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)?

The first guy I ever fell in love with believes I cheated on him with the man who almost raped me (didn't manage it by virtue of my housemate's impeccable sense of timing). I didn't find out he believed that few several years later and it took me a few years more (like.. ten) to be able to let it go.

@sar302 hah! This happened to me as well. My parents spent years believing I was the reason why my sister and I were always late to school. Even when, at the age of 13 I chose to cycle 30 mins to get to school instead of wait on my sister because I was sick of being late. They still thought I was the slow one. It wasn't until we were well into our 20s that they finally realised it was her. Being late makes me very anxious, I'm pathologically early!

My mother doesn’t think I do any housework because my room was messy as a teenager. Even though I left home at 18 and have always had a clean and tidy home since. She thinks my Dh does it all even though he works away for 2 weeks a month.

She also believes that Dh has always done everything for the children. She never believed that I did the night feeds (I was bf) and Dh did them all, I never got up to take them to school, cooked their dinner, etc. Like I said above Dh has always worked away for 2 weeks a month. Apparently this is because when I was a teenager I never got up until 11am on a weekend!

Also (this is the one that really fucks me off) she truly believes that Dh is only with me because we had children and I trapped him. I have been with Dh since I was 14! We were childhood sweethearts and have been together 23 years. We have had our ups and downs like most marriages (nothing serious thankfully) and I’m sure if he was going to leave me he would of done it by now! Dh and I are very happy and are making lots of plans for the future as the children are older, but my mum is just waiting for him to walk out of the door. He has never given any reason for her to ever think this. It has made me go low contact with her.

Three of my neighbours don't believe I work, I'm single mum to teen and I work permanent nights. They are convinced that I am saying I work nights as a 'cover' for going out (I work in a uniform, and wear it to travel to work, it's hardly the height of fashion!) And then 'laying in bed with the curtains closed all day' the place I live is social housing, the estate is now mixed with bungalows for 55+, social housing and houses bought by private owners, some then privately rented out. So I've just been stereotyped into being a lazy scrounger, because I'm a single mum in social housing, to the point I've been told 'they' pay for me, when I work 45 or thereabouts hours a week, and pay my own bills etc. Oh and apparently my dbro and ddad who visit occasionally, and some of the workmen that come to the house from time to time are visiting for an entirely different reason...... Which makes me feel slightly sick.
All this started when someone totally unrelated to me parked across the drive of one of the houses, and they knocked on and started shouting how my car was always there and they were going to report me, etc, etc. The fact I don't drive, or own a car (and regularly see the main instigators on the bus!) Seems to be irrelevant to this. As was trying to explain the car was nothing to do with me. There's 3 houses all seem to be under this impression, the rest and fine with me, take in parcels, and even looked after my dog when I had to rush her sister to the vet. It's just these 3, feels like bullying tbh, but I ignore them now and often if I'm in the garden or going out it's to a chorus of "There she goes, probably off to spend our taxpayers money. The fact they're all retired and I'm probably contributing to their pension seems to pass them by too. It gets me down sometimes.

My ex boyfriends best friend sexually assaulted me but my ex boyfriend decided I cheated on him after 3 years of being together, it was devastating.

@emmalovesmangoes all the biggest hugs for you.

@Damntheman Thankyou, it was 4 years ago now and I have a new partner and baby but it still stings that he ever thought I would do that, his best friend was a bastard, as you can probably tell, I trusted his best friend as well but what can you do 🤷🏻‍♀️ they aren't friends anymore but that's nothing to do with what happened to me x

My sister in law thinks, after 35 years of knowing me, that I'm stuck up and aloof. I'm not, I'm introverted and only come out of my shell around people that I feel comfortable with (which obviously speaks volumes for how I feel when with her).

My aunt believes that I collect pig memorabilia because I was once shopping with her, back in the 80s, and pointed out a cute pig ornament. Ever since, pretty much everything she's bought for me has been pig-related.

A friend thinks I inflicted a really odd injury on him when we were 8 (not saying what because it's so unique that it'd be outing) and it wasn't me, I was the one who took him to his mother, but he frequently brings it up in conversation about the time I did it.

When I was about 20, I got a bit political and gave a friend a lecture about my radical beliefs ( which were nonsense !). I haven't had those beliefs for decades, but whenever the subject of politics comes up, friend always says "well I know which way you lean Birdie, you're so wrong, etc". I can't make her understand that my 20 year-old self was just silly and that I've changed ! She just won't listen so I'm stuck with this silliness forever.

Forgot one. My parents and sister believe I can't cook.

When I first left home they called in to see me and my boyfriend (now my husband) and we were just about to eat Pot Noodles. I was 21, had just got home from a very long day at work and hadn't had chance to shop but 28 years on, Pot Noodles are apparently as technical as it gets in my kitchen.

From years ago, a belief held by a group of friends, but never expressed to me, that i was racist and colour prejudiced

It only came to light when one of the group came to stay with me and my OH in another country and met my very best friend - a very black,very shiny(cos she moisturised with coconut oil),Nigerian girl.. He was pleased that I'd at last "opened up my mind".

WHAT???

Apparently this happened because I absolutely loathed his then housemate. NOT because he was W.Indian,as they thought, but because he was an A-Grade,3*,prime SHIT to his girlfriend to whom he flaunted his other conquests and humiliated.

His surname was Tench, and his first name started with ST, so I always referred to him as Stench

Horrible,horrible man,fully deserving of that sobriquet.grrrrrr.

My mother seems to think I can't cook, in fact that I'm a danger to myself and everyone else in the kitchen. Yes, I may have brought some questionable dishes home from food tech back in my school days, but I have improved somewhat in the 25 years since then! However, she'd never dare to eat anything I had cooked because undoubtably she would immediately drop dead. My partner, kids, dad and friends all think I'm a great cook - so do I! Better than my mum actually and clearly she doesn't want to be shown up by me!

I’m another one whose parents think that I am the person I was as a teenager - fussy with food, messy and pretty disorganised, late lie ins (after working long hours in pubs). Apparently a lot of family problems at the time were caused by my very normal teenage antics.

I now live a very organised life, eat most things, get the 7am train to work etc. They refuse to believe it, my Mum even still comments when I eat vegetables if we’re eating out. There’s often snide comments about me and how much my husband does implying I don’t do anything. I can’t tell them any different so I don’t bother anymore and just distance myself from them.

Dp inadvertently told a mutual friend that he isn't the biological father of our dds, and it now seems far too late to correct.

He walked in to a conversation about "gaining a family", thought they were just talking about becoming parents and joined in. Only realised when a couple of other friends told him they were impressed he had "taken on" the dds and that he treats them just like they were his dc. Obviously he's corrected everyone he can, but occasionally people still bring it up to both of us.

Mine are ones I'd like to keep under wraps tbh!

Main one being keeping the fact that I'm in touch with my sister quiet from my parents, who are NC.

We're not especially close, but we see each other occasionally through my other sister. My other sister likes to really drag out the drama of it all, and I can see the fault on both sides. It's very much not black and white.

I happily compartmentalise the whole thing for a quiet, sustainable life. I don't live close to any of them, nor is there any risk of overlapping social media. I can't for the life of me see why my other sister doesn't do the same - some of the worst stresses of my life have come from when she's tried to crowbar them too close together.

That my friends thought I was being selfish and ignoring them when my mental health hit rock bottom. I tried to explain after. But they were not interested. They saw it as a slight on them that I had a break down and didn’t go out or see anyone for ages. Made me feel guilty and made my recovery ten times as bad. Never ever ever made someone who is recovering from this feel like they made me feel.

I was working on my 21st birthday, on a construction site. My manager took me out for lunch to celebrate, just a pizza place locally. When we got back to work the site manager refused to let me back in, saying that I must have had an alcoholic drink with lunch as it was my 21st, and site rules state that you can’t work if you have any alcohol in your system.
No matter what I said he wouldn’t believe that I hadn’t drunk. He accompanied me to my desk so I could get my bag and I left.

My manager was allowed back in, although the site manager wouldn’t believe him either when he said that I hadn’t had any alcohol.

Bizarre, but I got to finish early and enjoy my birthday!

Went back to work the next day and nothing was said.

Katsinki you really don't understand how you came across as racist?

Even your defence sounds racist.

Mine is similar to yours OP an ex of mine was told by someone I thought was a friend that I had kissed another lad (who I was also friends with) on a night out once. It 10000000% didn't happen!!! We broke up and coincidentally I now have a baby and am marrying the boy I was accused of kissing!!! So it looks VERY suspicious now! There's no way on gods earth he would ever believe I didn't cheat on him now and tbh I wouldn't believe it either if I was him. But I hate cheaters and it really gets to me that he thinks I am one. He is a lovely lad and doesn't deserve to think that someone he loved cheated on him.

@AndOutComeTheBoobs

What are you talking about?

Katinski explained quite clearly that her friends mistakenly thought she was racist because she hated one man who happened to be West Indian because of his horrible personality not because of his skin colour.

Yes I read what she put.

But it's hardly a surprise that she was labels a racist if she called the guy Stench, is it?

Thank you FiremanKing

I see where boobs is coming from. It's a common racist misconception that POC are smelly.

I can also understand that Katinski didn't know that and nicknamed him because he actually did have an odour problem. But it's not surprising to me either that nicknaming a POC stench looked racist.

My 'D'M has a revisionist history style when it comes to me. The child she thinks I was versus the one she tells people I was. I've given up correcting her. She wants me to do a speech about her next month for her birthday but I don't think my version of her would go down well!

HE DIDN'T HAVE AN ODOUR PROBLEM,Peeps!!! He DID have a name which, oh so easily, lent itself to reflect what I thought of him