Olalekan Adebumiti
This is one of those conversations every modern couple dreads.
It hangs in the air like smoke. You can feel him wondering. You can feel him doing the mental arithmetic. And when the truth comes out, even a fraction of it, you see the light in his eyes dim.
You see him pull back. You see the jaw tighten. You know the exact moment the energy shifts.
And your immediate reaction is anger. You think: “It’s the 21st century. Why does this matter? Why is he being so fragile? Why is he judging me for having a life before him?”
You label him “insecure.” You label him “controlling.”
And while those labels might be accurate descriptions of his behaviour, they are useless at explaining the cause.
If you want to handle this dynamic, you have to stop judging his reaction and start understanding it. You have to look under the hood of male psychology.
He isn’t angry because you had sex. He is tormented because your past triggers three specific, primal fears that sit at the very core of his masculinity.
Here is the brutal truth about why your history keeps him awake at night.
1. They Fear Comparative Incompetence
Men are raised in a hierarchy of competence.
From the time they are boys on a football pitch, they are taught that their value depends on being “better” than the guy next to them.
When a man looks at your past, he doesn’t see “memories.” He sees a scoreboard.
He sees a lineup of competitors who have been intimate with you. And his brain immediately begins the comparison game.
- Was he bigger than me?
- Did he last longer?
- Did he make her feel things I can’t?
- Was he more exciting?
This isn’t about sex but about significance.
A man’s greatest fear is being “adequate.” Being “nice.” Being the safe option you settled for after you had your fun with the “real” men.
When he thinks about your past, he is terrified that he is merely a placeholder.
He fears that you are with him for his stability, but you were with them for the passion.
He fears that while he has your heart, he doesn’t have your rawest, wildest desire. That insecurity eats him alive.
2. The Loss of “Specialness”
We all want to feel unique. But for men, sexual exclusivity is often the primary marker of specialness.
Biologically and evolutionarily, men are wired to seek exclusive access.
It is a deep, lizard-brain drive to ensure that any investment they make is truly theirs.
When he realises he is one of many, that drive takes a hit.
He feels a loss of uniqueness.
If you have done the same things with him that you did with five other guys, he struggles to feel like this relationship is distinct.
He wonders, “If she said ‘I love you’ to him, and ‘I love you’ to me, what is the difference?
Are these words just a script she reads to whoever is in the role?”
He isn’t judging you for having a past; he is grieving the loss of being your “first” or your “only.”
He wanted to be the explorer who discovered the map; instead, he feels like a tourist walking a well-trodden path.
It is irrational. It is unfair. However, it is a feeling, and feelings often defy logic.
3. The “mental Movie” and The Visceral Disgust
Women tend to experience memory emotionally. Men tend to experience memory visually.
When you tell a woman about a past lover, she thinks about how it made you feel.
When you tell a man about a past lover, he constructs a high-definition 4K movie in his head.
He visualises it. He pictures the physical mechanics of it. And that visualisation triggers a visceral response.
This is often called Retroactive Jealousy, but it feels more like nausea.
It is difficult to be intimate with someone when your brain is flashing images of them being intimate with someone else.
It creates a physical repulsion. He might pull away from you, not because he doesn’t love you, but because he is trying to stop the movie playing in his head.
He hates himself for having these thoughts. He knows it is irrational.
But the image is intrusive, and it creates a barrier of “disgust” that he has to fight through to reach you.
4. The Fear of Being The “Beta” Provider
This is the darkest fear of all, and the one he will never admit to you.
There is a pervasive narrative in the “Manosphere” (and in deep male psychology) about the difference between the “Alpha” who gets the sex for free/fun, and the “Beta” who pays for the relationship.
If your past involved “Bad Boys,” casual flings, or men who didn’t treat you well, and now you are with him, he worries he is the “Beta.”
He worries that those other men got the best of you for free. Meanwhile, he has to “pay” for your attention with dates, commitment, and emotional labour.
He feels like he is paying full price for a car that others took for a joyride.
This thought process is toxic, yes. It is transactional and dehumanising. But it is a very real insecurity that plagues many good men.
They are terrified that you are only with them because you are “done” with the fun guys and now you need someone to pay the bills.
5. The Uncertainty of Your Bonding Ability
There is a psychological concept (often debated, but deeply felt by men) that the more partners someone has, the harder it is for them to pair-bond.
Whether this is true or not is irrelevant; what matters is that he believes it.
He looks at your history and wonders: “If she could walk away from all those other men, how easy will it be for her to walk away from me?”
He sees a pattern of leaving. He sees a pattern of detachments. And it makes him feel unsafe. He worries that he is just another chapter in a book that has no ending. He craves permanence, but your past suggests transience.
How To Deal With This (Without Necessarily Apologising)
So, now that you understand the machinery of his insecurity, what do you do?
Do you apologise? No.
Do you lie? Absolutely not.
Apologising for your past validates his insecurity. It tells him that you agree: you did do something wrong.
Instead, you must shift the frame. You must stop trying to minimise your past and start emphasising his unique place in your present.
1. Validate the Feeling, Not the Fact
Don’t say: “You are being crazy, it was years ago.”
Say: “I can see that thinking about this hurts you, and I hate that you are hurting. I chose you. I am here with you.”
2. Highlight the Contrast
He needs to know he isn’t just “another one.”
Say: “I have dated other people, but I have never felt this safe/connected/understood before. What we have is different because [insert specific reason].”
3. Don’t Overshare Details
He doesn’t need the details. The details feed the “Mental Movie.” Keep it vague. He needs to know the emotional context, not the physical mechanics.
4. Reiterate His Victory
Remind him that out of everyone you have met, everyone you have dated, and everyone you have seen—you picked him.
He won! The competition is over, and he is holding the trophy.
Now, Your Mirror Moment
His insecurity is his responsibility to manage, but it is your responsibility to understand.
You cannot erase your history, and you shouldn’t want to. It made you who you are. But you can choose to handle his fragility with compassion rather than judgment.
He isn’t attacking you. He is fighting his own demons, terrified that he isn’t enough for you.
Show him that he is. And I hope it goes well with you both.
