Sometimes you do something you regret so much that you just can't share it. Sometimes you learn something about someone else that's just better left unsaid. Sometimes silence is the best recourse. Maybe it's because you're embarrassed, or guilty, or you just don't want to deal with the hassle. Whatever the reason, we've all been there.
Fortunately, we live in the era of the internet. If you don't feel like sharing with family or friends or therapists, you can always go online an anonymously get some stuff off your chest.
That's exactly what these folks decided to do. These are people from around the world confessing the secrets they will otherwise take to their graves.
50. Secretly rich
I won the lottery the day after my 18th birthday. I won’t state how much, but I live in a state where you an claim anonymously. I haven’t told anyone and haven’t made any lifestyle changes. I do have a heck of a retirement fund and investment portfolio. The only reason I bring this up now is people are just starting to put the pieces together. Not sure if I will end up telling my family, but I can’t risk word getting out, as my sister has a huge mouth.
49. You pay for your lie in other ways
When I was a kid I shot a metal dog bowl with a BB gun, it ricocheted into my dad's sliding glass door. Bullet hole, spiderwebbed glass, I panicked. I picked up a piece of gravel, rubbed it into the bullet hole then placed the piece of gravel near the door. I then started up the lawnmower, mowed part of the back yard and intentionally mowed the grass too short. I told my dad I must have hit a rock while mowing. BB gun didn’t get taken away, which was great.
But ten years later I'm an actual landscaper and my dad pays me to cut his grass. My stepmom makes me check for rocks before I mow, there aren’t ever any. It’s the lie that won’t go away.
45. One e-mail can change anything
44. Happy graduation
I forged my high school transcripts to get into university. I can't even think about the consequences to my actions if anyone were to ever find out. I'm 3 weeks shy of graduating with a degree in biology.
43. Invasion of privacy with a happy ending
I once helped out my a female friend's family by taking care of their cat for a week. Every day for a week, I would go over there and snoop around their house. I found my friend's diary, and proceeded to read the entire thing. I used this information to get her to like me, and she is currently my wife.
42. I literally don't see color
I have been pretending to be colorblind to everyone I have ever known, including my own parents since I was in 3rd grade. I am now 28 years old. I even convinced an optometrist of it.
41. Potential father
There is a super high possibility that I have a child. A girl I was with, who turned out to be emotionally manipulative, lied about being on birth control. The times line up almost too good and the kid looks kind of like me. Since then she has been married and her and her husband seem happy together so I've never worried about it.
40. How can you be both the alibi and the culprit?
39. Open secrets
38. You're not supposed to sell your children
37. Grandpa finally gets the "credit"
36. Not a place anyone wants to die
35. There are worse things you could do to a sock
34. Why I crashed my car
33. The crying game
32. Broken bed, broken family
31. The will to live
30. How did your mom not notice you were pregnant?!
29. Rewarded for stealing
28. Yeah, I think you should have talked about this one
27. He's better off not knowing
26. "They aren't human"
25. Here's a wholesome one
24. A grave offence
23. The worst time to be locked out of your car
22. Everyone needs love
21. Family matters
20. Building a mystery
19. Living a double life
18. Money for nothing
17. I'm sorry, you don't deserve your wife
16. Spoiler alert: I don't care
15. Sometimes it's easier to leave than tell the truth
14. Bullying the bully
13. Between the sheets
12. Pretending to go to college
11. Secret baby
10. I'm not who I say I am
I've been living under false identities and have been for a period of time that is over 15 years but under 25. I won't go in depth with specifics, but due to a traumatic childhood, I had to cut ties one day with my entire life. The longest I have spent as one identity since then is about 6 years.
I have a home, a marriage, and a job. Legally, this isn't exactly secure. I'm guaranteed to one day lose everything and face serious consequences if I am found or found out.
9. You have to do what you have to do
8. Secret good cop
7. You live the lie
6. Fake cakes
5. Kids will do anything for attention
4. A nonviolent way to get back at a bully
3. My secret bunker
Two and a half years ago I was in dire financial straights, so I sold my home to keep my struggling business afloat. I neglected to tell the owners that they have an 800 sq. ft. bunker on the property that I built about seven years ago. The bunker that I've called home since I sold it. The entrance to it is well-hidden, but I still come and go very early/very late in the day.
I'm a single man who keeps to himself. I'm now in a situation where I could move somewhere else, but I love this hidden paradise so much.
2. "My whole professional life is built on a lie"
My whole professional life is built on a lie and it's about ready to come down.
When I was 22 I was in a bad way -- halfway through my bachelor's degree, but with a building addiction to pills and some mental health issues.
Summer of that year I was in a bad car accident -- in addition to broken bones throughout my body, my head went through the window and my face received severe lacerations that required hundreds of stitches to close and left me looking very rough. As tough as that was to deal with, I also now know that I sustained a traumatic brain injury that left me very confused, angry, and overwhelmed by life in general.
I wanted to keep up appearances, so after taking three months off to recover I tried to go back to school. Within the first week I knew I couldn't handle it. Too many questions about what happened, too much anxiety, and I had lost pretty much all my coping skills. When I got overwhelmed (which happened often), I would feel sick and scared and literally forget where I was and what I was doing. It was frightening and embarrassing, especially for someone like me who had always had high expectations placed on my shoulders by those around me.
I had lost pretty much all my friends at this point, and in my mental state, I thought that those who remained would abandon me if they knew how much I was struggling.
So, I told everyone that it was going great. Every day I would I leave the house for six hours and drive. Sometimes I would stop in a parking lot, sometimes I would just keep driving all day. I would find cheap used textbooks at college bookstores so that I could bring them home and "study." I created elaborate lies about my classes and my professors in order to have stories to tell when people asked how it was going.
I kept telling myself that I was just doing this until my brain worked again, and that next quarter I would go back for real when I could actually handle it. Problem is, things just kept getting worse, and as time went on I became less able to get back on track.
This went on for 2.5 years, until I was supposed to be graduating. So I lied about that too. I forged transcripts and came up with stories of why I didn't want to work in the field of my degree and hoped to move past it. I got a labor job and slowly found things working themselves out as my brain chemistry improved and steady work kept me from completely destroying myself.
Eventually I had to move. For the first time in over a decade, I was finally free of my addiction and starting to feel part of the world again, but I was still carrying the lie of my college degree. I volunteered in some places related to that field and they really liked me.
They liked me so much, in fact that they hired me on an emergency basis (no transcripts required) and I've worked there ever since. Now, three years into my sobriety and seemingly a lifetime removed from the pain of those years, they want to promote me to a career-level job that I would absolutely love.
I'm so good at what I do and it brings me so much joy, but this promotion would come with scrutiny and background checks that I know I can't stand up to.
When I was so depressed, I honestly didn't think I'd even live this long, so while I knew that my lies could create this situation, I never prepared for it. Worse than losing this job would be having everyone around me find out what happened, so I am at a point now where I have to quit what I love because they like me too much.
I plan to go back to school for real and I think I'll do well, but the shame and regret of this situation is something I don't think I'll ever shake.
1. Fake injury, real success
In 2009 I was working a dead end job, living pay cheque to pay cheque, and my then girlfriend (now-wife) and I were constantly struggling with the stress of financial difficulty and I could never get a job in a industry I wanted to work in.
Fast forward to Easter 2009, I was sitting in the passenger seat of our little car, while my wife was driving. We got T-boned on the passenger side, that crumpled the entire side of the car and banged me up pretty good.
I managed to get out of the car check on my wife who was fine, I started to feel a minor throbbing in my leg, but quickly composed myself and ran over to check on the other driver, he was fine (it was a big truck) but he was mad he hit us and immediately admitted blame (it was pretty clear since he ran a red).
So we sort out the towing exchange information and I go home. That night I get a frantic call from my brother, he always calls asking for help, I don't even remember what it was for, but I was like "Look man, we were just in a bad car accident, and my leg is really feeling messed up, I can't help you." My brother was totally stunned and told me that I need to go to the doctor. I was mostly exaggerating, my leg was just bruised up and I didn't want to go out and lend a hand.
Next day my leg is a bit stiff and I started to feel a bit lazy, so I called into work saying I'm having trouble standing up after the accident. They say no worries, work from home and take it easy. So I do, I spend the day playing WoW and eating old chinese food.
My girlfriend came home and I was really just feeling lazy and I make this big scene of not being able to walk easily to help out. She immediately takes me to the doctor, and despite protesting they send me off for x-rays. Which while they are waiting, the nurse suggests that I start looking into a lawyer since this was a MVC.
I don't know what I was thinking, but I just went along with it, and started faking this injury, the x-rays came back negative for any breaks but there was a possibility of a dislocation that righted itself, so I just said, yeah I think there was a sharp pain during the impact. Anyways, I went on short-term disability, my gf was forced to carry the weight, I went on long-term disability and started going through physical therapy, which I faked my way through.
Now, fast forward 12 months, I'm done faking I've "recovered" from my injury I'm at a party with some friends who introduce me to this guy who heard my story and my "struggles" he was so impressed by my perseverance he offered me a salary job, nothing crazy something like 45k a year but when you've been working retail, it's huge. Then came a settlement, that was worth over 90k which my gf and I used to buy our first house.
Fast forward 4 years, I'm extremely successful making over 100k (with commissions), been promoted multiple times and got married and literally owe it all to being a lazy bum who faked a sick day following a car accident so he could pvp in WoW all day. My entire life is based around a single lie, but even to this day sometimes I get out things say my leg is acting up.