To ask what's the most tactless thing anyone has ever said to you?

[Squirrel78]

I've had someone come up to me today gushing "I didn't know you were expecting again?!" I'm not. Don't know who was more mortified - her or me! My stomach has grown over the last few months probably because I don't exercise enough. Now I'm tearful, depressed and embarking on a diet and the only thing that can cheer me up is s bit of shared misery!!

My dd was 1year old when my mil passed away. We were married 8 years before our much wanted dd arrived. The day of the funeral an aunt told me I was very selfish for starting my family so late because mil got so little time to enjoy her granddaughter!

Also our dd is an only child and a 'friend' told me I was selfish for only having one.

A colleague told me that my sister's disability was punishment for sinning in a past life.

My mother's neighbour (evil old biddy) told her that dsis' disability was punishment from God because my mum's birth parents (she was adopted) were unmarried.

That woman and her hideous bigotry came close to my very young and sensitive mum to a breakdown.

Oh my god MrsD, that is truly awful.

And others, I wish we could all have a group hug.

for everyone

cleanasawhistle my mum gave me the opposite advice "it's all very well you being pretty, but you will never keep a boyfriend, if you have no personality", just after I had been dumped by my first boyfriend [shocked]

Meant MrsD rather than cleanas

A health visitor told me I'd been lucky that someone else had been looking after my DS and that I should be pleased I didn't have to do night feeds from the moment he was born. Ds was born prematurely, I woul have given anything to have him next to my bed like every other woman on my ward.

A friend also came out with the gem 'you must feel like he isn't yours. I mean, you can't bond with a baby if you didn't actually give birth to it' ds was still in scbu, I'd had an emergency csec, having nearly died from severe pre eclampsia.

I think there's a difference between tactless and downright abusive.

We all say tactless things occasionally. I know I have. And I cringe afterwards. I also apologise if I get the chance.

But I would never, ever say things on this thread, even in a moment of unthinking.

After my miscarriage I was sent for a scan to see if I needed D&T.

If it wasn't bad enough sitting in the waiting room with expectant Mum's then walking into the room and having the sonographer greet me with-

"Ahh Ms Shakey, do come in. Congratulations, now let me look at your notes and see how far along we are" darn near floored me.

On hearing that I had 2 children born by CS 'I would have felt cheated by having the baby without the labour' Felt like saying better than having the labour without the baby like when 1st child was stillborn

Some of these are truly awful and beyond tactless.
Mine is not so bad after reading the thread but when a close friend told me that my hands were best feature I was quite gutted.

After explaining to mil that still after 6 years of trying for a baby it still hadn't happened for us. She announced that her and her daughter only had to look at a man and they were pregnant! This was amongst many situations when she sprouts out stuff without fully thinking about it! However the ironic thing is that she does have 5 kids with 2 different fathers and she's currently on husband number 5 already!

For example I once tried to empathise with a friend who'd had a miscarriage at about 15/16 weeks by mentioning my early miscarriages (about 5/6 weeks). I still regret it because it wasn't the same at all.

Telling my friend that ultrasound had shown baby would be born with dwarfism I said "could have been a lot worse", to which she replied "could have been a lot better"

On announcing my pregnancy to Dp's Mum.
"Oh, but you won't be keeping it".

My uncle drowned himself. Tragic. HR manager asked me were we sure he hadn't fallen in.........

I was asked once by a student I hadn't seen for a few months, ' was it a boy or a girl?' I hadn't been pregnant!!

Sil to me when she had her second and my mum's 6th GC - I feel sorry for you. Your mum will be sick of grandchildren by the time you have any!"
Luckily, DM heard and said don't be ridiculous, every baby is special.

Some of these are just so horrible

My MIL said we were selfish at conceiving a baby within 2 months of her well-earned retirement had started & that we should not ask her to babysit.

We had been undergoing IVF for 18 years (with no emotional or financial support from her)

The timing wasn't through choice to piss her off

One thing that stands out from so many of these is that saying the wrong thing, as the OP so delicately put it, so often really means saying a mad thing - old aunts savaging size 10s for being fat, for instance. A lot of these people were evidently drunk or mad or both.

I think that's a different issue to cruelty and lack of empathy.

Oh you're lucky, at least you can have a drink - friend of a friend after my first mc, she was pregnant with same due date

Oh god, you're not are you - MIL when we were announcing engagement, she thought we were going to say pregnant

My mum has a special line in tactless.

I miscarried four times during my marriage, then got divorced. Shortly afterwards she rang me up to complain about how SIL doesn't parent her children the way she would like (SIL is an excellent parent and very tolerant of mum being pushy). She ended up in tears because 'it's hard for me that you don't have children'.

Yes, mum, it's hard for me too.

A few more. I was an 'accident' and a few years ago my mum told me she'd wanted a boy ( I have 2 older sisters )

She also once, quite gleefully, told me that when I was a baby, when I cried she'd put me in the pram at the bottom of the garden ( it's a long garden ), so she couldn't hear me! Thanks mum.

My mother once overheard my grandma saying to a neighbour how she wished she never had her.
She also seemed quite proud of the fact she had held a pillow over my mothers face and only stopped because my granddad caught her in the act.