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You pass an idle Sunday afternoon in the bookstore with your new love, the person you think might be "the one" when suddenly someone you think is much better looking than you walks up to your lover and says hello. They speak a few words, never taking eyes off one another, and then the interlude is over, and you were not even introduced. "Who was that?" you ask with all the nonchalance you can muster, as if the answer couldn't possible matter. If you were to ask the question with the honest emotion you feel, it would be more of a demand than a question: WHO was that.

The conversation continues throughout the day as you wheedle and cajole, trying to get the intimate details of their old relationship. After all, honesty is important in a relationship. Your lover finally concedes to answer a few questions, certain that with a bit of honesty your curiosity will be doused and the two of you can move on.

Think about it before you ask to share information that will change your relationship forever. If we are mature adults, we have grown and changed over the years, and with any luck, we will continue to do so. Our values change, our understanding of right and wrong evolves, and the people we had in relationships back then are not the ones we would choose for ourselves today.

Once your boyfriend or girlfriend confesses a past, sordid or not, they are no longer the same person in your eyes. You disagree; you pledge that the relationship will go on as before, you swear it. But take into account the other person, the one who left the past behind, or so he or she thought. When we ask our partners to confess their past, we ask them to put the old clothes back on again. We force them to look us in the face which now mirrors back to them the person they used to be. Now when they look at us, they fear we are looking at the old version of them, not the new and improved.

Be prepared when you ask to know a person's past. When you uncover a piece of the old hidden character, it will forever change the person in front of you. Maybe your feelings remain unchanged, but the way your lover feels in your eyes is different. If we don't like how we think people see us, we find new people.

Each of us is a different person today than we were 10 years ago. Will you hold someone accountable to who they used to be or take them as they are today? Will you make them put on the old coat and return to the old state of mind? Do you want that person or would you rather keep the one you have.

Learn more about this author, Sandra Douglas.
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