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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

The Ick

161 replies

Ahostofgoldendaffodils · 31/07/2022 11:40

Inspired by an article in today’s Observer, AIBU to think that you just can’t get over ‘The Ick’ even if the other person is practically perfect in every other possible way?
When I was 18, I started seeing a man in his 20s - he was like an alpha male on steroids- muscular, deep voice, powerful. This was the 90s and his double denim look reminded me of a young Bruce Springsteen. He really was gorgeous and I was smitten. But…. every time he got drunk, his voice would go high pitched, I mean, if we were in a nightclub and he was trying to tell me something he’d come close to my ear and suddenly turn into Joe Pasquale. This was THE ICK. This perfect man, gorgeous, masculine, respectful, confident made me cower in horror at his squeak.
He spoke normally 90% of the time and was a great man but I just couldn’t get over the drunken voice and the fact that the day after every night out my ear would throb in pain at his shrillness. So I dumped him. This could have been a beautiful relationship with lots of mini young Springsteens on the horizon with a lavish wedding. I just couldn’t get over it. Was IBU?
But what I really want to know about are your Icks?

OP posts:
iklboo · 31/07/2022 14:48

The fact the guy who wrote this is Named "Rhik" is making me chuckle. Rhik writing about the ick

We've been Rhik Trolled 😄

Laiste · 31/07/2022 14:49

He was really REALLY funny, he was kind, he was gentle, he was tall, he was a soldier, he was ok looking, he really liked me, he was blonde/blue eyed ...

BUT went he went in for our first kiss his mouth smelt of baked beans 😯😭 No good reason. We'd been out walking for hours together.

I endured the kiss with difficulty.
I dumped him by phone the next day Blush

HouseHelp23 · 31/07/2022 14:54

The Ick was used in Friends in 1995, get over yourselves. It is not a MN thing and no need to slag people

I was once seeing a guy and he turned up for a date with these sort of moccasin slip-ons. Worse, he kept asking me if I liked them. They were new and he was obviously proud of them. We'd been seeing each other for a while and we'd made plans for him to stay over. I could not wait for him to leave and never saw him again

A hairy back was another Ick for me. DFiance has a hairy back but it doesn't bother me. I totally agree with the theory that The Ick is your subconscious telling you to run

Mykittensmittens · 31/07/2022 15:07

Hmm.

nice guy. Met him at the gym. Had several nice dates which were not exactly mindblowing, but I’d previously come out of a really toxic relationship and knew I should look for someone with a whole lot less drama.

he said he’d never had sex, which I was actually okay with. Until it got to the point where it was on the cards….and his eyes lit up at the prospect and in a rather overly enthusiastic voice he said…

’OOOOOH goody goody!! I’ve never even touched a real BREAST before!! Woo hoo!’

kind of a sexy mood killer. Sex didn’t happen. Called it a day.

he also ended phone calls with ‘toodle pip’ - !!!

Trinity65 · 31/07/2022 15:22

I was embarrassed by this little three wheeler in my case
Used to get him to drop me off round the corner to Home in it

Laiste · 31/07/2022 15:24

Oh god @Mykittensmittens you've reminded me of another one!

So it was bit cool on my side but i was waiting to decide properly how i felt. We'd got to the fumbling about in the car stage after a date. We'd kissed. I was wearing a body with a criss-cross lace up fastening (i'm not a medieval milk maid, they were fashionable at the time). He looked down at my chest and said, with a kid in a sweet shop sort of drooling expression on his face ''Lets have a look at theeeeese ...'' and went to unlace me!!!

I mean good god!? 🙄Ohhh no you don't buddy!
He didn't get to see them or any other bits of me ever again.

AffIt · 31/07/2022 15:35

Many years ago before meeting the OH, went for dinner with a man who seemed nice, normal and attractive.

Went to a nice restaurant, where he ordered Toulouse sausages and ate them off a fork - literally just off a fork, without cutting them up, like a character from the Beano.

I could barely look him in the face. There was no second date.

AffIt · 31/07/2022 15:37

The weirdest thing is that his table manners were, in all other regards, perfect.

Just the sausage.

Homewardbound2022 · 31/07/2022 15:45

In my early 20s a colleague used to pop in frequently to chat but never plucked up the courage to ask me out. He was gorgeous but inhaled when he laughed and sounded like a donkey.

Homewardbound2022 · 31/07/2022 15:52

I was asked out for lunch on a very cold winter's day.
When he came to my office I asked where we were going.
He then raised a Tesco plastic bag and said "I have my lunch here, how about the park?".

PotatoFamily · 31/07/2022 15:53

HouseHelp23 · 31/07/2022 14:54

The Ick was used in Friends in 1995, get over yourselves. It is not a MN thing and no need to slag people

I was once seeing a guy and he turned up for a date with these sort of moccasin slip-ons. Worse, he kept asking me if I liked them. They were new and he was obviously proud of them. We'd been seeing each other for a while and we'd made plans for him to stay over. I could not wait for him to leave and never saw him again

A hairy back was another Ick for me. DFiance has a hairy back but it doesn't bother me. I totally agree with the theory that The Ick is your subconscious telling you to run

@HouseHelp23 i too went on a date with an absolutely gorgeous guy. He was outdoorsy, looked like Bear Grylls, had a posh car, a beast of a motorbike, was really lovely…turned up for the date in cream moccasins and double denim. Ewwww

LeilaDarling · 31/07/2022 16:17
  1. blowing his nose into the air minus a tissue!
  2. snorting phelgm down the back of his throat
Trinity65 · 01/08/2022 11:48

LeilaDarling · 31/07/2022 16:17

  1. blowing his nose into the air minus a tissue!
  2. snorting phelgm down the back of his throat

Oh God that's awful

Poor You . Mine was very minor in comparison 😂

Poppyseed14 · 01/08/2022 20:31

QuimReaper · 31/07/2022 14:47

Mine was when he used 'pound' as a plural. Several times in one monologue. 'She travels all the way here every week. But that must cost a fortune. Like a hundred pound for the train. Then a hundred pound for a hotel. But she stays like three nights, so about three hundred pound. Then she eats out while she's here, easily another hundred pound. So about five hundred pound! Then she has to get back, another hundred pound. Now we're at at least six hundred pound.'

I was so fatally attracted to this man, and I can't express how powerfully I wanted to clamp a pillow over his face at this point.

@QuimReaper I had an accounts teacher at school who also said pound when it was plural. You can imagine how many times it was said. More annoyingly though she would also say without fail "one POUNDS". Like wtaf!

Meowmeowmeowmeowmeow · 01/08/2022 21:38

I have had multiple icks

best one was a guy saying to me on a walk ‘are you hungry lass’
hes scottish and so am i
it was just weird

Meowmeowmeowmeowmeow · 01/08/2022 21:39

LeilaDarling · 31/07/2022 16:17

  1. blowing his nose into the air minus a tissue!
  2. snorting phelgm down the back of his throat

Good god

DoingJustFine · 01/08/2022 21:52

best one was a guy saying to me on a walk ‘are you hungry lass’
hes scottish and so am i
it was just weird

Why was that weird? I'd love a man to ask if I'm hungry. It'd always be yes.

Was it the "lass" that gave you the ick? Do Scottish people never say "lass"?

Meowmeowmeowmeowmeow · 01/08/2022 21:59

DoingJustFine · 01/08/2022 21:52

best one was a guy saying to me on a walk ‘are you hungry lass’
hes scottish and so am i
it was just weird

Why was that weird? I'd love a man to ask if I'm hungry. It'd always be yes.

Was it the "lass" that gave you the ick? Do Scottish people never say "lass"?

It was the lass
think he thought he was an outlander extra

ihatebojo · 01/08/2022 22:11

One man smiled and he had a bit of extra skin that came down from inside his top lip.

I really can't explain it but it appeared every time he grinned.

I tried to get past it as he was really really wonderful, but I could not.

Crinkle77 · 01/08/2022 22:16

DoingJustFine · 31/07/2022 14:09

He had a pointy willy. The rest of him was PERFECTION and 100% my type. But his willy looked like it'd been through a pencil sharpener.

👋

Reminds me of the time I met someone who I really liked. However turned out he had the tiniest penis I have ever seen. Think length of your thumb erect. I've never been bothered about size before but this was so small I couldn't feel a thing. It was awful and went right off him.

Dotcheck · 01/08/2022 22:24

Meowmeowmeowmeowmeow · 01/08/2022 21:38

I have had multiple icks

best one was a guy saying to me on a walk ‘are you hungry lass’
hes scottish and so am i
it was just weird

Hang on…. Scottish people DON’T say ‘lads’ all the time??!?!??😩

Friffle · 01/08/2022 22:33

LeilaDarling · 31/07/2022 16:17

  1. blowing his nose into the air minus a tissue!
  2. snorting phelgm down the back of his throat

yuck. like a footballer when they press down on one nostril and let it all fly out?

But I'm assuming you weren't going out with Lionel Messi.

Friffle · 01/08/2022 22:40

People on MN are always moaning about the phrase 'the ick'. But it's been widely used for yonks, way beyond MN.

It's an efficient phrase. Quicker than saying 'it made any sexual desire I had for them to disappear like a fart on the wind.' Everyone gets it immediately.

Idontthink · 01/08/2022 22:49

He had a long (mid calf length) black coat with gold lining and he once ate McDonalds once with dirty fingernails

another wore a grandad (diamond shapes on it) jumper to a party with my friends and I was so embarrassed (he was beautiful but that jumper no no)

another shaved his pubes.

another lived in same house as me as his parents had thrown him out (separate bedrooms) he did a lot of E’s and smoked cannabis and the stress of my parents finding out damn near killed me. I would lay awake and listen to his shit music and go from his room to my parents to see if I could hear his music.he also pissed in glasses and leave them in his room rather than walk along the corridor to the bathroom

Scraggythang · 01/08/2022 23:01

shoes used to be mine OP. Loafers in particular 😬

I went off a bloke I was OBSESSED with when he turned up to the pub in these boxy beige loafers and a matching turtle neck. I mean, for fucks sake!?!?!?

As soon as I saw my current husband had a pair for his “going out shoes” I told him they had to go or I would. 🤣