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“My Cousin’s Disappearance”: 48 Personal Mysteries That People Have Never Been Able To Solve
Life is full of mysteries. What is my purpose? What is the meaning of life? Where on earth did I leave my car keys? Some questions will never be answered, and we just have to accept that. But sometimes, it’s hard not to put your detective’s cap on!
Redditors have recently been revealing all of the small mysteries from their personal lives that have left them puzzled for years. From the case of the missing box of crayons to what their father did in the Vietnam War, there are plenty of curiosities that people desperately want to get to the bottom of. Enjoy reading through these mystifying stories, and be sure to upvote the ones that you’d love to solve too!
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#1
One day I was walking up my stairs and saw a little square of white paper on one of the steps. It was about the size of a postage stamp. When I turned it over it was a picture of my dad when he was about 10 years old. My parents had lived in this house but it was over 30 years ago. We bought the house from mom after my father died.
I showed the picture to my mom and she had never seen it before. To this day I have no idea where that little picture came from.
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#2
I lost my car keys when I was disc golfing when I was 19. I looked everywhere and eventually decided they were gone and had to call my mom, order a new set. It was a mess.
I eventually found the missing keys two years later in my desk drawer at my house in college 100 miles away.
#3
I woke up one morning to 3 quarters stacked on the spoiler of my car. House located in the country with a long drive way and a dog who would have gone ballistic if someone had been there in the night. Still no clue who or how, but thanks for the 75cents I guess!
My family also has chickens in a small coop behind the house, not visible from the road whatsoever. Woke up one morning to two additional full grown chickens in the coop. They had leg band identifiers that we don’t use so they definitely weren’t ours.
Zig Zag Wanderer 10 hours ago (edited)
Chickens will wander around and occasionally find another rooster. We actually had a rooster attach itself to our free range brood. Had to get rid of him because the two roosters started getting aggressive.
#4
When I was a child, I visited a dinosaur themed exhibit with very realistic dinosaur animatronics that scared the hell out of me. I recall the entrance was very cave like and was inside a white building. I've tried searching all over for such place that was active when I was a child probably early 2000s in Malaysia and I couldnt find anything. I would've thought I hallucinated it but I actually had a souvenir from the place. A pterasaur shaped eraser.
Ronja Oksanen 11 hours ago
What, how is this exactly what happened to me?! But in Finland and the souvenir was coloring book of dinosaurs. The timing, white building, everything is the same! I remember being on the shoulders of my babysitter so the moving t-rex was SOOO close to my face that I almost peed myself. Sadly the babysitter passed away before I could ask him about it, and my mom doesn't remember this.
#5
I had a 64 crayola from first grade bought by grandma. If you had a 64 crayola, you are the "fancy kid" at school. So I brought my box to school to do some colouring and by afternoon, it was gone. I looked all over the classroom and went to the lost and found cabinet. Though there was a crayola box there, it had a name so it was not mine.
The next day the kid next to me had brought a crayola box. I confronted her those were my crayons (because I could see her glaring at my box yesterday), and she claimed her mom bought it so it was hers. I never got my crayola box back, but I still have the gut feeling she stole it from me.
Sarah 11 hours ago (edited)
Similar.. my school jumper ( uniform in Ireland) disappeared after gym. Nasty girl who sat behind me in biology ( threw my lunch sandwiches in to a puddle, threw hard boiled sweets in my hair) turned up wearing the same little teddy brooch I had on my jumper. She saw me looking and said..oh this (brooch/pin) isn’t yours my mam bought it for me . Like hell. My parents had to buy me a new jumper. I was 16 and it was 1996 and I still remember. I just wish I had the bravery to to speak out. She was - nasty girl. And as adult I can tell difference now between teenage insecurity and someone who has nastiness in them and she is def the latter
#6
I had a one night stand. I found out many years later she had a kid just about nine months later. The girl looks like my other daughter to a T. I just have this weird feeling she’s mine 😕 there doesn’t appear to be a father in her life at all!
#7
Why my family lied to me about my dad passing of a brain aneurysm. I found the autopsy and police report in some boxes as an adult and he actually passed from brain trauma. He also went into a coma while sleeping next to my mom (they told me he collapsed in the middle of the day around people).
So there is more to the story and it's bothered me a lot for the past ten years since I read those documents. But when I ask people about it they just say it happened 30 years ago and they don't remember. You don't remember if it was night or day time?
#8
What happened to my poor wee gorgeous, loveable black cat. I was away working, and she just vanished. Nobody seemed to have an answer for me, miss her heaps.
#9
A few years ago I was on the floor in front of my bookshelf. I think I was cleaning something up, I don’t remember exactly, when something caught my eye. Sticking out maybe a half inch from between books was $200. All folded up, just chilling there.
It was the second bottom shelf. No one had visited in months. It was barely visible. Where did that money come from?!
#10
Where do all the hair ties go? I've raised two daughters and between the three of us I've bought more packs than I can count. Just poof.
#11
Back in the mid 1990's, I was at the grocery store with my dad and his girlfriend. As they shopped, I went to the magazine aisle, like I always did. There was a new edition of GamePro that had came out, and I was super stoked for it. It was the Donkey Kong Country premiere edition.
I had saved up my allowance, and was able to buy the magazine.
The grocery store, which was a Food Lion, was no less than two miles away from where I lived.
I recall leaving the grocery store with the magazine in hand, getting into the car, still holding the magazine, arriving at our apartment, and getting out of the car, heading inside.
As I got to the top of the steps, I realized "hey, I left my magazine in the car, let me run back out and get it." I dug through the car, literally tore it apart, and could not find it. This was on a Friday. I did this at least three other times, and never did find the magazine.
I didn't roll the windows down on the ride home. The magazine was clutched in my left hand during the car ride home. All of a sudden, boom, it was gone.
And now, 30 plus years later, I still recall this like it was yesterday. Never did find that magazine, and I was really bummed about it.
Chich the witch 49 minutes ago
Wonder if your dad or his GF did not want you to have it for some reason and took it when you left it in the car.
#12
What my father did in the vietnam war. My sister and I know he was in the air force. He talked about mostly traveling, smoking and drinking beer overseas and how he was to tall to fly a plane. And how he joined the military to get away from his horrible family. Later in life he developed kidney failure, which eventually led to multiple organ failure, which is what got him at the end. He was on V.A. benefits, and had a military funeral. But we never found any information
No pictures, no postcards, no information at all about just what he did.
Kim Kermes 11 hours ago
Very common with combat vets. You may be able to get his records. I'd start with a call to a local VFW., they should be able to point you in the right direction.
#13
Why I have been sick since 2024. I have lost about 45+ pounds. No appetite, nausea, very watery movements, random fever, and so achy. Not to mention the new development. My entire rib cage is huritng. The mystery pain that started it is still there. My ride or die.
I have been to my primary, 2 gastroenterologists and pain management. My primary keeps sending me to the gastro doctors. The first one told me it was Crohn's and the treatment started. But when I started asking questions I got this response: if the pain is that bad go to the ER.
So back to my primary. Sent to a different gastro doc. One who specializes in Crohn's. Found out during that visit that I many not have Crohn's. It was listed as probable Crohn's. Oh and the pain is not related to the Crohn's. Go see a nutritionist and pain management. We will pop the camera back in and see what is happening.
So I went to pain management while waiting for my colonoscopy. Pain management sent me home for being in TOO much pain. Yep, that is correct. I am one who does not 'show' pain. I just quietly go about my day. But you run my vitals, it shows. My BP was 200/143 and pulse was 170. Sir are you experiencing any numbness or tingling in your left arm? No, the pain is just bad today.
Sorry but we cannot help you. We suggest you go to the ER or follow up with your doctor. With your vitals we cannot help. But I am in pain and this is because of it. They stopped listening to me at that point.
So I have quit all of my treatments. I have been monitoring my BP and pulse at home. Nothing out of the ordinary to report. I am now focusing on making my life work around it. If I have to live with it, I will find a way.
#14
My cat managed to remove the tip of his tail in an empty apartment, during the 5 min we were outside loading stuff into the rental truck. We came back inside to blood on the walls and floors, and he was hiding under the bed. The tip of his tail was near a door that couldn’t have slammed shut (it was heavy and there wasn’t any wind), and it was still as wide open as it was when we went outside.
There wasn’t any furniture in the apartment at that point. He wasn’t even near the door when we brought stuff out, so we know no one stepped on his tail or shut his tail in the front door. He doesn’t have extreme anxiety that would cause him to do that himself.
Really baffled still. This was about 6 years ago.
Biggie (cat) is okay, he just had a partial amputation and has coped reasonably well. Even the little grey tip appeared again once his fur grew back. 🙂.
#15
My cousin’s disappearance in 1979. He was in Kabul, Afghanistan when the Russians invaded and he hasn’t been seen or heard from since.
Official response from the US State Department: “We are boycotting the Moscow Olympics.” .
#16
The way individual socks just vanish into another dimension inside the dryer. I’ve lost enough pairs to start a textile factory in a parallel universe.
#17
Who made me an anonymous valentine's day card at school 30 years ago. I never could find out who it was!
#18
Why am I me, as in why is my consciousness in this body and nobody else's?
Zig Zag Wanderer 10 hours ago
One of the deepest philosophical mysteries of all, unfortunately.
#19
The first week my wife and I spent in our new house, I had a dream where I called a friend from college, Ryan, and we spoke.
Two days later, Ryan called and my wife answered. He was shaken up. He said that his roommate gave him a message, “For Ryan,” with only a phone number, no name. The mystery is twofold. We just got that landline number the day before (the day after the dream), and the call came in on his roommate’s cellphone, which he had gotten that day. So there should be no way these numbers were known to anyone.
Rali Meyer 3 hours ago
my mate called be during the transition from analog and rotary phones on my mobile. I saw his number, which was supposed to be impossible
#20
I lost my old slide phone in my 8x8 bedroom in my NYC apartment, and I never found it. There were no holes or unfinished areas where it could have maybe slid into the wall. It was just gone one day. I have since moved 3 times and have been through everything I own, but it’s still a mystery.
#21
Lost my favorite jacket in college and i've thought about it probably once a month for ten years. wasn't even that special, just fit perfectly. genuinely no idea what happened.
#22
Oh my.....there are a lot of deep, personal answers to this and I was just going to talk about roads 😅😅
But really - have you every thought about how many millions of miles of roadways were developed and paved across the USA alone? And in relatively short order? I mean, they work for years on a single 3 mile stretch if I-35 but somehow built out the US they way they did is just wild to me.
#23
Who my double is. A few years ago I moved to the opposite end of the UK for a job and I apparently have a double. I've never met this person but I have been called the wrong name by strangers and had acquaintances ask me if I work somewhere I have never worked. My father fitted machinery in a local factory so I have a suspicion I have another half sibling.
Chich the witch 39 minutes ago
In University I would occasionally run into a guy who mistook me for Steve, his chemistry lab partner. Could not convince him I wasn't Steve.
#24
Been trying my whole life to just see one photo of my mom’s biological mother. That would mean the world to me if I could do that for my mom.
SweetCheesySpaghetti 34 minutes ago
My grandmother was adopted as a baby. We never knew anything about her biological family. At the end of her life, my sister convinced her to do an Ancestry test. She didn't want to know about any of the family results, just her genealogical makeup. After she passed, I used her results to compare to my own. I found her boilogical family. I'm not sure which one of 4 sisters was her mother, that's as close as I got. But i found someone who is close to her age and looks just like her on facebook. I can't reach out because I don't want to uncover a possible family secret in their family. So i peak from time to time, and have used ancestry and other research sites to learn about them. I wish more than anything that I could see pictures of my grandmothers mother. But I don't believe I ever will.
#25
I have an indentation in my skull that doesn't belong. No one's telling me what happened.
Daisydaisy 11 hours ago
Forceps when you were being born? I have two small dents in my skull from being delivered with forceps
#26
What the actual thing is causing my seizures.
seanpar0820 26 minutes ago
Me too. Every test comes back normal. Its mainly during extreme panic attacks but they don't think that it can happen
#27
Whether my grandad and my partners grandad knew each other. They worked for the same company, in the same place, at approximately the same time. Unfortunately I don't know of any way we can ever find out!
#28
I caught long covid before there were vaccines for it.
I got sick for a year (so sick, I was afraid to go to sleep because I was afraid I wouldn’t wake up.)
A month after testing negative, I took my kids on a cruise that I had bought two years prior.
Before I left, I took my grandmother’s ring that I had inherited (and had always wanted,) and hid it somewhere that I wouldn’t forget.
I got back from the cruise, and it wasn’t where I thought I had hidden it.
I guess Covid has deleted the hiding spot from my memory.
I have looked for it several times, but still haven’t found it.
This was three or four years ago.
Sad.
Ben 2 hours ago
Still dealing with long COVID. Got it in July and still dealing with getting sick all the time, no taste or smell, my body goes into a fight or flight response for hours at a time, causing horrible anxiety. I have a hard time working for most of the day. And China gets away with k*****g all these people and ruining other people's lives. Each day is a struggle.
#29
When my partner and I moved into an old house, all of my brushes disappeared. My hairbrush, my makeup brushes, all of them. could not find them in our bathroom to save my life. A few weeks later, they all show back up in the places I had been looking for them (the drawers in the bathroom, on the countertop, in my makeup bags etc). Then about a year after living there a pink brush with gray hair in it shows up. no one in my family has gray hair. No one claimed the hairbrush. I even asked some folks who had visited us a few days prior if they had left it and they said no. Now I definitely believe in spirits. That house was 100% haunted (I have other stories on that), and I think whatever entity stole my brushes to begin with, felt bad and gave them all back with interest, so to speak. I have no idea where it got that pink hairbrush or why it chose that one specifically.
#30
How tf I managed to win the race to the egg.
Chocolate llama 9 hours ago
Well, you didn't. The egg has a protective layer that has to be weakened before s***m can fuse. The first ones arriving really just weaken this protective layer. Also, technically "you" are waaaayyyyyyy more egg than s***m at this point, but that's details
#31
Where all my money goes by the end of the month.
#33
Still dont know why I get small scratches all over my body (when I say small I mean really small).
#34
My biological dad abandoned my mom when he found out she was pregnant with me. I staged a surprise meeting when I was about 15? and it didn’t go well.
Always wondered why he left, especially after I heard that he left another woman who had a daughter that looks exactly like me.
I’ve made peace with it but it’s a curiosity I have.
#35
Why I walk into a room and immediately forget why, is my brain playing hide and seek?
#36
I lost an earring one night and I couldn’t find it anywhere. Looked in my bed sheets, in the bathroom, everywhere. A couple days later I stepped into the shower and found the earring sitting at the bottom of the tub. I have no idea how it got there. Everyone in my family had showered several times between the time it was lost and found, so in theory it should have been washed down the drain or found by someone. I still wonder how it ended up there, although I like to think I had a friendly ghost helping me out.
#37
What happened to that one shirt of mine?
#38
This just happened today! I have video evidence!!!
A flip flop materialised in front of my house and then landed on the drive, I swear no one was around to throw it and no bird seemingly to drop! My camera picks it up as if it had been thrown from my front door upwards but there is no one there to do it and no one who owns the flip flop.
#39
Where do all the spoons go?!? It’s like they walk away.
Chich the witch 28 minutes ago
People take them, or some psycho tosses them. At work we had a problem with teaspoons vanishing from the break room. Picked up a box of 50 and all were gone in a month or two.
#40
Why everyone reveres my grandfather who committed acts of domestic violence so terrifying I don't even want to type them out
now he's old and has dementia, everyone has selective amnesia and treats him like a king.
Ace 8 hours ago
Whole communities can develop a reverence for the most despicable criminals. They know that bad things will happen to people who don't show sufficient respect so convince themselves that the head gangster is actually worthy of that respect. It's the brain's way of coping with a***e - accept it, normalise it, avoid it.
#41
One family mystery that still haunts me, my grandparents always argued about a letter from my great-grandfather that supposedly explained why he left town suddenly in the 1940s. Nobody ever saw it, and whenever it comes up, everyone shuts down or changes the subject. I’ve asked countless times, but the letter disappeared long before I was born. I keep wondering what he wrote and if knowing would change how I see my family’s history.
#42
Why I'm a morning person on weekends but physically cannot wake up on weekdays. Same body, same alarm, completely different results. Science has no satisfying answer for this.
#43
How to land a husband.
#44
When I was a kid we used to have day naps, but no one really slept. I remember some people were looking at us and then I immediately fell asleep for some reason… it scares me even now, not sure if I want to know what happened.
#45
My grandfather sold a wine and spirits wholesaler business in the late 1920s. The mystery of what happened to the money has dominated my entire life. Equivalent today for about £1million. In the early 40s he died a penniless drunk. He had 2 sons (one my father) and a daughter. I once found the final ledger for the business which his daughter (my aunt) saved for the rest of her life. It confirmed the family rumour about how much it was sold for. Nobody knows what happened to the money.
#46
Small one:
I once misplaced an iPod nano and haven't found it yet. This was 11 years ago.
Now I looked everywhere and moved since then, so the odds of me finding it are none-existant. It was probably stolen, or I dropped it somewhere, but my brain REALLY is telling me it's misplaced for some reason. I had it one day. And I didn't have it the next day. But I don't know which day that was.
#47
Why people dislike or hate me for no reason.
I may have thought they're keeping it a secret, but nobody bothers to tell me anything. They just leave me hanging, and I have no idea why. I would approach and ask why, but they don't bother, like I'm disposable.
Same goes for my narc father and his mom. They just hate my existence, and even tell me I'm a mistake. Even on my grandma's death bed, she never apologized for abusing me, so I never got any answer from her.
#48
I seem to be a pretty likeable person, I have friends in lotsa friend groups but I cannot for the life of me land me a partner or get a date! I have been told I have Aubrey Plaza energy so many times but yea...single for ages!
Daisydaisy 11 hours ago
This seems to be a 21st century problem - I seem to know so many young people who would love to have a girlfriend/boyfriend but can't get one. Perfectly lovely people. I feel like it was so much easier when I was young. Has social media or the internet made it harder somehow?
What do you think ?
Lupita Nyong'heaux 56 minutes ago
i related this story on another post, but my big mystery is what happened to the patio door key i kept in the storage room on the patio. my patio door can lock itself if you turn the k**b a certain way, and i had locked myself out one day. to get back in the house, i had to squeeze thru the bedroom window, which i thankfully was able to jiggle open. i immediately texted my landlord and asked for a key to the patio door, which she provided. in the year after that first incident, i locked myself out on 2 other occasions and used to key to get in, always returning it to the storage cabinet under a specific paint can. well, about 6 months ago, i locked myself out again and went to the cabinet to get the key - only it wasn't there. i searched everywhere for over an hour. finally, i gave up and squeezed thru the bedroom window again. i have searched everywhere in my apartment and again in the storage room for that key, but to this day, i've never found it.
BookFanatic 3 hours ago
I want to know who took my grandmother's wedding ring. My aunt gave it to me when Grandma passed and I (incredibly stupidly) took it off at work to fix the printer. Remembered about five minutes later but the ring was gone.
Lupita Nyong'heaux 56 minutes ago
i related this story on another post, but my big mystery is what happened to the patio door key i kept in the storage room on the patio. my patio door can lock itself if you turn the k**b a certain way, and i had locked myself out one day. to get back in the house, i had to squeeze thru the bedroom window, which i thankfully was able to jiggle open. i immediately texted my landlord and asked for a key to the patio door, which she provided. in the year after that first incident, i locked myself out on 2 other occasions and used to key to get in, always returning it to the storage cabinet under a specific paint can. well, about 6 months ago, i locked myself out again and went to the cabinet to get the key - only it wasn't there. i searched everywhere for over an hour. finally, i gave up and squeezed thru the bedroom window again. i have searched everywhere in my apartment and again in the storage room for that key, but to this day, i've never found it.
BookFanatic 3 hours ago
I want to know who took my grandmother's wedding ring. My aunt gave it to me when Grandma passed and I (incredibly stupidly) took it off at work to fix the printer. Remembered about five minutes later but the ring was gone.
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