A woman has revealed her distress after discovering a life-changing secret her boyfriend kept from her for eight years.
Lily* was 21 when she met Max, they hit it off straight away and started dating shortly afterwards.
“I asked him how old he was because he looked like he could be any age so it was hard to tell,” she recalled in a post on Reddit.
‘The first red flag was when he avoided the question and asked me how old I thought he looked. I guessed between 28 and 30 and he smiled and agreed.
‘When I pressed him for the exact age, he admitted he was 36.’
But almost ten years later, Lily discovered that her boyfriend had been lying to her the whole time and that he was actually 46 when they met.
“My allowance for the age difference had been seven to 10 years – a 15-year difference was confronting, but I liked him a lot and we got along well,” she said, unaware that she was actually agreeing to a much larger age difference .
‘He’s 25 years older than me. He’s older than my mother. “I’m stunned, I feel so disgusted and violated,” she added.
A woman revealed her distress after discovering a life-changing secret her boyfriend had kept from her for eight years
The couple is about to break up because Max thinks Lily doesn’t express her emotions well and she accused him of being manipulative.
They live together, but in separate bedrooms, and Max had been gone for a week when Lily accidentally came across his date of birth written on an official document.
‘He was always secretive about official documents and made sure I never saw them. My jaw hit the floor when I read his year of birth: 1970.
“This man lied to me to get me and then continued to lie. Was he just never going to tell me that he wasn’t 36 but 46 when he met me?
‘I was only 21 and hardly left home. I now question the reality. What other secrets have I missed? Did he have a family? Is he a criminal?
‘I feel completely blinded and disillusioned. This can’t possibly be real.’
Lily begged strangers online for advice on how to confront him, but they all said the same thing: she should pack her things and leave.
‘I wouldn’t confront him. The relationship is over. You have nothing to gain from this. He could become dangerous, as you said; who is he really? “If he’s been lying about this for eight years, it might be because he’s hiding more,” one person said.
‘Don’t confront, just leave. Once you’re safely away, text him that you know his real age and that you never want him to contact you and block him again. Let your employer know what’s going on in case he shows up for work,” another advised.
“It sounds like you guys are already breaking up…just let it be, wash your hands of it and leave him in the dust,” a third chimed in.
*Names have been anonymized for privacy reasons.