Skeletons - epic, sorry.

[powderblue]

I have a big secret I have kept from most people in my life - well, the people I met after the age of 21. This includes my partner, my best friend, my boss etc.

Now I have thought I should maybe tell my partner, I don't like having this secret, but he's going to wonder why I never told him before.

It's really stupid. Everybody who knows me knows I got married at 26, it lasted 3 years and I threw him out because of his drug problem and domestic abuse.

What nobody knows is that this was my second marriage. In a moment of stupidity I got married after a whirlwind romance when I was 19. I soon found out he was a control freak, and also had a violent temper. He went out all the time, making me stay in, took all of my money off me, regularly physically and emotionally abusing me, as well as other things. It was terrifying. I don't like to talk about it, and I'm not going to go into detail. This is why I never tell anybody. I cannot possibly start telling them the details. It was horrible.

Anyway, after a particularly violent drunken outburst from him I managed to get away from him in the middle of the night, two years after we were married. I never went back. I moved to London and let HIM divorce ME because I had no money. I just wanted to get as far away from him as possible.

Nobody knows this, except family and people who knew me at the time.

I'm at the stage where I really want to tell my partner but I'm scared he'll reject me for keeping this secret from him for so long.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Should I tell him or just leave it?

Bloody hell. You poor thing.
It sounds as though you could really do with some councelling to enable yourself to accept, put behind you and move forward from that awful time, which you might have done superficially but inside you still blame yourself. This isn't how it has to be - it was the fault of the b*stard who treated you so poorly, not you.

Lots of love, hope you can find a professional to talk to about this and then you'll be in a better place to approach it with your partner - if you were mine I would feel nothing but pity for you for having been through such stuff.

Sorry for my swearing there, not edited successfully! Was just so shocked at how sad you sound over something that was clearly not your fault.

Counselling as well

What do you have to be ashamed of?

If your current partner is any sort of man he will understand your difficulty in talking about this traumatic period of your life.

Tell him. It sounds like you need to get it off your chest. If he finds out another way, he will be miffed.

And he WILL find out, these secrets have a habit of coming out at the most inopportune moments.

Tell him. It sounds like you could do with his support as much as anything. I would imagine you are a fairly good judge of character due to your past relationship experiences so you must feel ok about your current partner in order to want to tell him.

I would start off with basics about it and then expand a bit, and let him ask you questions if you are ok with this.
good luck, i'm sure it will go better than you think.

Definitely tell him, apart from anything else your family knows, it would be awful if something slipped out and you hadn't told him

You have NOTHING to be ashamed of and EVERYTHING to be proud of. You got yourself out of the situation and moved on with your life.

Sharing something so intimate with your dp can only add to your relationship, you will be moving it to another level of trust. Make sure you explain why you haven't told him and expect to have to let him have some time to process it all.

Good luck hun xxx