What is the WORST gift you've ever received?

[iamamop]

One of my aunts insisted on giving me barbie dolls for Christmas until I was sixteen. This is despite the fact that I am a complete tomboy and never liked barbies to begin with.

Out of our wedding gifts so far I'd have to say that the worst would be a set of Christmas themed wine glasses. I hate wine. He hates wine. It wasn't even on the registry! Yet someone sent us wine glasses and a pitcher. I ended up realizing they saw a plate set and went and found the matching wine glasses. I took the plate set off the registry to stop family members from sending more stuff related to it. I'm not ungrateful, but I have a registry full of stuff we actually need and wine glasses, glass pitchers, etc are NOT part of thats shtick. How about something useful like a meat thermometer, or measuring cups?


The hilarious part about the wine glasses gift is that it came from my rich aunt and uncle. Meanwhile, my poor friend in college gifted me beer glasses, a stainless steel tea kettle, mushroom shaped salt and pepper shakers, an over the sink strainer (something we needed SO BADLY), and a gift card to a lingerie boutique for me. That's over $100 worth of gifts from a single person who has known me for 1/4 of the time my aunt and uncles have known me. Way to go, cheap family.

[Anje]

This thread is awesome. So, I had a friend who gave me crappy ass presents. I don't care about money value of the gift as long as it is thoughtful. I put so much thought into my gifts and try to please people. For her birthday, I got her a nice sterling silver ring, as I knew she loved rings. I searched so many stores and put so much effort into it and she didn't even wear it. Then she got me some cheap presents for my b'day like dollar store chinese fan, wind chimes (I don't like them!) and an ok bracelet.
The next year I get a perfume she always wanted and stilla lip glosses. She said that perfume smelled different and she liked dark lipglosses. She then gave me body cream and a necklace that was BROKEN! I didn't notice that right away. One day I wanted to wear it, so I opened it and saw the link with the clasp was missing What a friend!

[loopyloo]

A knitted bright orange jumper and mini skirt with black spots on it. It was beyond hideous. One of my relatives gives me champagne truffles every year, but I am seriously allergic to champagne.

[fauxfox]

My worst "gift" was when I was 15 and my parents arbitrarily cancelled Christmas, on Christmas Eve, telling me not to expect any presents the next morning because I was too old for it. Fa la la la la, la la, la la.

[iamamop]

Oh, one of my friends gave me a t-shirt for a tv show that A) I don't even watch and B) they don't even like!

The best part of that story was that our birthdays a are a month apart, mine coming second, and just a month prior I'd spend $100 overall on several gifts for that friend that I spent weeks looking for. The best they could do was a $15 t-shirt.

Most of my family is bad at gifts. They don't do any research into what I would like. I suppose you could argue that one day the things they give me (such as crystal candle holders) will be useful and invaluable, but coffee makers and wine glasses? I don't drink wine and I never will. I grew up sipping wine. After twenty years of me hating it you'd think they would get the hint.

[DealWithIt]

I’m by no means saying this applies to everyone or even anyone at all in this thread but if you don’t know what someone’s financial circumstances are maybe go a bit easy on them. Even if you think you know how they’re doing money wise you never know what goes on behind closed doors right?

The reason I say this is because I was “best friends” with the same girl from roughly the age of 5 to roughly 13 years old. At the time my family didn’t have a great deal of money, we weren't completely poor but we definitely didn't have enough money to go out and splurge on expensive gifts. My mum and dad could barely afford to buy me nice things never mind someone else’s kid. Anyway despite the lack of money we always made an effort to buy her something nice and affordable. I really did try my best to get her something nice and that would suit her and every single time she would turn her nose up at it. She made me feel so awful about myself and the gift I would cry, not only that but she used to tell people at school the next day how “cheap” and “tight” I was.

[YellowBird]

A gift card. I know it's not the worst present in the world but to me it's kind of like a slap in the face. I take it as "Oh hey I don't really know anything about you or what you would like so here's this gift that I more than likely bought last minute". I get it some people are really bad at picking gifts and would rather play it safe...however I don't know I'd prefer a hand written card/letter over a gift card any day.

[CoralCat]

For my friend's 13th birthday I spent ages picking out a present for her and choosing somethign nice and a set that matched and I knew she'd love etc and I spent quite a bit on it
For my birthday she gave me a promotional bracelet from a cafe that had just opened in our town, it was literally a piece of string with a plastic charm with the shakeaway logo on it, it broke after a day and I had barely even touched it since she gave it to me.
But she was always rubbish with gifts, for Secret Santa we were suppossed to spend £10-£15 (we all agreed on that amount) but she just got the person a mini curly wurly. from a multi pack. that she got for her birthday

[Shameless]

This is going to sound terribly spoiled of me but off I go… I love my mother but she is just terrible with gifts. She will ask me what I want and I will give her a list of things and she will still manage to either leave it to the last minute and get me something really random instead or buy a cheap knock off version of something I actually asked for.

Growing up, we weren't exactly poor, but my mum was naturally frugal and my dad was one of those idiots who made good money but would buy random shit and the household would then have to run on whatever my mother could pull out of the accounts before he got his hands on it.

Anywho, we weren't given much as kids and we never received toys or whatever outside of Christmas and Birthdays. I guess my parents had me well trained, and I knew that xmas and b'days were the only times I could actually ask for something and have any hope of getting it.

So all year I had been begging for roller blades for christmas, god dammit I wanted them so badly. We had friends who owned a holiday house with heaps of concreted areas and I knew that their kids had rollerblades and that it would be really fun to have some too when we went to visit with them after christmas.

Anyways, come Christmas morning I race out to the christmas tree and there is a roller blade sized box and I freak out and start opening it and inside it was… a razor scooter. What. The. Fuck. I can only imagine my poor parents when they saw the look on my face. I'm pretty sure I actually said something like "what the heck, I said I wanted roller blades not a freaking scooter." My sister got a scooter too.

I later learned that the reason my mum got us scooters was because my sister was too young to have roller blades and mum thought she would be jealous of me so she just got us both the same thing. I am still bitter about this and I am 20 years old. This often gets brought up in fights.

Another time when I was about 14 I really wanted a TV in my room and I had been absolutely begging for one. My mum did get me a TV, but it used to belong to mum's friends kid and I'm pretty sure they just gave it to her and then she gave it to me. Then mum refused to get a TV line put through to my room so I couldn't even watch it anyways.

I think not getting much as a kid has actually made me more spoiled than I should have been because I had such high expectations for gifts because I knew that was all I would get for the year.

[BetterOffDead]

A used leotard.
I used to do competition cheerleading and somehow my grandmother [who I never met and who also cannot spell my name correctly] figured it'd be useful and decided to send me all kinds of used clinique and mary kay make up, also a leotard. It had very obvious stretch marks on it.
It turned into my dogs favorite chew toy.

[TheOneWhoJustCouldnt]

One of my friends has given me used make-up twice. They've both been foundations (one liquid and one powder), so I'm guessing she bought them for herself and they didn't match her skin so she gave them to me. The cheek of it. They didn't even seem to match my skin. One was really light while the other was very dark.

[kayleeee]

I forget how old I was but for Christmas my sister and I both got our own dictionaries from our great aunt and uncle.

[angelaj0921]

One of my friends has given me used make-up twice. They've both been foundations (one liquid and one powder), so I'm guessing she bought them for herself and they didn't match her skin so she gave them to me. The cheek of it. They didn't even seem to match my skin. One was really light while the other was very dark.

I think it's time yous stop calling her friend. Lol

[Guest]

My mom once gave me single whiteboard marker for Christmas. In all fairness I had gotten a printer that year.

I also once as child got this hideous shirt with pleats and flounce (lots of extra fabric hanging of it in a "decorative" fashion) I was tomboy and absolutely detested anything that was so girly. The best part was that my mother agreed with me, and it mysteriously disappeared, after I had worn it once for choir.

Then there was the time where my dear sweet "Aunt" who has a habit of giving me money gave me an envelope containing a newspaper clipping with a drawing of a black cat for my 30th birthday.

[Slagg]

My ex-friend's mom gave me a clear plastic bag of their old bras & underwear for my 18th birthday.

[Guest]

My ex-friend's mom gave me a clear plastic bag of their old bras & underwear for my 18th birthday.

I can see why it's your ex-friend:-)

[SponsorshipPolice]

A paper slicer. Like one of those things that you use to trim paper or pictures for scrapbooking. It came in handy years later when I actually started getting into art but seemed like a strange gift to give a 10 year old.

[Mar2013]

my boyfriends grandmother is the worst gift giver....she gets used junk at yard sales and gives it to me on Christmas. like one year she gave me a bag full of stuffed animals...im 23..what am I going to do with a trash bag full of stuff rabbits? Also last year she gave me an old bath and body works candle, and old bath and body lotions that were probably 3 years old or so. I much rather have her get me a gift card other than spending money on other peoples junk

[Ellle]

A family friend on mine gave me a portable water bottle for dogs, on my birthday. I cant really get any use out of it. It's the thought that counts, I guess.

[Turtleoftruth]

For reference, my birthday is in February - it's usually snowing on or around my birthday in the UK, and the weather is cold most of the time anyway.
For my 18th birthday, my dad gave me a desk fan... That's it, just a big fan which sat in a box. It was really embarrassing when my friends asked me what I got for my birthday - they'd get stuff like clothes, makeup, technology items, money etc (even cars! or driving lessons) and I got A FAN.
Also, for Christmas I got my sister a £150 32GB Nook HD+ tablet, and her boyfriend £50 worth of books he wanted. She reluctantly pooled together with her boyfriend and gave me £30 so I could buy some new curtains for my bedroom.

For my 20th birthday (4 months ago) she got me a £5 case for my ipod touch... and insists I come and pick it up - won't spend ~£3 postage to send it to me at university. It would cost me around £15 to get the train over there to collect the £5 phone case.
My dad also got me something for my 20th too (a box of chocolates) which he refuses to post and would also cost me the £15 train fare to collect.

Lol no thanks, I'll just buy an ipod case and a box of chocolates for myself, which equates to less than the train fare (bear in mind, both of them have transport, I have none and am a university student living off student loans). I feel like just buying an ipod case for myself to spite my sister - so she'll have a useless ipod case which she's wasted A WHOLE FIVE POUNDS ON. - not that the price matters, but I didn't receive a card, a visit, and it's a bit selfish to refuse to post it really (I'm refusing to visit them at the moment, because I've been at uni 2 years and they've visited twice from 35 miles away)

Sorry for the rant. I just receive such shit presents - I understand that money isn't the main point of a gift, but literally no thought went into these (A fan when it's snowing?!?!).