People Share the Juiciest Family Secrets They're Not Supposed to Know

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Emmy Pratt • Senior Editor
Jul 23, 2023 5:00 PM EDT

Family secrets can range from being horribly painful to being the juiciest gossip ever concocted. I definitely don't want anyone to have to deal with the trauma of finding out their father has a secret family or their aunt committed vehicular manslaughter in 1992. However, these stories are interesting for a reason. We don't tend to advertise our family's most heinous classified deeds. There's a sense of relief when you learn the family secrets because it can explain many things that were previously simmering below the surface. The mystery of why your family is the way it is can often be answered by a series of 2-3 devastating anecdotes. Additionally, the allure of a dramatic true story starring your very own family members is almost too good to pass up. When u/fuzzyloulou asked Redditors to share some of their juiciest family secrets, they did not disappoint with their answers. 

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  • 01
    Font - ? r/AskReddit u/fuzzyloulou • 23h 2 31 What family secret do you know, that you're not supposed to know?
    via fuzzyloulou
  • 02
    Font - Eas_Mackenzie - 16h S 1 Award Grandma and Grandpa did love eachother and were married but weren't "together" Grandma was gay and grandpa was her best friend. She wanted kids so they had kids but she had her love "Auntie Doreen" we called her. Grandpa was free to do whatever he wanted and to our knowledge never had a dedicated partner besides my grandmother. Just the times, glad they could make it work for them :) ... + Reply 355
    via Eas_Mackenzie
  • 03
    Font - RunFaster481 23h Every single one of my uncles is currently having an affair. ... + Reply 481
    via RunFaster481
  • 04
    Rectangle - BanditSixActual. 18h 5 Awards I have faint memories from when I was a kid of an aunt on my father's side. I remember her being thin and sad with blond hair. No one would talk to me about her and I didn't remember a name until one day the name Karen just hit me. Don't laugh, this was the 70's and Karens weren't really a thing. Neither my older or younger siblings remember her and no one would talk about her. No pictures, nothing.
    via BanditSixActual
  • 05
    Font - About 2 years before his death in 2018, I was talking to my grandfather and looking through pictures with him when I found the woman from my memories and asked about her. My father had a sister, Karen. She was born in 1948. When she was a baby, my grandfather took her out to his woodworking shop just to hang out with him while he worked. He sat her on a workbench, turned to grab some tools and turned around just in time to see her hit the floor head first. He said that he'd remember the s
    via BanditSixActual
  • 06
    Font - I am the only one who seems to know she existed. My mother doesn't remember her, or denies it. My dad passed away. Both grandparents are gone too. But I remember her face and her telling me it was okay to be sad. Grandpa said she was always interested in me. I'm neuro divergent and really struggled with social skills as a child. I think that it made her feel less alone.
    via BanditSixActual
  • 07
    Font - PersonMcNugget. 22h When my grandmother died, we found out she was married before my grandfather and had 4 kids. Her and that husband split up and just dumped the kids in an orphanage. Then she remarried later, had my dad and my aunt and just never mentioned the other kids at all. Reply 1.8k +
    via PersonMcNugget
  • 08
    Font - Aur3lya_175 18h My great grandma told my grandpa that the jewish girl he liked was taken to a concentration camp when in truth they fled (it is said she knew they were safe). Grandpa meets my Grandma shortly after, they get married but apparently he still talked about the other girl from time to time and that she was the one who got away and how awful it all was. Many years go by, my aunt and dad are born. Grandpa walks around town and meets the girl from back then, is totally shocked and
    via Aur3lya_175
  • 09
    Font - Symnestra 20h ● My great grandparents were high school sweethearts and the only role models I'd ever had for a relationship since my grandparents and parents are divorced and hate each other. Then my mom tells me that my great grandma had an affair and that's why one of my grandma's sisters isn't like the others. So, there goes that. + Reply ... 1.8k
    via Symnestra
  • 10
    Font - Alternative_Shame_73 • 21h My mother had an affair on my father that he doesn't know about way before he had an affair on her that blew up the family. ... + Reply 1.3k
    via Alternative_Shame_73
  • 11
    Font - SilentBlizzard1 . 21h My great-great grandfather moved from Romania to America and got married to another Romanian immigrant shortly after he arrived. Once they married he insisted they start using "American" names, only speak English in public, never return to Romania, and refrain from communicating with family in the old country.
    via SilentBlizzard1
  • 12
    Font - When my great-grandmother (his daughter) was a teenager it was discovered by the rest of the family that he actually abandoned his first wife and three children in Romania and left them in extreme poverty when he came to the states and married my great-great grandmother. Ya know, real upstanding guy.
    via SilentBlizzard1
  • 13
    Font - ERC69 22h My dad killed a guy and never told us. I found out on Google one day. + Reply 1.3k
    via ERC69
  • 14
    Font - Human_Commercial_406 22h My grandma was raised in a catholic orphanage under the pretext that she lost both her parents and siblings during the Spanish Influenza. Turns out her and her dad survived, but her dad didn't want to take care of her so he left her at an orphanage in Brooklyn and moved to Europe and started a new family. + Reply 2.3k 2.3k
    via Human_Commercial_406
  • 15
    Font - mildlysceptical22. 17h I had an uncle who was a railroad engineer and worked the Terre Haute, Indiana to Danville, Illinois line. Never took a day off from his one day there, one day back route. At his funeral, (I was a kid and didn't go) a strange woman came into the funeral home with some older children. No one knew who she was and finally my grandma introduced herself to the woman and asked who she was. The woman said, "I'm Mrs.so and so I'm here for my husband's funeral." Turns out my
    via mildlysceptical22
  • 16
    Font - LaLucertola • 20h This is pretty mild, but a part of my mom's side is very, very convinced they're Irish. In all the American, "kiss me I'm Irish" ways. My grandparents took a trip there. They spent a lot of time at a local pub, getting to know Irish singers and poets, my cousins have very Irish names, etc etc etc. I took a few ancestry tests to nail down the rest of my mom's side, not a single percent Irish in any of them. The family name, common in Irish- Americans, is actually a Swiss
    via LaLucertola
  • 17
    Font - tenkeywizard. 21h That my uncle committed suicide and that my grandmother committed suicide shortly after due to depression from my uncle's suicide. I found out from a random older friend of the family. None of my cousins knows this happened. + Reply 1.1k
    via tenkeywizard
  • 18
    Font - Kkarotcake. 18h TH My mom lied about how my dad died. Myself and my brother were told he died to cancer. He wrote us each letters of goodbyes and I still have mine. When I turned 18 the truth came out: he died in a murder-suicide with his wife (stepmom), her lover (who was also his psychiatrist). Turned out his wife was cheating on him with his doctor and while my dad had some psychological issues the doctor purposely prescribed him medication that worsened his paranoia. When he found out
    via Kkarotcake
  • 19
    Font - Edit: for more background: my dad had manic bipolar depression. He was prone to extreme anxiety and paranoia when off the correct medication. I do not know what the medication he was given was but I do know it made him far far worse in his paranoia and manic episodes. His wife (stepmom) is the one that initially had the idea about the doctor prescribing the medication in the first place. When he found all the evidence his already broken mind completely snapped. He planned the murders and
    via Kkarotcake
  • 20
    Font - Brilliant_Succotash1 . 17h My mom lied to a man and told him I was his son and frequently extorted money from him by telling him she needed it to raise me. I found out when he showed up with gifts shortly after I had moved out on my own. He had hired a Pl after my mom refused to give him my contact info. He apologized for not being in my life and cried while telling me he was dying of pancreatic cancer and he didn't want to go without meeting me. I asked my mom about it and she told me sh
    via Brilliant_Succotash1
  • 21
    Font - I only ever met him the one time. I took the gifts because it was such a surreal experience I didn't know how to tell him anything other than that I forgave him. My mom is the only other person that knows this happened.
    via Brilliant_Succotash1

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