AITA for inviting our oldest daughter over for Christmas eve dinner with the stipulation that her cheating boyfriend can’t join?

A Redditor faces a tough decision about family boundaries this holiday season. After learning that their daughter’s boyfriend of three years had an online affair, they invited their daughter to Christmas Eve dinner but stipulated that her boyfriend couldn’t attend. While the family collectively agreed with the decision, the daughter expressed hurt, feeling it undermined her efforts to rebuild trust in her relationship. Was this an unfair exclusion, or a reasonable boundary? Read on for the details.

‘ AITA for inviting our oldest daughter over for Christmas eve dinner with the stipulation that her cheating boyfriend can’t join?’

I’m 56 (F) my husband is 60 (M), our oldest daughter is 30 (F), our son is 28 (M) and our younger daughter is 26 (F). For privacys sake we’ll call our oldest daughter Kate, our son Sam and our younger daughter Mary. We’ll call Kate’s boyfriend James. So Kate has been with James for almost 3 years. They currently live together. We always had family get togethers during holidays and he attended along with Kate.

He always seemed very kind, polite, mature and down to earth. His family is very nice too. He and Kate seemed so happy and seemed to click so well. From what she shared, they had excellent communication and never fought and we’re even discussing marriage. About 7 months ago Kate told me he had her ring finger measured at the jewelry store and she was so excited! So we’re we!

Unfortunately 4 months ago, I found out from a friend’s daughter that he was having an online affair (long story). The family informed Kate, she apparently confronted James and he broke down crying and gave her all the details. From what Kate shared, he gave her full disclosure, did not blame her for anything, took ownership and he is currently getting individual counseling. He wants to work through it as does she. They’re still together.

She told me he’s going above and beyond for her to make it up to her. I cautioned her in case he does it again. She told me he promised her he wouldn’t and apparently can’t believe himself why he even did it in the first place. He reached out to me and my husband and apologized to us. He was in tears.

With Christmas Eve coming up our usual family holiday dinner is approaching. It’ll be me, my husband, Sam, his girlfriend, Mary, her husband, and hopefully Kate. I invited Kate but told her that this year we can’t invite James. She seemed very upset. Apparently the past two months they’ve been rebuilding things, went out on a romantic getaway, James is still getting counseling, gives her undivided attention and support.

She said he acknowledged that it’ll take a long time for trust to build back up. She told me if she attends without him this year she’ll feel like a third wheel among all the couples there. She said by not inviting him this year it feels like her family isn’t willing to give him another chance like she is. I’m not sure what to do at this point! I’ve spoken to everyone else and they’re all on board with not inviting him. AITA?

See what others had to share with OP:

TheHatOnTheCat −  INFO: Why didn’t you invite James? I understand he cheated on your daughter, that’s not the answer I’m looking for. My question is what is the reason you didn’t invite James and how do you expect it to play out?.

Examples: My husband and I are still too mad at James for betraying our daughter to be around him. Him being there will make us angry and we just don’t feel we can relax and be happy around James. I understand that Kate will feel bad if we exclude him, but we are excluding him for us and not for her. If Kate decides to go spend Christmas with James family instead so they can spend it together, so be it. What’s most important to me is not having to look at that bleep James.

I’m protecting our baby Kate. I don’t like that she’s chosen to forgive this c**ater, he dosen’t deserve that. I think she’s making a mistake. As Kate’s mother I know what’s best for her so I’ve decided that she’ll be happier at Christmas without James. Sure, Kate said she’ll be sad and feel like a third wheel, but I know her own mind better then her. I am doing this for Kate even though she says she dosen’t like it beacuse I don’t believe she understands herself.

Kate let James off too easily when James needs to be punished. By excluding James, we are punishing him so he has some consequence to his cheating. Yes, excluding him will also make Kate upset, but hurting Kate’s feelings is just the price we are willing to pay to hopefully hurt James’ feelings too. Assuming James cares a ton about hanging out with us, which he probably does beacuse we’re so awesome and it’s honestly a privilege to be around us.

CrimsonKnight_004 −  YTA – You need to be in your daughter’s corner right now. I’ve been through this with someone very close. Her partner cheated on her, in a way that went beyond online, and while we had disdain for the broken trust and betrayal, and made it clear that we did not expect her to just forgive him, that we’d 100% back her if she divorced him…we also let her know we’d respect her wishes no matter what she chose. Ultimately she is the one who was most hurt by this, and she gets to choose how to move forward.

She chose to forgive him. It took a lot of time to build that trust back up, we obviously couldn’t just forget what he’d done. Neither could she. But if she felt ready to bring him to family gatherings again, we would do our best to respect that and show her that we were in her corner no matter what and trusted her judgement.

I understand that this man hurt her, and that hurts you. But they are trying to heal. You may not agree with that right now, you may never agree with that. But I think doing this, excluding him when she wants him there, may keep the wound festering. Your daughter, the one most hurt, is trying to move forward. If she can stomach living with him after what he did to her, I think the rest of the family can stomach it for her happiness during the holiday.

happybanana134 −  What does excluding him achieve, really? It makes it harder for Kate to attend because she’ll feel conflicted about going without him, she feels unsupported re her relationship and her choices… I get why you don’t want him around, but I think you’re just going to push Kate away here.

GoingGreyer −  YTA. They are trying their very best to make this work and it sounds like the bf is doing sufficient to make your daughter happy and things are looking up for them. Why on earth would you want to exclude him? The only person who bestows forgiveness is your daughter and she has done this. Its nothing to do with you! That should be the end of it.

All you are doing by excluding him is ruining their Christmas, putting additional strain/stress on your daughter and her bf and getting to feel all holier than thou! Show some faith in your daughter as well as some Christmas spirit, please.

AzsaRaccoon −  I’m going to go with a different reason for YTA. Not inviting him alienates her. That means when she next needs support, she won’t turn to you. I’m making the assumption that he’s not a**sive but I’m going to use abuse as an example. When you have a child or friend who is in an a**sive relationship, you may wish to put your foot down and say “either you leave that person or I can’t be there for you.”

It could be for your own boundaries but frequently it’s to try to get the person to see they’re losing others and to leave the abuser. But it doesn’t work that way. Usually, that kind of action serves to further isolate the person being abused, which is what an abuser wants anyway. Basically, it removes alternative viewpoints from the person’s world.

So, if you want to make sure Kate has access to your alternative viewpoint of c**ater, paradoxically you have to actually keep him around. That way, she doesn’t have to choose and is thus more exposed to your position on whether his behaviour was or wasn’t acceptable.

I do agree in the end it’s her decision. But I just wanted to explain to you that if your intent is to help her see he’s not worth her time, excluding him will have the opposite effect. You have to include him so that she stays around and then sees other viewpoints and other possibilities.

Glittering_Joke3438 −  This reads like it’s actually “Kate” writing this to see if she is justified in being angry at her parents for not inviting the BF. Interesting how the OP skims over the details of the actual betrayal but goes into great detail with all the ways the boyfriend has worked so hard to make it better.

TrapezoidCircle −  YTA – boy oh boy has my family disliked some of my family member’s boyfriends.  They were always welcome with open arms on holidays, because the holiday is about family. Not necessarily “accepting” their boyfriends, but showing that even with a terrible boyfriend, the family member is still welcome. If that makes sense.

Some of these events even helped everyone form interventions, like, “Hey we all noticed Jess was a j**k to you when you spilled the soda, are they always like that? Let’s talk about it.” Now, we are old. Everyone married good people, so it all worked out. Sometimes we gossip about the bad ones “hey remember Jess, yikes!”  One day your daughters ex will be a joke, “dodged a bullet with that one!” And you can all have a laugh about how much he sucked.

Friendly-Kangaroo-80 −  NTA. I really can’t understand those who think you are TA. It’s your home and perfectly acceptable to not want someone there who will likely be a contributory factor to an uncomfortable mood. I support previous poster comments in that you should not write him or their relationship off, but right now you shouldn’t have to play happy families around a table if it’s with gritted teeth.

I’d tell my daughter she is welcome, at the moment he isn’t – that could change in the future. If she doesn’t want to join then that’s perfectly fine. You can revisit the relationship in the new year. I say this from a place of experience – my ex cheated on me. My parents would not have him in the house despite us trying to repair the relationship. I understood. And ultimately the relationship ended.

We are happily co parenting and divorced 10 years on and my parents welcome him now after showing up as a decent father and ex but as the guy who devastated a family – at the time he wasn’t welcome. And that’s ok.

CartoonistPrize8186 −  YTA. If she is choosing to work things out, making her choose between you and her partner is only hurting your daughter. I’m pretty sure her partner won’t be keen to face you, but she won’t want to rock the boat by uninviting him and will feel torn.

lllollllllllll −  YTA. B**t out of her relationship. You’re trying to make it harder for her to stay with this guy. But it’s not for you to decide whether she stays with him or not. Lots of inlaws don’t like each other but they still have to be cordial to each other.

What if they break up because of your pressure and she never meets anyone else, and spends the rest of her life blaming you? Do you want to be responsible for ruining her happiness? You might try to claim it was because of his online affair, but if they’ve moved past that, then to her it will still be because of you and she won’t forgive you. Let her make her own decisions. She knows better what’s best for herself.