Matthew Hussey explains how to answer the question that scares most people in new relationships: what to say when your partner asks about your exes or opposite-sex friends. He offers a communication strategy to address jealousy and build trust instead of triggering insecurity.
So there's a situation that I think ruins a lot of early new romantic relationships. It starts like this. One person brings up that they have this friend. If it's a, a, a woman early on in the relationship, she'll be like, oh, yeah, one of my, one of my guy friends. blah, blah, blah. And one of the immediate things that goes through his head is, well, who is this guy friend? And have you hooked up? Now, this happens the other way, too. Of course, he'll get a message is from Jane. And you go, did you. So is that who is Jane? Is she someone that you've slept with before or what's. What's going on? Is she just a friend? Have you always just been friends? We have this sort of initial insecurity and territorial nature that immediately makes us. question the opposite sex. Now, this would be ridiculous if we weren't right a lot of the time. Because of course, a lot of the time we are right. We question someone, we go, well, have you ever been with that person? And we'll find out, oh, maybe there was a little bit of history there. This actually came up recently with a friend of mine. She said to me, oh, this guy that I'm dating and I really like, he got really frustrated because I ended up telling a story and indirectly it referenced a guy that I knew a few months ago. and I said, you know, it's this friend of mine, and he said, well, have you hooked up with him? And she said, yes. Now, she said, I was just being honest, and I don't like lying, so I just said yes. But ever since then, he's had this massive problem with it, so much so that, by the way, this guy is from Chicago. He now has an issue with Chicago. Like, you know, when that happens, and you could be sitting here listening to this episode and thinking that's absurd, but I know, You've done this. I know that you've had someone that you're jealous of, that your partner has slept with or done something with, and they're in another city and you developed this irrational hatred for that city or that place. It could even be a restaurant. It could be a part of town. It could be, in some cases, it's a country. Like you've dated someone from a country and then you just completely fell out of bed with that country afterwards. You said, that's it, I'm never going there again. Screw Argentina. Now, how do you get around this situation? Because it's tricky. You don't want to get into the territory of always lying to your partner and saying, no, nothing happened there. Now, the first thing is, do not use his language. The mistake my friend made is when he said, did you hook up with him? She said, yes. In other words, all he now hears is, I hooked up with him. Use your own language instead. For example, you say, Look, I think it wasn't hooking up. We saw each other for a little while. We saw each other for a couple of months. Okay? Now, they may be the same thing, but you're using your language instead of his. A guy will always use the most self-harming language he can. So instead, soften the language in your own way. Put it in your terms. Second, when you talk about it, be bored of it. Don't say, oh, this guy, don't look, he was an idiot. I can't stand him. Don't do not start dissing the guy from the past or talking badly about him. All it shows is how much you care, how much that guy was able to hurt you and still is in your head right now. Be bored about it. Be like, look, yeah, you know, we saw each other for a little bit. It's so done. So done. I'm so over it. And truthfully, I don't even want to be talking about it. It bores me. So be bored of it. Use your own language and be a little sensitive. In other words, you can say to him, look, truthfully, I'm with you now. and I care a ton about you and you're my only interest and I don't care about anyone I've been with in the past. That's not my interest right now. That's boring to me. You're interesting to me because you're who's in my life right now and I want to put all of my attention on you. And always remember, you know, kindness goes a long way. When the situation is reversed, you want his sensitivity as well. If you're insecure, if you're jealous, if you're going through something, you also want his kindness as well. So be kind.
