Gummy Bear Deceit Prompts Spousal Strife

I've never been married. While holy matrimony seems like a mostly solid arrangement, I don't think I'm quite ready. At this point in my life, I have many secret behaviors that are unbecoming of a blushing bride. I also hate sharing my snacks. That's why I enjoy the recent Reddit tale of one man who lied to his wife about gummy bear flavors for more than a decade.

Newsweek found the post in question, courtesy of Redditor Moocow870. On the site's TIFU ("Today I F'd Up) forum, the gentleman revealed that his wife despises both lime and orange-flavored candies. With this in mind, the pair developed a system. "She passes on the orange starburst to me," Moocow870 writes. "She passes the orange and green skittles to me. She passes the orange and green Gummy Bears to me. This has been happening for 13 years."

Seems like a match made in heaven, right? The dude eats his wife's least favorite flavors. Here's where the deceit comes in. "What she doesn't know is that the green Haribo Gummy Bears are actually strawberry," Moocow870 writes. "Shortly after we married, for one reason or another, I looked at the back of the Haribo Gummy Bears package and discovered this."

You following this, readers? Moocow870 was snapping up the green gummy bears under his wife's assumption that green = lime. But in the Haribo universe, green does not = lime. Green = strawberry, and Moocow870 was eating more than his fair share of the gummy bears. The dude was exploiting the candy-sharing system. "I've enjoyed eating my little lies," he wrote in the post.

Of course, every marriage has its secrets—but, after 13 years, Moocow870's wife discovered his game. "After a few minutes, I saw her looking at the back of the bag," Moocow870 writes. "Then I saw her eyes get REAL BIG. She turned to me and asked if I've known that the green bears were strawberry. She always thought they were lime."

Moocow870 continues: "I was honest and nodded my head yes. The look of betrayal was unreal.... She asked how long I've known, and I was honest. I told her as long as we've been married." Now, Moocow870 reports that his wife has stopped sharing her candy entirely, even eating the orange gummy bears out of spite. I don't know much about marriage, but I'd say these two petty individuals are gonna be just fine.