What family secret was finally spilled in your family?

[reecejackox]

I would say that my grandfather ran off before I was born.

 

[fla4fun]

One of my aunts had a child while in college that she put up for adoption. It was about 50 years later when it all came out, although she had told her husband before they got married. No one else in the family knew until the child was searching for their parents.

 

[Piglet843]

I was 12 ish when my Aunt was talking to another lady at church about my older sister that had been stillborn. I went 12 years without knowing I had an older sister. I asked my mom about it - I wanted to know more! My mom was livid at that Aunt for saying that around me - and she hasn't talked about it since - I am nearly 40 now ... wish I knew at least her name.

 

[VandVsmama]

That my mom was conceived out of wedlock.

That my grandfather was *this* close to leaving the country & leaving my grandmother high and dry, knocked up, when he found out she was pregnant.

That my grandfather's best friend shamed him into marrying my grandmother.

That same grandfather was gay.

That my aunt had a baby who she'd given up for adoption.

That the GPs mentioned above offered to adopt aunt's baby and raise him as their own, but my aunt said, "No way in heck am I going to let you screw up another kid's life."

That my aunt was madly in love with a guy, who asked her to marry him and everything, and that my GPs said no, refused to let her marry him because he was Catholic (they were Protestant). And that aunt went along with my GPs wishes/demands, even though at that point, she was living on her own and out of the house.

It's enough to make for a good Dr. Phil or Oprah episode.

 

[Owlpost23]

That my maternal grandfather was a grand dragon in the kkk.Swell.

 

[JLTraveling]

That my grandmother was a pretty wild teenager. That she lied about her age to marry my grandfather. And that she lied to him about who she voted for in two consecutive presidential elections.

Maybe not noteworthy for most people, but Grandma was known for her prim, proper, and deeply conservative ways.

 

[PezRuth]

I was 12 ish when my Aunt was talking to another lady at church about my older sister that had been stillborn. I went 12 years without knowing I had an older sister. I asked my mom about it - I wanted to know more! My mom was livid at that Aunt for saying that around me - and she hasn't talked about it since - I am nearly 40 now ... wish I knew at least her name.

That is very hard. My oldest is 10. My youngest is 5. In between the two of them, I had a still born daughter. I have told my oldest and she does know. Specifically because I don't want this situation to happen with her. But I will say it is a very difficult subject and not one that I talk about. I have told my daughter that she can ask me questions if she has them but I have told her that it is very hard to talk about.

 

[RogueX]

That my maternal grandfather, who I had only met once, was a pedophile. He was caught twice and he had a criminal record because of it, but his parents used some serious political connections to get his record sealed.

My dad let it spill years ago that my mom cheated on him with his best friend.

 

[Piglet843]

That is very hard. My oldest is 10. My youngest is 5. In between the two of them, I had a still born daughter. I have told my oldest and she does know. Specifically because I don't want this situation to happen with her. But I will say it is a very difficult subject and not one that I talk about. I have told my daughter that she can ask me questions if she has them but I have told her that it is very hard to talk about.

Thank you for your insight - as a parent now I do understand more about why she wouldn't want to discuss it.
I've never asked her again either - don't plan on it...

 

[BlueStarryHat]

That my great-grandmother ran a "boardinghouse" where my grandfather spent his youth, and was arrested several times for running this "boardinghouse." I always knew she had been a floozy when a younger woman; was a good time flapper who made bathtub gin, but I discovered her arrest record while doing geneology. Her last arrest was for corrupting the morals of a minor, my grandfather and his older brother. Apparently she gave up the "boardinghouse" in order to not lose custody of them.

Man, I loved her. She was a pistol, even as an old lady.

 

[tvguy]

My dad's father died when he was 10. The obit said it was from ptomaine poisoning from eating spoiled canned food. 95 years later my daughter got the death certificate and he actually died from cirrhosis of the liver from alcohol abuse.
My dad's mother died 7 months later. The obit said she died from grief after the death of her husband. The death certificate says she committed suicide by shooting her self. Apparently my then 11 year old dad found her. He never spoke of it in his life time.

 

[Kellykins1218]

I knew my dad had a 1st wife but didn't know my mom had been married before until I was a teenager and looking at our baby books. My brother had a different last name in his.

 

[tazdev3225]

My grandparents weren't legally married until a year or two before my grandfather died. My grandmother had married when she was 16 or so and had a baby that would have been my dad's older brother. The baby died when he was about 6 months old. I don't know why my grandparents never legally married as I do think she was divorced, but my great grandmother (grandfathers side) was a devout Catholic so maybe that had something to do with it.

I also found out doing ancestry that my same grandmother's brother was shot to death by the police during a hold-up. No one knows if he was a part of the gang or a bystander. I didn't even know he existed before that.

 

[Wakey]

My grandmother wasn’t really my maternal grandmother.

My real maternal grandmother had dropped my mother as a baby down the concrete house stairs nearly killing her, causing her severe brain injuries, this causing my mother as baby to nearly lose her life and she was seriously ill in hospital.

This pushed my real grandmother who was suffering severe post natal depression over the edge and she took her own life, to be found by my grandfather. Unfortunately post natal depression was not recognised in 1946.

My mother recovered although she struggled at school. I always thought it odd that she is very bright in a common sense way, and can read no issue, but struggles to spell the most basic of words.

She recently had a scan for a sinus issue and the doctor called her in, to tell her the scan had detected massive brain injury. This wasn’t in any medical records as they didn’t exist then in 1946 as there was no joined up health service in the UK then. The doctor as you can imagine was shocked. This brain injury dates back to her being a baby and this incident 77 years ago- but she’s lived a very successful life.

Anyway, my grandfather remarried and this was my grandma. My mother said my grandma loved me so much when I was born she thought I’d think differently about her if me and my brother knew she was not our ‘real’ grandmother. We were very close. We did love her very much.

So all this was kept secret from us until after she died and one day my mother just told me the story when I was 15. It came as a shock as you can imagine, as I knew nothing about this, neither did my brother when he was told.

I think it was a big mistake not to tell us, as I think if we’d being brought up from being young knowing the story we would have thought no different of our grandma. We don’t now and I still miss her 35 years after she died.

 

[DisneyOma]

I found 3 first cousins on ancestry.com from DNA testing. One is from an uncle who went out to California with one woman, got her pregnant, they broke up and they put the baby up for adoption. He came back home with another woman. The other two are from an uncle who drowned at a young age (20) but not before he fathered 2 kids with his best friend's mother! And he drowned while canoeing with the woman's husband. Very suspicious.

 

[r1lissa]

My husband's grandfather fathered a child while overseas for war. At the same time, my husband's grandmother got pregnant (by a man she refused to name) and put the baby up for adoption. The grandfather and grandmother weren't married yet, but were a couple. They married when he returned from war. No one knew about his child until she showed up one day decades later.

 

[beanjean]

My mom gave up my younger brother for adoption and never told us kids

 

[Jen414]

My great-aunt was really my great-grandmother which means my great-grandmother is really my great-great grandmother. I thought I was my mother's oldest child. I am not. Found that out about 30 years ago when her first daughter found her. My father always knew (as of course did my grandparents and one aunt and apparently most of my mother's cousins.)

 

[crazymomof4]

This happened in the "Old Country" 1936 Europe. My father was conceived out of wedlock. His paternal grandmother attended the birth. She wanted to kill my dad right after the delivery, because his conception "brought shame to the family.". Paternal grandfather stopped her.

 

[Nabas]

I requested and received a copy of my grandfather's pre-WW1 Navy records and found out he was treated for VD.