History Main / KeepingSecretsSucks

* In the ''WesternAnimation/MiraculousLadybug'' fic ''Fanfic/PowersOfInvisibility'', Juleka becomes the SecretKeeper to both Marinette/Ladybug and Adrien/Chat Noir and has to deal with the fact that Marinette isn't ready to tell Chat Noir her secret or let him do the same. Things only get worse when Juleka finds out that Nino and Alya are dating and hiding it from Marinette and Adrien, mainly because they don't want it to get back to their parents. It's mostly played for laughs (so far), due to the awkwardness of having four new friends determined to hang out with her yet unable to talk about ''why'' they're suddenly so close with any of the other three around, culminating in Juleka having to walk out of a lunch with the four after being bombarded with text messages. Despite this, it's noted that Juleka is happier with them in her life than she's ever been before.

* [[Characters/MiraculousLadybugMarinetteDupainCheng Marinette Dupain-Cheng]] and [[Characters/MiraculousLadybugAdrienAgreste Adrien Agreste]] in ''WesternAnimation/MiraculousLadybug'' struggle with keeping their identities as Ladybug and Chat Noir a secret, although the former finds it considerably harder than the latter does. Both of them have attempted romantic relationships with Luka and Kagami respectively, [[TheMasqueradeWillKillYourDatingLife only to end up breaking up with them because their secret identities mean they can't be honest with them]].

* In the ''Literature/VitaNuova'', [[Creator/DanteAlighieri Dante]]'s attempts to keep the prying eyes of Florence from knowing which woman he's in love with ends up ruining his chances with her. Turns out, pretending to love other ladies makes you look like a medieval whore, something Beatrice in no way wants to associate with much to Dante's secret misery.

* Marinette and Adrien in ''WesternAnimation/MiraculousLadybug'' struggle with keeping their identities as Ladybug and Chat Noir a secret, although the former finds it considerably harder than the latter does. Both of them have attempted romantic relationships with Luka and Kagami respectively, [[TheMasqueradeWillKillYourDatingLife only to end up breaking up with them because their secret identities mean they can't be honest with them]].

* In the ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' episode "Green Is Not Your Color," Rarity confides to Twilight Sparkle that she is incredibly jealous of Fluttershy for her job as a model, while Fluttershy tells Twilight that she hates her job and only keeps doing it for Rarity's sake. HilarityEnsues, mostly from Pinkie Pie's constant reminders on the importance of keeping promises.

** Averted with Pinkie, who apparently has no problems keeping secrets whatsoever. Especially if she Pinkie Promises. At least until the Season 5 episode "The One Where Pinkie Pie Knows", where she spends the entire episode constantly struggling to keep the surprise secret of Shining Armor and Princess Cadence having a baby from her friends and everyone else. After Cadance and Shining Armor finally deliver the news themselves, Pinkie literally falls to pieces. And she ''never'' wants to go through all that again.
* In later seasons of ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'', it is revealed that [[spoiler:Rose Quartz and Pink Diamond were the same person]], Pearl being the only person to know this secret after Rose gave birth to Steven. Due to [[spoiler:her programming to follow her master's orders, [[{{Geas}} Pink Diamond's final order to her as her master being that she never tells anyone]]]], she is ''physically'' incapable of telling anybody the truth, watching helplessly as the actions she was accomplice to lead to most of her fellow Gems being corrupted into half-mad monsters and Steven floundering to discover the truth about his mother.

''WesternAnimation/DragonsTheNineRealms'': In the second episode of Season 2, main character Tom wants to tell his mom Olivia about the dragons since he feels bad about hiding it from her.

* For Franchise/SpiderMan, things could have been so much easier if everyone he cared about had known he was a super-hero. Subverted when one of his closest friends proves to be a deadly enemy.
* ''Franchise/{{Superman}}'':
** Superman's son Jonathan really hates the idea of hiding who he is from others.
** In ''ComicBook/TheUnknownSupergirl'', Linda Danvers really hates to keep [[ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} her secret identity]] from her loving adoptive parents, and frequently wishes she could come clean about all her secrets. She at last gets her wish right before her public debut.
** ''ComicBook/YoungLove'': Back when she and Dick Malverne were dating, Linda Danvers often wished she could reveal her hero identity to Dick instead of cooking up ridiculous ploys to keep him fooled, but her cousin warned her against letting suitors in on the secret.
* ''ComicBook/{{Robin|1993}}'': For a long time, Tim Drake's biggest problem with being ComicBook/{{Robin}} was that he ''absolutely hated'' lying to his father about what he was doing and did not at all like when Bruce made him weigh his loyalty to his father against his loyalty to the mission. The flip side of this coin was that [[ComicBook/{{Batman}} Bruce]] wouldn't allow Tim to tell his in costume girlfriend Spoiler his secret identity and refused to trust her for years no matter what she did to prove herself and how many times Tim vouched for her.

* ''Fanfic/AFrozenFlower'': In regards to Orchid's PowerIncontinence, only Olive and Oprah know about it, and Olive is forced to keep Otto out of the loop despite him growing suspicious. Even Oprah herself refuses to tell Olive things about Orchid, and denies Oz the privilege of outing himself as being a dormant ''lambero''. Likewise, Orchid refuses to tell Till, formerly known as Oz's partner Ottilie, about Oz's death at first, but eventually cracks.

* ''ComicBook/RobinSeries'': For a long time, Tim Drake's biggest problem with being ComicBook/{{Robin}} was that he ''absolutely hated'' lying to his father about what he was doing and did not at all like when Bruce made him weigh his loyalty to his father against his loyalty to the mission. The flip side of this coin was that [[ComicBook/{{Batman}} Bruce]] wouldn't allow Tim to tell his in costume girlfriend Spoiler his secret identity and refused to trust her for years no matter what she did to prove herself and how many times Tim vouched for her.

* The entirety of ''Webcomic/TheGreenEyedSniper'' is focused on secrets that the characters keep from each other. Shanti hides her secret life as an assassin from her partner Blitz and her friend Sekhmet. Sekhmet hides from everyone that she's a wanted war criminal. [[spoiler:And Blitz hides from Shanti that she has protected Sekhmet's secret for the past two years.]] None is them is happy with these secrets and there will be consequences...
* Chapter 3 of ''[[Webcomic/{{Morphe}} morphE]]'' focuses on a bet for the captives to call their families. Amical allows them to but sets a [[MagicallyBindingContract fate spell to prevent them from]] [[TongueTied giving anyone clues to their location]]. Billy is told he will lose his career if he does not arrive on set by the weekend, Asia ends up crying in sheer desperation for not being able to disclose information to help her guardian investigate her kidnapping and Tyler has to create an incriminating cover story to stop his family from worrying about him.

* A good part of [[spoiler:Hiro]]'s problems in ''Manga/FruitsBasket'' come from him [[spoiler:having witnessed how Akito threw Rin out of a window]] but being unable to tell others. [[spoiler:When he finally can't resist anymore, Hiro goes to Rin's boyfriend Haru and [[CryCute breaks down crying]] as he explains what happened.]]

* This ends up being deconstructed a bit for ''Series/Supergirl2015'' around its 100th episode. Having spent much of Season 5 blaming herself for Lena's HeelFaceTurn, Mr. Myxlplyx stops by and offers to change Kara's life by having her reveal her big secret to Lena. Unfortunately, in all the instances he shows, this only makes things worse, as somehow or another, even if Kara does tell the truth, it ends up getting her or someone else severely killed. As such, having learned that the outcome would have led to disaster no matter what, she visits Lena and blatantly declares that, whatever mistakes Kara herself might have made, she's fully prepared to stop her former friend.

* In ''WesternAnimation/Frozen2013'', under her parents' instructions, Elsa is to keep her ice powers a secret from everyone including Anna (after she was struck by her ice powers and the trolls alter her memory so she doesn't remember them), fearing that it will not only hurt and kill other people by accident but would also lead to her getting burnt at the stake for accusations of witchcraft. Unfortunately, it led to Elsa living a miserable life where for thirteen years, she is forced to become TheShutIn and drive her sister away to prevent her from knowing of her powers and irreversibly strained what was once a close bond shared between them. The psychological damage done to Elsa is so great that when her powers are exposed, she accidentally plunges her whole kingdom into an EndlessWinter out of sheer panic when trying to run away from them.

* The fact that everyone in ''[[VisualNovel/HigurashiWhenTheyCry Higurashi no Naku Koro ni]]'' is hiding something is one of the main reasons for how badly things always turn out. Because everyone is keeping secrets, [[spoiler:they can't trust each other and work together, and the HatePlague will seize on that distrust and turn one or more of them into a delusional, homicidal serial killer]], which is the ''last'' thing they need with everything else that's going wrong. Interestingly, though, TheyreCalledPersonalIssuesForAReason also comes up and is an important part of at least two arcs.

* ''Anime/{{S|enkiZesshouSymphogear}}ymphogear'': The heroine's need to keep her magical girl deeds secret puts a big strain on her relationship with her best friend.

* The Matt Fraction's 2011 ''[[ComicBook/TheDefenders Defenders]]'' title is purportedly going to put all the Defenders in this position when they stumble across an AncientConspiracy.