How much do you hide your sex life from grown children and older teenagers?

[proverbs519man]

My oldest is only 6 but even so, I have no desire to hide anything from my children anymore than I would anyone else. Obviously I am doing things privately in that I don't think I should be having intercourse in the living room while the kids are playing.

But I'm not going to worry about noise. I mean whatever comes naturally. I also expect they will figure out that mom and dad spend a lot of time behind closed doors. So if they want to put two and two together and figure out we have a lot of sex, well that is just a positive example.

Back in the days of the Bible, people lived in small houses or tents so this modern notion of privacy is a bit weird. They obviously had to come up with some system just to keep people from watching them. It's not like tents locked. So I'm guessing they had some way to signal to others (which would equal the whole community) that they were having sex. Something on the tent entrance or something. So I think the whole idea that people would be able to keep frequency of sex a secret is not something I think they had the "luxury" of in the past.

To be honest, I'm not sure if it benefits anyone that this is currently the case. It makes it hard to have accountability. Imagine if you knew what couples in your church were having frequent sex versus not. It certainly would inform you on their attitudes about such things, and you might even bring it up (hey, is your spouse ok with the fact you seem to have sex once a month?).

There's always this sort of balance of freedom/security and privacy/accountability. And we've gone way too far on the privacy side. It's one reason porn thrives.

But I do not want my sons to have any privacy regarding their sexual journey pretty much, so it would be highly hypocritical for me to want privacy myself.

I'm also the weird guy that will randomly bring up to men, "how's your sex life." Because it's such a critical part of life. And no they don't always have to answer but you'd be surprised how many helpful conversations I can have where I have helped restored marriages simply because I asked a question no one else would.

[DoveGrey]

I think this is a huge issue. And something churches probably need to have more conversations about. Society's idea about marriage is that you have to wait until everything is settled to settle down. We send kids to college, (and you should't get married until you finish school). Then they graduate with crippling debt, housing prices are crazy, wages don't feel like they have nearly risen with other costs over the decades. It doesn't feel right to get married with this sort of financial commitment hanging over the marriage so they wait longer. And as much as we don't challenge this secular/modern life plan, we are asking our kids to not have sex until late 20's at best. It's no wonder it's not working. I think there are pieces of that script we need to figure out how to reject and help our kids be able/ready to get married sooner if the right opportunity is there.

I agree wholeheartedly with this!


As for us, I wouldn't say we actively hide it. Our kids (19, 16) are usually awake when we're having sex. We do a lot of family socializing in our bedroom, and I'm sure they've figured out what it means when our door is closed. If a locked-out cat tries to get in the room, the kids aren't trying to let it in. We try to mask the noise because that's just good manners in our opinion. But I'm sure they've heard us.

Plus, we're hugging and holding hands a lot in front of them. Our own parents never showed physical affection growing up. We wanted to set a different example.

[Seekingjoy93]

Having grown up in a church community where any display of romantic love was basically considered wrong and personally experiencing the effects of these false teachings, I determined that my kids would have a different experience. My kids aren’t teenagers yet but I definetely hope that when they are they will continue to see our expressions of love. Of course I believe that most sexual activity needs to happen in privacy but things like Kissing, hugging, touching and other expressions of our love are very visible to them.

[newwifenewlife]

...
I'm also the weird guy that will randomly bring up to men, "how's your sex life." Because it's such a critical part of life. And no they don't always have to answer but you'd be surprised how many helpful conversations I can have where I have helped restored marriages simply because I asked a question no one else would.

In my opinion, a majority of the time, a couples sexual relationship is a thermometer (maybe barometer is a better word?) of a couple's relationship and while I don't typically ask it straight out like you do, I can pretty accurately discern over time what is or isn't happening in the marriage bed based on other conversations and observations I or my wife have had with others. Many times our discerning thoughts comes out later to be true. Dad always said "Son, truth and time go hand in hand" and I've found that truth to be an axiom to bank on.

I commend you on your willingness to have the conversations because as I said, sex or no sex in a marriage for couples in their 20-70's is typically an indicator of emotional and relational health, so having conversations about it will usually lead to bring up unhealthy or problem areas in the relationship when strife is there and sexual intimacy is lacking, which usually means emotional intimacy is lacking as well.

[proverbs519man]

This is very true.

It's not like the solution to, "My wife doesn't have as much sex as I want," is to just drag her to bed and tell her to perform her duty. Often the reason why the wife doesn't want as much sex has something to do with the husband's behavior. And in situations when it doesn't, it has to do with some emotional baggage or sinful attitude on the part of the wife.

So it's usually just part of a much bigger situation and not something on its own. If both spouses are content with the sex life, the marriage is probably in a good shape overall. It's hard to have a good sex life with a major problem at the same time.

[Guybrush]

Both DW and myself didn’t discuss sex with our parents. It wasn’t the done thing in those days. We haven’t really discussed the topic with our now grown up two boys, so clearly our upbringing has rubbed off in our own family communications.
I do remember DW telling me to keep my voice down when they were at home, so we obviously did our best not to share any detail of our moments together.

[vazny]

To be honest, I'm not sure if it benefits anyone that this is currently the case. It makes it hard to have accountability. Imagine if you knew what couples in your church were having frequent sex versus not. It certainly would inform you on their attitudes about such things, and you might even bring it up (hey, is your spouse ok with the fact you seem to have sex once a month?).

I'm afraid that many had sex only if they wanted children, certainly in Catholic countries. And that only very rarely, when the children were sleeping on the stove, small in bed with their parents. Just quickly and under the covers. Anything above this could be considered an undesirable pleasure and vice. After the often very hard work, I don't think there was much thought about it. Once a week, once a month.

Even my wife's great-grandfather lived as a master shoemaker in the suburbs of the capital in one room - a workshop with children, apprentices and sometimes journeymen. And there was also a stove and a kitchen where his wife cooked for everyone. During the day there was shoemaking, customers were received, everyone got soup. At night they cleaned up and slept on benches. In the corner was a bed where the master and his wife slept with their small children. When it wasn't necessary, it didn't heat up at night.

Many Christian leaders and pastors still think this way today, emphasizing that our world is over-sexualized.

On the other hand, Judaism considers sex a man's duty (not a right) and women could have the frequency specified in the ketubah - the marriage contract. On other hand woman must be separated from man during whole menstruation + next 7 days until she is cleaned in mikvah.

"The woman's right to sexual intercourse is referred to as "onah", and it is one of a wife's three basic rights (the others are food and clothing), which a husband may not reduce. The Talmud specifies both the quantity and quality of sex that a man must give his wife. It specifies the frequency of sexual obligation based on the husband's occupation, although this obligation can be modified in the ketubah (marriage contract). A man may not take a vow to abstain from sex for an extended period of time, and may not take a journey for an extended period of time, because that would deprive his wife of sexual relations. In addition, a husband's consistent refusal to engage in sexual relations is grounds for compelling a man to divorce his wife, even if the couple has already fulfilled the halakhic obligation to procreate.

Although sex is the woman's right, she does not have absolute discretion to withhold it from her husband. A woman may not withhold sex from her husband as a form of punishment, and if she does, the husband may divorce her without paying the substantial divorce settlement provided for in the ketubah." ( https://www.jewfaq.org/kosher_sex )

Talmud, Ketubot 61b: “The times for conjugal duty prescribed in the Torah are: for men of independent means, every day; for laborers, twice a week; for donkey drivers, once a week; for camel drivers, once in thirty days; for sailors, once in six months.” ( https://www.myjewishlearning.com/articl ... -pleasure/ )

[proverbs519man]

Jewish culture didn't get this out of a vacuum though, this is clearly the Biblical culture.

While Judaism has its share of problems, one thing it didn't adopt so much is the ascetism approach that infiltrated the Christian approach based on influences from worldly culture at the time. Paul speaks about this, but it sadly didn't seem to resonate.

What's funny is our world really isn't over-sexualized. It is sexually repressive against Biblical sexuality. The current climate actually both overestimates sex in some ways and vastly underestimates it in others. We still aren't comfortable with sex, which is why shocking and provocative stuff works. We still feel we are rebelling against something to be sexual. It's a mess.