Defining your parents as “cool” is not usually the first term that comes to mind for most people. However, these adults are proving they can be a boss, hero, and (still a) parent under any given circumstances.
Source list available at the end.
My aunt owned a nice big property out in the backwoods where we would go for bonfires and cookouts (you name it). One day when I was around 5 or 6, I went exploring on one of the old trails with my mom, my aunts, and my younger cousin.
The trail we were on was very overgrown. As we were heading back to my aunt’s house, my cousin and I noticed our parents were acting strange, talking less, whispering to each other, and scanning the undergrowth. Eventually, her house came into view through the trees, and we heard a low growl. It was a cougar (mountain lion), and it had been stalking us for a while. We couldn’t see it, but our parents could.
At this point, one of my aunts (my cousin’s mom) said to my cousin and I, “Guys, we’ll race you back to the house. GO!” and took off towards the house. As I was running, I looked back, and my mom and my aunt were staring something in the woods down. My mom had a big stick in her hand, and my aunt had a rock in her hand.
We made it back to her house. My mom and my other aunt arrived a few minutes later and said, “You guys did great!” We asked them what they meant, and they told us everything. They may very well have saved our lives that day.
throwawayjoe1997
My mom was a young American lady on vacation in a foreign country. She spoke the local language fluently, but she clearly looked like a tourist. One day my mom went to a small restaurant and sat down at the bar for a drink. Along came these two local guys, one of whom “accidentally” brushed against her and said, “Excuse me” in the local language, but my mom ignored them.
These two guys spoke loudly about how they assumed my mother was German, which she wasn’t, and continued to speak in their local language with the assumption that my mother could understand them. They said something along the lines of: “She looks easy. I bet she’d put out like the other one I met.” My mom just sat there and ignored them. Until, finally, one of the guy brushed against her again and said, “Excuse me.”
My mother got up and said, “Go —- yourself!” in a perfect local accent and walked away from those creeps.
pec-man
In her career as a nurse, my mom has successfully talked down at least 5 people from committing suicide.
CapnStabby
My dad repeatedly punched and power slammed a guy who sold fish at a local market when I was a kid because the guy mistook me for another kid who had vandalized his store and destroyed some of the fish tanks a couple weeks earlier. The guy, who was probably in his 40s, beat me up pretty bad and left me bruised up along with a bloody semi-torn bottom lip. I went home crying and told my mom and dad about it. Of course, my dad lost it, drove to the market, and beat that man in and out of consciousness for what seemed like half an hour. This was overseas, and my dad didn’t get charged with anything because the witnesses saw the guy beat me up, unprovoked, and sided with my dad.
coderite
When I was 10, my mother met my stepfather. To impress my sister and I, as well as, his nieces and nephews he laid down under an original Bronco truck (not the tiny Bronco 2, but a legit Bronco). He bench pressed the front axle and lifted the truck tires off of the ground. My mom saw him doing it and went, “What the hell are you doing?” He claimed we had lost our ball under the truck so he went after it, but we all knew what he was really about. He’s been a great father ever since (17 years now).
Kodiakswinehuman
In 1986, my dad was in the red army stationed somewhere in Ukraine. He was a radio operator, and the radios they had were powerful enough to pick up signals from pretty much all over Europe. Now this was the Soviet union, therefore, anything regarding the Western culture was banned (for example, wearing jeans could get you into a lot of trouble). So, if he had been caught, they likely would’ve locked him away for good. Anyway, what he did was, every now and then, he would pick up radio signals from the UK and listen to western rock music. At the time, he didn’t understand a single word in English, but he really enjoyed Pink Floyd and Queen. He listens to them all the time now.
welcometocity17
My dad trained under the same Master (Si Fu) as Jackie Chan for Wing Chun (a form of martial arts). My dad said he started before Jackie. He gave up school at the age of 10 in rural China to help raise his 4 younger siblings during the 1950s. He fought to have custody of my half-brother in the 70s and was a single dad- which was not very common. He left everything he knew in Hong Kong to have a better future in Canada for himself and for his family. He came to Canada and worked 4 jobs just so he could send money back home to help his siblings immigrate here. He worked as a butcher for a few decades in Canada. He chopped off a finger tip, and a few chunks of flesh here and there, but he never complained.
Kayt1784
My dad was shot down in a chopper in Vietnam and captured. He was actually able to escape and later rejoined his team.
GemJack
When my older sister was a senior in high school, she abandoned a school-sponsored “Relay For Life” kind of thing to go to a party instead. Later that night the party got busted up, and she was charged with underage drinking.
The school knew, but my sister was the only one from the party who confessed, so they had a sort of court setup to decide what to do. I think they were not going to let her walk at graduation or something. I was only around 11 or 12 at the time, so my memory is kind of fuzzy.
My dad went to the hearing with her. My sister was a great student who participated in clubs and sports and tutored other kids. This was her one serious mess up, and most of the teachers on this council all said the same thing and that they were willing to see it as a unfortunate juvenile mistake in judgement.
Unfortunately, one of the teachers really had it out for my sister and just wouldn’t let up. They even pointed out how my sister left a very serious event for cancer to attend this party instead. My sister explained she clearly had her name removed from the volunteer list and made sure she wouldn’t be receiving any credit for attending. My dad even chimed in saying that it was a dumb mistake.
The teacher’s response, “Well… Sir, I don’t think she understands how important this event was.”
Our dad is an urologist. My brother, my sister, and I have all participated in (or been exposed to) cancer benefits at some point in our lives. So, my dad was not going to accept that response from this teacher. He stood up and stared the man down and said, “No… she knows exactly how important it is. She’s participated in Relay for Life three years in a row. Oh, by the way, it’s Dr. (our last name).
This is the only time I’ve ever heard my dad actually correct someone from calling him “mister” instead of “Doctor.” Boy, did he choose the perfect moment to do it.
ClassicGamer102
My mom created a billion dollar Biotech business in her garage in the span of just 3 years. Her company Acerta Pharma created Acalabrutinib, which is soon to be the best drug out there for treating lymphoma cancer.
qwerty_in_your_vodka
My dad was working in the garage and using a nail gun. The wood split and shot the nail right through his thumb. He came inside and had me take a picture of it so that he could send it to our mom. This was before having my older brother (I was 15 at the time) drive him to the hospital. He was laughing the whole time as well.
Pooty_Taynk
I was born in Bosnia a little while before the war could start. I was 2 when it did begin. My mom told me this story about my dad. My dad managed to escape the concentration camp he was being brought to. He then got in touch with one of his friends, who had a connection to someone who could get us out of the country. He came back for us and managed to get us all out of there.
The reason my mom has to tell me this story, instead, is because my dad refuses to talk about it since most of his family died during it. We were taken in by Germany as refugees and lived there for 7 years before finally ending up in Canada. During our first year in Canada, my dad got diagnosed with lung cancer. He then beat cancer and survived that phase. I really admire him.
Little off topic, but if you google “Bosnian War,” you will notice a picture of a Serbian soldier who is holding a cigarette and about to kick the head of a woman laying on the floor next to her dead husband. Well, that couple featured on the photo were my parent’s neighbors. Unfortunately, they decided to stay instead of fleeing and were killed by Serbian soldiers.
syphlect
My day was a commercial sailor in his 20s and a blackbelt in Ishinryu Karate. He was sailing on a transport going from Indonesia to wherever and back, and almost everyone on the ship was a petty criminal. Now, they usually liked to pick on the tall Caucasian guy. One day, while they were back in port, he bought a kimono and started reading on deck.
This, of course, made everyone else think that he was crazy, so most of the people just left him alone. One of the tough guys decided to push a little further, and my dad performed (according to him) the most beautiful step-in sidekick you would’ve ever seen and made the tough guy throw up uncontrollably for a few minutes.
They left him alone after that.
The-Dissonance
My dad was the first person in his family to go to college. He got his PhD, became a professor with an endowed chair at one of the top liberal arts college in the country, and wrote some well-regarded textbooks.
My mom came to this country at 17. Within 5 years, she was fluent in English, married to my dad, and teaching in an elementary school.
And then, they adopted two kids- which is pretty awesome in itself.
Birch2011
One time, my sister and I were shopping with my grandma. We witnessed a man trying to rob a woman in the parking lot. She immediately put the car in park, got out, and waddled over to the incident. My sister and I watched in amazement as she whacked the man repeatedly over the head with her purse and slapped him across the face with her keys. She was both a landlady and a hoarder, so she had about 100 keys on the ring. Between my grandma and the other woman fighting back, he gave up and sprinted out of there. My grandma got back in our car and continued her day with us as if nothing had happened.
ak-throw7
My dad has a habit of chasing shoplifters down the street, into the woods, and through the swamps. When he does catch them, he drags them back to the store by the collar to wait for the cops.
He’s 5’9 and in pretty good shape for his age, but he still demoralizes the people that he runs down just, by the fact, that an old man could catch up to them and smack some sense into them.
When they get back to the store, the cops are usually there, and everyone has a good laugh at the shoplifter.
(Canada. No guns.)
vocabulazy
Many years ago, my house was robbed when I was still a kid. I think I was around 14 or 15. Our neighbor’s house was also robbed. We lived in a pretty decent, middle-class neighborhood. The thief stole my mom’s jewelry, but she was really upset about was my grandmother’s diamond ring which he took. The burglar was some local drug addict (in his early 20’s) with a big mouth. My mom and our neighbour found him within 24 hours. Now, our neighbor (we’ll call him Big Jake) was a pretty big tough guy. He helped out with the little act of vigilantly that the two of them dealt to the thief.
My mom knew this guy’s parents and phone number and called his home and invited him to our house to smoke. She was an attractive 35-year-old, and this guy thought he was going to get lucky. He was a scumbag and a liar, and my Mom knew calling the cops wouldn’t have done anything. Plus, there wasn’t enough solid evidence to convict him, and she would never see that ring again.
This guy actually came to our house, all smiling and happy, and then BIG JAKE popped out from my bedroom and tackled him to the floor and pinned him down. My mom had this old 1960’s RELAX-A-CIZER electronic muscle workout machine.
Big Jake pinned him down. My mom put the rubber pads on his torso and told him it was a CIA torture device, and she was going to crank it up until he told her where the ring was. He was laughing thought it was a joke. She started cranking up the RELAX-A-CIZER voltage and told him, “I WILL CRANK THIS UP UNTIL YOUR HEART STOPS IF YOU DON’T TELL ME WHERE MY RING IS!” He quickly started screaming. I think it was more from fear than any actual pain. The device was made for lazy people to workout on, and it was never going to hurt him. But he didn’t know that. He was still denying everything, but his junkie friend had already told Big Jake that he had done it. My mom cranked it to 10, and he started crying and confessing. He had her stuff in his parent’s house, and I think Jake’s as well.
I was laughing because I eventually tried her stupid workout machine, and it just felt like a freaky electrical shock. This loser actually thought we were going to kill him, which I guess, from his perspective, I now understand.
Jake walked the frighten and submissive thief to his house while I tagged along on my bicycle, and then we went back to our house where he finally handed over the loot. My grandma’s ring was safely returned! My mom eventually revealed to him that it was just a harmless electric workout machine, and he was lucky she didn’t have him arrested and Big Jake didn’t have to get into any trouble for beating him up (which was what he wanted to do at first).
Fun times! I really miss my mom. She had more balls than anyone I known. As of October 7th, it will be one year since she passed.
SwingJay1
My dad quit his job for me. My car broke down in college, and I desperately needed his help. My dads boss wouldnt let him leave, so my dad walked off the job and came up with his truck and trailer the very next day. He quit his job on Thursday, picked up my car on Friday, we fixed it together on Saturday/Sunday, and he had a new job by Monday afternoon. Fifteen years later, my dad is still at that very same job. His old boss still checks in on him every few years and tries to ask him back.
metela
My mom was outside watering plants when she saw a copperhead snake heading towards our front door. It was open since it was a nice day outside. My brothers and I were pretty small at the time. My mother grabbed a garden hoe and went after it like a banshee. I remember going to the door and seeing her standing over this decapitated snake. She said to leave it there since it acted as a deterrent for other snakes. She definitely had her problems as a mom, but watching a 5-foot tall woman holding a garden hoe while glaring at a headless snake was kind of cool.
katieames
My dad was a fireman and saved a woman from a burning building. He then went back inside and saved her daughter as well. The fire station gave him a Blue Ribbon Award and a giant plaque to thank him for his acts of heroism.
CrazyWhoDatXLIV
A distant relative of mine attempted to steal my family’s cattle one night when I was around 5 or 6. I remember watching my father stride over to where he kept his rifle and ammo, go out onto the front porch, take aim without a scope, and shoot our relative’s hat off. According to my brother, he also did it from across 10 acres of land.
BrockenSpecter
When my mom got pregnant, my dad told her that he didn’t want anything to do with it. So my mom packed up, flew back home to Oklahoma, had me, and raised me right. She gave up so much for me and devoted so much to me. She hasn’t done anything like fly helicopters or save lives, but she gave me a chance and took care of me. To me, it takes a lot of guts to be a single parent.
OldPeaches
Posts are edited for clarity.