A few weeks ago, I posted to another community about my daughter, EM, who is in a relationship with a man who has another girlfriend who also has another boyfriend. Following the advice of this community and the advice of my therapist, whom I see for unrelated anxiety issues, I invited them all to dinner yesterday. (My husband is traveling, so we are having “our” Easter next week.) My daughter suggested the group come to our house to make it. I confess I was incredibly nervous to let a swarm of strangers descend on my kitchen, but it ended up a lot better than I expected. My daughter made a salad, and her boyfriend, RA, made roast lamb and seasoned rice. They also made stuffed mushrooms as appetizers. His other girlfriend, TL confessed to being “rubbish in the kitchen,” and insisted on “staying out of the way” and playing Scrabble with me while we waited for dinner. (I’m sure my daughter told her I like Scrabble, and it was nice to have something to do instead of suffering through small talk completely undistracted.) She set the table and later did dishes, which was pleasant enough even though she didn’t know where anything was. Her other boyfriend, JM, made cocktails and crème brulee, and kept checking on us “to make sure TL isn’t committing any war crimes on the English language.” I’m not sure if any other parents frequent this forum, but if they do, I have some advice for them: Make-at-home dinner. I think it helped a lot being able to see my daughter and her “family” working together, laughing together and helping each other, before sitting down to eat. I also appreciated having tasks to do with TL, both playing Scrabble and showing her where dishes were. It gave us an chance to talk without having talking be the spotlight of our initial interaction. TL and I were the ones with most opportunity to talk, no doubt a clever move orchestrated by my daughter because TL is the person who I had been viewing as an obstacle to RA committing to her. She says she sees EM as a younger sister, and seeing them interact together, I believe it. They don’t seem to be competing with each other for RA’s attention at all, and in fact they were going out of their way to make sure they each had enough time with him. TL was even fishing for gift ideas for EM and RA’s anniversary, which I had never even considered was something she, as “the other woman,” would care about. Talking with my therapist, including in some pair-counseling sessions with my daughter, we discovered a big problem with my outlook had been framing the relationship model as similar to “dating around,” when one person dates multiple partners separately with the intention of narrowing it down to one monogamous partner. Even though my daughter had been telling me that this is not the case, I was still reacting as if it were. Seeing the group together really helped me to see that TL was not taking RA away from my daughter. In fact, they were all solicitous and caring of each other. I still have concerns about EM moving in with these people, but I think those are the usual concerns of an emptying nest. I’m embarrassed about how long I have been putting off meeting these people who are so important in EM’s life, how scared they made me, and how angry, and then how they turned out to be…really nothing to worry about. I’m just thankful that my daughter and her relationship did not hold against me my fears, concerns, or, yes, even my prejudice. I judged them unfairly and they turned the other cheek. Next week, when my husband is back home, we are having another Easter dinner. EM told me she may choose that time to tell him about RA, TL and JM. If she does, I know I will stand by her side. By their sides.

Holy shit, why.