People Explain Which Dark Family Secrets They Were Finally Let In On
Reddit user EgglessYolk asked: 'What dark family secret were you let in on once you were old enough?'
Content Warning: Mental Health, Suicide, Domestic Violence, Child Abuse, True Crime Cases
We've likely all had a really good friend or close family member whom we felt we could share all of our biggest dreams and deepest, darkest secrets with. But truth be told, most of those deep, dark secrets were having a crush on the "bad boy" at school or cheating on a math test in sixth grade.
Some families have genuinely dark and troubling secrets, the stuff from true crime stories and the best psychological thriller fiction, and upon being revealed these secrets, it might become hard to ever look at the family quite the same way again.
Bracing themselves, Redditor EgglessYolk asked:
"What dark family secret were you let in on once you were old enough?"
Not the Best Sledding Day Ever
"My paternal grandmother had an affair with our small town’s mortician in the 1940s. She got pregnant and he performed an illegal abortion. The fetus was buried behind the funeral home he owned where we kids used to sled every winter."
"My dad told me this as I was getting ready to take a ride down the hill on the sled when I was 12."
"Also, my paternal grandfather had multiple illegitimate children around our small town. Turns out one of my best friends was also my half-cousin. My father told me that when I was 17."
"My father was educated, intelligent, honest, and moral, but also Autistic and not always the best with timing. The fact that his parents were so wild was absolutely shocking to me."
- arjacks
Wonderful Bonus Brothers
"I found out when I was in my early 30s that my mom didn't just have four kids, but actually six, though she gave two up for adoption before I was born."
"Also, I was the last baby she had with some rando before she married my stepdad and she had intended to give me up for adoption, as well, but somehow kept me."
"The silver lining? One of the babies she gave up contacted her a few years after I learned about this and now I have an awesome new brother!"
- Pandora1685
A Terrible Family History
"1. My grandfather killed his own son by throwing him on the floor because he was crying (he was just a couple of months old)."
"2. My uncle tried to rob a bank and ran away on foot. He later got married and his wife ended up committing suicide. At the time, the police thought that my uncle killed her since he had a criminal past, but he didn't (he was at work and there were witnesses)."
"3. I have multiple half-siblings (my dad was, and is, unfaithful)."
"4. My grandfather burnt the house down with his wife and children inside with the intention of them dying. My grandmother ran away with her seven or eight children, I don't recall, and she asked a priest that she worked for (she cleaned his house) to give her a space to stay, and he ended up giving her a home that an old lady left for the church (and if I'm not mistaken, she was paying it off little by little)."
"5. My aunt's neighbor (who I went to the beach with when I was little) apparently killed his own wife abroad."
"6. There was a rumor that my uncle's kids weren't his."
- _leticia_
A Tragic Family Tree
"My grandpa (15) kidnapped my grandma (14) from a convent. No one even bothered looking for her thereafter because she was an orphan and didn't even know who her family was. They had 16 children together."
- afa78
An Assisted Ending
"My extremely wealthy uncle was going downhill quickly with Alzheimer’s. Before he was too far gone, he apparently made a deal with my aunt that when things got the the point that they would have to send him to a nursing home, she would kill him instead."
"He wrote all of this in a letter and gave it to the attorney of their estate."
"When the time came, I don’t know why she chose to shoot him in the back of the head instead of something less violent, but she did."
"It was a pretty big trial with a fair bit of news coverage, and it really blew up when the lawyer testified and brought forward the letter. My aunt served like two years, I think, and was released on parole."
- Cannoli_Emma
"That's extremely sad but also really bada** of both of them. I'm sorry for everyone who was involved."
- tsunaminatpot
"It’s kinda insane that this even had to happen. If we lose control of our body, we should be able to say what we want and when."
"She was doing what he asked. I think most would if they could. Sad that she had to go to jail."
"End of life for a lot of people isn’t something they want but they’re forced to do it for the sake of everyone else."
- jazzhandsdancehands
A One Night Stand
"I found out when I was about 32 that apparently in 1973, my dad had a daughter he never knew existed."
"I found out because he texted that to me while I was working, after finding out about it himself about one week earlier. She was in her late 40s by that point, I think."
"What's sort of tragic is all this time we thought I was my dad's only kid, and he always wanted a daughter but never got one due to marriages ending. He would have f**king LOVED this girl. His daughter was the result of a one-night stand with a girl he never talked to again, and according to his daughter, the mother had a mental breakdown not long after giving birth and never really had custody of the daughter anyway."
"Dad never would have had any way to find out, the baby grew up with the mother's parents in another state, and the mother kinda went AWOL."
- ManicDigressive
A Disney Trip to (Not) Remember
"My parents took me to Disneyland for my seventh birthday. I recall landing, going to the park, and having a great first day or two."
"Then my parents had to step out and take a bunch of phone calls. They sounded very stressed. They kept telling me nothing happened and everything was okay."
"Eventually, we flew home, and surprise! We took an extra couple of days to go to a big Waterpark away from home."
"I fondly remembered this birthday and eventually forgot about any of the weirdness."
"Maybe 10 years later, my parents finally told me what happened. My uncle, my dad's brother, tried to kill himself on my seventh birthday. He shot himself in the stomach with a rifle. He was poor, addicted to drugs, no work, etc. He felt depressed my dad had the life he always wanted, so tried to kill himself."
"He ended up living. My parents took me to the Waterpark so that we didn't have to come home to him leaving the hospital. By not telling me, my parents let me keep my birthday as my day, not the day my uncle tried to die. Knowing how a seven-year-old's brain works, I probably would've thought I had something to do with it."
- No-Ice-9612
The Documentary in the Family
"My dad's first cousin is serial killer Kenneth McDuff. We saw the 'America's Most Wanted' episode when it aired and were so surprised to hear about another McDuff, not knowing he was a relative."
- lolabam3
"Google Search Result: 'McDuff was given three death sentences that were reduced to life imprisonment consequently to the 1972 U.S. Supreme Court ruling Furman v. Georgia. He was paroled in 1989 and went on to kill again. He was executed in 1998 and is suspected to have been responsible for many other killings.'"
"Jesus H. Ch**st, they f**king paroled him after he had been given three death sentences commuted to a life sentence?!"
- dcbluestar
The Motherly Figure
"My uncle was actually my cousin."
"He was kidnapped as an infant, and when he was returned a year later, my aunt didn't want him back. My grandparents adopted him so he was legally my uncle."
"My aunt was a real piece of work. To backtrack a moment, this side of my family isn't biological. Technically my dad is my step-dad, but he raised me from toddlerhood and he's my dad, pure and simple. All of his family treated me as one of their own."
"Except my aunt. She would always tell my grandparents that she just couldn't understand how they could love me, because I wasn't 'blood family.'"
"I have no idea why she didn't want her son back. It was a familial kidnapping, a non-custodial father. When my cousin was returned, she ditched him with my grandparents and got back together with her other half."
- EhlersDanlosSucks
23AndMe Discoveries
"I found out I had a sister who had been given up for adoption. The only reason I found out was the person who informed me no longer felt bound to secrecy after my mom died. And the person who told me had 'receipts' solid enough that I have no reason to doubt them."
"It also explains why mom freaked out when I told her I'd done a 23AndMe test."
- zombiemann
"23andMe is how my father discovered he had a bonus cousin. As it turns out, his uncle had a fling before leaving for WWII that resulted in a child he either never told anyone about or didn’t even know himself."
"When my father looked her, the cousin, up she happened to live in the same city. He and my aunts contacted her and all met up for lunch. Turns out the woman had been searching for years to find her father's side of family. As far as I know, they still keep in touch."
- pyroagg
Hidden in Plain Sight
"My grandfather had severely scarred legs from burns he got as a kid. Growing up, we were told that he was in a fire in an apartment building and sustained the burns while escaping. He died when I was seven, and one of my few memories of him is an image of those scarred legs."
"Well, when I was 23, my great aunt (his sister), told me that it wasn't a fire. Their father ran a bath with scalding water and put my grandfather in it as a punishment."
"My great-grandfather was an abusive alcoholic piece of s**t who f**king maimed his son."
- idksomeusername42
An Unhonorable Sword
"My mother grew up in the American South. Her brother died in his early 20's and she always told me it was a freak accident. A bullet came through the window killing him. They lived in a rural area so I never questioned it."
"One year, I inherited an old Korean War officer's sword after my grandpa passed. My mom freaked out and told me that it was too dangerous to keep and that we should sell it or get a safe to lock it up in. I thought it was weird so I asked my dad and he got this sad look on his face."
"Turns out my mom's brother was brutally murdered with a similar sword in the 80s. He had gotten involved with some drug dealers and they thought he had snitched about one of their big deals that got busted. No idea why they decided to use a sword but it was pretty f**ked up to hear about. My mom had to ID the body."
"I found this out when I was 16 but she never directly acknowledged it until years later. My mom said he was just trying to make some extra cash by introducing people who partied to the dealers. I'm about his age now and I can see how he just thought he was making a quick buck. Never thinking something like that would get him killed."
- plurperonipizza
The Miniature Farm
"When I was very young, my family lived in a townhouse, and against all local bylaws, my mother decided to keep a horse in our backyard."
"Not only that, but it was an ex-racehorse that came as a package deal: the goat companion that slept in the closet of my nursery."
"I also later found out she was running a grow-op in the basement."
- SlyGuy011
Inspiring Our Own Inner Glorias
"Y’all’s stories are WILD! Mine is super tame:"
"When I was in my early 20s, I found an old photo of someone in a family album I didn’t recognize."
"When I asked my mom about it, she said, 'Oh, that’s your Aunt Gloria.” Then she lowered her voice (even though we were alone) and added, 'She’s a NUDIST.'"
"Poor Aunt Gloria. She just wants to be a nudey-lady and everyone acts like she’s a leper."
- WithoutDennisNedry
"I aspire to be a Gloria."
- breadanudes
The Redditor who posted this marked it for "Serious Replies Only," and their fellow Redditors did not disappoint.
While some of these might have had a happy ending in a way, like a family expanding with "bonus" siblings and cousins, but some of these, it's hard to imagine moving past the news. It's a delicate reminder of how resilient humans can be.
If you or someone you know is struggling, you can contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988.
To find help outside the United States, the International Association for Suicide Prevention has resources available at https://www.iasp.info/resources/Crisis_Centres/
Everyone has secrets -- those facts about themselves that they're either ashamed of or want to keep to private.
Some secrets are harmless and not even meant to be a secret -- it just so happens no one knows.
Others are shocking and may even make people look at your differnetly.
Redditors have some shocking secrets of their own, and they are ready to share them.
It all started when Redditor Difficult-House6853 asked:
"What’s a secret that would change how the people around you look at you if they knew?"
What Happened To Just Say No?
"In high school I kept my DARE pledge in my stash box until one day when I ran out of papers and used my pledge to roll a J."
– DanManKs
"How DARE you!!!"
– OkVolume1
Time To Leave
"All of my friends and family are Jehovahs witnesses, they think I am but I plan to leave. 85% of them will shun me when I leave."
– Allegedlystupid
"I hear you, left evangelicalism 20ish years ago. It’ll be scary and lonely at first but as you become the person you were meant to be instead of the person they told you to be, you’ll bond with others over shared interests and build new relationships. It takes time, be patient, but it’s worth it."
– Mr_Lumbergh
I Don't Wanna Know
"People think that I’m a good listener, and that just makes them say things to me that they really shouldn’t. I’m only listening because I don’t want to be rude, not because I care. Don’t tell me your family secrets, please."
– A_Guy_From_The_ME
No Rhyme Or Reason
"A few years ago, I went to the zoo during their Halloween celebration month where costumes were allowed. I dressed up as a zoo keeper. I told people that the penguins were animatronic. That when the giraffes get sick we feed them to the lions. I told a group of children that scientifically speaking, snakes and apples are cousins."
– Binder_of_chains
"I love how bizarre this is."
– Pickingupthepieces
The Horror!
"I like Cheese Whiz"
– Peckerhead321
"Not going to lie, I put that on an apple cider donut once as a gag... sh*t was soooo good. Like... I finished it. And thought about more. Never did it after that, but I think about it every now and then."
– BludgeIronfist
The Travesty!
"I’m a Philadelphian and I think cheesesteaks are soooo f*cking stupid. They’re really not that good. It’s the most okayest sandwich and people around here will steal your catalytic converter if you don’t succumb to their Philly cult."
– asking_for_it
"Can't argue with this but as a "born in Philly" guy, I get irrationally angry when food places serve "Philly Cheesesteaks" and their default toppings are green peppers and onions."
– MarcusAntione
Social Media Is Beneficial!
"How normal I've felt since I started using TikTok. I've learned so many things I berated myself for and told myself I was a freak are in fact things many, many other people do. There's really no unique life, everyone has something in common with someone."
– LordyIHopeThereIsPie
Superhero! Or A Dog...
"My sense of smell is off the charts. I can usually tell if someone showers in the morning or at night by the way their hair smells. If someone ate a yogurt in an auditorium hours prior but threw out the container in the trash and I walk in on the other side of the room I can smell the yogurt. My memory is also sense-driven. I remember people by their voices or scent, not their faces, or if there is something different about them (odd gait, odd body proportions, etc). My touch memory is also weird. Did I lock the front door? I focus on my hand and go through what my hand has felt in the past 20 minutes and if the feeling of locking the door is there I’m good. I’m literally a freak and if people knew how much of their behavior/body-oddities/scent I actually have no choice but to remember, everyone would look at me like I’m a monster."
– crashmurph
Alien! Or A Frog...
"I’m from a different planet… I just don’t want to be stereotyped as having big eyes and skinny legs and green, I’m not anything like that."
– AdditionalCheetah354
"You just described a frog"
– MN_Hotdish
"Do you have a waggy tail and floppy ears? Do you lollop when you run? You may be a labrador."
– The_Queef_of_England
"This is fascinating! The closest thing is I don't read by letters, but by shapes. So if two words have the same peaks and valleys, I have trouble reading it. It's also why I can read upsidedown at the same speed as right-side up."
– hobbes8889
Net Worth
"I’m a janitor. But I’m worth over a million dollars because I own real estate."
– Flashy-Weather3529
"Thats awesome. I work in Wealth Management, and one of the most surprising things I have learned is how people seem as though they are poor, but are just humble people living a simple life. A guy I work with regularly lives out of his van with his dog, drives all over the US and Mexico but has millions. One of my favorite people to interact with because he is so kind and mellow."
– ItsbeenBroughton
Check The 'Yes' Box
"I’m a convicted felon. Nothing violent, a white collar crime."
– PhotographIcy600
"F*ck people who disrespect felons. In the face or the law, you have served your sentence and redeemed yourself. The moment you step out of jail, your criminal record should not interfere with your life in any way (unless special security checks). Everyone deserves a second chance, and anyone who thinks otherwise is an absolute idiot with no empathy."
– S0crates420
Woof Woof
"I get more of a rush out of training my dog than any experience I've shared with humans. Dogs just feel more intense and genuine. when you look at them you know they are there, present, with you. There's only a handful of people I can say have ever even come close to that level of understanding and none of them managed to achieve it without words the way the dogs I've worked with can."
– Avengerwolf626
"As someone who always had a dog growing up and not that many friends or people around, the connection you get with a dog is probably the most honest and pure form of love one can experience. I can't have a dog right now and I miss that connection very much"
– JoStormBorn
It's all about the love!
Do you have any secrets you're to get off your chest? Let us know in the comments below.
Every family has a past.
Try as we might to hide, bury and whitewash, the mess is there.
Secrets and lies may be hidden, but only for so long.
Redditor fuzzyloulou asked:
"What family secret do you know, that you're not supposed to know?"
I have a small family. Not much to report.
Or so I've been told...
The Extra
"I have another sibling that is unknown except to me and my father."
Mac_nocheeze
Evil Granny
"My paternal grandmother hated my mother. One day she called my mom and asked her to come over and pick up a casserole my grandma had made for us."
"When she got there, my grandmother had shot herself and left a note saying (among other things) that she wanted my mom to find her that way. She was, shall we say, a f**ked up lady and one of the meanest people I've ever known."
"My mom didn't want people to know b/c she didn't want that kind of attention. My dad didn't want people to know b/c he didn't want to give my grandma any level of satisfaction."
"So, it's just me, them and maybe one other person who knows. Everyone else thinks she was just an old lady who was depressed about her recently deceased husband."
haroldtitus425
Forgiveness
"My mom lied to a man and told him I was his son and frequently extorted money from him by telling him she needed it to raise me."
"I found out when he showed up with gifts shortly after I had moved out on my own. He had hired a PI after my mom refused to give him my contact info."
"He apologized for not being in my life and cried while telling me he was dying of pancreatic cancer and he didn't want to go without meeting me."
"I asked my mom about it and she told me she told him that so she could get money for drugs after she left my dad."
"DNA tests confirmed he was not my dad. (tested myself against the man I was always told was my bio dad) I only ever met him the one time."
"I took the gifts because it was such a surreal experience I didn't know how to tell him anything other than that I forgave him. My mom is the only other person that knows this happened."
Brilliant_Succotash1
1912
"My welsh great-grandmother had passage booked on the Titanic in 1912. She ended up not going because she 'fell ill'."
"Turns out it was actually an out-of-wedlock pregnancy that gave her such bad morning sickness, she couldn't go. She lost the baby."
"She came the following year in 1913 and met my great-grandfather. She only told my mom (who she helped raise during the summers) who then told me."
"Great-grandma getting knocked up saved an entire branch of our family tree!"
sassy_steph_
Animosity
"My Great grandmother had a stepson the same age as her. He was the biological father of one of my great uncles.
"My cousins don't know. Always heard my Great uncle knew and had animosity towards my grandad because of it."
Secure-Particular286
The family tree of mess is big.
The Blow Up
"My mother had an affair on my father that he doesn’t know about way before he had an affair on her that blew up the family."
Alternative_Shame_73
The Lost
"My grandma was raised in a Catholic orphanage under the pretext that she lost both her parents and siblings during the Spanish Influenza."
"Turns out her and her dad survived, but her dad didn’t want to take care of her so he left her at an orphanage in Brooklyn and moved to Europe and started a new family."
Human_Commercial_406
The Others
"I had an uncle who was a railroad engineer and worked the Terre Haute, Indiana to Danville, Illinois line. Never took a day off from his one day there, one day back route."
"At his funeral, (I was a kid and didn’t go) a strange woman came into the funeral home with some older children. No one knew who she was and finally my grandma introduced herself to the woman and asked who she was."
"The woman said, 'I’m Mrs.so and so I’m here for my husband’s funeral.' Turns out my uncle had two families, one in Terre Haute and one in Danville."
"I didn’t find out about this until I was an adult. My mom, grandma, aunt and sister kept this a secret for decades."
mildlysceptical22
Broken Heart
"My great grandma told my grandpa that the jewish girl he liked was taken to a concentration camp when in truth they fled (it is said she knew they were safe)."
"Grandpa meets my Grandma shortly after, they get married but apparently he still talked about the other girl from time to time and that she was the one who got away and how awful it all was."
"Many years go by, my aunt and dad are born."
"Grandpa walks around town and meets the girl from back then, is totally shocked and finds out he has been lied to all this time."
"Grandpa got sick pretty soon after that and died when my dad was only 5 years old. My grandma later once said she believes he died of a broken heart."
Aur3lya_175
So, there goes that...
"My great grandparents were high school sweethearts and the only role models I'd ever had for a relationship since my grandparents and parents are divorced and hate each other."
"Then my mom tells me that my great grandma had an affair and that's why one of my grandma's sisters isn't like the others. So, there goes that."
Symnestra
Wow. Some families really need deep therapy.
Why do families keep secrets?
The truth will always finds a way home.
And it will of course be exposed at the most inopportune time.
Make sure you have a journal and write this stuff down.
It could be comedy/drama gold.
The tea is scolding, throw it at me.
Redditor AbsoluteHavoc wanted to heard all of the family drama that we've heard unleashed.
So they asked:
"What family secret was finally spilled in your family?"
Years Later
Family GIFGiphy"Found out my grandma had a baby as a teenager and was forced to give him up for adoption by my great grandparents. 40 years later he found us."
dont-take-my-soup
"Same thing happened to my mom. I'm 33 now, older half-brother is roughly 35. I hold hope that I'll meet him one day."
YagamiIsGodonImgur
Nod & Agree
"That my parents 'had' to get married. They always told us they got married in 1961, but it was 1962, 3 months before my sister was born."
"What's amusing is that my father was an accountant who was insanely fast with math. Whenever he was asked how many years they'd been married, he'd be off by one. My mother would correct him through clenched teeth and then my father would nod and agree."
dramboxf
23 and me surprise...
"My great grandmother wasn’t actually Mexican but rather was adopted by a Mexican family from a Chinese family who was being kicked out of Mexico when railroad construction was over. She always had more typically Asian features but only spoke Spanish and it was never really questioned. 23 and me is a hell of a thing."
bustyodust
ALL OUT!
"When my paternal grandfather died the federal govt reached out to do a state funeral. He'd been career army and a colonel, so we didn't question it. Then the funeral came and they went ALL OUT! Huge procession, people showing up who are really big names, like heads of dept's, senators, retired senators, people from the CIA and State Dept, it was nuts and we were all super confused."
"Turns out he was a key dude in the OSI during WWII and when the OSI splintered into the CIA and Secret Service, he went the Secret Service route. He wasn't on White House detail, but instead worked in a covert office that dealt with counterfeiting and currency."
"He went blind when I was a toddler and retired from 'the Army.' For whatever reason, he told no one about all his covert work with the OSI and Secret Service and the only person who knew (my grandmother) was sworn to secrecy and never told anyone. My father grew up thinking he was just a colonel working on base."
"Only after his death were we given all sorts of cool s**t like publications by him, lectures given by him, and all kinds of things from various things he did and was known for. All I knew him as was a blind old man who was perpetually smoking, drinking and being a crotchety b**tard. Turns out he was a bad motherf**ker and all but none of us knew."
haroldtitus425
True Crime
Consider True Crime GIF by Dateline NBCGiphy"My father's brother killed 4 girls when he was in high school. My father was the one who found out and told the police."
yeshelloitme
Good Lord. What in the world?
The Generation Before
Joe Biden Shock GIF by GIPHY NewsGiphy"My grandparents are first cousin’s... an uncle on the same side of the family is in prison for the assassination of a presidential candidate (family still says he was framed and is innocent)."
Cervesaz
The Push
"This is kind of messed up, but my parents told me my mom had a bad back because i pushed on her spine during birth. this was what I thought all my childhood. I think I was in my teens when my older brother told me my dad pushed my mom during an argument and she fell and had to have surgery. I thought I ruined my mom's back my entire childhood and those SOBs let me believe it "
thtssotrue
#7
"My mother is kid #7 of 10. My aunt (kid #4) who was born in 1945 did her DNA and found out that she has a different father from everyone else. She was devastated. There was always rumor that there was an affair but nobody talked about it. She has so many questions but nobody's alive to answer her."
I_see_farts
Thanks Mom...
"When I was 5 years old (1988), Santa Clause left a Nintendo on our front porch. It was wrapped in newspaper, and my parents had no idea who gifted it to us. My dad, particularly, tried to figure it out. He was always suspicious that it had been a family friend. It was by far the best gift of the year, and we played it all the time throughout our childhood."
"My dad died in 2004."
"Last Christmas, my mom explained that she was the one who had bought it and surreptitiously placed it on the porch. My dad really liked to be in control of things and had forbidden the purchase. She knew better. She didn't tell a soul for 30 years."
"Thanks Mom..."
Madame_F
In the Swamp...
Okaay What GIF by ABC NetworkGiphy"I only just recently heard about this, but my grandmother had gotten a little drunk with my dad and brother a month or so ago and started talking about our great uncle Ferber (not sure on the spelling), but from what I heard he apparently killed quite a few people and buried them on some family-owned land in a swamp."
DHA_Matthew
Well if there was ever any reason to change your last name and move.
Do you have anything your itching to get off your chest about your family tree? Let us know in the comments.
Every family has a past.
We all think we want to know our family's tales.
But that journey can be riddled with horrors.
You don't always want to find yourself saying....
"I wish I didn't know that."
Redditor Flash_Dimension wanted to sip all about the crazy family tea that our loved ones are hiding.
So they asked:
"Once you were old enough, what were the dark family secrets you were finally let in on?"
My family's darkness is too long to share. And I also don't want to know.
Hey Fam...
"Got a Facebook message from one guy asking if I was related to [my dad], since it's not a common last name. I thought he was a fan of his work, because I was in college at the time and the guy was about the same age as me. And that's how I found out my dad slept around and that I had a half-brother the same age as me."
Apatches
Never Found
"My father was married with another woman before meeting my mother. They had a daughter and my dad loved her so so so much his wife started going crazy jealous. My dad noticed some strange behaviour she had towards the girl and when he tried to talk to her about it she started arguing with him. He then left with his daughter to my uncle’s house."
"She knew my dad would left the girl with my aunt while he was at work, so she called the police and said my aunt kidnaped her child. The police came in and took the girl away from my aunt. She immediately tried to call my dad. But the woman drove back home, put poison in her daughter’s milk and forced her to drink it. When my dad arrived, he found his daughter already dead and left alone."
"The woman was never ever found. My dad had never had justice for his first child. Kinda sad. Then when I was born my mother didn’t mind to named me after my 'sister.' We share the same name, and that’s actually how I found it out! I asked my parents about my name and they told me the whole story."
mylows
The Aunt
"When I was around 3-4, my 'Aunt' and her 3 sons came and lived with us for a few weeks. One night my mom stayed up and I found her downstairs sitting in a chair looking out the window. One day, my 'Aunt' and the boys 'moved' and never came back."
"Turns out, she was going through a nasty divorce. She had the boys at the house with her while she was packing things one day, and her husband came home. He locked the boys in a room, stabbed her, and then shot himself. My mom had been staying up with a gun that night because she had seen him in our backyard earlier that night."
Deepstate-intern
No Touch
"My paternal grandfather was an alcoholic wife abuser who regularly cheated on Grandma. When my father was a teenager he stood up to him, and threatened to kill him if he ever touched her again. The abuse stopped."
pattersonjeffa
It's HIM!
"My mild-mannered Christian mother casually told me that she dated a gangster who trafficked drugs in NY during the 80's. He bought her a brand new BMW before getting sentenced to prison for murder for 20+ years. Someone who was friends with her and her ex for YEARS turned out to be an FBI informant and she barely escaped jail, had to enter a witness protection program, and moved cross country."
"Here's the craziest part: He's still stalking her, has contacted her on her birthday every year for 40 years, and keeps tabs on her!! My dad has no idea."
"I asked her why she waited so long to tell me. Like, what if she went missing? and she said 'Oh, honey. He's the type of person that if he wanted to harm me, I would already be dead by now.' Very comforting."
marvelous_persona
This is why we're sent out of the room as children when adults are talking.
Swing Low...
"My grandmother tried to murder my grandfather when she got sick of him beating the crap out of her everyday. She swung an axe at him and he blocked it with his hand and lost his thumb. She left him before I was born."
beers_n_bags
"I don't AT ALL wish to make light of an obviously terrible ongoing domestic violence situation (my grandmother faced a similar scenario, I'm very sorry). But the appearance of the axe makes it poetry. Good on her. I wish every victim could feel that strength."
Dangercakes13
Madness...
"That schizophrenia ran in my mom’s side of the family. I developed it a year after she told me about it at 25. She didn’t refer to it as schizophrenia, but as the '(her maiden name) Madness.' She said that every once in a while someone in our family would go mad and that that’s what they would call it."
"I guess her side of the family also had ties to organized crime. My family never talked about issues or emotions at all so it was a shock. I assumed our ancestors were relatively normal, but I also thought my family was sane back then too."
A**ckindragonyo
“sister day”
"Grandma had 13 siblings, of those 7 women are still alive. Once a year they have a 'sister day' where they all except one are going somewhere to have fun. They’ve been doing this since they were teens. All but one sister, who has been lied to her whole life about sister day, because she thinks it doesn’t exist. This is supposed to have been started when that one sister borrowed something and didn’t give it back."
"Or something trivial like that. We are all reminded whenever we ALL get together (pre pandemic) that we’re not to talk about this, because it will hurt that sister. Still can’t wrap my head around how backstabbing *itchy some family members of mine are. Because this is just stupid."
Whooptidooh
History
"My father always tells me as a joke that it's my fault my mom and him are married ( I'm the second son). But through the years from drunk conversations and several sources I've pieced the story together, my parents separated before they knew my mother was pregnant and only came back together after I was born."
Mond_13
Anxious...
"My mom had a brother who died in childhood, maybe 9 or 10. I always thought he drank cleaning chemicals and died that way, but turns out he was hit by a school bus while riding his bike. Now I know why my mom was so anxious about me biking on the road."
Corgi_with_stilts
Well, family is certainly never boring... but sometimes it's safest to keep these skeletons in the closet.
Do you have any family secrets to get off your chest? Let us know in the comments below.