First, on mobile, apologies for weird formatting. I (19F) am currently a sophomore in college. I set up a catch-up dinner with my high school mentor (37M) who was my US History teacher during my junior year of High School, as he would be in town for a conference. We had bonded during high school over a shared love of history. We had a previous catch up lunch my freshman year of college and nothing untoward happened then.
Tonight was going well as we had dinner, walked around the neighborhood the restaurant was in, and then went back to campus where we sat on steps in one of the “quads” on campus. We talked for a while before he opened up to me about problems with his marriage, as his wife and him were trying for children and had gone through an unsuccessful round of fertility treatments and now were going through the adoption process. He seemed to imply that the marriage may end and so I felt bad and essentially said it’s hard to get through the storm when you’re in the middle of it and you’ll end up where you’re meant to be when it passes. After this, sprinklers started to go off and this was a natural wrap up for the conversation.
I was joking around and offered to, “be a gentleman”and walk him back to his car. He laughed and on our way to his car he offered to have me stay in the hotel room that he would be staying in. I refused a few times while saying that I had assignments to finish before family weekend where I would be out with my family all weekend to my roommate would freak if she woke up and I wasn’t there to I prefer to sleep in my own bed and used my sister refusing to share beds as a comparison. While discussing this he said that ‘nothing would happen…unless i wanted it too’. At this point everything in my mind just became a big question mark and I awkwardly laughed it off.
At this point we had arrived at his car and we said to meet at 9am tomorrow for breakfast at a place on campus. I gave him a quick and brief hug before saying goodbye and heading back to my apartment on campus. I didn’t know what to make of the situation so I told my roommate (20F, also a sophomore) everything and she said that everything that happen with the hotel room was inappropriate and I should not go to breakfast. I still didn’t know how to make heads or tails of what happened so she said I should call my older sister (23F). My sister said the same thing my roommate said and helped me come up with a way to cancel breakfast tomorrow.
I don’t know if I’m in shock from what happened as this is completely out of character for my teacher and it legitimately came out of nowhere. I know logically I am probably being obtusely naïve and stupid, but because of my mentor I was able to regain my academic ambitions. My mentor was one of the only teachers who I really felt able to talk to and felt like I had a good mentorship with. I cannot express how extremely out of character this is for him and I don’t think I am being targeted as I know he keeps up with other former students from high school. I just don’t know what to do and I am legitimately dumbfounded. Confounded. Every synonym for perplexed there is. I really need advice please on what to do.
TLDR; Mentor may have made inappropriate proposition during our catch-up and I don’t know what I should do. I am also probably being stupid about this.
15 comments
I would meet for breakfast and let him know his comments are out of line for the mentor relationship you thought you had with him. If you are not comfortable with his response then thank him for his time and let him know you will no longer be in contact and hope he has a great life.
A catch up dinner with my hs mentor.. There’s the first red flag 🚩
i would skip breakfast, the next time you study with him have a conversation about how he crossed a boundary with his comments and keep any further communications between the two of you strictly business, if he is unable to then time to find a new mentor. he crossed the line in a big way, and he knew what he was doing.
Yeah he did. That was him shooting his shot after his “feel bad for me” story.
Absolutely inappropriate. Ew. Cut or minimize all contact.
I think your roommate is right. He was trying to hit on you and it was very inappropriate. I do not think you should go to the breakfast – I think you should cut contact.
He may very well have done this to other young women, some of the others that he has kept in contact with.
Sadly, his kindness to you over the years may have been entirely motivated by his inappropriate attraction to you.
He’s a 37 year old married man. He KNOWS that it’s inappropriate to proposition a 19 year old young woman who looks up to him. His pathetic excuse about there being stress in his marriage is as old as the hills, and a classic trotted out by many adulterers.
I know it’s horrible to face up to this, but I think you have to accept that you’ve been used here, and he isn’t the nice caring man that you think he is.
You don’t owe him anything. You would have achieved your success in life without his help.
He was absolutely asking you back to his hotel for sex and no, that is in no way appropriate for many reasons. When you hear from him next (and you will) you need to decline to meet or talk to him because “asking me back to your hotel was inappropriate and made me very uncomfortable.” Do not allow him to explain. Keep repeating “It was inappropriate.” He will gaslight the hell out of you and try to make you think he did nothing wrong. He did. He was absolutely asking for sex. And he had no business doing that, or bringing you into his marital problems. Do not entertain any conversation with him. Just tell him he was inappropriate and cut him off.
There are regular safeguarding training for many professionals including teachers in many parts of the world. It may have been a spur if the moment thing but he should have backed off and applied as soon as you said no. He overstepped the mark by a mile and should have understood the power imbalance. This is not acceptable behaviour and needs to be called out. You say he has lots of relationships with former students, I wonder how many times he has done the same thing before and if he has subsequently followed through.
He absolutely propositioned you. This is a mentor (power dynamic) who you trust because of his support and understanding of your interests and potential futures. I really hope it is out of character because it is EXTREMELY INAPPROPRIATE. If he thinks it was not, then he has been grooming you. You are protecting him. This grown ass man has plenty of options to get support and work through his personal issues with someone who is NOT you (someone qualified to help him). Yet he took the opportunity to fish for physical intimacy with you. He is NOT trustworthy (I cannot speak to if he was trustworthy before). Please do not go to breakfast.
>he said that ‘nothing would happen…unless i wanted it too’
What an absolute scoundrel. I feel sorry for his wife, and you OP. This is not on. And this is not a respectful way to treat a friend or mentee. Imagine you being his age and saying that to a 19-year-old boy who looked up to you? No.
Trust your gut feeling. This isn’t acceptable.
I am so sorry this happened to you. He’s scum and I’m not sorry for saying that.
You are very smart and you did the right thing. Also, how amazing is your support system?! Your roommate and sister have excellent heads on their shoulders.
No is a complete sentence and you shouldn’t have felt the need to justify why you didn’t want to go back to his room. It’s a shame that our daughters (I have a kid your age) are still doing the same things we had to do.
Cut him off and never speak to him again. It’s okay to be shocked and confused by this because what he did was despicable. You don’t owe him anything because he contributed to your academic success- that was his job as a teacher.
The best of assumptions of him would be that he is at a severely low emotional point and struggling in his most significant personal romantic relationship and made a stupid, inappropriate comment. Why? He’s not in his right mind. He could be testing the waters because he probably does find you attractive. I’m really sorry that this happened op, that’s horribly uncomfortable and damaging to your relationship.
It may have been a stupid thing he said in a low-low point, maybe something he had no intention of acting on, but it was so over the line. On the flip side, he could be a creep. You know him, but take into account that traumatic events do change people and he may be a different man after all that’s happened and after you are now of legal age…
You could go to breakfast, keep things professional, and make no mention unless he says something. You could go and confront him, immediately setting the boundary. You don’t have to go though, and you don’t need to even give him a reason for not going because he would very likely already know.
Dinner was already grey. Everything that happened after dinner (the walk etc) is inappropriate for the type of relationship you (should) have with him. The hotel conversation is the cherry on the top.
I know it sucks but please cut all connections with him. It will save you a lot of more hurt.
This is creepy as shit, and I’m sure you’re not the first he’s tried it on. I’m sorry it happened.
So are you going to go to breakfast anyway even though every person is telling you it is inappropriate and he was hitting on you? Because its extremely inappropriate and he definitely wanted to have sex with you. There’s no other reason to invite someone back to a hotel room in that situation, you are being very naive.