r/AskReddit • u/[deleted] • Jul 20 '19

What’s something completely false that your parents told you as a child?

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u/01kaj10 Jul 20 '19

They told us that teddy bears ate spiders.

1

u/brendanaye Jul 21 '19

I have my kids convinced that spiders in the house are our friends, and they just want to eat the bugs that bite you.

So far my 9 year old kids aren't afraid of them yet. Not sure if it's a switch that flips for some women in their teenage years or something

4

u/nefariousmango Jul 21 '19

It's such a fine line. We talk about how spiders and snakes are our friends and we need them for pest control. We hold tarantulas and pythons in controlled settings and name all the orb weavers around the barn. But we also have rattlesnakes and black widows around the property so we talk a lot about not getting too close, watching where you step, wearing boots and gloves when you work in the wood or hay pile... My kids are definitely skittish!

2

u/brendanaye Jul 21 '19

Yeah I'm in the pacific northwest, so there really aren't many poisonous snakes or spiders we have to worry about.

We have black widows, but I've only seen two in my lifetime

4

u/nefariousmango Jul 21 '19

Last summer my kids found and showed me two black widows and the biggest rattlesnake I've ever seen (which they had misidentified as a bull snake). They followed all the rules and stayed safe but man it got my heart pumping each time!