Apparently small things from your past that make you feel awful-anyone else?

[DannyWallace]

Just wondering if anyone is the same as me? Maybe you've done something by accident, but someone thought you meant something else and got insulted and you have no way to make amends. Does that make sense? 

So, my story is I was sitting outside a pub on a beautiful afternoon/evening with my 2 sisters. As a back story, we have a great, quite jokey relationship. DS1 is VERY into her looks, spends a lot of money on clothes/makeup but it's a bit of a running joke (no pun intended) that she keeps signing up for fitness events/personals trainers and only ever manages 1 session as she gets bored. She would rather stick to a strict diet than do any exercise, and fully admits that.

Anyway, we're sitting outside this pup. DS1 sitting opposite me and DS2 next to me. DS1 looks past us into the distance and says "her! Behind you! That'll be me soon". DS2 and I turned around and saw a woman out for a run. The woman looked fantastic-very slim, running very fast but didn't look like she was struggling....in fact she looked great. DS2 and I both burst out laughing, and we all had a joke saying that we'd actually pay DS1 to take up running as she just never sticks with things like that.

Anyway, as the runner got to us she gave us the finger and looked so upset/angry. She was wearing headphones and was obviously thinking we were laughing at her. This was around 6 years ago and I still feel absolutely awful!! I run quite a bit, but I'm definitely not a confident runner and think I would hide away if someone was openly laughing at me. But she ran off and I obviously had no way of finding her.

I actually feel a bit better for writing it down though. Anyone else?

Och, that's just one of those things. She's probably experienced some very unsavoury comments from other people. It's a pity you didn't get the opportunity to explain but shit happens.

I was thinking the other day about the time I almost asked Stephen Fry who his favourite Spice Girl was at a reading in the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall when I was a teenager. He was droning on about something very dull deeply worthy and taking questions from the audience. To introduce some levity, I put my hand up with a view to asking the question.

Thankfully he never took my question but I still cringe at the idea of how close I came to humiliating myself in front of hundreds of people and - probably - a Daily Record reporter.

Mine is from over 20 years ago. As a teen I was working in a family business for a week for pocket money in the summer holiday. We were re-painting the staff room and didn't clear it out properly, so some white paint got on one of the workers' coats. I remember him furiously trying to scrub it off. For some reason I never apologised, I think maybe I was a bit nervous, but it's stayed with me ever since.

We were on honeymoon in Thailand. My husband and I got chatting to a very nice American man who was telling us some very interesting stories about the places he'd been with his boyfriend. (The fact that he was gay is relevant to the story)

We ordered a round of drinks, and he commented that I was choosing a Woo-woo (a tall, pink drink made with juice and completely covered in umbrellas, and sparkly and fluffy bits - so much so that I struggled to get my straw in) and my husband ordered a whiskey on the rocks.

I commented "Oh, DH doesn't like fruity drinks" - not realising that 'fruity' is a slur for homosexual. I just meant that DH doesn't like sweet drinks made with fruit juice.

The attitude of the man we were chatting completely changed - he made some excuse and left, then blanked us every time we saw him for the rest of the time we were there.

I have one a bit like yours. A few years ago I was standing in a queue with a mum behind me who was carrying a baby. The baby had a rattle and was rattling it. It wasn’t bothering me in the slightest - in fact tbh I hadn’t really noticed because I was totally lost in thought about something that was annoying me at work. I know this sounds weird but I was so lost in thought - and irritated by what I was thinking about - that I gave a massive annoyed sigh out loud. The mum looked really upset then angry and went ‘she’s just rattling!!’ and walked off. So I couldn’t explain that I wasn’t sighing about her baby’s rattling.

So far, 3 out of 5 stories have involved other people misinterpreting the OP and stalking off.

There's probably a lesson in there about not jumping to conclusions.

Eurgh, i have loads and they haunt me if i wake up in the early hours for a good old overthink.
I wish I was able to let go of things easily!

I'm glad I'm not the only one. It's crazy how these things stick with you...especially as a they were not intentional!
I always try to remember it if I come across someone rude. Maybe I'm taking it the wrong way (although, I'm sure some people are just arseholes, but that's a different thread )

Mine is a school one. I was in a lesson and for some reason there were a few printed photos doing the rounds of the kids in the class. This was in the days before digital photos. One photo landed on my table and I nudged my friend next to me and drew on the photo of another friend lots of little dots, laughing while I did it. In my head I was being funny, making X into an alien/Mr Blobby but no one else laughed and I was really confused as to why but they told me I was being really offensive as X had acne. It honestly never occurred to me, I was just a 12 year old drawing on a photo. I tried to explain that I didn't mean it like that and I hadn't thought that's how it would be interpreted but they understandably didn't believe me. I've felt bad about it ever since. I even saw the girl a few months ago (well, not girl, we are now in our thirties) and felt like I should apologise although I'm guessing she probably doesn't remember.

Oh bless you OP I can really see how you would feel bad about that when you've done nothing wrong.

Just tell yourself that it wasn't the worst thing ever - at worst, the woman may have had her feelings hurt. At best, she thought 'fuck them' and put it down to a bad day.

I'm sorry, I too would feel terrible, but you're not a bad person.

@Ginfizplease speaking as someone who was bullied, she will more than likely remember.
I have loads of these stories, but my brain only let's me remember them when I am try in to get to sleep at night. 😫

I also have loads of these stupid faux pas ,the memories of which attack me when I least expect them to.
One was when I working as a temp and doing a great job. A colleague who didnt like me much spoke to me as little as professionally possible. I finished a really good piece of work and colleagues were called to admire the end result. Along with others the colleague admired the work whole heartedly. I felt she was warming to me at last.
I - trying to be clever or something - replied that any Criticism ( as in not all criticism is negative) was welcome. She stomped off saying that she wasnt being critical and she never spoke to me at all for the rest of my contract. I cringed often afterwards thinking abut my poor choice of words but never went and confessed my idiocy . It was years ago so no possibility of putting it right.
That was only one of many similar blunderings that haunt me. Im hoping Ive grown out of it at bit now though.

In year 11 we went away on a residential and some of the teachers came along. One of the teachers was my lovely, LOVELY food tech teacher.

I can’t remember the exact details, but we were playing some kind of ‘warm up’ game where we had to assign an animal, based on that person, to the person sitting next to us. Sitting next to me was my food tech teacher.

When it came to my turn, I panicked and said ‘horse’. My lovely teacher had a lovely, full and prominent set of very horse-like teeth.

I’ll never forget the look of mortification that spread across her face 😭.

towers I think you're mistaken. NO way would a gay man take offence at your saying your DH didn't like fruity drinks!

Anyway....fruity isn't a slur for being gay. some people might say "Oh he's a fruit" but that's not common...and in the context of your conversation...well you were speaking about a drink!

I was at university and standing outside the toilets with a friend. What i thought was a Male ( short hair/ dressed quite boyish,) came out of the ladies and I said loudly "that's the girls toilets!" And she replied " I know" ( very feminine voice). Iv put my foot in my mouth soo many times!

Two more!

I was walking on a path in a park, thinking about something. I came to a solution and it made me smile because I knew it would be really good. A woman walking towards me on the same side of the path (who I'd seen but not really registered as I was thinking hard) sidestepped around me at the last moment and said "ha ha, very funny". I can only assume she thought I was grinning because I was walking in her way and not moving and thought it was funny to make her move. Truth is, I hadn't really noticed that we were going to collide.

The other one is when I was early 20s and worked at a school as a TA. Some new teaching students on placement came in, one from my old secondary school who was about 3 years older than me. I went over to her and said we'd been at the same secondary school and she asked if I'd been in her year group. I said "No, I'm not that old", just meaning I was younger than her, but her face showed she'd taken offence and she didn't speak to me for the rest of the time she was there.

I often think I come across as socially clumsy and incidents like these, where I'm misunderstood completely, make me even more awkward when talking to new people. I just hate how I come across sometimes.

In a music lesson as a young teen, I said to another girl in our class (there were 3 of us), ‘oh I wish it would just hurry up!’ The teacher was talking to the other girl in the group about a piece of music and helping her. I was absolutely desperate for a wee (like wet myself desperate). Teacher turned around and shouted that I needed more empathy with this girl who had been struggling and he hoped that I didn’t ever suffer any difficulties with my playing. The girl was really upset and never really engaged with me after that. And every time I passed a grade exam, my teacher would make snide comments about me not deserving to pass because I was a lazy musician. I just needed a goddamn wee.

@vampiratequeen I honestly wasn't bullying her and I don't think she was bullied. We were friends. I felt so awful that I never mentioned it again but wish I had. I would have defaced the pic no matter who it had been, if that makes sense. I have no idea why I even did it.

Oh I know this so well Op! Sometimes it's my choice of words, other times it's the way I say something, but I just watch people's expression curdle and know I've done it again. Now if it happens I apologise at once. I wonder sometimes if there's a SN element to this?

@Parisbun, nah, sounds like she just disliked you and would have taken umbrage at anything you said. It happens. Bit like this:

I was at university and standing outside the toilets with a friend. What i thought was a Male ( short hair/ dressed quite boyish,) came out of the ladies and I said loudly "that's the girls toilets!" And she replied " I know" ( very feminine voice). Iv put my foot in my mouth soo many times!

You wouldn't dare challenge someone now for ... reasons.

I actually agree with what PP has said... I feel like I'm sometimes socially awkward/clumsy. I have said other things to people that I genuinely love/respect and I've said the complete wrong thing and lost a friend.

Another one I can think of is when I was off work on holiday, someone had to cover for me who didn't know my job too well. I really liked this person, but we didn't work together too often. Anyway, when I got back I was going through everything before going home for the day. After I was home I remembered a part of my job I Hadn't checked so called my boss (who works later than me) saying I had forgotten to check something as I had just assumed it had been done while I was away but didn't actually check. It's a very small part of the job (would take around 30 secs to do) but would mess up the system big time if it wasn't filled in before a certain time.
He told the other person and she refused to speak to me again after that. They both assumed I was implying that she hadn't done it, when I was actually implying that I was an idiot who didn't check my own work properly.

That last one probably doesn't even make sense, but it still bothers me!

A colleague had to do a presentation at work and was really nervous. She stood in front of everyone and then burst into tears and ran out of the room. I was hugely sympathetic and meant to say “ohhh Sandra...” but for some unknown reason I actually shouted “ugh, SANDRA!” like I was disgusted by her behaviour. She came back later and did the presentation absolutely fine and nobody ever mentioned the tears out of politeness so I never got the chance to explain!
*her name’s not Sandra

About 20 years ago, I was in the toilets at a club and a woman came out of the cubicle crying her eyes out. I asked her what was wrong, she said she'd just been dumped. Stupid me says "Bloody men, they're bastards aren't they?", to which she screamed in my face "I'm a lesbian!". Totally my own fault but I still feel bad about it today.

I distinctly remember this (non)incident from years ago. My then-boyfriend had just broken up with me and I was in my own world walking into Burger King. A man on his way out held the door open for me and I just waltzed in like royalty and didn't thank him. Once I realised I turned around to thank him but he'd gone. Probably thinks I was a right stuck-up cow.

Lipstick You're very kind, but he was definitely offended. Before he left he turned to my husband and said "Oh. So you don't like fruity drinks!" before pointedly looking at my extremely girly drink and going to sit by himself at the bar.

I was mortified.