I’ve fallen for my cousin so is our relationship incestuous?
DEAR DEIDRE: The man of my dreams rescued me from the roadside, but it turns out we are related and I don’t know how to tell our families that we are together.
I’m a 26-year-old woman and I’d never had a serious relationship with anybody before. I’m shy and I think my parents had given up on me ever meeting anyone.
Still I force myself to go to an aerobics class once a week and other than that, I don’t go out.
My car broke down on the way back from work one evening. I had to have it recovered from a lay-by and the guy was really lovely.
We got chatting and when I gave him my address he told me he had an auntie who lived nearby explaining “We never see her though – family fall-outs and all that.”
He dropped me off and then took my car to a local garage. I was delighted when he called a week later to see how I was getting on.
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He said calling customers was against company policy but he thought I was really nice and wondered if he could take me out sometime. It felt a little weird but we had got along well so I agreed.
We met in a pub. He was the perfect gentleman. He told me he was 34 and had been in a relationship for three years until she cheated.
We walked home and I felt on cloud nine. We texted one another for the next two hours.
Our relationship blossomed and it felt amazing when I lost my virginity to him.
We are so happy together but then I did some digging about his family background and discovered my Mum and his are sisters. I didn’t even know she existed.
I don’t know how our mothers will react after not speaking in so many years, never mind the fact that we are cousins. How do we tackle this?
MORE FROM DEAR DEIDRE
DEIDRE SAYS: You can have a relationship with your first cousin in the UK. You can even get married.
Cousins can be attracted to one another because there’s a familial trait, but socially it is still unusual for cousins to get together romantically or sexually and can test family relationships.
Some may even feel it’s akin to incest and with an existing family fall out, this isn’t going to straight forward.
Introduce your boyfriend as a friend first and tell your mother you’ve found out that you’re cousins. Then, if your relationship really does have legs then go for it.
Genetic counselling may allay any fears you have about having children. Contact Genetic Alliance (geneticalliance.org.uk, 0300 124 0441) for advice.