My grandad used to make jokes about how his stubble was the "hedgehog", my other grandads short, bristly beard was the "broom" and great-grandads long white beard was the "mop".

A few years ago i asked my parents and it turned out my great-grandad didnt have a beard.

I guess it was such a good joke...

Da Gal Wit Braces

My college roommate was the middle child in a huge Irish Catholic family of 11 children. One time she was asked to take care of whichever child was the current baby. The baby fell off the bed and was knocked out.

My roomate was terrified that she'd killed the baby, so she hid the baby under the bed. She figured her mom had so many children that she'd never notice the missing baby.

Fortunately, the baby was fine, and woke up squalling. So my roommate was convinced she had the power to bring the dead to life again.

rita's roommate

When I was 11 and my sister was 7 we told me brother, who was 5 at the time, that he was born a girl but that Mommy and Daddy wanted a boy SO much that they just decided that they would tell him he was a boy. He asked why Mommy didn't just have another baby and we told him that he hurt Mommy so bad when he came out that she couldn't have anymore kids. When he asked why he had a penis we told him that's what all girls have and since he was our "sister" we couldn't show our privates to him cause you can only show them to people that aren't your family. It took quite a few hours of convincing but finally he believed it and confronted my parents with the "lies" they had told him. Needless to say me and my sister were in BIG trouble. My brother is now 21 and to get his goat we still call him "Patricia Michelle" his "real" girl name (his name is Patrick Michael).

snufflekitty

For years I was believed that my dad was 49, that he didnt change his age every birthday.
I was gutted when I found out he was only 38!!

silly me

i used to think my parents put small microphones in my clothes, so they could hear what mischief i was getting up to. i suppose you could call it a micro conspiracy theory

glow

When my cousin Michael had misbehaved, my mother said that his mother would whip him. I thought this meant that she would put him in a bowl and use an eggbeater on him.

C.C.

When we were small children we had an aunt that was extremely overweight. At some point we came to the conclusion that you eat so much, you get fat and then you blow up and pop like a balloon. The aunt is still alive.

Lori

When i was 4 i thought that all the grownups where robots

Nomad

Someone once told me that everyone was related to everyone else, so I used to think that if enough royalty died, my father would be made king and I'd be a princess. Only I didn't want that to happen, because I knew that, whatever my relations to royalty, they were very, *very* distant.

Anon

I was so sure that the number of children in a family told you exactly how many times their parents had shared an intimate moment!

Lisa

I thought grown ups were born grown ups.

mea

I used to believe that I had two fathers. Actually I knew they were the same man, but it seemed to me that I had two in some sort of surreal way. The first father was the one who was around early morning. He had tousley hair, was unshaven and just didn’t look very good. Probably he coughed a lot and maybe he was a bit grumpy. There was nothing really wrong with him, it was just that I preferred the other one. Every morning he disappeared into the bathroom and after a while, kaapow!, the second father would appear. This one had slicked back hair, a smooth face, smelled good and seemed more friendly

John, aged 59 3/4

My father has a small scar on his forehead and when my brothers and I were young, he told us that during the war he looked out of his trench and was shot in the head with an arrow, which we believed for years, even though he was too young for WW2 and indians!!

Rob

my mom's from norway (im in the us) and naturally i was so used to any accent she mightve had that i refused to believe she actually did have one when someone told me. only when i went off to boarding school and came home a few months later did i actually notice it for the first time, and stopped being pissed at my jerk friend who i thought was making stuff up.

philly, pa

My brother firmly believed that our dad was Superman and that he kept his suit in a case under the bed. He searched for it many times but could never find it, 'because it was magic'. In retrospect, what a relief that he didn't find anything, I wouldn't like to think my dad was hiding tights under the bed....!

Amanda

i used to believe that i was bought at the supermarket. my mum found me between the mayonaise and the frozen chickens. my family kept the receipt in case they wanted to return me.

chazza babes

When I was little my Grandad told me stories of when he was in the Army and had to guard Buckingham Palace in his Bear skin. I believed him when he told me that he always took Liz her first cup of tea of the day and her morning paper. He always does this for my Grandma so I did not need to doubt him.

Jo

My Uncle's old school friend was Ringo Starr, everytime I was at my grans and the telephone rang he used to say it was "Ringo wanting to know if he was going out for a pint", only when I was older did I discover they went to different schools!!

Anon