Not all dinner parties turn out great, and it’s frustrating when you’re blamed for the disappointment. These guests question whether they were in the wrong at these dinner parties. Content has been edited for clarity.
“Meet My Grandson Party”
“My father has a ‘guests come first’ policy. He loves calling people over and hosting small get-togethers, and it’s happened enough for me to get used to it. What bothers me, though, is that he expects me and my sister to bend over backward for him and his friends. Examples include designing our rooms specifically to use them as guest rooms and berating me for not wanting to switch places with a guest at the dinner table.
He wants me and my sister at these occasions, but never actually interacts with us. He’s never had any respect for our time, boundaries, or work. Complaining or refusing to attend usually causes fights.
I moved in with my fiancé after college. Our first son was born last month. My dad has been trying to convince us to come over for a party with his friends for a while. We’ve refused, mostly because our baby’s first month has been exhausting.
Yesterday, he invited us over to his apartment for dinner. This time, he promised something simple: burgers, bonding with the baby, and a movie. I was looking forward to spending time with my dad, so we agreed to come.
When we got there to see the promised burgers… surrounded by about a dozen of my dad’s friends. It was very obviously a ‘Meet My Grandson’ dinner party. His drunk-ish friends were all around, gushing and asking to hold my son. There was loud music playing, and my baby started crying moments after we got there. I didn’t even see my father for a while.
The final straw, though, was when my dad led us to where he wanted us to sit: at a coffee table in front of the TV. He’d moved stuff around to accommodate two placemats for me and my fiancé. It’s not even tall enough for chairs. The actual dinner table was fully occupied by his friends, and he didn’t want to make his guests sit on the floor. He claimed to be hosting the dinner for us but didn’t even want us to sit at the table.
I told my dad we had to go home. He tried to convince us to stay, but we left only 15 minutes after arriving.
On the way home, my father called me furious, going on about how excited his friends had been to meet the baby, and how I and my fiancé were robbing him of spending time with his grandson. I told him I wasn’t going to sit on the floor with my baby just so he could chat with his friends, and that we were too tired and overwhelmed to deal with a dinner party. I explained that the only reason we even came was because he promised it was just a movie night, not a party with his friends. He got annoyed and said that what mattered was spending time together, and didn’t listen when I argued that he didn’t even expect us to be near him.
My mom is on my side, but my sister is on my dad’s. She says that he just wanted to spend time with us and introduce his first grandchild to his friends and that we could have sucked it up for a night.
AITA?”
Brother-In-Law Problem
“My wife and I have recently completed a major project to renovate our entire dining room, which included the purchase of an elegant marble dining table and new chairs. My wife, a professional chef, has cherished the dream of having a high-end dining room to host dinner parties since her childhood.
To celebrate this achievement, both our parents, my two siblings, and my brother’s wife are coming over for the dinner party my wife has longed to host since her childhood. This gathering includes all our immediate family members, except for my wife’s only sibling, her sister, and her husband. The reason for not inviting my brother-in-law is rather straightforward. He is physically unable to attend the party as we have it planned.
My brother-in-law’s weight exceeds 500 pounds. To avoid delving into a sensitive ‘fat-shaming’ conversation, I will explain why we didn’t invite him. The chairs we’ve acquired cannot support his weight, and even if they could, his excessive weight prevents him from sitting upright for extended periods. His only options would be to sit in our living room on the couch or in a medical chair that cannot fit through our doors. Having him in a separate room would defeat the purpose of hosting a dinner party in our new dining room. Additionally, our dinner party consists of seven smaller courses, a format we know my brother-in-law wouldn’t be comfortable with, given past incidents where he confronted my wife over serving smaller portions.
With all these considerations, when we sent out the invitations, we excluded him but not my wife’s sister. When he called last night to inquire why he wasn’t invited, I chose not to lie to him. I told him it was due to his weight and his past issues with food and my wife. He was understandably upset, considering the exclusion was related to his weight. He claimed it was unfair treatment. I reiterated that this evening was about fulfilling my wife’s childhood dream, not about accommodating his mobility and food-related issues.
This situation has caused a considerable uproar. My wife’s sister has publicly shamed both me and my wife on Facebook. While my wife and the other party attendees have advised ignoring the issue, my friends have labeled me a major jerk and an elitist for the decisions made.”
“Dinner Party Ruined”
“One of my friends is an excellent cook and makes this one particular dish that everyone LOVES. I don’t eat the dish, but her dinner parties are always a lot of fun, and she always makes sure there’s something for everyone. At this particular party, it was decided that she’d be doing an instructional, cooking show style teaching of how to make the dish which even though I don’t really cook, and don’t eat this particular dish, sounded super fun.
In our group chat, at first, she didn’t invite me, but then she mentioned that I could come later after all the food was done, but I didn’t want to miss out. Spoiler alert: I couldn’t.
When we all got there, she pulled almost everyone into the kitchen and began preparing the dish which involved semi-butchering the meat for the dish. Well, this sent me…directly to the floor. Where I puked. I really REALLY did not feel it coming. There was no warning except the second before it happened, and instead of doggy style trying to run to her bathroom and potentially puking on the ONE place in her apartment with carpet, I opted for elementary schooler style and just committed where I was standing with no warning.
As you can probably imagine, one was pleased. Someone else started gagging, another friend went, ‘Well, dinner party ruined, I guess.’
Someone shooed me to the bathroom, while I was apologizing and offering to clean up, and by the time I came out, everything WAS cleaned up, and I felt even more like a jerk. And after that, yeah, we didn’t recover. She asked me to leave, which kind of surprised me. I tried to weakly protest and apologize and offer to make it up, but she was just shaking her head and gesturing toward the door. She didn’t even really speak to me, and no one else did either.
After I left, they all went out to dinner, which bugged me, since I feel like we could have laughed it off and continued with the night, especially if we were going out and not eating there. Oh well, I didn’t complain about that, or post, or anything. After it was clear she really wanted me out, I left.
But now things are still weird. I obviously feel like it was a biological reaction that I couldn’t control, but some of my friends say I just shouldn’t have come. But I genuinely had no idea I’d react like that, and once I did, I felt like I shouldn’t have been banished like a naughty child (despite puking like one). We haven’t all really hung out much since then, and I know they had a replacement party to which I wasn’t invited which is fine, but of course hurts my feelings a little and makes me feel like I’ll be excluded from more in the future. AITA?”
