We recently took a look at some absolutely wild stories shared by Reddit users about "bizarre" things their families do that they thought were normal until they left the nest. These hilarious stories sparked even MORE great responses from our very own BuzzFeed Community! Here are just a few of the best:
1."My family and I would frequently talk about our bowel movements. I had a conversation about it with one of my close friends and they told me it wasn't normal at all."
2."Every year at Christmas my dad, my uncle, and my older cousin trade out a 'weird gift.' For example, it was this old tube of hemorrhoid cream for like three years in a row and it was great...but apparently disturbing to others."
3."My family and I have family meetings, daily, without fail. We discuss work, life, general stuff, and entertainment. When our relatives, friends, and colleagues found out about this, they all thought we were nuts. Actually it keeps us close as a family."
4."My mom always washed apples with dish soap, so I’ve done the same. I had no idea it was weird until my sister-in-law jokingly mentioned it in a group text. My response was, 'Wait that’s not normal?!' I still do it to this day."
5."My family does this thing where — whoever's birthday it is — they have to eat the first piece of cake without talking. So everyone in our family would try to make the birthday person talk by saying funny things and, if you spoke while eating your first piece, you had to finish your slice under the table. My grandparents told us it was a 'German tradition,' but no one else had ever heard of it."
6."We didn’t say the word 'fart' and still don’t. It's always 'so-and-so gassed!' I didn’t realize that this wasn’t normal until MUCH later in life, and I still feel weird saying that particular F-word out loud."
7."My wife's family does this thing where they clap out the number of years on someone's birthday. It actually drives me insane because it's something they not only do for my kids, but for me."
8."My parents store batteries in the refrigerator to 'keep them fresh.' I assumed this was just the common practice for battery storage, so I did the same when I moved out of their house. The look on my husband's face when he saw batteries in our refrigerator said it all."
9."For Christmas, my mum has to give out the presents from under the tree. ONE AT A TIME. And we all have to sit and watch that one person open their present, admire it, they say thank you, and then on to the next present. It makes the present-giving-out part of the day last a good few hours, but I really love it."
10."My family always kept the butter out to keep it soft. Everyone I come across now wants to throw my butter away or put it in the fridge when they see it out. I hate hard butter! My sister and I looked it up when we got older and butter doesn't go bad if you leave it out..."
11."My best friend growing up used to think it was normal to just take silverware from any restaurant she went to. It wasn’t until I pointed out to her that it wasn’t normal and made her return her fork that she stopped. It was then that I understood why her family had an over abundance of silverware that didn't match."
12."When my family finishes off a carton of milk, we lay the carton on its side and say, 'the cow’s dead.' I only realized this wasn’t normal recently, since I was never the one to finish off milk with anyone else I’d lived with."
13."My family would ALWAYS put green olives on top of our cream cheese. Like, I thought that was the ONLY reason they sold green olives. I didn’t know that not everyone did that until I offered it to my husband and he looked at me like I crazy!"
14."Whenever my parents's car entered a tunnel, my siblings and I would yell, 'Aaaaaaaah!' together until the car left the tunnel. I don't remember how this started, I just know that one day when another child was in the car with us, she asked why we were doing that and I didn't know what to say."
15."The only items my family ever puts in the dryer are towels and socks. All of our clothes are air-dried instead. I do this, my mom does this, and my grandmother did it. I always thought it was normal until the first time my fiancé stayed over and asked why I had all my wet clothes hanging on a drying rack in my room. He thought our dryer was broken."
16."Growing up, my parents and grandma would always put a single ice cube in my soup before serving it to me to 'cool it down.' I took me A WHILE to realize most people just wait for it to cool down, but I still swear by their single ice cube method!"
17."Because of how I was raised, I thought that everyone brushed their teeth in the shower up until I went to college. I remember thinking it was so strange when my roommate would brush her teeth after she got out!"
18."My immediate family is really into all things pop culture, and can hold entire conversations made up of only movie and tv show quotes and references. It’s really fun for us, but when we get around other people, they sort of look at us like we are nuts."
19."Growing up, if we wanted to put the windows in our car down instead of using the air conditioner, we would say, 'Let’s go by window power!' The thing is, I thought that was an actual thing that all people said until I went to college."
20."Each member of my family had an assigned spot at the dinner table, and I didn’t realize that other people's families sit wherever until I got older. I remember once asking a friend where 'the guest seat' was."
21."When my Mom made cookies, she would lay the cookies out to cool in rows. Each kid got 'a row' and — once your row was gone — no more for you. It was pretty funny when my fiancé was visiting and asked if he could have another cookie, and I asked him if he'd already had 'his row.' He was shocked because in his house it was every man for themselves!"
Now it's your turn! What's the most "bizarre" thing your family does that you used to believe was totally "normal" (whatever "normal" means, TBH). Share your story in the comments below!
