She Really Fell Off

“I had a friend since middle school. She was always very sweet, quick to make jokes and laugh, a bit chubby but drop-dead gorgeous. She had some self-esteem issues but she played it off well. That is until she started dating a 47-year-old homeless man while we were freshmen in high school.
She ran away from home, started doing speed, lost 80 pounds, and basically became a codependent psycho girlfriend trying to keep this dude in line. She told me that she liked how much he cared about her (the grooming put this idea in her head) and that he introduced her to tons of people around downtown so it opened up her social circle. She also liked his tattoos (a lot of awful home job tattoos on his face), but I think it mostly boiled down to; she didn’t feel loved at home, never had. And he gave her that.
And then one day her boyfriend didn’t come back to the spot they were supposed to meet up. This was after they were together for two years. She later got a call from him in jail saying that he was going to be there for a while. She didn’t know what happened until she found out his court date and sat in on it.
The dude had coaxed a 14-year-old girl under the bridge with promises of ‘smoking her out’ and he assaulted her. My friend told me this and I apologized to her, thinking we were on the same page about her ‘boyfriend’ being a complete psychopath. I asked her how the girl was doing. She launched into a huge ranting screaming rant about how she was going to beat the heck out that ‘witch’ and ‘how dare she make up these lies!’ She couldn’t accept that at the ripe old age of 16 that she was too old for her middle-aged boyfriend to be attracted to.
The guy was eventually released. The friend had a baby with a different homeless guy. So…she’s not doing so hot. She isn’t as bad as she was at the height of her addiction but it looks like she’s still using, and we’re in our early 20s now. I think the first guy isn’t allowed to come back to the area because this was his third assault charge, the second charge on a child.”
Not Quite The Coolest Guy In The Room

“A dude I knew shacked up with a lovely, lovely lady; she had a couple of kids by him, got engaged and marriage was on the cards. But this dude was The Dude around me and the lads always had your back in a fight, amazing wingman, knew everyone in the clubs, awesome guy. How little we knew behind the scenes.
First of all, we’d rock up at his place in the center of town for a few pre-club drinks and FIFA or movies, his missus would be there, kids running around; they were happy days. Then, it…slowly changed.
We’d go, ‘Dude, where’s your better half? Where’s the mini dudes?’ And he’d say that she was off to her folks over the weekend. We said OK the first couple of times as this happened for us very infrequently over the course of a few months. Then it was every few weeks. Then every weekend. It turns out he’d been beating on her and started cheating on her about three months after she got pregnant with their first one.
The Dude stopped being The Dude. It was the end of an age for me and all his buddies. The Dude was a freaking loser – way below scum to us all. I’d say that we all dumped him there and then, but that’s a bit too unrealistic. Me, I never had anything to do with him after that, but it took the death of one of the lads and his subsequent behavior in a bar after the wake to make everyone’s minds up.”
No One Saw It Coming

“My friend has always been very spiritual, but also very open and accepting. He started dating this girl who was also very spiritual, but… turned up to 11. She grew up in a small town in a huge, very strict family, and was homeschooled until college. She was very closed-minded, stubborn, and judgmental. When my friend started dating her, none of his friends or family liked her much. She was very controlling of him, so we would see him less and less. Then I moved in with him, so I was able to keep in close contact and see him all the time, but he still had basically no say in what he did when he had free time and she wasn’t at work. We would be hanging out with friends and he’d get a phone call and have to leave to go watch TV with her.
Then she started getting really pushy about wanting him to propose. He proposed before any of us thought he was ready. Everyone tried to talk to him about it and get him to think things over more, even his mom did this. Then the wedding ended up happening way sooner than planned (not because of a pregnancy or anything; she just didn’t want to wait). She had always said she wanted to have a bunch of kids and be a stay-at-home mom, and that she wanted to get married so she wouldn’t have to work anymore.
They got pregnant not too long after the wedding. Naturally, things started to change.
But here’s the plot twist, she changed for the better.
She’s mellowed out a lot. She’s still very strict, but not nearly as judgmental about it. She’s way easier to be around; her social skills have really developed over the past few years and it turns out a lot of what we thought was her being mean was mostly her being really socially inept (and I guess a little mean sometimes, but everyone is). I genuinely believe that she had basically been treating her entire life as just steps leading up to getting married and having children, like the housewife edition of a T-1000 Terminator, because that’s all she ever knew. Her whole life before college was spent in a home where her mother was a stay-at-home mom raising a bunch of kids, her father was the head of the homeschool organization, and her older sisters got married young and also became stay-at-home moms.
So yeah. She’s a lot friendlier and easier to be around now, and we get to see them more than we used to. Their son’s pretty cute, too. Poor kid will be the biggest dork on the planet if his parents are any indication, but he won’t be totally sheltered and isolated like we were afraid he would be.”
He Now Regrets Playing The Matchmaker

“A friend I considered my twin and with whom I’d hang out for hours without feeling bored developed feelings for a mutual friend we had. I decided to play match-maker and urged them to go on a date. It was downhill from there; we’d hang out and they’d have whispered conversations while I was there, exclude me from plans, throw slurs around, use me for when they needed something. They are still together but I don’t hang out with them anymore. I should’ve seen the signs that said friend was spineless.”
Super Strict

“My friend in college was always in a good mood and just a generally nice person.
She started dating a hectically spiritual guy and the longer they dated, the more she would change. The first thing was her dress code. She went from dressing like a normal college person to ankle-length skirts, with the only exposed skin being her hands and face. Then she stopped going out with anyone besides the boyfriend and his spiritual crowd. She became a shell of her previous self, never smiled, and always kept to herself. Didn’t see any signs of abuse though. She was somewhat spiritual, to begin with, while he was into some seriously strict sect. Apparently, he was in training to one day become a rabbi. It was all rather weird seeing her change. Probably grooming is a good word to describe what was going on.
She ended up marrying him (only strictly spiritual people were invited) and that was the last time we heard from her.
After the wedding, she moved overseas and deleted all her social media accounts, and changed her email address.”
From Zero To Hero

“Change for the better here.
I met my mate R at university, the first time I walked into his room, it was boiling hot, he was covered in his duvet having just jumped to turn the VCR off. Paper tissues everywhere. The dude was skinny with long, lank hair and big bottle glasses. He loved Richard Linklater and was kinda socially awkward in an Alan partridge kind of way. Used to go on about slackers and that kind of thing.
He was teased pretty mercilessly by the whole gang, and would often do and say things that would unintentionally make people laugh.
But besides that, he was a pretty sound lad, loved music and his heart in the right place, even if he had no real confidence of his own. He was the kind of guy who would say an opinion and if the group didn’t agree with it, he’d completely say the reverse of what he actually thought just to fit in.
His idea of cool was whatever Wired or NME said was cool at the time.
I introduced him to a friend of a work colleague on a night out, hoping to get the two of them together. At first, they kind of danced around each other for a bit, but eventually ended up together.
Over the next couple of years, he went from living on our couch in our living room, working as a bike courier to having quite a high-powered backroom job for a media company in London. When he got married he ended up investing in property and has a number of properties in the town he lives in with his wife and two kids.
I’ve seen his confidence soar, particularly after his kids were born when he has become like a new man.
Really proud of the guy.”
She Was Desparate

“My best friend started dating a man about a year and a half ago. She’s not at all the same person. She used to be so much fun to be around. Outgoing. Always in a great mood. Positive. Makes good money.
Now she’s always broke because he is a leech sucking her bank account dry. She’s always down and depressed thanks to his abusive mind games. He keeps her a nervous wreck. She doesn’t go out at all anymore. If she does, he’s with her and god forbid she talks to anyone. He travels for work but even if he’s out of town she stays home because he will get jealous if she has dinner with me. Really?
She doesn’t see him for who he is. She thinks this is a normal relationship and she should give him money anytime he asks for it. Thinks it’s okay that he’s jealous. I just don’t know how she has allowed him to change her so dramatically.
I’m to the point where I’m thinking of hiring a private investigator to look into this guy. He’s either married or has someone else in another state. When he goes on ‘work trips’ it’s always to the same state that is a 12-hour drive away. He will stay one to two weeks at a time. He conveniently has to work on holidays too. He actually has a place in this other state as well and when she has asked to go with him it’s always a no.
Some of the stories he’s told her about needing money.
First, it was when he got back up to his other apartment he had been robbed. Probably the landlord who knows his schedule he said. Cash was stolen from a safe even. Yeah right. He felt unsafe and needed to move. She footed the bill.
Then his new apartment burned down. He lost everything. She paid for him a rental house. Deposits, utilities, she bought new furniture, electronics, everything down to cooking utensils.
Then his car broke down. She gave him her car. Bought herself a new one. Insurance was still in her name. Then miraculously as he slept someone hit the car parked and totaled it. Hit and run! She bought him a new truck.
Is she allowed to go up north with him to see this other house and all the stuff she paid for? Oh, no boss says he can’t travel with anyone. Ok, I’ll follow you in my car then….nope always a reason why she can’t go.
His boss never pays him on time. He needs money for travel. Gas. Food. To tide him over. He never pays her back.
He gets lonely on the road so it would help if he had an iPad to play games on.
He lost his phone. Needs a new one. Top of the line of course.
He’s behind on child support …can she make the payments? Sure why not!!
The list goes on and on. I even told her once either he’s the unluckiest guy on the planet or he’s scamming her.
She’s a smart woman. Owns her own business. Great at what she does. Never took any crud from past boyfriends. So what spell does he have her under that makes her give him everything? I joked he must be great in bed. Nope. They never got intimate in a year and a half. Why? PTSD. Also because he is older. Really? He’s 40! I didn’t know his parts stopped working at that age.
Seriously, he blames it all on PTSD. Now I have no experience with this so I’m not saying he’s making it up, but I’ve looked into this guy myself secretly and can’t find any military record. During the time he was supposedly in the military I found he worked at a grocery store.
Maybe if I present her with evidence she will wake up. It may end our friendship but at this point, I just want him away from her.”
Completely Co-Dependant

“I dated a girl for almost two years, we both changed each other relatively positively. I’d been in a bad relationship before so I had a lot to work through, and she was in the process of getting out of a manipulative relationship as well, similar to the one I had been in. I saw the signs, pulled her out. So we started dating.
All of her past relationships were very controlling, so she was on the clingier side. She didn’t prefer to hang out with friends, just me. She wanted to talk all the time (which I mostly didn’t mind). Little stuff started to build up that I didn’t want to be responsible for, she wouldn’t go socialize without me. If I was out in class or something, she wouldn’t really eat or have a meal until I got back. She explained that that’s what all her exes wanted her to do, so that’s all she knew. We had a lot of conversations about her being independent. When I started pulling away, made work friends, was going out more, she didn’t like it. I could tell, even as she didn’t say anything. I was tired of feeling guilty for wanting to have a life outside our relationship bubble. So we broke up.
I told her she needed to be able to function on her own, she needed to spend time by herself, figure out who she was before being in a relationship. But, I kid you not, she was dating another girl a week later.
This is where the change comes in. All our mutual friends report it. The girl I loved, the girl I dated, retreated back into some corner in her brain because she’s now a carbon copy of her girlfriend. They don’t function separately. The girl I knew is gone. Her new girlfriend is all too happy about how submissive she is and takes full advantage. I hate it. But I’m just the bitter ex. I just miss the girl I knew.”
He Completely Flipped

“My own ex-husband.
Before we got married, he adored me. One time, he knew I had left my debit card at my parents’ place (over two and a half hours away) and my gas tank was on E. He drove down from his college town (about three and half hours away) just to spend the night with me. In the morning, he left and handed me my keys, telling me to go to class. Later, I got in my car and discovered he had snuck out early in the morning to go fill up my car for me.
He was always doing romantic things like biking several miles spontaneously to my parents’ house just to say hi and tell me he loved me. We would talk on the phone for several hours each night and call each other briefly in the morning so that we could be the first and last voices we heard. We both did things with the other person in mind and would email each other ‘letters’ to keep for later.
Fast forward a year and a half later. We’ve been married for two weeks and he says, ‘I don’t believe in monogamy anymore.’ Like, dude, this is an epiphany you should have shared with me while you were figuring it out?! Before we got married?!
He claimed he would never cheat, but he did start very openly talking about any woman’s body in front of me, including how good of a lay they would be. I had to tell him to stop because it was disrespectful.
But then, before we went on our belated honeymoon, he asked if we could find some random girl and have a threesome during it. I said no, it’s my honeymoon and I’m not into threesomes. He gets super disappointed but later claims it was ‘just a joke.’
Two years later, and he propositions one of my guy friends in front of me at my own party. Then says, ‘Oh, I’m not straight.’ Wait, what?? I had no idea. He had never told me and now he’s coming out to everyone in the middle of a party without giving me a heads up?
Fast forward another year where he’s a surgeon. We’re in a new state and suddenly, he’s waking up at four am and getting home at eight pm. He has, at his own insistence, absolutely no time to talk to me. I’m ‘not allowed’ to text him at work because it’d be ‘unprofessional’ for him to take personal texts while at work. I had no friends and no family nearby so I asked him to just, please, talk to me for thirty minutes one night. He started yelling at me about how if he did that, that’s thirty fewer minutes of sleep for him, and then he’ll make mistakes tomorrow and someone will die.
‘Do you really want someone to die just so you can have a thirty-minute long conversation??’
I mean, no. But…if you’re that sleep-deprived, don’t go in.
He also started attacking me for my relationship with my family. He would tell me how he was much, much better than me because he was a vegan and I eat meat. When I got jealous or insecure because he would flirt with other women or wouldn’t shoot them down when they got physical with him, he told me it was ‘unattractive’ and ‘unevolved’ of me, making him superior. Finally, any time I ever tried to initiate hooking up, he would shame me for it. He would tell me I seemed desperate and that it turned him off completely. This, just from kissing him while he was at his computer.
If I wanted to get him something for his birthday or a holiday, he would flip. Threatened to throw them in the trash or burn them without looking at them. At one point, my parents sent me a small, pre-decorated tree probably about two feet tall. He threatened to burn it or toss it when I wasn’t looking because he hated it. He also eventually shouted at me that he hoped my uncle and cousins (who were children at the time), get in a massive car wreck and die in a fire together.
There was other abusive behavior, but it’s not for the faint of heart.
I later found out, on Christmas day, that he had been cheating on me with another surgeon (woman) in his program. Nurses and such had been flirting with him as well as he’d been considering them. I ended up calling it quits after that. We were beyond redemption and he didn’t care.
When we met up to sign the papers, he said the reason we were divorcing was that he was a workaholic. Yeah…because that’s the only reason.
People ask me how I didn’t see it coming, but, honestly, while we dated the red flags were more yellow and they were pretty sparse. When we got married, that’s when his nonsense came out.
I graduated from law school, passed the bar exam and now I’m trying to find work. I also moved to a new city in the state, away from him, so no chances of accidental run-ins.
I have PTSD from some of the worst stuff he did to me so I ended up having to go to therapy. Since I’m unemployed right now, I can’t afford it but I’m hoping to restart it when I finally have an income.
Overall, things are going much, much better. I feel better, stronger, happier, and much more supported. I still have nightmares, flashbacks, and triggers, but they aren’t as bad as they used to be and I feel more and more like my old self every day.”
Her Personality Blossomed

“A good friend of mine was a very unattractive, dowdy librarian in her late-30s. She was very smart and could be fun to hang around with, but kind of an embittered, man-hater type. She was set up on a date by a mutual friend with a really nice, down-to-earth country boy in his mid-40s. He was amicably divorced, a good father, and treated my librarian friend like a princess.
They dated for a few months and she started smiling all the time, wearing makeup and dressing up a lot, and even just blushing when she talked about him. Only dated a few months, then ran off to Hawaii to get married and surprised us all! They have been happily married for years now, and she seems younger and prettier now in her late 40s than she did in her 20s and 30s. They go on fun road trips and out dancing, to movies, etc all the time. They seem to really adore each other.”
Change Isn’t Always A Good Thing

“My friend was always kind of a prick to girls, he was cynical, didn’t really believe in relationships, and was about as cold, depressive, and unemotional as you can get. He didn’t really do serious relationships and didn’t believe in love, but not in a free-spirited, fun, one-nighter kind of way, but in an emotionally stunted, intimacy issues kind of way.
Eventually, my girlfriend and I set him up on a double date with a friend, although we didn’t really think anything would happen. We insisted that he had to be nice to her. Against all expectations, he decided to go on a second date, then a third. It developed into a proper relationship and he preceded to transform into a romantic and surprisingly affectionate boyfriend. He was the happiest I’d ever seen him. He and his girlfriend also became very co-dependent, which was kind of the goal, but also kind of alarming.
Anyway, his girlfriend eventually cheated on him. She was at a party without him, drank way too much, and lacked self-control. She told him hoping he would forgive her. It was as though somebody had flicked a switch and turned my friend back onto his original setting. He broke up with her, didn’t seem especially upset, and laughed in her face when she tried to make him jealous of her new boyfriend, her stupid way of trying to win him back. He was an absolute prick to her, a side of his personality she’d never seen, and she was kind of taken aback. Whenever she tried to be nice to him or become friends again, he told her to cut the bull. Eventually, he slept with her again, then avoided and never spoke to her again, leaving her an emotional wreck, wondering what had happened to the loving boyfriend she’d known. She was probably hoping he missed her or would give some indication that he’d loved her at one point. Instead, he just messed with her, then laughed at her, said a few nasty things, and denied he’d ever felt anything for her. His apathy is what killed her.
As if the situation wasn’t messed up enough, she then underwent a complete personality change, almost as though she was trying to imitate him. She went from a happy, bubbly, giggly kind of person, to full-on emo. She began dressing really provocatively and sleeping with dozens of guys. She dyed her hair dark brown, started drinking a lot, and began quoting weird pseudo-philosophy. If you tried to speak to her, she’d give you a weird ‘deep’ answer. She pulled a ‘prank’ in her office where she filled the water fountain with Smirnoff and got herself fired. It was possibly the worst prank ever. It cost her a fortune, and nobody drank it because they realized it immediately, but she was pathetically proud of it though. She became possibly the most annoying person to talk to. She loved to go on about ‘the darkness inside her.’ She went from a normal, happy person, to the weirdest and most annoying person I’ve ever met.
That lasted a while, but she eventually stopped drinking, and she’s gradually going back to her original self. Hopefully, sooner or later, she’ll go back to normal. Meanwhile, my friend still hasn’t shown any interest in another relationship.”
Sometimes Two Wrongs Can Make A Right

“An acquaintance of mine hooked up with this chick one night. Both of them were the type to sleep around often, a little narcissistic, irresponsible, unemployed, continually made bad decisions. She got pregnant. They both sat down and decided to try and make a relationship out of it and try to be parents. They got married a little after the kid was born. They’ve been together for a long time now, couple of kids, turned out to be a great couple and great parents. He’s got a good job and makes decent money and last I heard she was doing something with children’s books from home.
They just needed each other to straighten themselves out.”
She Gave Up Everything For A Loser

“My best friend in high school was very headstrong, independent, and motivated. She had dreams of going to school to work with animals and traveling all over the world. Men were more of an annoyance to her than anything else.
She got married to an army dude a couple of years out of high school. His insecurities, anger issues, and drinking problem he denied having led him to be incredibly controlling and manipulative. He decided where she worked and who she spent time with. He spent all his money on weapons, video games, and car upgrades while expecting her to pay the bills. She went to school for a little bit, but he guilted her into dropping out so she could work more. She used to rock the messy bun, big hoodie, no makeup combo daily, but she started straightening her hair and putting makeup on every day because she was scared he’d cheat on her if she didn’t. He got her pregnant so she’d have ‘something to keep her busy’ while he was deployed. Shortly after she gave birth, he complained she wasn’t getting back to her old shape fast enough.
The last time I saw her, she told me that he gets wasted as soon as he gets home and doesn’t help with the baby at all. I’ve never seen someone with darker bags under their eyes. She was stick-thin from crash dieting to quickly lose the baby weight. She confided in me how she felt like she threw away all of her dreams for someone who didn’t turn out to be worth it. She was just the shell of who she used to be. He broke her, and I’d do anything to have the old her back.
BUT: She is leaving him! They’ve been fighting a lot lately and he’s been getting more physical with her and ended up hitting her. I think that was the sign she needed to realize that he’s a prick and that the best thing for her kid is to get out of there. She’s got physical marks on her, there’s no way he’s getting custody. Right now she’s staying with her super supportive mom while she figures everything out. Thank God she finally dropped that prick.”
From Bad To Good And Good To Bad

“My best friend did the weirdest 180 when he started going out with his now-fiancée. Before he was super outgoing and social, fun to be around, and passionate about hobbies but he was also super lazy, skipped class all the time, his parents did everything for him and he had anger management issues.
Now, after being with this girl for four years, he has become a super reliable guy, always on time, works hard, and is super relaxed. But he is also the most awkward person I’ve ever met, he doesn’t really want to go out anywhere and doesn’t have many interests besides video games. It’s like he traded all of his good attributes in order to improve on his bad ones.
I’m definitely proud of him for gaining his independence. But when he was super social, I was shy and awkward, so he didn’t invite me to things because he thought I wouldn’t want to go. Now that I’m finally at a place where I’m more outgoing and want to go out and do things, he doesn’t. It’s frustrating to have to choose between having fun and not seeing my best friend, or hanging out with my friend and being bored to death.”
He’s A Con Artist No Doubt

“My best friend started dating a man about a year and a half ago. She’s not at all the same person. She used to be so much fun to be around. Outgoing. Always in a great mood. Positive. Makes good money.
Now she’s always broke because he is a leech sucking her bank account dry. She’s always down and depressed thanks to his abusive mind games. He keeps her a nervous wreck. She doesn’t go out at all anymore. If she does, he’s with her and god forbid she talks to anyone. He travels for work but even if he’s out of town she stays home bc he will get jealous if she has dinner with me. Really?
She doesn’t see him for who he is. She thinks this is a normal relationship and she should give him money anytime he asks for it. Thinks it’s okay that he’s jealous. I just don’t know how she has allowed him to change her so dramatically.
I’m to the point where I’m thinking of hiring a private investigator to look into this guy. He’s either married or has someone else in another state. I think he’s lied about his past. He’s a con artist no doubt. I mean he tells outrageous stories of why he needs money. Maybe if I present her with evidence she will wake up. It may end our friendship but at this point, I just want him away from her.”