A 13-year-old asked to live with his dad, claiming his mom didn’t want him around anymore.

Months later, the truth came out: there was no boyfriend, no rejection—just a lie told out of spite.

Now his dad’s doling out punishment for something that happened weeks ago, and not everyone agrees with the timing.

Read on for the story.

AITA for punishing my son for a lie he told months ago?

I am a 32-year-old man and the father of a 13-year-old boy.

He used to live with his mother and spend the weekends with me.

But everything changed when, on one of the weekends he was supposed to spend with me, he told me that his mother had found a boyfriend and that she didn’t want him there anymore, so as not to interfere with her relationship.

He cried and asked if he could live with me, and I, of course, said yes, he could.

Yikes.

I didn’t question his mother, our relationship wasn’t the best.

My son’s mother and I were best friends in the past, we tried to make it more than a friendship, and our son is the result of that.

But it didn’t work out; both she and I ruined everything trying to turn our friendship into a romance.

After that, our friendship was never the same again, we only became cordial because of our son.

When I called her and told her that he was going to live with me, she agreed.

The roles were reversed and he started spending the weekends at his mother’s house.

Sounds like a good solution…

Months went by and, until then, everything was fine.

But my mother is a very religious woman and she thought this was absurd.

According to her, his mother should be the one taking care of him, not me.

So she started badmouthing my son’s mother to everyone, and, of course, my son’s mother came to question me about what my mother was saying.

After a long time of treating each other coldly, we decided to meet up and talk in person about what was happening.

This was all going too far, we had to think about our son’s well-being and not about our past disagreements.

True…

During this conversation, I found out that she wasn’t dating anyone and that my son had lied about her mother no longer wanting him at home.

She told me that she just respected his wish to live with his father.

She seemed hurt by our son’s lie.

I was worried whether I would believe her or not, but I went to talk to my son and he couldn’t lie this time.

He started crying and told me that he made up that story because he was angry with his mother and wanted to live with me.

I was angry, I hate lies.

As punishment, I didn’t let him go to his friend’s birthday party and he started crying a lot.

He couldn’t play video games or watch TV.

Reddit weighed in with mixed reactions, but none of it is great.

This person says he is the AH (but not for the obvious).

This person says NTA…but also the AH.

This person concludes with a clear YTA.

He missed the party—but maybe dad missed the point by punishing months too late.

They need to get it together.

If you enjoyed that story, read this one about a mom who was forced to bring her three kids with her to apply for government benefits, but ended up getting the job of her dreams.