Usually when someone has a full-blown temper tantrum, it's a small child. As terrible as the tantrums are, little kids can be excused because they have not learned how to cope with problems yet. But what about when it's a full-grown adult having the full-blown meltdown?
It's shocking how awful the people in these stories treat those around them by freaking out at the smallest things and take it all out on mostly innocent people who are in the way. It's terrible behavior by terrible people! Content has been edited for clarity.
She REALLY Hated Matchbox 20
“I had a girl from one of my community college classes stay over at my house so I could get lucky.
The next morning I turned on my stereo and played Matchbox 20. She then SCREAMS at the top of her lungs how much she hates Matchbox 20 and tells me to turn it off. I don’t; instead, I turned it up louder. She comes downstairs and rips up all of my roommates mail and starts tossing pint glasses at my skull.
Not knowing how to handle the situation, the first thing I could think of was to grab her purse and throw it out the front door into the middle of the street so that she would get it. When she went to retrieve her purse I quickly locked the door. She came a-knocking within minutes, asking to use the restroom. I quickly told her to buzz off and then it got real…
She pulled her pants down while standing in my driveway and urinated like some sort of spiteful retriever, then shouted at me that I ‘made her do this’ and it was ‘my fault.’
Everyone in class for the next two weeks asked where Megan was. I never saw her again.”
He Doesn’t Know Where His Reservation Was Made
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“A guy that thought he had a reservation in the hotel I worked. He didn’t. It was for another hotel. Even after I showed him that it was in another hotel with his own email confirmation, he still was yelling, saying I was wrong and that his reservation was for our hotel. I got tired of him after 30 minutes, so I picked up the phone while the guy is still yelling at me for being ‘stupid’ and ‘not knowing how to do my job.’
I called the hotel he booked asked to confirm a reservation and gave them the name and confirmation number.
While this is going on, the man shuts up and I start printing the directions for the hotel where he booked. As soon as it pops out o the printer, the hotel on the phone gets back from checking and says, ‘Yes, we have you arriving today and your reservation is for 4 days, correct?’
I thank the hotel and hang up. I look over at the man who at this point is bright freaking red. With a big smile on my face I say, ‘I’ve taken the liberty of printing out directions for your hotel. As you heard, they are expecting you now. If that is all you need, have a great day!’
The best part of all this was the guy and his wife didn’t like the hotel they booked. So they cancelled their reservation the next morning and came that same morning, before I got off shift, to try and get a room with us. I had informed my GM of the incident the previous night and she put them on the do not rent list.
And guess who got to tell them they weren’t welcome at our hotel?”
TSA Screeners At The Airport See It All
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“I work at an international airport. Strap yourself in, I have some amazing stories.
Even though there are warnings and announcements everywhere telling people not to leave their belongings unattended, people do this ALL THE TIME in airports. It never ceases to astound me. One time, during such an incident, I was talking to one of the security officers dealing with the abandoned stuff and she told me about one time she and a colleague had come and taken two large duffel bag-type soft bags and a surfboard bag. They’d just been left in a corner. That was early in the morning. Around 10 hours later, two guys turned up at the security office demanding their stuff and wanting to know why security had ‘stolen’ their stuff.
Another different airline. A passenger goes to check-in and the agent points out that their passport has expired. And not like ‘oops it expired yesterday,’ (not that this makes any difference as you usually have to have 6 months validity on it to travel anywhere), it had expired about a year ago. The passenger tries to insist that it’s okay because their visa for the country they were going to was still valid. Nope. That’s not how it works. But they were not having it. They ended up having to call security.
Another time, an older married couple check in for a flight that was subject to an aircraft change. Normally this isn’t an issue, but the new aircraft had several fewer business class seats than the previous aircraft. Unfortunately this couple were in business class. They had been given seats in premium economy, and refunded the difference between the price they had paid and the cost of the PE seats. They were getting business class meals, use of the lounge, and all the other bells and whistles that come with business class. Literally the only thing they weren’t getting was the actual business class seat. Also, they were given their frequent flyer miles at the business class rate, plus a bonus as an apology/compensation. The woman lost her mind. Sobbing and wailing and was all set to not go on the trip. The husband stood there staring off into the distance. Clearly he’d seen this all before. The wife stomps off to sit down and have a big ugly cry, and I quietly ask the husband if he wanted to proceed with check in. He said yes, then went to deal with the wife.
Same airline as the first one: A married couple comes running in to check in for a flight. There’s about 5 minutes until the close of flight. They have way too many bags, even for business class. They were trying to get away with not paying for excess baggage on a very popular route and very popular flight. They were up for hundreds of dollars in excess baggage and they refused to pay. Supervisor told them either they pay or he’s offloading them because the flight is about to close. They refuse. He offloads them. She loses her mind. Screaming and demanding the supervisor’s name, screaming that she’ll get him fired. Blah blah blah. She demands to speak to supervisor’s manager. So, down comes the general manager. I know this man. He’s lovely, very good at his job, and does not take anyone’s nonsense. He hears this woman’s complaint, gets the story from the supervisor and the check in agent, then tells them that what happened is correct procedure. Nobody gets excess for free. The woman deflates and says she’ll pay – and then expects to get on the flight they’d been booked for when the flight closed a good 40 minutes ago (by that time). They were rebooked onto the late flight for that day, paid their excess and checked in early. The woman stormed off with a face like thunder. Her husband just looked embarrassed.
I witnessed a grown woman (my guess would be mid-40’s) shriek and scream and cry (like full on ugly cry) and then throw herself on the floor kicking and wailing because she was too late to check in. The flight had closed a good 20 minutes before.”
A Crazy Lady Can’t Find Her Loyalty Card
“I work as a manager in a grocery store. On Halloween this year, I was helping ring up customer’s orders when a lady with normal clothes in a witch hat came to my line. She didn’t have many item so I rang everything up quite quickly then I asked if she had her loyalty card with her. She began to go through her purse, almost burying her face in it. I asked if I could have a phone number associated with the card to help her and without looking of her purse, she started mumbling numbers. The number given didn’t pull up an account, so she starts to give me another number but she stops short just as my lane phone rings.
I answer the phone with my boss on the other end. After I answered his question, she starts yelling at me ‘you don’t answer the phone when you have a customer!’ She walks over to another lane, still yelling at me, skipping other people in that lane, and leaves her items that she didn’t pay for.
I try to reason with her, saying it’s my boss, but she doesn’t care. So I void her order and start the next customer’s order. After I scan her loyalty card the other lady comes back and starts giving me her phone number again, so I void the new order and start hers over again. Once I finish her order, I apologize to the customer who was waiting patiently.
Luckily she understands and says she was about to let the yelling lady use her card to move the lane along, but she freaked out.”
Scamming At The Pump
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“I used to work at a gas station and we had one customer who I will never forget.
The guy prepaid twenty on a pump and went out to pump his gas, a few minutes later he comes back in and wants the money back on the pump. We’re really busy, so I told him I’d get it fixed and he heads back out.
I go to check the pump in the system and find there’s about 30 cents left. The guy comes back in and I refer him to my manager because I can tell this guy is going to cause a scene. We calmly explain to him that the system shows he pumped his gas and that, even if he didn’t, we can’t do anything and that he’ll have to call corporate; we can’t just hand out cash to anyone.
He proceeds to scream at us for fifteen minutes, during which time we called the police. He left screaming that he would be back the next day. He finally came back like six months later and apologized.”
When All Else Fails, Throw Things
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“I used to work as a phone repair technician at a local repair shop.
We had shifted managers around and I had been running the store for about a week.
One customer had left his device with the screen cracked to be fixed before I took over the store. So I get the screen that had to be ordered and start doing the repair. Only, the geniuses who manufactured it wired the touch screen backwards. Beautiful.
So I call the customer and try to explain the screen I received was defective, and I’d need a few extra days to get another one. He loses it. He says he doesn’t care the screen doesn’t work, I needed to fix it, asap. I try explaining the situation and I had to order a new one through no fault of our own and he ends up hanging up on me. Welp. Okidoke.
He shows up the next day expecting to get a fixed tablet. I try explaining why it’s not fixed again and he gets all angry and demands his tablet and a refund. I said fine, but we had already put work into it and $25 was nonrefundable for time lost and shipping parts back.
He loses it again, waving his middle fingers two inches from my face, cursing me out left and right. I took the paperwork and tablet and asked him if he’d like to come back and pick it up later after he’d cooled down. He shoved my computer off the desk and threw my business cards at me.
A cop, whose phone I had fixed a few days earlier, led him out.”
A Guy Loses It Over A Scratch
“I was pulling into the valet at a nice restaurant and the lane was extremely tight for two cars. Me, being in a truck, made things just a bit tighter.
I pulled in and before I could pull it into park, I hear a light tap on my rear bumper. I really didn’t think anything of it because I was literally about to replace the bumper the very next day. When I got out, I saw no damage on my truck. So I thought, ‘Eh, no harm done.’ I get out to tell the guy don’t worry about it, I didn’t really mind and it wasn’t worth getting angry over.
He had a very light little scratch that could’ve been buffed out easily. He gets out LIVID and begins to tell me I rolled BACKWARDS into him while my car was in gear. He was screaming at the valet boys to support him and screamed at me to become a better driver and ‘learn my car.’ His wife/girlfriend was very embarrassed, sitting in the passenger seat, watching all of this go down.
I honestly was trying to keep a straight face while he was ripping into me for no reason. He looked like an absolute moron and kicked up stink over literally nothing.”
Parts Are Out Of His Control
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“I’ve seen several since starting my current job at an auto parts store. Two of my employees have had money thrown at them and a lug nut, and I have been yelled at by two separate deaf people.
The worst was probably the first deaf guy, he was wasted and wanted to know where his part was. The commercial guy had ordered it from a completely different parts store and we couldn’t get a hold of them. I told him that there was literally nothing I could do, as it was their responsibility to bring us the part and I couldn’t contact them. I offered him a refund multiple times, at first he just kept saying, ‘I DON’T CARE, I WANT IT NOW!’
Eventually he got so loud that I couldn’t even understand him, and I had to threaten to call the police just to get him to leave. He came back and apologized, but a few days later I saw him yelling at the shop next door. Apparently he’d been harassing them for weeks.”
A Woman Gets Herself Banned
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“I work as a waitress and one night a woman, who happened to be a to-go regular, came in for a drink at the bar. Clearly, she was already wasted as she asked for Stoli on the rocks with Makers Mark as her ‘choice of Stoli.’ Reluctantly, the bartender served her a drink as she did live across the street.
The trashed woman proceeds to ask for a bartender that hadn’t worked there for about 2 months and was shocked and almost in tears after hearing he no longer worked at the establishment and kept talking about him and asking where he was working now. The other server said she didn’t know where to find him work-wise but knew that he did hang out at another local bar often and he would most likely be found there.
Commence the tantrum…
The woman, convinced she was being disrespected, asked to speak to our owners, who weren’t there at 9 pm, then asked for a manager (the bartender). The bartender said she didn’t think the waitress said anything wrong with her statement. The women proceeds to yell that she was a [witch] and that it was slow because she was indeed such a [witch]. The bartender puts her drink to the side and asks her to leave. The woman continues to drink her drink, so the bartender prints out the bill and gives it to her. After paying, the woman loudly announces that the bartender will be receiving no tip because, again, she is such a [witch].
At this point, I ask her to leave because she was embarrassing herself and being disrespectful. She looks at the three of us, slams her drink in a rocks glass on the counter, Stoli goes flying everywhere and she starts walking toward the door, saying we are a bunch of COLLEGE [Witches], then gets to our kids’ section, picks up a cup of Crayons – yes Crayons – and throws them at us. The cup hits the bar and crayons go flying everywhere.
She was probably in her 60s and is no longer welcome at our restaurant, even though she lives across the street.”
A Woman Blamed Everyone Else For Her Financial Problems
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“I worked at a bank as a teller, when a woman came in to try and withdraw funds from her extremely overdrawn account.
I’m talking below her overdraft limit, even the check she had coming in as a direct deposit wouldn’t cover enough for her to make a withdrawal.
The lady started screaming at me that she needed to get to her father, who could be dying right this minute, and what kind of human being was I to keep her from doing that. I went and called every branch of the bank that I could think of that might be able to possibly help her, because I’m not a monster, but also not a pushover. Every single person I spoke with simply said there is no way they can do anything for her when her account looks like this.
I apologized and told her I had done everything I could do, but there was just nothing in my power I could do.
She then threw her bag at my head and told me she hoped my dad died and I couldn’t get to him. Now, here’s the punchline: my father was in a hospital in Nashville, fighting Leukemia, and I swear it took every ounce of restraint to keep me from flying across that counter and beating the fire out of that woman.
Now some of you may think, she was in a crisis and didn’t mean what she was saying. You could be right, but she proceeded to walk out and to the convenience store beside the bank, and came back carrying 2 cases of cold ones, and when she was in the bank next, asked me if ‘karma killed my dad yet?’
She was just a horrid excuse for a human being.”
A Woman’s Outburst Leaves A Man Speechless
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“I once stood in line at CVS as a lady in a pink jumpsuit came out of the aisles to get in the line.
She had a bunch of magazines and cheap perfume in her arms and complained that the line was too long and they needed more workers. A young girl gets sent up front to open a second register and the lady loudly says, ‘Finally.’ Then she asks who called her a bad name and looks right at the young girl that just came up, and calls her a bad name.
Then she proceeds to scream a tirade of insults at this girl and tells us all she is homeless and not a mean person, and that she can’t help how she smells.
After that, she threw all of her items to the ground and walked out of the doors backwards yelling things like, ‘Eff this store, you effing pricks!’ and ‘Don’t ever judge me!’
Everybody literally just stood there frozen, none of us knew what to do because it was such a sudden psychotic outburst and the poor girl it was directed at had said absolutely nothing but suffered the brunt of it.
I wished I had said something, but I was so flabbergasted by what was going on, I just watched it all unfold in front of me.”
A Man’s Mother Can’t Handle Not Being The Center Of Attention
“My mom had a number of issues when I was growing up, one of which was that she loved starting fights for no good reason and she would kick, punch, and scream like a child when she was upset. I remember this one so clearly because of how messed up it was.
I was 18, my dad had been gone on a business trip when he got the news my grandfather, his dad, had passed. When he came home from his trip, my dog had bolted to the door to see him like she always does. He leans down to hug her and pet her as he’s clearly holding back tears. My mom, instead of consoling him, is berating him for talking to the dog. ‘Sweetie? Why are you calling her that? She’s a dog. Why are you talking to her like that?’ She’s just pushing his buttons for no real reason, completely ignoring the fact that he just lost his father.
I pull her aside and ask what’s wrong with her and tell her that she needs to show a little sympathy. She didn’t like that, so then she declares that ‘we’re taking sides against her like we always do,’ and she starts crying, making everything about her.
The funeral is the next day and my mom is still in a mood. These things always lasted a few days, before everything blew over. I don’t even remember what she was crying about at this point but I remember her dropping to the floor on her stomach and pounding the ground with her hands and feet like a child throwing a tantrum.
We were late to the funeral because of her, then when we get there she’s in a bad mood. Of course she’s nice and sweet to everyone else there but the second she’s alone with one of us she gets all nasty and mean again. She spent the entire funeral following me around. I was trying to hide from her because I didn’t want to deal with her anymore.
I don’t know anyone in my extended family, so I had no one I could run to and my dad was too busy talking and dealing with funeral stuff. She would see me leave the room and run to me and just start in complaining about one thing or another. As if it wasn’t bad enough we were attending a funeral for my grandfather, I had to deal with my grown mother behaving like a child.
I don’t know if she ever even consoled my dad.”
A Old Man Yells A Lot Over The Phone
“I work at a call center for cell phones and had a woman calling in for 3 hours to get her phone turned on, cursing out over eight reps, all over a $0.38 reactivation fee. She said she’d hire a lawyer before she paid us the $0.38.
I think aside from that, listening to a 60-year-old man cuss me out on the phone, trying to get me to do a replacement for his phone after repeatedly telling him that Apple has to service his warranty, not my company. As it was 3 am, he’d need to call back in the morning for us to conference in Apple and get to working on his replacement was the next worst meltdown I dealt with.
He screamed at me for over an hour and threatened to have my face and name ALL over Georgia, as he’s worked in communications all his life and has connections, blah blah blah.
Even worse, according to him, my ‘refusal’ to help him and my ‘persistent rudeness,’ by which he means explaining to him the steps he needed to go through to get everything done, was gonna give him his third heart attack and if that happened, he’d PERSONALLY sue me.
Now when a customer threatens legal action, that’s it, I can’t continue the call. I explain this and he goes OFF. He’s yelling and screaming like I personally just went and shot his dog because I tell him that I can’t continue the call or I will literally get a write up for violating company policy.
It’s in my top 10 calls for sure.”
The Woman In Line Already Has A Rep
“On my first day working as a cashier, I had a lady give me a 100 dollar bill to pay for her $56.80 amount due.
I typed $100 into the register, so I could easily figure out her change, and then she gives me a quarter and 3 pennies and tells me to add it to the 100. There was a huge line behind her and I was getting nervous and confused as to how much I owed her so I asked her to help me subtract it from her total and she just goes berserk on me! She starts yelling, ‘Come ON, it’s SIMPLE MATH! SIMPLE MAAATH!’
Then she made me get my manager and hold the whole freaking line up just because she’s a horrible person. She’s such scum of the earth that the person behind her in line told me, ‘Trust me, I work at a restaurant and just imagine how crazy she got when I once got her meal wrong.’
Apparently, she’s such a renown witch that the people right behind her already recognize her from her previous tantrums. I’ve even had customers who were in line behind her the day she flipped on me ask me if she’s come back and done it again since that day.
She’ll occasionally come in again while I’m working and she gets irritated when I don’t talk to her.
She didn’t even apologize.”