Our family histories have secrets and lies lurking under the rugs. Many of us relate to Disney’s Encanto’s song “We don’t Talk About Bruno”:
Admittedly, Lin-Manuel Miranda’s song is an absolute ear worm. It would stick with you even if you didn’t understand a single word. But the song and the story ring familiar tones of secrets and lies in my family’s history.
Secrets and Lies Cause Family Disconnects
It’s a truth I know well. A census record and subsequent research disproved my paternal grandmother’s stories of her father giving her up for adoption after her mother died.
But it further disconnected me from my grandmother, Jettie Dunaway, something I write about in my book. Grandma was at best ambivalent about her second granddaughter (me). Due to what I suspect was mental illness, my presence seemed to annoy her. We were never close.
Unfortunately, because her background is a void due to her very convincing secrets and lies, I don’t have enough context to understand her. I only have a few factual pieces of her in my possession. Fragments—census records, a scribble on the back of a photograph, an analysis of my own memories, and speculation.
She and my father had a difficult relationship. Some of it was about her animosity towards my mother and me, some about the suffocating nature of her affection for him and my sister. I’m convinced her secrets contributed to that.
Her adoption story denied my father of the acquaintance of many cousins by her eleven siblings. Almost all lived an hour or so away from his home, where he grew up as an only child.
One cousin I connected with years after my father’s death was a family historian. He’d always found Jettie a mystery. His memories of talking to Jettie’s siblings were remarkably similar to Encanto’s song. What did he hear from the siblings?
“We don’t talk about Jettie.”
Why are Secrets and Lies so Common in Family Stories?
White Lies
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It’s shocking for anyone to discover their Great-Grandma lied. Who could be more honest than a grandmother?
But family historians discover those untruths in research, but we seldom know the motives. A grandmother only aged 7 years between the 1920 and 1930 censuses raises questions: Was it vanity or losing track of time?
Were children’s ages misstated on a ship manifest to lower the passage rates? Was this stinginess or the only way the family could afford to immigrate together?
Why are innocuous lies such secrets?
According to Psychology Today writer Sarah Epstein, chances are that grandma kept that a secret because she wasn’t proud of breaking the rules. [1]
Our ancestors had no idea they were creating confusing for future descendants scrounging around in archives and on the internet to ferret out the details of their lives.
Family Shame
More serious individual rule-breaking behavior can lead to family shame.
Family history is like inherited silver—sometime proudly displayed, other times hidden away in cabinets, blackening into something unrecognizable. This tarnishing effect is particularly evident where families keep secrets and lies close to the chest.
We witness this shame in Murder, Mystery, and My Family, a true crime series in which family members and criminal barristers re-examine historic murder cases, hoping to overturn a conviction. In fact, the tagline asks, “Will modern forensic investigation rewrite their tarnished family histories?”
In several cases, family members reveal they were unaware of the conviction even though the family felt their ancestor was innocent. Does that really “tarnish” their family history?
The analogy of family history as silver is interesting. And do we really have to rewrite our family’s history to bring it out into the open? Is an inheritance with blemishes not also cherished?
Perhaps the “shame” caused by the stigma in such cases is closer to a fear. Apprehension of society’s judgment and whether that condemnation will bleed out over all family members.
(Related: Why you Should Write about Both Good AND Bad Sides of Ancestors in your Family Stories)
The Problem with Family Secrets
Not every secret is a problem. We all have them. The difficulty is knowing which ones are insidious enough to undermine the family psyche.
Some family secrets could prepare living descendants for hurdles they might face. Alcoholism. Inherited diseases. Propensity toward mental illnesses. Others, like my grandmothers, deprive the victim of support and the family from context that explain behaviors.
Sometimes the secrets morph into damaging lies. We come to believe a family myth instead of understanding our family history. We venerate instead of learning.
Revealing Family Secrets and Lies
Our ancestors couldn’t have foreseen what we would find out about them by donating a little spit. Now digitization is bringing dusty, seldom referenced records to our fingertips.
What are the pros and cons of uncovering and sharing secrets and lies our forebears took to their graves? The answers might surprise you, but that’s for a future post. Stay tuned.
Your Turn
What family secrets and lies have you encountered and how did you handle them? I’d love to hear your thoughts below.
[1] Sarah Epstein, LMFT, “3 Types of Family Secrets and How They Drive Families Apart,” Psychology Today, January 14, 2019, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/between-the-generations/201901/3-types-family-secrets-and-how-they-drive-families-apart.
Laura, oh my, little did I know doing a DNA test would reveal so many family secrets! I found out that my mother had an affair in 1952 and I was the result. I found out that my sister hid the fact that her oldest son (who is now 66) was not her husband’s son and that my mother let that little tidbit slip in one of her “tipsy” times many years ago. In researching my mother’s family I have found so many strange and interesting stories including criminals (nobody knew that one!) deaths of a husband and wife during the 1918 flu epidemic whose stories were lost in time….so many secrets and lies….I think all families have these, ours can’t be the only ones!
Holy skeletons in the closet that’s a lot of secrets. That must have been a shocking discovery. I’m sure many families have these, but I like to hope we’re not quite a secretive as our forbears.
My father’s side of the family was a taboo subject. We were told he has no other family but his mother. When I was in high school my siblings and I ask my father if he can tell us about his side of the family since we’re older now. He was immediately angry, got up from the table, and punched a hole in the wall, and said “never ask me again”. When my parents died in 2004 I started researching There were so many lies or white lies in family. I have met over 40 relatives on my father’s side of the family. Everyone I spoke to ran into lies within the family. My father and his mother hated each other and we don’t know why. BUT I found every love letter my mother wrote to him and I’ve been reading them. Whatever happened between them happened before my parents got married. I still have many letters to read.
Wow! Whatever the mystery topic is, it was jam-packed with emotion. I’m so glad you have the love letters your mother wrote. That’s a treasure!
My mum knew I was doing the family history. She thought I was only doing hers though. I have now discovered my dad’s grandmother was living only about 10 miles from us and died when I was 16. Her name was never mentioned. Why? What happened? Now I have no one to ask so will never know.
That’s so similar to my situation. Are there aunts or uncles still around? You could see if there are any court records, in case the dispute went that far.
What is particularly sad is that secrets rob future generations of the ability to know family members and family history. Some secrets, in my experience, are at times actually distortions or misinterpretations of stories passed down in family. New info can change the way we look at those episodes and help us understand why, not just what happened.
Exactly. We’re denied the understanding of how a rift happened. Or the perspective.
Wow, simply a fantastic and intiguing post! I have come across too may to list, in my own family tree, as well as clients, haha! Some have been through paper trails, and some have been through DNA. Some are quite interested in the findings, and some, of course, are in denial. 😉 Just as you stated above, are many of the reasons, to hide the truth, and more! 🙂
It was well known in my family that my maternal grandparents eloped, but the details were a secret. My mother never dared ask her parents, she only knew that it broke her grandmother’s heart. Fortunately, from records, oral history, letters and family memorabilia I was able to reconstruct the story of their elopement, which has become one of my top visited blog posts https://mollyscanopy.com/2019/02/a-valentines-day-love-story-my-grandmother-elopes-a-re-post/
Molly, I love that post. And the records came from Wayne Co. Michigan.
Did you ever find out why your grandmother’s mother was so set against Tony?