‘Genuinely what do you do in this situation?’: College students return from break to find their toilet has been ‘exploding sewage’ all summer

Every now and again, the world throws a very specific, very grotesque curveball at you that puts a smile on your face. The reason for this smile is that you’ve finally come to realize that fate is completely out of your control, and so you should have no qualms about throwing in the towel when the towel must very obviously be thrown in.

Of course, in the case of TikTok‘s @meagladon28, it’s not just the towel that’s getting thrown in — the unsanitary mishap that befell her and her roommates required the full power of every cleaning apparatus in the vicinity. Even then, victory was not assured. Not even close.

Meaghan and her college roommates were enjoying their vacation away from their shared apartment when the building’s dastardly plumbing decided to strike, but this wasn’t just a one-and-done sneak attack. No, this was a long assault carried out over the course of a month in which sewage continuously gushed out of the toilet and overwhelmed the apartment, leaving an unconquerable husk of demoralization waiting for Meaghan and company upon their return home.

We’re not exaggerating when we say that the 35 second slideshow above is a straight-up horror movie. Floors are covered wall-to-wall in ankle-deep dookie, flecks of waste have made their way to items and apparatuses all over the house, and bugs—so many bugs.

The top-rated comment, unsurprisingly, is right there in the headline; “genuinely what do you do in this situation.” Thankfully, an update reveals that Meaghan and company managed to find new digs after this tragedy, but it’s very hard to imagine a world where their old apartment-turned-toilet bowl gets salvaged. The sewage likely had all the time in the world to seep into the walls and floor, and that would of course cause way more problems than just nose trauma. Per A.B. May, sewage plays host to a number of airborne contaminants, which can cause such bodily damage as cramping, vomiting, fever, and intense gastroenteritis (i.e. the inflammation of the stomach and intestines, which doubles as a premium boarding pass for diarrhea).

If breathed in for too long, these contaminants can even kill you, and honestly? Bring it on at that point. Coming home to an event like this is precisely how you make somebody snap on a metaphysical level and make them live in fear of toilets for the rest of their life. I solemnly swear to never complain about the smell of tea tree oil ever again.