You remember that one time when you went over to a friend’s house for dinner and you left unsure if you could be friends with them anymore because seeing how they lived led you to believe maybe they were aliens?
It’s an oddly specific experience, but if this Reddit thread is anything to go by, it’s a near universal one.
Here are some tales of weird.
1. The Bed Shift
When I was in about 1st grade, my best friend at the time had a lot of temper tantrums.
We were having a sleepover and I fell asleep in her bedroom. In the middle of the night, I woke up in a different bed with her father. I was so confused, but he explained that she had a temper tantrum and her mom went to sleep in her bed with her so they moved me to the guest room. I was young and didn’t understand that’s not normal that he was sleeping in the same bed as me, just him and me.
I told my parents when I went home the next day and they were EXTREMELY concerned asking me if he touched me, etc. I was highly confused because my pure innocent mind didn’t understand the concept of that lol.
Now as an adult I’m like, why didn’t they just move me to the other room, why did the dad have to get in bed with me? Lol.
They’re truly good people and nothing happened, but it’s weird.
– flowersandchocolate
2. The Gin Joint
Here’s an “I was that family” story.
My Godmother (who was practically an aunt) ran a fairly successful daycare out of her home in the 90s. She was a first generation immigrant to the US, whose parents came to the New England area from Ireland. My two younger brothers and I spent a lot of time at her home and I was generally the oldest child there.
When I was about 8 years old, she started to have me make her her favorite drink. Gin and tonic. She drank these ALL DAY, while running her home daycare. At age 8 I knew…how to mix cocktails, that forks were better for stirring than spoons, and that large plastic bottles of gin were cheap and low quality.
This went on for years, on pretty much a daily basis, until my family moved out west. My Godmother kept her daycare running until she died (I’m sure of health problems relating to alcohol). I was 15 when she passed and I’m in my 30’s now. I honestly went most of my life thinking NOTHING of it until I became a father a couple of years ago. At which point I was like… “How the f**k did anyone let her have a daycare?”
Side note, I drink but would consider myself an average drinker, if not below average. With that being said, I could never stomach the thought of gin and didn’t try gin until I was 30. This was because I once licked my finger, early in my daycare bartending career, after a couple of drops of gin splashed on my hand as I was pouring. That plastic-half-gallon quality gin was the worst thing I’d ever had in my life and I had no idea how my Godmother liked it so much. Complete ruined my taste for gin…at 8.
– Academic_Bar9792
3. The Hoarder House
Not really weird I guess, but first time in my husband’s parent’s house (just a friend at the time), I got to see what a hoarder house looked like.
It wasn’t even a well known term/condition back then so it just really shocked me seeing the giant mounds of stuff everywhere and having to navigate through it all.
His room was clean, the rest of the house, not so much.
– ArtsySAHM
4. The Photographer
Went to a sleepover at this girls house and her mom was obsessively taking pictures of us all night. At one point, we were watching a movie and my friend passed out and her mom , I s**t you not, pulls out a huge newscast-type heavy duty camera and starts recording her daughter sleeping for a solid 5 minutes .
I have trouble sleeping and so that night when us kids were in the bedroom to sleep, I was on the floor, just staring at the wall in the dark. I was facing away from the door, laying on my side.
I hear the door creak…some footsteps and then the darkness of the room lit with a sudden flash. I got up just in time to see the door close. I know it was her mom taking pics of us. The weirdest part to me is that it was about 3am when that happened…meaning the girl’s mom either had an alarm or just stayed up that late in wait….
– TraditionalEye4686
5. Hitting the Bricks
Family had like Styrofoam bricks next to the couch in the living room for the explicit purpose of throwing at the TV if they didn’t like the show, or if a character said something stupid.
– Garlicholywater
6. The Naked Truth
My best friend walks around completely naked. We have been friends for 25 years and it doesn’t bother me. I’m used to it, but it gets weird when she invites me, my husband and toddlers over for dinner.
“Hey girl, your house your rules. But since husband and kids are coming can you put some clothes on?”
“Sure! No problem!”
– I_am_dean
7. How the Other Half Lives
My family were very comfortable and my mom always babysat lots of kids from around the neighborhood. Basically her place was just where the kids hung out.
Once there was an emergency with my dad and my mom really needed somebody to watch me overnight and I wound up with one of the families that she babysat for. They were really nice people and I was close friends with their kids obviously because they were at my house every day. It was a new experience though.
This was the first time I’d ever seen people living in real poverty. I was kind about it and I didn’t say anything, but parts of it were a real shock to me. The toilet didn’t work, but they had just continued to use it to the point that it was piled up to the seat. We had to unscrew the lightbulb to turn off the lights because the switch would shock you if you touched it. I felt really bad for them.
It was just a real eye-opener for me as a kid and it gave me a much better understanding of exactly why my mom babysat and fed all those kids.
– Armistice8175
8. The Break In
Stayed at a friend’s house when I was probably 10 or 11, and we had a sleepover one night, and we were up really late playing games and just talking.
Around 3-4am, his dad comes in, frantic, saying that he heard someone breaking in upstairs, and that we needed to leave immediately.
Anyways, we walk out of the house, and he tells the neighbor that they need to leave too. The neighbor looked extremely worried, and pulled her phone out.
We drive to a place and he gets us some food, and eventually an ambulance comes, and so does the neighbor along with it, because apparently the father was schizophrenic and having an episode. There was really no break in.
Obviously my friend NOW knows this, but back then, we genuinely believed him.
– mellowgang__
9. Don’t Have a Cow, Man
Had a friend who’s family lived on a huge property and kept cows for the property tax exemption, not odd.. he told me to come by and get some purple ringers he collected for me.. invited me in to meet his parents and I swear to god, there was a full-size cow chilling on one of their couches in the living room.
That sight was way more wild than any of the hallucinations later experienced. Really nice people though lol..
– Veg305
10. The Christmas Room
Growing up in rural East England, had a friend who lived on a working farm, they had the stereotypical big English farmhouse, lovely old place, no flat floors or straight walls anywhere.
Anyway, downstairs was an interesting layout, they had a room that was almost hidden away that you could easily miss unless you knew it was there or noticed it from outside.
So, this room, I only ever went in once, maybe twice in many years of being friends and going over their house quite a lot, it was their “Christmas room” it has decorations up all year round, and during the year when they bought presents they’d wrap them and just put in the room and leave them there until Christmas.
It was awesome in a sense though, a whole room for this is great, often when it came to Christmastime they’d forgotten what something was that they got for another family member.
– AnotherLostSouls
11. Talk About Strict…
When I was younger I was best friends with 2 brothers from Jamaica, one of the days they asked me to stay over so we could play some Atari after we finished playing outside.
We came home 12 minutes after their curfew so their dad who was extremely calm told us to sit in the living room, I Sat in there with my 2 friends and they were super quiet which was a bit weird until their dad walked in with a belt and beat the living s**t out of them.
I s**t myself (not literally) because I thought I was in for a beating but he didn’t hit me which was a huge relief, after the beating he (their dad) asked if I would like some carrot juice while my friends just went back to normal and set up their Atari like nothing happened… I was sat on the sofa wondering what the f**k just went on.
– Shinzo19
12. The Gross House
My gf and her little brother were staying at a sorta foster home that was absolutely filthy. They knew it was, but weren’t going to complain about it since it was still better than their last situation.
But the parents there had 2 little boys of their own, and it’s their normal.
I feel bad that those boys will either realise their home is disgusting and never invite anyone over, or have someone over who then embarrasses them or doesn’t want to be their friend anymore because of it.
– smallblueturtle
13. Jesus is Watching
Slept over at a friend’s when I was around 10. She was the only girl in her family, and had five brothers (whose ages ranged from like 4 to 15).
Everything about my friend’s room/sleeping situation was normal. But her brothers’ room was bizarre. They shared one big room, with three bunk beds. Each mattress a fitted sheet, a pillow, and nothing else. No top sheets, no blankets, no comforters. Also, the boys didn’t have pajamas. They all just slept in the clothes they had worn that day – with their shirts tucked into their pants, and belts on, too. Their room didn’t have a door, and neither did their connected bathroom or their closets.
Turns out they were fundamentalist Christians, and the boys’ setup was meant to prevent masturbation.
– SSDGM24
14. Out for Blood
My house but looking back it’s unusual. My Dad was a doctor and it was not uncommon for him to take a patient’s blood on the way home and store it in the fridge next to the orange juice over night.
Then take it to work the next morning.
Can’t do that these days of course but the 70s was pretty wild.
– Ozdiva
15. The Candy Vault
When I was seven, I went over to play with a new friend and she asked if I wanted a snack. I said sure and we went into their playroom where there was a mini fridge just stacked with candy, full bars of everything, and she casually tossed me a pack of Rolos.
Now, the house was a manufactured home— not a trailer perse, but definitely not like the usual house either. I know this doesn’t indicate how much money the family had, but this was not in an upscale neighborhood or house.
I marveled at A.) the largest amount of candy I have still to this day ever seen and B.) the fact that she and her siblings all just had free access to it at such young ages.
She was surprised at my surprise and asked what did I keep in my snack fridge. I told her I didn’t have one of those, and then it was her turn to be absolutely gobsmacked at the idea that I didn’t have a mini fridge full of candy just at my disposal and whim.
– RuyiJade
Well that last one sounds pretty cool. Also maybe the one with the pet cow.
Do you have a story like this?
Tell us in the comments.