What Did You Not Understand As A Kid That You Now Understand As An Adult?

I saw this question floating around reddit today and it got me thinking. All kids are dumb. Even the “smart” 7 year olds, which don’t exist but woke parents will say their kid was speaking in full sentences as they came out the womb. Excuse me mother but I am quite wet. Do you happen to have a towel?

Anyways, I was a particularly dumb kid. I peed my pants in first grade and thought I could cover it up by wrapping myself in those coarse, brown paper towels. I thought tricycles were souped up bicycles and what the cool kids rode. I was adamant I had pokemon living in my closet. You get the picture. Wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed. But there was one thought I had for years that sticks out. Every time I think about it I lose a few brain cells.

For years I thought guys got their periods.

My parents were very open about all the “adult” conversations parents have with their kids. I asked my dad where babies come from as we were walking into a restaurant and vividly remember him saying, bluntly, “Moms and dad have sex. That’s when a penis goes into a vagina. Then there’s a baby.”

So I don’t know when this thought crept into my mind or how it did, I probably saw something about periods on a commercial, and was terrified. I was so scared that I didn’t ask anyone about it. Not my dad, older brother, other friends (who probably didn’t know what a period was), because I was terrified to bleed where I pee.

I would wake up in the middle of the night sweating about the thought of blood coming out of my dick. When’s it going to happen? I thought to myself on a consistent basis. I was always checking my sheets, my whitie-tighties, and every other piece of clothing that came in contact with my pre-pubescent penis.

It wasn’t until I was so scared that I was about to have my period I asked my brother what he did and he proceeded to laugh, tell his friends, and eventually my parents. They sat me down and told me that I will not, in fact, be bleeding and that was only for girls. PHEW! 8 year old me was beyond relieved. I strutted around with my newfound relief replacing the weight on my shoulders.

So I ask you, what was one thing you didn’t understand as a kid that you do now?