“My MAGA cousin had an abortion 15 years ago, and her MAGA husband has no idea.”

I work as a Writer at BuzzFeed, creating and curating quizzes, listicles, and articles that cover everything from pop culture chaos to food trends I immediately want to try and fashion moments I can’t stop talking about.

"As far as she knew, none of the living descendants had any idea about the story. Honestly, that would be an absolutely brutal thing to uncover while casually researching your family history."

"I once drove my niece to another state so she could get an abortion, and I lied and said I was her mother to help make it happen. Her actual parents are deeply religious, red-hat fanatics, and she was terrified of them finding out."

"Here’s where it got insane: the woman had a very unusual first name. The exact same uncommon name as one of my coworkers. We checked social media, confirmed the last name and photos, and yep, it was her. He didn’t want to go to the police or confront her because he felt that, as a Black man dealing with a white woman, he wouldn’t be taken seriously. So instead, he started completely ignoring her while saving every message, email, and voicemail as evidence in case things escalated. 

My job has no idea about any of this, and my coworker has no clue that I know who she really is or what she’s been doing. A lot of the harassment even happened while she was at work, which could absolutely get her fired. But my friend and I agreed that using that information is basically the nuclear option because if she lost her job, she’d suddenly have a lot more free time to obsess over him. S

o for now, I’m just sitting on the information. Everyone at work quietly acknowledges that she’s kind of strange, but she’s good at her job as a data scientist, so most people ignore it. I don’t. I keep an eye on her."

"I had buried all of it for decades, but once I had my own daughter and she reached the same age I was back then, everything came flooding back. It completely broke me mentally because I realized my own parents never really protected me, and they still invited him around"

"I truly believe my parents played a major role in my brother taking his own life. After he died, they covered it up by telling most of our relatives that he had suffered an asthma attack."

"Later that night, I picked him up and took him out for beers. He started bragging about a hookup he’d had earlier, and I finally just asked him directly if it was his sister. He gave me this stupid grin and said, “Yeah.” Then he casually admitted that they fooled around whenever they were drunk, high, and bored. I kept it to myself because I didn’t want to destroy her life, but I did tell his girlfriend that he was cheating on her. I never said who with, just that he’d admitted to it. I’ve never spoken to either of them since."

"A few months later, he still married his fiancée. They’re still together now and have a five-year-old kid. We were never especially close before that night, but after it, we definitely drifted even further apart."

"During that time, whether from anticipatory grief, stress, or something else entirely, my dad had been acting terribly. She honestly seemed relieved when he left. A few weeks earlier, she had even told me she regretted never divorcing him. I’ve told my dad that the way he behaved during that period was unacceptable, and over time we’ve worked through a lot of it, but that’s as far as those conversations will ever go. There is absolutely nothing good that would come from me telling him that my mom didn’t want him there the night before she died."

"Apparently, all of these men stayed in touch with her and seemed fully aware that the kids were theirs, but they kept their distance publicly. The wildest part is that this all happened in a tiny, ultra-conservative Christian town that basically felt like Mayberry with extra self-righteousness. 

If this ever got out, my wife’s family would be devastated, and the entire town would absolutely implode because of who was involved and how long it had apparently been going on. At this point, I’m just waiting for one of them to take a 23andMe test or something similar. Until then, I’ll just play dumb and sip my tea."

Text has been edited for length and clarity.