When you have a crush, you're faced with two options: keep your feelings to yourself so as to avoid rejection or accept the possibility of rejection and bravely admit how you feel. No matter what you wind up deciding, the fear of rejection is, without a doubt, always going to be a driving factor. And hey! Sometimes you boldly share your feelings and you don't even wind up being rejected! But, of course, other times things don't quite pan out that way. For example, in a recent Reddit AskWomen thread, women share their worst rejection stories and, well, they're brutal.
But in their own way, I also would like to think these stories are inspirational. They prove that the worst possible scenario happened and these badass women lived to tell the tale. If you've recently been rejected, take heart: you aren't alone, and you will get through this.
Her best friend told her he wasn't interested.
I had a massive crush on my best friend. I finally confessed to him and he said he needed time to think about it... eventually I pressured him for an answer and he said no. I was heartbroken. To make things worse, he began chasing girls he met online.In the end, I dodged a bullet. It’s been over a decade and he hasn’t grown up at all. I’m in a stable, long-term relationship, working towards my degree. I’m ultimately grateful he turned me down, since it freed me to meet my partner.
He rejected her, then gave her his number out of pity.
In college I’d had a crush on him all semester and on the last day of class I decided it was now or never. He finished his final quickly and left and I sped through mine so that I could casually get outside to talk to him. We were waiting for the bus and I asked him if he wanted to hang out sometime over the summer and he awkwardly said that he wasn’t interested in that kind of thing right now. Then I had to continue standing there with him waiting for the bus trying to play it cool and ended up saying something about how I just wanted to hang out as friends, which might’ve been partially true. I just wanted to get to know him better and see. Then the bus finally came after what felt like forever and we ended up being the only people on it. It was the kind of university bus where the seats are on each side facing towards the middle. While we were riding the bus staring out the window, at our hands, or at our phones in silence he Facebook messages me with his phone number out of pity. And what’s worse is that I was looking at my phone when he sent it so he knows that I saw it right then. We ended up being somewhat friends the next couple of years and hanging out in the same friend group and neither of us ever mentioned it. But I’ve never asked anyone out again to this day.
He laughed in her face.
He told her point-blank that he was more interested in her friend.
I asked my summer camp crush if he wanted to sit together on the bus for our field trip. He said no and that he was actually going to ask my friend Stephanie. (Stephanie said no because she didn’t feel right going with my crush.) It hurt like hell to be rejected for someone else. The next day I caught him picking his nose in the mess hall though...
He barely remembered the moment they kissed.
I told him that I really liked him, and I thought about how we had kissed once and I couldn't stop thinking about it- and he said "Yeah, but that was like... a while ago? And I kind of already forgot." He was my best dude friend and it was a month after we had kissed maybe.
He physically ran from her (he was on a run, but still).
I gave a runner a note asking him out. (We said hello to each other every morning.) He looked at me dumbstruck then smiled awkwardly and ran off.
They stayed good friends! Yay for happy endings!
I don’t think it was particularly bad but in high school I told my at the time best friends boy friend that I really liked him, he respectfully said he had a gf and I told him I know but I just wanted to get it off my chest. We eventually became really really close and I stopped being close with the girl during college. Him and I are still really great friends and I help him when he needs girl advice so I think it turned out pretty well.
I love these women. To me, they are truly everyday heroes. They put themselves out their unapologetically and things didn't go their way but they're still strong enough to share their stories.
Good for them. Here's to hoping we all find the courage to live our lives as boldly as they do!
