Christmas is a great time for tradition. In the extended Sexton household these traditions never vary – whenever I go home I am guaranteed to eat too much food, fall over children running amok underfoot, have a squabble with at least one sister and be volunteered for dishes duty. Yippee. Worse still, I run the risk of being banished to the kid’s table if there are guests, as – being unencumbered with children of my own – my family don’t think I’m a proper grown-up. And of course they’re right!

Many years ago I realised that my family – lovely though they are – are too much of a liability to expose my boyfriends to them. However one Christmas my chap of the time, Chris, positively insisted it was time he met the parents. I acquiesced reluctantly: I just knew it was a bad idea, and so it proved.
All was going well until my younger brother, David, decided to take the poor bloke aside and give him one of those ‘if you mess with my sister, you mess with me’ chats, as if we were some kind of Sopranos-lite style clan.
This in itself was not so bad, seeing as David was a runty teenager back then, but I made the mistake of telling the rest of the family. A conversation ensued that I’ll never forget as long as I live. You’ll forgive a quick shift to the present tense.
Sally (older sister): Ha, ha, David should have been warning him against you. You change your boyfriends like underwear.
Chris looks confused. He’s under the illusion that I’m a nice girl, despite the fact that we’ve been shagging all over the city for months.
Father: It’s about time you settled down young lady. Your mother and I aren’t getting any younger. We’d like more grandchildren you know.
Chris looks terrified.
Mother, trying to be helpful: John, leave them alone. They are too young for that. I was the same at her age, you know, always plenty of men on the go. Of course, in those days, there was no sleeping around.
Father, getting annoyed: Sleeping around? What?
Father looks like he’s about to explode. Chris looks queasy.
Sally: I wonder why they use that term? There isn’t much sleeping involved.
Father, strangely distracted by this puzzle: Yes, I’ve always wondered about that myself. It’s quite the misnomer. Oh, that reminds me, I haven’t finished my crossword.
Father potters off…
Mother, making a joke: Anne, if you dump him, can I have him? I’d like a younger man! How old are you?
Chris: Twenty-five.
Mother: Oh, pity, too old for me. I’m looking for someone around twenty-one. Although you’re quite good-looking. I might just make an exception for you.
Chris actually thought my mother was serious until I disabused him of that notion. He then quizzed me repeatedly as to what my sister had been implying with the ‘change boyfriends like underwear’ comment. I don’t think our relationship ever recovered and I had my family to thank for it. After which I vowed never to take anyone to meet my parents – until Thomas that is.

So trust me: your family and your sex life ain’t a good mix. But for those brave – or foolhardy – enough to bring a partner home for Christmas, there are some things you can do to make the experience that much more enjoyable.
Once you’re over eighteen, your family probably suspects that you are no longer a blushing virgin. But whether they follow the ‘not under my roof’ line or are liberal enough to allow you and the man or woman in your life to share the same bedroom, I’ve learnt that the golden rule is not to advertise what you’re up to.
Even if you’re lucky enough to get a room to yourself, rather than being relegated to a foldout bed in the lounge, that doesn’t mean you’re free to engage in all the nookie you’d like. High jinks – or indeed high kinks – are almost verboten. How do you think the family would take to the sound of a spanking being dished out under their roof? Not a good idea, I think. Chances are there’ll be children in the next room, hyped up on sugar and too excited about Santa to sleep. And children – like dogs, she sniffed – have remarkably good hearing, therefore it’s important to be quiet. Even the tell-tale up and down squeak of bed-springs may be best avoided...
Your best bet is probably to have sex standing up, or to pull all the blankets and pillows on to the floor. Firstly, this avoids the squeaky bed issue and secondly, it’s fun.
Never, ever bring a sex toy of any kind home for Christmas – even if it’s a gift for someone else. Either your mother will have a good snoop while pretending to tidy your room, or your sister will find it while raiding your wardrobe and make off with it – or worse still your curious niece will chance upon it and bring it to the dinner table. (“Mummy, look what I found – a lovely pink plastic rabbit!”) Likewise, if you have to bring your laptop with you, remove any adult content you may have and clear the download history. It isn’t worth risking it. People have a way of happening to need to use your laptop to ‘do an email’ just at the moment when you have loads of porn files open...
One year I forgot to unpack a pair of handcuffs from my bag – a leftover from a dirty weekend before the festivities – and my nephew found them while rummaging in my bag for chocolates. Luckily they weren’t the furry kind and I managed a pretty good ‘fancy dress party, I went as a policewoman’ excuse. Unfortunately, my nephew, then just seven years old, demanded I play cops and robbers with him.
I might have got away with it, but at an inopportune moment my older sister arrived back, saw the handcuffs, went straight into mother mode, and demanded to know where the damn things had been and if they’d been cleaned thoroughly before her baby boy got his hands on them. Good lord! It’s not as if they had a load of sperm on them! My father, distracted by It’s a Wonderful Life, may not have noticed, but my mother is no fool. Embarrassing...
As much as I love my family, I have to admit that I prefer Christmas Day with just the man in my life. Besides the inevitable round of house parties and visitors, there’s nothing much to do except eat, drink and have sex – although preferably not in that order! My own favourite Christmas traditions are sleeping late, having sex under the tree and wandering around the house in lingerie, accessorised with a novelty hat.
It may not be a family Christmas – but that’s my idea of the best way to spend the most magical time of the year. Here’s to it!