Bride uninivites dad's best friend's ENTIRE FAMILY from wedding; 'This is too emotional for me.' AITA?

When this bride hyperventilates when she sees who her ex-bf (the son of her dad's best friend) is bringing as his plus 1, she asks the internet:

"AITA for uninviting my dad’s best friend’s entire family from my wedding?"

I 28(f) got married to my best friend and the kindest man I have known last week after being together for 6 years. Everything was just downright perfect and beautiful, except for one tiny detail.

My ex from when I was 21 was my dad’s best friend’s son, we will call him “Max”. Max and I were friends for 8 years and dated for 3. We broke up shortly after my birthday after he cheated on me with some girl from his college.

I only found out when I visited him. He went on a rampage(ok exaggeration) but you get the point, and started saying that he was in LOVE with this girl and that he felt that I was manipulative.

Mind you this was also shortly after my miscarriage, I was pregnant and Max ignored any of my calls or texts for 2 weeks and didn’t even bother to show up at the hospital even after his sister informed him. He was pretty emotionally abusive which I only realised after I met my husband “Dennis”.

I am still close to the family of my dad’s best friend because they have been nothing but kind to me even though their son is a b&h. His mother always hyped me up when we were dating and even after we broke up. So I wanted them to be there, I asked my dad if it’ll be rude to leave out my ex from the invite that was going to the family as a whole.

My dad said it wouldn’t be rude but might come off as a little petty. Dennis didn’t see a problem with Max coming so he asked me to just invite the whole family +2 in case my ex and his brother wanted to bring someone along. (His sister has her medical exams so she already informed that she wouldn’t be able to participate)

I sent the invite and a week later they sent their RSVP. But I started to panic when I saw the name of the girl my ex-BF cheated on me with as his plus 1. It came as a shock because his mom told me that Max and this girl had broken up soon after college ended.

I was hyperventilating because somewhere it still hurts, he was the first guy I got really emotionally involved with and have only ever been with him and Dennis. I called my mom and dad and they asked me to just uninvite Max if his presence will ruin my big day and they’re sure his best friend’s family would understand.

I called up Max’s mom and explained to her how it was affecting me and she said that she’s doubtful it is possible since he still claims that he is no longer with that girl (she looks exactly like her, I could spot her even in a whole crowd).

But she understands and would talk to Max but thinks it is unfair to uninvite over something that happened over 7 years ago, I said “okay” and then proceeded to uninvite all of them over text.

My parents and brother think that I shouldn’t have uninvited all of them and what I did was rude and petty. Max’s mother and my dad’s best friend are also upset about my decision but they say that they understand and still sent me a wedding gift.

Some of the people in my dad’s circle are calling me and Dennis aholes and petty for not having the people who have only shown me kindness and loved me like one of their own. My best friend told me that I should just put it on reddit if I am still in two minds about what I did, so here I am. AITA?​​​​​​

Let's see what readers thought.

oceanbre writes:

Max’s mom told you she understood, but then said she thought it was “unfair” to uninvite him. So she obviously did NOT understand that her son cheating on you & on top of it bringing the girl he cheated with was wrong. No wonder you disinvited them. NTA.

Who tells a bride it’s “unfair” to not want the guy that cheated on you at your wedding?? And with the girl he cheated with?? If it was their daughter, you can bet she would feel differently.

They may be kind and love you, but regarding your wedding she definitely didn’t love you like her own.

So disrespectful that people in your dad’s circle are gossiping about it (middle school behavior), especially when the core reason Max’s family was disinvited they probably don’t even know. Congrats on your marriage, it sounds like you ended up with the right guy!

sss8a writes:

This is a tough one, but ESH - you more than everybody else. You made the initial mistake of inviting Max despite your inner turmoil on this. You let you parents and fiance talk you into this (that is their AH part) despite your misgivings.

And you could have invited everyone in the family but him by specifying that on the invite. It would have been petty, but understandable. But since you invited him, you cannot police who he is going to bring as a plus one.

Uninviting the whole family was an extreme overreaction, despite his mom probably lying to you that she did not remember the woman. I hope you can move on from this faux pas.

naugtclu writes:

YTA. It sounds like Max's family has been nothing but supportive participants in your life. It was stupid for you to extend the invitation to Max to begin with.

If it was a misunderstanding and he wasn't invited, just added on from other family, you should have contacted them and made it clear he's not welcome. It was an asshole move to send him an invitation and retaliate against his entire family when he accepted.

chichou writes:

NTA it’s extremely rude and inappropriate that they would think your ex should even be at your wedding. And how they behaved after shows exactly why you uninvited them.

Your wedding is about you and your fiancé And it is supposed to be the happiest day of your life. Of course you don’t want an ex there that you don’t have a relationship with anymore. You want to be surrounded by people you love, and that love and support you.

When his mother said, it shouldn’t have been a big deal because it was seven years ago… you should’ve told her …it may have been seven years ago but I will never forget how it felt to be abandoned when I was losing my child after finding out that the person I thought I was going to spend my life with cheated on me.

Then ask her how she would feel if that happened to her? Ask her if she would ever want to be around the person who betrayed her and left her to suffer a miscarriage in agony?

massivepod writes:

YTA - Why would you invite a whole family , then un invite them over their son . He’s your ex, it was stupid to invite him in the first place. But to cancel the invite for the rest of them ? You seem exhausting and you scream drama .

floorp writes:

NTA. They witnessed their son abandon you and cheat on you. The fact that they would ever consider it appropriate for him to bring that woman as a plus 1 to your wedding is highly suspect. If that's how little they think of you, then you made the right decision to uninvite them. They were not showing you love and kindness in that moment, so why would you want them there?

Tell your parents and brother very firmly that you are not interested in them shaming you for removing people who would have made your day worse by attending. Max's parents chose to allow Max to mess with you by RSVPing with that woman who he's apparently not even dating anymore - he did not have good intentions with that action.

He wanted to mess with your head. It is blatantly obvious. And the way Max's mother demeaned your feelings about it has shown an ugly side to her character that you're not interested in associating with. Let them call you petty - you're not going to be emotionally abused by any member of that family, and if that makes you petty, fine.

fleeaagh writes:

I understand that you didn’t want to see the two of them together at your wedding, but you handled this so poorly. You shouldn’t have invited your ex in the first place, much less with a date. You should have told his parents they were uninvited verbally, not over text.

You could have had an actual discussion with his mother on whether the plus one is the cheating partner (surely his mother would know if they’ve been together for seven years?) You should have warned your parents prior to uninviting their close friends. Ultimately choosing to uninvite was worse than initially excluding. I’d call you ungracious rather than TA but since you asked, in this situation YTA