What you would hope is that once that child grows up, he or she would leave the temper tantrums behind and learn more effective and less dramatic ways to manage emotions. Unfortunately, this doesn’t always happen. 

We have seen many examples of adults having temper tantrums in public, for example, over current face mask rules, but the coronavirus pandemic is far from the only reason adults throw tantrums.

Reddit user AriaStars asked, “What’s the worst adult tantrum you’ve ever witnessed?” The answers are pretty shocking. Hopefully you have never witnessed anything like the following examples.

1. Crying at Target

   Reddit user BastianBalthazar shared:

   I had a roommate in college who spent money lavishly and liked to buy clothes, wear them once or twice with the tags on, then return them. One time we were at Target doing some grocery shopping and she tried to return a few dresses she had worn. One had a large stain on it and she didn’t have the receipt or tags for the others. The cashier said he couldn’t take them because they had clearly been damaged. She spent the next 30 minutes crying HYSTERICALLY while he tried to ignore her and check out other people. She sat on the bench outside of the Starbucks (that was inside the store), facing the cashier, and just stared at him while crying. It was so embarrassing and I begged her to stop and just leave with me.

2. Can You Break a $50?

   DosesAndNeuroses wrote:

   a grown woman pushed over an entire cash register (onto the floor) with one arm (she was holding her child in the other) because the cashier could not break a 50 dollar bill.she also (presumably by accident) slammed her child’s head into the door as she was stomping out of the store in a rage.

3. Yelling in Taco Bell

   alwvystired added another example:

   Worked at taco bell when I was younger, middle aged mom came in and threw a fit, called the cashier a brainless idiot who will never exceed in life and demanded a refund.All because he gave her the wrong change amount back. He was new and just a kid, working his first job. He didn’t come back the next day.

4. Threw Away $300

   Written by julianryan:

   I saw my 21 year old cousin toss his monitor out a second story window because of a video game, then proceed to cry about tossing a $300 screen out a window. Was pretty amusing

5. Blocking a Bus

   stinkyface wrote:

   I got on a bus at 5pm, the whole bus was filled with people trying to go home from work. As the bus pulled out, the woman in a car behind us must have felt she had been cut off. So she pulled up beside the bus and started yelling at the bus driver through the window. Then pulled her car in front of the bus and got out to yell some more. The bus driver couldn’t drive away and suddenly the police showed up. We all had to get off the bus and wait for another bus or find another way home. I decided to walk down to the ferry so I had to walk past the woman that caused this and I stared at her trying to understand how she could justify screwing up the commute of so many people.

6. Her Phone Was the Wrong Color

   Elephenomalant88 shared:

   I once watched a woman in my store complain about the IPhone she got being the wrong color. She threw a big enough tantrum that her father grabbed the phone and told her she was off of his account. She proceeded to bite his arm hard enough that there was blood. Out of reaction the father backhanded her. This proceeded to her yelling at everyone in the store for not calling the cops. So she called the cops. An hour later the cops then arrested her for the assault on her father. This all being in front of her four year old daughter.

7. “I Don’t Want to Go to Work!”

   Gooru_Skywalker shared:

   Grown woman (Btwn 50-60) gets on the train and proceeds to start hysterically crying. Screaming at the top of her lungs that she did not want to go to work. Her shrieks were so loud they penetrated through my noise cancelling headphones. Mind you this was at 6:45 in the morning. This continued until 8 stops later (the stop before I got off) she wiped her face and got off the train as if it never happened. The entire train car as well as myself looked at each other completely bewildered. I’d like to say only in New York but in this crazy world we live in I would not be surprised if this was a common occurrence in other places.

8. At a Car Dealership

   KelSaysThis wrote:

   I work at a car dealership and there are a few salesmen who throw massive tantrums on a weekly basis. I’ve seen so many it’s hard to choose just one incident but most recently, a guy who has worked here for literally 26 years got upset at one of the managers and started throwing things. First his pen, then his coat, his phone, stress ball (ironically) and finally he opened handed slammed the wall and just left. He was yelling so loud the whole time and there were plenty of customers within earshot. EASILY heard the whole thing go down…

9. Never Been Disciplined

   Written by themayadoodle:

   My boyfriend has an 18 year old niece who has never even once in her life been disciplined. She throws other people’s phones when she gets mad and yells at everyone and no one stands up to her. A few months ago she was out for dinner with the whole family and screamed at her mother for not grabbing her phone charger, the battery was almost dead. My boyfriend told her to consider acting like a human and socialize. She told him to shut up. He snatched her phone out of her hand, yelled at her to apologize and she cried and asked her mom to defend her. Her mom begged him for the phone back.

10. An Out-of-Control Brother

    painfullyavg wrote:

    Younger brother, who is 23, was mad that my mother wasnt home for some reason. So he called her, said he would break 1 thing every minute until she came home.She gets home and the house is in shambles, broken dishes everywhere, doors, windows, etc. Then nothing came of it. She just gave in to his demands, citing that hes bipolar and cant control himself. I put 1800 miles between myself and them 2 weeks ago. Best decision ever

11. At PetSmart

    ksteamed97 shared:

    I worked at PetSmart for awhile. During Black Friday this older man comes in and asks for a specific brand of something for cats. I stock so I know everything like the back of my hand but I was exhausted due to retail overworking me for this holiday. I ask him if he can explain to me what it is and this man goes off. Like full on curse words, knocks over a few cat stands, and people are looking at him. I politely tell him that I cannot help him if that’s how he wants to act. He gets even more upset and starts yelling at me louder, he calls me a dumb blonde and a few other choice words. I walk away, I’m not dealing with that. I get my manager, bc this man was at my heels following me. MY MANAGER DOES NOTHING. This man apparently gets what he wants and a discount and goes (to my manger) “I knew I just needed to speak to a man to get this done, women complicated everything.”

12. At a Hospital

    Written by vi0lant:

    I work at a hospital and one person actually called the cops and said he was emotionally deranged and wanted to kill himself beCause his nurse aid didn’t want to smother him with shampoo over his head. He wanted to be flawless like a donut from head to toe with shampoo.

13. Bridezilla

    Shared by rihannaiguana:

    One time my best friend freaked out on me because I couldn’t come to her moms weddings because my brother and sister-in-laws baby shower was the same day and I had family who flew in to be there so I couldn’t just leave my family. She freaked out on me on the phone and we didn’t talk for months. Some people are just so self centered.