchanges, I would kind of imply that we'd met to spare my brother (and myself) the inevitable embarrassment. Eventually, he stopped talking about the imaginary girlfriend and she stopped posting imaginary things. I will never ask what happened to her. I'm pretty sure he will never mention her again. She's still on Facebook.
31. All I Can Say is Wow
I accidentally farted very loudly at my grandmother's funeral in the middle of her sister’s eulogy speech. I was 17. Everyone heard it, yet no one has ever acknowledged that it happened.
30. Tick Tock
I came home from a week at Girl Scout camp at 13, and discovered a tick the size of a thumbtack attached to a very private place. I had to go to my mom and get her to help detach it. When she finished, she told me we didn't ever have to talk about this again if I didn't want to. Her tone made it clear that she certainly didn't want to.
29. Illuminating Discovery
As a fireman, our department constantly gets called to the local university dorms thanks to kids who don’t want to go to class, or spark up in their dorm room without cracking a window.
We got an alarm activation at the dorm room at 3 am on a Friday. Nothing really out of the ordinary, we went and it was another routine nonsense call. Procedure dictates, however, that we evacuate all residents and look for a source of the alarm activation. That also means getting a master key and going into any room without an open door.
When we reach the last room on the third floor, the door is locked and no one seems to be coming out. We knocked, banged and finally opened the door forcefully. There was nothing in the room but a lamp, with a muscular unclothed dude passed out on top of it. My lieutenant looked at me, and not a word was said. We continued our search and to this day have not spoken of that room.
28. Possession is Nine Tenths of the Law
Back when I was a teenager, my father and I had an unmentionable battle of sorts. There has been a tacit agreement never to speak of it, and we haven't.
It all started when my mother found my hidden stash of adult magazines. Both parents confronted me about it when I got home from school, confiscated it and, of course, threw it in the bin.
Or so I thought.
Months later, I happened upon my collection, hidden at the bottom of my dad's wardrobe. Hidden. From my mother, clearly.
So I took it back and hid it in my bedroom. What's he going to do? Tell my mother I'd taken the materials he'd hidden from her that he was supposed to have thrown out?
Eventually, he found it again. And took it back. And hid it.
And I found it again. And took it back. And hid it.
This went on for years. And it's never been mentioned.
And it never will be.
27. Top-Down Approach
I once accidentally saw my friend’s mom without a top on. We don't talk about it. It was very weird going to his house the next day, I could not make eye contact with her after that.
26. Be Thankful She Was So Nice To You
My husband and I were going to Thanksgiving dinner at the house of some of my dad’s family that I only kind of knew. We got there, knocked, and a woman I didn’t recognize let us in. We went into the home and there wasn’t anyone there. There was also no dinner or sign of any event hosting preparations. So we’re making small talk with this lady and I ask when everyone is coming. She asks what I mean.
Turns out we were at the wrong house. The woman just thought we were friends of her husband’s because he would often randomly bring people home, and that we had simply arrived before he did.
We left and never mentioned to anyone at the real party that we had been in another house on the way there.
25. There’s a First Time for Everything
I got into a car accident for the first time in my life with my younger brother in the car. I stupidly wasn't paying attention to the car in front of me and rear-ended them pretty hard. Luckily, no one was hurt—but my parents would have ended me if they had found out I had done that. We exchanged information and took pictures, but there was no noticeable damage so we left it at that.
I looked at my brother and we both agreed never to bring it up again. I gave him that car when he turned 18 as his reward.
24. Lost but Won
During WWII, my father was a photographer for the 9th Army Air Corps. Most of the time it was ground-based, but occasionally he flew. During the lead-up to D-Day, he flew multiple missions.
They would fly over France and take pictures until they either ran out of film or the Luftwaffe showed up. To minimize detection, they flew alone with helper fighters circling out over the Channel. In the event of an brawl, they'd drop until they were skimming the waves and run for England, passing under the fighters who'd engage the Germans while they fled.
This, of course, did have its risks and on more than one occasion they'd be caught too deep into France. Crew size meant even the photographers had to man a piece.
So with all that, here's the "let's never speak of this again" moment. They were still at a high altitude when one of the pieces jammed, and the guy took off his glove. He ended up freezing his hand to the metal of the piece.
He's yelling for help and my dad goes over and says, "There are two ways to get your hand off. Either we yank it off and take the skin off your palm, or we use warm liquid. I know of only one source of that..."
"Never tell anybody about this," was said. Dad didn't keep his word, and thus was born the often told story of how my father peed on a crewmate’s hand.
23. Friends in High Places
I ran into one of my ex-girlfriends recently at work. I go “Hey, long time no see! What are you doing here? What's new?”
Then suddenly my boss walks up from behind and says “Hey Bob, how do you know my wife?”
I totally made up a random lie on the spot. She went along with it. No one said anything more or brought it up again.
22. Taking the Plunge
I had to stay with a work friend one night as we had a conference in his hometown the next day. It was weird enough staying in his spare room, but to top things off he had a fancy modern bathroom with a square toilet—which of course, I blocked up in the morning with a poop the size of Mt Fuji.
After 30 minutes of fruitless searching for a plunger while the situation went from bad to worse, he knocked on the door and asked if I was okay. I had to tell him not to come in but to just hand me a plunger and some bleach. Apparently, his girlfriend did the same thing the first night she stayed at his place, so at least I'm not alone. To this day I cannot look him in the eye at work.
21. Scenes From an Italian Restaurant
In high school, a friend and I were eating at an Italian restaurant. We were splitting a pizza and pitcher of root brew. As we were finishing up, a woman comes over to our table to tell us she is very proud that we were so comfortable being open about our relationship—and said she would pay for our meal.
There we were; two straight guys staring at each other while mentally balancing the pros and cons of free food vs. reputation.
Despite being very conflicted, one must never turn down free food. We took the meal and never brought the incident up again.
20. Cannonballed to Oblivion
I was at a pool party in 8th grade. I think I may have been swimming around or sitting weirdly, but I remember a friend of mine told me "Dude, I just saw your privates!"
Me: "No you didn't."
Friend: "You're right, I didn't."
We never spoke about it again.
19. Viva Las Vegas
I was in Vegas with my boys and I got trashed early. I somehow ended up in my room and, during the night, I went into the bathroom, fell in the tub and split my forearm open. I just went back to sleep. I wake up to blood all over the white sheets and carpet. At that moment, a cleaning lady comes in and sees me covered in blood and unclothed. The look in her eyes still haunts me today. I just grabbed my wallet, threw her a 50, and she left. I could have gotten away with anything in Vegas.
18. Ever Get the Feeling You’re Being Watched?
I was a weird kid. When I was 15 years old, I wandered into the living room in my boxers one afternoon, hand down the front, enjoying being home alone. President George W. Bush was on TV saying something about cloning. With little understanding of what he is talking about, I yell at the top of my lungs, "WE'RE FREAKIN’ SCREWED!!!"
When I was home alone and a teenager, I liked to get wacky like this—probably just as an outlet for excess energy and my general facade of being a decent kid. I would dance around, yell random things, you name it. Basically, if you saw me in private at any point in these years, you would have thought I was insane.
Unfortunately for me, I discovered that I had not actually been home alone that day and my mom was in the living room watching this unfold. She yelled at me in shock at my behavior. It was easily one of the top ten most embarrassing moments I've ever been in, and it was never discussed again.
17. Really Driving the Point Home
In middle school, my crush's mom and my mom drove the exact same SUV. They even had similar license plates. After school one day, I ran up, hopped in my mom's car and started talking. When she didn't talk back and hadn't left the pickup row after about 30 seconds, I looked at her. She was not my mom. I look to my right and my crush is standing outside the car looking at me like I’m crazy. I sheepishly got out and ran a few cars back to my real mom.
A few years later, I had moved back to the area and was a cashier at a local store. My crush came through the line, recognized me and started to say “weren't you that girl who...” where I just interrupted with a "yes," handed him his change and quickly started with the next customer.
16. It’s Hereditary
This is my friend's story.
She smoked a bit in high school but obviously hid it from her parents. This one time, she came downstairs in the morning to find some ...substances sitting on the kitchen counter. She knew for sure it wasn't hers and that she wouldn’t be stupid enough to leave one out like that. Her mother soon walked downstairs and started cleaning up around the kitchen. When she ran into the joint, she paused, locked eyes for a bit with my friend, said "Uh-oh," and quickly brushed it away. They both pretended that it never happened.
15. Two of a Kind
I accidentally started kissing my girlfriend’s identical twin sister. Nuff said…
14. A Friendly Favor
My friends and I were playing Never Have I Ever and I brought up that I’d never had a hickey. They decided it would be a good idea to forcefully change that—so two of them pinned me down, while two others sucked on opposite sides of my neck. No one was really sure how it got to that point, but it happened and hasn’t been brought up since.
13. A Romantic Evening
I once tried to make love in a hotel bathtub. The bathroom was very small, there were no lights, and the faucet was leaking. Also, our golden retriever walked into the room and decided to come sit with us—and entered the bathtub while the act was going on. It was definitely one of the weirdest nights of my life, and is never to be spoken of again.
12. That Could Have Been Real Bad
My wife and I were at my cousin's apartment in a big city. They have a balcony on the 40th floor. We were all outside on the balcony drinking some brews and getting a little tipsy. My wife rests her can on the railing of the balcony. I scold her and go to move it when my half-tipsy and clumsy self accidentally knocks it off. We watch in horror as it falls 40 stories in slow motion and hits the ground next to a crowd of people.
It could have been SO bad.
We never mentioned it to anyone.
11. For One Night Only
My friend and I are very laid back and live in a conservative and very religious part of the country.
One night, while he was going through a really messy divorce and we were away in Europe, I decided on the spur of the moment to take him to the red light district of Amsterdam.
Naturally, we cannot speak of that night. Ever.
10. Revisionist History
Last week, I was in the separate bathroom at work, “pooping” and just buying some time until the end of the day (there wasn’t much to do).
I accidentally had the door unlocked and this coworker opened it and saw me on the toilet. I didn’t know what to say, so I just said “Hi!?."
Before the end of the day, I told him that whatever that was didn’t happen.
9. A "Ham" Sandwich
When I was younger, my sister took our pet hamster and swallowed him whole without realizing I saw. I didn’t, and still don’t, know what I should do with this information.
8. Cloud Watching
I was about 15. Definitely old enough to know better.
I was putting spiders and ice cubes on the super hot wood stove because the Leidenfrost effect was interesting.
I thought it would be funny to do it with urine. Turns out it was not.
For the uninitiated, what happens is the pee vaporizes and, depending on the volume of your bladder, produces a thick and clearly visible dark brown cloud. If you can imagine the smog line in LA, it looks like that. That cloud hugs the ceiling and hangs down about a foot. It doesn't really move because it's water vapor, and it leaves a film on everything it touches.
It smells like... well... like burnt pee, and you can also taste it in the air. The cloud absolutely does not dissipate before your mother gets home from work.
That was the only time I can remember her looking at me with actual hatred—and now we just act like it never happened.
7. Taking One for the Team
I was trying to teach my girlfriend how to drive my manual car. She told me she had done it a few times before and knew what she was doing. Fast forward ten minutes and I no longer have a front bumper. She continues with "I can’t believe I did this! Your friends and family are gonna think I'm an idiot!" I just replied with "I did this," and we haven’t spoken of it since. Everyone thinks I’m the idiot.
6. Till We Part… Or Not
When my best friend passed, we figured he would have liked a "sky burial" of sorts. So at the height of the funeral party, we released his ashes into heavens with a giant balloon.
After a few meters of flight, the string snapped and his remains rained down and covered the mourning crowd.
Everyone made their best efforts to get plastered as soon as possible. No one there will ever speak of this again.
5. Love Story
I had a bout with internal bleeding and really low blood pressure. I was in the hospital and instructed to not try to stand or walk since I’d faint. I didn’t obey that suggestion.
I went to try and use the washroom. My girlfriend saw and chased after me. She caught up just in time to throw herself between me and the floor to prevent me from cracking my head open as I fell back unconscious, pants down, peeing all over everything on the way down.
I awoke with her sandwiched between me and the tile floors, lying in a pool of my urine.
And that’s actually the moment I realized I should marry that girl. Anyone who cared about me to that extent was worth keeping.
I did.
But that’s not the story I tell when someone asked, “When did you know she was the one?”
4. Let Off With a Warning
I was on my way to spring break driving from Ohio to Florida and got pulled over. Being a dumb 19-year-old, I had been toking steadily the whole time. But that wasn’t even the worst of it. I also had a massive stockpile of other substances that I had planned on sharing with my buddy in Florida.
Officer tells me to get out of the car since he can smell grass. He sits me in his passenger seat and starts interrogating me. I openly admit how much I have since I know he knows it’s there.
The hard substances were in a Pringles container with a false bottom in a bag full of regular snacks. I figured I’d be safe with that. However, during the questioning, I begin to think “what if he knows these stash cans exist?”
When he finally asks me if I have any other substances in the car, I hesitated. In that moment of hesitation, I knew I gave away that I had more on me. So I told him where to find them.
After searching my car, he finds everything exactly where I told him. He asks me “What would your parents think?” and proceeds to call my dad.
My dad gave me a good scolding until he felt that I had learned my lesson. He agreed not to bring it up again or even tell anyone about this as long as I stayed clean in the future. He never even told my mom.
We shook hands on “Let’s put this in the vault and never speak of it again,” and haven’t looked back since.
3. A Match
I accidentally matched with my cousin on Tinder.
I was like "Wow, she is hot—wait a second, that's my cousin!" while rapidly swiping. It was too late. It all happened so fast and I had already swiped "yes" before I realized who she was. Same thing must have happened to her, because we matched. I just messaged her and said “We never speak of this, agreed?”
She agreed. And we've never spoken about it. Things are weird around the holidays. We just kinda make eye contact and then one of us finds a reason to leave the room immediately to go and talk to other family members with whom we have not matched on Tinder.
2. Falling for This One
One time, I was taking a poop and feeling very faint. I started getting cold sweats, feeling dizzy and light headed. In a panic, I shouted for my wife to come help me. As she entered the room, I proceeded to faint. I fell off the toilet and rolled my body onto my side to prevent injury. Mid-fall, a solid poop torpedoed out of my behind across the floor—leaving a trail of poop smear. When I came to, my wife was standing there in shock. I got up, grabbed some toilet paper, picked up my shame and we never spoke of it again.
1. Doing the Legwork
So back in high school, there was a girl who sat behind me in Spanish class who loved to put her feet against the back of my chair and push. It was annoying for me, so I would always turn around and smack her legs so she could know to drop her feet. She would do it so much that I got into the habit of just smacking her legs without even turning.
So one day, I feel her feet on the back of my chair as usual and throw back a smack without looking. Her legs felt oddly soft, but I thought I was just imagining things. Her feet remain up against my chair, so I throw an even harder smack. It's still soft. I turn around to see what’s going on.
I had smacked my Spanish teacher's rear-end. Twice. She stared at me in shock, said nothing, and then just proceeded to act like it never happened.
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