We asked the BuzzFeed Community to tell us their funniest babysitting horror stories and, wow, these tales will have you second guessing the offer of watching your local rugrat!
1. The screams heard at night.
"My sister and I were babysitting this little girl who would run around in the dark and giggle like a haunted doll. After we put her to bed, she would sneak out, cut all the lights off, and scream. When we asked her why she would do that, she said, 'I just wanted to scream in the dark.' Not to mention, her parents came home three hours later than they said they would. When they arrived home and we told them about the situation, they told us, 'Yeah sometimes she does that at night. So weird.'"
2. The artist in the making.
"When I was 16, I babysat a very precocious 4-year-old. One time, she told me she needed to use the restroom and I asked her if she needed help. She was very insistent that no, she was a 'big girl' and could do it all by herself. After 15 minutes, I started to worry and knocked on the door. She was like, 'I'M FINE. DON'T COME IN!!' which prompted me to open the door. The sink, toilet, even the bottom parts of the mirror that she could reach were covered in her mom's menstrual pads. Guess she thought they were stickers or something!"
3. The bulls in a china shop.
"I used to babysit three boys: a set of twins and their younger brother. One time, they threw a stool down the stairs and put a huge hole in the wall. On another occasion, when I was giving them all a bath, one of the twins screamed and I looked over to see the youngest squatting and pooping in the tub."
4. The "lucky" save.
"When I was in high school, I once had to babysit a 3-year-old neighbor and my 9-year-old sister. We were tossing a ball between the three of us in the house when it bounced very high and ended up on the balcony. When I went upstairs to retrieve it, my sister yelled and I looked down to see brown liquid squirting out from under the neighbor girl's pant leg and onto the carpet. I instinctually ran to pick her up with my hand out (to protect the white carpet) and a HUGE pile of diarrhea just plopped RIGHT into my hand."
5. The only one looking on the bright side.
"I was babysitting a 3-year-old whose grandfather just passed a couple of weeks earlier. We were out on a walk when she started singing, 'I only have two grandmas alive!' Very enthusiastically. "
6. The not so subtle threat.
"Once, while babysitting this 8-year-old, we went on a walk by a creek. When I bent down to take a picture, she was suddenly right behind me and whispered into my ear, 'If I were to push you in, no one would ever find you.'"
7. The uninvited bed guest.
"My sister babysat two kids: a 4-year-old and a 6-year-old. She sent them to get ready for bed while she cleaned the kitchen. When she went upstairs to tuck them in, the 4-year-old was missing from her bed. She couldn't find her anywhere, so she put the 6-year-old to bed before going back downstairs to call their mom. But, before she could dial the phone, the 6-year-old suddenly started screaming. Apparently, the 4-year-old had wedged herself between her sister's bed and the wall, and had been waiting for her to get into bed so she could jump out and scare her."
8. The sweet (?) gesture.
"I was sitting for an 8-year-old boy. He came up to me, told me to close my eyes and hold out my hands for a surprise. He then put a cold, dead hamster in my open palms. His parents explained (after my VERY panicked phone call) that there was nothing to worry about; it had simply been stored in the freezer until the ground was soft enough to give it a proper burial. Needless to say, I did not volunteer my services again."
9. The unconventional trail of breadcrumbs.
"I was nannying for three kids: a 6-month-old, a 10-month-old, and a 3-year-old. The 6-month-old had a cold so he was on a medication that caused horrible diarrhea. He had a blow out and I didn’t notice until he had scooted his butt across the floor, stuck his hands in the skid mark, and rubbed it all over the curtains. While I was cleaning him up, the 3-year-old walked through the mess, leaving a trail of poop footprints on the floor. All this happened 30 minutes before their mom got home."
10. The meal she never saw coming.
"I was babysitting an infant and the baby’s mom left a bottle of pumped breast milk for them to eat. After I fed the little guy, I burped him. He got a little belch out, and being fairly new to burping infants, I assumed we were good. I turned him to face me and starting playing peekaboo. The little guy laughed, and then projectile vomited breast milk, The Exorcist-style, RIGHT INTO MY MOUTH!
11. The self-taught painter.
"I was maybe 14-years-old and babysat for a family with three kids. It wasn’t too bad until the youngest daughter told me she needed to use the bathroom. I let her go in alone and, when it had been a while and I checked on her, I found that she had discovered her mom’s nail polish and was happily painting her whole body."
12. The "I don't get paid enough for this."
"I was babysitting my mom's friend's 9-year-old daughter when I was 15. She told me she wanted to show me something and took me to her mom's bedroom. She then pulled a shoebox out from underneath the bed and opened it to show me a huge, vibrating dildo. I was mortified, but I pretended to not know what it was, told her to put it back, and to not go through her mother's things. Awkward."
13. The effective defensive strategy.
"Four years ago, my cousin and I had to babysit one of the neighbor's kids during Christmas break. We decided to watch The Nightmare Before Christmas and, when it came time to go to bed, the kid was too afraid to sleep because of the Boogie Man. So, my cousin proposed that one of us pretend to be the Boogie Man so the other person could "defeat" him and show the kid everything was alright. But, before we could do anything, the door to his room opened suddenly. The kid thought it was the Boogieman and threw his lamp at the first thing that came through the door, which turned out to be his mother!"
14. The home decorating no one asked for.
"My mom ran a daycare out of our house when I was about 13. There was one child who was a nightmare. The last straw for my mom was when she caught the kid with a pair of scissors in my younger brother's closet. He had been CARVING INTO THE CLOSET WALL!!"
15. And, the ultimate shady comment.
"My babysitting horror story is that that kid who I was babysitting told me I was ugly. 😭"
Want to be featured in similar BuzzFeed posts? Follow the BuzzFeed Community on Facebook and Twitter!
Note: Submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.