Truth or dare! Okay, have you ever kept any secrets from your bestie? Be honest!
No matter how many years you’ve known someone, you can never be certain that you actually know everything about them. Whether your childhood best friend is hiding secrets about their hobbies or your college bestie has decided to keep all of their romantic relationships under wraps, there’s always a chance that you don’t know your loved ones as well as you thought you did.
Redditors have recently been sharing the secrets that rocked their worlds when friends finally revealed them, so we’ve gathered some of the juiciest ones below. And keep reading to find conversations with Rebekah Ferguson, LMHC, Rachel Friendly, PhD, and Paula Glashausser, LCSW, from Zencare!
#1
Found out that a long time ago a golf buddy of mine was a professional ballroom dance teacher in his previous years. Guy is 300+ pounds and just didn’t give off “ballroom dancer” vibes.
My wife of 10 years used to work for Arthur Murray dance schools and didn’t believe he knew how to dance so she invited him and his wife over for dinner.
Boy was she wrong.
Golf buddy twirled her, dipped her, the whole 9 yards as both myself and his wife stood there with our jaws on the floor.
After going through 7 different dances with my wife, he twirled her one last time towards me and said “told you so”.
We had a great dinner and I learned something new about the 300lb Samoan that I golf with every weekend.
Image source: this-aint-frankie, Marko Zirdum/Pexels
#2
I learned my husband was attracted to children after knowing him 8 years, shortly after our sixth wedding anniversary. I found a video one day and our marriage dissolved in an instant. I contacted police and cooperated fully with the police. He’s in prison, now.
Image source: eminva02, Pixabay/Pexels
#3
I my 70s. My best friend of 40 years and I were talking, she was very fond of my mother, who has been dead for many years. She said something about how much I must miss her….
I didn’t say anything. She pushed.
I finally said, I never say this to people who liked her, but she was extremely abusive, and I was greatly relieved when she died. She once threatened to cut my cat’s throat.
There was a long pause.
She said, mine was too.
All those years and we never shared that.
That was quite a talk.
It’s amazing the things you hide. .
Image source: Any_Assumption_2023, Pixabay/Pexels
#4
I worked summers as a ticket booth operator at a minor league baseball stadium for around 3 years.
The owner was this really nice old guy (mid to late 80s) who always showed up in a wheelchair being walked by his daughter.
He always rewarded his employees with bonuses for good work. he even gave me $300 once for helping cash out one of his close childhood friends.
One of the final games I worked there he called me into his owners box and gave me beer and free food as well as $1500, just to thank me for all the hard work I did for him over the years.
He told me the reason he liked me so much was because I didn’t pretend to like him because of who he was. Confused, I asked him to clarify. And he asked me if I seriously didn’t know. I was still confused and then he told me the truth, he was actually a Hall of Fame pitcher who played with the Cleveland Indians and Philadelphia A’s from the 1940s-early 1960s and even served in WW2. And showed me a replica of his Hall of Fame plaque.
We laughed about it and he further insinuated why he liked me so much.
He passed away around a year after this and I attended his funeral.
All around an amazing dude and I feel like such and idiot for not knowing who he was.
Image source: Turbulent_Archer_727, Tima Miroshnichenko/Pexels
#5
I’ve been married for 17 years. One day my husband’s mom came over and said here I cleaned out your room, take your violin. He then proceeded to play minuet in G. I had never seen my husband play before, he never even mentioned it.
Image source: libremaison, Tom Swinnen/Pexels
#6
My grandfather was always jumpy around thunderstorms. We assumed it was because he was shot down during the war and it sounded like anti-aircraft fire. Nope! Turns out, when he was a teenager, he got struck by lightning! The craziest part was, this happened the day before he started dating my grandmother. And she’d never heard that story!
Image source: kingsmen06, Philippe Donn/Pexels
#7
Finding out my best friend was secretly a published author blew my mind!
Image source: Annual-Use5039, Dziana Hasanbekava/Pexels
#8
I found out that one of my best friends used to be a competitive figure skater! We’d been friends for years and she never mentioned it. One day, we were talking about childhood hobbies and she casually mentioned she used to compete at a national level. I was shocked! She even showed me some old photos and videos—it was so cool to see a completely different side of her.
Image source: Bunnyagents, Tima Miroshnichenko/Pexels
#9
I knew my best friend for about 20 years before I found out that his sons were not actually his biological kids, his ex-wife cheated on him and both kids had different fathers, but he loves them and considers them HIS sons.
Image source: ponderingprofessor
#10
He knew American sign language
Knew the guy for a few years, just a regular guy. One day I met him for breakfast to find him deep in conversation with a deaf dude.
Image source: 04221970, cottonbro studio/Pexels
#11
I recently found out that one of my good friends is really rich. Like comes from old money rich. She has the biggest heart and is incredibly sweet and down to earth so I would have never known. It wasn’t until she got married that I started to piece it together.
“Where are you having your bachelorette party?” “Oh my family has a condo in Florida that we’ve had since before I was born, we’re just gonna chill there for a week.”
“Where is the wedding?” “Oh my dad is part of a club so we’re just going to have it there.” Looks up the club and sees that there is a dress code just to walk into the freaking building, and it costs a couple hundred dollars a month to be a part of it.
At the cocktail hour there was a vase in glass that had pretty birds on it so I took a look, there was a plaque inside that said it was donated to the club and was made in like the 1700s. Priceless art that could be seen at the Met on display in this club as decoration.
So yea, had no idea. In hindsight when she got her master’s in education from an expensive university I should have gotten the hint lol. But I mean it when I say she’s a really phenomenal person. One of the biggest hearts you’ll ever know. Just a gem of a human being.
Image source: Actrivia24, Andrea Piacquadio/Pexels
#12
She was homophobic.
Had a friend for over 20 years. She supported me when I came out at 32. She met my partner and loved her. Was a great friend.
Then I went back to court to get custody of my children changed and she sent me a 5 paragraph email telling me that I have no right to my children as I’ll raise them in my lifestyle and they don’t need to be exposed to that. She also said I need to grow up and realize that having someone who is gay as a parent will get them bullied so I need to find a nice man and put my perverted lifestyle aside for the sake of my kids. It went on but, that’s the gist. It was vile. Full of name calling and homophobic dog whistles.
I was so heartbroken. This was my BEST friend of TWENTY YEARS and she writes me a horrible and disgusting email!
Ruined our friendship. Cutting her off was like losing a limb and it took me months to get through it. It’s been 14 years and it still hurts. I check on her through Instagram sometimes (her profile is public) but I have her blocked everywhere else.
Image source: bookworm1421, Liza Summer/Pexels
#13
I learned that my friend was a psychopath.
I knew him as passionate, fun a bit eccentric but over all a good guy.
Then he suddenly took a journalist out sailing in his submarine, tortured her – killed her – cut her up and threw her overboard.
Image source: Rare_Competition20, cottonbro studio/Pexels
#14
Not so much a secret but news to me.
My roommate and I were in the USMC together and if you aren’t married then you must maintain a barracks room. Most people take that as meaning you have to live in the barracks, but if you show up to field day and keep your room clean you can’t technically get in trouble if you decide you don’t want to stay there all the time. My buddy was married at the time so he had his own house off base, and after getting tired of the barracks life I started staying at his house more and more helping out and whatnot. We were definitely friends, always had each others backs and had similar humor, really growing close, getting into each other’s hobbies.
Well one day almost out of the blue his wife leaves him to “find herself” which is pretty f****d as they had a child together. So, buddy is now single and back in the barracks almost ready to EAS, basically get out of the USMC, so he lets his now ex-wife have custody for a few months back in their home state so he can get his s**t together to presumably work out a custody deal. Nothing too notable happens, we have a sending off party for him and he heads back home.
I spend another like 6 months to maybe a year still in, I’m pretty s****y when it comes to keeping in touch with people, so I figure he probably feels a little betrayed I didn’t reach out a whole lot during that time. I get out and move in with my parents, I saved quite a bit of money not having a car, mostly living in the barracks and eating at the chow hall, so I take a year off. Spent time with my family, didn’t have any friends really, when my buddy starts reaching out.
Every few months or so he’d say stuff like there’s a really good job here, you wouldn’t have to rent a place you could stay with me, I could stay there rent free if I looked after his kid, at this point he had him every other week, another job opportunity, you should just visit so we can hang out or whatever. I finally think to myself why not, it seems to me he’s either lonely or trying to look out for me, so fly out see his house and boom pandemic shuts down airports and s**t and I don’t have a car. So, basically become a live in nanny, but it’s not so bad we’re having fun and have each others backs again.
One day we get completely s**t wrecked drunk, happens sometimes, but he tells me something that just shocked me: I am the main benefactor of his will. Here I am thinking we’re just good friends and dudes like no you have the responsibility of making sure that whatever I have is used to help my son live a good life. Damn, that hit me right in the feels.
*Edit I had been the beneficiary of his will for a few years by the time he told me.
Image source: Spare_Library1601, Pixabay/Pexels
#15
She won a f*****g **GRAMMY** (like actually, literally) for music she worked on for a video game soundtrack. She didn’t even tell anyone, we only found out because her family made posts on facebook congratulating her and tagged her in it.
Image source: Korpi–
#16
My mother was married with a famous drummer before she started dating my dad.
Explained why my dad always got mad when i told him i wanted to become a drummer.
Image source: SpidermanBread, Josh Sorenson/Pexels
#17
I had a tenant in a basement apartment that I became friends with. He was doing his PhD in philosophy or politics science and in my Canadian city for a couple of years. He was American. He was covered in tattoos and def looked the rock and roll part. We hung out a little bit and since I’m a rock and roll guy I mentioned something about him looking like he was in a band. Turns out he is the lead singer of a well known death metal band. I’m not a metal guy but I was a little shocked.
Image source: heavym
#18
I was on a team in high school for 4 years, got pretty close with the other girls on the team and we all hung out all of the time.
We decided to go bowling together and one of these girls, who we had spend hours a week with for years and talked about everything under the sun with, showed up with her own shoes, gloves, bag, and bowling ball and crushed us all with a near-professional score.
She had never mentioned bowling to any of us, even once, even when we were making plans to go bowling.
Image source: listenyall, Pavel Danilyuk/Pexels
#19
That the man she claimed was harassing her actually took a restraining order out against her because she’d been the one stalking him the entire time.
This was going on for years. He had video proof. It was unsettling to think of how easily she lied for years and years to so many of us.
Image source: pralineislife, Teguh Sugi/Pexels
#20
My brother-in-law’s father was a god-fearing southern Christian man. Very evangelical, family first, salt of the earth kinda guy. When he passed not only did they discover logs of online conversations with gay men, but that he also wrote extremely popular gay erotica. To say our minds were blown is an understatement. As far as I know it has never been discussed again.
Image source: despiacco20
#21
In my youth, I learned my friend of six or seven years was a Jehovah’s Witness, I had no idea. Sitting there talking to him one day and I asked him if he was ready for Christmas and he said no and that’s when he told me he was Jehovah’s Witness, I had no idea.
Later I found out that he was the reason why every time the Jehovah’s Witnesses went up and down the street in our neighborhood they always skipped my house .
Image source: Vulturev4, Jonathan Wells/Unsplash
#22
When my “best friend” died I learned that I never knew her at all. She was a pathological liar. She had told me that she was born in New Zealand and moved to the U.S. when she was 2. Nope born and raised in NJ. She told me her middle name was different than on her obituary. The craziest lie was that she had a younger sister that was hit by a car as a toddler and died. She had a tattoo of roses that she swore was for her little sister. There was a specific day in November every year where she’d fall apart crying. Said it was her sister’s date of death. That sister never existed.
Image source: mrsmoffbricks, cottonbro studio/Pexels
#23
It wasn’t really a secret so I don’t know if it qualifies. But I have a work friend we’ve known each other for years. Grab beers together, hang out side of work from time to time. Turns out we’ve been in each others orbits since birth. He mentioned his mom knowing someone I knew via my mom. We started going through contacts. We’d attended the same schools just diffrent classes that never blended. His brother dated my cousins best friend. We’d worked for the same companies just a mix of one of coming in as the other was leaving or the company was big enough for paths to never cross. We’d lived in the same neighborhoods multiple times. We had the same favorite restaurant in one place we just had diffrent regular days to go.
Image source: tdasnowman
#24
A good friend of mine that I’d known over 20 years died in 2021 from covid. I noticed a bunch of children at the funeral that I didn’t know. I asked who they were, and I was told that they were his children. He told me he had no kids but actually had 10. 10 kids!
Image source: CascadeJ1980, cottonbro studio/Pexels
#25
My partner just randomly started juggling when we had friends over a couple months ago.
I never knew they could juggle.
We’ve been together for over a decade lol.
Image source: UnhappyBell4596
#26
My friend was a hip-hop dancer in his youth and won a lot of dance competitions before uni. Lesson learnt humble people never brag about themselves 😎.
Image source: SalletMoon
#27
I’m 56 now but at some point in my early 40s while driving with my dad he says “you have a half brother somewhere”.
Image source: FarGazelle8339, Vika Glitter/Pexels
#28
I’m still not 100% certain on this but I know something is there.
I have a friend who is really smart, in good shape, good looking and very personable. He’s always had one of those postures and builds like someone who has been in the military for a long time. I’ve known him for over 10 years, closer to 15 and I’ve never once heard him mention anything about the military, in fact he’s very against the military.
Every person we run into randomly who is in the military ALWAYS ask about his service to which he says he never served but would have loved to. He has one of those khaki colored baseball caps with an American flag Velcro patch in his room that looks like its been worn to s**t. He said a friend who did some tours in Iraq while wearing that gave it to him. He also has some challenge coins I’ve seen that he also said his friends have given him.
Thing its, we’re close, we have a tight knit group of friends and we never met any of these military friends. There is a period of his life before me and people in our group met him that seems unaccounted for, from like after highschool for like 10 years there aren’t any people who knew him then.
I have a very and I mean VERY high suspicion that he was involved in the military or maybe still is in some capacity that he either isn’t allowed to say or decided to forget about. He has a tattoo that was lasered off, he said it was a stupid tattoo of a cartoon named Battle Toads. That sounds believable but he has other tattoos that are also pretty silly that he has never removed, he even has a misspelled one. I recently found out that they call navy seals “frog men” – is it a coincidence that he had a tattoo of a “battle toad” removed?
I asked him about it once while drinking and he laughed and said he wishes he was that interesting. But there are SO MANY signs.. Also, dude is fearless and can diffuse any situation and eventually befriend even the scariest and meanest dudes.
Not sure what to make of it but I’m certain there’s some pretty cool story that can’t be talked about for whatever reason.
Edit: in my 40 years of living I just realized its “defuse” and not “diffuse” 🤯.
Image source: nicearthur32
#29
Finding out she never really liked me. She would laugh with others about whatever I would tell her in confidence.
We had our first babies only a few months apart. Broke my heart more than any man could.
Image source: Ok_Priority_1120
#30
They have a lisp. No bulls***ting I never noticed the lisp until my wife met him and pointed it out and bam I notice the lisp now. Son of a b***h slipped it by me.
Image source: bnetana1, Kampus Production/Pexels
#31
I found out after years of friendship that my friend had been taking photos of me while I slept at sleepovers. Turns out they had an entire album titled “Dreaming” with pics of me in various sleep poses. (no longer friends with him).
Image source: CurvyCharmXO, Torsten Dettlaff/Pexels
#32
A childhood best friend of mine had a mother who constantly went on vacations alone to “Florida”- turns out she was actually in the psych ward.
Image source: lokeilou, Craig Adderley/Pexels
#33
I had a friend, who I had known quite closely for years. She had a plethora of aliments. Everything from Celiac disease to autism. I would also cater to her aliments. Making sure there was no gluten, making sure to take her to places where she wouldn’t get sensory overload. Not being offended if she wanted to go home early, or be left alone. Being a shoulder to cry on when she couldn’t get pregnant because of her PCOS (she claimed this), being patient with her ADHD. Turns out she was faking it all. Till this day I am not sure why she would do this. But I think it was a form of attention seeking and maybe narcissistic.
Image source: CopperHead49, Pixabay/Pexels
#34
I recently discovered that a very good friend of mine who I’ve known for about 11 years had a security clearance several levels higher than POTUS. He retired from Sandia National Labs and prior to that was in the Navy working for the Department of Naval Intelligence. To clarify, I knew all of this I just had no idea to what extent.
Image source: ObjectReport
#35
Found out he can breakdance
Was a a squadron Christmas party (USAF) and one of my buddies is s**t faced drunk and pushes our commander off the dance floor and starts legit breakdancing on the floor, like the whole leg scoops, head spins, hand stands all that. And typically he’s just this slow moving barely animated character but he becomes a whole lot more lively after that alcohol hits.
Image source: zotonn
#36
I lived across the street from an older Israeli guy, very decent family person. It was only after knowing him for maybe 10 years he pointed out to me that half his right hand was missing, because a missile went through it when he was a navigator in an Israeli tank and removed 3 of his fingers. When I asked him if he knew who was shooting at him, he said “scrubjays, at that point there were so many people shooting at us it could have been anybody.”.
Image source: scrubjays
#37
I had a very close friend growing up from a big family. He was the oldest brother out of 6 kids. I never saw anything wrong but definitely remember some weird vibes during sleep overs. We lost contact after high school but during the pandemic reconnected. His family was having a bbq one day and I’m sitting with him in his car hanging out smoking and listening to music. One of his sisters came to the window and made a really overtly sexual joke to him and he looked over at me like he was seeing if I heard it. He said something like “you’re nasty get the f**k away from me” and she said “that never stopped you before”.
Image source: w4rlok94, freestocks.org/Pexels
#38
That he’s good friends with one of the band members from one direction. I was shocked until he pulled up some of their childhood pics together, they have been friends a long time.
Image source: clumsy-bumblebee, Eva Rinaldi/Flickr
#39
I found out at her funeral (When I was in my late 40s) that my grandmother worked on the Manhattan Project as one of General Leslie Groves secretaries (what we would call an administrative assistant today) at Los Alamos and, before that, as a human calculator.
Its been almost 10 years, and I’m still pissed at her because I’m a huge WWII guy, and she straight up lied to me when I asked her what she did during the war when I was a kid (she said she worked in a hospital – which made sense because her first husband was a doctor).
(Technically, she was my step-grandmother, but she married my grandfather long before I was born, and my bio-grandmother died when my dad was a teen).
Image source: seaburno
#40
My multi year fwb and I had many deep conversations and I thought I knew her pretty well, so when I found out she was a married politician from a neighboring state I was surprised.
Image source: upornicorn, Scott Webb/Pexels
#41
Not exactly a secret as something not shared but twice now I’ve learned a male friend I assumed was straight was bisexual. Both cases I went “oh cool, that’s new info” and never brought it up again. Men tend to not talk about relationships at all unless asked to.
Image source: dishonourableaccount, Anete Lusina/Pexels
#42
That my mom had a one night hook up with James Brown and kept her receipts to prove it.
Image source: AcademicCollection56
#43
Close friend had her marriage end when she was caught having an (online) affair. I was supportive without being judgemental. I don’t know the full picture and both parties have a lot going on and are a handful. I very recently found out that the person she had an affair with was almost certainly (though not 100% sure) a minor at the time. It was online so whether or not she knew is up for debate…but the more I think about it the more I doubt every single thing she says now.
Image source: NorthBoralia
#44
One of my best friends faked an olive allergy for about 15 years. Someone exposed him at his bday and he started panicking and yelling about blowing is cover of just not liking them olives. We all just laughed at him and I was gonna use that against him as long as I could. That was end of May. He passed away suddenly two weeks ago, so didn’t get to use against him much….
Image source: johnnykalikimaka, Polina Tankilevitch/Pexels
#45
That he killed someone driving while drunk. It happened in another state ( I’m in the U.S.). His lawyer kept getting the case postponed and eventually he stopped getting updates by phone or mail. When he finally called his lawyer he was told to forget it ever happened and was sent a bill from the lawyer. My former friend has since passed away.
Image source: tonyhott
#46
That he couldn’t hold a conversation about something he wasn’t personally interested in. He’d just nod his head and wait to change the subject.
Image source: rockmetmind, Milbert Sambile/Pexels
#47
I found out after years of being friends with Chris that he used to be married. We were just having a casual conversation over coffee when he mentioned something about his “ex-wife.” I was so shocked that I almost spilled my drink. I had no idea he had ever been married, let alone gone through a divorce. He told me that he got married young, and they ended up splitting amicably, but he never really talked about it because it wasn’t a part of his life he felt defined him anymore. It was such a surprise because he’s always been so private, and I realized there were whole parts of his life I didn’t know about.
Image source: SweetAss26
#48
I found out that one of my best friends from age of 5 until I was in my 30’s, was a lesbian, on Facebook, when she posted video of her wedding.
She was in my wedding as a bridesmaid.
She was always a private person, but that really threw me. I felt like I wasn’t a good enough friend to tell. It really put a rift into our relationship and it hasn’t been the same for many years now.
Image source: gogomom
#49
After several years, I found out he was from Texas, a vegan, and did cross-fit. Never had a clue.
Image source: bingboy23
#50
His middle name was Moreen.
Image source: I_Am_Terry, Elle Hughes/Pexels
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