She had an affair with a married grandfather before she met me

QMy girlfriend is in her late 20s and I’m in my early 30s. I am happy in our relationship and I think she’s great. However, in her past she had an affair with a 65-year-old married grandfather — she was friends with his family. She told me about this early on in the relationship, and even though initially I thought I was ok with it, as time went on I found I wasn’t. I find it immoral and very hard to accept . . . and totally out of character for her. She was not in a relationship at the time. I think it has come to a head now because we actually bumped into him one night recently when we were out and she told me afterwards who he was.

I found it very hard to understand what she saw in him. Apart from the very obvious age difference, he wasn’t even good-looking, and my stomach turned when I thought of them having sex. What drives an attractive woman to have an affair like that which can only hurt others? She says that it just happened but I find that hard to believe. I had been thinking of getting engaged — we don’t live together for various reasons — but now I’m not so sure.

AI have to admire your girlfriend for telling you about her history with this man. It would have been much easier for her to say nothing, particularly as it was early on in your relationship when she didn’t know how serious it could become.

You are taking the moral high ground here and I have to ask what makes you feel you have the right to. Almost everybody has things in their past that they wish they hadn’t done — that is what maturing is all about. No doubt you also have some things that you are not proud of but that doesn’t give anybody else the right to sit in judgement on you.

We are attracted to people for different reasons and thankfully not all of them have to do with looks. She may have admired the way he thought about things, he may have made her feel very special, he may have made her laugh. Or she may have found it interesting to have somebody more mature in her life. All of this is just speculation on my part as I don’t know either of them. But rather than speculate as to why she had the affair, I wonder why you have to keep looking backwards instead of forward, particularly as you say that her behaviour was totally out of character. It may come down to a question of trust and how much you trust her. Because if you don’t trust her then there is no point in going ahead with the relationship and you may as well call a halt right now. There would certainly be no future for you if you were constantly questioning her movements and she would very quickly become aware of your lack of trust. I also don’t think there is anything to be gained on your part by imagining your girlfriend having sex with him, or indeed anybody else. That is giving yourself unnecessary grief.

Don’t even contemplate getting engaged until you are prepared to put all of this behind you. Your girlfriend certainly has — she was able to tell you about it and also introduce you to him, and she didn’t have to do either of those things. So question yourself as to how you really feel before you ask her that allimportant question. It’s all up to you from here on in.