Dear Prudence

Help! My Boyfriend Recently Dated a Much Younger Woman, and It Creeps Me Out.

Dear Prudence answers more of your questions—only for Slate Plus members.

Every week, Mallory Ortberg answers additional questions from readers, just for Slate Plus members.

Q. Why do they date the young ones?: I recently started seeing a man. He’s 40 and divorced. I’m 38 and divorced. We both have children. He recently told me he had a yearlong relationship with a 22-year-old while he was divorcing his wife. (He was 37 at the time.)

This bothers me a lot for reasons I don’t quite understand. She was younger, yes, but I think it rankles me that he would be so interested in someone who was born while he was in high school. I question his judgment.

I realize this is on me and my prejudices about age gaps, but I seem stuck on this point. Do I just say goodbye, or what are some ways I could reframe my thoughts to move past this?

A: It’s fine to have reservations about significant age gaps. You’re not running around breaking up May-December romances; you’re trying to figure out if you’re comfortable seeing someone who’s dated an extremely young person in the past. It’s a matter of figuring out your own limits, not trying to dictate other people’s behavior.

If you’ve only been on a few dates with this guy, it’s too soon to pry, and you can absolutely decide not to go out with him again. If, however, you’ve gotten to know each other a little better, you can certainly ask (gently and without obvious distaste) what that relationship was like and why he dated someone so much younger than himself. If his answer seems fairly self-aware and mature, you might learn to move past it; if you find yourself turned off by what he saw in his much younger girlfriend, you’re free to stop seeing him.