No right or wrong answer here, just curious. Our son is a rising college senior and has been in a serious relationship with his girlfriend this past school year. They essentially lived together this past semester. Both are driven, goal-oriented, strong students. He recently visited her in another state and stayed with her in her room. She is coming for a visit this week and we have a guest room, but my son wants her to stay in his room. We’re torn, but I’m not even sure why. Our kids are very open with us and we weren’t born yesterday, but for some reason I’m mildly uncomfortable with it while they’re still in college, though that doesn’t really make sense, because I know they basically lived/slept together this past semester. We also have a rising college sophomore at home. Just curious as to what others do/how they handle it…Again, no right or wrong answer here, just looking for perspectives!
Edited to add: My kids are really respectful, and our son will respect what we decide, but it feels somewhat disingenuous to be a stickler about this, when we talk openly about what they do elsewhere. Also, I always WANT my college/adult children to want to come home and bring their significant others, friends, etc…
Yep, my kids slept in the same room with their SO’s when they visited. I’m pretty sure they were sleeping together while they were at college 
so it seemed silly to me no to.
Yes - because they already do.
Interestingly though, at my daughter’s bf house or grandparents house, they sleep in separate rooms and we’re told we can never mention, when we meet them, we allow this.
hmmmmm - I can’t imagine they’re that dumb. They visit each other every semester - so 2x - and my daughter is spending a month with him right now - through his graduation.
I choose to be a realist.
Hi. Our daughter has been in a serious relationship for 3 years. She is also a rising senior. She has been in a serious relationship for 3 years with a boy she met in high school (although they were “best friends” in high school and started dating when they went to college, so have known each other well for 5 years) He is at a school in our area and she is away at school. He has an apartment here, his parents moved out of state. It was obvious that if we did not welcome him here, they would just stay at “his place”. We love him, he is sweet, respectful, hard working, all the good stuff.
At this point, they choose to stay here when she is home and they plan to move in with us after graduation, as they settle - which we love - we have room for them, and we know they will both find jobs and save money for a year or two.
It was weird at first, but we think its part of parenting an “adult” child, and we are so glad that our daughter will continue to confide in us, choose to spend time at home whenever she can, and we have an “inside” view of the relationship.
Yes, agreed, I ALWAYS want my (adult/emerging adult) kids to want to come home and always share/confide in us. I pride myself on my relationships with my kids, so this really resonates. Thanks for sharing.
I think that after the first night you (and maybe, they) will not feel awkward anymore. And I think you’ll be glad you treated them like the adults they are!
When my daughter (now 30) and her long time boyfriend have visited us, they stayed in separate rooms. My daughter has never asked for him to be in her room, I think she would feel uncomfortable in our home sharing a bed with her boyfriend.
Yes and on a regular basis, 3 of my kids have had SO’s sleep over. My oldest dated her lady boyfriend for 7 years, dd19 has been dating hers since college orientation. His home is 1 1/2 hours from here but he’s at grad school in Florida, my daughter in Boston, so they frequently stay at their childhood homes and visit each other, as well as flying to each other’s college state. Ds16 and his girlfriend stay here when they go to Hoboken or NYC. In HS dd19’s boyfriend lived a half hour away. I was convinced he was gay so I let him stay over. I think I was right about him being gay, but I think my daughter confirmed it for him.
An idea:
You could always be very upfront with your child that you are going to give their SO the guest room (so they have a place to put their stuff and space to spread out) while also making it very clear that you aren’t the room police and if the SO doesn’t want the extra space, you won’t be inquiring about where SO and son are sleeping at night or keeping their stuff (no hall or room patrols).
That might satisfy both any sense of propriety while also making it clear you see your child as an adult and aren’t judging their choices.
^^^ to me and FOR me, this makes me feel like a “dare ya!”
It’s a personal choice for sure what you feel you are advocating or not advocating by encouraging to share or not share a room but also if you are considered about intimacy happening in your home, well they very well may not but may just enjoy being close and having those great before bed and in the morning conversations about their visit and such.
Yes we did. His parents didn’t. One guess where they preferred to stay ;).
If this was directed towards my idea, some context:
All three of my children read voraciously and my two oldest read tons of regency era romance novels. We’ve discussed the bedroom hopping in those books: at regency era house parties each room would have the name of the person staying at the door which helped facilitate easy movement for those preferring ‘alternate’ accommodations at night. All of us found this hilarious…manners and morals intersect in strange ways at times.
Not a “dare ya” at all, more a nod to the idea of propriety to satisfy any moral objection while also acknowledging that adults can and will make their own choices which don’t need to be monitored after hours. That’s why I suggested clarity to the son if parents decided to go that direction. Giving SO more room for her belongings as the stated reason for the room…and then MYOB when it comes to how rooms are actually used.
I’m assuming this is a typo. If not, I am intrigued…
Omg she’d find this typo hysterical!
I did think of this, and my husband and I entertained this idea, but then I felt like I’d prefer us to just have open, honest, adult conversations because, as with all of their life choices, I want them to be honest with us, not just act, or pretend to act, how they think we want them to…
Yes, agreed.
I didn’t let my oldest have her boyfriend stay in her room because I didn’t want her younger sisters to think they could have boyfriends overnight. And I let the youngest because I had chilled out a lot by then. And my oldest will never let me forget it! (They are all happily married now.) It also depends on the space available. We really didn’t have space when the oldest was in college, but we did once the older two moved out.
I was way stricter with my oldest, by the time #4 and #5 came around… #3 actually had her boyfriend sleep over before #1, my oldest wasn’t allowed to have boys in her room when she was in HS. She does have some resentment.
The short answer is no, not while in our home, which is totally hypocritical on our part. Firstly, her bf of 4 years lives in our city, albeit on the other side, which is 35-45 minutes away depending on traffic, so it’s pretty rare that he stays here unless they are doing something on our side of town that runs really into the early a.m., or if we are leaving early to go on a family vacation (more on that later). We have two empty guest rooms, and he stays in one of those.
Now for the hypocritical part. When we go on family vacations (he always comes with us), they do stay together. At first, H was adamant on booking them separate rooms but then I ran the math by him on how much we could save if they shared a room (a very significant amount for a week-long vacay), and he (very begrudgingly) agreed. Giving in to them staying together on vacations deflated him a bit as he would like to abide by some form of standard for his daughter. As a concession for this, I let my daughter know that on the rare times that her bf does stay at our house, he sleeps in the guest room (to her credit, she’s never fought me on them staying together in any scenario). I think this makes my H feel better about it.
They will both be seniors in college and obviously stay together when they visit each other. They also just returned from a semester study abroad in the same country and traveled all over Europe, so obviously stayed together a lot.
In order to retain some modicum of fatherly honor, my H does make a big deal of requiring their vacation hotel rooms have two beds 
I haven’t come across this issue yet but I hated sharing a room with my then boyfriend (now husband) at his parents’ home. It felt weird to me, despite the fact that we practically lived together on campus.