When I was a kid, the adults often told me that if a dog bit me, I would’ve to get 40 injections in my belly, supposedly to avoid rabies. Now I understand perfectly well that this was just a horror story for kids of that time, but back then, I developed a full-blown phobia of dogs, which I managed to completely get rid of only in my thirties.
As it turns out, adults often say things to children, seriously or jokingly, which then have a significant impact on them, one way or another shaping their outlook on life. So today’s selection of stories, made for you by Bored Panda, is dedicated to exactly these supposedly “harmless” lies ever heard from adults.
More info: Reddit
#1
“Mr. Yuck” lives in the cabinet under the kitchen sink, and if we were to ever open the cabinet, he would eat us. I was terrified of that cabinet for years.
Eventually I realized the household cleaners were all kept under the sink, hence “Mr. Yuck” to keep us away and safe lol
Edit: I had no idea it was a thing with a commercial and stickers! I just assumed my parents made it up themselves. Wild what Reddit comments can teach you lol.
Image credits: forgetfulkaiju
#2
My mother told me that eating until you feel very full stretched your stomach out, which is why you got that feeling. She said that if you kept doing that, you would get fatter and fatter as you continued to stretch your stomach out. I was terrified to even feel slightly full as a kid/adolescent and ate very small meals. Ended up badly anorexic. I’m almost 38 and still have an unhealthy relationship with food.
Image credits: yugogrl2000
#3
As a kid I had a small allowance of 5 bucks every week, the only thing I bought for myself was a video game once or twice a year, so I saved most of that money, but when my parents noticed how much I saved they always took it away. At first I believed they where saving it for later but eventually knew better. Not sure what kind of lesson they wanted to teach me, but I learned to burn the cash as soon as I got it or it’ll be taken away, it really messed me up once I became independent.
#4
My grandma went blind around when I was born. My dad used to tell me it was because she looked at me.
Image credits: anix421
#5
After my parents split up, my mom came to visit. We visited her at our uncle’s house, and at one point my dad went out for cigarettes and didn’t come back.
For 20+ years I thought my dad had abandoned us and didn’t come looking for us.
Turns out our mom kidnapped us and when our dad got back our uncle met him at the door with a shotgun and told him to leave.
Image credits: lameth
#6
“We beat you because we love you.” I used to hide my black and blue bruises under my school uniform at 8 yrs old. Perfect. Trauma and affection in one neat package. What a combo.
Image credits: ctrlaltdreamer
#7
Had a bad habit of chewing on my nails when i was in the 6th grade. Mom told me a “story” about a girl who chewed on her nails and accidentally swallowed a small piece. The nail continued to grow in her stomach until it poked through her stomach and cut her open from the inside and she had to have surgery.
Never chewed on my nails after that.
Image credits: mouseypink
#8
I was apparently not good at drying off after showers as a child. My mom told me that not drying between my toes could lead to gangrene. She just wanted to get me to dry off more thoroughly, but I was terrified of my toes getting infected and falling off for way too many years.
Image credits: elevenghosts
#9
Small one, but that it was illegal to turn the overhead light on in the car at night when someone was driving. To this day I get anxious when someone turns it on. And to this day, my mom swears she never told me that lol.
Image credits: that_sara
#10
Watched the news with my dad, the newsreader made a mistake I said to my dad what happens to the newsreader now he’s made a mistake? Afterwards my dad said they’ll take him out the back and shoot him. I was about 7 thought it was very harsh but accepted it.
Image credits: SaharaLeone
#11
My dad saying he could lift a car with 10 people in it. Also that he was secretly the hulk, but never transformed bc he was really good at controlling his anger. I remember the next day bragging about it to kids in my class and debating them the entire day about how it’s true and my dad wouldn’t lie.
Image credits: mrsoap105
#12
When I was 6, my dad told me that aliens came down to Earth using meteor showers as cover so they aren’t noticed on radar. I lived in the suburbs in Arizona, which has lots of cloudless skies and Dark Sky initiatives (laws designed to reduce light pollution). You basically can’t not see meteor showers when they’re happening (which is pretty regularly). That’s the start of my insomnia.
#13
Not parent but my older brother said he saw the Easter bunny come in to drop off the baskets, and described him as a 7 foot rabbit who walked on two feet upright, and his fur was purple. And that each step he took had no sound. It terrified me.
Image credits: mrsoap105
#14
When I was maybe 5 or 6, I remember my parents talking about something and my mom saying, “why don’t you go with your girlfriend?” I thought this was funny and so I turned to my dad, laughed and said, “Yeah, go with your girlfriend!” Well, when I was 11 or 12, my dad told me he cheated on my mom when I was 2. The woman became pregnant and turns out I have a half brother.
Edit: I forgot to add that when my mom was feeling jealous or angry, that’s when my mom would tell my dad to go with his gf, aka the woman he cheated on my mom with.
Image credits: sticky_chicken01
#15
If mum had gone out for the day and I was looking for her round the house, my dad used to tell me she’d had enough of us and gone to America to live with her brother. Wrecked my head.
Image credits: allywillow
#16
They told me my tortoise that I loved at 5 years old was stolen by a man who collected reptiles…
They sold her. They sold her while I was sleeping and let me believe that a man had stolen her from my garden.
#17
My parents told me Jewish people don’t own dogs and just let me and my brother assume it was some kind of strict religious rule so we wouldn’t keep asking for one. As such, long after I realized that was a lie, I still kind of avoided dogs and didn’t get one until i was in my 40’s, at which point I realized that dogs are the greatest thing ever and that I’d wasted many many years not having one in my life. I don’t know if that counts as being messed up, but it definitely makes me sad, cuz I missed out on a lot of awesome years with dogs.
Image credits: snaithbert
#18
Dad convinced me as a young child (like 4-5) that if you eat only one of two Reese’s cups and then put the pack in the freezer, you’ll get a second cup/fresh pack.
He spent a lot of extra money keeping that lie up for a bit until I got sick of Reese’s cups and didn’t eat one for nearly 20 years.
#19
When I was 5 I had several cavities that needed to be filled. Our family dentist allowed my mom to come back in the room with me, but them she said she had to go get a magazine and left. And didn’t come back. Still mad at mom for that, may she RIP.
I haven’t forgotten it, 63 years later.
Image credits: HollyB422
#20
My mom told me I was part black to avoid me growing up racist. I’m a Ginger, I got a lot of push back in school due to sharing said “fact”. Oh boy I was confident.
Image credits: CavemanSamu
#21
That when I was 14 I could get my teeth fixed. I think they hoped I would forget.
#22
Touching yourself will make u blind.
20/20 vision here.
Image credits: Calm_Collection_4414
#23
ONE DAY i walked home drunk from a friends house, and apparently couldn’t manage to unlock the door to the house, and started puking and passed out on the porch.
for years she told me she found me on the porch with a birthday cake on my lap.
later in life she told me she made that last part up, but for years i didn’t go to a couple stores that were on the route home cause i was scared i’d stolen a cake.
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Image credits: bendystrawboy
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