To ask if anyone has ever met a Walter Mitty type character?

[Mrspoopoohead]

Just that really it always amazes me to hear how people manage to get jobs impersonating doctors for example. Has anyone had any real life experiences?

@Handsoffstrikesagain

Certain units will still parachute if needed, but yeah, every word out of that idiots mouth is a lie! How is your sister falling for this?! How old is the guy?

He’s approx 50yrs. Not worked for the 3 yrs he’s lived there. She supports him. Unfortunately my sister has to have a man, she’ll believe anything that comes out of his mouth. She can’t see the lies, even when he trips up and it’s pointed out to her. I’m just the wicked older sister, who doesn’t want her to be happy.

@HelpfulBelle

My dad was at school with someone who had delusions of grandeur/was a Billy bullshitter. There are loads of stories but the one I remember best is that one day they were hanging out and he started nudging everyone and looking at the sky. When they asked what he was doing, he said, ‘that’s my best mate flying that plane’. When asked how he knew, he replied, ‘just dipped his wing at me, to say hello, didn’t he?’.

Was it a small plane? To be fair, dipping wings is a thing. I've known many Pilots do it when they're flying low/fairly over somewhere where friends or family are.

Even large airliners do it on their retirement flights, shortly after take off.

I work with a number of people that have diagnosed personality disorders. Some not all will constantly lie, sometimes attention seeking other times to create a split or a drama it’s exhausting at times. But it is part of their condition

Others I’ve known that lie when there is no reason to. It baffles me why they do. Sometimes the lie isn’t even particularly interesting and mundane but they still carry on with it or tell other similar lies

@RossPoldarksWife I can promise that dh isn't a Walt, unless he just likes ironing the uniform, but he looked very confused when I asked about the red book. What is that?

@Firstinlastout

There's a bloke in our town who has been in the army ,but hasn't done as much as he's made out.Every Rememberance Sunday he sits in the pub wearing medals that he's bought off ebay!Heard a few people calling him Walter Mitty.

Do you know for a fact that he's not won the medals and has bought them off eBay? There's a LOT of veterans out there who get trolled by seemingly jealous individuals who start rumours that said Veterans weren't in the forces after all or didn't win the medals they claim to. From what I gather, it happens a LOT! These trolls are apparently jealous of the pride & attention

This bloke was part of a few military partner groups I was in on Facebook. Even when his stories and uniform didn't match up he had a number of core believers. He ended up being tied as a sex pest too. So many women have him information about themselves and husbands.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/09/03/walter-mitty-fantasist-secretly-pestered-soldiers-wives-sex/amp/

Apologies for the typos!

@AgeLikeWine

I did bar work when I was a student. It was surprising how many former SAS soldiers I encountered who wanted to tell me all about their time in ‘The Regiment’ and the top-secret clandestine operations they participated in. All very hush hush, of course, and they shouldn’t really be telling me about it due to the Official Secrets Act. One claimed he was writing a book about his exploits, under a pseudonym, of course, because he didn’t want to become a target for foreign operatives, or whatever.

They were all balding, overweight, unfit looking middle-aged men, drinking on their own during the day. They didn’t seem very bright. I didn’t know whether to laugh at them or feel sorry for them.

So because of how they looked, you've declared them liars??? The majority of ex-forces become less fit as they get older as they're not as active

[quote Wingull]@RossPoldarksWife I can promise that dh isn't a Walt, unless he just likes ironing the uniform, but he looked very confused when I asked about the red book. What is that? [/quote]
When my ex left the Grenadiers he had a red book, it stated the day and time he joined and the day and time he left. It lists all the places he served in. His rank and dates. His achievements and medals. My daughter still has it. He left in 1994 after 17 yrs.

I’ve known two.

The first was the partner of a family member.
They were together 8 years, she said she worked for a big pharmaceutical company in a pretty dull role, she knew quite a lot about it, or it seemed like she did, although she rarely actually talked about work.
It seemed like a good job as she was able to work from home a lot and take time off whenever she wanted.
There were quite a few things she obviously exaggerated about, she was one of those people who could join a conversation about anything and knew someone who had some experience with whatever you were talking about.

They didn’t live together until shortly before it all ended, she moved into his house and it quickly became clear she didn’t have anywhere near the disposable income he thought she did.
At first he thought she had a load of secret debt she’d hidden from him, she refused to discuss it but out of concern he did some digging and worked out she was lying about working at the company she claimed to work for, he thought she must have lost her job and lied to save face.... but no she’d never worked there.
For there entire relationship she had been unemployed and claiming benefits.
She couldn’t explain why she lied and instead of trying to sort it out she packed her stuff and left, she pretty much completely ghosted him, we assume out of embarrassment.

It was awful because he was heartbroken and said he would have forgiven the lie, he really loved her and up until that point their relationship had been perfect, it does make you wonder what else she lied about though.
They were late 30’s so not like it was teenager nonsense.
I still can’t understand it.

The second was a colleague who got the job based on a completely fabricated cv, she was lovely but rubbish, we couldn’t understand it, it was like she didn’t know anything about our industry, I contacted someone I know who works for an agency she listed as a former employer on her cv and they had no idea who she was, further checks proved the same for everything else on her cv, including education.

Her references, which were supposed to be people from the former employers were also not known by the actual companies, we think she either created the contacts and give the references herself or had a friend do it.

It’s a shame she was so shit as the job she made such an effort to get it and was actually really nice.

A classmate kept up a fairly long-running story of having cancer, even cut her hair to pretend it had fallen out from chemo. Another child at school genuinely had cancer, and was obviously getting quite a lot of attention, which the fantasist apparently wanted in on. The fantasist was quite unstable and was a horrendous bully, I've wondered since what was going on at home, I suspect it wasn't a good environment.

Couple of cautions though

• You can tell people you've signed the Official Secrets Act, everyone working in the Civil Service (from cleaners to senior staff), police, public bodies etc will have signed. What you should not do is tell random people what level of security clearance you have.

• Do be careful not to confuse a walter mitty character with someone who has a fluctuating disability, struggling to walk one day, but fine on other days. People with such disabilities get bad enough reactions as it is, to the extent many won't claim the help they need because they get a kind of imposter syndrome about not being disabled enough.

And with mobility it's a case of use it or lose it, despite the pain. Then when they do, as PP says, they are subject to their disability being questioned by all and sundry.

I had a friend in high school who lied constantly. Big lies about living abroad, family relocating and, as with many liars, a ‘dead’ relative. We eventually lost touch and reconnected as adults. I really enjoyed catching up with her until she said something that just didn’t ring true and I realised I had no interest in being friend with someone if it meant constantly second guessing everything she said.

I also had a long relationship with a man who lied about things both big and small. Like others, it could be something as simple as whether he’d turned off a light, but ultimately I discovered he’d lied about everything and he was actually a con-man, defrauding people out of their life savings!

Being around someone like this is like standing on quicksand, one minute you’re fine, then suddenly the ground below you shifts. It’s a horrible, unsettling feeling.

My husband has a friend who was like Jay from The Inbetweeners, knew everyone, had done everything, really outlandish silly lies. Then he met his wife and the lies stopped. I think he was just lonely and unsatisfied and now that he’s happy, he doesn’t need to lie.

Dh thinks the red book could be the testimonial that they are given when they leave.

I know a woman in my town who lies about health issues and exaggerates everything in fact, im giving her the benefit of the doubt assuming there's a grain of truth in there. She comes out with such tall stories all the time, her house went on fire = fire in her sink. She knows a lot of well known people. They send her cards and gifts. She is married with kids and her eldest two kids have issues. Drugs, depression, suicide attempts, but i think that might have been for attention in the family and not from any deep deep depression luckily.
Why she carries on like this i do not know. Most keep just go along with it. Nobody says "hang on, that cant be true because you were in london on the 4th February". All so baffling!

@VienneseWhirligig

I work with a woman who is a fantasist. Mention a famous person or politician and she is related to them or friends with them. Regardless of who you say. Peter Mandelson, Jeremy Corbyn, Liz Truss, Elton John, anyone basically. She has had every disease going, has worked in every job going. She is also very fond of the sound of her voice and has an opinion about anything and everything.

Wow, this is the profile i recognise.

Reading this thread, there is such a pattern, what is motivating these people?

A childhood wound that makes them feel invisible???

But I really agree with the comment about second hand embarrassment. When their lies dont embarrass them because they see no reason you wouldnt believe them, but you're the one squirming with awkwardness!!

Ooh, met a few!

When I was doing an apprenticeship about 11 years ago, this whole class of students was failing every single exam that came up. Eventually they looked closer into this man's qualifications in the area, to find that all of his qualifications didn't match to him. Still they gave him the benefit of the doubt, and sat him down for a few of the exams they were giving us apprentices, which he tanked.

He was sacked and the police were apparently involved.

My step dad, he had been involved in car racing, had been a chef, had been a builder, had been in the army, talked about when he was stationed.

So imagine my surprise, when I grow up and have a boyfriend involved in that particular type of racing. He says so fuckit, where did your dad race? So I ask Dad, he tells me (but that track was the open at that time) he mert my dad, and he's talking to him about racing. My boyfriend says to me, I don't think he's ever raced.
Never been a builder either. DH is a builder, when I first met him I asked him to help my step dad with a job, nope. Wasn't a builder.

My dad is my stepdads brother so he knows the timeline of his life before him and my mum got together, never got through the initial training, but he was in Ireland with my dad.

Oh and the chef thing, he can cook a roast dinner, but everything else is from the freezer and thrown in the oven.

My daughters father sent me a picture of himself in his security uniform. He was apparently working for security that was top secret, which is why I never realised he was working as security (or anything!) His stepdad told me he found DDs dad in one of his old work uniforms taking pictures one day. How he laughed when I told him that he apparently worked secret security, and then there were questions how he managed to get into his Step dads uniform. He is of a small build and ex was about 5 stone more than him.

I was long haul cabin crew for many years. We used to do quite long trips so would get to know our colleagues quite well while on trips, despite not usually knowing them beforehand. On a 10 day Australia trip there was a pilot that also had horses like me. We got on very well chatting about our riding. I was engaged to someone else at that time, but it was a really sociable trip and friendly crew. I didn’t fly with him again until a year later, I had split up with my fiancé, cancelled wedding etc. We went to the pool at the hotel and sat talking all night. Nothing happened but we swapped numbers. Our rosters never coincided, but we spoke on the phone regularly. He’d ring me while riding his horse. We arranged a date, but the day before I got a phone call from a lady who turned out to be his wife! And he didn’t have a horse. Everything he’d said on that 10 day trip, to 18 crew members was completely made up. He managed to not talk about his family once in that time. And crew talk a lot about their lives to each other! It wasn’t even about a leg over, there was another girl that really fancied him and he wasn’t interested, he just wanted to talk about his made up life and horse to me!! (end of story is that I told his wife everything - he said I’d been stalking him. She left him)

Yes, I had a boss at a part time job once who did this. She was a serial fraud, would move to a new place, set up new identities (including on one occasion pretending to be both of a pair of twins) and set up theatre companies. I only worked for her one day a week (in one of her incarnations) and was really young at the time but later realised that there were clues. Just before the law caught up with her she tried to steal my identity, using my actual birth certificate. It was awful.

Some fascinating stories here keep them coming. It must be so exhausting trying to keep the deceit up, especially now that so many lies can be squashed right away with a quick check on Google.

I don't know anyone like this but the podcast Pretend Radio by Javier Leiva sounds right up your street!

A teacher at my high school. She covered a class I was in during her first few weeks at the school and told us that she was the product of gang rape, and had been recruited by, and worked for, MI5 before teaching (so in the three months between uni and starting with us then - she did her training in situ). I found out she repeated the rape story to another group of students, but the story re MI5 changed to her just being offered a job.

Ok, it could have been true, but why, if it was, would it be the first thing you told a group of students? There were other stories she told which made little sense.

She left in the middle of a term, having spent the previous few weeks sat by herself in the dining hall rather than with the rest of the staff. No idea what happened.

@MNWorldisCrazy.Yes definitely know they were bought and not won.The blokes who have called him it were all in the Armed Forces and have done their own things and won their own medals,so no need for them to troll anyone or be jealous_just pissed off because people do this!

@notacooldad

I don't know anyone like this but the podcast Pretend Radio by Javier Leiva sounds right up your street!

Thanks some of those look interesting I'll give it a listen.