Not really shattered illusions, more lies told by your parent/s.

What a trip down memory lane!

I remember reading The News Of the World in secret and being puzzles by what a G String was, I had some really funny looks from people depending on who I asked, think it was my older sister who told me it was a very scanty pair of knickers, remember thinking this was too tame an answer so never believed her.

I've just remembered being told that touching raw bacon (I think) would give us warts, as well as what somebody else said about orange pith giving us worms.

As a child, I used to love my dad playing with my hair. He pretended it was the jungle and he was searching for wild animals when, in reality looking back now, I think he was probably looking for nits!!!

And something grownups used to say that wasn't a lie but was a bit of a scam nonetheless. If you wanted them to get out of their chair and play with you they'd say "I can't, I've got a bone in my leg" leaving kids thinking that having a skeleton to hold you upright was some dreadful affliction!

My dad was an engineer and scientist so always explained things (often at mind-numbing great length) if we asked a question. I asked him, as we were travelling in the car, what the 'road liable to subsidence' warning sign at the side of the road meant and he explained it meant that the road might sink due to mine works below. I was petrified for years that the road would suddenly sink and swallow us up but I never asked for reassurance!

Schools never used to serve vinegar with meals in the 50s and I was told it was because vinegar dries the blood. Except we had vinegar at home and I used to use it loads and my blood stayed runny.

Your dad sounds a bit of a card Daddima. How lovely.

When I was about 12 dad told me he was taking Bailey the dog to live on a farm as he was poorly and needed open spaces to get better. It was when I was in my 50's mum told me that Bailey had been put to sleep as he had liver cancer. I think I believed because he was only 5.

A friend of my Grandma's husband told me that he'd written the name of his son on a marrow seed so that the marrow would have his name on when it grew! I didn't realise for ages he must have scratched it on the growing marrow!

Me too, NotTooOld. I was always waiting to see him come back with a puppy. Why could be not say he was going to toilet? ?

My mother told me if I picked my nose my head would cave in. My young daughter had a really annoying habit of cracking her knuckles and I told her she would get arthritis. She stopped. Then we had to go to the doctors about something and she asked him (little minx) and of course he said it was perfectly safe even though I was trying to signal him behind her head, in the way you do with that meaningful wide-eyed frantic shake of the head ....so she started again and still does it at 35....eeugh

My dad told me that Pneumonia (pronouncing the P) was twice as serious as pneumonia ( silent p). I believed him until I was about 18!

Mother said that if I ate the pith of an orange I would get worms. I can remember where I was when I was told it. I love oranges, pith and all but remember what she said every time I have one.

I think really that a lot of these sayings were told to children in a joking spirit, but the grown-up telling them did not realise that a small child would take them literally.

We were told that if we pouted that our faces would stay like that if the wind changed. I expect you were too. Until we were around four, I think we believed it, but I never believed the other common saying to little girls who in a huff stuck their lip out that you could boil a kettle on it.

Don’t worry, Daddima, some people could start a fight in an empty room!

I don’t remember whether it was one of my parents who told me that if I picked my nose my brain might leak out.

But I did see the price of those dresses and tell my DD2 that only Irish children could go to Irish dancing classes. Unfortunately I was so convincing she asked a Scottish friend who did just that how she’d managed to get in. They were at university at the time.

My granddad was always going to see a man about a hoss ( horse) as he often came home with some nag or another I believed him but then I found out the horse swapping usually happened in a pub! He was a real character and had loads of sayings including ' it's gone black the back of bills mother's meaning rain later but as I had an uncle Bill I was always interested to know where his mom lived so I asked him but he wouldn't tell me

When I asked my dad where he was going,he would reply "to Timbuctoo." I thought it was a name he made up and it was years later when I found out it is a real place!

If I was begging dad to go somewhere, like the park or seaside. He'd say we'd go next Sheffield Wednesday. I'd be waiting and waiting for this day to come round. He would often say he was going to see a man about a dog. I was waiting for him to bring a dog home. My aunt told me not to eat jam with seeds in as a tree would grow inside me!

If you were the second to pour from a teapot you would have ginger twins!

Drinking tea before 14 turns you insides brown and doctors will tell you off. Those black lumps grownups get when they pinch their skin in something (used to be called a certain thing that isn't really pc now but I'm sure you know what I mean) were woodlice that had crawled under the skin. My Dads swallow tattoo was a bird that had flown into his arm and stayed there.

Swallowing pips would mean an apple would grow inside me.

My parents didn’t lie to me or tell me silly stories. They explained things to me and answered my questions truthfully.

Jings! I didn’t expect to be psychoanalysed because of a word I used!
Would ‘stories’ be better?

The post was intended to be lighthearted

Asking my uncle how he broke his leg, he told me he tripped over a draw and a chicken kicked him! Used to be quite wary around chickens for s long time ? Also had the gone yo see a man about a dog but never ever got the expected puppy either!

My mother told me, when I was changing siblings nappies, that I would not smell my own baby's poo. I found out that was absolute rubbish!