_There are a million secrets we keep from the outside world, some of them are down right outrageous but some are just too 'cute'/'innocent' to let anyone know about them. _
Can’t tell I’m sick.
” I have cancer and it’s spreading to the rest of my body but I haven’t told my family yet.
Thing is I recently moved out and got a bump checked out. Turns out it’s cancerous and has spread to my lymph nodes. My mother worries about me a lot but is dealing with putting her mom in a home and losing her company at the end of the year. I can’t put her through the idea her only daughter might die or be seriously sick for a while. “
Why don’t you grow a beard for change?
” I shave because I have this weird thing with my facial hair where some of it’s blonde and other parts are black and two patches are red.
I tell people I don’t like the way it feels to have a beard but the real reason is that I look like a calico cat. “
Fake it till you make it?
” I’m not half as patient and understanding as my girlfriend thinks.
I just pretend to be, except now it’s been over a year and I think I am now. “
Goosebumps still haunts us all.
“As a kid, I was really scared of R.L. Stine’s Goosebumps.
I’m a few months shy of 20 years old now, and the theme song to the show still makes me uncomfortable for a minute. But I am totally okay with the series now. “
Beastly man with an emotional heart.
” If you pay me a sincere compliment I don’t know how to handle it. I blush hard and tear up real quick.
My friends willingly use this against me when introducing me to girls to embarrass me. I’m a 30 year old, 6ft 2, 230 pound bearded dude.
My friends are the best jerks I know. “
I set up alarms to wake myself and talk with him.
” My significant other and I live 1100 miles away from each other at the moment. We have completely different schedules. He works late shifts, and I usually work mornings.
Sometimes, when I’m really tired, but I know he’s working late, so I’ll go to sleep early and set an alarm for when he gets off so we can talk on the phone.
He just thinks I just stay up super late. I wouldn’t tell him differently because I enjoy these talks too much to let him worry about my sleep. “
Shhh.
” I am a teacher, and where I teach some of the children I teach live in an orphanage. When I see they are having a bad day, I usually slip them a piece of candy while the other kids can’t see. “
Would like a bone for dinner?
” I have, on multiple occasions, gone to text my dog while I’ve been at work.
‘Oh I miss the pup, let me just let her know I’m thinking of h–oh. Right.’
Then two hours later, ‘Aw pup would love this toy, let me just show her a picture and see if she wants it.’ then I text her. “
Secret Santa loves you.
” When he mentions some item he likes or would be useful to him I put it on a secret list – so I know what to get him for the next birthday/Christmas/surprise. “
Singer in the making.
” I like to sing to myself whenever nobody is around.
And I actually try to sing something accurately and try to improve my ability to sing. In the rare times people have heard me sing, they say it’s good, so maybe its working! “
Not ticklish really.
” When we first started dating he tickled me and I pretended to laugh because I just liked that he was touching me.
Now it’s eight years later and he still tickles me and I still pretend to be ticklish. “
I listen to washing machine and oscillating fan sounds.
” I always have my earphones plugged in so everyone at work thinks I listen to music all the time. While I actually listen to white noise – hoovers, washing machines, oscillating fan sound on YouTube. It calms me down and blocks out their idiotic chatter. “
I pretend I am single sometimes.
” He works overnight and sometimes when he’s gone I order takeaway for one and pay for it in cash. But honestly it has nothing to do with eating or anything like that.
I just like to pretend I’m single and stuffing my face while watching TV. I have a thing for Chinese food. I used to do it when I was single and it’s primarily nostalgic for me. “
Wow, wow. Hiss, hiss.
” When I was a middle school-aged kid, between the ages of 11-13, I made constantly made animal noises at school. I rarely talked and mostly made these animal sounds to communicate.
Dog barking, cat meowing, snake hissing, etc. I had a really bad home life and I justify it to myself as normal acting out, but at 30 I still cringe when I think about it.
I have never told any friend or partner about it, and I always check the “what did that one weird kid at your school do” threads for stories of my behavior or similar behavior from others, but I’ve never seen it.
I don’t know if I’ll ever tell anyone in person, ever. “
Loves writing little notes and putting in occasional surprises.
” My kids think that I pack their school lunches to be frugal as buying school lunch at the cafeteria adds up. That’s what I tell them, anyway.
The real reason that I do it is because I love writing them the little notes I sporadically include in their lunch bags and putting occasional surprises like candy. It makes me happy. It’s only a matter of time before bringing bagged lunch to school won’t be “cool” anymore so I’m getting away with it while I can. “
Can’t help falling in love with you.
” I sometimes stare at my wife while she’s sleeping and stroke her face and give her a kiss. She doesn’t know.
Within 5 mins I feel just as happy as the first day I met her and I don’t know why I just feel more and more in love with her. “
Hey, you look good.
” I like being told I’m attractive. That’s it.
I’m a normal guy, fairly quiet, not social at all, and I have no idea how to react when it happens. But whatever, I like being told I am good looking. “
No spiders please.
” I’m scared of spiders.
The only reason why this is a secret is because I fear that if people know, they will try to put me into a situation involving spiders for a joke that will not make me laugh. “
Hey, I’ll never let you get hurt.
” I love my dog too much.
I cuddle her when bad stuff happens to animals on TV and tell her that I’ll never let anything bad happen to her. “
Happiness is danish twist, bag of cheddar and sour cream potato chips, and two litres of diet coke.
” Im on my period and just ate an entire cheese danish twist, bag of cheddar and sour cream potato chips and drank like an entire bottle of 2 litre diet coke.
Don’t tell anyone or I’ll be kind of really embarrassed. “
Goodnight.
“I often sleep to the sound of music boxes on youtube.
I find music box tracks to be calming, like for example the music box versions of Studio Ghibli soundtracks, and my breathing gets as slow as the song that plays. I know it’s cheesy but it really helps me sleep. “
Thanks, mom!
“When I was 15, my mom, even though we weren’t financially well, bought me a pair of ice-skates for Christmas. My size was written on the ice skates, but it felt like 2 sizes smaller. I couldn’t hide it when I tried them. My mom was very upset and even angry. I told her I will go and change them to a bigger size.
However, when I went there was no bigger size left of those ice-skates. I returned home and pretended to be very happy and lied that I got my size. I never used them when I went ice-skating and just used rented ones.
That’s my secret that I never plan to reveal to her. She has always wished me all the best.”
Christmas is for everyone.
” My parents think that I bake three cakes for my friends every year before Christmas, but actually I make them and deliver to a homeless program called ‘dignified Christmas for all’ in my city.
My parents don’t believe in volunteer work and were never into it, so I never told them. “
Love for Lassie.
I had an imaginary friend that I talked to constantly, either in my head if I was around other people or out loud if I was alone, until I was in middle or high school. It was Lassie, the collie. I would imagine her always at my side, sharing in all the little joys and frustrations of my daily life. I would also imagine that she could communicate telepathically with me and we would have long conversations or joke about other people. Eventually, I realized I was getting older and should stop. I had to gradually wean myself off of the imaginings and I think I actually cried when I finally said goodbye to Lassie.
Devoting time to someone’s work.
I’m currently turning a dead fledgling attempt at a comic-based fanfic that I absorbed into my thought process (which was then subsequently corrupted by it and my other interests) when I was younger into a complete, fully fleshed-out piece of writing.
The weirdest part? It wasn’t mine. I was just that infatuated with the awful work of someone else, and once I remembered everything about a year ago, I thought “if you loved that so much, why don’t you go and do better?” So I chose to do just that, or at least try to. I’m learning a lot about what it takes to re-write something for new standards – so many things to cut, change, and add. I actually had to cut away a bunch of characters and the plots of different comics because they boiled down to gags, not things I could develop into individual characters and stories.
The reason I don’t feel comfortable telling this to people in person is because my involvements with the original work. That, and I live with nosy family members who probably wouldn’t shut up about my work if I told them about it.
Vintage collector.
I collect Furbies. I’m interested in their mechanics and I just like customizing them. I guess a lot of people would think it’s cringey or weird cause a lot of people think Furbies are creepy. I can kinda see it but they have an appeal to me, I think they’re cute.
It’s not a complete secret cause my family knows and supports it but I have a shelf of them in my closet that I just close when I have people from school coming over, I just don’t wanna become the Furby kid. Although I don’t really think my friends would care too much, it’s other people at school I’m more concerned about
A vicious creature.
For years, I felt personally responsible for turning the rooster my mom raised from a chick into a huge jerk who would chase after and try to attack anyone who made the mistake of walking through his yard without something to push him back with, like, a rake. We literally had to put up a sign that said, “Beware of Attack Rooster” because our propane tank was in the chicken pen, and he’d try to spur the propane guy every time he had to fill it. My whole family got into the habit of carrying around a big rake any time we had to walk through the yard, just in case we had to swat him away. That’s how persistent this rooster was. The odd thing is, we all put up with it. We had several people tell us that if their rooster was that mean, they’d have gotten rid of him a long time ago. But we couldn’t bring ourselves to do it. Our chickens were like pets, and when we fed them, this rooster who was a huge jerk 95% of the time would suddenly transform into a friendly, docile pushover. But as soon as you no longer had food in your hand, you had to watch your back.
Anyway, when this rooster was just a few months old, 10-year-old me, not knowing any better, would try to chase him and catch him. But one day I think I took it too far when I held him to the ground on his back for about a minute. I’d read somewhere that you can hypnotize a chicken by holding it down this way and moving your finger back and forth in a certain way above its head, and I wanted to try it. It didn’t work, and instead he ran away making freaked-out noises. Right around then is when we all started noticing behavioral changes, which were made worse when various people would tease him by running along the fence-line, where he’d follow you, running furiously and matching your exact speed, trying to get at you. I did end up getting spurred a few times (ouch), which necessitated tetanus shots, so that’s karma I guess. We all knew how he was, but I always secretly felt more responsible for turning him into a paranoid, violent little beast.
Sadly that magnificent bastard is no longer with us, as he gave his life heroically protecting his flock from a bear.
A helping hand.
My friends think I like throwing parties (like barbecues and sporting events on TV) and entertaining because I’m social. In reality I hate being social but I know that my husband and I are better off than a lot of our friends. Some are struggling to make ends meet, others have issues with homelessness and drugs, some don’t know when their next meal will be, some are just lonely, and some have no heat or air conditioning. We throw the parties because it’s a break for our friends. It gives them an evening where they can eat a home cooked meal and eat all they want, they can get out of the heat or cold, and for a few hours they don’t have to worry about their problems. The night doesn’t cost them anything and they leave with leftovers. We also put on a big camping trip each year because most of them can’t afford a vacation. They just bring a tent and their clothes. We provide all of the food, games, kitchen stuff, extra blankets and camping gear.
Dance like no one is watching.
I tell everyone I never dance and refuse to do it in public, but only because I always dance to music when I’m alone and know what I look like. This isn’t like an “Oh just be yourself and people will appreciate it” situation either. I have no rhythm and just sort of flail in directions like the kid in middle school with no prospects and nothing to lose.
Note: Comments have been edited for clarity.