A fib, a lie, bending the truth, lying by omission—call it what you will, but parents are the worst offenders of them all. Sometimes they lie for the sake of protecting the innocence of their sweet spawn, but other times, they lie just to cover up their own shortcomings. These Redditors reveal their most revelatory moments—the good, the bad, and the ridiculous.
1. Age Is Just A Number
From when I was a young child to about a pre-teen my mother told me that she was born in a particular year, when in fact she was born three years previously. I always assumed that a certain year was the year of her birth and didn't really think much of it, because when I asked it was the year she mentioned. But one day I looked through some family records and accidentally came across the fact. The truth was way sadder than I realized.
My mother was being vain about her age and wanted to seem younger than she was. I confronted her about it and I remember feeling a bit sad that the year I thought she was born wasn’t her actual year of birth. She could have lied to anyone, but why would she want to lie to her own son about the year of her birth to feel a little bit younger?
She lied to me just to have some self-esteem. I know it's somewhat idiotic now but when I think about it, that was one of the most ridiculous lies I was ever told by her.
2. Surprise Celebrity Visit
When I was about 6 years old, my mom decided it was a perfect time to expose me and my siblings to the Austin Powers movies. Understanding little of the adult humor but still enamored with this insane British moron, I fell absolutely head over heels with Mike Myers and took it upon myself to perfect my Powers impression, quoting the movies as often as I could to practice.
Well, at some point or other that year, our roof needed replacing, and my mom managed to convince me that one of the roofers was Mike Myers because he looked exactly like him. I spent every second I could, showing off my impressions to this guy, absolutely 100% convinced this was the famed actor Mike Myers just casually doing some spare roof work. In retrospect, it's all so mortifying...
I believed that lie for years. Literally years. Not sure whether to feel betrayed, insulted, or bemused that this random Floridian roofer was nice enough to humor my nonsense.
3. Hidden Depths
My mother told my brother and I when we were about eight that the catacombs under Paris were infested with fire ants and flesh-eating beetles in the hopes of deterring us from exploring the catacombs. This was simply because we have an entrance very close to where we were living at that time. Well, it worked for a while when we were kids because my brother and I hated fire ants.
But we realized as teenagers that mom had lied about it. So, now, basically any time are in Paris we check out the catacombs. We have even been to a party or two down there. It is always fun. Especially when you get one of the fire breathers in attendance. Nothing like going to a rave in an underground artificial cave.
4. Just Another Day
When I was 6, I overheard my mom having a conversation on the phone. I heard her say something about "next Saturday." That was my first time ever hearing the term "next Saturday," so when she got off the phone I said, "Mom, what's next Saturday? Is that another day of the week?" Well, to be honest, my mom isn't the type of person who will correct you when you ask a question that's laughably ridiculous.
So, she looked at me, rolled her eyes and said, "Yep." I thought this was true, because my mom said it. So, I went to school the following day and was telling all my classmates, "Did you know that there are 8 days in a week? Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Next Saturday, and Sunday." Needless to say my fellow classmates were looking at me with a very puzzled look.
One student asked the teacher, "Are there 8 days in a week?" The teacher says, "No. There are only 7. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday." I said, "What about Next Saturday? I heard my mom say Next Saturday, and when I asked her if that was another day of the week she said, "Yes." My teacher just busted out laughing.
After she got her giggles out, she looked me right in the eyes and said, "There are only seven days in a week." Her tone thoroughly convinced me that that was true. There are only seven days in a week. Next Saturday is not another day in the week. C'mon, mom, I'm already a little slow. Don't make it worse by making me believe things that aren't true!
5. Finding Your Inner Garden
The way that my grandparents told it, one of them told me that watermelon seeds would grow inside me and sprout out of me if I swallowed them. That just spurred me to eat those seeds. So, I ate a few seeds and drank some water. But that wasn't all. I also ate some dirt, and then stood in the yard facing the sun with my mouth open, trying to get them to grow. My reason? I like watermelon.
6. Holier Than Thou
I grew up in a neighborhood with Sikh neighbors and a gurdwara just down the road. One of our neighbors had a kid about the same age as my sister and I, so we would hang out and just be kids. Our parents didn't like us hanging out with them so they would tell us all sorts of things like "That kid and his family are thieves. We don't want you hanging out with them."
The most ridiculous lie was that Sikh people are cursed and if we were around them then we too would be cursed. They eventually built a fence to block off our neighbors. Discrimination sucks and I'm glad I never fell for my parents lies because Sikhs are some of the nicest people I've ever met.
7. Misleading Blurb
After school I would always go to my one buddy’s house until my mom was done with work. Him and his dad loved to watch The King of Queens. I had never watched a single minute of it before. So, they are watching on the couch, I'm eating pizza, kind of half listening from the dining room table. I tell the dad I've never watched The King of Queens and ask what it’s about.
Without hinting at a smile or even looking away from the show, he says something like, "Well, this guy is a psychopath, but none of his family knows. He's a joker but he offs someone every episode." My buddy somehow goes along with it without laughing at all. In hindsight, I think he probably turned away while I focused on the show.
Before this I had heard of the show and thought it was some basic comedy and just wasn't interested in it because of Friends and Seinfeld, etc. I just didn't want to watch another show with the same style. I must've watched the show for about three months after this, being a complete idiot just waiting for someone to be offed. Sometimes I'd miss half the episode and think I was always missing said part.
These two people laughed so hard at me when I finally confronted them. I had just started liking the show normally and had nearly forgotten about how I got into it until, one day, I turned to them and wondered that I had never seen the main character get rid of someone. That was a big dumb dumb moment. It all clicked in that pause before the laughter, when I heard my own voice say it out loud.
8. Egged On
Mum told me that the inside of a Cadbury Creme Egg was a baby dragon, because they were her favorite and my sister and I had been given about 5 each for Easter one year. Unfortunately, she—being a zoologist—had also told us exactly where babies come from when we had asked not a few weeks before. And so, I understood what a fetus was.
So, staring at that yellow/orange/pink-ish blob in the middle of white cream, I felt immediately nauseous and couldn't eat another bite. My mother then, heroically, took on the task of finishing my Easter eggs. My mother denies the intensity of the trauma she instilled, for she had only intended it to be a small offhanded comment that would make me forget about them for a few days. To this day I still can't eat them.
9. A Weighty Truth
My stepmom had a surgery for something that was aching, and dad told us that she could not do any chores for a month while she was recovering. So, me and my little sister did the laundry, dishes, cleaning, vacuuming, etc. To help her so that she could recover fully from what was paining her. It turns out that dad paid to get her breast implants.
10. Elf Recruitment Drive
My parents decided to tell me that Santa’s elves were actually kids that saw him. They showed me a picture of a semi-creepy Santa and said this is why we don’t want you looking for him. Yeah, thank you so much, Mom. I totally didn’t have nightmares and now am paranoid that a hefty man with fangs and bloodshot eyes is going to take me because I saw him.
11. Don’t Press In Case Of Boredom
Once I was in a waiting room in a hospital with my mom, as about a 7 or 8-year-old kid. I noticed that some of the light switches on the wall were for some reason painted red, instead of white like they usually are. I asked my mom why they were red, and if I could press them. She said that if I pressed those red light switches, a hole in the ground would open below me. But she didn't stop there.
According to her, I would, then, fall into it where there would be a pool full of crocodiles. So, I had to leave those switches alone. I always saw this as a very ridiculously funny and creative way from my mom to prevent me from doing stupid things in the middle of a hospital.
12. Having Kittens
Way back in the ancient times, in the 1970s, an approximately 4-year-old me questioned why my mother needed to swerve a giant car around a paper bag in the road. Surely a paper bag couldn't hurt our giant battleship of a car? And, somehow, while explaining to me that one could never be sure what was inside the bag, instead of implying nails and flat tires, she implied kittens.
To be honest, that really messed me up as a kid, and it never quite left me. Even now, I still think "Oh no! What if there were kittens?!" when I run over any debris, of any kind, ever. The truth was my mother didn't learn to drive until well into adulthood, not long before this. She was probably barely able to process a parenting moment like this while driving at the time.
I was horrified for years, but she doesn't remember it and has no idea what she was thinking. So, as messed up as it is, her motive was less malevolent than just poorly thought out.
13. Rubbing Shoulders With The Rich And Famous
I'm Swedish. My dad and mom visited Madame Tussaud's in London, and he had a picture of him and Arnold Schwarzenegger and told me they were best friends. Of course, I completely fell for it. He went with that lie for years and pretended to talk in English over the phone sometimes. I loved Arnold, and I even made a paper about him in school and took the photo with me and everyone believed it! I was so angry when he told me the truth, man.
14. Brains On My Mind
When I was little, my mom told me if I didn't finish my dinner my stomach would get very hungry and come up and eat my brain. So, of course, I always tried to finish my dinner after she had told me this. However, a few nights later after she said this, I woke her up at midnight crying because my stomach had growled and I needed a second dinner or it would eat my brain.
15. Born (But Not Raised) In A Barn
I am 15 years younger than my older brothers so they were out of the house when I was young and we had very different childhoods. During grade school, I had to fill out a family tree. I did my mom’s side with her, then went to dad and we did some but then he told me that both of my grandfathers were adopted, found in a barn and raised by the local doctor.
I took this as the gospel for years. After my father’s funeral many years later, my brothers and I were sharing drinks and talking with the extended family, and they started mentioning family on dad’s side. I disagreed with what they are saying and said, “No, both of dad’s grandfathers were found in a barn.” They looked at me like I was insane, and after a while we determined the most likely cause of this was dad was tired that night and was done helping with homework for the evening.
16. Toeing The Line
When I was younger, I learned that mushrooms were a fungus and refused to eat them. My dad made me some soup with mushrooms in it and I threw a fit about eating it. So, he inspected the bowl and told me they were whale toes. Apparently, I was old enough to know that mushrooms were a fungus but not old enough to know that whales didn’t have feet.
17. The Medium And The Message
I asked my dad if it was C-P3O or C-3PO. He replied very sagely that it depends on whether you say it out loud, or write it down. In spoken English it is C-3PO, but when written it is the other way. I believed this until I was in high school and had repeated that epic lie so many times to others. Surprisingly, they all believed me. Either that or just politely thought I was nuts but didn't say it to my face. I love my dad.
18. Omniscient Dad
My dad would say, “I'm going to ask you a question, but keep in mind, I already know the answer.” It worked; my child mind freaked out knowing there was a 50/50 shot and if I guessed wrong, I'd be grounded from the tv. The panicked silence told him all he needed to know. He was a solid dude who raised two kids while working 4 different jobs after my mom bounced. Shout out to dad!
19. A Heady Situation
I had a really nasty wound on my knee back when I was a child and I really didn’t like the idea of cleaning it and rinsing with water because it would sting. My parents told me, “Lalabas ang ulo ng pari diyan sa sugat mo.” Translated, it means, “A head of a priest will show up in that nasty wound of yours.” I had them clean the wound so fast when I heard that!
20. Chocolate Greenhorn
I grew up without chocolate. I had no idea what it actually was until I went to my first birthday party as a kid. I was about 5 at that point. In all fairness, I was very allergic to many things that I no longer have a reaction to. So, we literally made all our food from scratch after having to visit the hospital the umpteenth time when I was a baby. That's when my parents came up with the most diabolical plan...
What my parents used to do was keep an M&M’s bag in the freezer but fill it with peas. I was told repeatedly that my parents liked all the other colors of M&M’s and so they ate them...leaving me only the green ones. You will never guess my surprise and outrage when I tasted someone else’s M&M’s for the very first time.
21. A Door To Candyland
My dad used to tell us that there was a magical door in his head that, when opened, would provide a treat of some kind; a tootsie roll or another treat of the like. To get the door to open we would need to scratch his head. The door would move around so we’d have to find it. Eventually, he would tell us to scratch quickly at a spot.
And then he himself would reach at the spot, scratch a little, and he would dig into this "door", and out he would pull the treat. We believed this for far longer than we should have but eventually learned of this ploy when I saw him pull a treat from his pocket when my sister was looking for the door. Looking back on it, I find it hilarious.
22. When The Clock Strikes
As most kids do, I too loved making my eyes squint once I learned how to do it. My father, one day, told me with a straight face that I must be careful when I do it because if I was doing it when the second hand of the clock struck 12, my eyes would get stuck that way. I was in that age group where you are incredibly credulous about anything your parents say.
You think that they tell no lies and know everything. So, I believed it. From that point on I was very careful to only make my eyes squint while watching a clock to make certain they weren't that way when the second hand hit 12. Like so many things in life which you believe without scrutiny, I weirdly reached a much older age than I care to admit while still believing this.
I obviously grew out of the habit of doing the squint thing, so me not doing it meant I didn't have to face the fact I was sold. It was only in my teens that I faced the facts. When I was sitting at this restaurant and these cute kids were staring at me, I started making faces at them while they made squinting eyes at me. This brought back what my father told me and I thought what a prankster he was. All those years I actually believed him as a kid.
23. Pinocchio Blues
I tell my kids their nose turns blue when they lie. Only adults can see it, and it stops happening when you get to a certain age. For years my kids would ask me if their "noses were blue" and sometimes my son, 7, will be very adamant that I needed to look again because "his nose is not blue." I must admit, it's worked pretty well thus far. Most of the time they don't even try to lie to us. Of course, they are very young, so they are ineffective at lying anyway.
24. Crystal Clear
My grandpa told me a story about how he had my mom and uncle, as children, completely convinced that plain water was some sort of special drink called “clear juice.” He would keep a pitcher of it in the fridge just like they would do with Kool-Aid or lemonade in the summer, and get them to drink water instead of juice/sugary drinks.
It worked for years until an unwitting babysitter blew the whole thing up. He never forgave, and he never forgot.
25. Planted Gifts
When I was 6, I found a wardrobe in the spare room. I got it open and it had plants under bright lights. I asked my parents what these plants were for and they freaked out, telling me they were tomato plants that they had been hiding and saving to give me on my 7th birthday. I felt unbearably guilty. On my birthday, I got some tomato plants. I don't think I even wondered why they went to such extremes to give me such a random present.
26. The Birds And The Bees
I was my grandpa’s little girl and he was the adult I trusted most. So, at around 6 years old I asked him where babies came from. This was a man who was a refugee and had lost everything during WW2. He didn't want me to know how messed up people could be. So, he told me that we came from the rocks and sand that were a part of the beaches we walked along.
He told me we came from something beautiful. That is what I choose to take away from him. Now I never believed that butter came from buttercup flowers like he said. That is just stupid. It comes from four leaf clovers, of course.
27. Neat Treat
I used to beg for Arby’s if my mom made casserole, which was my dad’s favorite dish and my least favorite. While deployed, he ate a lot of subpar food. Those two weeks were the only time he could eat real, homemade cooking, whereas I got it every day. Of course, he wouldn’t want to take his kids to fast food when we could have a real meal together.
However, during one of my tantrums, my dad once told me if I didn’t say a single word the whole way home, he’d take me to Arby’s. In the driveway, I came to the realization that we couldn’t go to Arby’s, as we were home. So, I asked, “We’re not going, are we?” He promptly replied, “Well, you talked just now, so guess not.” He explained the above facts to me every time after my Arby’s tantrums. I was often too young and bratty to acknowledge his sacrifices.
28. Fatally Floral
My mom told me that the blossoms on the Magnolia tree are poisonous. I told my girlfriend—now wife—that when we were dating, fifteen years later. Fifteen more years later, she told her friend, "Wait, don't touch that blossom," and her friend said, “What?” It turns out that mom had lied to me so that I wouldn't monkey around with the neighbor's pretty blossoms and the lie went lived for more than a generation. At least my kids know the truth.
29. The Fauna Secret
My mom convinced me—between ages 4-7—that animals could talk and actually had their own society. She came up with an incredible bedtime story around this and I was sold. When outside and seeing squirrels, birds, dogs, cats, or farm animals in the country, I would first try to engage but then later on became very suspicious of them. I remember the moment I found her out...I read Animal Farm and my mind was flabbergasted. Mom, you are one funny, amazing human.
30. Waving Distance
When quite young, I became obsessed with seeing the ocean. My dad took me to see it one day. Only, it wasn't the ocean. It was, in fact, Lake Michigan, since we lived pretty close to it. I didn't figure this out until 7th grade geography when the teacher asked the class if anyone had been to the ocean. I raised my hand and said that of course I had, since it was like 20 minutes away. Needless to say, that blunder followed me for a long time.
31. Buttering Up
My mom told us about the “Butter Man” who popped into random people’s homes to check that they were only cutting pats of butter from one end of the stick and not from both ends, like a bunch of Neanderthals! Pretty sure mom told us we got a prize if he stopped by for a surprise inspection and saw we were doing it the ‘right’ way.
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32. The Family Secret
When I was a kid, my father told me about "the can." He said it contained a family secret of incredible value, and that when I turned 18 I could see it. On my 18th birthday, I finally asked my father about the family secret—about "the can." He said, "What in the world is “the can”?" After I reminded him of it, he burst out laughing, saying that he had been messing with me.
For almost a decade I believed that I would be privy to some cosmic secret on my 18th birthday. Turns out I'm just very impressionable.
33. Discerning Thieves
When I was a kid, one of my friends’ parents told him that their house had been robbed and the thieves had taken his VHS copy of Grease. That’s right...only his VHS copy of Grease. So, apparently, they broke in and all they took was this one VHS. It didn't occur to him that his parents had just thrown it away because he would not stop watching Grease. This kid seriously liked that movie. We still rib him about it to this day.
34. Adoption Notion
I was told that I was born in Mexico because my mom, when she was nine months pregnant, decided to go with her mother—my grandmother—across the border to visit and stay the night with her aunts and cousins. According to the story, she went into labor the next morning and couldn’t make it back across the border in time so she was rushed to a local clinic where I was born. I found out 35 years later I was adopted.
35. Speed Racer
Around the time the first Toy Story movie came out, my dad drove an Infiniti, and he told us that he could press a button and go “to infinity and beyond” to jump over other cars. He’d have us close our eyes and press the button. Then, he’d speed up and pass the car in front of us while our eyes were closed. As a kid, I was dumbfounded and thought that he was magic. It’s actually a nice memory.
36. Silence Is Golden
My dad said that I had an older sister named Matilda, but she kept screaming in the car so he dropped her off at the side of the road and left her there. It didn't stop me screaming in the car until one day he actually stopped the car and told me to get out. He only drove 10m away but I never screamed in the car again.
37. Birthday Treat
My birthday is the 11th of July. The gas station 7/11 gives away free slushies on 7/11. When I turned 7, 8, and 9 years old, my parents told me that the 7/11 wanted to celebrate my birthday by giving me free slushies. There were free slushies and I thought my parents made complete sense, so I didn't question it. I thought the gas station just really liked me.
38. Just Like Magic
My dad told us, my brother and I, that he could tell what card we were holding just by looking at the back of it. So, we would hold up a card from the deck, and we would hide it from him. We got creative, trying to trick him, and he would still be able to tell us which card it was! I remember spending hours with my brother and a magnifier trying to figure out how he could tell which card we were holding up.
Finally, when I was in my 30s, my mother let the cat out of the bag: she admitted that she was always standing behind us and telling him! We had no idea she would betray us. It’s one of the good memories of him, and it always makes me smile.
39. That Special Farm
Growing up, before my mother left, we had this gorgeous Alsatian. We called him Shadow because he was so meek, he'd literally shadow you. We even got burgled and he did nothing at all. I must have been 8 or 9 when he “went to live on that farm we love over the way, but we mustn't go and see him because he'll pine for us.”
Fast forward to me being 21 and my teenage dog, Pepsi, also went to live on this lovely farm which we couldn't visit. I was 27 when I finally realized the truth. My dad was many things, not all great, but he loved me so hard he tried to protect me from the simple pain of losing my beloved pets.
40. Need For A Charge
As a parent, I used to sneakily switch off the tv when my 2-year-old wasn't watching. Then I would look up from my book with feigned surprise and say, "Oh, the tv's run out of battery! Let's give it time to charge." She once came back from a playdate at a friend's place claiming that she watched lots of Peppa Pig, and their TV never ran out of battery!
41. Eye Spy
When I was about 3 or so, I asked my Mum why she wore glasses. She was the only immediate person I knew that did so. Apparently, she thought that I wouldn’t be able to comprehend the actual reason that she just had poor eyesight, so she told me that one day a fly flew into her eye. I am probably lucky that I didn’t end up with a fear of bugs in my eyes.
42. The Parental Cut
I'll never forget how my parents lied to me about the ending of Edward Scissorhands. We would watch the first half, then my dad would tell me what “happens” in the end—Edward goes on a talk show, raises money to get regular human hands, and gets the surgery. Then he decides he misses his scissors, and gets them back. He opens a hair salon, marries Winona Ryder, and they all live happily ever after.
I saw the actual ending when I was 15 at a party. Imagine my surprise when I found out that that's definitely not what happens.
43. Too Much Personal Time
Any Asian knows the bull their parents or grandparents say to get them to stop doing something. When I was a young teenager and anticipating my first period, my grandma told me to never sit on the toilet for too long while on my period, because I would get a clot and die. I, later, found out she just didn’t want me sitting on the toilet with my phone. I don’t know why she didn’t just say that. And no, clots from your period will not kill you.
44. Dogging The Cows
I grew up on a farm with cattle, and we had two dogs. I had really bad allergies growing up and was allergic to everything with a fur coat but I still hugged our dogs and kept getting sick over it. So, to prevent me from hugging or playing with our dogs, my mom told me that my doing so would make them want to chase cows and getting our cows worked up was a strict no no.
So, I stopped hugging the dogs in order to make them stop chasing cows. The funny thing is, when I bring it up now, my mom doesn't even remember telling me that. How convenient.
45. A Smooth Ride
I told my kids that there was a button on the dashboard that raised the wheels off the ground like a landspeeder. I’d wait until I could see the tarmac change to a smoother grade and push the button and the tire noise would go quieter. When they asked me to raise the wheels, I would tell them that I couldn’t right now because I needed all four down “for traction.” And, then, I would wait for another change in the tarmac to do the trick.
46. A Different Kind Of Tooth Fairy
I was maybe six or seven years old and my mom worked as a dental hygienist at the dentist office we would go to. I had to go in for a filling, and my mom comes in with topical numbing gel on a q-tip. She tells me it is a "special fairy gel" that will numb my mouth, and that I had to close my eyes for a minute while it worked its magic.
Little did I know that the dentist came in behind her with an actual injection. This happened a few times, so you can imagine my surprise when I went to get a filling as an adult and the dentist came over with a big needle.
47. A Well-Educated Fox
We somehow lost our daughter’s super special stuffed fox, one that was some sort of limited-edition thing from Anthropologie. We looked and looked for months and looked and looked for a replacement. I bought one the second it popped up on eBay. I think we paid a ridiculous amount for him. We sat him on her chair and waited for her to wake up for breakfast.
She was thrilled and so happy. But then she started questioning where he had been and I panicked and told her he’d been to college.
48. Happy Birthday, Love From Dad
When I was in pre-school I started asking about where my dad was. I had never met him, and I guess I was finally starting to wonder about him. My mom told me he was sick but that he was somewhere where he was getting better, and when he was better I would likely get to finally meet him. A couple of years later I received my first birthday card from him. It was from a state prison.
Even though I was still pretty young I kind of realized what my mom was doing and pretended I didn’t notice the tiny stamp on the back of the card. He got out, and it turns out he’s an awful person, but my mom never said a bad word about him because she wanted me to have a chance at a good relationship with him. She was hoping prison and rehab had changed him. She let me form my own opinions.
49. A Wee Little Lie
In high school, I was walking around with a friend and she stopped to pick some flowers, so I warned her, "Don't. Those are dog wee flowers." I explained that those wild flowers grow by the side of the road when a dog went to wee there, which my mother had told me from before I can remember. My friend let me know that I was an idiot, so I asked my mom about it when I got home.
It turns out that my mother was annoyed when I was a toddler that I would always insist on stopping to pick flowers to give to her. So, she told me she didn't want them and that I shouldn't touch them because they are covered in dog wee and that's why they grow there.
50. Water, Water, Over There
I grew up with my grandparents for some years and we would always drive this specific route to visit family in Arizona. I would often ride on the passenger side with my grandpa driving since everyone else would want to sleep during the drive. Often on the trip he would say, “I smell water.” And then, sure enough, we would pass water and I would think something like, “Wow! That’s cool!”
He did this a lot and I always thought my grandpa had a really good sense for finding water. Only in my 20s, when reflecting back, did I realize that he was lying and had just memorized the driving route and knew when we’d be passing by water.
51. Blood Ties
When I was a kid, my dad told me that my younger brother was born because I had left a drop of my blood in my mom's stomach before I was born. So, my younger brother was none other than my drop of blood which grew inside my mom's stomach. I completely believed him. So, he said it was my responsibility to take care of him.
Thus, I ended up loving my brother a lot. My bond with him is much stronger than most brothers. But it was only because I believed my dad's lie. But genetically speaking, me and my brother share the same blood, so I guess that is not a complete lie. I am very scared of physical confrontations. I am, usually, the kind of guy who runs away from scary situations. I am a tiny guy too.
But when I was in my high school, I ended up getting into a hand-to-hand combat with my gigantic 6'-plus PE Teacher because he was punishing my brother—for my mistakes—and that made me furious and I became physically aggressive for the very first time in my life. For the sake of my brother. I have two kids and my brother has 2 kids. But for us both, we think we have 4 kids of our own. They spend time at both our homes. My dad’s lie worked out for the best, it seems.
52. Getting An Upgrade
My parents convinced me that, every year on my birthday, during the sleep leading into my birthday, I was replaced by a newer, older, better version of me, and that's how aging worked. Apparently, everyone got replaced on their birthday, had all the same memories and everything. It was just that nobody talked about it.
They would straight up say things like, "It’s been nice, 13-year-old son, but we're really hoping the 14-year-old version cleans his room more" the night before my birthday, or "This 9-year-old version hasn't been programmed really well, you sure get sick a lot. I hope they fix the bugs next time." Honestly, it still kind of messes me up when I think about it.
53. Sleeping Beauty
Where I live, in the summer, we have endless, yellow fields of canola. It's beautiful but I distinctly remember my mom telling me not to run around in those fields because if I ever sit down there, tired from playing, and fall asleep among the canola flowers, I would never wake up. As a kid, I took it seriously. However, it was pretty odd and very specific.
So, once the internet became a thing, I started Googling if falling asleep and expiring in canola fields was really a thing. Well, it's not. Nobody on Google had ever heard of a case like that. So, I went to confront my mother about it and she swore to God she was certain it was a thing because her mom told her that and raised her never to play in the canola fields.
So, I went and confronted my grandma about it. I asked her if she ever told mom that if she fell asleep while playing in the canola fields, she would never wake up. Grandma said that she had. A confused me asked why she would do that. My grandmother had the perfect response: “Because that plant is impossible to wash off clothes.” And that is how me and my mom were raised in fear of expiring in the endless, yellow canola fields.
54. Barney Blarney
I did this to my oldest daughter, who was obsessed with Barney. I was getting about three hours of sleep a night at this time, so I was always exhausted. One morning she came into my room and asked to watch Barney. In my groggy state, I replied, "Barney's dead." Her reaction was...not good, to the say least. I never did that again.
55. A Gerbil’s Tale
When I was younger, I had a gerbil as a pet. The people breeding them were friends of the family and taught us that the proper way to pick up a gerbil, to avoid getting bit, was to pick them up by their tails. Of course, now I know that's kind of cruel but, at 5, I did not know that. So that's what I did. One day, I picked up my gerbil, Archimedes, and his tail came off.
I, of course, freaked out and was really very upset and crying because I thought I had hurt my pet. I felt like a monster. My mom came in and, in order to soothe me, told me that gerbils grow their tails back like lizards do and that the gerbil had no feeling in his tail so I hadn’t hurt him. I accepted that. Sure enough, the next day, the gerbil had "grown his tail back."
Every once in a while, his tail would break off again and, by the next day, it would have grown back. I've gone my entire life, up until a year ago, thinking that gerbils grow their tails back. I found out, at 25, that this was, in fact, not the case. The reality is actually horrifying: My mom was just replacing the gerbil with a lookalike while I was asleep.
Every time I pulled a tail off, the gerbil would expire, and my mom would go out and get another one. I guess she was not ready to explain this fact of life to me yet. And, in retrospect, it was pretty sweet that she went to those lengths to keep me happy. But now I have to live with the fact that I precipitated the end of so many gerbils like a messed-up gerbil exterminator. Like, a stupid amount. RIP to all the gerbils I literally loved to their ends.
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