Is Days of Our Lives based on real life? These juicy real-life soap opera stories are starting to make us wonder. From passionate affairs and family secrets to heartless betrayals and chilling revelations, these stories prove that truth is way, way stranger than fiction. Make some popcorn, get comfy, and settle in: These stories take drama to the next level.
1. It’s Like I Don’t Even Know You
I recently found out that the man I'd been involved with for six months had not one, not two, but three aliases.
2. Save the Last Word
When I was 17, I had an argument with my father and told him to screw off. Later that evening, he died. Our argument was the last time he spoke to anyone in our family and for that, I feel a terrible amount of guilt. Instead of him saying goodbye and I love you to my mom and brothers, he got told to screw off. My punishment is to live the rest of my days in shame and guilt.
He never left a note either.
3. Snooper’s Regret
Recently, my mom used my husband's phone to make a call—to the man she was having an affair with. The phone had auto record on. And that was how I found out she'd been in that relationship for 17 years, and tried to have kids with him as well. My dad found out about it years ago and almost ended the marriage as a result.
What he doesn’t know is that she continued the relationship up until last year, and only recently broke it off because the loser CHEATED on her with someone else. She's also a raging narcissist.
4. You Look Familiar…
My friend met a guy, and within a week they were engaged. He was in the military and ghosted her about a month after proposing. Six months later, he turns up and starts working at the same place as her and acted like he didn’t even know her.
5. Real Enough to Us
My friend was about to get married when a woman busted the doors down and screamed at the top of her lungs, "I'M THE REAL LEGAL WIFE, STOP THE WEDDING!!!" Amazing. The story even got picked up by local news.
6. Too Close a Call
When I was 15, my parents were going through a divorce. My mom worked night shifts and my dad was living with a friend of his. One night my sister, who was 19, at the time came home pretty drunk from a party. She was acting goofy and fell on the couch next to me. She started grabbing my leg and laughing and we started fondling. That's when I made the biggest mistake of my life.
We ended up hooking up right there. When we woke up the next day, she had no recollection of the night before, so I just kept my mouth shut. Fast forward to when I’m 18. Sister is home from college and dad is over for a visit. They get into an argument and in a fit of rage my dad announces how he has never forgiven her for "killing his grandchild" when she got an abortion at 19. At those words, my blood ran cold.
The baby she aborted was in fact mine...and as far as I know, I am the only one who knows since she has never mentioned that night.
7. Clean Them out, Girls
How's this for a soap opera plot? Our cleaning ladies got involved with a smuggling ring. They set us up for a robbery that totally emptied our house out.
8. Home Away From Home
Two and a half years ago, I was in dire financial straits. I sold my home to keep my struggling business afloat. But I neglected to tell the owners about one key thing. They have an 800 square foot 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.
9. Something Doesn’t Match in this Match…
My brother dumped his fiancée a month before the wedding because when she gave birth. The baby that was born was black, and neither he nor his fiancée is. Unsurprisingly, a paternity test proved it wasn't his, and thus child support was denied.
Wikimedia Commons, Pete unseth
10. If At First You Don’t Succeed, Ram Ram Again
One of my sister's friends from her sorority had a mental breakdown on her two roommates. Of all the crazy stuff I overheard, the best part was when she got in her car and proceeded to ram directly into the back of one of the other friend's cars, over and over again, for almost TWO FULL HOURS. Like, they got security camera footage of her ramming the car, backing up, and doing it again for literally two hours straight before finally getting bored and driving away. Amazing.
11. Meeting Expectations
My wife started to feel “trapped” just a few months into our marriage—as in, my expectation of monogamy was too much for her to handle. So she discovered polyamory, decided that she wanted to be polyamorous with her boss, and retroactively decided that our marriage was an open one. She was pretty surprised when I divorced her.
12. The Harsh Truth
My mother was in a fatal car accident when I was three—but my family never told me the whole story. I found out from a newspaper article years later that it was her fault. She wasn’t paying attention and crossed the yellow line and ended both her life and that of the person in the other car.
13. Sounds Like It’s Time to Cut Back
My barber got two different girls pregnant, neither of whom was his girlfriend. Prices at his shop have gone up a little bit recently, but the phone calls I overhear while I’m there make it well worth it.
14. Brothers Never Known
I always knew that my parents had some kind of "family secret." Various mutterings amended streams of conscious, etc. in my childhood. From the sound of it, I was under the impression that I had an older sibling. I am the oldest sibling of four, so I was fixated on the few little details, but as I grew older, I assumed it was a very morbid kind of imaginary friend delusion I had.
When I was in high school, I was talking to my mother when she slipped, saying something about her early relationship with my dad. I pushed her on it and found out that she had stayed with my dad after they had a child at age 15. She went on to tell me that I’d had not one, but three older siblings, and that they were lost in some kind of accident.
My mom broke down. I didn't push for details and never have. That day, I went from being the oldest of four to the middle of seven. Probably my frame of reference for the concept of "trauma." Every obsession, every worry, and character flaw of my teenage self at that time burned into my character like scars.
15. Never Too Early for Pre-Wedding Plans
I once helped out my 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.
16. Liar, Liar…
My sister married a guy who lied about a lot of stuff. In the first six months after the wedding we've found out he had lied about:
His previous job—he wasn't a history professor apparently.
His house back in his country and the fact that it was damaged by a hurricane—he didn't even own a house.
His previous marriage, unfaithful ex-wife, and him having kids—he was married but only for a couple of years and those kids were not his...she kicked him out.
His mom being dead (a really strange moment for us and her).
His other relatives like cousins, etc. treating him badly. We couldn't figure out why nobody in his family wanted to help or even come for a wedding.
Turns out he's a pathological liar hated by everyone. Needless to say, they’re separated now.
17. Fake Grandpa
My grandpa fought in WWII and did all of these heroic and brave things. I always loved knowing that I shared my genetics with him—but everything is different now. I found out last year that my grandfather wasn’t my biological grandfather—I’m 35. Apparently, he met my grandmother and father after the war in Germany (my grandmother is Polish) and he brought them to America.
My dad was only three at the time. Everyone in my family apparently kept this from me because they knew how much I looked up to him. And sadly, both my grandparents are long gone so I can’t even ask them questions about what really happened. I kind of wish I didn’t know; ignorance is bliss sometimes.
18. The Plot Thickens
I'm 60 years old and my girlfriend is 59. About 40 years ago, she wrote a book that became a bestseller. The celebrity freaked her out. She changed her name, moved to a small town and ignored everyone from her past. She doesn't know that I know all about it.
19. Who’s Your Daddy?
I know that my uncle's son is not really his biological son. His wife at the time was sleeping with her cousin and boom, baby! To this day, my cousin doesn't know and treats his dad—who raised him as if he were his own and has never said a word about it to anyone but me—like garbage because of the lies his mother spread about him. I kind of want to tell him to do a DNA test so that he'll know and maybe, just maybe, realize that his mother is not exactly the saint that she’s made herself out to be.
20. All in the Family
I was just informed by a close friend that my wife’s openly gay brother is secretly having an affair with his own husband’s half-sister. The friend who told me about it also says that the half-sister is desperate to get pregnant, and my wife’s brother has no idea. This could get interesting…
21. Keeping Your Mouth Shut
My boyfriend's parents just lost their house. I told my mom what he had told me and she didn't think the story lined up, so she went all Sherlock Holmes and started looking up his parent's names in our county's public records. She got more than she bargained for when she found a locked file with a chilling label. It said "ADOPTION" and had my boyfriend and one of his brother's names listed on it.
None of his other three siblings were on there—they are all way younger. He's never mentioned being adopted though, and is well past the age where you would tell a kid something like that—he's in his mid-20s. His family has already had a really bad few months and I don't want to cause any more drama by asking about it.
He has the same last name as his "dad.” He was in the military and claims his "dad" is on his original birth certificate so, I'm really confused. I don't think his parents were married yet when he and his brother were born because his dad was still in the military and away from home a lot. The papers weren't even filed until he was almost 10 years old.
But a biological father wouldn't have to adopt his own kids, even if they weren't married yet, right? I regret knowing because now I'm insanely curious and I can't say anything because this has that feel of “your darkest family secret” to it and I don't want to start anything.
22. Swing Low, TMI Chariot
I overheard two girls and learned that my neighborhood has a not-so-secret group of swingers. I will never look at my middle-aged neighbors the same way.
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23. More Than He Bargained for
Private investigator here. One woman I was hired to investigate was married to a guy who made a decent living. He wasn't mega-rich, but he likely made around $250K a year. He started to suspect his wife was cheating on him, so we tailed her for the weekend. It was only one weekend, but we quickly discovered that she was selling herself on Craigslist and Backpage.
We caught over 13 men coming in and out of her motel room that weekend and found her ads online.
24. The Unwelcome Additions
My stepfather had a long-time sweetheart in his home country, and they planned to marry once he had built a life in the US and gotten his citizenship. Four years later, he sent a letter to his family letting him know that he was coming to visit for a week and to let his fiancée know that he wanted to see her.
She and their families assumed that he finally wanted to get married that week, as planned, so they set up the wedding. Big. Mistake. Imagine their surprise when my step-dad shows up with a wife and a two-year-old child. I don't know what he said to his fiancée, but his words had terrible consequences. She actually hung herself after he formally called their wedding off. It was incredibly heartbreaking.
He ended up having to pack up my mom and the baby and flee the area the following morning because the fiancée’s family blamed him for her death.
25. No Double Dipping!
I once went to a wedding where the bride got back at her cheating groom in the most ingenious way possible. In the final moments of a Jewish wedding, after the marriage was finalized and all official, the bride straight up runs to the crowd and says, “I’m divorcing my husband for sleeping with my sister!”
I'm not Jewish but apparently, once you’re married in that faith, the bride or groom cannot marry or remarry someone related to the previous wife or something like that. So, this bride not only publicly humiliated her cheating groom and her sister by outing them. She also sealed the fact that they can never ever be together. Mic dropped.
26. Famous Last Words
When my dad died, the associate pastor of my mom’s church spoke at the funeral and talked all about how devastating cancer is. Meanwhile, I knew the pastor’s secret. That pastor used to attend a different church, but had to leave after she was caught for having faked cancer for two years. Her husband left her and her daughter disowned her after they found out.
My mom was the secretary at that church. So she knew, and had already told me. My dad’s funeral was only like two years after that whole thing went down. I would have walked up to the podium and punched her right in the face were it not disrespectful to my parents.
27. You Really Let the Cat Out of the Bag On This One
Two girls in the back of my theatre classroom would not stop talking. One of them seemed upset, so I asked them to keep it down. It continued, so I told them more firmly to pay attention. The upset girl promptly freaked out, said "WHAT DO YOU WANT ME TO DO? I'M FREAKING PREGNANT!" The entire class's mouths dropped and I couldn't think of anything to do but send her to the trauma counselor. Sure enough, yep—one of my sophomores had a baby the April before she became a high school junior.
28. Plot Twist
My friend got invited to some distant cousin's wedding and apparently the bride had requested that everyone wear white. My friend thought it was weird, but whatever, the whole family was going, so she buys a white dress and heads out. Her family arrived at the church just before the bride was scheduled to walk down the aisle. My friend, thinking they’re late, wanted to slip in and stay in the back.
Her father, however, takes her arm and starts walking up the aisle. It isn’t until they’re halfway up that she stops and realizes what's really going on. Everyone is looking at her and smiling and crying tears of joy. She turned to one of her aunts in the pew next to her and asked them who was getting married. The whole church went silent, and then the aunt looked at my friend’s father and said “You can’t be serious! You planed a wedding for your daughter and just expected her to go along with it?! Have the two of them even met? Did you seriously think this would work?!”
Apparently arranged marriages aren't uncommon in her culture but this was on a whole other level. The whole room was chattering about them and the father just cleared his throat and told his daughter to keep walking. Luckily, the aunt grabbed my friend first and pulled her into the pew, pushed her past the row of people, and they both ran out of the church. Her parents disowned her after that, and she moved in with that aunt.
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29. A Pair of Jerks Can Cause a Lot of Trouble
A girl's mom had been renting out a storage unit and using it to have private time with her own daughter's boyfriend. The girl and her boyfriend were only together because the mom suggested it to the boy, so he could hang around her without any questions. When it came out, her parents got divorced and her dad died in a drunk driving accident a month later trying to cope with it all. Really messed up.
30. You Think You've Had a Long Flight?
Just got on a flight in London headed to Vegas. Sitting next to my girlfriend and she wants to show me something she has planned for the trip so gets out her phone. It opens to the Messages and shows a chat with a guy (I know him) saying how much she is gonna miss him and how she doesn't wanna go away with me anyway. The doors close on the plane and that was a really fun 10-11hrs...
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31. Once in a Generation Blues
My daughter turns 5 next week. If anyone knew the truth behind her parentage, I would lose her forever. I grew up in foster care, never knew my parents or siblings. In my senior year, I met an older guy and we dated for almost a year...getting pregnant about 7 months in. One night, while we were watching TV, the subject somehow came around to our real parents (he had been adopted as a young child).
Turns out the man I was seeing, the father of my daughter...is my half-brother. We have the same mother. Our relationship didn't last, and he is not in her life, per his own choices. My daughter is extremely smart, beautiful, and well-rounded. She'll never know the truth...her father and I made a pact to never tell her. I just hope she never needs a kidney or something.
32. Did You Forget Something? Or Someone?
I was at a wedding where the priest said, "If anyone here has any objection, speak now or forever hold your peace.” A woman in the back stood up and said, "The groom can't get married as he is my husband.” Turns out the woman who objected and the groom were in fact married and tried to get divorced, but the divorce was never completed.
So technically the groom was still married, and the wedding did not proceed.
33. Spilling the Beans
I know that my mum and dad love my nephew who lives with us more than they love me. How do I know that, you ask? I overheard them literally say it while talking in bed one night.
34. The Ball That Changed the Future?
In grade 7 during a snow day, I whipped a snowball at my ex-girlfriend but didn't realize there was a big chunk of ice in the snowball. It hit the girl right in the face shattering her glasses and hurting her eye. She instantly cried after crashing to the ground. Everyone instantly froze and looked in my direction. Out of nowhere someone yelled "It was him!!!" but instead of pointing at me, pointed at my friend beside me.
Everyone agreed they saw him do it and ran to the teachers. My friend was suspended, his parents had to come in to talk to the other kid's parents and everything. This friend was always a troublemaker, but this might have been the final straw that broke him. When we got to high school he did and sold all kinds of substances, and got two girls pregnant before he was 20. He’s unemployed right now and not paying child support. What if I ruined this guy's life because of a snowball filled with ice?
35. You Can’t Drown Out the Truth
When I was about 5 years old, my sister (2 years old) and I were in the backyard in a kiddie pool. When my mom went inside, I attempted to drown my sister. After I saw her lifeless, I realized that I was making a big mistake, pulled her out of the pool and called for my mom. Luckily, she knew CPR and she was life flighted to the hospital. My mom thanked me for saving her, pulling her out of the pool.
Next week was my birthday, the police, firefighters, and paramedics came to my house to give me gifts and celebrate my birthday. To this day 20 years later, I still think about it. I remember the day so vividly, not a soul knows the real truth.
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36. Family Matters
I'm a junior detective and in all my years on the job, absolutely nothing compares to this case. So this guy had been cheating on his wife (my client), with her brother. Except—the wife claimed that she was an only child. So naturally, I had to find out who this "brother" was. When I questioned the husband, he said that the guy who claimed to be his wife's "brother" said that "We've known each other for so long" and "I grew up with her" and all that jazz.
At first, my friend assumed it was probably a long lost brother or something, but then when the husband was asked to describe the guy, our jaws hit the floor. He described his wife's father. According to the wife, her father wasn't there during her wedding and was replaced with her uncle instead, so her husband hadn’t met him before. He was cheating on his wife with her father! Absolutely wild.
37. Lies Spread Like a Disease
I heard the couple next door arguing. The wife was furious because she realized her husband was cheating on her, but that wasn't even the worst part. She found out about the affair because she tested positive for chlamydia. He tried to convince her that she must have been the unfaithful one. She still lives there. He doesn't.
38. Blaming the Victim
My dad died by suicide almost 20 years ago. At the time, my mum told me that it was because he had been having gay affairs with people and he couldn't handle that "sinful" lifestyle anymore. It turns out she cheated on him, and that was what had actually sent him over the edge. I only know this because I was finally able to read a copy of his note last year.
39. Classic Soap Opera Trope
This private investigator came to court with a pile of evidence that this woman who was "wheelchair-bound" and collecting injury insurance was actually fine. The guy had tons of photos of her running around doing errands, no problem. He shows all his stuff in court…and then the defense calls the person’s TWIN SISTER who moved in to help her after her accident.
That was, in fact, the person the P.I. had been stalking. Every soap opera needs a twin mix-up!
40. So Many Questions...
Although neither of them realizes it, I am fully aware that my ex is secretly sleeping with my dad. And that’s all I’m going to say about that…
41. Marry Us, Marry the Drama
At the rehearsal dinner for my brother-in-law's wedding, his crazy ex somehow showed up. She started her insane tirade by saying that she forgave him for breaking up with her, and he seriously needed to stop trying to act like he moved on (him and my sister had been together for a couple of years and had been living together for at least two, like I'm pretty sure he ain't faking it).
Then she decided to take it up another level. She said she was pregnant with his child. My brother-in-law proceeded to tell her that she was his greatest mistake, and that if she was pregnant it was probably her stepfather's just like the last one. She claimed it was his and she got an abortion without telling him. Me and the Best Man kindly kept her away from the couple while the friend who owned the house the wedding was taking place at called the police because she refused to leave her property.
42. The Fake From Down Under
After graduating from high school, I went to a small out-of-state college where no one from high school knew me. I was told many times how impressive my false Australian accent was, so I decided it would be great fun to go through college pretending to be from Australia. All of my friends and even my girlfriend of two years thinks I'm Australian.
I have a completely fake Australian identity, family, and past. I will soon be graduating, and I plan on asking the girl to marry me. Everything she knows about me is Australian I don't know how to tell her she doesn't really know me. Guess I'm forever a bloke.
43. Let It Go, Dude
My ex-husband went off the deep end when I left him three years ago, despite the fact that he was cheating on ME every step of the way. Anyway, I moved 1,000 miles away and began to restart my life. One day, about a month after leaving him, I checked my mail and saw that I had a huge, heavy envelope in the box. When I opened it, I was horrified.
It was photos of me doing allllll the activities of my daily life, but the photos were clearly taken from afar, and without my knowledge. Immediately, I contacted my attorney. It turns out, my ex was hoping to catch me with someone else, because he wanted to try to sue me for abandonment. It was awful, and it took me a long time to feel safe and secure in my new home.
44. With Care Like This, You’re Better Off Alone
I lived next to a guy who took care of his disabled girlfriend. She stayed home with a nurse while he worked to support them and pay for her healthcare. Everyone really admired him for it. But because I lived next door, I knew the chilling truth. He used to get drunk and tell her that if she doesn’t start putting out, he was going to throw her out.
45. Ancient History
Before she was married to my dad, my mom had a child out of wedlock and gave him up for adoption. This was way back in the early 70s. She will never find out that I know about this.
46. Taking a Second Job
My dad is not aware that I know that he is a sex worker in his spare time, and runs his "business" out of our home. I have even gotten excuses from him like, "Sorry daughter, I'm breathing heavily from a game of tennis" on several occasions, when I have secretly been well aware that he was not actually playing tennis.
47. Umm… Fancy Meeting You Here!
Teacher here. This is my craziest soap opera story and sometimes I still can't believe it happened, but here we are! One of my students in the 11th grade came to school and told me she’d ran into the principal in the weirdest situation that weekend...
Turned out, my student was dating another student who lived with his mother. The mom had recently separated from her husband after he caught the mom cheating. The man she was cheating with was the principal, who was still married. My student had run into him as they were both sneaking out of the same house early on Saturday morning.
Turned out to all be true.
48. The Tight Embrace of Motherly Love
This won't ruin me because I've already gone no contact with my mom, but it still hurts and is a big secret I've not told anyone. When I was a kid, I had asthma pretty bad. So, I'd be up all night, coughing constantly. My mom and I lived with her parents. We shared a room, so I slept in her bed often when I was a toddler. Mom would come home from work and lay down for bed, but I'd keep her awake with my coughing.
Sometimes at night, I'd be coughing, and she would hug me so tight that I couldn't breathe. It would really distress me that I couldn't breathe but I knew mom loved me so much. I didn't want to tell her she was literally squeezing me to death because I was afraid of hurting her feelings, so I'd just tell her that I loved her so much, and she would cry pretty hard after that.
Took me years after having my own kid to figure out the awful truth. It's actually pretty difficult to squeeze a kid so hard that they couldn't breathe. Mom is bipolar and has had other incidents of hurting people and abandoning those in her care that need medication and can't take care of themselves. So...I finally put it together and figured out, mom would be so agitated with my asthma that she would try to stop me from coughing by squeezing me almost to death. And then she would cry out of guilt when I told her I loved her.
49. Streaming My Little Secret
15 years ago—between jobs—I took a short-term gig helping a large gay smut website company, assisting them resolving some performance issues on their website. It was supposed to be only 2 weeks. That was 15 years ago. No one in my extended family knows what industry I work in, let alone know that I'm in charge of everything except video production.
50. Never Judge a Book By Its Cover
A couple that my wife and I have been friends with for a few years now recently took a trip overseas that was supposed to last for one week. For as long as we’ve known them, they have both been very ordinary people with vanilla jobs, nothing that stands out in particular or raises any red flags. Nothing unusual about any of that, am I right? You’d think so, but nah.
After no one in our circles had seen or heard from either one of them in close to a month, we all began to worry. Not too long after, we found out that they had been living a double life. They got arrested on the other side of the world for trying to smuggle close to a million dollars worth of cash across an international border on behalf of a notorious international drug cartel who operate out of the country they were visiting. When we first heard the news, we just sat there quietly in disbelief for a solid five minutes at least.
51. Big Mistake
There was a messed-up story about the twins in my country. Two baby girls were swapped at the hospital, and one twin came back home with another family, and their daughter stayed with her “twin sister.” Girls were completely different, but the family just thought they weren’t identical twins. They found out the truth when all three girls were in high school.
The real twins were constantly called different names, and strangers would approach them and say hi. They lived in a relatively small town, so finally, some common friends organized their meeting. Although they look identical, they are completely different people, e.g. one of them likes metal music and wears black clothes.
The story didn't end up well, although they sued the hospital, and both families are devastated by the whole story.
52. Father Knows Best
I have two sisters and our mom died more than 20 years ago. A few years back, my father was going into the hospital for high-risk surgery. The night before he went in for surgery, he told my oldest sister the family's big secret: that he was not really her dad. It turns out that, before they had gotten married to one another, my mom and dad had actually broken up briefly. During this time, my mom had hooked up with some random other guy, getting pregnant in the process.
She told my father about it and the two of them ended up eloping. For whatever reason, they never told my sister and my father promised to keep the secret before my mom passed away. After telling my sister, my father asked her to not tell anyone else. However, she has since talked to her husband, to myself, and to my other sister about it.
My dad has no idea that we all know now. He also has no idea how much I respect him for raising another man's child without any animosity or resentment, and for always loving her like the daughter that she was.
53. Save the Drama for Your Mama
When my great-grandpa died, we discovered that he had not one not two but three wives and two secret families! We hired a private investigator to figure out the details and clear up the messy inheritance it caused. Oh, but it gets worse. My family kind of caught the P.I. bug after that. When my uncle traveled a bunch to Mexico for work, my suspicious aunt hired a P.I. to trail him. Turns out, he also had an illegitimate family in Mexico. It caused a huge inheritance pain in the butt AGAIN when my uncle eventually died of natural causes.
54. It’s a Not-So Beautiful Day in This Neighborhood
I know that my mother slept with several of the men in our neighborhood while my dad was very ill and literally dying.
55. Keep Your Frenemies Closer
I recently found out that one of my "closest friends" has been paying someone to perform some witchcraft/voodoo rituals on me because she doesn't want me to do well or succeed in my career. There are some crazy people out there…
56. Do You Know Where Your Wife Is?
My wife and I found out that her identical twin was an exotic dancer when a bunch of my fraternity brothers went to the club and all started calling and texting me to ask if anything was wrong, and if I knew where my wife was.
57. If at First, You Don’t Succeed...
I know that my mom tried to have Child Protective Services take my daughter away from me when she was born, claiming that I had used drugs while I was pregnant. I was actually nine years clean at the time. She tried again when I was diagnosed with cancer. You would be amazed to see what doctors actually put in your medical records…
58. Santa Is Stuffing Someone Else’s Stocking This Year
I once walked into my dad's van while he was hooking up with a woman who was not my mom. My dad had a drinking problem. Mom took me and my brother to go looking for him because he was supposed to be buying Christmas presents. We found his van at a bar. Mom sent me to look inside the van to see if there were presents in there.
I looked into the back and saw my dad's bare bottom as he was plowing some chick. But that's not what horrified me the most. It was when he turned over his shoulder, looked right at me, and said in the evilest voice, "Get out." This was 20+ years ago now and I still get emotional thinking about it. I still remember the entire thing so clearly.
59. A Poor Performance
I would see this couple panhandling outside different stores around town. He would be in a wheelchair, and she would push him. A couple of weeks ago, I saw the familiar couple on bikes riding behind a shopping center. Recognized them as the couple. I followed them for a couple of minutes, just to see how he miraculously recovered.
I saw them pull up to a nice home on the other side of town. I’m thinking maybe he got better, and they’ll continue panhandling. Nah. They opened the garage, parked their bikes, and casually strolled in. There was a new Chevy truck parked in the driveway. I talked to my cousin who’s a deputy, and he said really nothing can be done. Technically, it’s not illegal to panhandle in our city and they’re not breaking any laws.
60. Pissing Off the Wrong People
In high school, there weren't very many girls in our grade, and this one girl dated a whole bunch of the guys and somehow stayed cool with everyone in the end. Well, almost everyone...I don't really know all the details of exactly what happened to her, but I know that this one particular guy from our school got her alone in a room one time and physically abused her. And when I say abused, I mean bad. Like, hospital level bad. Nevertheless, she didn't want to turn the guy in for some reason. I guess she was scared.
That's not even the dark secret. After this happened, two of her exes and two her friends decided that if she wasn't going to turn him in, they would have to take matters into their own hands. We didn’t see the guy at school for the next little while and, a few days later, one of the guys from that group got really drunk at my house and admitted what they had really done to the guy.
It turns out that they physically confronted him, held him down as the group literally castrated him, and then finally dumped him off at a hospital. The story was later confirmed to me by another one of the guys who had participated when he too was under the influence of alcohol. I am still in a constant state of shock every time I remember that this happened—and I can only imagine what those guys would think if they realized what they had confessed to me while they were drunk…
61. ‘Til Debt (Paid) Do Us Part
This one wedding I went to was off the freaking rails. A person in the bride's group chat got into a big fight with the bride on the day of the wedding and ended up sending the groom’s father a bunch of horrifying screenshots. Apparently, the bride admitted that she was planning on divorcing the groom after he paid off all her student debts and bought a house, so that she could get the property in a divorce.
The bride tried to deny it, but I guess the groom had suspicions that she was just using him already. After he saw the proof, he called the wedding off. My friend, who invited me as her plus one, was super embarrassed, but I was thoroughly entertained.
62. I Told You Cliques Were Dangerous
I went to my 20th high school reunion about five years ago. The woman organizing the event was always bright, intelligent, charming and pretty, super active in high school and by all counts had a very bright future. Speaking to her at the reunion, it seemed that had happened for her. We talked about her self-help/life coaching company and how they are growing and doing great.
I asked her to send me more information when I got home. Her email that sent a chill down my spine. In it, she introduced me to her West Coast partner, whose email was from the url esplosangeles.com which I thought sounded unusual. A quick look at their website had me immediately worried and a short Google later I saw that they are an offshoot of the NXIVM cult that has been all over the news.
The woman I was talking to, that I'd known since eight, was Lauren Salzman, who just this week plead guilty to holding two slaves locked in a room for two years. She was trying to recruit me and basically everyone at the reunion into NXIVM! I noped right out of that email conversation and have been watching everything unfold for the last five years.
They are all looking at some serious jail time now.
63. Double Whammy
My mom long-term replaced my dad’s cancer pain pills with Tylenol, to fuel her own drug problem. I didn’t discover this until long after he died—and just two months later, she died from an overdose.
64. This Threesome Was Really a Foursome
My last apartment had particularly weak walls between apartments. One night. I was reading in bed, and I was unknowingly the third party to a particularly nasty fight between the couple living next door. The fight last for almost an hour and was apparently the end of their relationship as she was going to leave him and the apartment the next day. The longer the fight went on, the more interested I became as I pieced snippets of the reason for the fight together.
I did not know them personally, only enough to wave and say hi, help them with carrying up groceries etc. ... good neighbor stuff. It seemed the couple were bored with their intimate activities so they decided to fulfill a fantasy and invite another man to join them. I guess things worked out for awhile, but when Female A came home early from a work trip, she found Male A and Male B deeply engrossed without her.
Female A flipped out, and I guess after that point they tried to patch things up, but she caught both of them on two other occasions (the latest being the night before fight night that I was unashamedly listening to). Neither neighbor would hold my gaze for long the next morning.
65. True Beauty is Only Google Search Deep
In high school, I was pretty good friends with a guy that was a bit overweight, about 6'4" tall, really smart, and a bit nerdy. Lost track of him after high school but saw him at our ten-year reunion. He was the talk of the reunion. Still tall, lost all the weight and was in great shape, had long hair like Fabio and was a doctor. He showed up with a beautiful wife. He gave us his contact info and invited us to Atlanta to stay with him in his huge house.
After the reunion, I tried to get in touch. Contact info didn't work, and through some sleuthing, I found out he was neither married nor a doctor. He was still in good shape, can't fake that, but faked everything else.
66. All in the Family
My great grandparents were brother and sister. I don't want to believe it, but it’s unfortunately true.
67. A Helping Hand from Far Away
While stationed in Germany, I lived in this apartment busing that had four floors. I lived on the top floor. The layouts of the apartments were the same for one side, and the bathroom was right by the doors of the apartments. There was this couple that lived two floors beneath me. We all knew that this guy abused his wife some way or another; we never saw her, and she was a complete shut-in. We called the police multiple times, but of course with no evidence, they couldn't do anything.
One time on my way up, I heard him yelling, as always. I usually paused by the door to see if I could hear her in distress. Well, as I paused by the door, I heard this piece of human garbage yell something truly chilling across his apartment: "You don't have to cut yourself just because I hit you!" Apparently, the poor girl was in the bathroom cutting herself because she was so tired of being abused.
I called the police promptly. I knew about how long they'd take to get there, so right before they showed up, I began pounding on his door. He answered it, angrily. I immediately laid into him. The whole neighborhood could hear me, even the MPs when they got there. He went to jail and was kicked out; she went to the hospital. I'm just really thankful that I stopped and listened.
68. Sisters Don’t Need to Share Everything
I was at a wedding where the wife objected because she had just found out that her soon-to-be husband had been sleeping with her sister for the past eight years, despite the two of them having two kids.
69. The Long and Winding Road
When I was a Teaching Assistant, my professor once told me (after a few too many glasses of wine) that when she was 16 years old and still learning to drive, she once accidentally hit and killed a homeless man. The local cops showed up at the scene and she confessed to them that she had hit him. After some internal discussion of the situation, the cops told her to just go home and never speak of it again. They said that the man was “probably just some homeless drunk who wandered into the road and won’t be missed by anyone.” She's been having nightmares about that day for many years ever since.
70. Fraud in the First Degree
I never went to college. In fact, I barely even spent any time at a community college before dropping out. Before working at the company where I do now, I had never had a job higher than third assistant manager for a retail store. I was unemployed and really starting to feel stressed out about finding a job before getting evicted from my apartment.
So, one night, in a bout of depression, I did something that would change everything. I made up a fake resume. I gave myself a bunch of awesome past jobs, gave myself a degree from a prestigious college, made up some impressive references, and basically created the perfect profile of an exceptional job candidate. I then submitted it to what was a dream job for me at that time.
Amazingly, I got an interview. At this point, I was thinking that it would be a great story to tell my buddies about after bombing the interview. But I didn't. It went perfectly. I'm telling you that I could have done that interview 1,000 different times and it would have never come off better than it did in real life. I was simply on fire that day and they ended up offering me the job.
So, I accepted. It was for a salary that was almost 3 times the amount that I had ever earned in my life. I figured at this point that I should give it a try. After all, what was the worst that could happen? I thought that maybe I could get a week or two of paychecks before they caught on and fired me. But that didn't happen.
I've been promoted 4 times since then. After having started off making around $60,000 a year (almost $40,000 a year more than I had ever made before), I now make over six figures a year. Before this job, I had never had a job outside of retail. I turned in the resume more as a joke than anything else, yet it kept snowballing.
It created the life that I now have under totally false pretenses.
71. I’m Not Who You Think I Am
While everyone who knows me thinks that I have a good job and nice roommates, I have secretly been homeless and doing sex work to support myself for over a year.
72. Save the Last Dance for Me
Words cannot even begin to describe the level of social awkwardness that I used to exhibit back when I was a senior in high school. One time, a rude jock guy in my grade joked during study hall that this equally awkward freshman guy should go with me to the upcoming Homecoming dance. I had been planning to just go stag with a friend, as neither of us had attracted the attention of any guys.
I was mortified, as you would probably expect in a case of a mean jock picking on chubby senior girl and a nerdy freshman boy. As a result, I didn't commit to going as his date. A day later, I got called to the administration office, as the Assistant Dean had received a phone call from the freshman's parents.
They were concerned about this senior girl allegedly planning on taking their kid to Homecoming. I told them, “Relax, it was just a joke that [insert idiot jock’s name here] made, but I already have other plans for the homecoming dance." And that was the end of that. Later, I found out the heartbreaking truth about the kid.
It turned out that the real reason that this kid's parents had been concerned was that their son was ill and they didn't know how much longer he would be in school. His sophomore year he was too ill to attend classes, and I believe he passed away during what would have been his junior year before he had ever gotten the chance to attend a school dance.
I should have invited him for real and said "Screw you!" to the jock.
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73. Bedtime Story
When I was 13 years old, I caught my father in bed with my 15-year-old brother's girlfriend, who was also 15. I haven't seen her since, but I've been blackmailing my father with this info for the past six years.
74. An Improper Business Model
This is a horrible secret that I've kept for nearly two decades at this point. During the summers when I was growing up, my parents would often leave my brother and me with our aunt and uncle who lived out in the country. It was great, as they had four sons of ages close to ours, so we always had a lot of fun doing kids’ stuff.
One year when I was eight years old, the oldest cousin was maybe about 16. We somehow got to talking and he asked me if I wanted to sleep in his room that night. He had the nicest room and bed, so I was all for it. When we got into bed, he asked if I wanted to kiss him. I was 8 and just thought it was ok, so I said sure.
As soon as I did it, he handed me some money and told me never to tell anyone about what had just happened. The next night, he wanted to do the same thing. At this point, I realized that I could make a lot of money off of him by continuing to play along, so I agreed. This continued to happen on a regular basis for two summers.
Eventually, I got old enough to realize that this situation was quite wrong regardless of how much money I was getting. I put a stop to it at that point and never told anyone about it. Today, both of us are grown up and married with children. We often see each other at family events. I don't have the guts to even try and talk to him about it. Heck, I'm not even sure what I'd say!
75. Diamonds Are a Guilty Man's Worst Enemy
My wife loves her engagement ring. It's got a huge diamond and it cost $10,000, so she always shows it off to her friends. But in reality, it's all fake. I bought it for $50 on eBay. We can't afford a fancy ring right now, and I don't know what I'd do if she found out.
76. A Fresh Start?
My whole life is a soap opera. I got tired of my ordinary life, so one day I just abruptly cut off all contact with every single person that I knew and moved all the way to Kenya. I now go by a fake name and a completely made-up background story here, and I have made it appear to my family back home as if I got killed on a boat trip in the Pacific.
No, I am not joking. I am really believed to be dead in the United States, while I am secretly living it up in Africa under a false identity. How’s that for a confession?!
77. Person You May Know
I found out at age 22 that I am adopted. How did I find out? My biological mother added me on Facebook one day.
78. I’m Onto You...
My husband is having an affair. I know but I am too scared of what will happen if I confront him. He is so narcissistic that he can't see anything wrong with anything he does. We have a nine year old and I think it would destroy him. And as a little background, my mom was married seven different times while I was growing up. I have a huge fear of becoming her. I know it’s irrational but that fear is what stops me. I have a good job and can afford it. I haven't confronted him yet. I know he will lie because he lies every time I confront him in an argument about anything.
79. Shocking Admission
I remember that my biological mother admitted that she hated me, because I didn't save her marriage like she hoped I would. That's the only reason she had me. I think she changed her mind now that I'm an adult, and she wants to be in my life. But I can't forgive that.
80. Where Did You Come From?
I left a cult, and my entire family is still stuck in it. If I tell them, I will lose them forever. No, I'm not kidding, they will cease to communicate and associate with me and my wife. My parents, brothers, sisters and 20 years worth of friendships, gone. Some of them, including family have already expressed that I am no longer welcome in their lives.
81. More Than Friends
For the last five years I have been hopelessly, painfully in love with my best friend. I have dated other people and so has he. We've moved to different cities and led completely different lives but I am so in love with every single fibre of his being that it consumes me.
82. Negative Association
While I do love and trust my husband and enjoy private time with him, being intimate is very hard for me. It should be this magical, special moment, but instead, it constantly brings back a lot of terrible memories. The truth is that when I was child, I was involved in sleeping with family members. That's why I avoided intimacy until we got married and that's why I have such conflicted feelings about it to this day.
83. So Did You Get a Second Date?
My father texted me his will hours before he killed himself. I feel as though if I had just called him things would have been different, but I was on a first date at the time. For some reason I just ignored his message, even though part of me knew what was going to happen. I regret what I did every single day.
84. One Big Happy Family
I don't love my wife anymore. She's pregnant with a child I'm not ready for. The child, in my mind, is nothing but a financial burden that we can't afford. But that's not even the worst part. I'm too afraid to divorce her because the state that I live in always punishes the father with very high child support.
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85. Thinking Things Through After the Fact
I have a long distance girlfriend that I love very, very much.
Meanwhile, my single and 10 years older (than me) roommate was severely sad. She asked me to do the unimaginable: impregnate her because she desperately wanted a baby. A sperm bank would have cost her thousands of dollars which she didn't have. She promised that she wouldn't tell anyone who the father was. I had previously said no to her hitting on me, but she begged for a baby so many times that I finally gave in. It's the right thing to do, right? Nothing can go wrong!
She is pregnant now and the realization is slowly starting to sink in that:
- I will have to either (a) lie to the love of my life forever or (b) tell her - but I know for sure that she will leave me then.
- Someday there will be a young guy or girl asking who his/her dad is. My flatmate will say it. And then I will get a call, 16 or 18 years from now, no matter where I am or who I am with or whether I have children of my own: "Hey, I'm your child. You're my Dad. You knew that. Why were you never there when I needed you?"
Dang.
86. A Horrifying Story
A very long time ago my mother died of AIDS. She contracted it when I was eight. We were victims of a home invasion and she was assaulted. My mother and father were still together when she died and it completely devastated him. I've never seen a happier, more open, or more in love couple than my mother and father.
He couldn't bear to be alone so he remarried an old family friend. I like her a lot actually and I want him to be happy.
This is terrible, but to people I actually know in person, I couldn't even begin to tell them how my mother died. So I just say my stepmom is my biological mom if it ever comes up in conversation. I'm a big bad liar, I know. I've since moved to a new city and I just don't think it's anybody's business, especially since I spend most of my time in a professional environment.
I accept that I haven't fully dealt with this yet.
87. Regrets
I will regret this night for the rest of my life. I bought my underage brother alcohol so he could have a good time with his friends. They all got drunk. They got into a drunk driving accident. They all died. Every single one of them. All because I bought them drinks….
88. Who’s Your Daddy?
My daughter isn't mine. My fiancée went away for a mud run the weekend "my" daughter was conceived. I took the baby to get a DNA test one day when my fiancée was at work and I was at home with the baby. Sure enough, just like on Maury, I was NOT the father. I went to a doctor and it turns out I am sterile. I can't tell anyone because I love the little girl like she's my own, but it hurts when people comment on how much "she looks like her mom" but never how much she looks like me. I could never bring myself to say anything to her though because I don't want to NOT be in the little girl's life. As far as she knows, I am her father and she loves me unconditionally. I can't ruin that.
89. Someone Out There Has the Answer
A friend of mine killed herself when we were younger. No one knew why. But I did. It was because her dad touched us when we were kids. We never told anyone.
90. Timing is Everything
In mid-December I was headhunted and offered my dream position at a company I've always dreamt about working for. I moved away to the capital and made a plan with my university to finish my degree whilst working. But no one knows about my secret. I have early stage cancer. I found out before taking the job. I haven't told a soul.
91. Doing Her Best
I’m a high school and junior high teacher in a rural town. About a year-and-a-half ago, a sixth-grade girl stays out of school for a couple days. She shows back up with long sleeves (and what I assume were bandages), and she says she was burned by "liquid fire." The newspaper ran a story the next day, and it told me everything I needed to know.
It said a man was arrested for throwing acid on his family when he went into a rage at the mom. Looked up the dad, and sure enough it's this kid's dad. He threw acid all over his family. Again, this giant bag of smegma threw ACID on his children in a temper tantrum. She didn't know, but a few other teachers connected the dots.
The girl was already a pretty screwed up kid. She was a raging lunatic just waiting to explode over anything. She ended up getting expelled for attacking the principal, but honestly all that she had gone through changed my opinion of how bad she could have turned out, considering.
92. Bad Suggestions
My twin brother died in a car wreck and my family suggested that I should date his girlfriend because...grief, I guess? REAL FREAKIN' AWKWARD, MOM.
93. Change of Heart
Amazingly, I saw the groom himself object. He just stood up there and started crying, then announced in front of everyone that he had fallen out of love with the bride a while before but didn't know how to break it off. It was extremely uncomfortable, and they both stepped out. Ten minutes later, they came back in and got married—because she'd apparently told him she was pregnant.
They're still together, with three kids now. I'm not sure about the husband, but I can confirm that the wife is having an affair. Neither of them are happy, but she has a comfortable life and he doesn't have the spine to leave.
94. Whoops!
I work wedding bars often in between library shifts, and I saw a wedding where the bride never turned up to the altar and texted the guy 15 minutes before saying, "Sorry but I'm not coming." It was super depressing, they went ahead with the 'party' and the groom ended up leaving at around half 7, the rest of the guests at 10.
What had happened was the bride had spent all day with her parents the day before and they apparently hated her husband to be and had convinced her not to show up. Last thing I heard was she came to his door the next morning and apologized, they're still together as far as I know... Man was that an awkward work night.
95. A Cell Phony
I went to a wedding where the bride got drunk and the groom picked up her phone to discover that she had been racily texting a coworker throughout the entire wedding. He told the officiant to not file the paperwork. This occurred towards the end of the reception, as they were leaving to go to the honeymoon suite. The story is that she was very drunk.
Her phone kept getting notifications so he decided to pick it up for her. They did not go on their honeymoon and they returned the gifts to everyone. The guests weren’t told about what happened for a couple of weeks, as the bride was trying everything she could to save the relationship. Regardless, it was a great reception!
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