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5 Weird Lies Parents Tell Their Children

5 Weird Lies Parents Tell Their Children
Carly Jacobs
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any of my posts are inspired by conversations that I have with my girlfriends and I had a ripper with a mate of mine recently while we were drinking Sav Blanc on her balcony on an unseasonably warm afternoon. She told me that her mother had told her that she shouldn’t wash her hair when she had her period. No explanation, no reason why, it’s just something you didn’t do. This mate of mine didn’t wash her hair while she had her period for YEARS until she realised it was total bullshit. My parents have told me some corkers over the years and as I’ve shared these strange lies with my mates I’ve realised they’re not unique to my family. Have your parents ever said any of the following to you?

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‘She’s talking about his… um… banana.’

When Rizzo and Kenickie (Grease) are making out in the car at the drive-in and Kenickie gets sad because ‘it’ (the condom) broke, I asked my mum what ‘it’ was and she said ‘His watch.‘ without skipping a beat. Needless to say I was very confused when Rizzo later excitedly screamed that she wasn’t pregnant. I was all ‘Cool. Why would you have been pregnant? That makes no sense.’Β It wasn’t until I was about 13 years old and said out loud ‘Oh! It was a CON-DOM!’ that Mama Smaggle realised the damaged she’d done.

‘You’re adopted.’

I once asked my dad why I had blue eyes and everyone else in the family had brown and he told me that it was because I’m adopted* which I’m not. This seems to be the standard reply of all parents when their kids question why they don’t look like the rest of the family.

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We were just wrestling…’

My mum is probably totally freaking out right now as she’s reading this but thankfully I never saw my parents engage in any sexual activity… and if I didΒ I’ve blocked it out of my memory like all good little traumatised children should.

‘I’ll turn this car around!’

My dad would say this after we’d been in the car for 7 hours straight to visit my grandparents and my brother and I would be biting in holes in each other because we were so restless and bored. It was a flat out lie and we knew it. Note to parents: Children are very aware that you are not going to turn the car around on a day-long trip. Come up with a better lie.

‘If you don’t go to school today, the police will come take mummy and daddy away and put us in jail.’

That was my mum’s favourite line if either one of us was chucking a wobbly about going to school. Not going to school for one day was not going to send the men in blue over with handcuffs to cart my parents off to jail.

* This sounds way more horrific than it actually was, he was laughing as he was saying it and my mum was sayingΒ ‘Don! Don’t be mean!’Β and then followed up with a very detailed explanation of how she can vouch for the fact that I was indeed not adopted because she had personally pushed myΒ ‘boofhead out her vagina’.Β 

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What lies did your parents tell you when you were growing up?

 

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22 Comments

  1. Liz @ I Spy Plum Pie 9 years ago

    My friend’s mum actually edited all the bits of Grease out that were vaguely sexual (it was taped off the tv but I still don’t quite know how she managed it!) so she was even more confused about the not-pregnant bit than you would have been. It wasn’t until it was played at school when she was about 13 she saw the whole movie and suddenly it alllll made sense!

    • Author
      Carly Jacobs 9 years ago

      That is some serious commitment… she would have needed a second VCR I guess? Is that how we did it back then? Seriously, that scene was so confusing thinking it was a watch. I thought Rizzo was kind of mean… I was all ‘DUDE! His watch just broke? What are you being so cavalier about this?’

  2. shannon 9 years ago

    My Mum told me that the theme parks weren’t open on school holidays because they were all run by teachers. I believed this for years.
    She also told me that the writing on the back of bottles of coke (the ingredients) said “not for little girls”.

    • Author
      Carly Jacobs 9 years ago

      Oh my god that’s brilliant. Your mother is a genius.

  3. Omega Howell 9 years ago

    My dad told me that the Beatles song “ObLaDi ObLaDa” was about him and my mother – his name is Desmond.. hers is Mary, he said they changed it to Molly in the song because she didn’t want to be bothered by “the press”.. I wholeheartedly believed this for many many years…. too young to know it was a total lie, and also too young to fully understand the lyrics of the song (pretty sure Dad got hung up on the names in the song and wasn’t trying to tell me he is a crossdresser…. hmmm… I’ll get back to you on that one!!).. Even though I know it’s not true the song still makes me smile every time πŸ˜€

    With regards to editing movies, this was my mother’s domain… … I was in my twenties and moved out of home before I realised that “The Sound of Music” doesn’t finish at the wedding. Imagine my surprise.

    • Author
      Carly Jacobs 9 years ago

      Ha! That’s so funny! I’ve heard of parents turning off movies before the endings… I’m not sure my parents ever did that actually… but we did have a VCR tape of The Silence of The Lambs that I was flat out forbidden to watch. With good reason.

  4. I can’t remember any. Obviously they weren’t very good at lying. I have just had to start telling my son a few innocent ‘porky pies’ and I have to remember what I have said so I can fill my husband in so we are on the same page.

    • Author
      Carly Jacobs 9 years ago

      Oh definitely! That’s key! My parents were pretty good at having each other’s back… partners in crime you might say!

  5. KT 9 years ago

    Re. parents wrestling – this comic was published on Cyanide & Happiness today! http://explosm.net/comics/3739/

    • Author
      Carly Jacobs 9 years ago

      Oh wow that’s such a weird coincidence! πŸ™‚

  6. J 9 years ago

    My mum didn’t lie to me much (that I know of) but I do remember that I asked what an ad was for. And she said diapers for older women. Took me a while to understand that it was pads.

    She also lied to my dad and said that in Norway children take the mother’s last name, because she thought my dad’s name would be too hard for me to spell and have people pronounce correctly.

    • Author
      Carly Jacobs 9 years ago

      Ha! That’s hilarious! That’s a big commitment to a lie but good on her. πŸ™‚

  7. Sue GP 9 years ago

    A friend of ours told the kids that when the ice cream van (Mr Whippy) was playing the cheerful music it was to let you know that they had run out of ice cream. The music was bright and cheerful to ‘break it to you gently’ I guess.

    • Author
      Carly Jacobs 9 years ago

      Oh my god! That is SO MEAN! They must have though the Mr Whippy can was super bad at re-stocking! πŸ™‚

    • Caitlyn 9 years ago

      A sister had my nephew convinced it was a “music truck” that drove around playing music. It lasted for quite a long time. BRILLIANT parenting IMO!

  8. Christine 9 years ago

    Your hair won’t grow curly if you don’t eat your crusts. Did you eat all your crusts, Carly? – maybe it’s true after all xx

    • Author
      Carly Jacobs 9 years ago

      I actually didn’t eat crusts! It’s a lie! Also no one really wanted curly hair like mine so it was hardly a threat! πŸ™‚

  9. Mary 9 years ago

    Yep…the no washing of hair policy while menstruating!!! The…if you don’t eat your crusts you won’t get curly hair!! The …don’t walk under a ladder as it’s bad luck!! The ..don’t cross a black cat!! The…no doing washing/ironing on the sabbath!! The…can’t go swimming after a meal!! The…putting up and the taking down of the Christmas tree on certain days only!! The….watching Santa’s sleigh flying through the sky and can’t you hear his bell?!!! I could go on and on and on……

    • Author
      Carly Jacobs 9 years ago

      I’m still a bit funny when I walk under ladders! Just can’t do it! I never really believed in Santa though because it just didn’t make any sense…

  10. Bec 9 years ago

    When my sister and I asked Mum how babies are made (we would have been really young, I wasn’t at school yet), she did the whole no nonsense nurse thing and told us exactly how things were done.
    Apparently there was a stunned silence for a few moments before I demanded to know: “how does he get it in? does he shove it in with his hands?!”

    That’s what you get for telling kids the truth!

    • Author
      Carly Jacobs 9 years ago

      Oh my god! My mother did the same thing! I once asked her what anal sex was when I was like 10 years old. I’d read in a magazine and pronounced it ‘AN-AHL sex’. So funny.

  11. nessbow 9 years ago

    My parents have always been straight-shooters and I can’t think of any weird lies they told me. But one of my best friends was told that his cat had run away to join the circus, when in fact the cat had been hit by a car while he was at school. For years, his mother would periodically send him postcards from his cat, telling of it’s adventures while travelling with the circus. He was well into his teens before he realised what was going on.

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