| A
female
age
36-40,
anonymous
writes: I recently found out my boyfriend has a kid. Not from him, but from a mutual friend who didn't realize that I didn't know. His kid is ~5 yrs old, I am 25 and he is 29. I met him 9 months ago and we dated briefly for a month. I broke up with him because he could only hang out with me at odd hours (like 6 AM), which made me think he had another gf. A month ago, we ran into each other and he apologized that it had been a hectic time for him back then with applications and such. We started dating again and I really like him (I had really liked him a lot at first as well, and I had originally broken up with him because of his sketchiness). When jokingly asking about him being sketchy when we first dated, he said again that it had been a hectic time of his life, but that he has more time now to spend with me. The past month has been some sort of heaven. He's really attractive, smart, sweet, fun and a doer. We have many hobbies in common, and actually make things happen. When I heard through this mutual friend that he had a kid, I could hardly believe it. I confronted him and he told me he had been meaning to tell me -- but that things were going so well, there had been no time to really talk about it. Also, it was hard for him to talk about it. It turns out that he was in an abusive relationship with this girl for 6 years. The pregnancy was unplanned and he didn't want it but she wanted to keep it. His parents are not supportive of it and told him to leave her, but I suppose he felt a natural responsibility for his child and stayed to help take care of it. As a result, he does not receive emotional or mental support from his parents. In addition, he is typically not open about his feelings with anyone and I guess never discussed his abuse at home with anyone, or a professional counselor. When I had first met him 9 months ago, he was still living with her and his kid (lol, that would explain the odd hours of hanging out thing, and why I never saw his place). Anyways, now he's moved out and seems to be doing pretty well. But the fact that he has a child and has to deal with her makes me unsure of how I should proceed with this situation. From my understanding she is emotionally unstable, gets angry a lot and yells at him. As of now she has full custody of the kid and he does not want full custody because he is about to start grad school. I think they take turns on weekends to take care of him. I haven't met her or the kid, but one time he was taking care of the kid whilst on the phone with me and I heard the kid say "daddy" in the background. It was really cute and shocking at the same time... I suppose I am freaking out because if I were to have a kid, I imagined it being with someone who also has not had a kid. Also if I'd like to have a kid in a few years, he will have to run around and help take care of both kids, which kind of scares me. Although I can really see how he would be a wonderful dad. Actually, I suppose he already is a wonderful dad. I do think I'm jumping the gun a bit in imagining things that far ahead, but knowing that he has a child now changed my perspectives. What makes it hard is that I adore him. I like his mom a lot, and met one of his brothers and like him too. I like the way he is so chill about things. What bothers me is that it took so long for me to find out. I am not sure if there is anything else he is not telling me, although I don't think there is. He said he wasn't trying to hide anything, and he knew we had a mutual friend in common and didn't tell her not to tell me. But still, I feel that on numerous occasions he had the opportunity to tell me. I told him to seek professional counseling, and that I needed some time to think about the situation. Thanks for any thoughts and advice.
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female
reader, chigirl  +, writes (6 September 2011):
 Hard one. But you can't deny it, that was deceitful. He was pulling the wool over your eyes. It was disrespectful.
I'm not sure if the situation here is "should I date the dad of a 5 year old", but rather "should I date a man who deceived me and was dishonest with me?"
He wasn't honest about himself. Maybe he didn't deny having a kid, but come on. When you have a kid that's sort of a big deal that needs to be mentioned. It's nothing small that you can wait with telling until you're 6 months into a relationship. It's something you lay on the table from the go. He chose not to. He chose to fool you. He chose to pretend to be someone else, he chose to not tell you the truth, and he also directly lied when he didn't give you the honest reason for why he couldn't see you often the first time you dated.
The question isn't "can I date the father of a 5 year old", the question is "can I date a man who pulled the wool over my eyes and lied to me?".
No, you can't. I get that you care about him, and it's a pity that he threw away what could potentially be a great relationship, but that is HIS loss. Next woman he meets, hopefully he will have learned to be honest with her. If you continue with him now, after his deceiving you, then you are in effect showing him that this behaviour is OK.
If you value honesty and open communication in a relationship then break it off with him. He didn't respect you enough to be honest with you, and feeds you BS about how "the time was never right".
A
female
reader, VSAddict  +, writes (6 September 2011):
 It's been months and you're just now finding out about this? There really is no excuse for this one. I'm sure he had plenty of opportunities and if he thought he was going to be able to hide a child, he's clearly mistaken. No matter what he may have been going through, it wasn't bad enough that he needed to keep this secret. Unless you think you can deal with this and possible secrets in the future, I would seriously consider leaving.
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A
female
reader, Honeypie + ♥, writes (6 September 2011):
 Lying about having a kid (to me) is a MAJOR red flag. I would really make me wonder what else he's hiding lying about.
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