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For some, being frank about the good, bad, and ugly from early on is essential to building a relationship. To some, certain things are extremely personal and they may feel they never need to be disclosed to a partner.
Both partners need to be on the same page in regard to their expectations on disclosure, and, essentially, a "don't ask, don't tell" approach. Different expectations in regard to disclosure can be fatal to relationships.
I think it is unfair to be with someone who has a very serious conflict of basic morality to your own beliefs. If you have incompatible core values, then either one person will try to change the other and it will be a bad thing, or you will likely come apart at the seams somewhere down the line.
Further, the question is when to tell a potential partner about flaws or embarrassing things you're not proud of about yourself. So be be serious, if you're not embarrassed or feeling "not proud of yourself" about some part of your past, then it doesn't fit the question posed here. Upthread I commented on a bizarre situation, but a woman can have an abortion and feel OK about it.
Yeah, to speak to the original question...it depends?
If it was some small humiliation that doesn't matter, I might have forgotten about it altogether. If some subject of conversation comes up and there is a relevant confession of having done something I'm not proud of, I might share my input. My love does not know every last detail, anecdote, and story of my entire life history, and that doesn't always mean I'm deliberately hiding things...sometimes it just isn't important and it hasn't come up.
The only time I think that disclosure becomes ethically important, is if it's something that could affect your partner's ability to give informed consent to the relationship, in other words, there are things that would matter to most people and should be disclaimered early, things that you find out your date has serious problems with that you should disclose when you discover this, and things that just don't matter at all.
Regardless, really, of how you feel about it.
- If it's part of WHO you consistently are, don't mislead people about it up front.
- If you find out it's going to be a problem, don't hide it. (Such as your partner is a recently recovered addict or alcoholic and you regularly partake in the substance they're trying to stay clean of, for instance.)
- If it's some part of your distant past that you are very sure will never resurface to cause issues, then maybe don't need to talk about it at all.
- If it's something someone should know before, say, living with you, then you should probably tell them before sex happens so they can choose not to risk getting attached. A good example would be some kind of chronic illness that sometimes debilitates you, or they would need to provide support to you through.
- If they state some sort of strongly held belief that would condemn you for something you have done or been, and if they find out, they'll judge you harshly...I wouldn't tell them, I'd just stop dating them. Good chance they'll find out one day, and I couldn't be happy with someone who would turn on me or hate me for some real part of who I am.
I don't see why it would be a topic of discussion unless it could potentially affect the other person in some form.
This can relate to practically any past behavior you might disclose, though.
I have an ex, who, I found out many years into a long-term relationship, had drug use very far in his past, over a decade before I knew him, which he had never disclosed.
It did affect me, because it shed some light on alarming behavior in the present, answered some questions I'D never been able to find any good answers for, and the nondisclosure spoke to an increasing degree of secretiveness and emotional withholding that, in a d of themselves, ultimately directly contributed to the demise of the relationship. There were lots of other things that were not disclosed as well, and the past drug issue merely served as the canary in the coalmine, so to speak, when it came to burying secrets.
Behavior often speaks to a pattern.
In that particular case, I'm sure he was convinced that it was not going to be roasted behavior. For my part, I suppose the argument would have been that even if HE was sure there would be no relapse, I still deserved to know of the history and make my own decision on whether or not to pursue a further relationship, with that knowledge.
But, honestly, for me, the bigger deal was not if a relapse was looming, it was that there was a big wall of, "Well, what OTHER secrets does he have that contribute to dysfunction?" between us. Especially because there were indications of a potential variety of other secrets.
Last edited by TabulaRasa; 11-13-2017 at 02:17 PM..
Yeah, to speak to the original question...it depends?
If it was some small humiliation that doesn't matter, I might have forgotten about it altogether. If some subject of conversation comes up and there is a relevant confession of having done something I'm not proud of, I might share my input. My love does not know every last detail, anecdote, and story of my entire life history, and that doesn't always mean I'm deliberately hiding things...sometimes it just isn't important and it hasn't come up.
Yes, stuff that just hasn't happened to have come up is a different thing than stuff that's being deliberately concealed, and is certainly different than purposefully misleading someone, if there is some reason they would likely not choose to continue a relationship if they knew.
In some cases, the past is to be learned from, then left in the past. If, for example, I had a discrete abortion in college, and then went on to date a few people and get married 10 years later, I would probably keep the abortion to myself. It’s really nobody’s business. But if my husband came out and asked me, I wouldn’t lie to him.
The problem is, if someone has done, or is still doing illegal things, or things that affect his present life, he will want to keep it secret for fear of losing the woman he wants. He will want to get married to her before she finds out.
The best defense is to spend a long time getting to know a man, his friends, and his family. If possible, get a note from any ex wife, explaining what is wrong with him.
Ok, judgey mcjudgerson here, but leaving a trail of aborted fetuses, dead husbands, and pregnancy during an affair seems a tad more than "messy"
Doesn't it?
Only one dead husband, really. Massive heart attack. The other died as an ex, but he was already pretty much terminal when they got divorced. Cirrhosis.
She lives a quiet, peaceful life these days.
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. 6 are about 5 too many.
