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Original poster

What is something someone has said that is etched in your brain?

707 replies

WhiteNoiseMoreToys · 19/02/2023 21:49

Mine is when I was 17, pretty self conscious and just finished being intimate with my then boyfriend.

We decided to get up and go out and as I sat up to put my top on he poked my belly and said “Christ, you could feed Africa with that tyre” it baffles me now, how brazen it was to just come out with it. But I was a size 8-10 and honestly I think I’m still confused 😂

Its one of those things that ‘pop’ into my mind at random times ans it’s gout me wondering what others peoples ‘moments’ are when they remember something someone has said that might not have significance, but will always be remembered.

OP posts:
thesugarbumfairy · 20/02/2023 09:10

At about 12 my dance teacher singled me and another girl out. I cannot remember the context of why she said it, but her words 'These two could definitely do with losing some weight' triggered the bulimia that I suffered with on and off till I was 40 and finally got counselling. She wasn't wrong actually - I was chubby - and I imagine she meant it constructively - but the things you say to people can and do have a lifelong impact.

Starred7 · 20/02/2023 09:12

‘Hahahaha you’ll never make a million pounds in your business’

ex bf in crowded pub when was bf at time and everyone joined in

’i don’t love you and you deserve to be with someone who loves you as much as you love me’

ex bf as he left me for someone else

made £3m so far and counting.

met and married the man of my dreams who loves me more than anything in the world and much more than the toxic ‘love’ of my last relationship

Footle · 20/02/2023 09:16

@CanadianJohn , ´dynamite in red' is the best!

Alwayswonderedwhy · 20/02/2023 09:17

I just don't think you're genuine and don't trust you. Said by a friend of a friend who was off with me from the first time I met her.
I'm ND and it made me realise how people might see me. I can't think of anything I did that would make her think this.

Xiaoxiong · 20/02/2023 09:18

My aunt, the first summer after I got my braces off and got contacts "so great you're finally out of the ugly duckling stage!"

I know she meant it as a compliment and don't hold it against her but it really never will leave me. I can't remember large swathes of my teen years but that is crystal clear!

Imamumgetmeoutofhere · 20/02/2023 09:18

Pouffeycat · 20/02/2023 00:01

Working in a shop on Oxford Street.
There was a queue. I apologised.
"Sorry about the wait"
"I'm sorry about your hair!"

It's stuck with me for years..
I didn't have mad hair or anything strange.
She was so forceful about it. So odd.

Not excusing her comment but perhaps she misheard you and thought you said "sorry about your weight"? Clutching at straws here but a possibility

frami · 20/02/2023 09:19

'I like my women with a bit of meat on them'
Said to me by a man in a pub, old enough to be my father, who was pestering me in a pub.
I was 18, and a size 10.

JohnPrescottsPyjamas · 20/02/2023 09:20

Another XBF one.

”You’re not very pretty, but you’ve got a nice personality”

Maybe I was oversensitive, but it really hurt the 18 year old me. We’d been together 3 years but finished soon after. Once I was single, I discovered I never lacked male attention (maybe because of my ‘nice’ personality?) but I was dreadfully self conscious about my looks for years afterwards and when I look at photos from then, I think it was so sad that I did.

I recently stalked him on FB and he hasn’t aged well either!

DisenchantedDewberry · 20/02/2023 09:20

When my boyfriend broke up with me when I was 17, we had been together since we were 12 so was a total childhood sweetheart situation. He told me "there's nothing to love" about me. I'm 34 this year and I've never forgotten it.

DisenchantedDewberry · 20/02/2023 09:25

Oh another one is when my then 9 year old told me that I'm "lazy and always in bed" - was literally dealing with chronic fatigue, working 30 hours a week and doing all the housework and childcare (my youngest was 4), and I know she only said that because she had heard my own mother talk shit about me and my house 🙃
I was barely ever in bed 😂🙃

Wexone · 20/02/2023 09:25

I don't see a ring on your finger so to me he is not family, said my mother of my boyfriend of 12 years, plus living together and had a mortgage at the time - now my husband. A long list of horrible things she said to me

silverbubbles · 20/02/2023 09:29

Age 17/18 got a job telemarketing. One day we found interview notes in the cupboard. Mine said - 'nothing special'

EllaView · 20/02/2023 09:29

My mum, when I was 18: ‘I don’t know how two such attractive people like your father and I could have such an unattractive daughter.’
Nearly 40 years later that still hurts!

CinderRosie · 20/02/2023 09:29

I was 14 (and slim) and got a text off the boy I fancied saying "I hate your fat arse". I was just getting to that point in puberty where I was gaining hips and curves and feeling self-conscious about my newly-rounded bum. It often pops into my head even now, aged 36, when I'm trying clothes on in the mirror.

Treesandsheepeverywhere · 20/02/2023 09:31

When I was 18 or so I went to our family doctor as I had thrush and thought I had a sexually transmitted disease despite being a virgin.
It was the first visit unaccompanied by my mum or dad and the doctor asked why I'd come alone....
He checked me over and as I was leaving said,

"Don't be trusting of men, not even doctors like me"

I found it a strange thing to say at the time as doctors back then were highly respected.
It wasn't until I started reading and seeing in the News about doctors who've abused/ killed their patients.

Has always stayed with me and also especially as most abuses are by people close to the victim.

cobblers123 · 20/02/2023 09:36

There's been several nasty comments made over my teenage years, always from boys or young men and every time I remember them I force myself to think of all the nice comments I've received over the years and there have been quite a lot.

It doesn't wipe out the horrible remarks completely but I can now over ride them with something that was said that is much nicer. 🙂

xogossipgirlxo · 20/02/2023 09:37

EllaView · 20/02/2023 09:29

My mum, when I was 18: ‘I don’t know how two such attractive people like your father and I could have such an unattractive daughter.’
Nearly 40 years later that still hurts!

WTF 😔

MrsFrugal · 20/02/2023 09:39

During a really busy shift I was struggling and my lovely colleague said 'this day will end, this shift will be a distant memory' now whenever I am having a bad day I say this to myself and it really helps put things into perspective

BeachBlondey · 20/02/2023 09:40

On a drunken night out, when we were all having fun, my male friend said to me :

"Do you know, that when you're not looking, DH tries to kiss all the other women"

Genuine heart stopping moment. And I then uncovered way more. A 20 year marriage with 2 kids, utterly down the pan.

He begged me not to leave him, but when he realised I was actually going, he said "Oh well, sleeping with you was like fucking a corpse anyway" 😳

His Mum knew what he'd done, and her belter was : "But DH was just having a bit of fun, whereas Beach is breaking up a family" 😡

Sigh.

None if his religious Catholic family ever spoke to me again, even my sil's, who I'd been close to for 20 years. Not one call. Nothing. And they all knew the truth. I hope they all go to hell, quite frankly.

Got myself a gem of a DH now though. So it all worked out in the end.

SmudgeButt · 20/02/2023 09:41

Bitchy ex boss commented that I looked a bit sloppy at work with "you should take a better look in the mirror in the morning". I almost snorted at her as she stood there in her lovely Laura Ashley dress with baby sick on one shoulder.

writemynameinthesand · 20/02/2023 09:43

‘Whenever you doubt yourself please know that I never do.’

Texted to me by a very close friend when I told her I was suicidal.

Have repeated it to myself a thousand times over since.

SicParvisMagna · 20/02/2023 09:44

Many from my mum. One day when I was about 21 she dropped me off for a job interview, and told me as I was getting out the car with a snear “eww, your breath smells like dog shit”.
Many comments from her about how I’ve squeezed my cankles into certain outfits, my chunky little legs etc. My grandad telling me I would never amount to anything but pushing trollies outside Tesco because I was (still am) terrible at maths and everyone (dad mum sis) laughing their heads off at me. My mum and my sis laughing their heads off at me when I tried on clothes when pregnant with my dd (I was 19). My eyebrows hadn’t been plucked for a while and they mocked me saying I looked like an extra from the film Borat. A boyfriend telling me at 14 the reason he was addicted to watching porn was because my boobs were too small. A guy in a nightclub who was dancing with my friends looked me up and down when I dared say something to him in passing that “he doesn’t dance with ugly girls”.
No wonder I have non existent self esteem, and spent my late teen years sleeping with anyone who even looked at me just to feel like I was worth something. Which made me feel worse.

NooNooHead1981 · 20/02/2023 09:44

A couple of things...

My wise dad told me at about aged 16 that I'd enjoy life a lot more if I took it less seriously. Aged 41, I still need to take his advice and tell him that he was right. I think I'm just someone who takes things too seriously and worries far too much (and I remember my French GCSE teacher telling me I worried too much aged 16 too...😒🙄)

I also remember my dad telling me (around the same age again) when I was trying to take an antidepressant to "cure" my social anxiety, thar doctors didn't know (and still don't now) how the drugs work on the brain. I wish I'd been able to listen to him properly then too, but I needed to take psychotropic meds after a breakdown following a head injury and post concussion syndrome. The stupid antipsychotic given to me left me with a permanent neurological involuntary movement disorder. The fact my dad told me the advice 20 years previously made me realise that I had a gut feeling the drugs weren't a good thing, and I know it's too late now. Oh well.

Maireas · 20/02/2023 09:46

writemynameinthesand · 20/02/2023 09:43

‘Whenever you doubt yourself please know that I never do.’

Texted to me by a very close friend when I told her I was suicidal.

Have repeated it to myself a thousand times over since.

That actually made me cry. I hope you're ok now 💐

HowcanIgetoutofthisalive · 20/02/2023 09:48

AnyFucker · 19/02/2023 21:56

“Does she have to come ? She cramps my style”

My dad, about 15 yo me

I had something similar. I was about 12 and walking with my parents to the bus stop when my dad (in a bad mood anyway) sneered and said 'look at the state of her' (me) and walked back home leaving me sobbing with my mum who said 'just ignore him'. At 12, growing up in the 70's I had no control over what I wore so not sure what he meant really but as a result this has stuck with me ever since and yes, I have a huge problem with my body image.