When I was about 5 or 6 I went with my Dad to by new tennis shoes. The sales guy brought out a shoe for my Dad to try on that had the little air chambers at the bottom heel, and they almost looked like a neon orange cave. the sales guy told me that little men lived in the bottom of the shoe and when you ran, they stuck their feet through the bottom sole and made you go faster. I totally believed him.

Haleigh

I used to believe that "Yesterday" and "Tomorrow" were actual days of the week, and that they both had a day of the week for which they were a double. I would ask my parents, "what day of the week is tomorrow?" and they would say "Thursday". And I would be outraged, because the last time I asked that question, they had said that Tomorrow was Monday, and now they were changing the story.

Jasmine

i used to believe (thank you, older siblings) that i had a twin with no belly button that went to school for me when i was sick. she lived in the laundry room.

Anon

I used to believe, thanks to my sister, that mannequins were once real people. She told me they were people that God had punished for being bad and they were 'frozen' forever.

Anon

My grandfather had lost half of his right index finger in a work-related accident many years before I was born. When I was younger, he would tell me all sorts of stories about how he had lost his finger... but the common theme in his stories were that it was somehow my grandmother's fault.

She had chopped it off cutting veggies, she had sewn it off on the sewing machine, she had vacuumed it off while cleaning. But his favorite story, the one that kept me well away from my grandmother for a number of years, was that she had gotten mad at him for pointing at her, and bitten it off.

I was 9 before I learned the truth. In the interim, I would never point at ANYTHING in my grandmother's presence, nor would I give her hugs. I was determined that she wouldn't take a bite out of me.

Rose

I told my son that when he lied, something changed in his eyes and that's how I could tell when he wasnt telling the truth. My son later went to the bathroom mirror and looked deeply into his own eyes while telling himself lies to see what it was that changed in his eyes.

Jo

When I was little, Mom, my sister, Nancy, and I would go to a bakery in the next town. One day, I was thirsty, so I drank from the hose that they used on the delivery trucks. Nancy convinced me that, because I drank from the hose, she could turn me into a truck. she would point her finger at my face then move it around in a circle, telling me, "ooooh your eyes are turning into head-lights! oooh now your mouth is the grill!' so forth, so on. I would scream and run for Mom. (To this day, Nancy still does it and it makes the hair stand up on my neck!)

Princess Yacine

My big brother would always tickle me when I was little but when I tried to tickle him back it wouldn't work. I asked him why he wasn't ticklish and he said, "Because a half ant, half man came into his room in the middle of the night and took away all his tickles."

Kristen

when i was younger my older sister, and my two neighbors tricked me into thinking that if they went into the garage they could warp into the car motor and become smaller and travel through the car. they told me i was too young to do it, and when they came out they pretended to have heart failure. i actually believed them for a whole year. when they would go in the garage they would shut the door and yell like they were traveling. i was stupid.

mr. gullable

I used to believe that I could tell the time by looking at the clouds and imagining I could see numbers. What I could actually see was the church clock in Audenshaw, and as it stopped a lot my friends were never very impressed with my David Blaine-esque talents.

Ricardo De Force

When I was about six or seven, my biggest fear was being kidnapped.
Once, while staying at my grandmother's, my great grandmother (who lived there) was sitting across the table from me while I ate my toast in the morning.
My grandmother makes the most AMAZING bread, but I was too young to appreciate it. I left the delicious thick crust on my plate and jumped up to leave.
My great grandmother looked at me and said "If you don't eat your crust, the crust man will come take you away until you're a teenager"
She then told me that when she was a little girl and wouldn't eat HER crust, the crust man (who was also an electrician) came in and almost took her away but she was a good girl and finished it before he could wisk her away.
I was absolutely terrified, and I ate my crust every morning from that day on.

Kathryn Ann

Where I live, there's a HUGE statue called the Driller outside of the fairgrounds.

Well, when I was little, my Papaw told me that the Driller was really a sculpture of him, since he was a famous astronaut.

I believed him for YEARS.

Kate

I thought Van Goh BIT his ear off for a lot of years... I didn't occure to me that it was impossible to bit your ear, I was telling my mom about it and she like He didn't bite his ear off! and then I tried to bight my ear and I was like WHAT? He really didn't bite his ear off! I think I was 10 or 11 when I found out!

You just can't bite your ear

when i was younger my mam used to say that the tv didnt work when it was sunny outside, so we had to go outside and play...me and my brothers believed her for years

Anon

When I was 4 my 14 year old sister would often babysit me. When I misbehaved one time, she said she was going to call the police and they were going to take me to Mexico. I asked her what Mexico was and she said it was a place where bad kids are locked up in cages. This terrified me at first, but after awhile I decided there couldn't really be a place like that so I stopped worrying about being sent there.

Well, when I went to kindergarten there was a map of the world in class. I remember the day the teacher showed us," Here is the United States and here is Mexico." I shouted "Oh no, Mexico is real?" and I became very upset....I went home and told my sister and parents I would never be bad again because I never want to be sent to Mexico!

Danielle

My brother was born premature and was in an incubator for a little while. When I asked my dad why he was in a fish tank he told me it was because my brother was half fish and the doctors had to make sure his lungs worked well enough for him to live on land. I assume, or hope, that this was so I wouldn't be scared.

I only found out the truth when I told my mom how jealous I was that my brother could go swim with Ariel and the other mermaids and I couldn't.

Alex

When I was little by brother told me the UPS guy had such a big truck because when the UPS guys found little girls playing outside without their parents they would steal them. One day the UPS guy stopped outside my house and I was playing outside. He walked up to me and I screamed, "Leave Me Alone" and I ran away from him. I still believed it even after my mother told me it wasn't true!

Anon

My brother and I shared a room growing up. At bedtime every night when the lights went out he told me he had this black dot and that by pressing it he was able to contact any person I wanted him to. I used to have him contact people for me and ask them questions that he would answer. Anytime he was mad at me he would press this black dot and contact lots of scary people. Boy, did I have a lot of sleepless nights. :)

Pam

I was a pesky little sister to two older brothers and apparently annoyed them with my constant chatter. Finally, they told me that we are all born with just so much air in us, and the more we talk, the more air we use. In solemn tones they said that when all the air is gone, we die, and I was very close to using all of my air. Since they didn't want to lose me, I ought to think about not talking.

Of course, I believed my brothers completely, so from then on I didn't say a word to anyone. My parents, suspicious (as always) that my brothers were behind this change in my behavior, eventually made them confess their lie, but it took them a long time to convince me otherwise.

Judith

My sister once told me that I was given away by my father, who supposedly owned the Barbie doll factory (Mattel INC); she also made me promise that I'd send her 1 doll every month if I ever went back.

Anon