Is there anyone who holds an incorrect belief about you, which you can never put right?

[Gingervitis]

Partly inspired by the revenge thread, is there anything in your past that people believe about you which isn't true, and which you'd like to put right? Or something inaccurate that was said which you've never had a chance to correct?

Mine is from a 4 year relationship I had in my early 20s. We bought a house together but weren't married, and unfortunately things didn't work out.

To that guy I'd like to say, "You thought I was cheating on you, but I wasn't - I had binge eating disorder and when you mentioned in a row after we split that you had noticed the extra plates and bowls in the washing up, and that I must've thought you were stupid, I thought you were referring to my dysfunctional eating. That's why I didnt defend myself. But I wasn't having men round, I was just stuffing my face on my own and I was mortified when I thought you knew!"

I have no idea why this still niggles at me 20 years later, I'd just rather he went to his grave knowing I wasn't a cheating trollop, just a greedy bastard.

Are there any wrongs you'd like to put right (reasonably lighthearted)?

I'm autistic so my entire life is a misunderstanding. I go to great lengths to minimise interaction with others now as it's very upsetting to be constantly misunderstood and judged for it. I've had to leave jobs and move house due to it.

Everyone in my small town thinks me and my friend have been sleeping together for 10+ years. We’ve never even kissed but if they bring it up like ‘how’s jim wink wink’ and I say we’re just friends they don’t believe me. It really bugs me.

Yes minor, but none the less infuriating...

DH is a bad listener. He can be looking right at you and mentally be somewhere else. I can tell him something repeatedly and he will totally deny that I have.

Tonight he has (grumpily) made it very clear that he had no idea I had a GP appt first thing tomorrow. I’ve told him about this appt (in passing, specifically and within other related conversations) at least 4 times since 6pm and he totally believes I haven’t told him at all and I’m just making it up.

I have no idea what to do about this but I can’t stand him thinking I haven’t when I have! He does it lots.

My sister insists that I kissed a man at my hen party. I did not. It just didn’t happen. Other friends who were there on the night have attested to this. It just did not happen.
I wasn’t drunk, I remember everything that happened.

She’s even told my DH

He believed me, but she brings it up approximately once a year. It’s maddeninf because it’s one of these things where, the more you protest innocence, the more guilty you sound.

I now just ignore her.

Yes I have an older sister who despite being in my 40's and mother of 3 still treats me like a 18 yr old. I hate that she makes up completely untrue versions about me in various events throughout my life. She has herself convinced of certain things that never happened. I may as well talk to the wall trying to convince her otherwise. It really bugs me

1973. Myself and my friend Alison returned to the classroom early and were looking at the cactus on a shelf that belonged to our lovely teacher.

Alison reached out to touch the flower that appeared on the cactus and in doing so she knocked the flower off.

I picked up the flower and attempted to place it back on the cactus but it would not stay on and in walked our teacher and I was accused of pulling the flower off.

Alison was a very quiet child and said nothing and for some bizarre reason, perhaps I felt a sense of protection towards Alison I took the blame for it.

Back in those days it was very wrong to pick wild flowers and the pulling off a flower from a cactus was also met with disproval and my teacher telling me how disappointed she was in me.

Mrs Peacop is long dead but years later I’m annoyed with myself that she thought I was to blame!

Employers from nearly twenty years ago.

I wasn't the one stealing from you. It was your idiot spoiled brat sons girlfriend.

I think deep down they knew it wasn't me but I was the convenient fall guy. Still, all these years later I still burn with fury that after I'd left they told customers that I'd been stealing so people thought I was a thief.

I am many things but I have never been a thief.

@FiremanKing I had a teacher with that name!!! In the SE? Town beginning with R?

An ex of mine told everyone that I was crazy and stalking him. I was dating him for a couple of years and completely unaware he was already in a long term relationship. Whenever we bumped into someone he knew when we were together he later passed it off as me being suicidal and stalking him to the point he felt he had to hang out with me.

I lived on the other side of the country for about 8 years and recently moved back to my home town. I still occasionally notice people that he knew giving me a wide berth. It’s infuriating as no one ever actually confronts me about it ( i guess they think I’m crazy/ suicidal) so I can’t even defend myself.

Totally trivial but I made the mistake at about 8 years old of making polite conversation with my aunt and uncle about their antique glass milk bottle collection (a thing people collect apparently). And from that they assumed I had a passion for antique milk bottles. I got one for every birthday, Christmas, etc for at least the next 12 years. I now have quite the collection and have no idea what the hell to do with them, so I’ve just dragged them around in boxes for 20 years.

Yes, to DH.. YOU put the passports in the wrong place causing us to miss our flights. And the fucking CD was MINE.

mind I have similar but with Willow Tree ornaments. My mil got me one for Christmas years ago which I only used to display when she was with us. She’s obviously told everyone she knows that I love them and I now have an enormous army of these faceless bastards all over my house.

When I was about 10 I had a friend who lived opposite the school. We all used to pop in before school to catch up with each other.
On one day we fell out about something stupid. This friends mum rang my mum to say I wouldn’t be welcome around their house anymore as I put a piece of toast in their VCR (going back a bit). Well, no that wasn’t me, as a) I didn’t eat at their house and b) I saw the little brother do it.
Weirdly, I saw these people 10 years ago and they still believed I was the one who put the slice of toast in the VCR 🙄 ffs!

I was physically abused as a child by my parent & parents partner. I cried and screamed during the abuse. My parent told the neighbours that I was a horrible child, and the screaming was me throwing tantrums because I didn't get my own way. The neighbours believed my parent. I didn't find this out until I was an adult, and made contact with the neighbours, whom I had viewed like family. By this time the neighbours had years of poison poured in their ears from my parent about all the awful things I'd done, and I was rejected by them, and told how awful I'd been. There was no point trying to correct them, so I walked away from them for the final time. It hurts to know that people I loved will go to their grave (if not already there) believing this awful stuff about me.

Equally, one time I cracked, and told another family member of the abuse. That family member tackled my parent about it pretty harshly. My parent wept and wailed to me, and I felt bad for them. So I told the family member that it wasn't true, and I'd made it all up, to protect the parent. Later, as an adult, I tried to tell this family member the truth, and why I lied, but they just brushed it off. It bothers me to think they died, and I never got the chance to make them understand what happened.

DM believes that DH and I have a six figure income, because the father of a school friend of hers in the 1960s worked in the same industry and was a millionaire. Our income is far more prosaic, even combined. Approximately 10% of what she estimates.

Almost everyone I went to senior school with thought I was a lying, attention seeking weirdo nymphomaniac who apparently cheated her way into a prestigious independent school and wasn’t anywhere near as academically bright as her peers...

I actually had undiagnosed Asperger’s syndrome, an attention deficit disorder and hemiplegic migraines. I now have a First Class Honours degree, a lovely home and have been with my husband since before I even left 6th form.

Nope, still a fucking weirdo under-achiever apparently

Just because I had one relationship with a dickhead in my 20s (who doesn't?) one of my friends seems to think I am an appalling judge of character who can't be trusted to find a decent guy. I'm nearly 40 now, and I have a lovely DP. The dickhead still hangs over me (as it were...)

Someone I used to manage thinks I discriminated against them on grounds of disability. In fact I dismissed them on the orders of our HR manager because of evidence gathered by another manager during my maternity leave. Turned out afterwards that the evidence didn't exist. It really hurts me that this person thinks I'm really callous and hardhearted when in fact I was acting on orders, and tried really hard to persuade them to take a different course. I'm a really caring manager too.

One day our paths will cross again professionally and I suspect they will be a complete wreck at just seeing me again. Horrible.

Lighthearted - my grandmother went to her grace believing that I had disproportionately long arms for my body because once, when I was 6, she knitted me a jumper and had to make the arms longer than the pattern said for the body size. She knitted my several more jumpers in the following 18 years before she died. On everyone, the sleeves were 3 inches longer than the pattern said. Three inches that I turned back.

My colleague believes that I have a daughter called Hannah. Dd is actually called Anna. I’m too embarrassed to correct her, and I don’t know why.

Certain members of my DP's family have thought for years that I'm a vegetarian, although I'm actually an omnivore. They think he is too. Despite the fact that we've had Christmas turkey dinners, fish and chips, sausages etc with them over many years I can only think that it's because we're both slim and, in his case, he has a shaved head that might subliminally remind them of famous vegan Moby...?

Also, not now but until fairly recently my mum would buy me clothes for my birthday in a size 10–12. I was around that size when I was in my teens and living at home, but I've been a 6–8 for quite some time now!

@Alabasterangel6 sounds more like gaslighting to me

Yep. An old friend thinks I'm an awful person. I made a mistake (which I explained, apologized, pleaded). She cut me off with barely a backward glance. It's a couple of years ago now, but I think about it most days.
Doesn't matter what I say, nothing will change her opinion of me now.

Kind of hate her for it, if I'm honest. I'd never do that.

"I'm autistic so my entire life is a misunderstanding"

Same

Possibly many people think I cheated on my XH. I only know this because it was repeated back to my DF, with the source being OW's mother (nothing like slinging mud when you're the guilty party!).
I came to the conclusion that I'd let other folk believe what they would if I didn't know them, but if it came back to me again, I would go and see the church warden who I knew (OW's mum was supposedly a pillar of the church, doing flowers etc), and ask him to put her straight.
Luckily for her I never did - it would have been very embarrassing for her.