Reddit user u/whitneywestmoreland posed the question, "What’s something that happened on a first date that made you decide against a second date?" The thread quickly filled with hilarious and troubling stories of first dates gone wrong. Here are some of the wildest submissions:
1. "He used his pocket knife to cut me a slice of cake and later scraped some dirt clumps off of his shoe with the same knife. I asked him if he ever cleaned his knife, and he replied, 'No, why?' He also confessed that he was madly in love with me the same day. We had just met."
2. "I went on a breakfast date once where my date ordered two sunny-side up eggs. He proceeded to take two straws, poke one in each yolk, and suck the yolks up. Don’t even remember his name."
3. "He chewed on my hair while we were watching a movie in the theater. I'll never forget feeling someone tugging on my hair, going to flick it back, and feeling that it was soaked."
4. "He tried to change my order with the waiter because I didn’t order what he’d recommended."
5. "We went on a first date to an upscale restaurant and bar. We met at the bar first for a drink to get to know each other, and then I was going to suggest moving over to the restaurant to get a table. It was a fairly large place with a large bar area. While we had our drinks, I kind of noticed that she was consistently looking across the bar at this older lady, and the older lady was looking back. It also appeared they were communicating with facial expressions. I wasn’t sure, but it seemed very odd to me. After our drinks, we moved to a small booth in the restaurant area to get some dinner. We were getting along great, but I kept noticing odd facial expressions on occasion from her, but the place had 'mood lighting,' so it was kind of dark, so I wasn’t sure."
"After we finished our appetizer, I excused myself to go to the bathroom, which was behind me. I noticed that the older lady from across the bar was sitting at a small table behind us. She was trying to hide but not doing such a great job. When I got back to the table, I asked my date if she knew who the lady was, and said that I thought they were 'communicating.' She confessed that the lady was her mother and she always brought her on first dates so she could give her opinion and rate her date. So far I was doing well, and her mother thought I was great. I asked for the check, paid the tab (it included drinks and dinner for her mother), and cut my losses. On the way out, I told her to lose my number."
6. "I asked about his hobbies, and he said he played the bagpipes. I thought that was really cool and asked him to tell me more. He asked, 'Are you sure?' and I said yes. He proceeded to go on about bagpipes for the rest of the night — how he felt that playing the bagpipes was his calling in life, how he needed to carry on his grandfather's legacy (who also played the bagpipes), how his dream was to play bagpipes for the Queen, what his favorite brand of bagpipes was, the anatomy of bagpipes, etc. Every topic was somehow turned back to bagpipes. To be fair, I did say yes to him telling me more. I hope he's doing well and found someone just as passionate about bagpipes."
7. "He tried to control the whole date: what I wore, what I ate, whether I wore makeup or not, how I wore my hair, etc. He had this long list. I answered the door with bedhead and baggy PJs. I told him to buy a blow-up doll to control and not to contact me ever again, then closed the door."
8. "He told me that we were going to a birthday party. He refused to tell me for whom and said I didn’t need to bring anything. It was a birthday party for Jesus at his dad’s church. I am an atheist and was incredibly uncomfortable and angry. I don’t like being lied to. Didn’t go on another date."
9. "He asked for our server's Snapchat in front of me. Then he cut the date short so he could go to the gym."
10. "For no reason, he started laughing, which attracted the attention of nearby tables. I asked what was so funny. He said that he was just thinking about a joke. He then laughed harder and harder until he was positively howling like a wolf. I decided there'd be no second date."
11. "My friend went out with a guy who got drunk and pooped his pants on the first date."
12. "She kept sending her friends on WhatsApp a play-by-play of the date instead of listening to me, so I stood up, paid for my dinner, and left because I found it disrespectful AF."
13. "The guy told me he would still be together with his kid's mom if she had apologized for what she did wrong. Out of curiosity, I asked what she did wrong. I was expecting something like she cheated, or something else that warranted an apology. Nope. Apparently, she kept nagging one day and wouldn't shut up, so he tied her to a computer chair, went out for three hours, and left her there. I said it didn't sound like she was the one who needed to apologize, then left."
14. "One time, I took this girl to dinner, and she could not stop staring at our waiter. I'll grant her one thing: I'm a guy and can admit this guy was probably totally hot to anyone who prefers men. Square-jawed and muscly, college-athlete type. I get it. But I didn't appreciate that she literally craned her neck every time the kitchen door swung open to see if he was walking out. Eventually I gave her enough cash to pay for my part of the meal, told her I'd noticed, suggested to her that she could get his contact info when she paid the bill, and left."
15. "He got us pulled over. The car was searched, and he had a brick of coke in the trunk. I almost got arrested. He finally vouched that it was a blind date and I was innocent."
16. "He insisted on paying for our dinner instead of going Dutch and then totally stiffed the server. I tried to leave a tip, and he got mad at me because he was paying and it was his decision to tip or not."
17. "I met a guy on a Counting Crows online forum, and he happened to live half an hour away. Cool, let’s grab drinks at a local bar and see where it goes. I got there and couldn't find him anywhere, so I figured I was stood up. Then the lights dimmed and he walked out onstage, drunk as hell, slurring every other word, and proceeded to play 'Round Here,' then stopped halfway through to vomit on himself. Now I can never hear that song without cracking up."
18. "The date felt more like a job interview to fill a position rather than an actual date. He gave off a vibe of someone who wasn't into getting to know me as a person but just listed his wants and needs. So at the end of the date, he asked how I thought it went, and I said I didn't feel like it was a match. He said he was missing the 'wow factor.' So I laughed my butt off (slightly offended) in the car home. I was happy we only went for drinks, but even that felt a bit too long."
19. "He had in his bio that he was 6 feet 9. First thing he said when he pulled up was, 'So I’m actually 6 feet, and the 9 inches is somewhere else.' THE FIRST THING!! Before asking how my day was or anything."
20. "He farted and smelled it, then proceeded to rate the smell of the fart."
21. "He asked me how big my baby was and if I birthed him vaginally or had a C-section. His explanation was that he'd never slept with a mom before and had heard that a baby can stretch out a vagina. I excused myself to the bathroom and promptly left the restaurant."
22. "I went to dinner with a girl I'd been crushing on for quite some time. It seemed to be going well, and we ended up back at her place, watching a movie or something. Out of nowhere, her boyfriend (of whom I was not aware) came back from out of town and stopped in unexpectedly. He and I had a super-awkward conversation for a few minutes, then the two of them disappeared into another room for a minute or two. She came back and said something to the effect of, 'I don't have a place for you. I'm sorry.' I just got in my car and drove home, with one of the strangest feelings I'd ever felt. At some point, a few minutes into the journey, I couldn't contain myself and busted out laughing."
23. "They asked when I would get a real career. I love what I do. I'm a union stagehand in a major entertainment city. I have been in my industry for over 20 years, toured the country, toured the world, and I make a comfortable living. Yeah, no. That's pretty demeaning."
24. "He created a Build-a-Bear that was supposed to resemble him and gave it to me at Olive Garden."
25. "We went to her place to watch movies, and we chose Kung Fu Panda 2. From the moment it began, she proceeded to cackle at every single joke. Anything that could even be perceived as mildly funny set her off like the Wicked Witch of the West. I know some people have interesting laughs, and it wouldn't have been so bad if it wasn't constant from beginning to end. After that, she put on Iron Man and it was the same thing — witch-cackling the entire movie. There's a point in the movie where a character's phone goes off, and the ringtone is an old Iron Man theme, which made me chuckle. She turned to me and said, 'You laugh at all the weirdest parts!' The second the movie was over, I got out of there and did not see her again."
26. "She asked if I could clean her pet rat's cage or hold her rat while she cleaned it. She also listed a number of odd jobs she needed me to tackle."
27. "The date was going great, but while we were talking about family, friends, and all that, I realized that I’d slept with her sister. I didn’t really know what to do, but you can’t just say, 'Oh, your family looks fun! I slept with your sister not too long ago. Show me more pics of your dog. Is she a Lab mix?' I cut the date short after dinner and hoped it would just fizzle out, but they found out. It was cool, though, just an awkward coincidence."
28. "She took me to a PTA meeting on our first date so I could meet her son's second-grade teacher. Needless to say, there was no second date."
29. "I went on a date with a woman from the office. I thought we had good chemistry and got along well. She couldn't find her phone, so I tried calling it, and someone from the restaurant answered. I went back in for her to get it, and the waiter showed me I was saved in her contacts under 'Free Food.'"
30. "He was clearly desperate to put a ring on ANYONE'S finger. He was intensely overly romantic despite not knowing me really at all. He put on 'A Sunday Kind of Love' by Etta James (the date was on a Sunday, BTW) and tried to sing it to me while looking earnestly into my eyes. He was also in the military and we were both like 19. Go figure."
31. "He just kept making a weird number of jokes about tapeworms."
32. "His phone kept going off with messages from multiple other women, which he showed me, for some strange reason. It felt as if he was trying to make himself seem more appealing, or he was trying to make me jealous on our first date. Weirdo."
33. Finally: "He told me he loved me BEFORE the first date, after we had talked for approximately one day via text. I have no idea why I even went on the date after that, when I'd already decided there was not going to be a second. It was extremely awkward. This guy could not carry a conversation, constantly tried to hold my hand, and then told me that he was pleasantly surprised that I wasn't trying to get him to pay for things because all his friends had told him I would. Yikes."
Have you ever been on a first date that was so bad, you immediately knew there'd be no second date? What happened? Tell us in the comments!
Note: Some submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.