My mother would get us to spit out our gum before we went to bed at night by telling us if we insisted on chewing our gum in bed, it would turn into skeleton bones in our sleep! We all believed this and promptly spit it out!

Misty

i used to beleive that if you swalled gum it would give you chiken pox

nose picker

I used to believe that you shouldn't swallow gum because it would stick to you heart and make it stop beating.

Anon

i was told when i was young that if i swollowed gum my stomach would grow teeth to chew it

gammie

When I was really small, I had this little friend who thought that Starburst was gum. She'd put a piece in her mouth and chew it for a few seconds and then take it out and give it to her mom. I was only three, but I thought, "Gosh, this girl is dumb." She thought I was going to die from swallowing it.

friend of the stupid

When I was little, my sister used to tell me not to swallow my gum because it would make my guts stick together.

Rob

When I was a kid I had an obsession with chewing gum. My mother trying to get me to quit chewing gum told me that gum was made out of elephant Buggers, so I stoped chewing gum.... for years

elmo

i used to belive that if you swallowed bubble gum it would be stuck inside you forever. i always refused gum or spat it out quickly once i was done chewing it until i was 9.

steve

when i was little i used eat this gum with a zebra stripes on it and a zebra on the pack and one day i asked my older cousin why it had zebra stuff all over it and she said it was made from baby zebras...

hala

When I was little, my sister told me that if I swallowed chewing gum, or just any lollie without chewing it, I would die. I remember a teacher handing out lollies. Then I swallowed mine and I was nearly crying. I'll never let my sister forget that.

Flick

Starburst candy used to air commercials where they would show a person popping a candy into their mouth, and then the camera would switch to showing that person riding an exhilarating roller coaster ride, or sailing off the top of a mountain on a hang-glider. I guess this was to show how exciting the taste of Starburst candy was.

Except I took the commercials literally and thought that if I ate a Starburst candy, that I would instantly get shot off a cliff or sent flying around in a crazy (scary!) roller coaster. I held this fear until I was about 7!

shoolz

My older brother told me that if I swallowed gum it would stay in my stomach for seven years. Everytime I swallowed a piece I would calculate how old I would be when the gum finally got digested. I did this for years. I finally clued in when I was about twenty.

Tracy

When I was a kid I thought
If a person swallowed gum that it would stick to your insides for seven years

Angela

I used to swallow my gum so one day my dad told me that when I swallow it, it would get stuck with all the other gum and form into a ball and stick to my organs and then the docors would have to surgically remove it. I still swallowed my gum anyway.. and still do!

Cass

I believed the urban legend that gum stayed in your stomach for 7 years if you swallowed it.

Lindsay

When I was little, i had the very bad habit of swallowing a lot of bubble gum. My mom used to tell me that one day I would get stuck to the toilet seat! I didn't care and still don't as I still swallow gum.

NANCY

When I was about 5 and started chewing gum, and sometime I accidentally swallowed it, I used to believe there were 2 rods inside my stomach to wind up the swallowed gum: one for the pink gum and another for the white gum (there wasn't all sorts of gum colours back them. The gum would be rolled up around the rods as cord. It's terribly stupid, I know. I was 5, see.

Nuri

i was told when i was little if u swallow gum it would stay there for 7 years and i would have a gum tree in my tummy which would grow and make me really tall and i would never stop growing

Anon

Although I never thought it would kill me, I used to think that gum would get stuck on my ribs if I swallowed it and just be a gooey mess.

the_only_nighthawk

My father would always tell my little brother and me when we were younger that if we swallowed our gum, we'd get stuck to the toilet seat forever. We'd laugh it off but we both admit to being extra careful in the bathroom afterwards. Not anymore, of course.

Grace C. from Chicago, IL