Warning: This post contains mentions of drug addiction and pregnancy loss.
Kids are wayyy more observant than people think. And sometimes, they discover family secrets their parents were keeping for quite some time.
So, the other day, redditor u/iLuvDILFSSSS asked the internet, "What is something you know about your parents that you shouldn’t know?" They spilled the truth, and some of these secrets are seriously messed up.
Here are some of the wildest and most heartbreaking ones:
1. "As a teenager, I moved in with my mom after not living with her for most of my life and fighting to be a part of hers. One night, I heard her and my stepdad talking about how the only reason they let me live there was for the tax credits and child support."
2. "As a kid, I saw an old family tree that showed my mom had three babies (all different dads) whom she gave up for adoption before meeting my dad. I didn’t say anything, and she didn’t admit it to me until about 10 years later."
3. "My mother and father had a deal that my father would get a job so my mom could finish college — and then, my mom would get a job so my dad could finish college. My father did his part, and when it was his time to go back to college, my mom and all her family humiliated him into going back to work."
"My brother and I aren't supposed to know this because we were too young, but I know."
4. "So my mom passed in 2020, but before she died, she spent at least 10 years trying to get my dad to divorce her. It wasn't just 'I don't love you anymore' type of stuff either. She would try and get a divorce or separated so that she could just be independent — but also get government handouts since she didn't qualify for SSID or disability while being married to my dad. The only reason she never went through with it herself is because she didn't want to be seen as the person who broke up their marriage; she specifically needed to be the victim in the situation and would come up with plan after plan after plan to try and get my dad on board."
"She even faked an affair the year before she died (she was bedbound, extremely sick, and disabled so it was an online 'affair'). When I was visiting that year, I went through her entire computer history and every social platform she used, and there was absolutely no one she was talking to; my mom was very bad at anything technological. She literally lied and faked an affair as a desperate plea to make my dad divorce her."
5. "For the first 16 years of my life, I thought that my father had died in an accident. Turns out, he just didn't care about me, and my mom was trying to make 4-year-old old me feel better because she didn't want me to think it was my fault. It really messed with me when I found out at 16 that my biological father was still out there somewhere."
6. "My parents escaped from Iraq during the worst period of the Saddam regime. As a kid, you don’t know what a war refugee is. I used to think my father worked at the welfare office. I found out years later that my father was going there for PTSD therapy."
"Having found his papers, I learned my father was tortured in prison for helping his students escape the country. My parents never ever ever talked about the stuff they went through. We grew up thinking we were a perfectly normal family."
7. "As a young kid, I overheard my parents screaming in another room about what age I was when my dad left us. Mom said 3 months. Dad said 3 years. I didn’t know he left at all."
"At least he came back?"
8. "My father never went to college. He worked as a mechanic for many, many years to put food on the table for my mother, sister, and me. It wasn't until recently when I was visiting his parents (my grandparents) and we were talking that I realized how much stress he was going through when I was a kid."
"As a kid, I always thought he was just an angry guy who would work all day, be pissed, and yell at at us for no reason. I didn't understand the long hours he was putting in or the stress it was putting him through. But especially now as I enter more serious full-time employment and adult life, I'm starting to appreciated him and his hard work, despite him never explicitly telling me. He's now got a very high position in a very large trucking company without a degree. I'm proud of him."
9. "My dad had a live-in girlfriend for 18 months before he divorced my mom. He was in the military and went on what he called an isolated tour overseas, where family wasn’t allowed. When he got back to the States, I met some folks who lived in the same apartment building as him in Turkey. They told me they really liked my mom, and it was a shame I couldn’t go with them. The thing is, I was in the US with my mom."
"I met the girlfriend a few months later, and she was the same age as my older sister. Needless to say, we didn’t get along."
10. "My mom didn't marry my dad because she was in love with him. She chose him when the man she was in love with told her he couldn't marry a woman who already had another man's child, and my dad had no problem with stepchildren. She did eventually fall in love with him, for what it's worth."
11. "My dad and stepmom are cousins."
12. "When my dad was in the Navy, he spent a short time in Australia — long enough to find a local woman to 'spend time with' a few times. After he shipped out, he got a letter from her saying she was pregnant, but not to worry because she was getting married to a local lad who would take care of her and the baby."
13. "I’m old. When the pill came out, women needed permission from their husbands before doctors would prescribe it. My mom was friends with a local family doctor and got him to prescribe it for her friends. Then they kept the pills at our house, so their husbands wouldn’t find out. Every morning, they’d stop by for 'coffee,' which was really just them coming to take the pill. My siblings and I wondered why so many neighbors stopped by every single day. We didn’t find out until years later when one thanked us for never telling their husband. A few questions later, and we knew what she meant. We immediately told our father, thinking he was going to be stunned. Nope. He was in on it the whole time."
"He cosigned mortgages and helped open bank accounts for divorced women they knew. Turns out our stay-at-home mom and workaholic dad were pretty badass, and we had no idea. Now it's not something we ~shouldn’t know~, but there was a time we were sitting on a huge secret but had no idea. We could have blown up a lot of lives just talking about someone stopping by 'for coffee' every day."
14. "My mom has no boundaries. Like, she will tell you about guys she’s been with, her relationship problems, etc. because she doesn’t understand that kids — and I was 14 MAYBE when she told me this — don’t need to know your nasty-ass business."
"Basically, 1) in her opinion, she’s good at head, and 2) my stepdad’s uncircumcised. Didn’t ask her either of those things."
15. "When I was a teenager, I found this like daily affirmation type thing my mom had written talking about how she knew her two miscarriages prior to me were in heaven. After she passed, I found an old journal, and one of the entries said how every day she says a prayer when she woke up still pregnant. I can't even imagine."
16. "My mom made me live with her parents while she was having a major depressive episode where she couldn’t care for me. I think at this time she and my dad were divorcing, and since I was, like, 1–2 she was having a postpartum depression. I was really young and don’t remember anything from this, but one time while my grandma was drunk, she told me — and I don’t think my mom knows that I know."
"I don't blame her, as I also suffer from depression and have those really hard days too. Thankfully, both me and her are in therapy and are taking medication, and she's here with us now. I love her to bits and try my best to show her that even though she had experienced many hard things in life, she still raised a good child."
17. "My dad cheated on my mom constantly and once gave her an STD. When she told him she had some kind of rash down there, he told her I will get the medicine the doctor gave him. He knew he had an STD — who knows who else he gave it to."
18. "When I was 16-ish, we were moving house and packing things up. We had moved to my parents' room and started cleaning. I opened a small box and found their adult toys. I did not need to know that. At all."
19. "I am the executor of my parents' will if they both die in an accident. Problem is I'm the youngest of five. In October 2021, my wife and I had to drive to a bar to pick them up; the waitress called me from my mom's phone and told me to pick them up or they are calling the cops. We got there, and my dad was trying to fight everybody, while my mom was just being a happy drunk. Off we went back to their place, and on the way home, they told me — well, they were drunk-talking about it."
"It’s bad because all my siblings are trashy and will lose their minds when they find out."
20. "My father died when I was young, and we moved around a lot after that. It was only when my grandfather was dying of cancer that I learned my mother had lost over $500K in casinos over a four-year period. She would always downsize a house to get more money, and my grandfather would always bail her out."
"He put the remainder of the money in a trust under my name for her so that she couldn’t do the same after he passed."
21. "My dad's cheating on my mom, and now, they're getting a divorce. I shouldn't have known about my dad cheating on my mom, but he yells too loud during their arguments."
22. "My dad was addicted to drugs when I was a baby/young kid and would drive us around while using. When I was a kid, he would 'go away' for 30 days at a time. I wasn’t a teen until I learned he was a user, and I honestly thought he just had 'business trips' despite working as a technician for the phone company."
"I also never knew he was married before my mom. I was going through pictures and happened to find his wedding pictures from his first marriage. He’s never spoken about it, but I can understand why they didn’t work out."
23. "My mother got pregnant at the age of 18 after three months of dating my dad. At the age of 21, poor and studying architecture, my father did his best to take care of his 'unexpected' new family; he got his degree, built his career as an architect, and they got pregnant two more times. I was the last child. After 25 years of marriage, my mother wanted to get a divorce. She wanted to explore life. The shocking part? She's always maintained this habit of writing down things, meaning she has several journals. When I was about 21 (already child of divorce), I snooped and found this entry of hers talking about how she lied to my father about contraception when she was 18 and got pregnant on purpose."
"She also wrote how lucky she was that my father made a lot of money throughout their marriage and how bummed she was that it was taking her so long to get her share of the divorce money. That information has been living rent-free in my mind for the past nine years, and it changed the way I see mom. I love her to death, but I definitely regret having snooped through her journals and coming across that specific piece of info. I don't know how to explain why it's painful to even think about it, but it just is. It's not my place to judge. I love my parents. My father has no idea as well."
24. "My mom told my dad that they would eat only one meal per day so that they could help us (me and my brother) finish our studies. It was during a period of war where I come from, and my father was retired. He had me when he was 50 years old."
"Today, my brother and I both have PhDs. I really hope that we could somehow reward the sacrifices they did for us."
25. "My dad was a standover man for a well-known criminal. There were also a few unexplained disappearances of people who may or may not have had something to do with my dad, but we moved a lot for Dad's 'work.'"
"A TV series was made about the guy my dad worked for. Years later, Dad made an off-the-cuff remark that they'll never find these so-called missing people."
26. "When I was around 19, I had dropped my phone and it shattered, so I was looking around and found my dad's old phone. He was 55 at the time. I didn’t think to wipe the phone and happened to go into his messages, where there were D pics he was sending out to other women besides my mom."
27. "My dad dated my grandma (my mom’s mom) first and then dumped her for my mom. Weird part is my grandma is my dad's age and my mom is 19 years younger. ALSO, my mom cheated on my dad and got pregnant with my brother; she lied to my dad about who the father was until my brother was 3 years old. Turns out, the biological dad was my dad's good friend and roommate."
"My mom also used to put Sun-In on my brother's hair so he looked blonde like my dad. Anyway, my dad didn’t care and adopted my brother, and he loves him like any father should. My mom left when I was 8, and my dad raised me and my brother ever since. Wild family, I know."
28. "My mom had multiple affairs when I was between 7 and 12 years old. She took me on overseas trips where we would go to different destinations, and she met a man at each one. She would tell me about these men as though they were really special and that I should look up to them."
"She said the meetings were work-related (she was a stats professor), but about 30 years later, after she died, I found a box of love letters from all of them, which clearly indicated she had sexual relationships with all of them."
And finally...
29. "My parents divorced when I was 3. My mother had custody of my sister and I, and she loved to verbally bash my father to us. She would tell us he never once paid child support. Life was hard for a long time. When I was 15, I was cleaning out a closet and found every child support check uncashed. She hated him so much that she refused to take his money."
"I cried and put them back. All I could think about was being about 5–6 and being so hungry. I have never asked either of them about it."
Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.