Lies your mother told you

[Fragile Bird]

Or your father.  Or sister. Or brother.  But lies your mother told you carry more gravitas, don't they?

I was just thinking about this when I made scrambled eggs for breakfast the other day, and managed to drop some egg shell into the bowl.  As I painstakingly took the bits out, I remembered my mother trying to teach us the importance of not eating egg shells by explaining the Queen's own mother accidentally ate a piece of egg shell and had to be rushed into surgery, because otherwise those wicked eggshells would have cut up her stomach and she would have died.  Really.

Actually, the danger from eggshells is salmonella and other bacteria being on the shell.

My example is pretty minor, but I have heard some bizarre stories about things their family told the.  Take a break from the US election....

[Humble AK]

Santa Clause. The Easter Bunny. The Tooth Fairy. The typical bald-faced lies that parents feel quite at ease telling their children for years on end. Also, you should listen to your parents because they know what they're talking about. (Nope, not true).

[sologdin]

the sanctity of marriage, the importance of blood relatives, the significance of gender ideology, the fairness of criminal justice, the severity of public discourse in bourgeois democracy, the rightness of patriotism, the justice of capitalism, the heroism of war.

not cool, mom, not cool.

[zelticgar]

You are a late bloomer, it'll grow.

[Dr. Pepper]

Eating watermelon seeds will cause watermelons to grow in your stomach.  

[Stubby]

A practical lie.  We all hated skim milk.  Mum filled ordinary milk cartons with skim milk and none of us noticed for a month.

[Lily Valley]

The water from the hot tap is filthy, use it for washing your hands, not for cooking.  Turns out the hot water lines in one place we lived were rusty and needed to be flushed before the water ran clear.  I still do not use hot water for cooking.

Anyone who uses the last inch of milk is a monster who hates their whole family.  My sister, father, I, my uncles and aunts are all incapable of using or throwing out the last inch of milk in the fridge.  Mum was serious about her morning coffee.

The washing machine ate your favorite blanket. 

Lima beans are good for you.

 

 

[ants]

My understanding is that you shouldn't use hot water for cooking, because the hot water piping is different from the cold water piping. Its not as healthy. 

[Arch-MaesterPhilip]

I guess that I'm smart and handsome.  

[Dr. Pepper]

My mom would try to tell me that not finishing all of the food on my plate was some sort of direct threat to starving children, usually in Africa though also often in North Korea.  

[Michael Seswatha Jordan]

My mom it was starving kids in specifically, Ethiopia. My dad always said the bit about the hot water, also. I think he was being dead serious, because he never told those little white lies. He also walked to school up hill both ways in 4 foot of snow. Ate onion sandwiches with just mustard. Tough man he is.

[The Marquis de Leech]

Think of the starving children in Ethiopia was the one I recall. That, and eating bread crusts makes your hair grow curly.

[Minstral]

My childhood. That everything was alright.... that there was nothing that could be done to improve my lot at school. Basically a lie she told me and herself because she thought it was the best response to my situation.

[Tears of Lys]

Truly, the only thing I can remember that was anywhere near a lie was that she was as pure as the driven snow until she got married.  And the only reason I think that's a lie is that with the wisdom I've gained through the years, I've figured a few things out.   

Now, my **dad** on the other hand...

[HexMachina]

2 hours ago, Dr. Pepper said:

My mom would try to tell me that not finishing all of the food on my plate was some sort of direct threat to starving children, usually in Africa though also often in North Korea.  

Biafra was the one used on us. "Children in Biafra would give anything for that..." 

This despite my being born in 1995...

6 hours ago, Dr. Pepper said:

Eating watermelon seeds will cause watermelons to grow in your stomach.  

Apple seeds too. And swallowing chewing gum will make it stick to the inside of your throat until eventually you can't breathe

5 hours ago, Stubby said:

A practical lie.  We all hated skim milk.  Mum filled ordinary milk cartons with skim milk and none of us noticed for a month.

This wasnt my mam, but I remember a friend when I was about 6/7 who wouldn't eat any meat but chicken. So his mam used car to just tell him that beef, pork etc were just different parts of the chicken, and sausages weren't meat. He actually believed her too, until he was X about 11 or 12...

[Michael Seswatha Jordan]

Oh, eating anything green or something I despised, would put hair on my chest. Sitting to close to the TV would make me go blind. Eating bubble gum would stay in my stomach for 7 years. I know there are a bunch more, I just can't recall them at the moment. Anything she didn't want me to do, she always had a reason it would hurt me or some nonsense.

[Sivin]

"I'm your mother."

I haven't proven it yet, but I've recently procured a lock of her hair for DNA testing.

[polishgenius]

6 hours ago, ants said:

My understanding is that you shouldn't use hot water for cooking, because the hot water piping is different from the cold water piping. Its not as healthy. 

My understanding is that hot water is considered less healthy because it sits in a tank in your house for a while before you use it, which causes it to stagnate even though it's being heated. Whereas unless you have a cold water storage tank (we could only use cold water from the kitchen for drinking/cooking at home for that reason, the bathroom water came via a cistern in the attic) it comes straight from the mains.

[Red Tiger]

* Eating at night makes you fat

* God is real

* Some sugar is good for the waistline

* You should always put the needs of others before your own

* Thinking first is always better than acting first

* You have to love them, they're your family

5 hours ago, Dr. Pepper said:

My mom would try to tell me that not finishing all of the food on my plate was some sort of direct threat to starving children, usually in Africa though also often in North Korea.  

This too

* Enjoying your work is more important than money 

Those are some off the top of my head

[HexMachina]

1 hour ago, Leap said:

Maybe my memory is particularly bad, but I can't really remember any of my mother's specific teachings at the moment. I mean, obviously I am very much the product of her upbringing, but I can't remember her coming up with many lies. Apart from the usual - God, Santa, Tooth-fairy (Toothfairy was revealed to be a lie fairly early on, Santa still referred to (albeit tongue-in-cheek), God is never mentioned in the household, so my atheism is presumably not that obvious to her (apart from my utter disinterest in the Church). 

Speaking of Santa though, to further the deception, for the first 10-12 years of my life or so (despite the notion being ruined for me sometime in primary school), my Dad would stand outside our house after we'd gone to sleep and wave some bells around. It'd be another 2 hours before we got to sleep. He still does it for the neighbours' kids, but now with something of an evil twinkle in his eye. 

Oh, and the other biggest lie I can think of is the famous ''I'm not cheating!''. Damn you, Monopoly: Destroyer of Homes!

What, no eat your crusts they give you curly hair? Eating cheese before bed gives you nightmares? Don't sit close to the TV because you'll get square eyes? (This was a personal favourite  )

Monopoly games in our house were always a minefield. I suspect my mam modelled her banking off real life and gave herself an awful lot of bonuses