‘A friend told me that the guy I’m seeing physically abused his ex – I don’t know what to do’ – Lalala Letmeexplain

In Lalalaletmeexplain's hit column, readers ask for her expert advice on their own love, sex and relationship problems.

With over 200k Instagram followers, Lala is the anonymous voice helping womankind through every bump in the road. An established sex, dating and relationship educator, she’s had her fair share of relationship drama and shares her wisdom on social media to a loyal army of followers. Every week thousands turn to her to answer their questions (no matter how embarrassing), and her funny, frank approach to love and relationships has made her the ultimate feel-good guru.

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Dear Lala,

I’ve been seeing this guy for about two and a half weeks and it seems to be going well. He’s really nice and we get on. He’s been completely single for two and a half years and he’s in therapy. He told me this week about an incident that had previously happened with his ex. He self-harmed and then had to go to the hospital. Following that he completely stopped dating and started therapy. This did worry me a little, but I talked it over with friends and we all agreed that everyone has low points in our mental health and the fact that he’s in therapy is a real positive.

He is a colleague of a good friend of mine and she just found out that we are seeing each other and has now told me some more. She said that he has been physically abusive to his ex, has told lies and that the female staff at their job refuse to work with him. She said that she has a soft spot for him and believes he is a nice guy, but she wanted to warn me about his history. This has been the first red flag, although I have been a bit uneasy at times in the last two and a half weeks because he’s been quite full on and telling all his friends about me. Obviously, these are red flags but not huge ones, and he’s never done anything to me. Do I carry on and see how it goes?

Lala says…

I can see why you’re questioning this. You’ve known him for a short time and in that time, you’ve had a good experience with him. He’s been kind to you and he’s also being super keen, he’s reciprocating your energy and seems to want more. That is quite rare in modern day dating. It is far more common to come across people who are confused and blowing hot and cold, so meeting one who is enthusiastic about you feels lovely, and it doesn’t feel like something that you should throw away lightly. It’s understandable that you would want to focus on the positives and take him for how you’ve experienced him rather than being influenced by hearsay or unclear rumours.

But when the things you’re hearing on the grapevine are that he assaulted his ex, and that his female colleagues refuse to work with him and therefore the risks to your personal safety are potentially high, then you need to take off the rose-tinted glasses and think very very carefully about why on earth you’d be willing to run that risk.

You’ve been romantically involved with him for just over 14 days, of course it’s going well. It is an extremely short amount of time, definitely short enough for both of you to still be on your best behaviour. You don’t know him anywhere near well enough to make any kind of clear judgement of him. The people who work with him do though. It would be interesting to know how they found out about what happened with his ex and more about the nature of what his female colleagues are concerned about. But this is such a huge red flag that it kind of doesn’t matter what the details are behind it. The fact that his female co-workers refuse to work with him is massive.

The need for you to run is solidified by the fact that you have felt uneasy about how fast he’s been moving in the past fortnight, it does sound like it could be a sign of love bombing. Two weeks is nothing, literally a matter of days. Your uneasiness is something to pay attention to, it’s your intuition telling you that it’s not right. It’s interesting that he has just disclosed to you that he self-harmed and ended up in therapy, when the story from his workplace is that he harmed his ex and then went to therapy. Either way, it’s great that he’s in therapy, but therapy isn’t magic. Getting therapy doesn’t mean anything at all. It is not a sign that he’s changed or healed. He may have just learnt new techniques for manipulation or control.

You could do a Clare’s Law request by contacting your local police to request information under the domestic violence disclosure scheme to find out more about his history. However, as you don’t reside in the UK this may not be available where you live. And it doesn’t make that much difference because even if a Clare’s Law comes back clean it doesn’t mean that the person has no history of harming partners.

Your two options are – cut it off now on the basis of what you have heard or give it a chance and wait for an incident or another red flag before you run. You need to think about why your need to be with him is so strong that you’re willing to potentially enter into something that could end up really harming you, and possibly even end your life. What is so wonderful about him? Why is he worth that risk? I can’t see a situation in which it would ever be worth taking that risk – but especially not after knowing someone for two weeks.

There are a lot of men out here who have never harmed their partners and whose female colleagues feel safe with them – it would be better to hold out for one of those men rather than risking it for a man whose keenness has already made you feel uneasy. It would actually be better to be single for the rest of your life than to risk an abusive relationship. I’d cut it off now, but if you can’t help yourself then stay alert, be careful, tell friends about anything he does that feels off or not right, don’t hide or minimise any of his behaviours, be certain that any additional red flags will make you run, don’t rush into any big commitments too soon – don’t live together or get pregnant or go halves on a pet. Take it extremely slowly. You deserve safety and security and you deserve better than someone’s crazy ex.

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