The truth irreversibly changes, often destroys, but sometimes, contrary to our expectations, it strengthens relationships. The only question is how to distinguish one from the other and choose what is right for us.
Many years ago, a tragedy happened in Alina’s family: her older brother raped and killed an 8-year-old girl. Alina was then 5 years old, and her parents, in order to protect her daughter from the revenge of the family of the deceased and the stigma of the “killer sister”, sent her to her mother’s childless aunt in another country, where she changed her last name …
Thirty years later, Alina returned to her hometown, where no one remembered her. I bought a house, got a job, got married, had a daughter. “And then my mother-in-law told a story that made my eyes go dark,” recalls 38-year-old Alina. “It turned out that my brother killed my husband’s sister.”
Alina was able to share the burden of the mystery only with a psychotherapist. She doesn’t know if her confession to her relationship with her husband would hurt her, but she decided not to risk it and keep a secret from him for the rest of her life. “In each case, you have to consider the situation individually,” says Marina Travkova, a systemic family psychotherapist, “and decide: how much will the truth destroy my partner? How much does it actually need to be discovered?
Debriefing by composition
What will happen to me if I find out that my partner has cheated on me, will never be able to have children, has a fatal diagnosis? What will happen to my partner if I tell something like that? Sometimes we are silent not because we are afraid for ourselves, but because we do not want to make another suffer.
“Sudden changes can be experienced as a real loss,” agrees Marina Travkova. — The one whom we have studied well, is revealed to us in a new light, becomes someone else. And we next to him are not who we were before. Often, the discovery of a secret leads to the loss of the image of “we”, the loss of the horizon of the future for the couple.
Nevertheless, the answer to the question, to speak or to remain silent, exists.
It is imperative to talk about things that are related to the safety of a partner and the future of your family, children
“In a single space of two there is always a certain watershed: is this a secret about me or about us? continues the psychotherapist. — A personal secret does not directly affect the life of a couple. If one of the partners was a drug addict in the past or he was diagnosed with diabetes and in other similar cases, you can weigh: am I ready to carry this burden alone, can I survive the separation if my companion rejects me? But it is imperative to talk about things that are related to the safety of a partner and the future of your family, children.
Debts and loans, a psychiatric diagnosis, the presence of children from other marriages… It is dishonorable to remain silent about such things, and diseases like HIV are completely punishable, because we are talking about harm to health. If one is barren, and the other dreams of a child, then it would be cruel not to tell the truth.
It is possible that recognition will lead to a favorable result. “It often doesn’t even occur to us that a partner is actually ready to accept, share and endure what seems shameful and difficult to us,” Marina Travkova clarifies. Options are possible. But even if the partner leaves, the fact that we did not want to violate his trust will help us maintain mutual respect.
The dilemma of adultery
With regard to treason, experts do not have a unanimous opinion. Marriage therapists Sue Johnson and Scott Woolley believe that hiding the fact of infidelity undermines intimacy in a couple. And sexologists Esther Perel and Ulrich Klement are sure that you don’t need to talk about everything: if the romance on the side is experienced and completed, deal with your shame and guilt on your own or with the support of a psychologist and do not burden your partner with your problems, they advise.
Often, betrayal or another socially unapproved fact like a financial scam becomes the property of a partner, but … both pretend that nothing happened. “This is a case when we understand: if the secret is revealed, we will not be able to live with it, such a reality is unacceptable for us,” Marina Travkova explains. “But we also know that we are not able to get out of the family system now, where children grow up, life is adjusted. And the partners go to joint self-deception: I don’t catch you, but you don’t come across to me. It’s a silent bid that we’re staying together.»
Albeit in a strange form, but the secret works, holds the family together.
The boundaries of the intimate
When deciding whether to speak or not, it makes sense to listen to your inner voice: Do I like living with a secret? Do I really want to remain silent? “It is our right to hide from a partner some aspects of our past and present, we are free to make any choice,” the existential psychologist Elena Stankovskaya is convinced. — Such a decision may violate our intimacy with a partner, but at the same time more in line with what suits us personally.
Although silence does not always undermine trust. Sometimes, on the contrary, it contributes to the Meeting in a relationship: when I understand that I do not know everything about the other, but I trust him, then I can be with him, having this incomplete knowledge. The main thing is that partners, in principle, do not hide in their «shell» and be able to share warmth, negotiate, hear and support each other.