By Eric Grundhauser, | Atlas Obscura
eing a mom is a tough job, in large part because you just can’t reason with small children. What you can do, however, is lie to them. In honor of Mother’s Day, we asked readers to send us the most outlandish white lies their mothers ever told them. As it turns out, moms all over the world are telling some wonderfully inventive lies.
We received over 500 responses, and as uniquely crazy as many of them were, there was also plenty of common ground. Many mothers still tell variations on the classics: if you make a funny face, it will stay that way; if you eat before you swim, you’ll get cramps (or die); moms have eyes in the backs of their heads, and so on.
But then there were the more esoteric fibs, such as the dangers of dragonflies sewing your lips together, that playing in puddles will give you polio, or that a little man lives in your eyes and signals your mom when you aren’t telling the truth.
We couldn’t include all of the fantastic entries we received, but we’ve collected over a hundred of our favorites below. Check and see how many of your own mom’s fantastic tales you recognize. Oh, and watch out for the “Lie Man” …
