speaking

I mixed "confidence" up with "competence" so when I was watching an episode of a kids' show that involved the idea of "losing your confidence", I was like, "But she didn't lose her confidence! She's still good at it, just too nervous to actually do it."

Anon

I used to think that clinical depression was called "cynical" depression.

Anon

I believed that the word optimistic was something to do with opticians and being happy with your eyesight.

Anon

I thought for a long time that the word "awry" was pronounced like "aw-ree" (rhymes with sorry) , instead of "uh-rye". The weird part? I had heard people say it lots of times, but it took ages before I realized it was the same word

dumby

At 31 I moved from Italy to London, UK. I used to believe that the phrase "out of spit" was a particularly graphic and rather dramatic way of expressing one's animosity and vengeful intententions. Only 8 years later, after moving back to Italy, I eventually realized that one is supposed to say "out of spite".

Fed

When grown-ups said "this morning", I thought they were saying "tiss morning"
When grown-ups said "newspaper", I thought it was two words: "new" and "spaper"
But really, my hearing is okay.

Vicki J.

My mother used to complain she "couldn't get a word in edgewise". I thought "that's ok, none of us speak Edge-a-wise."

diane

My Teacher asked if I could Name types of beans so I stood up in class and said Baked Beans, Runner Beans and Human Beans!

Nadia Whyte

I opened the car window a crack and my mother told me to shut it because I'd "catch a draft," which I interpreted as "catch a giraffe." I didn't question the sense of it, and just assumed it meant "to get a chill." I think I must have been learning about idioms at the time ("have a cow", etc.), because it seemed perfectly natural to have an expression that made no sense literally.

jamby

For years I believed that "giblets" was a made-up word my parents used to describe me and my siblings. My maiden name was Gibbs, so "giblets" obviously meant "little Gibbses". It makes perfect sense. I was in my teens before I figured it out.

Ex-Gibbs

I once saw a sign that used to the word 'Prohibited" and I asked my dad what he meant. He said it meant it was forbidden.
So for the next few years I believed the word "prohibited" was pronounced "forbidden". It wasn't until I was reading a sign aloud that a friend of mine asked why I said "forbidden" instead of "prohibited" and I realised that they were actually separate words.

Julianne

For the longest time I thought the phrase "Dog eat dog world" was actually "Doggy dog world" and this made me happy because I liked dogs.

Xornia

when i was young i used to believe that the 'carry-over champion' on game shows was in fact a 'karaoke' champion. It wasnt until i was 17 and asked my boyfriend what on earth a 'karaoke' champion was, that i learnt the truth.

Sarah. F.

When I was about ten or eleven, I somehow mixed up the words "lesbian" and "leprosy." I used to be afraid of catching "lesbian" after that. One day I overheard my mom on the phone; she was talking about some woman she knew who was a lesbian, and I freaked out and started screaming at her to get away from me because I thought she'd picked up "lesbian" and I didn't want to catch the disease too!

Needless to say, I felt very silly when my mom explained my mistake.

Manda

When I was about 6 I knew a mute girl at primary school. I used to believe that people had a limited number of words that they could pronounce in a lifetime and once you'd used them all up, then you became mute. From then on, I paid special attention not to waste words.

Anon

I used to believe there was some secret reason about why "clothes" wasn't pronounced "cloth-es" and "shoppe" wasn't pronounced "shop-e." I thought that when I grew up, my parents would sit down and explain these secrets (and others) to me.

Jen

When I was young, I heard the word "castrated" somewhere, which means to cut off one's penis. At the time, for some reason or another, I thought it meant to abandon something, like "abandon ship!" So, my younger brother and I were sledding one snowy winter evening, and we were headed for a tree... would you like to guess what I shouted?

eagles forever!

i used to think that only men could get bachelors degrees. i thought women got bachelorettes degrees.

Anon

I used to believe that anyone speaking a foreign language translated it into english in their head

galen

I was in high school and heard the word euthanasia.
Everytime I heard it, I wondered why they were talking about "Youth in Asia."

dmeanybean