Talking About Past Sexual Sins

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MJJean said:
I don’t think telling a potential spouse about past sexual sins should be a requirement, either, but I do think disclosure is prudent. It doesn’t have to be detailed, but in general. It’s not about just forgiveness. I can forgive a potential mate his sexual sins of the past (and I have), but forgiveness doesn’t necessarily mean I can comfortably live with what that potential spouse did. For some people, sexual history is a deal breaker.

I favor telling whatever you’re going to tell sooner rather than later for just that reason. It seems cruel to wait until a relationship is very serious and then say “Oh, by the way, I did XYZ with 10 guys when I was 17.” Some people would just say “Ok, thanks for telling me.” and others would say “Why didn’t you tell me sooner? That is something I just can’t live with and I can’t believe you waited until we were so deeply involved before telling me!”

When my husband and I were dating and getting to really know each other we sat down and had the talk about our sexual pasts. For us it was somewhere around the 2 month mark. We made our disclosures and took some time to think about it and decide if it was something we could live with. In our case, it wasn’t a problem. And having that talk let us know two things. One, we can trust each other to be honest even when honestly is less than flattering. And two, we can talk to each other about anything. Even uncomfortable subjects.
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Couldn’t two people talk about his generally, without disclosure, and say something like, “I’m not a virgin but I want to marry a virgin” (a double standard that should lead to more discussion but this would give me pause) or “I would rather that my future spouse be a virgin but I realize that the right person for me may have a past. What is important to me is that they are chaste now and wholeheartedly believe church teaching on sexuality” or “any STIs or porn addiction is a deal breaker for me.” Something like that. Or actually I would ask questions. I’m always concerned that someone is going to tell the person they are dating what they want to hear rather than the truth. It happened to a friend of mine (only it was on financial matters.)

And I think timing is everything. I don’t think that you and your spouse talked about these things a bad thing. I would want to be able to be honest about everythingto someone I was going to marry and I would want him to be honest and open, as well. However, I would want some idea of how the other person would handle it before any details are discussed. I would want to know deal breakers so I could bow out gracefully. I would want to know if there are any hang-ups before I get too invested in a person.

I wish marital inventory tests that are done for engaged couples could be done for people who are just dating.
 
waanju said:
Well, it hasn’t reached that magnitude yet. I agree that having a conversation about this NOW would be a bit ridiculous and, frankly, dangerously private. However, if we were to begin dating, it would be with a very serious eye towards marriage. That’s one of the reasons we aren’t dating now- we don’t want to date until graduation (and thus the possibilty of marrying) is reasonably close. Even if that does not happen with this particular person, I do feel that it would be good to tell my future husband SOMETHING, because, as was said, it might not be something he can live with. I would expect and hope that it wouldn’t be a “deal breaker”, but to keep this a secret (for my whole life!) would seem a bit… Deceptive almost.
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Personally, I don’t think it should be a forced topic until the very time that an engagement is established. I think you guys might be putting the cart before the horse a bit. Even though we as Catholics go into dating with the understanding that this partner is a marriagable partner… there are many things to learn about someone before presuming the marriage is probable. Do you get what I’m trying to say?

If he asks you about your sexual experience, be tactfully honest with him… but if he hasn’t asked, don’t feel you should volunteer that information. If and when you get engaged… then that aspect will probably naturally come up.

It’s a credit to you that you understand that chastity matters though.
 
Hmm…usually, a very good policy to follow is “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

But the next best might be to tell only as much as you need to in order to get past it.

You told him you did stupid things. Does he have an inkling about what they might be? Because “stupid” things could be drug abuse, shoplifting, car theft, vandalism, arson, joining a cult, fighting…

In other words, I would recommend leaving out as many details as possible, but you might want him to know you don’t have a criminal record, for instance.
 
Well speaking as a man I would like to know a girl’s feelings about what they did in the past. Most girls I know do not in any way regret their “fun years”, because that hurts their self-esteem too much, but to me, such violations of chastity say something about a girl’s track record, and when I look at this, I have to be sure I can reasonably trust this girl, especially when it comes to creating a loving home for children, and a sign of that would be sorrow and regret for what was done, and an amendment in life that such a way of living is wrong and will not be repeated.

One thing I notice from your OP (and I don’t really care, it’s not for me to judge, but if I were your partner I would) is that you seem to blame others for your violations of chastity in the past. Blaming others is what adam and eve did, it’s in our fallen nature, but it’s not an excuse for doing wrong. If I were your partner I would be thinking if she might play this card again should she have an affair or a dalliance with some other man.

Perhaps a discussion on the ten commandments and the Catholic interpretation of them from the catechism is how i would bring this up and go into these events.
UbiCaritas said:
You might also think about this from his perspective. You probably do not want to know that when he was 14, he got, erm, “excited” when a scantily-clad woman walked past him. Nor do you want to know if he looked at porn once or twice as a teenager*, what those pictures looked like, and what the women were doing in them. Way. Too. Much. Information. He’ll feel the same way. 😉

*Though for other reasons you definitely do want to know if he has, or has had in the past, a porn addiction.
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Ok I see, but what I gather from this thread is that a woman doesn’t have to tell anything specific about her sexual past, just that “I haven’t always been chaste”, or even “I was stupid in the past”, but if a man has a “porn addiction” (which AFAIK isn’t a well-defined or recognized term like alcohol addiction) that pretty much means he’s trash, or perhaps “used goods”, the term one might apply to women in the reverse, and isn’t worth dating. Good to know the double standard here, this is usually par for the course in man-woman relations.
 
Dealing with the same questionings here…I do want to know, but more important than that, I think knowing what the person thinks TODAY about what they did in the past is much more useful. We’ve all made mistakes, but it’s important to recognize them and show with our actions that we’re different people.
 
on_the_hill said:

"Hmm…usually, a very good policy to follow is “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

“But the next best might be to tell only as much as you need to in order to get past it.”

It’s not a bad guideline to ask oneself, if they found this out only after marriage, how upset would they be? The more upset they would be, the more necessary it is to share with someone one is seeing seriously (although if they’d be REALLY upset, maybe we shouldn’t be serious with them). Also, the amount of publicity that the failing has enters into it. For instance, if you have a criminal record for prostitution (especially now that there’s an actual industry of internet blackmail involving public records), I think that that is something that a prospective spouse needs to know. However, just saying, “I have been arrested for prostitution,” is probably adequate in that case. In advice columns, I’ve also seen it asked what to do if the OP had a fling with their fiance’s brother or best friend. I would be very uncomfortable with the idea of hiding that sort of huge thing that was known to others that he was close to from a prospective spouse (and with the brother example, I’d be tempted to just tell the person to start fresh with someone else whose brother you haven’t had a fling with). I also think that if a person is recovering from abuse of any kind, that should be disclosed to a prospective spouse.

I don’t think spouses need to share 100% of information (for instance, my husband doesn’t need to hear about my friends’ gynecological troubles), but we do need to have a good idea of who we are marrying.

Estevao said:

“Ok I see, but what I gather from this thread is that a woman doesn’t have to tell anything specific about her sexual past, just that “I haven’t always been chaste”, or even “I was stupid in the past”, but if a man has a “porn addiction” (which AFAIK isn’t a well-defined or recognized term like alcohol addiction) that pretty much means he’s trash, or perhaps “used goods”, the term one might apply to women in the reverse, and isn’t worth dating. Good to know the double standard here, this is usually par for the course in man-woman relations.”

Presumably, the “I haven’t always been chaste” or “I’ve struggled with chastity” is suitable for a man, too, so there isn’t a double standard.

But if there’s some sort of repetitive, compulsive drive to consume pornography for hours a day, that does seem to be qualitatively fairly distinct from having actual in-real-life sexual relationships, and quite predictably very destructive of the marital relationship. That is worth knowing. Consider that while few men will actually bring home floozies under their wives’ noses, many men are bringing women home digitally, and then wondering why their marital sex life has lost its zing. There’s a special evil to pornography, in that so many men believe they can combine it harmlessly with an actual marital relationship, while understanding that they can’t get away with an in-real-life affair.

I can’t help but notice, Estevao, that you’ve got a bit of a chip on your shoulder about women.
 
With regard to sin in general, I think it’s not a terrible thing to mention the sort of stuff that one is struggling with or has struggled with (i.e. “I’ve got a temper,” “I used to pirate huge amounts of movies,” “I can be scrupulous,” “I can be lazy,” “I can spend whole days playing new games”). If one marries, every single vice will become part of the spouse’s life and their future kids’ life.

Sex is somewhat unique, because when dating it’s not that advisable for a woman to tell a man (or vice versa) to mention, “I’m really struggling with chastity right now,” because that could be an occasion of sin to both of them. Likewise, too much mention of previous unchastity might wind up being treated as a menu of options by the new guy.
 
Estevao said:
Ok I see, but what I gather from this thread is that a woman doesn’t have to tell anything specific about her sexual past, just that “I haven’t always been chaste”, or even “I was stupid in the past”, but if a man has a “porn addiction” (which AFAIK isn’t a well-defined or recognized term like alcohol addiction) that pretty much means he’s trash, or perhaps “used goods”, the term one might apply to women in the reverse, and isn’t worth dating. Good to know the double standard here, this is usually par for the course in man-woman relations.
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Actually, pornography addiction is a recognized problem. A good site, and one with some scholarly articles on the subject, is Your Brain On Porn. I particularly direct you to this Cambridge University study.

Nor did I even imply that a man with such an addiction is “trash” or “used goods.” I do think it is vital that someone considering a relationship be aware of such an addiction in a potential partner.

Back when I was dating, if the guy I was dating was an alcoholic or drug addict, I would want to know that. I’d also want to know he was in AA (or the equivalent), had been clean for some time, was actively working his program, and so on. I would not need or want to know every stupid thing he ever did while drunk unless it could specifically affect us–i.e., if he couldn’t drive due to a DUI conviction, for example. If he wasn’t in a program and didn’t have that problem under control, I’d want to know that too, but for a different reason: I would not want to seriously date, much less get engaged or married to, someone currently in that situation.

Same thing with porn. If the guy I was dating was watching porn in every minute of his spare time, I would *not *want to know what particular type of porn it was or what was going on in those videos. The mere fact that he was watching it would tell me a great deal about a) how he thought about women in general, and b) where he was in his spiritual journey–and that would be in a place where I wouldn’t feel comfortable seriously dating him, because I know women whose husbands are addicted to Internet porn, and they are in truly miserable marriages. On the other hand, if he was addicted to porn but was working on a program, hadn’t viewed any in a long time, and was actively avoiding it through various means, I might have been willing to date him with an eye to marriage.

In short, someone a person is seriously dating has the right to know, very generally, about past or present issues pertaining to morality in the person they’re dating if those issues could affect them as a couple. Specifics…not so much.

Your final sentence was just plain nasty, and quite uncalled-for.
 
UbiCaritas said:

“I would not want to know what particular type of porn it was or what was going on in those videos.”

But you might want to know whether or not it was anything illegal.
 
My husband and I did. It meant a lot to us to know this about each other (we both sinned previously with others 😦 ). How would you feel if you got married and THEN found out your spouse wasn’t a virgin prior to marriage? This could be emotionally devastating, especially for a woman (this is not your case obviously, but men can suffer emotionally too.)

If you feel you couldn’t possibly tell him this because you are too scared, then are you two really emotionally secure and intimate enough to marry in the first place? You should definitely tell each other this if you are engaged or talking about marriage.

Also, in my opinion, it is a moral obligation to tell someone you know you will be sexually intimate with (of course when married!) prior to the wedding so they can have time to make a clear decision if they want to “sleep with all those you slept with”. STDs usually show up shortly after the sexual encounter, though sometimes they can take several years or more. AT THE VERY LEAST definitely have STD testing, for your future spouse’s sake, and DEFINITELY tell him if ANYTHING comes up positive. That’s just for the sake of human dignity, let alone morally.
 
Convert_in_99 said:
My husband and I did. It meant a lot to us to know this about each other (we both sinned previously with others 😦 ). How would you feel if you got married and THEN found out your spouse wasn’t a virgin prior to marriage? This could be emotionally devastating, especially for a woman.

If you feel you couldn’t possibly tell her this because you are too scared, then are you two really emotionally secure and intimate enough to marry in the first place? You should definitely tell each other this if you are engaged or talking about marriage.

Also, in my opinion, it is a moral obligation to tell someone you know you will be sexually intimate with (of course when married!) prior to the wedding so they can have time to make a clear decision if they want to “sleep with all those you slept with”. STDs usually show up shortly after the sexual encounter, though sometimes they can take several years or more. AT THE VERY LEAST definitely have STD testing, for your future wife’s sake, and DEFINITELY tell her if ANYTHING comes up positive. That’s just for the sake of human dignity, let alone morally.
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I wasn’t really asking “if”’ I should tell (though some here have made good points that maybe I should not), but rather “how”, “when”, and “what” to tell. I am still a virgin and I do
not have any STDs, so those more practical reasons for telling are not really applicable. Oh and I don’t know if this matters much, but I’m a woman (otherwise, my interest in this young man would mean I’d have far greater problems).

As for those who’ve said that I should never tell him because what’s forgiven is gone and because I did at least reserve the marital act… I understand what you’re saying. However, I think it might matter for this friend to know (eventually, and if it comes to that) more than it would for the majority of guys out there, because he (rightly) takes all of this stuff rather seriously. He’s exceptionally careful (without being scrupulous). For example, we pray the rosary together every evening in our college chapel. Usually we have a group of friends, but occasionally it’s just the two of us. When that happens, he chooses to sit on the pew across the aisle from me rather than next to me (it’s less awkward than it sounds as it’s a very tiny chapel). And, though we’re both naturally very cuddly and affectionate people and hug our other friends often, the only times we’ve ever touched each other are while dancing. He and our other friends have regular conversations about the sacramentality of marriage and we were all reading things like “love and responsibility” together. Some of our very close friends have mentioned things like waiting until they are engaged to kiss. In this context, though I know my friend well and know that he would understand that I feel remorse and would eventually be okay with it, I feel that it would MATTER to him and that, at se point, it would be fair to let him know. Does that make sense?
 
waanju said:

“Does that make sense?”

Yeah. You may want to work out your exact phrasing and timing with your confessor.
 
The amount of information revealed should be dependent on where a couple is in their relationship. As a general rule, only generalities are necessary when first dating, with more specificity as the relationship matures.
 
Xantippe said:
But if there’s some sort of repetitive, compulsive drive to consume pornography for hours a day, that does seem to be qualitatively fairly distinct from having actual in-real-life sexual relationships, and quite predictably very destructive of the marital relationship. That is worth knowing. Consider that while few men will actually bring home floozies under their wives’ noses, many men are bringing women home digitally, and then wondering why their marital sex life has lost its zing. There’s a special evil to pornography, in that so many men believe they can combine it harmlessly with an actual marital relationship, while understanding that they can’t get away with an in-real-life affair.
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The average American high school and college woman these days is in every way a part of the “hook-up culture” involving “sexting” (and no that’s not midday prayer), sending nude shots over the internet and cell phones, having “hook ups” with random men every weekend or partaking in very loose “serial monogamy” involving fornication, and also very close to being just as involved in looking at pornography as men (given the propensity of women to hide these things, especially the last one, I really would add quite a bit to what the statistics say and place a lot more weight in my experiences on a top 20 university campus with tens of thousands of women around 20-24). Given this I really don’t think that the average “unchastity” of an american woman is in any way less destructive for long-lasting marriages than the supposed epidemic of “porn addiction” among men.
Xantippe said:
I can’t help but notice, Estevao, that you’ve got a bit of a chip on your shoulder about women.
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I call things like I see them.
 
In my experience, people are more open in the early days of a relationship than they are later on. Which makes complete sense, because as time progresses you have more of an investment in the relationship and you’re unwilling to hurt it.

Case in point: At one point I was involved with a young woman who volunteered a lot of information and details early in our relationship. As time went on, she began to shut that part of her life, to the point where eventually she denied having said anything at all.

Later on, when a conversation led her to mention her past sins, she started to tell me something she hadn’t told me before. I got really upset about it.

Not because of what she had done, but because she had withheld it from me. Her actual sins were of little meaning to me. I couldn’t have cared less. I felt that her keeping them from me was more hurtful than anything she had done prior to my knowing her.

So I iterate my advice: tell only what you need to tell to get past it. Then clam up and forget it. If you’re worried it will hurt your relationship now, it might make things worse later.
 
Estevao said:

“The average American high school and college woman these days is in every way a part of the “hook-up culture” involving “sexting” (and no that’s not midday prayer), sending nude shots over the internet and cell phones, having “hook ups” with random men every weekend or partaking in very loose “serial monogamy” involving fornication, and also very close to being just as involved in looking at pornography as men (given the propensity of women to hide these things, especially the last one, I really would add quite a bit to what the statistics say and place a lot more weight in my experiences on a top 20 university campus with tens of thousands of women around 20-24).”

You know tens of thousands of women personally? Wow.

“Given this I really don’t think that the average “unchastity” of an american woman is in any way less destructive for long-lasting marriages than the supposed epidemic of “porn addiction” among men.”

Here’s the thing–you’re not looking for the “average” woman.

Also, bear in mind that appearances are deceptive. I was just looking up the data, and here are the current numbers on sexual activity among US teenagers:

“Only 16% of teens have had sex by age 15, compared with one-third of those aged 16, nearly half (48%) of those aged 17, 61% of 18-year-olds and 71% of 19-year-olds.[1] There is little difference by gender in the timing of first sex.”

guttmacher.org/pubs/FB-ATSRH.html

To put that backward, a whole 29% of 19-year-olds have not had sex, 39% of 18-year-olds, and 52% of 17-year-olds. Granted, there’s a lot of everything-but going on, but it’s not actually the universal depravity that you are imagining. And that’s even without thinking about all the people who try the stuff you are mentioning, figure out that it’s not quite as much fun as they were led to believe, and decide to turn over a new leaf. I expect social media creates a sort of distorting funhouse mirror where it looks like everybody is doing XYZ, whereas everybody is not doing XYZ.

How about you start looking for a good woman, instead of thinking so hard about all the bad ones? I imagine that is one of the major bad effects of pornography–warping one’s perception of the world and causing one to believe that what one sees in images is real, whereas it represents a world that does not actually exist. If the real world were just like pornography, no one would bother with pornography.
 
waanju said:
I wasn’t really asking “if”’ I should tell (though some here have made good points that maybe I should not), but rather “how”, “when”, and “what” to tell. I am still a virgin and I do
not have any STDs, so those more practical reasons for telling are not really applicable. Oh and I don’t know if this matters much, but I’m a woman (otherwise, my interest in this young man would mean I’d have far greater problems).

As for those who’ve said that I should never tell him because what’s forgiven is gone and because I did at least reserve the marital act… I understand what you’re saying. However, I think it might matter for this friend to know (eventually, and if it comes to that) more than it would for the majority of guys out there, because he (rightly) takes all of this stuff rather seriously. He’s exceptionally careful (without being scrupulous). For example, we pray the rosary together every evening in our college chapel. Usually we have a group of friends, but occasionally it’s just the two of us. When that happens, he chooses to sit on the pew across the aisle from me rather than next to me (it’s less awkward than it sounds as it’s a very tiny chapel). And, though we’re both naturally very cuddly and affectionate people and hug our other friends often, the only times we’ve ever touched each other are while dancing. He and our other friends have regular conversations about the sacramentality of marriage and we were all reading things like “love and responsibility” together. Some of our very close friends have mentioned things like waiting until they are engaged to kiss. In this context, though I know my friend well and know that he would understand that I feel remorse and would eventually be okay with it, I feel that it would MATTER to him and that, at se point, it would be fair to let him know. Does that make sense?
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Perhaps my advice might be different than the others.

I don’t think there is a rule on how much to tell. Some couples tell and are fine, some couples don’t tell and are fine. Other couples suffer about their partners past, and then years down the road wonder.

But in your particular case, your friend and you are just close friends and discerning in a calm fashion whether to become closer.

He’s your friend…would he want to know and would that change how he feels?.

Maybe find out hypothetically, “how would you feel if your future wife had committed some sins against chastity years ago. Would you want to know”

.
 
There may be an analogy (even if an imperfect one) with other major issues that have to be disclosed, where it’s just as important to talk about what you are doing to deal with your problem and how much distance you’ve put between you and your past.

For instance, at some point in a serious relationship, one has to disclose one’s financial situation. Example: “I owe $20,000 in student loans, but I have a job that pays $40,000 a year, I stick to a budget, and I am paying my loan off $1,000 every month.”

If I heard that, I wouldn’t be thrilled by their debt, but it would be clear that the person was working hard on escaping from debt, and was very serious about it.

Likewise with substance abuse. “I drank heavily in college and my early 20s, but I haven’t had a drink for 5 years and I go to AA.”

The OP’s version might be something like, “I haven’t been involved in an illicit relationship for the past 3 years and I try to go to confession at least monthly.”
 
Estevao said:
The average American high school and college woman these days is in every way a part of the “hook-up culture” . . . in my experiences on a top 20 university campus . . .
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Really.

Huh.

Do you know any real, live women on your top 20 university campus? Talk to them? Spend time with them?

Or do you know this from watching movies and YouTube?

Frankly, your opinion is offensive.
 
Your future spouse will love you for who you are! Telling him, not telling him until it feels right, not telling him unless he asks; they’re all okay. The sooner you show him you’re ready to be more open with him, the sooner you’ll know if he’s willing to do the same with you. The longer you don’t, the longer he doesn’t know.
 
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