1. One of my old schoolmates lived with his mother in a single-parent household. The father wasn’t around because he was in a very peripatetic line of work and didn’t come home too often. Well, that was the official story.

The actual truth, as known by parents and the school, was a long prison sentence for some kind of serious fraud, embezzlement, false accounting, etc., and the mother put her family back under her maiden name, so nobody would make the connection. He’s out now, although I’ve never met him.

2. My best friend and his wife had been trying for years to have a second child, with no luck. Then one day, he found out his wife didn’t want a second child and had been secretly taking birth control.

3. My father’s ex-wife, with whom we lived for seven years (I was 14 when they separated), stole my father’s key (they separated and tried to have a relationship but lived apart) and had it for half a year. Apparently, she used to enter the apartment when we weren’t home or when we were sleeping.

We found out one night when dad couldn’t sleep and caught her unlocking the door.

4. I found out that my dad still takes his ex-girlfriend (from when he was 16–22 years old) out to dinner when he travels to his hometown to visit his dad. He still calls her Junebug, his pet name from when they dated… And he has never told my mom.

5. I found out my grandfather had an affair, which produced a kid, while my grandmother was pregnant back in 1926. Also, one of my brothers has two kids no one else knows about. Everyone knows of the six kids he has now (two with his ex, two with his wife, and her two from a previous marriage). No one knows there are two more that live in our same town, somewhere. I know of them, but not who they are or who their mother is.

6. When my grandma was in her 90s, she started showing early signs of dementia. One day, I was just hanging out with her, and then she randomly told me that her husband wasn’t related to his mom. Apparently, his mom was seeking for a son in China, and someone in the village was selling their son for a bag of rice…

7. I found out my mom had an affair with our downstairs neighbor while they were both married. The neighbor is around 20 years her senior as well.

8. I’m in my early 20s, and I found out earlier this year that I have a half-brother who is 10 years older than me. My mom put him up for adoption when he was born because of her parents.
When I was young, she said that she tried to get in contact with him, but his adoptive parents wanted nothing to do with her.

It kind of slipped out when my dad had a little too much to drink, and my mom was extremely upset. I don’t think she ever would have told me. I might even be an aunt at this point!

9. Just a few weeks back, I found out from my mom that I had an aborted sibling and was almost aborted myself. My dad had told her to, and she felt incredible guilt over it and couldn’t do it again to me.

10. I found out while my parents were married that my dad had a girlfriend after finding a Valentine’s Day card for him from his then-girlfriend, now-wife. A few years later, I found out via her Facebook that they were engaged (having never met her), and then I found out via my aunt’s Facebook that they were married, still without her existence being acknowledged to me by my dad.

11. My now ex, it happened last month, faked having cancer for a year… there are a lot of details I won’t get into, but she made me and all my friends believe she was close to dying for a while… I’m still getting over it.

12. I went to an international school in Asia that attracted a lot of kids with very wealthy parents, most of whom would get dropped off by their chauffeur in a brand-new Mercedes. I had a scholarship, and we were working class. I never understood why my mom would take me to school at 6 am before anyone else was even there and park the car miles away behind this big tree.

She’d just tell me it was good to exercise before school. Years later, I found out she was embarrassed about our little Mitsubishi and didn’t want the other kids to pick on me if they saw we were pretty poor in comparison. What are your thoughts on this? Do you have any recollections about past events?