Every family has its secrets and lies and history.
When COVID is over, If every family member everywhere got loaded at the next gathering, and decided to open the family's "Pandora's Box," a whole lot of trouble would be afoot.
There are dark tales, crimes and misdemeanors, and Dateline NBC level nonsense littered throughout all of our family tress.
Be grateful you don't know what you don't know.
Redditoru/llsuperninjallwanted to hear about what some of us have uncovered about our family "histories" by asking...
"What's the darkest secret you found out about a family member/relative?"
Every Sunday
"When I was a kid we went to my grandma’s house every Sunday and all of my uncles and aunts would be there. One day I noticed that one of my uncles didn’t show up anymore so I asked my family where he is. They told me that he wouldn’t be able to visit anymore because he moved away. years later I found out that he killed two women and they locked him up." ~ lizkeenhater
"supposedly"
"My mother 'supposedly' has a fraternal twin. My grandmother couldn't handle the thought of two kids so she gave the male child away to someone she knew that was moving away. In a drug induced rage one night my grandmother screamed at my mom that she kept the wrong child; it was never mentioned before or after that moment."
"My mom was roughly 12 at the time. She asked my great grandmother about it and she knew the boy's name but not where they moved to or who he was living with. My mom actually had met him once but didn't know who he actually was. My grandmother denies it ever happened and my grandfather felt that 'surely they'd have had to tell me.'"
"I doubt they would have though. When she was pregnant with me, my mom asked my great-grandmother what my middle name should be: my middle name is actually his middle name." ~ psychotrshman
The Punch
"Step father was cheating on mother. Didn't find out because he was caught cheating; found out because he and his mistress were drunk, got in a fight, and he punched her so hard that she fell over and died. Found out about the whole thing during the investigation, the trial, and the conviction. Was weird to have a lawyer want to call 12 year old me to a stand to defend the character of a man I already had very little interaction and a fear of, and that was before the manslaughter charge." ~ blazedanddefused
Evil
"My father tried to kill my mother while she was pregnant with me." ~ GloryGloryLater
Bye Mom
"Two years ago I found out that my Dad had a wife before my Mom and she died in a freak accident on their wedding night. She was sleep walking and fell to her death over the balcony if anyone was wondering. I know, I feel so bad for him. He slept through it and didn't find out until the cops arrived at his door. :("
"Now I understand why my Dad always worshipped my mother and caters to her every whim because she can be a little bit of a handful. Also my Mom said that when he introduced her to his old friends they were eerily extra super nice to her." ~ PookSpeak
Lessons Learned
"I found out that my grandfather’s first wife (before my grandma) died of botulism from eating some tomatoes she had canned at home. She could have been saved, but he refused to take her to the doctor because the botulism was her 'fault.' He let her die to teach her a lesson." ~ Filiaeagricola
Honeymoon Tales
"A few years before he passed, my dad and I had a long heart to heart, at the end of which, he told me he wasn’t the one to first sleep with my mom on their honeymoon. He caught her in bed with her cousin, with which she was had been in love for a long time. He spoke with their pastor, who told him to forgive and forget."
"That worked, until 6 years later, when he caught her again, with the same cousin. He told me he wanted to leave with me but ultimately decided to stay, because he wanted me to have a family. With all that happened in my childhood, and to him (workaholic, diabetes, heart attack), I wish he’d left and be happy instead." ~ Bassman1976
Unsolved Mysteries
"There is strong debate in our family as to whether my aunt fell out of the window of her flat, whether she jumped or was pushed. She survived, but with brain damage, and says she can't remember." ~ Smart-Connection6154
Don't Tell
"I found out from my dad that one of my cousins isn't related to anyone in the family. My aunt and her mother used to work at a hospital maternity ward and apparently a woman came in one day and gave birth to him and then left the next day without him. My aunt decided to adopt him, but a few months later the woman showed up again asking where he was. They both lied that he was given up and didn't have a clue where he was. They still haven't told my cousin anything." ~ Existed_
Painful Memories
"My dad told me that, before my mom and dad broke up, he hadn't been happy with her for several years. My mother even had a miscarriage at one point, which destroyed the both of them. But he couldn't leave her, because he was afraid that she would hurt or even kill herself. So his only thought was to have a kid with her, so that motherly instinct would hopefully prevent her from killing herself." ~ SnooDonuts5850
Uncle Richard
"A member of my family Richard Stainforth used to own the Otley Chevin pub. In Otley, Yorkshire, U.K. Anyways they fell on hard times so Uncle Richard decided, in his drunken stupor. That it would be a wise I'd to set a fire and claim the insurance money. His plan was to wait until my Auntie walked the dog across the moors one night and do it then. Anyhow it gets too said night, hasn't seen Auntie or dog in hours so lites the fire, upstairs in the flats."
"Uncle Richard assumed Auntie was out.. She wasnt. As the firebrigade finished putting out the fire they found my Auntie with dog. Deceased from smoke inhalation. I'd post a ref or link but still newish to reddit. [T &, A news article] (https://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/news/942108.amp/)." ~ stanny1387
The Kray twins
"My biological grandfather threatened to kill my grandmother while she was very young and pregnant with my uncle. (Long story short, he was engaged to someone else). My grandmother became a nervous wreck while pregnant and wouldn’t leave the house and he used to throw bricks through the window. Eventually she told some of her friends about what he’d threatened to do to her. Shortly after that he went missing, never to be seen or heard from again."
"We always kind of laughed and joked that one of her friends must have threatened him or ‘ran him out of town’. We would even go as far to say someone might have killed him for her. It wasn’t until we were going through her boxes of photos and ‘love letters’ we realised she was actually friends with the Kray twins." ~ blxndeandblue
Swamped
"My great uncle was murdered along with his wife, the murder suspect was run down and got stuck in a swamp, shot himself in the head. The strange particulars. My uncle, his wife, and the murderer were all deaf/mute. The murderer was renting a room from them. This happened in the 40's, and no one ever found the motive. A few years ago, I took a DNA test, and found that I had cousins who had descended from the murderers wife. Turns out my great uncle was cuckolding him." ~ _finalOctober_
The Doctor
"My Uncle didn’t have an aneurism stroke spontaneously. (Sorry, I’m not a Doctor). He deliberately stopped taking his blood thinners. Dude was 63 with a wife, four kids and 15 grandkids, the oldest of which was 13 and the youngest was not even a year. He was just done. His wife doesn’t know, his kids don’t know. I only know cause I overheard the family doctor telling my dad. As far as I know, only myself. The Doctor, and my dad know." ~ Phranquelyhnne
Getting away with it...
"I found out that my great-grandpa got away with murder. He thought that my great-grandma was cheating on him with her dentist so he went into his office and shot him. He got away with it too and they didn't find out that he did it until he told everybody before he died." ~ AlexGeekSpeak
Affairs
"Both of my mother's parent's had affairs without the others knowledge. My grandmother had Parkinson's and in one of her confused states she told my grandfather that she had an affair. Suffice to say my grandfather was not happy and put her in a home. He then started talking to my mother trying to figure out when it could have happened."
"He speculated that it happened around the same time he was having his affair, which was around 1966. My mother was shocked, she was born in 1967. So my mother may or may not be related to the man she believed to be her father." ~ Witchgirl2658
Australia
"My step-grandfather had a completely hidden life in Australia before he met my grandmother. He had a family and kids in Australia, and faked his death by driving his car off a cliff then moving to America. His kids thought he was dead until my grandmother found out about them and reached out years later. His son actually became a famous comedian over there, and from what I know has a joke he does at his shows about his father faking his death to disconnect from them." ~ ivydragons
Dinnertime
"A relative tried to poison one of their guests. Once I learned about it, it finally sealed the deal for me and forever changed my view on them. They were bonkers anyway but good lord that's too much." ~ VonFelder
Stories from Wartime
"I found out that my great grandpa wasn't actually my great grandpa because my great grandma had my grandma (her daughter) with a famous boxer who was extremely abusive. She divorced him after having kids with him and met my great grandpa while she was supervising the manufacturing of B-25 bombers during WW2. My mom and I are the only ones (besides my grandparents) that know the true story." ~ Pyrrhic_Void
Forensics...
"Found out that a great great uncle pretty much got away with murder. His wife turns up dead, and she had bruising around her neck. Criminal forensics wasn't to advanced back in the early 1900's. Don't know how they ruled how she died, but he remained free, and ended up marring her sister a couple months later." ~ eF240uKX52hp
