No matter how careful we all are with our secrets, there’s always someone who knows some little tidbit that could make life really, really difficult for us — if not destroy us entirely.
Sometimes those secrets are massive, criminal-scale skeletons ready to burst out of the closet at the holder’s whim, but other times they’re smaller, but possibly just as deadly.
A recent Reddit post called for people to reveal any kind of secret they know about another person, on any scale, “that could literally ruin their life,” and some of the answers will leave you reeling — and second-guessing ever telling anyone anything again.
But before you get to frantically scrolling through the entire post, wondering if your own secret is buried somewhere within, here are some of the most popular responses:
1.
My friend had sex with his wife’s sister long before they got married. She has no idea.
2.
A rich businessman in my neighbourhood is meeting with a hooker on regular basis. I guess that could mess up a lot if his wife knew.
3.
A former neighbour of mine wasn’t a retired teacher, he was a Balkan war criminal. But it was better than having noisy neighbours so I let him be.
4.
My mom told me my step-father is not my step-sister’s biological father. My step-sister has no idea.
5.
One of my closest friends went to an Ivy League college. He very much acts like it on a regular basis. I know (but he doesn’t) that his parents bought his way in. His grades were far too mediocre.
6.
My ex microdoses mushrooms at work. He’s a pharmacist at a well known retail chain. He is also growing them in his house. Not super illegal there, but the charge could cost him his career.
7.
A coworker bragged (at work) about losing his virginity the night of his bachelor party but his wife still doesn’t know and thinks they lost their virginity to each other on their wedding night. It’s a VERY big deal to her and would most likely end in their divorce if she ever found out.
8.
Lied about being pregnant and subsequently a miscarriage. Claimed she had photos taken at the hospital of her miscarriage but turns out she cropped those photos from an article written by a grieving mother. Sent these to her ex, supposed father of the child, for monetary support.
9.
My coworker drunkenly confessed to a murder to myself and another coworker. He told us the story, the details (including the victim) the location if the body, and the motive. I’ve actually reported it to Law Enforcement but they never followed up with me. They either don’t believe me or they have investigated and found nothing to prove, or they’re still investigating it.
10.
Went into the search history one day to find a closed tab, previously thinking my brother was smart enough to clear it or use an Incognito browser. Found out that not only was he on a group masturbating website, but he was getting off to [My Little Pony] porn, when he previously told me he would rather die than see me enjoy MLP as a show.
11.
Years ago was trawling sketchy personals listings and came across my then Starbucks manager. He not only posted this face, but I could also see his shitty tattoos so it was definitely him. Anyhow, he was servicing men and women starting at $100. I never told anyone and I hated the fact that I’d seen his penis.
12.
A good friend of mine is Indian and gay, which she knows her family won’t accept. She about to have an arranged marriage to a man, who is also gay. Neither of their families know the truth and are excited about the upcoming wedding.
The groom’s boyfriend is part of the wedding party. They plan to have children via ivf at some point.
13.
I went to university with a guy who became a very successful drugs dealer on the dark web. He made tens of millions, then quietly retired somewhere in Asia and opened a vegan restaurant. His wife and kids don’t have a clue.
Last we spoke he said he still held most of the Bitcoin he collected back then and it’s worth “9 digits” now. I don’t want to say much more, he’s the nicest guy who just unwittingly stumbled into a dubious windfall.
14.
My brother had an affair with one of my friend’s mums. She used to give him a lift to work when he was 18 years old, and she started being suggestive on one drive so they pulled over and you know what. This continued for a long time, over six months.
She ended up getting obsessed with him and he blocked her on all social media and his phone and basically buried his head in the sand. Her husband is a huge skin-head scary guy that owns one of the pubs, and her son is a lifelong friend of mine.
15.
My mom is the most straight-laced, uptight person you can imagine and she works very high-level financial jobs for the government…What no one else knows is that she has a tattoo on the back of her leg of a bear with penises instead of legs- like where it’s legs would be there are just massive dicks.
She wears tights or pants to cover it all the time, as far as I know I’m the only person that knows about it. S
he was a very wild teenager and met up with an “aspiring tattoo artist” (aka rando with a tattoo gun) in a hotel room to get a tattoo of a bear when she was 16- the guy got a little excessively creative and gave her a bear with dicks for legs.