Things you used to think and now can't quite believe you did

[treaclesoda]

I saw a seagull flying and it suddenly occurred to me that when I was little, I thought there were two different types of seagulls. Ones with legs, and ones without. Naturally the ones with legs had no choice but to fly all the time

I was a pretty bright child, I can't imagine why I thought that.

Please tell me someone else out there thought the same?

[ThatWasThat]

Oh yes, I couldn't work out why America seemed so backward when people on The News thought it was worth taking notice of.

[Pimpf]

I was told that tabby cats are always female and gingers were always male, when looking for a new cat a few months ago, came across lots of female gingers. So that's wrong then!

[balenciaga]

I used to think unicorns were real

And that "test tube babies" grew in test tubes ie till they were ready to be born. Then they would just be handed to their parents

[ThatBloodyWoman]

Fantastic yelwah

Now what was the date on that........

[Atbeckandcall]

I still don't get why mum says when someone is tickled they'll get worms (as in thread worms).

But I believed it, until I worked at a vet practice and I actually then understood how you contract worms (ingestion, not tickling).

My mum is really weird.

[balenciaga]

Oh yeah and I thought New York was in LA. Or vice Versa. And also that New York was the capital of America

And I also thought Australia was where the South Pole is (i think the term down under confused me) ... Worst thing is I was 31 when I twigged, and only because I was on a plane looking at that virtual map thing on the back of the seats and amazing myself with seeing where places actually were in the world

[balenciaga]

And until I was about 9 I thought women just got to a certain age then occasionally and randomly got pregnant with babies, (ie. it just happened with no input from a man)

My parents were not big on telling us about the facts of life

[Oldraver]

We did sex education pretty early on (for the seventies) when I was 8, but I was a tad confused. I thought only animals put it in but humans just lay together in bed, and the sperm wriggled across the bed. For this reason I stopped hopping into bed with my Mum and Dad in case I got pregnant.

I can remember the first year of secondary school saying something like..."er imagine if you had to actually put it in like animals, how gross" and getting some funny looks

[JugglingFromHereToThere]

HaHa OldRaver

Mine is a bit similar in that my DMum would try giving us the talk and begin with "When two people are very much in love ...." but then just peter out and not get to the crux of the matter!

So, me, aged about 8, and heading towards being a good-hearted, liberal minded kid of the 70's, would think "Ahh, no wonder there are so many children of un-married mothers (still presented to me in that era as something of a problem) when all it takes is one "look of love" and bingo, there you are, up-duffed"

[xeno]

I thought there were two rivers in London. The "temms" and the Thames (pronounced "thaymms")

I only twigged when I asked mum and dad how to spell "temms" and they told me t.h.a.m.e.s. And I said no, the other one!

[FoolishFay]

Cats eyes: I thought that they had some sort of intelligent sensor so it would turn itself on when it 'saw' a car coming and then turn itself off again. My dad told me that the film 'The sting' was a catastrophe movie about giant bees; I believed that for years.
Re sex education; I found a book about 8, and understood most but couldn't work out what caused an erection. I thought that they just happened out of the blue. You'd be browsing the slacks in M&S and.....whoops! There it was.

These two not mine but always amused me. A school friend thought that one of Henry VIII's wives was Irish - Katherine O' Faragon. And a teacher who announced loudly in a busy staff room that she'd watched a TV programme about J Lo - and she looked exactly like Jennifer Lopez.

[supersop60]

I thought that 'open sesame' was pronounced open sea same. Having only read it and never heard it, it's not surprising.
I teach a couple of yr 3 girls who can't understand how 'I'm not married, yet have children.

[RowanMumsnet]

Hello there

We've moved this to Mumsnet Classics now (and for those who haven't seen it we've made a jolly fun page out of some of your more elaborate misconceptions)

[mrspremise]

As a child, I genuinely believed that being taken into police custody involved actual CUSTARD

[cabbagewhite]

I used to think that when a man was helping the police with their enquiries, that he was actually helping by knocking on doors and helping the police interview people.

[minipie]

I'm another one who took a very long time to realise you had to move during sex - I blame the "educational" picture books

I thought all modern housing (1960s or later) was council housing - in my defence this was pretty much true in my area

I thought "twat" was a very minor insult, a cross between twit and prat

[alemci]

when learning to drive ( young adult) I misheard driving instuctor and thought the car three wheeled not free wheeled when you disengaged clutch. had visions of 3 legged/ 3 wheeling car.

asked dh which wheel didn't work. he fell about

[MallGalleries]

When I was small I thought washing machines were
water powered.
Like the water pressure made the drum spin or something. ..
Just seemed logical at the time. ..

[MallGalleries]

When I was small I thought washing machines were
water powered.
Like the water pressure made the drum spin or something. ..
Just seemed logical at the time. ..

[MallGalleries]

When I was small I thought washing machines were
water powered.
Like the water pressure made the drum spin or something. ..
Just seemed logical at the time. ..

[MallGalleries]

Oops! And still haven't learned to use a smartphone, obviously!

Sorry about that.

[Bumpsadaisie]

I used to find the words of "I vow to thee, my country" quite confusing.

I couldn't understand why it was that, in the "other country I've heard of long ago, most dear to them that love her most great to them that know", their pride was suffering so much.

Perhaps they had been a really great country but recently someone had done something awful to make them ashamed and embarrassed?

[JugglingFromHereToThere]

I was perhaps similarly confused by the words "The Lord's my shepherd, I'll not want" - that's a bit harsh I thought, not to want him

[blondiep14]

I used to think that they put very tall prisoners in lamp posts to turn the lights on and off ??!

[EasyWhiteChocolate]

Just looked through the top half of the thread, and came across this:

I thought Arkansas was pronounced Ar-kan-zus. ... How is it pronounced?! I'm an adult, I have no excuse!

As a child, when people said "Eat plenty of food and you'll grow big and strong!", I thought that it was because all of the food that you ate would build up inside your body, starting at your toe and building up to your head, and eventually there would be so much food that it would push against your skull and stretch your body. I was quite old when I realised that the digestive system was an actual thing.