How a secret-keeper can initiate a chain of guesses and assumptions for the person from whom the secret-keeper keeps a secret!

 

Secrets can negatively affect relations and also the health of the secret-keeper when he or she does great efforts to hide things. But sometimes, secrets can raise the curiosity level of people around and lead to some funny assumptions and guesses that may not turn out to be true! But it does create some funny situation. This happened to me when I met a person from the corporate world of IT. He was a good guy but for reasons best known to him was not bringing up the topic of his family. His mention of his family was in codes and indirect form that I failed to understand about whom or what he is talking about. I am the last person to peep into and ask about a person’s family life! But I am a doctor and we are trained to not only listen to the patient’s complaints but also to observe and look for those subtle signs that are pointer of the disease. I did notice some sadness in his eyes that were not missable. After we departed, it set off a chain of guesses from my side as regards his personal life.  

Guesses and assumptions

Secret keeper (Source: Getty Images) 

Also,  read on Secrets and reasons for it! 

Along with being a doctor, I am also a human being. Combining both of these sides of me, I was trying to draw my own conclusions about the person’s family from his talk, incomplete mentions of some human figures in his home, and his gestures, actions and expressions, and opinions on various subjects. It set off a train of guesses and assumptions and some of these were really hilarious ones! I present below how the whole thing unfolded.

Relationship status

Initially, I thought that the person might be married since the majority of Indian men are married. But there was no talk about his wife or children. So I thought that he might be shy and hence not mentioning them. Then I thought that maybe his relations with his wife may not be good and hence, he is refusing to talk about her. Or maybe due to the long duration of married life, he has overcome the repeated mentioning of wife in his talks. Or maybe talking about her might be against his corporate image. Or maybe she resides in her native place and hence is less mentioned in his talks. Or is it that the two are separated? Or maybe divorced?

He appeared a secular person and that made me feel that he might have had an interrelationship marriage. Maybe a Hindu-Muslim relationship. 

When he was down with dengue, I enquired about whether his family was with him but there was no answer from him. So I wondered whether he is just in a live-in relationship and does not want anyone to know about it. Or does he have multiple girlfriends? This is a possibility since he is from the field of IT from Pune. I had read many news articles about relationship issues, infidelity, and crimes related to the family life of the IT people of Bangalore and Pune (probably due to living more in the virtual world). This sent some cold shivers down my spine. I was wondering whether I should continue with my talk with this person.

Sexuality

Only once during the talks, he mentioned a person whom he referred to as his ‘better half’. I was wondering as to why he did not say the common word of ‘wife’. Why did he use the less-often used term of ‘better half’? And my thinking started off on a totally different line. I was wondering about his sexuality. Was he is gay? And I remembered that during my first meeting with him, he had said that he is okay with gays and same-sex couples. He had specified that he has no problem with them. So is he gay? Better-half means his same-sex partner? Even when in the first meeting he said that he is okay with gays, I was wondering about his sexuality and thought went into my brain whether I was speaking to a gay. Not that it troubled or bothered me, but just thought it was! And I had also thought that maybe he has some relative or child who is gay. Whenever the topic of a male doing household chores used to come up, he used to mutter that yes that is what he means to state that men should do house work also. I thought maybe he has, a son who is refusing to help his mother in housework. Hence these statements. 

So many thoughts crossing the mind and so many guesses and assumptions!!! One day I decided to confront him and wanted to know about his family structure. I was happy to learn that he is married with straight sexuality and his wife is also a working woman but they have decided against having a child. And most importantly, his relations with his wife are good and trouble-free! I heaved a sigh of relief and am happy for the couple! I believe that there are some people in the world who like to keep secrets over everything in their lives and make people keep guessing for attention or any other reason! It may be also due to shyness or a feeling of inferiority complex. Whatever the reason, the guesswork journey was, an enjoyable one!!!