Many years ago, I had been with my boyfriend for 6 months. We had already been rather serious for some time. One day I had gone through a few of his things in his room (I didn’t think it was a huge deal, being that I believed that we didn’t keep anything from eachother) and when he got home, I told him that I looked through his room a bit. He became VERY angry and I couldn’t understand why he was THAT angry, especially when I told him right away about my nosiness. A few hours later, he sat me down and told me why he got so upset…he told me that he had a 2 year old son…he was worried that when I looked through his stuff, I would’ve found the court documents on his son. The real kicker is that before he told me, a few months prior I actually met his son…but he was introduced as a ‘friend of the family’s son’ that my boyfriends mom was babysitting.

I’m not done.

1 year into our relationship…
My boyfriend was driving us back home and I was angry about something that made me say, “If I ever found out something was being kept from me, then, I’m done!” Well…
My boyfriends pipes up and admits…”You know Maria?” (His girlfriend right before me)…I said, “yeah…” He says, “We had a baby together and we gave her up for adoption.”
WHAT?! AGAIN?!
Kicker on this one…she had the baby a couple months into our relationship and I had no clue. He also admitted he didn’t plan on telling me about it either. Oh yeah, and all my friends knew about it, except me. Ugh.

So again, it is VERY important that you tell people about your children up front. Those two incidents left me with a big scar. But you know what? I stayed with him…

So I have read all the responses and like Kelly I do feel really guilty about not telling the guy I have only been chatting to via email and phone calls about my little Princess who is almost 5 years old. I have been a single mum for the last 3 years and have not been in a relationship. (super deprived)

My daughter is the most important thing to me and my reasoning for not telling this guy just yet, is because I have not met him yet?

Should I tell him over the phone, or wait until we do meet, which will only be after a month, due to work schedules and studies… should I see if there is any chemistry when we meet and then the day after break the news to him that I am a fully fledged single mum?

Please help me?

As for how late is too late…after sex would be too late. If it’s just been dinner dates thus far, she may simply be wanting to protect her child, since the guy is still a largely unknown factor. There are a lot of creepy crazies out there, of BOTH genders.

My first thought when I read the title of the post, previous to reading the actual content, was that if someone is not willing to be upfront about the fact that they have children, perhaps they have problems greater than trying to find a partner in life.

I am a single Mum. My kid is 6 years old. He’s been spending a lot more time with his Dad lately, but despite this he is still my life. Even when I’m meeting people face-to-face who aren’t potential dates, it takes a very short time for the topic of conversation to come around to my boy.

I once heard a rather true thing said about having kids as someone who is dating: they’re great bullshit filters. Basically, if a possible future partner runs a mile when he or she hears about a child in the equation, then perhaps he or she is not the type you want to consider as your future partner. They might be the type that’s better of as just a friend.