30 Decisions People Made During The Pandemic That, In Hindsight, Bit Them In The Butt, As Pointed Out In This Viral Thread
Remember COVID-19? That teeny-tiny virus that has managed to wreak havoc across the entire globe, killing as of today 6.68 million people world-wide, with 658 million cases registered? Yeah, that started 3 years ago this month.
Thankfully, it’s (more or less) under control because of regular vaccinations, keeping up hygiene standards, and just plain old physical distancing in public spaces. But it’s still surreal to think of all the lockdowns, work from home, living in the unknown and the like that have happened in just a few years.
This hits even harder for those who lost loved ones, or at the very least made some regretful decisions right before or during the dawn of the pandemic. Folks online have been sharing their regrets after someone on Reddit asked in hindsight, what decision bit people in the [butt] during the pandemic?
And folks answered. And then Bored Panda compiled this lovely list of the best responses from the now-viral thread. And then you scrolled down to check it out, upvote, comment, all that jazz and then you left your own regretful decisions in the comment section below.
And then we all read them and showed support for you.
More Info: Reddit
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Allowing anti-scientific nutjobs to get a hold of the narrative
Adopting a pet while obeying stay at home order. A lot of people did this out of loneliness and being home 24/7. Afterwards people go back to work pet is suddenly alone 8-12* hours a day and then the shelters are refilled to beyond capacity and now these sweet babies are being put down to relieve the overcrowding problem a lot of shelters were facing.
Same here in Portugal 😭 A lot of abandoned pets. The human kind is really a despicable species 🤮
Thinking that everyone was on the same page and we could all end this together quickly
The amount of children who were forced to stay inside with their abusers. For some reason, a lot of people don’t consider that side of things.
One of my students was killed by her father because the safe-house closed and she was sent home. What could possibly have gone wrong …
Forcing “essential workers” to continue to show up every single day and do the whole job they signed up for with little or even no hazard pay. Worse, laying people off without any consideration for the obvious upcoming boom in homelessness.
And those essential health workers who are now suffering from long-term covid effects are also suffering financial effects...
Closing outdoor spaces at the same time as schools. I’m sorry, the PARK is closed? Hiking trails are closed? National parks are closed? WHY?!
Politicizing a public health issue.
In my country it was taken to the level of ridicule, but the overall situation did expose some real colours in many places across the globe
I heard a terrifying statistic that domestic abuse reports dropped during covid… it’s terrifying because victims were isolated from their friends/family and trapped with their abuser, so there was no one to report on their behalf.
This needs to be way higher. I'm SO thankful I left my ex before a global pandemic. Doesn't bear thinking about. Pandas, please consider donating to charities that help victims of domestic abuse.
I got really fat.
I regret that.
Hey I did too but you can fix it! Just cutting out certain foods and not eating at night I'm now down 15kg since August
All those idiots that bought pallets of hand sanitizer and toilet paper to sell at a markup and then were left without sales and still have those pallets in their garages.
I read in another article that pandas crâp 40 times a day, so the tp is swirling nice for the honorable members of this community 🙃
Buying a pet they couldn't afford to keep once the pandemic ended. Lots of animals are in shelters or euthanized due to it.
How is no one saying putting infected old people in old folks homes with healthy people and keeping them in there
A lot of neglect, abuse and mistreatment going on in those senior care homes surfaced. One of the places, I believe in my city, the care workers were told to lock up and take off for weeks while leaving the vulnerable, needy elderly people to fend for themselves. They had no one to give them company, no one to talk to and no one to take care of their needs. Prisoners were given better conditions.
Encouraging retirement for older employees, ESPECIALLY airline pilots
A big reason theres been so many issues with travel in 2022 is because back during peak pandemic, a huge chunk of pilots were pushed to retire
Now travels back at pre-pandemic highs and airlines are looking around like "F**k... whos gonna fly the planes???"
In addition airlines and every other service industry are seeking to rehire for less benefits and rate of pay than what they previously paid....but, hey "Nobody wants to work" , try actually "Nobody wants to be demeaned, devalued and financially abused so the top management can collect 15 to 30% pay hikes and bonuses for their country club and yaghting lifestyles.
Not getting adult braces. Never imagined masks for 3 years long, I could’ve had perfectly straight pearly teeth by now
Believing it when they said “don’t worry, it’s only two weeks to flatten the curve.”
This bears repeating- a totally new virus with multiple symptoms that are not normally asoociated with its genome and has been shown to trigger incredibly unusual responses from a person's immune system. Trust me, this virus was so much worse than anyone ever thought it could be, including the people who've studied these viruses for 10-30 years. Three years on and researchers who have been studying this since the beginning are finally getting answers to questions such as "how is long covid caused", "what's up with the atypical blood clots and vascular response including the brain fog", "how does covid trigger a cytokine storm" and others. In other words, this is a really weird-a** virus.
Only taking one pack of toilet paper, one pack of antibacterial wipes, one bottle of hand sanitizer, and one can of Lysol. To make sure everyone else would have some.
The day before all hell broke loose.
Late in the pandemic I was lucky to have found the last 24 pack of tp at my grocer after trying to use swiffer sweeper refills and the last bit of paper towels, and a couple of rags. Some biotch worker saw me and remarked "That's a lot of toilet paper. That would last me 6 months." So I was basically shamed for buying a necessary item. Nice.
My friend found an above ground pool on clearance for $199 at Lowe’s right as the pandemic was starting. She texted me about it saying there were several left and I should hurry and go get one. I was too cheap to go buy one. I regretted that decision every day for the next year.
Paying $300 more a month in rent to be closer to my job and never stepping foot in the office.
A bunch of people in my area decided to buy houses in rural areas under the assumption they'll be working from home forever. Now a lot of workplaces are hybrid or fully back in person and they're all stuck with long commutes and less wealthy people in rural areas are being priced out.
Too many people don't read their employee agreements. Or memos for that matter.
Bought a dog. Then never left the house so he grew up with us around 24/7. Now he’s neurotic and can’t be left alone. #brittanyspaniel
We had a spaniel that had gone blind and had never been away from his dad for 5 years until he got a job that he couldn't bring the dog with him. Dog had severe separation anxiety and after we tried everything else, i suggested we get him his own kitten. Told the dog he had to watch it while we were gone and would you believe it worked. They were best friends for years.
Drinking heavily. Well, drinking heavily AND joining an online casino. Does nothing for your savings, I can attest.
I took up amateur whiskey drinking. My collection grew and I drank more whiskey then the rest of my life combined. However it makes a difference going from Canadian Club to Angel's Envy bourbon.
Not letting road crews fix roads in their social bubble.
The road crews never stopped working in my city...but for some reason they 'fixed' roads that had no issues, while leaving those with actual problems untouched even though there was no traffic to impede the projects.
Not walking out of my dead end job and playing video games for a year like so many other people. Instead continued working my a*s off for complete douche bags who just tossed me out with the trash when “my services were no longer needed”…
Learned that the hard way, work and keep upskilling, stay late and finish jobs that are left over by less productive people, screw the balance of life and lose the job anyway. It doesn't pay off.
Deciding not to buy a house right at the beginning
I did literally right before the market went ape-s**t, and I'm so glad because it's easily worth $50-60k more now than what I got it for.
Oh man. The number of people who filed for unemployment who did not qualify and are now getting overpayment notices with the 30% penalty fee is insane.
I'm talking owing 20-36k in overpayments.
The worst ones claimed uo to 52 weeks at 750 a week plus 30% penalty
Putting off trying to make new friends, it has become immensely more difficult for me to make friends since the pandemic and im not completely sure of the source
I have felt it was difficult to make friends before. Everyone has always just wanted to be in their own bubble and have nothing to do with new people. Too distrusting and leery.
Not getting household spending under control THE SECOND I was out of a job but on the hook for an expensive lease. All those new hobbies were fun but now I’d much rather have savings than rudimentary gardening knowledge.
Note: this post originally had 38 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
The UK government made the idiotic decision that children’s clothes were not essential. So in the supermarkets, the clothes sections were sealed off. My son outgrew his shoes. We got them from a local shop but we did the transaction outside. The lady came out to the car with shoes and when we found the right pair for our son, we got cash out from the nearest cash point to pay for them. KIDS CLOTHES ARE ESSENTIAL.
Buying shoes for a growing child is a purchase I would be uncomfortable making online, too. With an adult, you know what size and brand to purchase, based on experience. But with a growing child, how do you know what will fit properly without trying them on first?
Load More Replies... No one even mentioned how online schools and then the limitations students had when they started going back to school, and the whole drive thru grad thing. My daughter was in choir and I was working from home. We live in an apartment. She would have to have her singing lessons while I was working on the phone. That was interesting. She said it was hard to know what the others were doing because she felt she couldn't sing too loud and couldn't hear the others very well. When school opened there was no singing allowed inside. Choir had to be outside during winter. Cold air and singing don't mix well, she told me. Plus the acoustics were nil from the sound absorbing snow and the temperatures were often too low to be standing outside for more than a couple minutes. The teacher had to cancel choir and choose another elective to get enough credits. No extended family was allowed to attend grads. Parents had to be in a vehicle and line up to see their kid get their diploma. I have no car.
I told the school I could just watch from across the street. They said that wasn't allowed. Umm.... of what authority do they have of where someone is off school property? This was a lot more crushing on me than I let on.
Load More Replies...
We, the people, should have stayed home and stopped b*tching. And we needed in the US at lesat to cancel the Defense R&D budget for 2 years to dump 100 billion $USD into upgrading health care. (Signed, an MD. PATIENTS OVER PROFITS! Now back to my regularly scheduled data collection and classification....)
It was a lost opportunity to invest in and reset our healthcare system. But look who the orange was in charge.
Load More Replies... The UK government made the idiotic decision that children’s clothes were not essential. So in the supermarkets, the clothes sections were sealed off. My son outgrew his shoes. We got them from a local shop but we did the transaction outside. The lady came out to the car with shoes and when we found the right pair for our son, we got cash out from the nearest cash point to pay for them. KIDS CLOTHES ARE ESSENTIAL.
Buying shoes for a growing child is a purchase I would be uncomfortable making online, too. With an adult, you know what size and brand to purchase, based on experience. But with a growing child, how do you know what will fit properly without trying them on first?
Load More Replies... No one even mentioned how online schools and then the limitations students had when they started going back to school, and the whole drive thru grad thing. My daughter was in choir and I was working from home. We live in an apartment. She would have to have her singing lessons while I was working on the phone. That was interesting. She said it was hard to know what the others were doing because she felt she couldn't sing too loud and couldn't hear the others very well. When school opened there was no singing allowed inside. Choir had to be outside during winter. Cold air and singing don't mix well, she told me. Plus the acoustics were nil from the sound absorbing snow and the temperatures were often too low to be standing outside for more than a couple minutes. The teacher had to cancel choir and choose another elective to get enough credits. No extended family was allowed to attend grads. Parents had to be in a vehicle and line up to see their kid get their diploma. I have no car.
I told the school I could just watch from across the street. They said that wasn't allowed. Umm.... of what authority do they have of where someone is off school property? This was a lot more crushing on me than I let on.
Load More Replies... We, the people, should have stayed home and stopped b*tching. And we needed in the US at lesat to cancel the Defense R&D budget for 2 years to dump 100 billion $USD into upgrading health care. (Signed, an MD. PATIENTS OVER PROFITS! Now back to my regularly scheduled data collection and classification....)
It was a lost opportunity to invest in and reset our healthcare system. But look who the orange was in charge.
Load More Replies...