[Serious] What's the most disturbing thing in your family's history?

When I was 14 my Dad 'fell in love' with a girl in my class. This then climaxed with him getting her to give him a blowjob. I found out in science class a year later when a friend of her boyfriend told me. My Dad was a high school teacher (at a different school to ours).

Also, two years ago, my brother, who'd been living in Shanghai for many years, committed suicide there. He died in a park and had no ID on him at all. I later discovered that while our whole family had been in regular email contact with him, unbeknown to us all, he'd been unemployed and living there illegally for over 5 years. He'd been fired from his last job as a lawyer because he wasn't actually a lawyer. I knew he was a liar but discovered he really was a pathological liar and had been telling us (his family) and his friends in Shanghai a whole heap of lies about who he was and what he was doing for years. Some of the lies were disturbing in their preposterousness and severity, including a fatal car accident he was in, that he was Jewish (??), that our Mum came from wealthy aristocracy in England (she was working class raised), that I am a lesbian architect who designs prisons, and that he'd been employed by the Chinese govt as a contract killer.

To survive he lived on the streets for a time then moved in with a friend who didn't charge him rent. He stole from various people including cleaners at the local bar and various maids at the apartment he lived in.

I'm still processing the grief and shock of his death and his life in Shanghai now. One of the most shocking discoveries was that when he moved back to Sydney (where I live) for two years, he actually had brought back his Chinese wife and lived with and owned a business with her without a single person in our family knowing. He was very private and although I'd picked him up from his apartment he never invited me inside. When he returned to Shanghai I believe he simply abandoned his wife and disappeared from her life. I now have no way of contacting her to even let him know that he's died.

And despite all of the above I love my dad and brother very much. I've had a shitload of therapy though.

/r/AskReddit Thread