Every family has its secrets.

Some are huge and devastating, some are small and insignificant.

We’re about to read some from folks on AskReddit who shared the family secrets they didn’t learn until they were older.

Let’s take a look at what they divulged.

1. Wow.

“That my sister (she was 16 when I was born, and kicked out) is my mother.

Her mother, my grandma, raised me as her daughter. It doesn’t end there. I was a product of abuse from a family friend. To this day I don’t know who my real dad is.

My grandma was in her forties when she “had” me. And my sister was sent to a boarding school when she was pregnant with me. My sister has no idea that I know.”

2. Awful.

“My uncle came to visit us when I was little and before he came mum sat me down and told me not to be alone with my uncle, and that if he made me feel uncomfortable to let her know.

Found out last year that when my mum was nine, she was r*ped by my uncle.”

3. Grandpa.

“Something felt strange about my grandfather’s funeral, just they way they were emphasizing his place in heaven.

Later found out that he shot himself in the heart with a 357. Same side of the family also had seemingly random people show up at family gatherings throughout my life that ended up being illegitimate children of my grandma.

I just started gaining uncles and cousins…Confused the sh*t out of me as a child.”

4. Sad.

“My grandpa burned to death.

I found out he died when I was a kid, but was not allowed to go to his funeral, and they told me he had a heart attack. I was so confused because everyone around me would clam up when I asked about him.

Turns out that he had a heart attack while trying to put out a field fire, collapsed, and burned. I still have no idea how long it took for people to find him, but I’m assuming it was hours.”

5. Mental illness.

“When I was around 6-8 years old, my uncle passed away. I thought it was something sudden and medically tragic, as I remember him having lung problems of some sort.

When I got older I found out he committed suicide, because his girlfriend broke up with him. I remember visiting my dad and hanging out in my uncle’s room where we got to play video games and listen to cool music with him.

That was the start of me learning about mental illness running in the family and connected a lot of dots for me.”

6. Jeez…

“Was told my aunt and uncle died because of a carbon monoxide leak in their house. When I was 16 I was told the truth.

My uncle was having serious money problems. He shot my aunt and then hung himself.”

7. Family matters.

“That my grandmother’s husband was a pedophile.

All of a sudden I knew why my uncle was so weird and would pick me up and carry me away rather than let me stay alone in a room with him.

For the longest time I thought my uncle was a real prude, my male cousins could all swim naked or run around in just their swim trunks, but my uncle made me always wear a swim suit and put on a cover up when i came out of the pool.

He later admitted if  “god forbid he touched you, I was making sure no one could try to blame you. They blamed all his other victims for being too tempting.”

My uncle, bless his heart, wanted to kill that man so bad. For that matter so did my dad. Finding out the pedo was, well, a pedo, made all of their muttering to each other at family gatherings make so much more sense.”

8. Mom’s recipe.

“One of my most beloved “mom’s recipe” recipes was actually Hamburger Helper.

She was a from-scratch cook and literally everything else we ate she made herself. She never told us because it made her so mad that her kids would love a boxed meal so much. She did it once out of sheer desperation because she didn’t have time to cook one night.

We ended up loving it. I only found out in college because I begged for the recipe. I love giving her crap for it to this day.”

9. Oblivious.

“That my aunt’s close friend that she lives with is actually her girlfriend. Was about 22 when they told me.

Never even thought about it until it was said. Weird how I was completely oblivious to this for so many years.”

10. Poor little fella.

“My pet rabbit got attacked by something a couple years after I got it. My parents found it dead and replaced it before I found out.

I just thought my rabbit lived super long but it was actually two rabbits. This happened over 10 years ago and I found out last year.”

11. Don’t talk to me.

“That my grandparents didn’t talk to each other 20 YEARS before my grandfather finally kicked the bucket.

They lived in the same house the entire time too and no one knows why they weren’t on speaking terms.”

12. Sterilized.

“My grandparents forced my aunt to get an ab*rtion before my family moved to America, rendering her permanently sterile.

It finally makes sense why none of the adults talk about having children around her.”

13. Mysteries of Dad.

“My late father was a great dad, went to work, came home every night and nothing was really out of the ordinary…

Except that he would ask my sisters and I to let him use the money from our piggy banks (my granddad lived with us and he had a great pension and relatively no bills, so he spoiled us rotten and would always give us money) because he knew we had it, but told us not to tell anyone and that he’d give it back.

He would also really only have 2 moods, really cranky or extremely sweet (my sisters and I called it his “nice face”). This was all we knew until I was about in 8th grade… we went to a private school and my dad would tell us school was canceled, there was a gas leak, institute days etc and we would stay home, when we would go back to school, nobody else would know what we meant as they had been in school.

One day, just before my graduation, my mom let out a scream and started screaming. Our house was being foreclosed on and my dad hadn’t been paying the mortgage and had been trying to cover up for the fact that he had been a functional cocaine addict.

The “nice face” was when he was high, the school absences were because he’d spent tuition money on drugs and then had to pay before my mom caught wind. Apparently, it had gotten worse by this time but he’d been an addict for more than 20 years and none of us knew.”

Did your family have any deep, dark secrets that you learned about when you were older?

Well, we want to hear them!

Talk to us in the comments and spill your guts. Thanks!