Teenage son saw me having sex and now won’t speak to me

[mortified48]

Utterly mortified. Bit of background… been divorced for nearly two years after a horrendous marriage. Thanks to good friends helping me with an exit plan, I managed to get out and am now in my own lovely little home. Two DS, 11 and 14 who I share custody with my ex 50/50. Eldest son doesn’t always see eye to eye with his dad who lives about 20 mins walk away.

So yesterday was changeover day and as kids are on half term, they went back to their dad’s at lunchtime and I’m not due to get them back now until Weds (we use a 5 5 2 2 schedule). I was working Fri afternoon and suddenly my eldest appears in my house (he has a key) as he’d had a row with his dad and didn’t want to go back. DS and Ex have a decent relationship but they clash quite a bit and I’m very close to my son. I had a good talk with him and when my ex arrived to come get him, had a talk with him too, calmed the situation and they went back to my ex’s house.

Later that evening my boyfriend of one year came over for some food and a film. It’s worth mentioning here that my kids haven’t met him yet. They’ve bumped into him once, and I talk about him, but more as a close friend I guess. The reason for that is I’m not about to introduce them to someone unless I know they’re going to be sticking around. Ex got a new girlfriend straight after the split and has been with her for 22 months now. At the beginning the kids struggled a little with this, it was quite soon after the split; my ex did the same thing and didn’t introduce her to them straight away incase it didn’t work out. The kids were recently introduced to her properly, and seem ok with it, although it’s a little awkward for them as she’s a teacher at their school. Anyway.. I certainly wasn’t going to introduce my boyfriend to them when they were in the throes of adjusting to dad’s new girlfriend and going on holiday with her and her kids etc.. it’s a lot for them to take in still. So I’ve kept it as mentioning my boyfriends name quite a bit as a friend and then when im sure the relationship has a solid future, i figured this would make it easier to introduce him to the kids.

Back to last night.. boyfriend was round watching a movie, and at about 9pm we got frisky in my living room and then again in the bedroom and then made some food. My phone was in a different room charging. When I went to get it around 11:15pm , I saw a text from the ex at 11pm saying that (unknown to me), my eldest had had a row with him and had run to mine around 9pm, let himself in and saw me having sex 😣 and had got such a shock he ran back to his dads in his socks(!) and now isn’t wanting to speak to me because he feels lied to. I had NO idea he was even in the house and only found out when I went to get my phone from the other room at 11pm. Ex had also texted at 9pm to say DS had rowed with him and was running to mine but I hadn’t seen this. Ex didn’t appear to have tried to stop DS running to mine.
i immediately tried to get in touch with DS as I could see he was still online, but he said he didn’t want to talk and turned his phone off. He’s really upset. I think the “feeling lied to” is probably because I haven’t introduced my boyfriend to him yet and he feels kept in the dark (which he hated when it happened with my ex’s girlfriend at the beginning of their relationship).

Utterly mortified and need advice how to handle this. I’m so close to DS, and he’s never not wanted to talk before and is obviously very shocked and embarrassed and upset. Help!

Oh yes but unfortunately it has to be done. Cat's out of the bag now so no going back.

Well clearly none of us here has a time machine.

God almighty, can you imagine the introduction and the small talk?
The lad will certainly be more cautious about opening doors from now on, anyway.

I'm surprised so many people are giving you a bit of a hardish time.

I don't think you've done anything wrong and it was an unfortunate event which he will get over once the shock clears.

I walked into my mother's room when she was having sex with someone I didn't expect to be there. It was shocking for all sorts of reasons I was about 15 at the time. We never spoke about it and I got over it.

You didn't tell him about the relationship for very good reasons that were all about the care and protection of your son. Hopefully he will come to understand that.

I would message and empathise and apologise and keep it open for him to talk then let the shock settle and hopefully your will get to clear the air. He's just in shock and emotionally fragile. Young though he is he will need to learn that you have a life of your own.

He’s not the priority in this situation

I think this is a horrible way to look at it It's not the boy's fault his parents uprooted his life and forced him to live between two houses and move from one to the other every couple of days. (Not having one primary home sounds horrendous btw, what adult would choose that for themselves?)

Both houses are his home. What if he hadn't "stormed" but had forgotten some clothes or a school book? The fact he has his own key indicates it's okay for him to let himself in (to his own home remember!) and his mum goes about having sex right there in the living room! Poor lad.

You could swap feelings with the word responsibility too.

Seems like the perfect Segway to have a grown up conversation with your son about boundaries and privacy, and what him having independence between two houses means.

And to sort out why he keeps running back from dads.

hes purely embarrassed because he saw you having sex which - at his age it’s the worst thing in the world and it would be no different if you hadn’t divorced and he saw you having sex with his dad.

use the moment to talk about rules if he wants to float between two houses

It would be the literal elephant in the room but in this case, definitely don't talk about it. Hope bf has a good sense of humor and can detract from the obvious.

Can you imagine the accidental double entendres?
You'd feel like Alan Carr on steroids.

You could do but considering it’s OPs house and OPs son the responsibility to protect them is hers

Yes, she did. You haven't read the thread properly.

I see that you’ve managed to get away and well done for that, I’m just gently pointing at that your son hasn’t.

Well said. What an important point you are making.

Mumsnet is full of advice ‘to leave the bastard’ but make no mention of the fact that the children won’t get to do this, and on top of that they will have semi-homeless lives shuttling back and forth between their parents while at the same time trying to get on at school have friendships etc.

I am not saying OP shouldn’t have left, or that this mistake makes her awful, of course not. But no one should minimise this boy’s feelings. He is particularly close to his mother too.

I bet it wasn't her idea to go at it in the communal area of the house.

I know what you mean and in most cases I believe that laughter can be the best cure but not in this situation.

It isn’t locking him out - she can let him in. I am sure he wants a repeat performance even less than she does. Saves everyone’s embarrassment.

Please leave your misogyny in to 20th century. Women are allowed to have sex and enjoy it. Even in their living rooms.

It very much depends on the boy, and depends on the boyfriend. I suspect the boy is quite sensitive and upset anyway, with both parents. Not a happy situation

What is she ‘protecting’ him
from. She was doing something everyone does in the privacy of her own home.

Her son will get over it.

It is interesting, isn't it? There are definite sex differences, but also clearly social double standards all over the place. There is a good thread on the sex board about how socially acceptable it is as a woman to say you like/enjoy sex, so it's not just teens, and it's still stigmatised

I agree with this! I wouldn't stress too much Op.

This. The rest, while unfortunate, isn’t your fault (as you didn’t have your phone you couldn’t have known he’d walk in and you’re not wrong to have a boyfriend, have said boyfriend over, shag said boyfriend to your hearts content, not by a long shot!) but this is gross. He’s probably imagining the worst that you’ve been shagging this random bloke (to him) all over his home, supposedly his safe space. Poor form. I guess all you can do is apologise that he saw that and that you’ll be mindful of the fact it’s his home too in future.

I agree with this.

DS needs to stop running away from his dad on his time - what’s going on there?!

I can’t believe the hard time the OP is getting a hard time from some people.

She’s done nothing wrong . She’s an adult who had sex with her partner in her own home at a time she believed it was entirely empty .

It’s not her fault that her ex seems to be completely unable to manage his relationship with his son and keep him at his home safely during their contact periods .