Ask Renée: When to tell the new partner

Dear SOON,
Probably right as you coordinate both the skywriter and the barbershop quartet! Grand gestures aside, if this feels like tightroping some delicate timing, you’re right. Making the big reveal too soon risks high school levels of awkward. Waiting too long threatens to erode any growing trust. But wait! Before your life flashes before your very eyes, remember: men have traversed the impossible before. You can do this.

No one in sincere pursuit of love wants to be in early relationship limbo forever. How tired the parade of wit and charm! How primed the rehearsed panache! Getting to a new level of comfort requires us upping our openness. There’s no universal time limit, no optimal calculator. The pace of every relationship is different.

Getting to a new level of comfort requires us upping our openness. There’s no universal time limit, no optimal calculator. The pace of every relationship is different.

Look to your relationship for clues regarding your current intimacy threshold. Is there existing evidence of vulnerable disclosures being met with warmth and trust? Go for it! Still in the process of building basic trust while getting to know each other? Play with sharing lower-stakes vulnerabilities and assess your partner’s receptivity. Feel out the timing and when in doubt, err on the side of making a smart risk in the service of growing closer.

Hot sex. Hot vulnerability. The same rules apply: I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.