The anguish of a guilty mind

“Seriously, if he finds out that I dated his brother some years back, I’m finished,” are the words of a woman traumatised by her past. They say the truth will set you free, and in some cases it does, literally!A cousin of mine found herself ‘boyfriendless’ when she dared to tell him about a little fling she had with a close pal of his back in their campus days. Okay, for sure it happened a long time ago and she probably thought it made for great conversation as they were drunk, otherwise she never would have said a word. The guy however didn’t care if it happened a century ago. These were skeletons he simply wished had stayed neatly buried in the closet he never opened! The winner was when he asked her why he was only hearing about it. He was mad that she did what she did, and also mad that she told him about it, but then he wanted to know why she had never mentioned it to him before? I’m having a hard time figuring out how that works.“I would never tell my man anything I suspect will piss him off,” said a close friend of mine. “Men are the strangest things, they ask you to be honest with them yet when you are, they don’t hesitate to dump you. Annoying even is that some men take burying the past to another level and know how to hide an entire family! I have heard of women who have been with guys for years only to find out he has grown kids like decades later!”Normally, when a relationship is new, some women feel the need to be as honest with their men as possible – starting afresh. But like we all know, the past always has a way of catching up, threatening the current relationship till one is forced to surrender. So how do you go about that?“You don’t! I would die before I ratted myself out to a man, especially about something that happened before I met him. If he wants to find out, that’s up to him,” insisted my friend, who by the way has mastered the art of defending herself, I suspect she studied law!To be honest, confession DOES sometimes cause more problems than it solves. It changes the way your partner sees you and creates suspicion, hostility and resentment. And I can tell you now, once there is doubt in a relationship, going back to normal is pretty much the hardest thing. According to my ever cautious friend, if a partner is not going to find out what happened, and if the problem is not going to reoccur, it may be best to keep things quiet and learn to deal with your feelings of guilt in a different manner. While feelings of guilt can be overwhelming, they are also fleeting. Think long and hard about it because at the end of the day, the decision is yours. Your disclosure might make you stronger or tear you apart.