Get Premium
Dark mode theme is available exclusively for premium users. Learn more about the benefits of subscribing.
No fees, cancel anytime.
Dark Mode 
No fees, cancel anytime 
then open in external browser
and click "Open in External Browser" 
42 Of The Most Extreme Attention-Seeking Behaviors People Have Witnessed From Their Loved Ones
Attention-seeking behavior can appear in various forms, such as acting out, excessive displays of emotion, and continuously seeking praise and affirmation.
To learn how far people are willing to go, Reddit user MelodicFishing8899 posted a question on the platform, asking everyone to share the worst examples exhibited by their friends and relatives.
Perhaps it was the anonymous nature of the internet, the desire to empathize with others, or both, but many did. Continue scrolling to read some of the most memorable stories from the thread.
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
For context, my aunt always needed the spotlight, always an attention seeker. This was at her own daughter's wedding for context where she didn't get attention.
Aunt: "I'm gonna k**l myself"
Me with anger issues and tired of this s**t
Me: *hands her a knife that was meant to cut the cake* do it, I want to watch, do it, right now, I dare you.
She never said that s**t again in front of me because I would keep doing it. I had enough of her bullshitting. I got in trouble but it was worth it to call her out.
RELATED:
#2
My ex-wife staged a fake pregnancy for April Fools, instead of it being just one day of April Fools, she turned it into a week long prank. All her friends and family sent her money, gifts, and guidance for the fake baby. I told her not to do the prank because it's mean but she didn't care. Thought it was funny and to test how naive people were. After about a week, she finally said it was a prank and kept all the money and gifts. Her family didn't talk to her for a few months after that and her friends dropped her. Anyways, one of the reasons why she's my ex.
winterwidow87 3 days ago (edited)
Reminds me of a recent event that happened here in Italy. A woman faked a whole pregnancy and then kidnapped a newborn baby from the hospital. Her family and husband didn't know anything about it and were waiting for her at home, ready to celebrate the "birth". Luckily there were cameras in the hospital, she was caught and the baby brought back to their real family.
#3
My dad’s first cousin’s second wife (giving you all that context to properly DISTANCE myself from this horrible woman i share no blood or bond with) lived in the same hometown as me and worked at our elementary school as an aide. I’m long out of the school at this point but knew her as a faculty member. It came out a couple yrs ago that she was impersonating her 13 yo daughter on instagram to sext with other 13 yo boys in her class. She was literally taking nudes of the young girl and sending them out to children as her. The daughter didn’t find out until a boy came up to her in class and showed her the conversations with her own explicit pictures. absolutely despicable. The daughter reported her to administration and she was arrested. Her reasoning was, quote, “to make her daughter more popular”. So disgusting to involve your own daughter in your ploy for attention from minors. I think she’s in prison now but we don’t talk to them anymore … for obvious reasons.
Maisey Myles 3 days ago
That is absolutely horrific. I hope she stays in prison for a long time
#4
A cousin of my best friend at the time (1999?) became close to me for a summer, knew who I had a crush on for my entire teen life, encouraged me to profess my love for him and ask him out.
Took months of encouragement and I did it!
Turned out that she was secretly dating him the entire time.
She apparently told him that she had cancer and only had a year to live…
The sheer insanity really shook me in my early adulthood.
#5
My cousin pretended to have a seizure at her own sister’s wedding & ruined the whole thing.
BeepBoop is Lonely (she/they) 3 days ago
bro as someone with epilepsy, I think I would just..not talk to them anymore lol. I mean I make plenty of jokes about my life and epilepsy but FAKING IT??? Hell nah
#6
When i was a freshman in high school my friend and her 2 older brothers had a house party. Well she and her brothers dr**ged me. They put their little brother's anti seizure medication in my beer. They did that so her 2nd oldest brother could sleep with me. Luckily that did not happen because one of the brother's friends thought it was f****d up. Needless to say i was not her friend after that one.
#7
Pretended to be me on a facebook account and messaged herself as me saying that I was using my bf to get over an ex and she took a screenshot of it and sent it to him. He broke up with me and didn't tell me until we became friends again a few months later.
#8
My ex MIL insinuated she had cancer every time she couldn't have her way. If you couldn't make a family dinner- she had news she wanted to share from her hospital visit. That kind of thing.
She also tried to stop the wedding by faking a "medical emergency " for which an ambulance had to be calked. Right in the middle of the ceremony.
F**k that b***h. I sometimes Google for her obituary , hoping one day soon I'll find it.
#9
I might have a few that include my MIL.
1. She vomited during our wedding cake tasting
2. She passed out when I was trying on wedding dresses
3. She decided during our reception dinner she could no longer walk up stairs. She got put in a chair and carried up the stairs. (She has done stairs before and after this)
4. The day of our wedding she decided she needed to be in a wheelchair and only the groom was accepted to push the wheelchair
5. At the wedding reception, she gave a speech. She said her older son was unfortunate as he just got divorced, and wished he could be more like her younger son getting married. She then proceed to say if anyone in attendance was rich, she was single.
6. When my husband and I bought our house, she came in and said it was all wrong. Then said she was having some financial troubles with her house and left all emotional. Upon my husband researching, there were no financial issues
7. We were all having spaghetti one night and she kept putting it on her shirt and looking around to see if anyone would notice / say anything. I kept my mouth shut.
This was all over a decade ago, and her behavior has gotten much better.
#10
Girl I went to high school with. The cheerleading coach took her own life. The girl broke into her house, put on her jewelry and clothes and took pictures posing as the dead body.
#11
My brother pretended to have a back problem until the doctor pulled my mother aside and told her that he was clearly faking.
We were extremely poor, and could not afford doctors. We probably spent our rent money just to get the doctors to talk to him, and I bet it was years to pay off all the bills.
My sister was maybe worse than that by calling me, crying, telling me that our mother had forced her to abort her baby. After an hour of consoling her on the phone, I called my mother to yell at her. My mother responded 'What the hell are you talking about? She's sitting right here, big as a whale!'. So, I told my mom to give my sister the phone, and immediately said 'What the f**k?', and she explained that she was just bored and wondering how I'd react if that had happened.
Paul C. 3 days ago
Young guy at the pub clearly pretended to pass out, just for attention. I lifted his hand over his face and let go, he made it flop to the side, pretty much a sure sign of faking it. Others called an ambulance and the paramedic did the same. He then said " I think we need to put in a large intravenous drip, I'll get the needle" Queue matey boy to miraculously wake up!
#12
Told the newspapers that the people helping her out on the emergency line was rude and was putting her in danger. Ended up in a national paper, the recordings popped up. Guess who was rude and unhelpful, and also drunk?
#13
My cousin faked a proposal at my grandma's 80th birthday party just to get Facebook likes. Classy.
Sue Denham 3 days ago
You say "Classy". I say the same except without the C, L and Y and with "hole" on the end.
#14
He (27) self harmed then sent me a video with no caption. When I called him out for being immature, inconsiderate, and generally just saying like hey don't do that (I have a history of s*******m and it was very triggering) he flipped out saying I was a bad friend and it was a cry for help. I told him to just be a mature adult and message me that he needs some support right now.
Later on he sent me another snap just labelled "single life" which I didn't respond to and he once again flipped out. Blocked him after that one, f**k that. I don't need that in my life right now.
#15
He pretended to be deaf. He thought all deaf people were mute, and tried to communicate using sign language and the notes app on his phone.
winterwidow87 3 days ago
People pretending to have disabilities/health issues they don't have make me particularly furious.
#16
My friend staged a fake breakup on social media, complete with dramatic screenshots and sob stories, just to get sympathy likes.
BeepBoop is Lonely (she/they) 3 days ago
that just sounds like someone addicted to social media likes
#17
Step 1: My cousin went off her birth control without telling her boyfriend so she'd get pregnant and guilt him into marrying her.
Instead, her boyfriend offered to share custody when the baby was born.
Step 2: My cousin said she had a miscarriage to emotionally manipulate her boyfriend into marrying her.
Her boyfriend marries her out of guilt.
Step 3: Oh-wow, my cousin gave birth to a healthy baby just 5 months after their wedding. Coincidently, the due date was just three days off from the due date for the baby she miscarried.
Yeah, she didn't have a miscarriage. He sued her for divorce after their daughter graduated.
#18
This girl I used to be friends with had multiple fake pregnancies during our senior year of high school. Lucky me I had mostly distanced myself from her at the time, but it was infuriating watching how she got people to fawn over her for every fake pregnancy and subsequent miscarriage story. She also got one of our mutual friends arrested and sent to juvenile hall for falsely accusing him of a**ault just because she felt like it. She was a nightmare.
#19
My childhood bestie wore a white, backless sundress and a white flower in her hair...
To my father's funeral.
Maisey Myles 3 days ago
This isn’t that awful. I see funerals as more of a celebration of life.and should be more joyous than morbid depressing event. Maybe dad would’ve liked it.
#20
Friend of a friend, our senior year, called in a b*mb threat. He wanted to do something so epic that he'd be remembered. Almost 30 years later, I still remember him as the dude who scored a suspension his senior year and had to spend a fifth year in high school.
#21
Led a convoy to the nation’s capital. She’s a conspiracy nut who yearned for an audience. She used to spout conspiracy theories and post cheesecake photos on FB to friends and family.
#22
Pretended to lose their voice for three days just to seem mysterious. 🙄.
#23
Classmate in high school faked a b*mb threat that got classes called off for the day while investigators raided every classroom checking for explosives. None were found and the call got traced back to him and he was presumably kicked out as we didn't see him the following semester.
#24
A coworker used to have convenient crises to steal the attention of the other co-workers.
She had a fake lawsuit with her ex-boyfriend about being thrown down the stairs. Completely fabricated.
Updates would continually happen as there were announcements of other co-workers being pregnant or getting married.
She had to take time off cuz her mom died. She wouldn't return anybody's calls.
When we called her sister, her sister had no clue what we were talking about and cleared everything up.
This was after I'd already moved on from the company.
My former co-workers took me out to dinner to apologize for believing all the slanderous things that were said about me.
I was always curious why there was a change of heart by people and they started being really mean.
KatSaidWhat 3 days ago
Yeah, if suddenly there is a whole attitude change in the office, you know someone has been trashtalking you - or discovered your ugly secret.
#25
Sister had a baby with a rare condition. The community rallied together to fundraise and support her. It was a big occasion and a great night.
This is a very small community where everyone knows everyone. She had everyone's support and attention because of her child.
She later falsely claimed another family member sexually a**aulted her, abandoned her baby after finding out it also had autism, and disappeared to another state to hide after using my name for her debt collectors.
Years later, it was discovered she spent most of the fundraiser money on herself. She crawled out of wherever she was hiding only when our pop died so she could suck money out of our grieving nan.
She got the attention she wanted alright. Everyone in that community now knows to never trust her. Some are out for blood if she ever returns.
Family has cut all contact. Any attention on her or her name is bad news now.
#26
Friends younger sister announced her pregnancy at my friends wedding, she wasn't pregnant. Funniest thing is she only said that after the rest of my friends family got on her a*s about it and she tried to play it off as a joke.
#27
My cousin's uncle (not my dad) was visiting her. He went upstairs and was gone for ages. She went looking and found him lying naked on the bed unresponsive. Called an ambulance, they came out and he tried to pretend to be in a coma because he lost his job, started gambling and got in debt and some people were looking for him.
Pink kitty 3 days ago
Of all the available options and that's the one the Uncle went with. I get that he needed help but did he think the medical professionals were going to say "we got your back. We'll tell everyone you're in a coma when you're not'
#29
My husband’s ex (they broke up 2-3ish years before we met) sent weird messages to me after we got engaged. She created fake profiles that were quite convincing they were real.
Then a month or two before our wedding she started unsending a ton of messages in their fb messenger conversation from years ago. I’m talking like from 2014-2017. This happened in 2023.
We had to give security and everyone working the event a photo of her. My brides people also knew what she looked like. She didn’t show, but through mutual acquaintances we found out that she was in the area of our wedding when we got married. This place was across the country from her and our wedding website was private for that very reason. None of the mutual acquaintances were invited to the wedding as well….
#30
My aunt. Pretended to have MS for 20 years, even though the doctors ran every test and they all came back looking normal. And she told me that, but because I was a child and she said she had MS and s****y doctors, I believed she had MS and s****y doctors.
Her “MS” stopped very suddenly 10 years ago (I think she said some diet cured her???) and now it’s one of the things we’re not allowed talk about at family dinners.
#31
Not a friend of mine but a colleague got dumped by his girlfriend. He came into work the next day saying he missed her and wanted to get back with her. She was having none of it so he decided to take some pictures of empty packets of paracetamol and phoned her and said he took an overdose. It didn't work out for him as planned and she rang the store and he was fired shortly after.
Huddo's sister 3 days ago
It really pisses me off when people use threats of self harm/suicide to manipulate friends or family. I have a friend who's boyfriend would do this, while on the phone to her and her sister and I told her to break up with him, because once he succeeded with getting his way/attention he would use it again. She didn't listen and married him. I have worried about her ever since.
#33
My friends daughter faked having cancer in school....even got a fundraiser out of it to help for medical bills.
#34
My aunt, at her own mother's funeral wake, gleefully proclaimed she was engaged and the wedding will be later in the year.
Then got huffy when everyone looked at her in shock & disgust.
I am the rat in your walls 3 days ago
i really want the wedding to be just her and no one else came :)
#35
A member of my high school friend group faked brain cancer.
Her boyfriend told me she was very scared and not to talk about it to spare her anxiety and not to spread it around school. He said she was starting treatment but it was too soon to say if she was at risk of dying. Being the gullible idiot I was, I followed orders and didn't speak of it to a soul. If I caught her alone I'd ask innocuous questions like, "Hey, how are you feeling?" And she'd give me an equally vague answer back, and I thought that was as supportive as I could be while respecting her wishes.
It wasn't until YEARS LATER that one of the other friends in the group casually threw out "Wasn't it crazy how (friend) faked cancer for so long?" And I was like "she f*****g WHAT? None of you were going to tell me??"
I'm a little upset that we stopped hanging out long before I found out she was a lying piece of s**t, so I didn't even have the chance to call her out on it. Last I heard she married a pastor, had a couple kids, and became a stereotypical tradwife.
Maisey Myles 3 days ago
Well, something must have been wrong with her brain to think like that
#36
A friend went out on a date with a man one time. Once. She changed her name on Facebook to having his last name.🤣.
#37
Someone I used to know recently told me they are waiting for a cancer diagnosis. He said the blood tests only show stage 4, so even though the blood test didn’t should anything to do with cancer, the doctors still suspected a tumour…..
Maybe I don’t know enough about diagnosing…. But I just felt this was all very off.
Undercover 3 days ago
Blood tests mostly don't indicate cancer (except leukemia and similar cancers). That's why doctors do biopsies and radiology
#38
Told me she was depressed. It was shortly after she told me I’d die alone (guess which one of us was recently left), unless I get married to a toaster or pet.
I told her she’s cruel and didn’t text again.
And then she had depression and the next day, she lost her phone.
Can’t say I cried a ton when her boyfriend left her.
Edit: she conveniently had „very bad thoughts“ after being this cruel to me and me no longer responding, which seems a bit of a stretch on the believability scale.
Also who cares? If someone is cruel to u, let them be depressed.
Zander Porbanda 3 days ago
And if you have lingering frustration with someone as a result of them not growing, heads-up: they’ve tricked you into not growing too.
#39
I haven’t ever talked about this one, but in my teen years I was heavily involved in a very niche internet fandom. One individual who was also active faked a s**cide attempt. Her “friend” logged into her account to post about it and also shared “updates from the hospital” for several days. I started getting individual emails as a “close friend” of this person, which they asked me to share with the rest of the fandom. When the emails started up I felt a little off, because they sounded exactly like the writing style of the individual supposedly comatose in the hospital. At one point the “friend” mis-used a phrase that I had noticed the person using before. I never wound up calling them out (felt screwed up to go “hey I think they faked a s**cide attempt for attention!”), but the individual made a remarkably quick recovery and spent weeks responding to messages from others wishing them well. Still wonder if anybody else caught on to the ruse or if it was just me.
OzymandiasTheManokit They/Them 3 days ago
you should never ever do this. it makes suicide seem like a cry for attention, not help.
#41
I'm pretty sure my sister crashed her car for attention. She was at least decent enough to hit a stationary object rather than another vehicle.
#42
Some girl I met when I was in middle school ran away from home when she was 18-19 and made everyone think she got kidnapped.
Birma Gustafsson 1 day ago
If she's 18-19 she can't "run away", she's an adult, and can leave as she pleases.
What do you think ?
UncleJohn3000 3 days ago
I think the goal was to laugh at them but for most of them, I just feel bad for all involved.
Load More Replies...
Neopet22 1 day ago
I'm not sure if this was done for attention, empathy or just to miss work but I have one. I worked as a team lead and had 1 new agent under me. She was already with the company for a few years but new for me. Anyways,she was just assigned to me and few days later tells me that her child disappeared,I obviously was very empathetic and even worked with my manager to ensure she gets time off to handle all of that without any issues. But the story sounded so weird to me that I kept checking on google for any amber alerts,and nothing. They did find her,and she got more time off to be with her child and help them with the trauma but in my city,literally Everytime a child goes missing it will be online. I thought this was a crazy thing to lie about so trusted her.
Neopet22 1 day ago
But then,every month something awful happened to her and I was trying my best to be empathetic but I didn't believe her anymore because everytike she would get a week off for various quite serious things. The reason why I also didn't believe her? In the past 2 years,her attendance never met the expectations and her previous team lead was also empathetic to her situations and said it was mostly similar issues as she told me. So I don't know if it was for attention or just to miss work,I never truly found out if it was lies but my gut feelings are pretty damn accurate and if it was lies,some of them were very awful things to lie about
Load More Replies... UncleJohn3000 3 days ago
I think the goal was to laugh at them but for most of them, I just feel bad for all involved.
Load More Replies... Neopet22 1 day ago
I'm not sure if this was done for attention, empathy or just to miss work but I have one. I worked as a team lead and had 1 new agent under me. She was already with the company for a few years but new for me. Anyways,she was just assigned to me and few days later tells me that her child disappeared,I obviously was very empathetic and even worked with my manager to ensure she gets time off to handle all of that without any issues. But the story sounded so weird to me that I kept checking on google for any amber alerts,and nothing. They did find her,and she got more time off to be with her child and help them with the trauma but in my city,literally Everytime a child goes missing it will be online. I thought this was a crazy thing to lie about so trusted her.
Neopet22 1 day ago
But then,every month something awful happened to her and I was trying my best to be empathetic but I didn't believe her anymore because everytike she would get a week off for various quite serious things. The reason why I also didn't believe her? In the past 2 years,her attendance never met the expectations and her previous team lead was also empathetic to her situations and said it was mostly similar issues as she told me. So I don't know if it was for attention or just to miss work,I never truly found out if it was lies but my gut feelings are pretty damn accurate and if it was lies,some of them were very awful things to lie about
Load More Replies... You May Like “It Was Brilliant”: Man Pats Himself On The Back For Petty Revenge On Selfish People At Resort “I Waited For Them To Come By”: Man Gets Abandoned By Staff In A Restaurant, Dines And Dashes “You Walked In Here Didn't You”: Employee Refuses To Believe Teen Is Disabled, Gets Reported
Ieva Pečiulytė
Ieva Pečiulytė
Mantas Kačerauskas
Related on Bored Panda
![“Am I The [Jerk] For Not Giving The ‘Dollhouse’ I Built To My Niece, But To My Wife As A Gift?](https://www.boredpanda.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/refusing-giving-dollhouse-niece-coverimage.jpg)
