Last winter, Mandy Proton and her fiancé were at her family’s home for Christmas, cuddling on their sides.
After listening to make sure everyone else was asleep, they began doing the deed — immediately after which Proton realized that her mother was across the hall, brushing her teeth.
When the bed squeaks — because it always does at some point — one of us will loudly cough as a means to disguise the truth.
- Mandy Proton
“I don’t know if she heard anything,” says Proton, 35. “I don’t ever want to know.”
Still, “I like the thrill of having sex at Mom and Dad’s over the holidays,” says the newly married Proton.
The East Village blogger explains that’s because “it reminds me of when I was in high school and my boyfriend and I would wait until my mom dozed off in the family room, so we’d go at it in the living room at the other end of the first floor.”
Heading home for the holidays typically means singing festive carols, enjoying wholesome cooking — and, for those traveling with a significant other, having sex on the sly. Although getting on the naughty list has its allure, nobody wants to be caught by parents or face uncomfortable stares at the breakfast table the next morning.
Proton says she’s not as brazen these days as she was when she was a teenager. To avoid detection, she and her husband have sex in the bedroom after both of her parents go to sleep.
“We’ve worked out a system in which we’re extremely quiet and always do it on our sides,” she says. “When the bed squeaks — because it always does at some point — one of us will loudly cough as a means to disguise the truth.”
Francesca, 30, a model who lives on the Lower East Side and asked that her last name not be used, employs a different tactic.
She says that during family holidays her ultimate sex-on-vacation savior is setting the alarm for 2 a.m. That’s when the house is quiet — save for her and her husband “doing the deed in the shower.”
While it might seem silly for grown adults to go to such lengths to put up a sexless charade, experts say it’s perfectly normal to feel uncomfortable getting busy at mom and dad’s.
“Many of us revert to [behaving like] children or teens when we’re back at our family’s home,” says relationship expert Andrea Syrtash, co-author of “It’s Okay to Sleep With Him on the First Date: And Every Other Rule of Dating Debunked.”
Francesca’s ultimate sex-on-vacation savior is setting the alarm for 2 a.m. That’s when the house is quiet.
She continues: “Let’s face it, you don’t want your mom and dad to think about you getting down, just like you don’t want to think of them getting naked!”
Andrew Pincus, a consultant from Hell’s Kitchen, really doesn’t want his in-laws to have to think about him naked with their daughter.
Earlier this year, he married his girlfriend of six years, but the two still sleep in separate bedrooms when they visit her family.
“Secrecy and tacit respect for the house rules goes a long way,” he says.
If it’s all too awkward, Maria Avgitidis, 29 and a matchmaker, at Agape Match, suggests checking in to a hotel — or, better yet, an Airbnb.
“[There’s] nothing more festive,” she says, “than holiday sex in front of a stranger’s tree.”