Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

AIBU to want to know your Family secrets (light hearted) or not

188 replies

99pokerface · 01/04/2015 19:20

Four years ago we found out my uncle was not my grandads

Nana was having a op and was dosed up to the eye balls she very old any way and just kept repeating the baby's not his you know he looks nothing like him I was 4 months gone before we were wed Confused

My uncle is the first and their has always been hushed coversations and dark clouds surrounding uncles birth
Tbh were all very dark looking and my uncle looks more mixed raced than black

OP posts:
YourMaNoBraBackOfMyCar · 01/04/2015 20:19

I think my mum had a baby before I was born and gave him up for adoption. When I was 9 I overheard her saying something about him being her child and it was her decision and how long ago it was... I know she wasn't talking about any of my present siblings. I can't remember who she was talking to but it played on my mind. She was crying and saying she would never forgive herself. I plucked up the courage to ask her the next day and she hit me for eavesdropping. I was in bed. She was drunk and loud. She eventually told me that she was talking about my older stepbrother. I didn't believe her then and don't now. They never really bothered with each other much. She used to say she had a secret that she would never reveal. Not even on her deathbed. If I'm correct in my suspicions then I wish she'd either confide in me or just shut up forever about it. I'm 36 and have 3 children myself. She and her brother were raped as children by the same man. Her father died when she was 15 and her mum when she was 27. They were both mentally ill people who abused their children mentally and physically. I don't think my mum knows how to be a parent to someone like me. Part of me feels like she is jealous of me. She has made the odd snide comment about my life. I remember how mean she could be to me as a child ( when she was pissed naturally) and though I have forgiven her she probably feels I'll judge her. She lives with my two brothers who are troublesome, druggy and boozy. She rarely bothers with me and my sister. She is probably "hiding" behind their issues. We are just making our own way in the world and never asked her for anything. She once said she hated telling me anything as I had the audacity to make suggestions or even try to help her. I think she just wants someone to sound off at. Wow, what an essay. Sorry op. Yes I think we have family secrets...

Namehanger · 01/04/2015 20:20

DH was married to an Iranian, who he married after the Iranian revolution as she was scared to return. They never got divorced, the annulment only came through a couple of weeks before we got married.

Talk about cutting it fine.

Blueandwhitelover · 01/04/2015 20:20

boring life but placemarking anyway
although my aunt is supposed to be the daughter of my grandfather's brother. he found out she was pregnant and departed on the next trawler, his brother stepped in because he had loved her from afar and married her, she's small and fair and everyone else in the family is dark haired and cuddly.

YourMaNoBraBackOfMyCar · 01/04/2015 20:21

Oh and if I'm right it would have been Southern Ireland in the mid 70s. I totally understand the secrecy.

fattymcChocolateEgg · 01/04/2015 20:26

my dads parents left the four children they had at the time with their nana (my great nana) while they went to the chippy...even asked if she wanted a pie.
they never went back. they had decided to do a runner to england!
they sent for the children eventually but only kept the youngest two plus the one they had while in England, my dad and the oldest sister went to live with their aunt and uncle for the next three years, at which point my grandparents decided they wanted them after all.
my dad harboured a lot of resentment, but still made us go see them every week Hmm

my grandad tried to make amends at least. my granny didn't.

Cariad007 · 01/04/2015 20:32

My great aunt was married off to a man from overseas back in the 1930s. They had 7 children and then she returned to her home country for a long holiday. Met up with an old flame while over there. When she got home and got off the boat, her husband saw that she was six months pregnant! He accepted the child as his own though, although he died just a few years later. Everyone in my family knew this story except for the child (now 69) themself. They only found out about it a few years ago when their biological father died and left them something in his will.

Another great aunt was also married off to a much older man and was very unhappy. They went on to have three daughters who could not have looked more unalike than night and day. Rumour has it they had three different fathers...

CornChips · 01/04/2015 20:33

My DM was raped by her own father and her older brother from the time she was about 6 years old. She got pissed the night before my wedding and told me 'in confidence' as apparently I 'had to know' the family secret before I got married and how 'bad blood ran in the family.'

99pokerface · 01/04/2015 20:37

Oh dear corn chips what a awful start to married life

OP posts:
Quokka12 · 01/04/2015 20:38

My dm and df were chief bridesmaid and best man at each other's first wedding - unsurprisingly the exes didn't come to the second

CornChips · 01/04/2015 20:45

To be honest 99although it sounds selfish of me,I am still angry about the timing of her telling me. I have been married more than a decade now and never brought it up with her again. I am having counselling though, and am trying to work it all out in my head.

Failedspinster · 01/04/2015 20:45

My great-aunt, who had learning difficulties, got knocked up by the coal man back in the 1950s. She couldn't have cared for the baby and the decision was taken for her to give the baby up for adoption. She then fell pregnant by the coal man again the following year.

My dad was the result of a fling between my 21 year old grandad and a 15 year old girl who, as a result of falling pregnant, was thrown out by her parents, and gave birth to my dad in a Salvation Army hostel. Grandad's parents formally adopted my dad and brought him up, so my dad's legal parents were in fact his biological grandparents. To the end of his days grandad never gave a toss about my dad, or about the teenaged girl that he left homeless and pregnant. When he later married, his wife (a lovely woman) encouraged him to try and bond with my dad, but he never really did.

And - although not a secret - my eldest son is biologically unrelated to me. He was a stepson from a previous relationship, his mum has never been around and I took him on as a baby. He continues to live with his dad and i have the role of non resident parent. Always makes me giggle when we are out and people comment on how alike he is to my two year old!

StrawberryCheese · 01/04/2015 20:47

My DM found out that her brother was in fact her cousin, when she came across the adoption records in a drawer. She was 11 at the time and her dad had just passed away. Her Aunty who gave up the child also put another one up for adoption, but they weren't kept in the family. Neither child was fathered by her husband, apparently she had a thing for bus drivers.

BernadetteMatthews · 01/04/2015 20:47

Oh there are some very sad stories on here. Flowers for you all.

Chippednailvarnish · 01/04/2015 20:50

Well, my Great Grandfather was in the IRA.
My Godfather's DD was actually fathered by my aunt's ex-husband.
When my other then unmarried Aunt got pregnant out of wedlock my grandparents sent her to a home for shamed women.

ResurrectAndEatShitChoc · 01/04/2015 20:51

A member of my bio dads family was arrested for smuggling uranium for Gaddifi or how ever you spell it.

So basically a terrorist.

Yet I'm the fucking black sheep Grin

IUseAnyName · 01/04/2015 20:56

My dad died when I was 8, I found out 10 years later it was suicide due to my dm cheating. I don't blame my dm though.

Sexyhouseslippers · 01/04/2015 20:58

my great grandpa was married to my great nana until he died but was cheating on her since they were married , my great grandfather was gay but never told anyone till he was caught and he was cut off from my family and the neighbourhood. This was during the aids scare which he contracted and passed away from.

FingerBlastingFun · 01/04/2015 20:58

50 years ago my grandad ran off with my nanna's brother's wife. My grandad married her and they're still together now.

My nana then put my DM and all her siblings into care. Both my Nanna and grandad went on separately to have lots more children but they left my DM and aunts and uncles in care and even took their new babies to the care home to 'show them off' Shock

Secret674 · 01/04/2015 21:00

My parents are first cousins - their mothers were sisters. They had to get permission from the church to marry, and when I was born my mother was terrified I'd have some weird genetic problem. They only told me when I was 13, but I'd realised years before.

Luciferbox · 01/04/2015 21:02

Found out my uncle wasn't my grandads bio son. He was 11 when they met, no one questioned the big age gap between him and his sisters or the lack of wedding photos. It all came out as my DM found the real wedding certificate dated 12 yrs after my uncles birth.

Ihatecobwebs · 01/04/2015 21:04

On one side my great grandfather married one sister, had children with her, then when she died, married her sister - found that sister was not the same as original wife (she was a teetolar, he owned a pub), felt forced to change, sold the pub, couldn't cope so comitted suicide - leaving three children with a step-mother who was also their aunt in control of the money, who definitely did not want children. My grandmother was left bringing up her younger brother, whilst having to work and earn enough to keep them both.
So my great great aunt is also my step great grandmother. She decided she wanted to be buried with them, so bought the plot next to her sister (where husband had also been buried). As she lived for another 50 years or so, that was fun finding the paperwork to prove ownership of the plot. (She used to visit it regularly to make sure it was still vacant.)

On the other side my grandfather's sister had one child out of wedlock, left him with her parents, and ran off with another man and married him. She used to visit once a year but wasn't allowed out of the kitchen. Then she became married to another man, and had more children. There appears not to have been a divorce between these two marriages, and according to the marriage certificates I have found, she got younger rather than older. The grandchildren from this second marriage were not happy (understatement) when they connected to us via family history searches and found more about their grandmother than they had bargained for!

Another one - no proof of anything, but I wonder how one set of my great grandparents were able to afford for the wedding they had complete with photographs, when one worked in the kitchen of the "big house" and the other worked in the gardens.

Have others, some fact, some "spoken history" but most don't mean anything to anyone outside the families.

ilovemydoggy · 01/04/2015 21:05

We didn't find this out till my nan passed away we was sorting through hrt stuff and found 6 wedding certs and only one was for the wedding to her and my grandad. We asked her sister about them and she had a wedding every time her current boyfriend went to war and she never divorced any of them. Only stopped when she become pregnant with my dad and got wed to my grandad. Sounds like she had a lot of fun during the war,

LaLyra · 01/04/2015 21:06

When my Great-Grandfather died my Grandad went along to register his death and was told 'You must have the details wrong, that person is already dead'. After double and triple checking he went back and they discovered that Grandad's parents registered their son as dying at 2 years old. My Grandad could remember his Grandparents so they definitely brought Grandad up. We've no idea if Gr-Grandad was actually an illegitimate baby born in the family around the same time who was given the dead baby's name/legitimacy or if the illegitimate baby died and was buried under that name perhaps due to not being christened (we have never found a baptism, marriage or death for the illegitimate baby and there were a few illegitimate babies in the family so no reason to think he would have been adopted out).

My Grandad's sister remembered her Dad going somewhere, we think maybe to get a pension or something, and him being listed as deceased in a big book, but him arguing with the lady behind the desk that obviously he wasn't dead as he was there.

We've never ever been able to get to the bottom of it, I don't think we ever will.

itsnotmeitsyou1 · 01/04/2015 21:06

So many stories in my family. Some truly shocking, and quite frankly unrepeatable. I dread my child/children finding out, but hopefully the 'bad blood' won't be passed on.

I have one that is not remotely shocking now, but a scandal at the time. My great aunt turned up at my grandparents house, asked to lie down on their bed for a bit. Next then, there's a scream from the bedroom, she'd only given birth! This was the late 40's, she was unwed and it was probably the local bus driver's. My grandparents didn't judge, just went straight out and bought her all she needed. Always makes me smile, they were amazing people.

I also have a relative who's mum was gran, sister/mother. They have always been screwed up, very likely because of it.

toffeeboffin · 01/04/2015 21:07

My grandma (dad's side) married two brothers: the first one died in the war, so she married his brother. Not a secret but still a bit different.

Also, great, great uncle died when he was six trying to re-create a magic trick - he choked to death on a sixpence.

Husband's uncle used to regularly abuse his daughters. (that one is secret, FIL mentioned it when he was drunk one night)