It can be a really difficult thing – shattering, even – to realize that someone you looked up to or were even just kind of friends with might in fact be a bit of a monster.
Might in fact be in severe need or help, and may require that you stay far, far away from them.
When did you realize that someone you were cool with your whole life was actually really messed up?
byu/Shadow_Saitama inAskReddit
The people of Ask Reddit were certainly no stranger to these types of situations. Here are a few of their stories.
(Content warning: violence, drugs, bigotry.)
1. “He almost killed the poor girl.”
This cool laid back brazilian guy went to 7th grade with me.
I live in Peru and spanish and portuguese are mildly mutually intelligible, so we had a lot of fun as he playfully learned spanish, and had a carte blanche whenever it came to actually understanding school subjects.
We all liked him but him and his family missed living in Brazil, so they went back the following year. We stayed friends on facebook and he’d post jiu jitsu tournament pics every now and then.
Years later, a schoolmate found a brazilian news article about him beating a woman for refusing to have sex with him on a date. He almost killed the poor girl. There was a following article about him having beaten his disabled brother for years.
– computer_crisps
2. “Bragging about hookups.”
I had a fifth grade teacher that was f*cking awesome. He had high energy, talked about partying and the girls that he’d bring home on the weekends.
I thought he was so cool until I got old enough to realize bragging about hookups to a room of 11 year olds is weird.
– pantaleonivo
3. “Only to find that…”
This one girl I went to a church camp with.
She was really fun and nice and we exchanged social media at the end of the summer.
I got home and added her on instagram, only to find that she posts nudes, smokes, drinks, and does crack.
We were 14 at the time.
– ThislsMyTrashAccount
4. “Good God.”
Had a crush on a guy in high school, even made out with him once.
He ended up murdering his girlfriend, stuffing her in his trunk and dumping her body couple hundred miles away.
Good God.
Never let a nice set of abs distract me again after that.
– Erna626
5. “She’s a philanderer to this day.”
Ex-wife announced when she was three months pregnant that she was into group sex and was going to an orgy that weekend.
She hoped I’d “be cool with it and join her”, but instead followed through with destroying the marriage by following through with her plan.
Turns out she was cheating from day one. She’s a philander to this day.
– -Azrael-Blick-
6. “I overlooked them.”
When my former best friend stole a chainsaw and weed eater from my parents.
I knew about some bad things he had done but he had been my friend since grade school so I overlooked them.
– badword4
7. “He thinks I’m a sad pathetic loser now.”
My friends and brother to me. I used to be the cool HS rebel with a serious attitude problem. I smoked and drink and f*cked and people thought I was so cool.
Then I robbed a liquor store and spent the next 11 years in Prison. What’s worse is I ruined my best friends life too by strong arming him into robbing the Liquor Store.
My brother used to idolize me. I protected him from my Dad and bullies in School. I was so cool to him because I defied everyone. He thinks I’m a sad pathetic loser now and doesn’t believe I reformed.
– ArrogantDante
8. “Be careful who you trust.”
Didn’t really know this person my whole life, but I knew her for 4 years of my childhood. She lived next door to my family and my parents would hire her to babysit me, my sister, and my brother.
I didn’t really realize anything was wrong when I was a kid, but thinking back to it, a lot of the games she played with us (or with me anyways) were oddly sexual.
She also brought a pornographic video to our house once and showed it to me. I was somewhere between the ages of 6 and 10 when all of this happened and she was in her late teens.
Be careful who you trust to watch your children and remember that not all predators are men.
– 54R45VV471
9. “She’ll know it’s about her.”
A few years back was on a new birth control pill that ended up not working for me and got pregnant, tried working it out with the sperm donor only to find out that my sister had been f*cking him the entire time despite knowing we were dating and I was pregnant.
If she see this she’ll know its about her and all I can say is f*ck you wh*re.
– kitten896
10. “Really, really racist.”
I wasn’t really “cool” with this person, more tolerated his annoying behaviour because he was on the wrestling team with me.
But then he came out that he was like, SUPER racist.
Like, really really racist.
F*ck that guy.
– engineertr1gg
11. “Lost all respect.”
Someone I considered a mentor told me over lunch one day how the family dog was getting old so he dropped it off at the pound.
Lost all respect for them.
– _babycheeses
12. “They were in denial.”
I was friends with a guy for 16 years. We had a lot in common as we are both into the outdoors. We would hang out together with our spouses and even travelled a little together.
All was fine until he got me a job with him working for his parents. They were so kind and generous, they treated me very well. That’s when I learned my friend was an *sshole. He lied about everything to his parents. Lied about being overwhelmed with work (that’s why I was hired), lied about money (he pocketed it any way he could).
I tried telling his parents about a little of it and it ruined my relationship with them. I think they had an idea about how he was but were in denial
– hikermick
13. “Wish you didn’t exist.”
My neighbor/ lifelong friend when I followed them on Facebook…nothing like seeing your close friend posting about how they wish you didn’t exist/ you shouldn’t get the same rights as everyone else.
– Pipessqueak
14. “F*ck your opinion.”
She got a face tattoo and a neck tattoo that says f*ck your opinion, right out of high school someone told me they saw her begging for beer money at a Walmart.
She peer pressured a younger impressionable girl with epilepsy into smoking weed and then laughed and took a video of her having a seizure and sent it around to everyone to make fun of her,
She put her senior-aged cat in the dashboard of her car and hit the accelerator and brakes repeatedly so that the cat got thrown around in the car.
– redditorinalabama
15. “Bye.”
“No seriously, there’s loads of evidence, check you tube, the earth is flat.”
Ok then, bye.
– ProcessSmith
Always a super difficult thing to deal with. And yet you’re usually left at least a little grateful that you didn’t fall full victim.
Do you have a story like this?
Share it with us in the comments.