Reddit user Jacksparrow913 asked about secrets people can't tell their family members, and people had a lot to get off their chests. Here are 27 secrets people say they will take ot the grave.
1. "I'm the one who called the police on my little brother. [He was arrested for] possession, of illegal drugs, and the selling of them to minors. The minute I found this out, I called the police."
2. "My eldest brother, who is over 15 years older than me, is actually my half-brother. Aside from my parents, I'm the only one who knows. He's framed his entire life on the lineage of our father, who adopted him when he was one when he married my mother. He'll never know. He just had a baby this month, a little girl. Dad is already in love with his granddaughter. It'll be on my shoulders to tell him when my parents pass."
3. "I wish I married my ex instead of my current wife."
"I'm stuck as we have young kids so I'll stick it through for them and keep a happy face. My father wasn't around and it definitely messed me up as a kid. I'm very close to my kids and not having them around daily would kill me. Maybe when both are old, I'd consider it."
4. "That I’m a furry. If I came out as bi, they’d think the devil did something. Do you really think they’d respond nicely if I was also a furry?"
5. "My foot fetish stems from being introduced to foot play by a family member."
6. "I’m not too busy to visit my grandmother before she dies. I hate her and I’ll be happy when she kicks the bucket. I take a lot of joy knowing that I’ll probably never see her again. And when that blessed day comes, I’m not going to the funeral."
7. "I’m happy my older brother passed away. Yeah, I do get sad here and there, but he was always in and out of jail my entire life. When he was out, he wasn’t really around as he was chasing the next way to make quick cash. He became a junkie at the age of 38 and overdosed at the age of 43. Left behind four kids as well. ... There are no more worried phone calls from my mom and his kids asking if he’s back in jail, or where he is. When he was locked up, we really didn’t worry as we knew where he was. I can’t tell my mom that, even though she’s is pain from losing her first child, it just doesn’t hit me the same. I also get bitter towards her for always talking about it and my response is, 'he’s not suffering, looking for his next fix, and we know where he is now.' I love my brother and always have. But the weight that’s lifted off my shoulders feels amazing."
"I truly do feel for his kids though. They never got a chance to meet the awesome person he was before drugs and crime."
8. "My sister was murdered almost three years ago. ... Two weeks before her death she left me a voicemail saying she was scared to go home and needed to come live with me. We lived across the country from each other and she had a history of drug abuse. I thought she was trying to steal money again, and I had a newborn and didn't want that influence around. Then I heard the news. I could have helped her and stopped it from happening if I had just called her back and gotten her a plane ticket. I don't know if my mother would ever forgive me."
9. "I'm secretly hoping my grandparents pass soon. One has cancer and the other, dementia. Their quality of life is nonexistent. Both of them can't take care of themselves. Once they go, there will be so much less stress on my dad and his family. I've never seen my dad truly upset, and I've only seen him cry once. I've never seen grief affect him, and I'm scared to. He's always been the 'strong' one in my life."
10. "I'm contemplating on disappearing from my husband and family. Everyone in my life has been a negative force and has made me depressed for years. I've been saving money for the past three years and thinking about leaving a note and getting on a plane and disappearing to another country. I don't have children so I have nothing for me to stay here for."
11. "I didn't 'eat at work,' I just pretend that I did so my kids don't feel bad about eating when I'm too broke to afford enough food."
12. "I think my mother helped my dad end his life from a terminal situation."
13. "I got baptized when I was a baby and my father doesn’t know (he’s Muslim). My mom is Christian, and [when] she was mad at my father, she baptized me as revenge. I don’t know how to tell my father because I feel really bad about this and I didn’t choose it."
14. "That I am planning on my dad moving in with me once he is released from prison. My mom can’t find out beforehand she would lose it. Just keep saying I'm going to cross that bridge when I get there."
15. "I started an onlyfans to pay for my heart surgery when they think I’m just going to get a loan."
16. "I'm married and have been in a loving polyamorous relationship with another married woman for almost two years. My wife is also in a relationship with the same woman and her husband. Due to ALL of our religious upbringings, if either of our families or social circles found out about what really goes on with our 'best friends,' it would be a scandal at best, catastrophic at worst. We all love each other and spend most of our free time with one another but we have to keep a very significant chunk of our lives a closely guarded secret and it's hard."
17. "My GF is pregnant and going to keep it. My friends and family are all happy for me, but if I could choose, I would not want a child at this time. I love my independence and freedom and it feels like it's all being taken away from me."
18. "That all the invasive medical procedures I had during my childhood made me feel violated and that’s the reason I don’t enjoy any kind of physical contact. Lord only knows how I’ve managed to stay married for so long."
19. "That I stopped believing in Mormonism 15 years ago. I’d lose my marriage, my kids, and my whole social structure — and probably my job. I have to keep going along and make it 'look good' or I lose everything."
20. "I hate my brother-in-law to the point I can’t be around him. He's a sneaky manipulative loser who just uses people while picking up and dropping friends and family when they are useful. The amount of times I’ve had my fiancé crying on me about the latest trash things he's done to her, and then in the next breath, she is defending him. The amount of financial and mental abuse she’s put up from him but because he's the golden child the rest of the family won’t hear anything bad about him. So rather than making him cry in front of everyone and nuking the situation, I just stay away and make excuses not to attend family events."
21. "I would likely get cut off from a lot of my family if they found out I made videos on Pornhub."
22. "I've never told my parents how badly my ex-husband actually abused me, because my father would probably have killed him and ended up in prison for the rest of his life."
23. "That my dad had an affair when he died. Mom never found out and never will."
24. "That I genuinely don’t love them (my parents specifically). I just feel like there is no reason to owe a life debt to two people just because they brought you to this hellhole of a planet. I should be grateful that I’m here? I didn’t ask for this. It’s your fault that I’m here. You can’t pay for things because you gave yourselves a third person to take care of. Not my choice. You want me to give up my contentment to simp for a metaphysical deity that you believe in only because you were essentially indoctrinated into a legal cult as an easily impressionable child? No. I owe you few thousands of dollars that you don’t even want me to pay back. I can’t tell them this because I don’t like hurting people in general. They did nothing wrong to me, really, that’s just what I feel."
25. "I was a sugar baby — only for about a year — but it helped me move out and be on my own."
26. "I’ve always disliked my sister. She loves me and looks up to me and always wants to talk and be near me but I just don’t like her. It started with things like her telling people she grew up in an affluent part of New York when she did not. Or when my mom took her to get her first car and she took photos with my mom but then went to take photos in front of her friends house because it was nicer and posted those so people would think she lived in a better area. Or when I noticed she never shared holiday photos with our family and only shared holiday photos with her in-laws in them."
"Our mom was poor, she’s missing teeth, she doesn’t look like an elegant older lady from a Cialis commercial, but her MIL does and her sister in law is the typical Christian girl autumn instagram mom type. She’s embarrassed by her upbringing and by us, and I think she’s a terrible person for it."
27. Finally, let's end on one that's more positive/kinda cool. "I’ve been uploading music on all streaming platforms anonymously under an alias and have amassed over a half million streams in the first year on Spotify alone. Couple hundred thousand on others. I make underground rap/alternative music."
"I take judgement very to the heart which is why I have never told any friends or family, but it’s hard making up excuses of what I do with my time. Luckily we live in such an era where artists can stay anonymous and focus on what they make not who they are supposed to please in their circle."
What secret are you keeping from your family? Let us know in the comments below or via this anonymous form.
Submissions have been edited for length/clarity.