By Anna Potter
Question: I just found out (via some totally sane internet stalking) that my boyfriend used to have a thing with a guy. We've only been dating a few weeks. Should I be concerned? Should he have told me? How do I bring this up?
Ahh, Google. Where would our dating lives be without this vital online vetting tool? For starters, we'd probably be a little less neurotic about our partners' past lives. For future reference, let this be a lesson to you that searching a potential lover's name, while useful for weeding out serial killers and sociopaths, may not be in the best interest of the relationship at hand.
That being said, you've already clicked the search button and found out that your dude used to date a dude. The first thing to do here is to explore your own feelings about this. Does it freak you out, and if so, does it freak you out enough that, even if you brought it up to him, you won't be able to date him knowing that he's also into guys? If this is the case, it might be time to call it a day with him. I'd encourage you to ask yourself whether and why you're concerned about it. What about him being intimate with a man makes you flinch?
People of our generation tend to be a little more fluid when it comes to sexuality. Asking a person of generations X, Y or Z to define his or her sexual orientation can result in a range of responses; it's not just about gay or straight anymore. Lots of us have been with people of our own or other genders, and at the end of the day we're looking at our partner for who they are, rather than seeing their gender as something that defines our attraction.
You have a couple of options if you do want to bring this up with him. If you want to be completely honest, you can tell him that you Googled him and found this out. After all, we're all guilty of online investigations, and if there's something on the Internet about his former relationships, it's practically public information, so he's probably aware that it's out there.
If you want to be a little more stealth, you could say something like "Wow, my friend Jenny has always dated other women, and she told me yesterday that she met this guy who she's really into. Isn't that interesting?" If he doesn't take the bait, let it lie. At the end of the day, the past is the past, and since most of us don't want to have to talk about our past relationships with our current partners, let him have his history and move forward with this budding relationship with you.
