For many, Christmas is a time for family.

But people define family differently – and whether it’s the people you’re related to by blood or people you’ve adopted along the way, it’s nice to spend time with people you care about as you celebrate the holidays.

So when the woman in this story was preparing for a family Christmas at her sister’s place, she was imagining an intimate affair with their small family.

Read on to find out why her sister’s guest list shocked her.

WIBTA for saying no to sharing family Christmas?

My sister (female, 39) and I (female, 42) are the only two children of our mother.

Our father died seven years ago.

My sister (let’s call her Mary) has two sons and a husband, while I have one son and am divorced.

Mary offered to host Christmas this year and that was fine – until today, when she said she plans to invite three (male) “orphans” from her workplace to join us.

Let’s see why this is an issue to her older sister.

I don’t want this to happen because firstly, we are only five adults (me, Mary, her husband, our mother and our elderly uncle) and three kids.

Adding three strangers to an already very small family group will tip the balance and make it an awkward day.

Also, my 10-year-old son has autism, and will really struggle to understand and cope with three random male strangers at our Christmas celebration.

I always strive to have family traditions (which admittedly are hard to keep up in such a small family), but adding three (to us) random strangers will really affect the dynamics.

And these weren’t the only reasons that she took issue with the setup.

I also think the three workmates probably wouldn’t want to come if they understood how intimate our family group is.

They aren’t really orphans after all (they could do something the three of them and almost be the same sized group as us!).

My sister has always wanted to invite “orphans” and when it was just one genuine, hard done by loner, I welcomed them too. But three workmates when we are only five adults in the first place is too much.

Would I be wrong to kick up a fuss and say no?

WIBTA?

This woman is right, inviting three strangers would very much change the dynamic of a traditional family Christmas, and it is admittedly very different to just inviting one person along.

But at the same time, her sister is doing a kind thing by inviting people who would otherwise be alone on Christmas day.

She just doesn’t seem to be considering how her family members might feel about that, and for her sister this seems to be a dealbreaker.

Let’s see what folks on Reddit made of this.

This person pointed out that the sister and her son could have Christmas just the two of them if they preferred.

While others thought that there were better ways for the woman to navigate this.

Meanwhile, this Redditor thought that including the strangers might be uncomfortable for some, but it was the kind thing to do.

Sometimes it’s important to give people the benefit of the doubt – and that’s a lesson that this older sister might need to learn.

These three men aren’t strangers to her sister, who works with them – and hopefully she can trust her sister not to bring unsavory characters into a family situation.

Her son might struggle with strangers, but there are other ways to accommodate everyone, giving her son a safe place to retreat to is one of these ways – but it shouldn’t affect her sister’s ability to invite whoever she wants to Christmas.

The more the merrier!

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a daughter who invited herself to her parents’ 40th anniversary vacation for all the wrong reasons.