The Confessions

"When my parents divorced I told my father things my mother had said in confidence. I was thirteen and angry. Those words contributed to a legal battle that hurt everyone. I never told either of them what I had done."

"I told my children their grandfather was a good man when he was not. I wanted to protect them from a complicated truth. Now they are adults and I wonder if I should have let them form their own view. I took that from them."

"I have not called my mother in three weeks. She will not call me because she does not want to be a burden. She is eighty one and lives alone. I know this about her and I still do not call. I do not know what is wrong with me."

"My teenage son thinks I never struggled in school. I struggled enormously. I was too proud to tell him when he was finding it hard and instead I pushed him harder. I watched him cry over his results one night and said nothing useful. I wish I had just told him the truth about my own failures."

"I have a half sibling I have never met. My father had a child before he met my mother. Everyone in the family knows except the child themselves who is now in their thirties. I have their name. I have never reached out. I do not know why."

"I was a terrible older brother. Dismissive, unkind, always too busy. My brother idolised me and I treated his admiration like an inconvenience. He is one of the finest people I know and I spent his childhood making him feel small. I am trying to make up for it now but some things cannot be undone."

"I uninvited my brother from my wedding because my in-laws did not approve of him. I told him it was a venue capacity issue. He believed me. He gave me a card and a generous gift anyway. I have never felt smaller in my life than I did opening that envelope."

"I borrowed two hundred pounds from my mother when I was twenty three telling her it was for a deposit on a flat. I spent it on a holiday. She never asked for it back. She passed away four years later never knowing. I think about it every single time I see a photo of her."

"I read my teenage daughters diary. I found nothing alarming but I violated her trust completely. She is twenty six now and we are close. I have never told her. I think about it whenever she tells me something in confidence."

"I told my family I could not make it home for Christmas one year because of work. I stayed home alone by choice. I just needed to not perform happiness for one year. Nobody knows that. They think I was miserable being away. I was the most peaceful I had been in years."