My youngest daughter is a lesbian and recently ended a five-year relationship, her longest yet. Feelings between my daughter and her ex-girlfriend are still very raw. To my knowledge they haven't been speaking. My daughter has asked my husband and I, and her brother and sister, not to ask questions about the relationship and to not have communication with her ex-girlfriend.

One thing concerns me. My daughter's ex is also ex-Mormon. Her parents cut her out of their lives when she was eighteen. She left college in Utah and moved to the our area, where she soon met our daughter. Because she's lost her family, she's grown very close to ours, and she's spent the past five holiday seasons with us. Now I am increasingly bothered by the possibility she might spend Christmas alone. I want to ask my daughter what her ex-girlfriend's plans are for Christmas—she still celebrates it—and, if she has none, invite her to join us. But I'm unsure if it's my place to do this. It probably isn't.

Your advice would be welcome.

Yuletide Worrier

My response after the jump...

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Your daughter is being unreasonable... maybe.

Did she offer you any explanation as to why she doesn't want you to contact her ex? Was the end a spectacularly painful clusterfuckmare? Did something toxic seep into the relationship and irrevocably poison their feelings for each other? Betrayal? Cheating? Abuse? Glee? If your daughter is going to ask you to cut off all contact with her ex—if she's going to ask you to turn your back on someone she asked you to welcome into the family five years ago—then she owes you an explanation.

An explanation, mom, not every last detail.

That said, YW, even if the breakup was amicable (and it sounds like it wasn't), it's perfectly understandable that your daughter wouldn't want her ex-girlfriend hanging out at the house over Christmas. No one wants to make small talk with an ex a few weeks after a breakup. While it's admirable that you can feel your daughter's ex-girlfriend's pain, your daughter is also in pain right now and she needs to feel like she's your first priority.

But unless your daughter can, again, provide you a some good explanation as to why you're not allowed to have any contact at all with her ex—are you supposed to turn and sprint off if you see her walking down the street?—you should reach out to her ex-girlfriend. Call and tell her your that sorry things ended and ask her if she has someplace to go for the holidays without extending an invitation. After five years in a new city your daughter's ex doubtless has a few friends who aren't her ex-girlfriend's mom. Hearing that she isn't going to be alone at Christmas should set you at ease.

And finally, YW, lots of homos become friends with their exes—it's one of our superpowers—so while things may be too raw for the ex-girlfriend to be included this year, or for your family to continue to play a role in her life right now, that doesn't mean you won't be able to include her sometime in the future.

Provided the breakup wasn't betrayal-, cheating-, abuse-, or Glee-related.