How To Crash Out & Come Out On Top

“If you gotta burn it all to the ground, then let it burn.” The viral TikTok sound sums up the latest video style to take over the app — “crashing out.” The basic idea: When things go wrong, go rogue, follow your impulses, and don’t worry too much about the consequences. If you’ve got chaos in your love life, go ahead and air it out on main.

It might not sound like the most productive use of time, and offline, the term has been associated with an extreme — sometimes violent — overreaction. But online, many TikTokers are starting to view this feral phase as essential to personal growth post-breakup. A “crash-out” online can look like a lot of different things: sharing screenshots from a cheating partner or calling out a former friend for dating your ex-boyfriend. The messier the situation, the more likely people are to watch it.

The current era of crash-out content started with Tareasa “Reesa Teesa” Johnson’s iconic “Who TF Did I Marry?” series in February, a 50-part TikTok story time chronicling all of her ex-husband’s toxic moments. She started the series with 8,000 followers. By the end, she had 3.6 million. Other large creators like Brooke Schofield and Madeline Argy went viral for detailing their painful relationships with respective ex-boyfriends Clinton Kane and Central Cee through multi-part videos.

These exposés aren’t just a way to boost engagement. As TikTok creator @bimbo210802163 puts it, “Crashing out is needed before you can protect your peace.” Sometimes, airing out your dirty laundry is exactly what you need to move on.

But what makes a TikTok crash-out successful? Not all of these messy moments are made equal — in some cases, exposing someone online can result in massive personal drama or your followers turning against you. But there are ways to crash out and come out of it on top. Here’s how some creators have managed both.

The Initial Collision

No one wants to experience a crash, but some are inevitable when relationships deteriorate or someone lies. For Charlotte-based TikToker Nicole, 31, sh*t hit the fan in 2023 when she discovered her boyfriend — someone she was planning her future with — was cheating on her. She made the discovery when turning off an Amber Alert on his Apple Watch and seeing an “I miss you already” text from another woman. She soon learned he was in a “dual relationship” — but it wasn’t a one-off affair. He was involved with plenty of other women, too.

Vivien, 25, had a toxic boyfriend when she was 18 years old. On the day of her grandfather’s funeral, he skipped out on sending condolences (or flowers or any other gesture of sympathy). Instead, he scolded her for forgetting to wish his mother a happy birthday, which happened to fall on the same day. He followed up by telling her mom — the woman who just lost her father — that Vivien’s actions were “intolerable.” She broke up with him afterward.

The Accident Report

Both Nicole and Vivien decided to post their painful experiences online, exposing their exes for exactly what went down. But they followed a different timeline.

Nicole shared her story on TikTok days after finding out the truth. “I found out on Oct. 18, and I’m pretty sure I filmed that on the 21st,” she says. She posted the video, “An amber alert exposed my cheating bf story time,” from her bathroom before bed one night after having a couple of glasses of wine. “I don’t know if I would’ve done it if I hadn’t had a little liquid courage, to be honest,” she says. When she woke up the next morning, the video had gone viral. Nine months later, it has more than 3.2 million views.

Nicole didn’t share her experience with any intention of gaining a following. At the time, she only had about 500 followers. (She now has more than 39,000.) “I was just so beside myself that all of a sudden this was my story, and I felt like I couldn’t even properly describe it to my friends because it was so wild,” she says.

Even after her ex confronted her over the video, she didn’t regret posting it. “The cathartic piece was like ‘Come hell or high water, I’m going to tell my story.’” She left his name out of the TikTok to keep things legally sound. “Nobody needs to get sued.”

Vivien waited years before sharing her ex-boyfriend’s antics — and in her opinion, he brought it upon himself. In 2020, a few years after they broke up, Vivien was living in Germany (far away from their hometown in Mexico). But mutual friends let her know he was still “bad-mouthing” her. “He was saying that I was the worst girlfriend ever.”

Vivien posted six videos about his actions, starting with his reaction to her grandfather’s passing. “Before that, I had never openly talked about him to anyone. But after I heard what he said, I was like, ‘Excuse me. What?’” Her first video has more than 360,000 views.

The Pileup

Once creators post, people are eager to weigh in. Nicole says she experienced “very supportive and validating” responses when she shared her story, and plenty of people with similar experiences commented. It didn’t bring her comfort at the time, though. “Initially, it made me sadder. While I was glad that I wasn’t the only one out here getting cheated on, it brought this new awareness that a lot of people are really sh*tty.”

At the end of the day, she sees the bright side to the camaraderie. “Talking through it all helped me process,” she adds. “I know it’s such a weird parasocial relationship on TikTok, but still. Most people were very supportive because they can relate to being cheated on.”

Vivien got a different response to her content. She posted a total of six videos outlining how her ex treated her. Right away, she felt relief. “I had all of this frustration pent up from years and years, and then I let it out on TikTok,” she says.

Commenters requested that she share more toxic moments from her relationship, and she complied. But after her first three videos, things started to take a turn. “I got some comments about it being mean, and people assuming I was still hung up on this guy that I dated years ago,” she says.

The idea of continuing to expose him lost some of its appeal. “It stopped being fun,” Vivien adds. “I still felt relief from getting it out, but it felt less good, morally, than the first couple of times I posted.” Still, she’s glad she shared her story — even after she found out later from a mutual friend that her ex watched her videos. “He should know the damage that he did,” she says.

Moving Forward

The crash-out might be cathartic, but these creators didn’t stay in that phase forever. Once the rush of public attention passed, they chose to mute the notifications (figuratively, of course) and look inward. “I started therapy after this because it obviously changed my perspective on men and dating,” Nicole says. “Having a real-life human to talk things through with — someone that’s paid to know what they’re talking about — has been a good balance to the Internet’s opinions.”

Since she was already years away from this relationship and her ex, Vivien had processed most of his behavior when she shared it online. Still, she says TikTok was her “outlet to let all of that frustration out” after hearing about his gossiping. “At the end of the day, it was such a long time ago. I don’t feel bad about posting, but I realized I had done enough.”

For both creators, exposing their exes was a critical step to restoring some inner peace, even if there are some “micro moments” of doubt. “I’ve questioned: Would I have preferred my life being different had I just stomached it and moved on?” Nicole says. “The answer’s no — absolutely not. This is just part of my story, and I’m happy to stand by it.”