To wonder if I was actually groomed?

[Tulipsfromfrance]

So I’m a fully grown adult now, but trying to process some trauma from my younger years, and I always come back to this question.

When I was 14 I started seeing a 18 year old. He bought me alcohol, drugs (nothing too heavy!), cigarettes. We obviously started sleeping together - I ended up pregnant at 14 and have a lovely son now. He did stick around and I do feel he loved me which is why I can’t decide if it was actual grooming or what.

My family said that because I wasn’t a virgin and he was (I was a very troubled child!) then it was my fault and I led him astray.

We split when I was 18 as I just didn’t feel anything for him anymore, he always stayed in contact with son, although when my son hit 14 my son pulled away from visiting his dad a bit, he admitted he found it weird his dad got me pregnant at that age.

grooming or me just being a stupid teenager?

No-one can tell you if it was grooming on the basis of that information alone.

You need to work through this with a proper therapist to process your trauma.

I dont think it was grooming, you were both just naive teenagers

Your family are wrong. If you weren't a virgin at 14, then you were a very vulnerable, abused child. I think working through this with a therapist would be useful for you, as there's obviously a lot of trauma there. 💐

Well your parents are clearly wrong. A 14 year old can’t lead a 18 year old astray. 18 is old enough to know better.

It’s not really possible to judge if he groomed you from so little information. In The eyes of the law a 14 year old can’t consent so the relationship was totally unbalanced from the start.

You're putting an 18 year old in the same category as a 14 year old who is already vulnerable due to previous abuse?

By today’s standards yes, by the standards 28 years ago (which is the minimum it could be based on ages given but it’s probably longer) no.

Your family sound very messed up to say your virginity or lack of is relevant though.

The OP hasn't said anything to indicate it was 28 years ago. She talks about her son's reaction when he hit 14, so this could have happened as recently as 2009.

An 18 year old buying drugs and alcohol for a 14 year old who was vulnerable due to previous sexual abuse would have been seen as wrong when I was that age, and I would guess that I'm a fair bit older than the OP.

You're family sound just like mine. Victim blaming is not ok.

I would say simply that if you are asking yourself questions, there are things you probably need to work through. It may be rather less simple than pinning things on one individual as grooming you, although that might be part of the puzzle. You say you were a troubled child and to be already sexually active at that age; to experience your family dismissing your concerns based on this fact which is in itself a worrying one -- these all speak to something that you may need support understanding and working through as an adult, with a therapist.

It's a bit of a stretch to say anyone who loses their virginity underage is by definition a vulnerable abused child. Almost 20% of people have sex before the age of 16 in the UK:
https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/this-is-the-average-age-brits-lose-their-virginity-at-and-we-didnt-expect-this_uk_6400b5f9e4b072dc5958f60e

However, an 18 year old (a teenager, yes, but also an adult) supplying a 14 year old with drink and drugs, then sleeping with her, is deeply questionable.

I dated a 17 year old when I was 14 and our 'relationship' mainly consisted of snogging in the cinema on a Saturday afternoon - no drink, no drugs, no pressure to have sex.

OP, I don't think your experience was neccessarily normal or healthy. It sounds like you've powered through a difficult youth though, so well done.

You are not a responsible adult because you aren't a virgin at 14. That just meant that you had been being taken advantage of at an even younger age.

Being a virgin at 18 does not make the person who groomed you less guilty. You are perfectly able to abuse a child even though you haven't slept with a woman, which he did, and at 18 you bloody well know that a 14 year old is off limits, experience or not.

Yes, you were groomed.
Yes, as a child you were an innocent victim.
Yes, your family sounds toxic if they believe a child can be responsible for seducing an adult into giving her drugs.
Yes, your son's father committed a crime.
Congratulations for raising a son with healthy values.

Yes you were, I say that with absolutely no doubts. I’m completely baffled by the posters here who think you weren’t!

Someone who says "I was a very troubled child" when they talk about not being a virgin at 14 isn't painting a picture of healthy sexual activity...

The OP is painting a picture of a troubled teenage girl from an unsupportive/ abusive family who was using drugs and alcohol from a young age. The men and boys who have sex with girls in that position are usually abusive, because decent men don't prey on the vulnerable. I would have thought that was obvious?

I'm shocked at some of the responses I'm seeing here tbh. MN has obviously changed a lot.

Thank you all for your replies!

Yes, luckily karma didn’t come and bite me because my son is a lovely person with great values, and nothing like me when I was young.

I completely turned my life around and didn’t look back when I fell pregnant with him, I suppose it’s clichè but he did save me.

Abusers can love their victims. It doesn't mean they haven’t harmed them.

18 year olds know damned well that they aren't meant to sleep with 14 year olds.

1. your family are complete idiots and this is probably a big part of why you were a bit out of control at 14, had more than one sexual partner and landed up pregnant.

2.your ex was absolutely wrong to get in a relationship with you when he was 18 and you were 14 but I don't think this is an entirely unusual situation and if you were (outwardly at least) mature for your age and he was a bit immature for his age, it could happen.

3.to that end, I wouldn't consider it grooming based on what you say here - it sounds like he genuinely did have feelings for you and he then stuck around and tried to be a dad. Grooming suggests someone purposefully attempting to manipulate or coerce someone who is vulnerable, which it does not sound like the case here.

I think a short course of therapy wouldn't do you any harm though. If for no other reason than to process the batshit things your family tell you.

You were a child, being groomed and raped by an adult. Children cannot consent, and grooming or coercion aren't an opinion.

An adult gave a child alcohol and drugs and then raped them and got them pregnant. That is not okay.

You can love each other and it's still grooming. Just because you felt ok with it it doesn't mean it's ok or consensual. Children cannot consent x

@Flickersy What on earth are you on about. She was 14 of course it was grooming.

It doesn’t matter what she may or may not have done. She was 14

based on what you said here
you had a bad childhood, probably some abuse and by 14 you were troubled and acting out
an 18 year old, even though by definition an adult, may have been a young 18 who unknowingly took advantage of you
but it doesn’t sounds like grooming, if anything he took advantage of the situation and he sounds like he cared in some way
even if this was 14 years ago, we’re still talking early 2000’s culture- which was quite messed up by today’s standards
you were a victim, but you were a victim before you meet him - your family blaming this on you drinking and having sex at 14 is just shifting the blame

I think you have tagged the wrong person. I didn't say it wasn't grooming.

OP would be much better served by seeing a professional therapist to work through her childhood trauma rather than asking strangers on the internet (who don't know her or her history) to decide whether or not she was the victim of grooming, however.

It’s really not a black and white answer as some folks are posting it is. Ie it’s grooming due to age difference, case closed. That’s not how it works.

grooming is deliberately developing a relationship so you can abuse and exploit someone. Only you know op if you feel that is what he was doing. At 14 sex with him is not even automatically abuse. It’s assault at 13 and below.

can I ask why you think you were groomed by him?

Please don't talk about karma like you deserve something bad to happen to you. You were a child, obviously groomed by an 18 yr old and sounds like you were sexually abused before that. Children can't consent - however you feel about yourself, please try to remember that you did nothing wrong.

Please don’t do this. It isn’t ok. There is no obviously groomed about it.