My partner just divulged some of his past to me 3 weeks before we marry

[Dreamingfever]

First of all, I’m going to be mentioning suicide so please don’t read if that will upset you in anyway.
My partner and I have been together for 4 years, we are both in our 50s so won’t have any children together. I have a DS from my first marriage, he has a DD from his first marriage, both now early 20s.

DPs first wife passed away 6 years ago, they’d been split for about 7 years before that and I’ve never pried as to the details of his first wife’s death, not my place nor business.
He didn’t live in the UK for most of his adult life, he’s a dual national so spent most of his life in Spain, his mother is Spanish. His first wife was French.
He had told me that once they split his first wife took his daughter to France, he spent most of the holidays with his daughter (who was 12 by the time they split), would take weekends to visit her. I’ve always thought I couldn’t have lived in a different country to my DS but I wasn’t there, I don’t know what the relationship between him and his first wife was like etc. He seems to have a very positive relationship with his daughter, she lives abroad still (different country from either she was raised in) but he calls her often, visits often and we just flew out to spend Christmas with her.

Tonight he seemed upset, I asked why and he told me it was the anniversary of his first wife’s death. I asked if he wanted to talk about it and he said actually he’d like to tell me about it before we marry.

He told me that his first wife was amazing for many years but when her own parents passed she struggled with her mental health, when they split she asked to take her daughter to her parents home she’d recently inherited and raise her there. He admitted he had been hesitant about her abilities to raise their daughter but he worked long hours, and felt a daughter needed her mother, so agreed.
He then told me that over the years he knew her mother was unwell, an alcoholic he claimed was what he knew. He thought about asking to have his daughter back, reporting it to someone, but feared it would only make things worse. He said he told his daughter she could move home anytime but she never wanted to.
His daughter then moved to a different city for university. Then 6 years ago her mother, his first wife, took her own life, overdose alcohol and prescription drugs.
He arranged everything as his first wife had no living family she was close to, any only child, both parents passed, and her daughter just 19.
He also sold the property and sorted out everything inheritance related for his daughter.

He then said during a deep chat over some wine with his daughter he learned his first wife had been an alcoholic for many years, she never told him as she was scared she’d be separated from her mother. She was honest about her teen years being difficult, often coming home to her mum passed out, making her own meals, taking the metro to school and back unsure of her mothers well being etc.

He admitted he has felt immense guilt since and always finds the anniversary a hard day.

Now I’m conflicted, I feel awful for him. But I worked with young adults and teens for many years and I often felt the excuse of “no one else knew” was a weak one, I’ve always felt it shouldn’t be a child’s responsibility to know when an adult needs help or they need help but someone should be looking out for them, I feel he failed to do this, he knew she was an alcoholic and failed to both protect his daughter and get help for her mother.

This clouds my judgement of him, I feel I can no longer see him as a the devoted father, kind man, and loving partner I believed he was.

AIBU to feel like this? Is it the past, something to be moved on from? Or an indicator that he may not be the kind of man I’ve been made to believe he is?

Hi OP. I think I’d feel the same as you. You sound very emotionally intelligent. None of this would sit easily with me, and the phrase ‘too little, too late’ comes to mind with how he handled everything.
Maybe it’s just me, but I also find it surprising that this has all come up so late in the day. To my mind, it would be natural for a couple to talk about how she had died.
I’m very open though, so maybe just me!

That is very tragic OP.

I'm afraid I'm failing to see why you now think less of your partner.
If his ex wife was an alcoholic he couldn't " get help" for her. That's not how alcoholism works: the alcoholic needs to want to change their life themselves.
And he offered his dd the chance to leave her mother and make her home with him if she ever wanted to do that.

I think you are being unfair on him..

I think that’s an over simplistic take. Yes you can’t force someone to receive help, but it shouldn’t have been on his child to decide what was best for her. Children can often feel a sense of duty to their ill parent. Asking a child to effectively blow up their own life isn’t reasonable, as the adult and parent you have to step in and do what is right by them, his daughter should never have been in position where she had to choose between her own well being and looking after her mother, it was her fathers job to prevent that.

An interesting difference of opinion!
I’d agree with you if there hadn’t been a young girl in the mix. The ‘come and live with me if you want’ isn’t particularly helpful to a kid. Sometimes they need the adult to take charge, but he sounds pretty passive. And the fact that she chose to be with her mother doesn’t reflect particularly well either.

If they were living in a different country to your DP, how would he know how bad things were? It wasn't like he could pop in and see them after work.
Perhaps he should have made his DD come and live with him, but I doubt he'd have a good relationship with her now if he'd made her leave her mum when she didn't want to.

So him demanding she live with him would be wrong with some people on here also, there is nothing he could have done that everyone would agree with

so up to you what you do now

So don’t choose to live in another country then!

He told me he knew she was unwell and has issues with drinking. He visited monthly so was able to get a glimpse. He admits he didn’t know the extent and I sympathise that in a different country there may have been no way he could.
However I feel leaving a child with someone you know is unwell and his drinking issues is inappropriate. This also returns to the wider question of allowing his daughter to move countries at all.

He didn't chose to live in another country. His wife chose to move back to her own country.

I think the main issue here is how has none of this come to light until 3 weeks before you’re meant to be getting married? How much did you know before this about the circumstances of his wife’s death? Had you never spoken about your previous relationships? That’s what seems most like a massive red flag to me.

He tells you all this now when it might feel too late to change your mind - but you can’t say you didn’t go into marriage with your eyes open. I’d wonder if he was worried his daughter might say something to you about what their relationship is really like.

We spoke about the relationships but as his wife died 7 years after the split the details of her death weren’t mentioned. I didn’t really know how involved he was when she died as they had been split for so long and obviously I had no idea about her family set up.

Still, that’s quite a big deal not to bother mentioning!

I mean, I don’t know how it doesn’t come up that the mother of your only child, who’d been sole resident parent, was a deeply troubled alcoholic who took her own life.

It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks, if this makes you feel very differently about him, but as an outsider with limited knowledge of the people and the situation, I don't think this would be enough to prevent me from marrying someone. If his daughter has forgiven him for any mistakes or poor judgement in relation to her upbringing, I think I would, too. The fact that you won't be having children together would make this an easier decision for me, in your shoes.

It is complicated. In the end, he did what was easiest for himself and that is why he feels guilt/heavy and you feel unease. It’s a shame he blindsided you with this so close to the wedding, but ultimately we are all flawed and he is probably neither a the worst nor the best of what you think of him. We are all capable of many conflicting things and we can grow over time. So i don’t think you are being unreasonable at all to feel as you do.

It sounds to me like he felt he was in a “damned if I do, damned if I don’t” situation with no good solutions. I think you’re being unreasonable to conclude that his failure to deal with a very difficult situation in the correct way means that he’s not a good person and never has been.

You said that your partner has a very positive relationship with his dd.

And from what you have said about their history he made quite an effort to be involved in her life - spending the holidays and weekends with her despite them living in different countries.

I just dont understand why you seem determined to think badly of him.

It does sound like he was overly passive and allowed his daughter to live in a bad situation - out of what, convenience? If she had said, actually, I want to live with you, would he have genuinely stepped up? These are questions to ask.

OTOH you won't be having more children together. But does it point to his personality and priorities. Who knows.

He’s a shit father in my eyes sorry. He didn’t protect his daughter. So what if him taking the daughter back caused issues for the wife. That might have been the wake up call she needed to get help and sort her life out. I also don’t agree that you’ve not had this chat sooner, it’s a massive significant life event for him and his daughter and needed to be spoken out. I personally wouldn’t marry him tbh

I'll never understand a parent who allows their child to be taken away from them. He didn't stop his wife from moving to where her parents were. That was the moment I would lose all respect. Once his daughter was established elsewhere it would become very difficult for him to be able to intervene. But not impossible but difficult. He chose the easiest path for him at the cost of his daughter's happiness. So a lot of this is on him and the choices he made.

You have posted about this before as I recognise the details so it's not been so late in the day as three weeks before you marry.

You'll need to choose if you can marry him and carry on as before when you didn't know the details. Sweep it under the carpet as they say or whether you actually decide he doesn't have that strength of character you expect in a partner and break up. This close to a wedding then last is hardest to do but probably the 'right' decision.

Daughter of an alcoholic here.

its a family disease which thrives in secrecy. It’s not as simple as getting them help. Nor would have removing the daughter been simple either.

if he has a close relationship with his daughter now, then they have clearly worked it out between them. It’s not for you to judge. I’d feel differently if they had a strained relationship. But it doesn’t sound like they do.

it’s a very difficult situation dealing with an alcoholic. A lot of the time you are in too deep before you even realise how bad things are.

I don’t think it’s your place to judge.

A lot of posters are just assuming that it would be easy for your DH to stop his wife moving away and to simply uplift his DD from her home. This causes conflict itself and often (especially with preteens) is not understood by children to be in their best interests and the ‘saving’ parent becomes the villain in the story.

I wouldn’t make any definitive decisions yet op. Postpone the wedding arrangements if you don’t want to feel pressured in to making a decision too quickly.

I think you are within your rights to ask him more questions about this. Most importantly I would ask him why he had left it so long to tell you? It could be because he was afraid you would think much less of him if he did.

Tbh I think you are being a bit harsh on him as the situation he found himself in was very challenging and complex. Alcoholics can lie a lot and behave very duplicitously. And his first wife needs to bear some responsibility too. Visiting your child in another country once a month d holidays is a lot more than a lot of divorced fathers do. Also, is it your place to judge him if he and his dd have a good relationship now?

Maybe he thought his wife would get worse and suffer more with her mh if he had not agreed to her moving back to her late parents’ country?

Did his late wife work? Or did her alcoholicism affect her career? Was he forced to work long hours to support them all? It takes a lot of money to run two homes.

And he has just revealed that he feels immense guilt over how he let his dd down hasn’t he? So it’s not as if he felt his behaviour was satisfactory.

Also relevant is how does he treat you in the here and now? Does he step up when things get difficult? Any red flags that he is uncaring?

I do understand where you’re coming from OP in terms of thinking he should have been more proactive in terms of child safeguarding re: his daughter in this situation, it seems he actually feels the same way, hence the guilt, and that he has taken responsibility and learned from this.

It was obviously a tough situation at the time with potential downsides for him, his ex-wife and his daughter whatever he did. And as a pp said, in terms of getting his ex-wife help with her alcoholism, unfortunately only she could make the decision to access help, nobody could do that for her so I don’t think he should be held responsible for her failure to get help with this.

I do think that the fact that he was living in a different country (not through his own choice) is a mitigating factor when it comes to the daughter, and it’s encouraging that he has maintained a positive relationship with his young adult daughter despite that, and has helped her through all the death-related admin etc. I think it’s easy to look at a situation in hindsight from the outside of it with all the information available as to how a decision has worked out and feel that you would not have made the same decisions in such a situation. But at the time it may not have been so clear to him and it’s perhaps a little unfair to judge the situation in retrospect like this.

I agree it would have been good to know all this long before now so that you have time to process how you feel about it. However I don’t think it means he is not the person you had thought him to be in general, but he is flawed like the rest of us human beings and has made some mistakes in life which he regrets. Overall it sounds like he has learned from his mistakes and has deep regret for what happened in the past, and has a good relationship with his daughter now.

In your shoes if your relationship is good otherwise and you feel he is generally a good kind caring partner and father then I would not personally consider this to be an unforgiveable error of judgement, or completely damning of his character forever, people do make mistakes and learn from them. Perhaps this was a factor in shaping him into the man he is today who you love. But ultimately it is your life and you need to decide how you feel about this.

It reads to me like you are looking for an out - do you not want to marry him and are latching on to this as a way to justify the fact that the wedding is in three weeks and you’ve realised you don’t want to go ahead with it?