Parents have to keep certain things from their kids while they’re growing up, for the greater good. And some of those secrets they can’t even know when they’ve fully grown up.
Below are secrets parents share that their kids may never know, as told on AskReddit. Check them out. A source to even more can be found on the last page.
I used to play mini games to win coins on their Club Penguin before they shut it down. They think it’s some kind of glitch with the game. I like the dancing one and the tobogganing ones the best. But those are also pretty much the only two I can consistently find. I always get lost. But I’m pretty good at those ones and can win some coins.
Barazway
My dad died in 2013. It was a depressing and bizarre situation. About a month afterwards, my older brother just casually blurts out that before my dad married my mum, he had a whole other family. A wife and three kids. And I never knew any of it. Neither did my younger brother. It’s not like they were keeping it from us, I just never knew. I still have no idea who they are or where they are.
TocTheElder
My nephew is 13 now, going on 14 in high school. His father was in jail for a year for possession, and his mother starred in adult films.
justhereforthekarmas
I’m not a parent. But my parents grew plants. We had an incubator room. They were allegedly tomato plants. We actually did grow tomatoes, and the plants are surprisingly similar, to a point. At the time, I just dealt with the plants, had no idea.
calcaneus
I’m not my daughter’s biological father. Her bio father has never been around. I did meet her till she was three. As far as she knows I’m dad. Eventually she’ll learn her birthday and our wedding anniversary and connect the dots. Being a dad has made me the happiest man alive.
bigredm88
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Speaking as the child here, but I found out that my dad killed someone in self defense when he was young. My mom told me, blurted it out even though I was never supposed to know. Dad doesn’t know that I know. I really want to ask him about it, but at the same time I don’t. I tried googling and I found his prisoner number but the records were expunged after he turned his life around. It doesn’t scare me; I remember thinking at the time that I know he would do anything to protect us, even if that meant killing an attacker. It’s just so weird because my dad is the most mellow, calm and wonderful person in the world. I love him so much. But I know when he was young he had a really rough life. I think about it a lot.
deathro_tull
I smoke my kid’s candy all the time.
Parent tax.
a-r-c
Don’t have children but I have students. Here’s an unspoken result of public schooling. If you are a B or C student, you will be overlooked most of the time. A students get my attention because I use them for pacing. D and F students get my attention because I don’t want them to fail and I don’t want to see them next year. They can also be a real pain in the ass. If you are a B or C student, you are not my concern.
iforgetredditpsswrds
They can’t even IMAGINE my past. I now live in a middle class bubble with my husband and my children…but I grew up in a poverty stricken area with very few opportunities. I lived on a travellers community for some time in my late teens, then in squats in London during the early 90’s.
BottledApple
My husband and I play Battlefield together for hours when my son goes to bed. We strictly limit his video game time these days as he was getting pretty addicted to gaming. It was affecting his grades at school, so we pulled the pin for a few months before allowing him an hour or two on the weekends.
someboooooodeh
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Found out my mom used to work at a Playboy Club when she was younger. There she met a Hell’s Angel who she dated for a few years. She got arrested once. And it all came to an end when he asked my mom to marry him, mom said no. None of this my mom knows I know. Found out bits and pieces when my dad would blurt something out or I would eavesdrop as a kid.
angel-acid
I’m the child in this one, though I’m 55. Father passed away 20 years ago. Mom is 83. Last year I went on Ancestry.com and found out my dad was married twice before he married my mom. Have no idea if she knows and can’t bring myself to ask.
nwvoyager
As the kid: I found out when I was about 20 that after my brother and sister were born, mum wanted another child built dad didn’t because he got the son he wanted. So she went off the pill and didn’t tell him. It actually explains a huge amount about our relationship (brother is the favourite, sister and I were largely ignored and could never do anything right).
stueh
That I had been married (and divorced) before I met their mum. It’s a part of my life they don’t need to know just yet. I’ll tell them when they’re older and mature enough to understand.
jrsau1275
I’m a child. When I was 5, I remember visiting my dad in a place where there were other men. I was never sure what it was, my parents said it was a hospital so that’s what I grew up thinking. When I was 15, I found my dads criminal record and it said he went to prison. That place they called hospital was really prison.
xxnostalgiadolphinxx
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I just learned my dad is trans. Got all the way to university, had no frickin idea. My parents were divorced and seemed to hold back a lot. My dad would go out on weekends to “drink wine with some work buddies.” Turned out the divorce was related to my father being trans, and his going out was finally dressing as who SHE was with the few friends who knew. My father has been there for everything and of course I accept them.
oetzii
My parents got divorced when I was 3. I don’t remember it very well other than them yelling at each other a lot. Many years later my father was upset about something and told me the reason they got a divorce was because my mother was cheating on him with my now step-dad who lived on the floor above them. That sucks. It doesn’t really change my view of my mom because she was always very loving and is a great person. But it’s an interesting view into her life that I’ve never talked about with her. I’m 40 now and everyone is pretty happy. I don’t see any point in bringing it up.
bg-j38
We had a dog that we did not give the attention it deserved, so one day he “followed our neighbor’s dog” into the road and got hit, conveniently when no one was home. Two years later at a new friend’s house, I meet his dog, which looked just like my old dog. It even had on the exact same collar. What. A. Coincidence.
weeds96
My parents split up when I was about 6 months old. As I grew up, I’d question why. My dad always said there were money issues. My mom always said they weren’t meant to be.
Finally, when I was about 21, I overheard my aunt telling my girlfriend the truth: while my mom was a few months pregnant with me, my dad walked in on her and another guy doing it. They were engaged at this point. They decided they were going to try making it work after this incident for my sake. Obviously, that didn’t last much longer.
Neither of them know I know the truth. My mom is married to the guy she cheated on my dad with. My dad now has three sons with three different women and seemingly can’t find happiness. I love my step-dad, so I’m not upset about anything, but I feel terrible for my dad.
Thats2Easy4Me
I’m pretty sure my Dad visits sex workers. I’m the only one who knows, and I have literally no idea what to do with the information, or how to process it.
I know because I snooped where I shouldn’t snoop – curiosity killed the cat and all that.
lyingsupine
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My children have no idea that we are poor.
We rent an okay-sized house for our family away from the poor, more dangerous part of town.
We often are very low on food, but our kids think we haven’t had time to get to the store yet.
Our utilities, phone, etc are shut off nearly every month, but we blame outages.
We also do not completely hold back their childhood. We still do things and go places that are fun, often free or obtained through connections.
We are facing eviction now, and if/when we move, it will be harder to gloss over. But in the meantime, our children have almost no idea that we are very poor and scraping by day to day.
RobinLep8H
I spent two years in prison, got released, and had full custody of my four year old (then 3) a couple of months later. I was a bad drug addict when he was born, and one of the things I had done caught up to me. When I got clean, I became a new man, spent every day of those two years planning my new life.
At the same time, his mother fell down a black hole. She was the shy, quiet girl who I couldn’t get to drink some vodka with me. When I got home she was a negligent stripper, with various older ‘sugar daddies’ supporting her while abusing my son both emotionally and physically.
Before I even went home on my release date, I spent two hours in court filing papers just for visitation, as she wouldn’t voluntarily allow me to see my son. Once I was approved by a judge and saw what was going on, it didn’t take much to persuade that same judge to let him live with me, although I came ready with character statements from my parole officer, and employer.
This was a little over a year ago, and his mother is slowly coming back into the picture. She seems to be making positive progress, and I know as well as the next guy how important a second chance can be. It’s honestly the hardest thing I’ve had to do, knowing what has happened in the past. But it’s necessary in my mind. I won’t be the reason my son doesn’t have a mother. I’ve cried myself to sleep so many times because I simply don’t know what’s right.
I’ve even lost the respect of the judge after I went from demanding her not be around him while the judge gave her visitation, to then coming back a month later to tell him she was doing a fine job during the couple of hours each Saturday he gave her with our son. It seemed as if he believes I should either be all against her, or all for her, with a never changing opinion. The way I look at it, I walk into his court room and tell him the truth. If the truth is positive for my sons mother, absolutely great. If it’s negative, so be it, I can take care of him myself (with family support of course)
I will never let my son know what his mother allowed happen to him, it’s simply not my place. I’m here to keep him safe and as happy as possible, and I swear on my life I try every damned day to ensure this. I hope she does well, and I never have to answer why she isn’t around. If I do, I honestly don’t know what I’d say…
One day, however, I will most likely tell him my story. If it can be of use to him, I will let him know how drugs affected me. I’m not too eager for this, and will only tell him if it’s relevant, but for now, those are my secrets. Life has been a crazy 23 years for me so far.
delancey517
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I’m the kid, but I recently asked my mom why my parents got divorced 11 years ago when I was 13. She said the final straw was when my dad was threatening her. He said that if she left him he would let our whole town/community think it was her fault that their marriage was broken. He threatened buying a gun and said it was just so my brother could learn how to shoot a gun, but it was just to be threatening. She said she still doesn’t know what he meant to do with that gun, but he never did end up buying it. They ended up splitting up and my dad lived in our basement while we sold the house. I’m 24 now and have a great relationship with both my mom and dad.
For 11 years, I never asked. I always assumed it was just because they didn’t get along well, because they didn’t. But I had NO idea this was going on. It was a shock for me, I mean I didn’t know what to think. She told me my dad is diagnosed bipolar and this happened when he was at his worst and not medicated. I could NEVER imagine him doing something like that, still to this day. He’s never been abusive towards me or my siblings. It was a huge secret.
ogrunner
Found out a secret my parents were keeping from us. About 5 years ago I started figuring out why my parents would go out ALL THE TIME at night and wouldn’t come back till about 3am. They always told me that they were hanging out with friends and going to see late night shows in the city. I was about 18 at the time and didn’t think much of it. Then one day my mom had a “close friend” come over to hang out. Which I thought was weird because I’ve never seen this dude before. Turns out my parents were swingers and they been trying to hide it from us as long as they could lol. They finally told us about it 2 years ago. Turns out my dad was gay and had been seeing another guy for awhile. It was really hard for him to tell us cause I could see it in his eyes he didn’t want to disappoint us but we didn’t care. As long as they were happy I didn’t care what they did. Then my dad passed away a few months later due to an ATV accident. My mom ended up marrying the guy she was seeing. He helped us out a bunch and is an alright guy.
oCaLLMeSkiLLz