Anonymous wrote:I realize now, at 46, that I was being groomed. I was 15 or 16. I went to a summer camp in a closed down hotel (it was off season). The caretaker of the property was a 30-something woman (I am a woman too). The kids were kinda shunning me. So I would hang out with her. She would give me Bailey’s to drink and show me porn magazines.

I realize now she was probably trying to groom me into something sexual. Luckily, nothing happened.

Wow. I'm truly thankful that you were fortunate enough to not have anything traumatizing occur. It sounds like she was definitely grooming you.

Anonymous wrote:I got a BJ from a thirty something year old married mom that I occasionally worked for when I was 16. As a 45 year old guy, I think it's totally wrong now, but 16 year old me still high fives anyone that asks.

I would do it all over again in a heartbeat and have zero regrets.

NP. As a mother, if I had a son, I would be so angry at this. I'm curious to know if you are a father, and whether you have a son. Or, if you have a daughter, how you would feel if she did this to a 16 year old once she turned 30?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Maybe it’s different for men?

I think it is. Probably has something to do with the big age differences you see in tv and movies. Old men with very young girls. Gives people he idea that it is normal and ok.

+1

I got a BJ from a thirty something year old married mom that I occasionally worked for when I was 16. As a 45 year old guy, I think it's totally wrong now, but 16 year old me still high fives anyone that asks.

I would do it all over again in a heartbeat and have zero regrets.

I realize now, at 46, that I was being groomed. I was 15 or 16. I went to a summer camp in a closed down hotel (it was off season). The caretaker of the property was a 30-something woman (I am a woman too). The kids were kinda shunning me. So I would hang out with her. She would give me Bailey’s to drink and show me porn magazines.

I realize now she was probably trying to groom me into something sexual. Luckily, nothing happened.

Anonymous wrote:So 20 years ago you had a consensual sexual relationship that demonstrated bad judgment and bad parenting, and you think that was a #metoo moment?

You are really trivializing the experiences of women who were actually sexually harassed/assaulted.

None of us have done anything of the sort.

guy here - I was 17 and lost my virginity to a late 30's neighbor during the summer after my senior year. I did yard work at her home and she was always around. She was married but didn't have kids and was always around because she was a teacher. At the time I thought I thought I was the luckiest kid on the planet.

So 20 years ago you had a consensual sexual relationship that demonstrated bad judgment and bad parenting, and you think that was a #metoo moment?

You are really trivializing the experiences of women who were actually sexually harassed/assaulted.

Any other New Englanders remember the "Don't have sex with underage girls" PSAs that used to run on late night TV?

When I was 16 I had a sexual relationship with a 24 year old. I made a calculated choice that I wanted to have a sexual experience and I didn't want it to get back to my social circle. At the time I thought he was okay and we were both using each other-now I think he must have been incredibly skeevy.

I'm dating a man who had a sexual relationship with his high school teacher, and it messed him up. At the time he thought it was incredibly cool.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Maybe it’s different for men?

I think it is. Probably has something to do with the big age differences you see in tv and movies. Old men with very young girls. Gives people he idea that it is normal and ok.

I don’t think it’s just men. I feel like I am always hearing about female teachers with underage male students. My own DH was propositioned by a teacher in high school.

Like everyone else, I felt very grown up as a teen and would have seen no problem with it. When I was 23 I had a relationship with a 49 year old and saw no issue, but my parents flipped out. I couldn’t understand why back then but now I do.

Anonymous wrote:

Maybe it’s different for men?

I think it is. Probably has something to do with the big age differences you see in tv and movies. Old men with very young girls. Gives people he idea that it is normal and ok.

My 15th and 16th summers, I lifeguarded at our community pool where I had a very flirtatious relationship with a 30 year old family acquaintance. We'd spend time together during my breaks and after my shifts, just talking and playing video games in the lodge. He often tried to get me to leave with him (to where, I can't remember), but I was very naive and lacked self confidence so refused. But for some reason he emboldened me to discuss things I'd like to try sexually. Just thinking about him now is making my stomach flutter!

For 2 summers, he'd always come to the pool alone when I was working. Then, once I took someone's shift and he was there with his kids. I suddenly felt sorry for his wife and shortly thereafter I quit working there.

My DH and I had 2 kids of our own by the time I was 30, and remember thinking what if DH was like Barry? (He even had a creeper name, now that I think about it!) Now I wonder if he even had a job, as he was at the pool so often.

When I was 17, my boyfriend was 27. At the time, like you, I didn’t feel negatively about it - felt very mature and felt that I was just as mature as him. We got together midway through my senior year after I was dumped by my first love, and it was totally a rebound thing. I didn’t even like him that much and we had almost nothing in common. But he was super sexy and I liked that he wanted me and that I got to be grown up. There were aspects that were not good, such as being unable to take my boyfriend to my prom (or having him give a damn about my prom), but mostly I was hurting and he made me feel better.

In retrospect, I feel suspicious of a nearly 30yo who wants to be with a high school girl. I would assume he was immature and in the case of my boyfriend, that was probably true. I knew that when I was 17 too. I just didn’t care then. I wonder what my mom thought. She’d basically accepted that I was moving out in a couple months and never told me not to see him or anything. My dad didn’t even know.

That said, I’m happily married to someone who is 8 years older than me, and occasionally I freak him out by reminding him that I was in 4th grade when he was a senior etc. I don’t think we are all that different but we definitely would have been when I was 17 and he was 25.

OP again. To think about having sex with a 17 year old boy is just so gross and wrong to me. I would consider him a child.

Maybe it’s different for men?

If you had sex with an adult when you were still a minor, what do you think about it now that you’re an adult?

When I was 17 I had a sexual relationship with a family friend. He was married and in his 30s at the time. At the time I honestly considered myself a grownup and didn’t think anything of it for years. But now that I’m in my thirties and I have a daughter...I don’t know, it’s kind of shocking. What surprises me most the cavalier attitude I had towards it for so long.

What about you? Big deal? No big deal?