I feel soo stressed

[CuteKitten]

Hi Scarleteen I suddenly feel soo stressed. So basically my laptop is getting fixed and I am sharing my mums laptop. For some reason she was looking at my emails on my email account (like that a bit weired) and then she found a l email to do with sexual content. Not graphic but descriptive actually it was a nice email I got from some I have been speaking to. I feel completely busted and worried. She called me to chat and I was stuttering and avoiding eye contact sweating visibly I can’t lie to save my life. Anyway the conversation has been dropped but I feel so exposed. Just looking for support and advice.

She wasn’t cross but still I am panicking inside as it’s rather personal. Like honestly I feel like my boundaries have been broken.

Like I want to have talks with my parents but under my terms if that makes sense? Not them looking at personal information and then chatting to me.

[Becky]

Hi CuteKitten!

This does sound stressful but it doesn't sound like you did anything wrong or that your mom is mad at you.

It can definitely feel very exposing and even a bit embarrassing to have people see into our personal sex lives... especially our parents!

It does sound strange that she would be looking through your personal emails. Did she give you any reason why she was doing that? Is it common for her to invade your privacy like this?

[CuteKitten]

Hi Becky thanks for the quick reply.
Um basically I think she does it occasionally to check I haven’t missed anything (not that I do know but sometimes did a few years back so maybes just a hangup from then.)

So basically I haven’t had sex yet but read up a lot listen to podcasts and chat to people with similar interests so I can be more prepared when I do. That includes all the good stuff like kinks and consent which was what the email she saw was about.

I just don’t know what to do if she bring it up again like I’m a such bad lier. Like I think she will dig deeper. I have scrambled to delete emails and search history but still. Like I have tried to be sneaky about all of this staying up u till after my parents are asleep and doing the good switch tabs trick.

[Becky]

I definitely think it would be fair to say something like "Mom, I appreciate you looking out for me but I'm an adult now and I don't want you looking through my personal email." If she pushes back on that, are you able to just use your phone for a while until your laptop gets fixed?

As for the content of the email, do you feel like you need to lie to her? Are you able to talk to her about sex at all? Or do you feel able to set a boundary with her about not discussing your private life/sexual interests with her?

[CuteKitten]

Hi agreed I do use my phone more than the laptop. I think that she will probably be open to talking about some topics. However what she saw was related to d/s with me being curious about submission. I think she will concerned about power dynamics particularly sexual. It more like this is really personal to me and know she knows

[Heather]

I want to back up Becky in saying that I think you deserve privacy. So, for starters, I would simply change your passwords so that things like your email are not things your mother can even access. I would go ahead and let her know that you don't want her looking through your emails or texts anymore, and that you're changing your passwords so that you can be assured of that privacy.

Depending on how much you do or don't want to talk to her about any of this, you can also simply let her know that she can find out about what parts of this part of your life you DO want to share with her by asking you and engaging in conversation with you instead of by reading your email. Like you said, you want to talk on your terms, and you 100% should be able to do that.

You also get to say something like, "I know you found out about some things about what I was sexually curious about in my email, but I that wasn't my choice and I feel a little violated. That feeling -- and my lack of choice -- makes me not really want to talk with you about what you read, so I'd like to ask you to just leave it" or something like that. You don't owe anyone, including your parent, information about your sexual life you do not want to share, nor conversation you don't want to have.