Bringing Up Your Old Baggage In A New Relationship Isn’t Easy

It’s hard to bring up your baggage when you enter a new relationship because you’re never sure when the right moment is to have the conversation. You don’t want to bring up your past too early and chase them away, but you don’t want to feel like you waited too long to bring up something that has impacted you so much either. You have to take a guess, take a risk, and hope your person is ready to hear what you have to say.

It’s hard to bring up your baggage when you enter a new relationship because you don’t want to think about the past. You want to focus on your future — or on the present and what a good time you’ve been having together. You don’t want to ruin the moment by switching to a serious topic. But at the same time, you don’t want to feel like you’re hiding a piece of yourself either. You don’t want to feel like you have to censor yourself around this person.

It’s hard to bring up your baggage in a new relationship because you never know how the other person is going to react. They might have gone through something similar and will be able to relate to you, able to understand where you’re coming from, able to empathize. Or they might have absolutely nothing in common with what you went through but will still be there to listen to you, to support you, to learn from you. They will prove you can trust them with your past, with your secrets, with yourself. They will make you feel confident you made the right decision in dating them.

However, there’s always a chance it could go the opposite way. Your person could learn what you’ve been through and start looking at you differently. They might become overprotective of you. They might treat you like you’re fragile, like they have to walk on eggshells around you, like they have to protect you from the rest of the world. Or they might judge you over your history, they might assume you’re broken, they might assume you can never be trusted after what you did to survive in the past.

When you bring up your baggage in a new relationship, it’s an exercise in trust. It’s going to give you a hint about whether this person is right for you or whether they’re just another one who is bound to break your heart.

No matter what their reaction is, whether they respond in a way that makes you feel secure in yourself or shitty about yourself, you have to remember you’re strong. Your baggage has shaped you, but it does not define you. If someone else is unable to love you, that’s their loss. You shouldn’t regret being honest with them. You shouldn’t feel like there is something deeply wrong with you. You shouldn’t start tearing yourself apart.

If they cannot handle your baggage, they’re not the perfect person for you, and you deserve the best. You deserve better than them.