I used to believe that if you accidentally inhaled a whiff of Raid whilst killing a bug, that you only had a few hours to live. And I did once, when I was six. Inhale a whiff, that is. But I didn't die, which was a relief after a pretty tortured hour of doubt. And I didn't tell Mom about it, because I wasn't supposed to be using the Raid. So I walked around thinking "this is the last time I'll ever get to do _______ again", like swinging or climbing a tree, or watching CHiPs.

A1phab3t

I had no concept of death, I used to believe that everyone lived to 100, at which point they instantly turned back into babies!

Jeanette, UK

As a kid I worried a lot. I used to think that my grandmother, who were 75, could die at any moment. And then when my mother walked in, and found her dead. I figured she would die from the shock. Then when my father would come and see them both dead and he would die too, and I would be all alone in the world! I hoped that the neighbours would let me stay with them.

Gudrun

When my son was little, he told me that he knew why we buried dead people .... then he carefully explained ..... 'so we don't trip over them.'

Squeak

When I was a kid I overheard my parents talking about "The Baby Boom". I thought it was a problem of small children suddenly exploding.

Alan

I used to believe that, as heaven was in the sky and it was always represented as people floating about on clouds, grey clouds had more dead people on them. The darker the cloud, the more dead people on it. And they could SEE you...

Scal

When I was young, I really used to believe that 'R.I.P.' (on a gravestone) meant 'Return If Possible.'

Colin

By the age of 4 or 5, I'd noted my parents were taller than my grandparents, and both were taller than my great-grandmother (whom I'd been told would soon die). I therefore concluded that people grew to a peak height at my parents' age, then progressively shrank thereafter. I assumed at the time that Great-Granny's 'death' would be a matter of her shrinking to nothingness in her bed. This latter part of the theory was revised after her funeral a couple of years later.

Randy Whitaker

This story is still a source of hilarity in my family whenever it is recalled. When I was a very small child, my family had goldfish and tropical fish as pets. Occasionally, when one of the fish would die, I would see my mother or father removing the fish from the tank and giving it a rather inglorious funeral service by flushing it down the commode. It happened that one of my aunts died and my mom and dad were readying themselves for the funeral and when they explained to me where they were going and why, I apparently asked them if they were going to flush Aunt Wanda down the toilet. Of course, up until that point in my young life, my only experience of death were the fish being transported away through the toilet.

Charles Maurer

I used to believe that eveyone died in alphabetical order, especially after i would read the newspaper obituary collumn. Hence I always wished I could be called Mr Zebedee! I'm a funeral director now, so I pretty much realise this isn't true!

Brian

When I was little, I heard my Dad say that someone would probably die at the weekend. I didn't know what a weekend was, so from then on, I assumed that the 'weekend' was when we were all going to die. I could never understand it when my mum would tell me that we were going to do something at the weekend, because I assumed we would all be dead. I believed this for years.

sue

I was about 6 when my great-grandpa died, but wasn't allowed to go to the funeral. Somehow I came to the conclusion that they must be stringing up the corpse and making it dance around like a marionette. When I saw this happen with Mr. Burns on the Simpsons last year, I almost injured myself from laughing so hard.

Brian J. Wright

When my daughter was five years old we lived in Los Angeles. She and her father had been shot at on the freeway, he had been mugged outside the neighborhood bank, and we frequently heard gunfire at night. When I gently informed her that her great-uncle had passed away, she thought for a moment then asked "Who shot him?"

Anon

I used to believe that if you bled to death your body would be flat.

-G

When i was eight my grandma died and to help me cope with it my mom told me that god took people with special talents or gifts up to heaven with him and the reason he took my grandma was because god thought it was time he learnt how to knit

shannon

My family went to visit my Grandparents and I knew the trip had something to do with my Great Uncle and a “wake.” I wasn’t sure what a wake was or what that meant, but I knew that we had to look nice and we were packing Sunday clothes. On the first night, the whole family got dressed up and went to a big party. All the relatives, neighbors and old friends were there also dressed up and they were smiling and talking. It was an open casket wake and when I finally spotted him lying there, I assumed he was asleep. I didn’t understand how he could sleep through all the noise, but I kept waiting for the part where he would wake up and we would all yell "Surprise~!!!"

akafab

I used to wonder when reading the obituary column how people always managed to die in alphabetical order.

diane

i used to belive the saying "kicked the bucket" meant that if you kicked a bucket you would die, its no surprise i fear buckets still, shame im a window cleaner.

window steve

I was a shy kid. My father and I were waiting to pick up food from a resturant and the man in front of us looked at me and said, "Hey there partner." He gestured his index finger and thumb like a gun as to pretend he was a cowboy. I thought I had just been shot by a "hand gun" and I would soon die. I was terrified and my father was embarassed to have raised such a wuss.

Ritz

When I was younger, I played a lot of a videogame called Sonic the Hedgehog. When you died in the game Sonic flew up and fell down off of the stage.

So I was convinced that when a person dies, they bounce up 30 feet into the air and fall down through the earth and disappear. I was sure disappointed when I learned the truth!

Anon