How do I tell him my BD gave me herpes?
Hello, I (24f) am going on a first date (23m) in almost 2 years since having a baby. I’ll call my son’s father Cole (34m). When me and cole first got together, I was I just turned 21 and he was 32. He was my boss, and after a work party, he had hosted at a bar. I had a couple too many drinks and he said he would give me a drive home. He ended up driving me back to his place and at the time I was OK with it one thing led to another and we ended up seeing each other from there. I had a bad situation going on at home and was mainly staying with friends at the time so he very quickly moved me in with him for him to “take care and protect me”. Within a couple months, he ended up moving into a nicer apartment which I found out later was in his exes name. At the time I was naïve enough to think that he was genuinely trying to look out for my best interest in the relationship did start out great (in my head). After about four months, he began picking fights. Constantly accusing me of cheating and stopped taking me out with him anywhere. It was around the same time I realized that he had been doing coke as well. He started going out with friends every weekend and not letting me come with him. This is around the same time he brought up the idea of threesomes. Especially when he would get coked out he said that he deserved to have his woman show him off and that he wanted to impress me on what he could do to other women. I thought that he had been joking or that it was just dirty talk until one day, he tried bringing over someone he met at a bar. I was very angry, but ended up still staying because I thought I loved him. It was a very stupid 21 year old thing to think. Not too long after this he started picking fights at work too, at the time, no one knew that we were together because he said it would get fired. So pretty soon after he had me quit without notice to the higher ups. He promised that he would start sobering up and wanted to take care of me to eventually start a family. He actually did the opposite and started going on couple day benders at least once a week. After about four months of not having a job, I ended up finding out from his ex that he had stopped paying any of the bills and that she had been covering our cost to live there however she stopped paying as well and that there’s only two days before we need to get out of the apartment. We started living out of hotels and friends couches. He also sold my car one of the days that he had gone out without telling me. I later found out is for more drugs since he had been going on almost week long benders at that point. Something snapped in me pretty soon after that I needed to get out but knew it wasn’t gonna be so simple with how manipulative and controlling he had gotten. While I was contemplating everything I found out I was pregnant with my son. We found out together and it was scary and exciting all at the same time. he had promised he was going to get sober, and that we were going to be a happy family. Which he did get sober for about a week then quickly fell back into old habits, but trying to hide it behind my back. He was still going out to bars but saying that it was for work. But something snapped three weeks after I found out I was pregnant and him leaving me an Airbnb without food or water or toilet paper for 3 days while he was on a bender. I ended up calling my mom and having her pick me up in the middle of the night. He did come with me to my first OB appointment & I told them about me having a very painful ingrown hair. This is where they told me I had contracted herpes. I was devastated. I had actually got tested for everything before we got together. I had never had an outbreak before in my life and was terrified. After this appointment, cole never showed up to any of the other events or ultrasounds. Since then I got my life on track. Found a great job, bought a car, moved into a home & brought my son into the world. His father does come around from time to time, but has never been consistent. Typically visits are only about 30 minutes every few months.
Fast forward to now I’m going to be going on a date for the first time since being with my son’s father. He seems like a very sweet and caring man. He doesn’t mind that I have a son and so far has very genuine intentions. How do I go about telling him that the father of my son gave me herpes? I appreciate any words of advice in advance.