Inspired by Auto’s thread,
What is the worst / most hateful or hurtful thing you’ve ever been told?
Was it true?
As a bonus question, what is most hurtful things you’ve ever said?
Me first.
Let’s just say that my younger brother is an idiot.
We have a long history of disagreements.
A couple of years ago, he did not appreciate my comments on his plans for a major career change and has not spoken to me since.
He has done his best to rip me to shreds behind my back, stupidly not knowing that every word and email would be forwarded to me by family and friends who also know he is an idiot.
I finally came to the realization that if it were not the fact that he was my brother, I would have never had anything to do with him for the last few decades.
How does that Illinois expression go?
You can pick your friends, and pick your nose - but you can’t pick your family.
What is the worst / most hateful or hurtful thing you’ve ever been told?
“No, I don’t love you anymore. Go kill yourself.” - when I was severely depressed and dragging a girl down with me.
Was it true?
Yes. And it changed my life for the better by making me realize I was manipulating people.
As a bonus question, what is most hurtful things you’ve ever said?
I was running away from home once and my parents were looking for me at the airport. A security guard found me by an old picture they gave him and he dragged me back to the folks, at which point I went into a whole charade saying “Sir, I’m sorry. I’ve never seen this woman before in my life. I think she might be… confused… old age? And yes, I know that picture looks like me, but a lot of people of our race look alike. You have the wrong person, I’m sorry.” She started crying and the guard wasn’t sure who to believe. She started shaking me and wailing, “What are you talking about?! Please, come home!” And I just calmly backed away, saying, “I’'m sorry, ma’am. I’m not your son. You must be looking for someone else. I’m sorry. I can’t help you; good luck with your search.”
I don’t remember what happened after that, but months later, she told me it was one of the most painful things she’s ever heard.
That I was demon possessed by mother who is of the unbelievably fundamentalist Christian type who absolutely thinks that everything she says is 100% accurate.
Not as far as I know, but would a demon really tell you it had taken up residence?
After a lengthy set of discussions where it had been bandied about that my marriage was open (but ultimately decided by my spouse that’s not what he agreed to), I confessed that I’d fallen in love with someone else. No matter what the many reasonings were behind all that, it’s the one thing I hate myself the most for and would give anything to undo. It was the ultimate betrayal to the best person I’ll ever know and he did / does not deserve the bottomless pit that is me.
That really, really sucks. For both of you, though. I don’t think people have the luxury of being able to choose who they fall in love with. You’re only human.
Thanks Reply. Here’s a brief (hopefully) further explanation:
It’s been a really sucky situation all the way around. If I hadn’t gotten mentally ill and strained our relationship to the breaking point, we’d have never been in negotiations on what to do about so we could stay together (because we still loved one another, just the marriage had ceased to exist as it should and I had nowhere else to go, plus needed his insurance to procur my medications) but still have some sort of intimacy. I was desperate and needy and, initially only wanted one friend. He was tired of fucking with the whole thing (we’re talking a decade at this point) and relented. Or so I thought. It was later that I found out he really hadn’t and by this time, my friend had become the Love of My Lifeline. :rolleyes:
So it was incredibly stupid, pathetic and painful rolled together. I’m sorry I ever thought that would be the way to handle my myriad problems. I can’t even imagine now, despite still not being well, really how I got there…
It sounds like things weren’t well and you needed a rebound. It happens. Hugs – for all of you involved. Even faultless love can be devastating, and there’s no point in placing blame if the harm was never intentional. That’s just the way life goes sometimes.
A stranger I’d been talking to for ten minutes. We were discussing someone and I said “I think he’s a bit of a prick” to which the stranger said “Well I think you’re a total prick.” Later we found we were on the same train home and I said “I’ll see you on the train” and he said “not if I see you first”.
Well it was just opinion, and pretty mild in retrospect. I guess it stood out because it was so unexpected, and from a complete stranger. It might have been a class thing - I have a posh accent and he was a leftist warrior - or just that he thought I was a total prick.
Not direct, but inadvertant. When I was at school. “Are you going to Matthew’s party?” someone asked. I replied “yeah, but just to steal the booze and trash the place - why else would you go?” Then realised Matthew was sitting at the next table and had heard everything.
When I was in grad school, someone I was very close to said, conversationally, “You know, Jane (a mutual friend of ours) thinks you are smart, but that you don’t have the right kind of intelligence to succeed in philosophy. She thinks your intelligence is analytic rather than creative. I thought she had a good point.” What made it so hurtful was that neither person was trying to be mean, but was just stating the truth as they saw it.
I guess it must not have been true, since I got my PhD and have published a lot and been successful. But at the time it got right to the heart of my deepest fears (and like a lot of people I still often succumb to Imposter Syndrome).
As a young and stupid lad, I slept with a woman (I think I was maybe her first) right before X-mas vacation. Returning to school after the break, she asked why I didn’t call during the break. “Oh, I guess I was just too lazy,” I thoughtlessly reply. Christ, what an asshole.
Mother’s Day (about eight years ago)
Mother: Would you like to see what’s in my locket?
Me: Okay. Sure.
(She opens it. There are two photos. I can’t make out the first one.)
Me: Who is that?
Mother: That’s me holding your sister as a baby.
That’s all she had to say. The other photo was of my sister’s daughter when she was ten.
I have never spent another Mother’s Day with my Mother. Strangely enough, the photo of her holding my sister disappeared a few weeks after we were there and was never seen again. She had kept up with that little photo for thwo-thirds of a century until it was used to wound me.
There is more behind this story than meets the eye. It was the culminating act of a series of events designed to treat me like a third rate member of the family.
I have had people threaten to kill me before, but nothing caused as much anguish as this.
Ouch, Zoe. 
Would you be willing to share those other events?
I love you.
I may never know.
I love you, too.
The one that carried more personal vitriol was my mother calling me a bad daughter for leaving her bedside to go give lunch to my brothers. There’s also been people who’ve called me a murderer for being from where I’m from and stuff like that, but although hateful and unwarranted it wasn’t personal.
I don’t think so, no.
… I avoid saying hateful things… do things said below age five count?
1. What is the worst / most hateful or hurtful thing you’ve ever been told?
Calling my parents and hearing my father in the background say “What does that bastard want?”
2. Was it true?
As far as I know, no. But then again I was not present at the conception. Perhaps neither was he.
3. As a bonus question, what is most hurtful things you’ve ever said?
Probably what I just typed above.
‘‘You know what? Out of everyone I know, you’re the only person who thinks this about me. How can that be so? Everyone else seems to think I’m all right.’’ I really thought I was on to something there.
But she replied, ‘‘Oh, that’s easy. They don’t have to live with you. If they had to live with you they would realize how horrible you are.’’
Not even a little bit true.
Once I was out of the house I do recall screaming at her ‘‘Go to hell! Burn there!’’ and hanging up the phone. There was a short period of time (months) where any interaction we attempted usually resulted in me screaming insults at her. I don’t really feel guilty about it.
*Just have your lawyer draw up the papers and I’ll sign my parental rights away so I don’t ever have to deal with you again because it’s just not worth it. *Said as I cried and screamed at him that he absolutely would not take our child to a motorcycle gangs clubhouse. At 2 years old. Oh, and that he couldn’t have him around drugs and guns. Because I’m such a hardass. Same conversation (or thereabouts, it’s all such a blur now) he threatened to bring motorcycle friends over to beat my ass in front of the children. Still wasn’t as painful as the thought that he could throw away my child.
He backed off when I jumped at the chance and later denied he’d ever said it.
OK, I’m not exactly proud of this but here goes: *Please just go ahead and kill yourself because it would be easier to pick up a SS check and explain that you are dead than have to tell your child what a piece of shit you are - plus we’ll actually have a gravestone to visit so he may actually know where you are! * I think we all know I said it to the guy from#1. It was a bad situation all around. In my defense I said this when he threatened to shoot me before taking himself out.
I was dating a guy who was always sweet and loving towards me, but a complete and utter dick to all of my friends. In hindsight, I think he jealous of my spending time with anyone but him. I finally broke up with him because of this. Once he realized he wasn’t going to change my mind, he said: “All those times I said I love you? I was lying. You were pretty fun to fuck though.”
I don’t think so. I think he was just trying to hurt me because I’d wounded his pride. At the time, though, I believed him. I almost felt violated at the thought of being manipulating into believing somone loved me when he didn’t.
There was a boy in high school who claimed to be a neo-nazi (I think he was just trying to shock people). I was about as radically liberal as you can get (I’m still somewhat liberal, just not as extreme anymore). He loved to bait me into arguments, and I’d fall for it every time. During one of our screaming matches, I said "You know what? I think you’re the only person I’ve ever met that I can honestly, thruthfully say that I hate. I hate you Billy.
His face fell, and he said a tearful “Why?” before running away. He didn’t bother me after that. It still surprises me that it upset him so badly, but I still feel bad about it.
How timely.
This past weekend my father sent the most vile, hateful email imaginable to my wife. He called her a bad mother, called our marriage an “emotional perversion”, said the other family members didn’t want her around among countless other horrors. And it went on and on and on - pages of horrible, hateful, hurtful things.
They’ve never exactly seen eye to eye on, well, anything - but Jesus H. Christ. I didn’t think it was possible to harbor that much malice towards another person.
It’s been a bad week
The background was that I’d gotten a story published where the main character had the same name as my cousin. In the main character’s kitchen was a table with a blue tablecloth. This triggered my cousin to believe I’d spied on her and written about her, since she had the same name and once owned a blue tablecloth.
Really not true. But I do think she sincerely believed it herself. Her conviction was so strong that for a while I wondered if I’d somehow subconsciously written about her. It took a while to recover. It also took years before that rant disappeared from the search engines.
I’d like to think I don’t say a lot of hurtful things. I’ve probably hurt people most with the absence of words.