We asked the BuzzFeed Community to tell us the weirdest punishments they got as kids. Here are the hilarious results.
1. The tree hugger:
"Once I was forced to hug every tree in the backyard because I told my mom I hated yard work. We had over 30 trees."
—Adrienne Cambria, Facebook
2. The poultry punishment:
"I was terrified of the chicken we kept in our yard. Whenever I was bad, my mom sent me out with a tortilla to feed it. The thing chased me when it saw food, so I always ran away from it crying, while dropping little pieces of tortilla."
3. The foul-flavored fail:
"Whenever I misbehaved, my mom would make me eat the rotten cheese flavored jelly bean from the Harry Potter Bertie Botts jelly bean boxes. It was so gross!"
4. The public school proposal:
"Before school one day, my siblings and I were all fighting, so my mom drove us to a nearby public school (our school we went to was Catholic), and told us we were switching schools. We all were crying, begging her not to make us go to public school, which we were terrified of for some reason."
5. The woeful workout:
"My father was against hitting children, but he most certainly was not against unusual punishments. Whenever we got out of line, he made us do planks — no slouching allowed — to his old Queen CD."
6. The seatbelt story:
"I genuinely forgot to put on my seatbelt during our drive home from summer vacation. My mom caught me, and made me sit in the car for two hours (with the doors open) because that's how long I hadn't been wearing my seatbelt."
7. The taste bud test:
"My parents made us eat fruitcake, because they kept some frozen all year. If we were especially bad, they would thaw some and make us eat it. My dad always said fruitcake was gross, so it was a disgusting punishment."
—Iinz
8. The slam situation:
"I used to slam doors when I was mad, so one afternoon my mom had me slam the door over and over again after a tantrum for what felt like an hour, but was likely 10 minutes. I cried and cried, but she calmly said, "If you're going to slam doors, you will slam doors."
—Ashley Bowdin, Facebook
9. The book report tale:
"When I was in 4th grade, I stopped doing my homework, because I wanted to see what would happen. When my mom found out, she made me read Little House On The Prairie series during my summer break, and I wasn't allowed to do anything else until I gave her a book report for each one."
10. The frame thief:
"I was notorious for 'cleaning my room' by shoving things under the bed... so, I lost my bed frame and had nothing to shove anything under. I started just keeping my door closed so my parents couldn't see the mess, so then my dad took my door off the hinges."
—s474
11. The neighbor no-no:
"If my siblings and I did something bad, my dad would threaten to take us to Mr. Stamper's house. Mr. Stamper was a mean old dude my dad made up, who would cage and bury children. He got the name from one of my grandparents' neighbors. So when we actually saw the real Mr. Stamper, we got pretty freaked out!"
12. The language lesson:
"One time, my parents got fed up with my sister and I fighting over the TV. So they changed the audio to Spanish and hid the remote."
13. The Jo-Bro dilemma:
"I called my mom a 'monster' for some reason, and at the time my room was covered from floor-to-ceiling in Jonas Brothers posters. So she came into my room and ripped off all my posters from my walls. I saved a few, but I was devastated!"
14. The definition downer:
"My mom would make my brother and I copy words from the dictionary when we misbehaved. We learned very quickly that there were certain words you didn't want to copy, because they had a lot of definitions."
15. The puppy plan:
"When I was little, I was terrified of dogs, but I got toy robotic pup for my birthday from an aunt. When I got in trouble, my mom would sit me down at the table, scold me, and turn the robot dog on. I'd just start bawling."
16. The fireplace run:
"Maybe my mom was just really tired, BUT one night she heard my siblings and I awake and talking, and called us to the living room. She said if we had that much energy to talk, then we needed a way to lose it. So we had to run laps around the fireplace for hours."
17. The TV tragedy:
"I was grounded from TV for a week, which itself isn't that odd. But all week, my mom would let me sit in the room and listen to my shows with my back to the screen while I coloured or worked on homework. I remember thinking it seemed normal at the time, now I think it was extremely odd."
18. The chili case:
"My brother used to cook spaghetti every Tuesday, and every time I annoyed him (which was all the time), he would add a sprinkle of chili to the sauce. Most weeks, the spaghetti was too hot to eat."
—1988
19. The ice cream cat:
"One time when I was in the 3rd grade, I fed my cat ice cream. My parents found out and made me eat cat food so I 'knew how it felt.'"
20. The naughty girls school:
"My mum always said I was going to go to the 'naughty girls school' whenever I was bad. One time I cut my Barbie's hair, and she started packing a case, telling me it was time to go to the school. By coincidence, a family friend came by for a visit, in his police uniform. I screamed, thinking he was there to take me away!"
21. And the cop call:
"My mom once told me she "called the cops" on me after I snuck snacks before dinner time. She didn't actually, but since I was seven, I really believed it! I hid in my room for hours, scared that the cops were coming to arrest me."
