86 Small Lies That Escalated Into “This Is My Life Now”

I'd recently lost my friend Charlie and was blue about it for a while. One day going about my business I stopped in a coffee shop and when they asked for a name I gave them Charlie. This shop was near my work so I frequented it and every time I was Charlie, staff began getting familiar and greeting me whenever and one lady even asked if I ever go by Chuck. I do not. I still miss that damn dog :(

Before finishing college I got a low level job in low level section of a very large company. My first boss liked me a lot, assumed I had finished college and recommended me for another job which I got. I did not mention college on my resume and the hiring manager assumed a college degree, given the referral. That repeated three times and now I am within the ranks of solid college grads from solid schools. I never finished and they all assume I have.

I was dating a girl and I met her parents. I was a freshman in college seeking my physics degree, when I met her dad he asked me why in the world I would go into physics when it is a difficult field to get work in. Thinking on the spot I said “yeah I’ve thought about that too and I’ve decided to switch to mechanical engineering”. Welp I’ll be getting my mech engineering degree this may

My uncle's name is Ernie and he owns a restaurant, and likes to talk to guests when they arrive and leave. One of the patrons that eats there a lot, confused his name with Bert, a la Bert and Ernie. Being the pleasant and polite asian dude he is, he didn;t have the heart to correct him. Now whenever this one customer comes, the staff and and my aunt (the manager) has to call him Bert. He is my uncle Bert now.

I told everyone I was going to double-major in Psychology and German. I wanted to, sure, but my plan was to commit suicide after high school graduation so I at least left a good legacy. (Finished summa cum laude - I was a good student.)
I just finished my BA in Psychology in July. Feels weird - "wait, shit, did I really do the thing?" and realizing you have to plan for a future you never anticipated having.

Told my then-girlfriend that I'd like to have kids someday.
I didn't actually want to, but she was hot and I thought saying that was a good idea at the time.
Now she's my wife and we have a 1 year-old.
No regrets, though. Being a dad is pretty awesome.

My dad and I both have allergies to one of the ingredients in some kinds of wine. This somehow got twisted into general alcohol allergy in middle school, and that reputation stuck with me.
So I grew up not peer pressured into alcohol in any way - and when I got smashed on my birthday as an experiment, I didn't quite see the appeal anyway. Considering how much money I see the other students wasting on alcohol every weekend in Scandinavia, I think the misunderstanding struck jackpot.

When I was 14 years old I played with a group of other kids on stage during the 2008 Hawaii International Ukulele Festival. Jack Johnson was performing and we were behind him strumming along. Hundreds of us. This story has turned so thoroughly into-I played on stage side by side with him just the two of us- that I can't correct people anymore and just shamefully accept the oohs and ahhs when it gets retold.

somebody thought I was jewish and I didn't want to correct them because I hate confrontation. So now everyone in the school thinks im Jewish and my homeroom got me a Passover card signed by everyone my brain told me it was time to stop but I didn't want to ruin the thought of the gesture.

Someone bought my wife a Vera Bradley handbag. She doesn't care for Vera Bradley, but uses the bag anyway.
Because of her use of Vera Bradley, people buy her Vera Bradley things. She has a ton of it, plus gift cards to Vera Bradley. So naturally she has a ton of Vera Bradley accessories. She is now considered by others to be 'very into' Vera Bradley, so she gets more stuff from Vera Bradley.

This will probably get buried, but one time my roommate and I were talking about visectomies for some reason, and I told him my dad had had one. He wondered aloud what it would feel like, and I have no idea why, but I told him that when I asked my dad the same question he punched me in the nuts and said "THAT'S WHAT A VASECTOMY FEELS LIKE."
It was funny, I thought, and completely harmless.
Fast forward to a few months later, and he was still jokingly referencing it a couple times a week, and would even pantomime actually punching my nuts when he did it. He even did it in front of my brother, who had no idea what was going on, but laughed hysterically when he did it because it was funny. And because he laughed, my friend, of course, assumed he was in on it.
This went on for maybe a year, and became an inside joke in our friend group. It was mortifying. Wed literally be out at bars joking and laughing, and one of us would fake punch another in the nuts and go "AND THAT'S WHAT A VASECTOMY FEELS LIKE!" Or, any time someone got unitentionally injured, someone would yell it, and we'd all laugh.
Eventually, it became too much to bear and I fessed up. He confessed that he'd known that I was lying the whole time, lol. He just wanted to embarrass me, and admittedly thought it was pretty funny, but then the joke took on a life of its own and spun out of either of our control.
We still make that joke today, but now with the carefree, reckless abandon of two people, freed from each others expectations, able to whimsically enjoy the idea of a world in which father's nutcheck their sons in order to teach them life lessons.

My high school was full of toughs. Kids of guys working Baltimore's steel yards, kids of plumbers and Marines. I was just skinny and shy. I wasn't tough and I wanted to be. So I made up a story about a non-existent girlfriend. I told it to people who sat at my lunch table. Whenever I wanted to puff myself up, I added to the story. The girlfriend became someone who was so smart that she graduated high school in three years and went to Johns Hopkins on full scholarship.
Then it got out of hand. I made up that I got her pregnant. As the months went by, it became twins. The twins were born and the girlfriend had to drop out of college. I gave the twins names. This went on all the way through graduation.
Fast forward 25 years and it's a high school reunion. I'm flirting with this woman I had a crush on in high school and we're both laughing and enjoying the illusion that we might have a little something going. (We're both married. Nothing was going to happen.) Then we get joined by a couple of the women who used to sit with us at the lunch table and the question of the twins popped up. It caught me totally off guard. I'd forgotten all the lies I told. Then somebody mentioned my "girlfriend" and Johns Hopkins and it all came back. It was like a dark curtain descended. I didn't know whether to hide behind it or confess. I hid. They were interested, asking me questions. The woman I had been flirting with was leaning against me, one hand laying on my shoulder all friendly like. From the questions, it became apparent that this little group had all been in touch with each other in the years since high school My misadventure and my twins had been something they'd talked about and wondered about.
So I told them the twins were in England, studying at Oxford, that their mother and I were still friendly and that sometimes she and the twins came to visit with me and my wife for Christmas. It was all very civilized and everybody was happy.
I get emails and cards in the mail about high school reunions all the time. I ain't ever going back. Uh, uh. No way.

I lied about attending University for 2 years while living at home
Started out by missing a class here and there, falling behind, getting depressed and stopped attending full stop, told everyone I was still attending. Spent time in netcafes playing games, waiting until next semester where I would buckle down and work hard. Next semester came and I just kept spiralling down due to depression, ran out of money as I was barely working so I stopped going to the netcafes and stayed home (usually spent my days on my laptop hiding in my walk-in closet in case my dad came to open windows or something as he worked from home), and when I had a few close calls I stopped doing that and spent my time in libraries mostly.
Constantly lied to my family and my girlfriend about how my day at uni was etc, and whilst over the first year I still had the intention of fixing everything and turning my life around by going back and getting good grades etc but eventually I resigned to just going with the flow with the acceptance that I'll eventually just kill myself (so I was stringing everyone around me on with this false life that I never had the intention of finishing). Started losing control of my mental state and was always in a panic, cried myself to sleep at night etc, started to lose control of the lies in November last year and decided to say fuck it and come clean, cause worst case scenario I can still kill myself if things don't go down well.
Came clean to my (now ex) gf first and she really struggled with it (it was all at once over text so I don't blame her) Came clean to my parents the next day, and they were so unbelievably supportive. I know my dad was angry about it but he never took it out on me and worked through those feelings himself/with my mum. I owe my current (much better) life to their love and care and I will always be so grateful for them.
My gf never really could come to terms with it and I don't blame her. Looking back on the relationship I don't think we were a great match anyway and I was mostly hanging on for stability I didn't really have otherwise.

I became friends with one of the managers at Panera. One day as I was giving a cashier my order, he told her to give me the same discount as they give to firemen, police and paramedics, i think. He just chose this discount as it was an easy button to push on the register. Well this cashier really thought I was a fireman. I'm not. So for the next two years this cashier gave me the discount. Even if she wasn't serving me, she would go out of her way to tell the cashier that was helping me, "He's a fireman, give him the discount". It snowballed into such an awkward situation that I didn't know how to get out of it. Luckily that cashier eventually transferred to another store and I now happily pay full price.

Friend of mine started a job. Shortly after starting, they were having a company BBQ. He looked at the sausages and was grossed out by them for some reason.
So he claimed he was Jewish to have a polite way to not partake.
Lie snowballed and compounded, and he ended up converting. He is now Jewish.

An electrician came and priced up a job at our rental property.
He greeted me with “Hi Ian! I’ve come to price some work up” I replied “yep, that’s me”.
My name is not Ian, it’s not even close to Ian. I was too British to correct him with his error, so I just went along with it, its not the worst lie I’ve ever come out with.
In my head I’m thinking, at worst the guy is just going to call me Ian again when he leaves.
He was in my flat for a good 20 minutes, calling me Ian during conversations we had. Not once did I correct him, just stayed in character as Ian.
Weeks went by and he eventually came back to do the work at the flat. My mrs and me had the day off, I had forgotten about the whole Ian thing until that day, so I explained to her that if she talked to me that day to call me Ian. It’s just easier.

I told my dad that I would love to follow in his military footsteps while unbeknownst to him I absolutely hated the idea. Well On my 20th birthday he took me out for lunch and a few beers. Right after that he took me to his best friends recruiting office and 2 hours later I was confused, drunk, and basically convinced by my dad and his idiot friends that this would be the best thing I could ever do.
After 2 tours in Afghanistan, one divorce, and 10 years of my life they were definitely right.

For some reason, I have a tendency to drool even though I'm in my mid 20's. Everyone gets a laugh out of it and I'm not terribly embarrassed by it, so whateva.
Come to find out one of my friends, Dan, told another friend Mary (who honestly didn't like me too much) that the reason I drool is because I got kicked by a horse and had to get surgery when I was in grade school.
Ever since, Mary immediately comes to my defense if someone makes a drooling joke and will pull people aside and tell them to knock it off. Its really a nice gesture!
How have I repaid her kindness you ask? Whenever we are around horses (we live near some farms and do a bit of camping and hiking and stuff) I play along with the lie, start acting really nervous, and act freaked out if they get too close.
I feel like kind of a dick, but its pretty funny. Truth is, I've just got weird, drooly genetics!

I'm from a small town and was super worried/anxious about how college would go. After move-in day, everyone on our floor had to go around saying our major/ what we wanted to do occupation wise. I was 4th to go.
The first three people say, 'doctor', 'lawyer', 'surgeon' . I'm convinced at this point that everyone in college was way smarter than me and had their shit together.
Anyway, I blank, blurt out economics as my major, then say 'Professor' because it was the best thing I thought you could do w/ that.
So now I'm in my 2nd year of PhD program because I just never found a good reason to change from my RA meeting as a freshman.

I playfully said if she acted up once more she'd get the belt.
It turned out she was super into bdsm and it was surprisingly fun to do, knowing she was into it.
Now I guess I'm a sadist.