DEAR JANE: My brother’s sexy new girlfriend seemed strangely familiar, and then I remembered how I knew her

Dear Jane,

I went to my parents’ house for Thanksgiving and brought my new girlfriend. I was really excited for her to meet them and my younger brother.

As we got on the train to go, my brother texted our family group chat saying he was on his way and was bringing a girl he had just started dating.

It was classic for my brother to have something like this happen to my parents at the last minute and he always seemed to be dating someone new.

He’s 23 and I’m 30, so there’s quite a big age difference between us, but we live close to each other and have always been very close.

When we arrived, we jumped out of the taxi, hugged my parents and I introduced my girlfriend. As we all said hello, my brother also arrived.

After hugging him, I turned to his girlfriend to introduce myself. But when I looked at her, I had the strange feeling that I had met her before. I obviously stared a little too long because my brother jokingly pushed me, so I just said hi.

But I couldn’t shake the feeling that I knew her. Even her name, Emma, ​​sounded familiar.

It wasn’t until we had dinner that evening and I sat across from her that I realized what I recognized her from: we had made a match through a dating app.

And it gets worse. Before I got together with my current girlfriend six months ago, I was single and using the dating apps hard. I probably lowered my age range a little more than I should have.

I matched with Emma (who is 20 years old) and we started talking, things got more and more flirty until Emma finally sent me some racy photos. I never reciprocated anything and we never met in person as things got more serious with my girlfriend.

When I realized the connection, I turned bright red at the table and everyone looked at me and I had to pretend to cough.

Emma seems to have no idea who I am, but I still feel absolutely terrible. I don’t want to tell my brother or my girlfriend, it would be way too awkward, but I find it so weird to hide it from them too. Not to mention she’s so much younger than me.

Should I keep this to myself and be uncomfortable around her forever, or should I say it now and try to laugh it off?

Best,

Tinder cheater

Dear Tinder Trickster,

Dating apps can feel like a smorgasbord of fun when you first join. There are so many attractive people to meet and quite a few may be interested in you.

But soon the people in these digital dating pools start to feel disposable.

It’s no one’s fault. Some singles are looking for a relationship on the apps, others are looking for distraction.

In fact, unless you meet in “real life” with your cyber dates, it’s hard to remember who you talked to and even harder to remember what you discussed.

I recently had a date with someone from a dating app. When we moved our conversation to WhatsApp, I realized that his contact was already in my phone, even though I couldn’t remember him. We had obviously talked before, but I have no idea what we were talking about.

I only say this to explain why Emma doesn’t remember you, even though you have clear memories of her (no doubt helped by the racy photos). But neither of you has anything to feel guilty about.

But if there are any young women reading this, please don’t send compromising photos to strangers. You have no idea where those photos will end up.

Now back to you. I don’t think there’s any need to remind Emma of your previous connection. You have done absolutely nothing wrong. And the whole exchange between the two of you seems pretty uninteresting.

But if you were to bring it up, I suspect it would be something to laugh about rather than something to get angry about. (For convenience, I can leave out the part about the spicy photos.)

As for your brother, he is young and meeting people. Let him make his own judgment about Emma.

Dear Jane,

I am 35 years old and my mother just passed away at the age of 55 after a battle with cancer. I have no full siblings and never met my father as I was a secret love child so I am all alone now.

My mother’s brief relationship with my father ended after he proposed to his girlfriend and decided their affair had to end once and for all. My mother hadn’t found out she was pregnant yet, and after she found out, she was too embarrassed to tell him about me and didn’t want to disrupt his “perfect” relationship.

Through some light Facebook stalking, I found out that my father had four children with his wife, so I have four half-siblings that I have never met. It’s painful to have an entire family with whom I have no relationship, and who don’t even know I exist.

Based on their social media accounts, it seems like my siblings are all incredibly close and spend a lot of time together as a family. My father and his wife also seem to still be very happily married.

Before my mother died, I had never dreamed of imposing on their family. But now I feel overwhelmingly lonely and long for a family.

I fear reaching out to my siblings and my father in case they react angrily or reject me outright, but a small part of me is hopeful that they will welcome me into their perfect family with open arms.

Should I take the chance and contact them, or avoid the potential pain and try to move on with my life?

By,

Secret sister

Dear secret sister,

I’m sorry you carried this secret for so long, and I’m even more sorry about the loss of your mother.

I completely understand why you would want to contact your father and half-siblings, especially since you are alone now.

I honestly don’t think there is a ‘right’ answer to this. One school of thought would advise against reaching out, given the potential to cause chaos for your father and his family with the news of his affair and secret child.

The second approach would say: you should Reach out, because your father deserves to know he has a daughter, and your half-siblings need to know about your existence.

I know someone who was in a similar situation. This person had discovered through a DNA test that her beloved father, who died several years earlier, was not her biological father.

Through genealogical research she found her real father and finally decided to contact him.

At first he didn’t want anything to do with her, but after a while he was willing to meet.

Now, several years later, they have a friendly relationship and she has met her half-siblings.

One of the reasons she felt it was important to contact him was to learn more about any genetic health issues.

Ultimately, her decision to reach out worked out in her favor, but a positive outcome was not guaranteed.

If you do indeed decide to reach out, I recommend that you do so privately and with him alone. And as difficult as this part may seem, I would advise you to separate your feelings from his reaction as much as possible. It would be nice if he chooses to accept you, but if he doesn’t, that’s something you have to live with.

At this vulnerable time in your life, think carefully about whether or not you can live with this kind of rejection. It is rare that these encounters result in a happy life.

My best advice would be to stop thinking that happiness lies in having a large family. Instead, find other ways to curb your loneliness. Whether that means focusing on building your friend groups, or joining a grief group to process your feelings about the loss of your mother.

Whatever you decide to do, remember that your happiness is within you your hands.