12 People Who QUIT THEIR JOBS — What Happened Next Shocked Everyone

Quitting your job can feel terrifying, especially if you’ve been there for years or it pays the bills just fine. But sometimes, sticking around does more harm than good. Whether it was weird coworkers, shady bosses, or just a gut feeling they couldn’t ignore, these folks called it quits... and never looked back. Here are the wild, funny, and downright bizarre moments that made them say, “Yeah, I’m done here.”

• I used to work in a small IT company — not a startup, not a big corp. My job was mostly admin stuff: helping out the managers, keeping schedules in check, light paperwork. Everything was fine until one day, this horrible smell hit the front desk. Like something actually rotted in the walls. We called the cleaning lady. She came in, looked around, and straight up said, “That’s not my job.” Turns out... we didn’t have a cleaning lady. Cleaning duties were now... rotated between employees. And yep, it was my turn. They handed me gloves and a list that said, “Open the drain under the stairs and check.” I laughed, realized they were serious, took off my badge, and left. Never looked back.

• I used to work at this mid-sized company where the boss loved acting like we were all “one big family.” One day, he calls me into his office, all smiles, and says, “Great news — we’re giving you a raise!” I was honestly surprised. I’d been working hard, sure, but hadn’t asked for anything. Two weeks later, I get my paycheck... and it’s less than usual. I thought it was a payroll mistake, so I emailed HR. Guess what? The “raise” was a title change — no salary bump. But with the new title, I no longer qualified for the commuter stipend or lunch reimbursement. So basically, my “promotion” cost me $150 a month. Put in my notice the next day. Found a new job where raises actually, you know, raise something.

• I was a receptionist for a medical software company. My boss refused my request for a single day off to take my teen daughter to get eye surgery. I waited until the first day of her 2-week vacation and put in my notice. Ruined her holiday. © HenrysGrandma / Reddit

• The guy who worked behind me when I was an insurance agent was hired as an accountant. He rarely did the accounting. He mostly just chatted on the phone. I found out he was making nearly double what the rest of us were. When I went and asked the manager why, she said it was because he had a family to support. I told her that the rest of us should all get paid at least as much as he was being paid because we were doing all the work. She declined. I quit on the spot.
  © tranquilseafinally / Reddit

• My boss cursed me because I took a phone message for him when he was already on a call. Apparently, he was eagerly awaiting the call I answered and would have preferred I interrupted him. I threw a pencil at the wall, and said, “Do I look like a mind reader? Cut me my check, I quit.” He tried hard to backpedal, but there had been many, many previous straws. © John*** / Reddit

• I worked in retail. I sprained my ankle badly while ice skating and couldn’t so much as get out of bed. I had to call in and take 2 days off before I was even able to limp to work. As soon as I got back in, my manager pulled me into his office to SCREAM at me for taking 2 days off. For a physical injury that made it so I could not do my job. I threw a cold cup of coffee on him and walked out. My only regret is that the coffee was cold. © LH115 / Reddit

• I started training a guy (machinist), and he told me his starting wage was $27/hr. He had a few years of experience but had been out of the industry for a while. The guy would constantly come to me to fix his problems and ask me dumb questions every day. So I asked my boss for a raise since this guy was at $27. I was at $22, and he told me he could find someone to do my job for $16, so I said, “Then let’s do that.” I handed him my badge and walked out after 15 years.
  © Unknown author / Reddit

• The owner of the company told me to fire a woman for arriving to work right on time. It was always something different with him, some ridiculous new rule that he applied retroactively to suit whatever mood he was in on any given day. And that particular morning, he took it as a personal insult and a show of blatant disrespect that his employees didn’t arrive early.
  I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t fire this woman, who I didn’t even particularly like, to satisfy this new whim of his. So instead of firing her, I marched into his office and quit myself. Funnily enough, the woman I wouldn’t fire continued working for him for years. She might even still be there now, more than twenty years later. © Kind-Dust7441 / Reddit

• I was having a meeting with the boss, who was a difficult guy to work with, and he stood up and punched the wall. He wasn’t doing it jokingly. He went to the wall of his own office like he was in the gym hitting a punching bag. I sat there in astonishment for about two seconds, then stood up and left. I cleared out my desk and exited through the back door without a word to anyone.
  © doublestitch / Reddit

• I was told I wasn’t working hard enough after months of 70+ hour weeks. I had asked multiple times to hire someone else, I knew we had the budget for the job. I agreed to work harder and called Mom to vent because I was so angry. Then I called my boss and quit with no notice.
  A few days later, I was asked to call her again to calm her down and say it wasn’t her fault. Instead, I calmly explained how she burned me out and that multiple people needed to be hired to cover the workload I was doing, otherwise the same thing would happen again. © k_lo970 / Reddit

• I was working at a call center and got written up for going to the restroom too much. Talking on the phone means drinking water. Drinking water means peeing. My supervisor handed me the write-up, I took another call and then walked out when the call ended. © Extreme_Qwerty / Reddit

• I quit my job two months ago, no regrets. Worked in marketing — things got weird fast when our new manager asked for baby photos “to boost team bonding.” Next week, our baby pics were pinned to a board in the break room. Okay, whatever. Then she brought in pillows — with our faces on them. Real pillows. And told us to “nap with ourselves” during breaks. I noped out of there the same day. Now I work from home — no creepy pillows, no forced childhood nostalgia.

Here are some stories of things kids said that totally threw their parents off.