Maybe it’s my age showing, and the fact that I don’t have kids. I thought casual hook-ups weren’t supposed to involve your children. I’m so out of touch.
Does it matter that she didn’t seem to think it was casual? I think she was seriously daddy/husband shopping, though maybe not in the most rational or healthy manner. As with most relationships that originate on the internet, she talked to this guy for a while. She “thought she knew him” well enough for all this to go down. My feeling is, you don’t bring the kids to meet someone until you’re sure he’s going to be in their lives. I mean, how many times can you introduce them to a new guy you’re shagging? Show some restraint, offer them some stability in this chaotic time. They’re going through a divorce too, for god’s sake.
If she thinks she can know somebody from only talking to them on the internet, that’s a serious issue in itself.
You mean…you mean you don’t know me?
<sobs>
This woman is whacked. It’s everything–it’s the drive; it’s the first date; it’s the no concept of babysitter; it’s the risky behavior for the whole family; it’s the trapping of the kids into a scenario that they cannot remove themselves from; it’s the sex in the next room with a total stranger (near enough)…one wonders what the ride home was like.
Poor kids. Stupid mother.
You can put me firmly in DianaG’s camp. I also don’t see the reason to bring your kids on a first date. Not because they hamper you or anything, but really, kids need permanence and I see no reason why they need to see the guy every time the mom is thinking of dating. The man can be introduced to the kids later, when things are a little more settled down, and if it looks like he’s going to be around for the long haul. I really think it’s bad for kids to have people coming in and out of their lives sporadically.
What if the kids were 4 and 5? Would it be better or worse? They’d be less likely to know what was going on, that’s for sure, but does that mitigate it at all?
One also wonders what the next onversation with their dad was like. “Oh, yeah, so Mom took us to New Jersey to visit a new friend. We stayed over…<blah blah blah>” Even if they didn’t know anything about the sex, that there is pretty effed up.
I feel badly for the lot of them. I hope she gets to feeling less desperate soon.
Some mommies and daddies live in apartments with pressboard doors. Just sayin’.
Not that I don’t think this situation was ill-advised, but IMO the problem isn’t the sex per se, it’s the dragging kids four hours in order to have sex. As others have said, it indicates that the mom is not in top form, and I’d view this as a likely symptom of many other ways in which mom is probably flailing about post-divorce. The ‘harm’ to her kids here is that she’s obviously too self-centered at the moment to make good choices with their best interests in mind.
That, to me, is the real test. She was sitting there, rationalizing the whole thing, but what I wanted to say to her was, “Imagine, just picture, if your ex-husband brought the kids to some strange woman’s house who he met on the internet, and banged her while your kids were in the next room.”
I had the feeling she wouldn’t have liked it very much; who would? I’m sure outrage would have been her reaction. I kinda wish I had said it, but I didn’t want to get into a verbal altercation with a stranger over a meal.
If I was one of the kids: Well, at 4 or 5, if my mother said “…We’re going to go visit a friend of mommy’s…” that probably would have been enough for me. Possibly at 8, but definitely by 10, I would’ve had a really bad gut feeling that the guy was more of a “stranger” than a “known friend” and it would have creeped me out and set off all the danger alarms from watching too many after-schools specials.
If I was the guy: A woman that I had only ever met online, bringing her kids along with with her for a four hour drive to have sex with me would make me think she was a wingut. I’d probably also worry that it was a deliberate ploy to screw-'n-tell. Kids would probably mention it to dad, dad blows a gasket, I’m smack in the middle of divorce warfare? No thanks.
As a random person on the SDMB: Taking your kids out of state so you can bring them along for your rebound screw with a total stranger, who could be an axe murder for all you know, is a really lousy idea. I’d be a little shocked by it, if any of my friends displayed such poor decision-making abilities.
Would you say “no thanks” before she came up, or after? Or after another weekend of hijinks, like her erstwhile friend? I mean, yeah, she’s obviously a wingnut, but you could bust a nut, right? Is probably what this guy’s attitude was.
Hmm… I can see the guy’s point of view. And if he had no advance warning that she was bringing her kids with her, he probably figured: “What the hell, she’s already here…”
But personally, I’d think she was nuts and would be turned off by the potential for bigtime drama. (A strong potential for hysterics/stalking/fist-fight with ex-husband) is SO unsexy!)
No, she told him she was bringing her kids. He was OK with it. I think that’s part of why she was so optimistic about it working out. Though it could have worked out that they were hanging from meat hooks in his walk-in cooler. Heh. Well, in that respect, it worked out for her, eh?
Younger kid, whispering to older kid: “What’s that smell?”
Older kid: “That is the smell of shame.”
I was in a situation similar to this. Except I was at her house with her kid, mom, and a friend. We were in our late teens and did it with everyone asleep in the next rooms over (mom in her room, friend in the living room, no idea where the kid was) He was only like 2 or 3 though so it was a little different situation. I probably still would have hit it if I was the guy, and I thought the kids were asleep.
Could she be reported to social services for something like this? At the very least, you would think the children’s dad would like to know. It really does seem like engaging in really high risk behavior (not the sex per se, but taking kids to a guy you met on the internet’s house that’s 4 hours away).
Really? He was comfortable with a woman brining her kids along for a booty call? Ick.
I’m betting he figured he wouldn’t get any that weekend. Wouldn’t you?
True enough.
She needs to learn how to internet date. Your first meeting is a meet-and-greet, in a public, neutral place, with both people driving their own cars, and NO KIDS. Sure, you’ve emailed and chatted and talked on the phone, but you don’t know someone until you’ve met them (and even then, you’ve just met them). That’s a basic fact of life of internet dating.