📝 AITA for not defending my mother when my partner privately pointed out their behavior to me.

By Throw_Away_Megee • Score: 5 • April 8, 2025 2:21 PM


I think I already know the answer, but some reassurance will go a long way.

Some context is needed before the 'inciting incident'.

Me, a bisexual man, and my trans man partner, have been in a long distance relationship for approximately a year and moved in together close to our 1 year anniversary. My partner, let's call him Steve, moved in to an apartment in my home town, leaving family and friends behind for me and it's clearly been tough on him. To help with this, I've been doing my best to help with visits and holidays to make things easier for him. Back in November, he wasn't able to head home for Thanksgiving, so of course, I asked my family if they would mind me inviting him and they said he was welcome. My parents then offered to take us out to dinner to get the 'meeting the parents' jitters out. Me and Steve thought this was smart, and sounded like it could be a good time, so we said yes and the day before Thanksgiving we went out to dinner with them.

Dinner was a little tense, bringing over a new partner tends to be, but things were made slightly more tense as my parents are older and a little ignorant of how LGBT relationships work, but they try their best to understand and are overall accepting. During dinner my parents asked how I was doing, and I made the mistake of mentioning how fearful I was after the USA election (which had just happened) because of Donald Trump's previous attempts to make LGBT life difficult, my fears being doubled now that I have a trans partner. My mother's smile was wider then the grand canyon as they insulted me for being worried, insulting me for my concerns that were backed up by previous political events. My partner excused themselves as an argument with me and my parents broke out. Truly I felt like this came out of left field, I knew my parents were always right leaning, but they were always accepting and supportive of me and my previous partners, so I figured they would at least be understanding of my fears. Admittedly, I could have handled the argument better, but eventually, when my partner came back, the argument was cut short and we awkwardly finished dinner.

Now for the inciting incident:

Despite me and my partner wanting to ditch Thanksgiving all together, the dinner putting a bad taste in our mouths, we decide it would make things worse if we ditched now. To make things a little easier, me and my partner where as many pieces of jewelry as possible to appear as 'gay' as possible. Admittedly a bit petty, but overall harmless.

Me and Steve get our Thanksgiving food, my parents and my little teenage sister sitting down with us as we stewed in the awkward air. Eventually after we finished our plates, my sister decided to go find a board game to play with us 5. I figured it was a good way to break the tension so I was all in, however the game in question wasn't something like Uno or Sorry, it was an odd kind of improv game. As my sister explained it, reading from the rules, we each were supposed to answer questions or voice our opinions on topics while being given cards that would give us weird stipulations, like talking in a pirate voice or being forced to mimic the body movements of the player to your right. My mom vetoed the game, saying "I shouldn't play this since I can't have an opinion" an obviously pointed statement after our previous argument. After that no one was interested in playing the game, all of us awkwardly putting the game back. Afterwards me, Steve, and my sister all went to go find a new game to play, intent on breaking the tension that was still thicker then smog. While all three of us were in the other room, looking through bored games, Steve whispered to me about how uncomfortable he was. One of the things he said was, "I don't like this, your mom's kind of being a bitch right now." as he tried to convince me to leave. I agreed that my mom was being terrible, and did my best to reassure him that we can try to salvage it as I kept looking through bored games, my logic being that it was still too early to politely leave.

What we failed to notice was that my sister had heard Steve's private comment, and left to go tell my mom while me and Steve kept looking through bored games. Steve returned to the table first while I was still getting all the game pieces for Scrabble in order, and before I could finish making sure I had all the letter pieces he came back. "We need to leave." Steve told me. Obviously confused I asked what was going on, and Steve then told me that my sister told my mom what he had said, and that she was now crying because of it. I 100 percent agreed that we should leave now, and we began to, as Steve collected the few food items we brought with us. I then made the horrific realization that my coat was still on my chair where my mother and father were. I did what I could to tactfully take my coat back, while I saw my mom crying with a face of pure anger. I said that we were leaving, and my mom told me to lose her number. I wished them a good christmas and left, left as quickly as possible.

As we drove off, Steve apologized to me, and said he would apologize if that's what I thought he should do. I told him not to, as I thought it was unfair for my partner to be made to apologize when my mother had been so nasty for the last few days. We did what we could to salvage the day, starting to decorate the apartment for Christmas while I did exactly what my mom requested.

I stand by my decision to stand by my partner, and have cut my mom entirely off from my life. Yet as months go by I keep getting more and more drops of information from my father and sister about my mom going through the emotional ringer as they realize they've been cut off by their son. I have no interest in a relationship with my mother now, as I see it as they've showed their 'true colors', but of course I'm a bit reluctant to say that given that she is my mother after all.

So, AITA for cutting my mom off for this? Should I try to fix things?

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