Fleeting comments that still sting years later

[HoorayFriday]

I was early 30's and single. Dating, but having zero luck and wondering if I'd die alone at the bottom of the stairs with my cat eating my big toe.

I confided in my best friend at the time, I was feeling low about myself and sad. Fed up of the dating world.

She said, her partner had told her that "if I lost a bit of weight I could have anyone I wanted".

Was it a back handed compliment? Meant to hurt me? Meant to make me feel better? Why would she say that? I had no idea.

Years later, it still pops up in my head like that unexpected morning pimple.

I've always carried a few extra pounds, I love my food! But, I was by no means what you'd describe as "big".

Anyway, it stung. A lot. And certainly didn't make me feel better.

It made me wonder if anyone else had a carefree passing comment, that probably meant nothing to the person who said it, yet hit you to the core and stayed with you years later?

A friends ex told her she was the second best looking woman he'd ever been with but that was a huge compliment apparently because his number one was so good looking nobody could compare. The same guy was shocked when he got dumped a few days later!

When I was in my early thirties, recently qualified into a profession and working my way up the career ladder, my dad told me that he could have done twice as well my brother and I put together had he tried. The comment actually stings more over time as I watch my own DC grow up. As parents, DH and I want our DC to surpasse us from an education and career point of view. We also put huge amounts of effort in giving them a comfortable life. So the acknowledgement from dad that he didn’t try hurts…money was always short when I was growing up and my poor mum was under massive stress making sure the bills were paid and we had food to it.

Who rattled your cage? Bore off

I was a gumsy five year old and was told by my mum to smile with my mouth closed for my school photo. My mum is lovely by the way and no malice was intended. I’ve perfectly nice teeth now but I do feel weird about showing my teeth when I smile!

When I was about 10 years old a friend’s mum gave me a lift home from school. On the drive we passed my mum walking home so I realised I wouldn’t be able to get in the house as I would arrive before her. I was very shy and whispered to my friend “oh I’ve just seen my mum walking”. My friend repeated this to her mum (bear in mind this was in the space of about 30 seconds so we hadn’t driven far). My friends mum turned around and screamed in my face “I’M GOING TO HAVE TO TURN AROUND NOW, I DON’T HAVE TIME FOR THIS, YOU STUPID GIRL!!” glaring at me with such anger in her face. I just said I’d get out of the car and walk to my mum but she screeched the car round, drove about one minute, whilst still screaming and shouting and dropped me off next to my mum. I was so shaken and upset - I still remember it vividly to this date (I’m now in my 40’s)! She must have been stressed but I would never scream like this at one of my son’s 10 year old friends - awful.

From MIL (at the time, boyfriend's mum, and I was in my early 20's) who we have been NC with for several years:

"Oome is as fat as lard" (when talking about some lard in her fridge)

"I was as slim as Oome used to be" - when she was talking about how slim she apparently was after her pregnancies.

"You can't afford to put on any more weight"

At BIL's wedding reception, while she was sat at the top table next to DH who was best man: "isn't it sad how Oome is only happy when she's drunk"

From others:

Got "fatty" and "FAT!" shouted at me when passing abusive bully neighbours in my old road.

From my younger DB and DF years ago: "You and Mr Oome look like sumo wrestlers"

From a taxi driver:
"You've got the same problem as me"
Me: "what's that then?"
"We're both cuddly"

From an old boyfriend: "I was watching a programme the other day, one of the girls looked like a supermodel and the other girl reminded me of you"

☹️

From a former manager who I had the misfortune to sit next to every day:

"Do you have takeaway every night?"

One day when I'd put on little to no make up: "Why aren't you wearing any makeup?" (while trying not to laugh).

My late husband's ex spun the narrative that he'd left her for a younger woman. (In actual fact, she'd spent the night with a work colleague. He was younger than her too, but not obviously so. They never married.)

We attended a 65th birthday party. To my horror the ex and her BF were there.

She waited for my husband to leave my side, swept up to me in front of the village matrons and declared "My, Weary - what a lovely dress. What a lovely colour. Mind you, you can wear it...being so YOUNG!"

I just said "Thanks!" and she swept off again.

Years later, we were supposedly on better terms. There was a family lunch: DH and I, his daughter, granddaughter and the ex. (Her first BF and subsequent partner had both died. We didn't know it, but she had already acquired the next man.)

DH had had a stroke by then and probably said more than he should when she phoned 'to update [him] about the kids'.

Ex, loudly: "I hear you've had an implant! [I had my front teeth broken when I was a kid. One of the crowns had failed and the root had gone.] Is this you trying to make yourself look beautiful?"

"No. Just want something to chew with."

As a teen I asked my mum if I was pretty and her reply was.... you can't look pretty with spots. We get on very well surprisingly 🤣

Not long after being separated from my now ex DH I decided to download a dating app and have a browse. I got a message through from one guy which said ‘too ugly’. So I immediately deleted the app. Nearly 10 years later I’m still not looking. I’ve decided dating apps are definitely not for me.

I must be misunderstanding something. But what is wrong with that? I look like my dad, and certainly no one would think that I looked like a man!

This thread is making me realise how sensitive I am cos I honestly think I could name about 10 off hand 🤣

Age about 15 walking through the shopping centre with my friends when a woman from a stall selling skincare came over and proclaimed "I see you have terrible spots all over your face, I have a product to help that" and I burst into tears, having spent ages doing my make up to cover just that - my biggest insecurity.

When I was about 23, spent a lot of time on hair/make up/outfits and cared how I looked (more than I do now 🤣) and a guy I worked with similar age to me was speaking to me and one other female colleague who was much older than us, a masc-presenting lesbian, who didn't wear make up etc. he was telling us how his girlfriend was extremely jealous and hated him talking to women. She said "would she be annoyed you were talking to us now?" And he said "nah you're not the type she would be jealous of, but if I was talking to Harriet over there she would freak out". In my mind I was aligned with Harriet more than my other colleague but I got humbled, and clearly not.

Been asked if I was pregnant many times when not - carry my extra weight on my tummy - those occasions all stick in my mind clearly.

Oh, and every mean thing my husband has ever said in cross words lives rent free in my head forever.

I frequently get mistaken for a man, and when I wear a dress I look like my dad in drag! I'm not pretty at all and have quite a ....masculine face. (It looked lovely on my dad though!)

My now DH is a lot younger than me but when we got together, I had a few comments from friends/colleagues about me only being with him as I wanted a baby!
Turns out he was in fact infertile and it took us several rounds of ICSI to conceive!!
20 years down the line we are still together, married and raising our family but it stung at the time that people genuinely thought I only wanted a younger man as I was so desperate for a baby!

My first office job out of uni and I had an appraisal, all was going well no problems happy with work etc
then right at the end my manager said there’d been complaints that I didn’t make tea and coffee for the office (20 people) regularly enough… I didnt drink them at the time but I still made the odd ones for everyone.
i was mortified that people had been discussing my lack of tea making as they were expecting several cups a day!
now I would respond and knock it on the head but back then I diligently went about making drinks then staying late to catch up .
20yrs on at every new job I get a bit paranoid I’m not pulling my weight on the drinks front! 😂

Oh@Vroomfondleswaistcoat I can see why that would rankle then.

40 years ago: I was 22, had a six month review with my training partner (accountancy). About a week later I was let loose in the HR department for some reason so of course dug out my personnel folder. All the twat had written re the review was ‘another quiet person’. I was and still am livid, it was such a lame, lazy, inaccurate thing to write. I’ve never forgotten it, have got louder and louder as the years have gone by, have made people pay attention to me. So I suppose I should thank him! Instead I’m just glad he soon after got taken down for the crook he undoubtedly was.

Your mother was clearly too stupid to realise that people holding up others are the strong ones...

Please squash her comment into the pointless pile of crap it needs to be and put it in the bin.

As a teenager I moaned to my dad about being fat - I wasn't, but I was a teenage girl. He said at least you have a waist, not like when you were a child.
It was not until children that I realised younger children do not really have a proper waist.
And yes it stung.

I can sort of laugh about it now, but I haven’t managed to fully let go and it did damage our relationship.

MIL holding my 3 day old ‘oh are you crying because you look like your mummy, don’t worry you’ll get used to that’ made me see her in a different light, my first born looks exactly like his dad and I’m regularly reminded about how you can’t see any of me in him so it felt personal.

It was also on top of other throw away comments, I liked a style of hat, and she responded with ‘oh you have to be pretty to carry those off’ comments about dress size etc. but the comment about my newborn I decided to withdraw, my dad was also dying from cancer at the time so it felt particularly unkind to a woman who had given birth 3 days earlier.

Oooh I have loads of these, I have such low self-esteem as a result of pathetic men and a not very complimentary mother. But just one for now, when I was 19 and in my prime I worked as a live-in groom for a girl who had horses at home. She used to go out every weekend with her mate and I'd get dragged along even though it wasn't really my scene (think flirting with anything in trousers and being generally loud). This one time we'd been to the local pub and her jack russell terrier had come along too and was in the back of the car with me. She pulled over to chat to two lads who invited her and her mate back to theirs and she said she couldn't because she had the dog in the back - they looked across and said "which one's the dog". Over 40 years later and it still gets to me.

My mum told me when I was a teen that my grandmother had looked at me when I was born and said ‘Poor little Faversham.’ I understood from her it was because I was an ugly baby but I was also premature and unwell.

When I was about 13 and stood waiting at the bus stop, a woman said to me “Are you a boy or a girl?” Admittedly I had short hair and was wearing jeans, but I’ve never forgotten that remark and I’ve never had short hair since.

What springs out at this is that people who are going to make nasty comments will make them no matter what, it is about them, not you! I haven't had anything that bad but my granny did say to me that my forehead was so big I would always have to have a fringe (it is really not that big), when I'd given birth my friend's mum said 'You've REALLY piled it on, haven't you?' and followed it up with 'you look SO much better now'...
I did have a funny unintended one recently, I bought a royal blue blazer for work and my DD 14 said 'oh it looks just like the ones on Superstore (the netflix series about people working in a Walmart-type store), and she saw the look on my face and said 'I mean the one where Amy goes for the job interview as the manager!!' That didn't bother me.

After coming out of a DV relationship I met my now husband.

In the early days I was struggling with the impact or the past so self esteem very low.

My partner and I had a little argument anyway his mum said to me if we separated “well you’d have a lot to lose”. I turned around and said - yes and so would he.

Shes never liked me but to try and make me feel worthless was disgusting it’s been the first of many from her and I will never forgive her.