It’s pretty straightforward—you need to sit your mom down and tell her that her close friendship with your ex feels like a betrayal of your feelings and experiences, and disrespectful to your current relationship. Plus, monthly coffee dates with your ex is actually criminally punishable under the law of [INSERT YOUR STATE HERE].
Just kidding, but…her behavior communicates to you that she doesn’t care that he hurt you. You’re not dating to find her a son/daughter-in-law, you’re dating to find yourself a life partner. I’d come prepared with the level of contact you’d ideally like them to be in and some boundaries laid out about inviting him to family events. Those specifics are up to you. Hopefully, she comes to understand how she’s hurt you, but if not (or not right away), you’ve been really clear about how you feel and what you’re comfortable with. I also think you can reach out to your ex and be like, “…dude…stop going to coffee with my freaking mom…” Deep loser behavior on his part if you ask me…
Do you know anything about any of your mom’s exes or former flames? Or even former friends? Can you reach out to one of them and ask to grab coffee or something? Actually, you don’t even have to contact them at all…just tell your mom you did.
First of all, your mother is aware that your relationship ended because he cheated on you? And still wants to grab a monthly coffee? No disrespect to your mom, but she’s got some serious stuff to work out.
Second of all, I don’t think there’s any other way forward (if you intend on having a healthy relationship with her) than to tell her exactly how you feel. Frankly, it’s no one’s business when or if you choose to forgive someone who hurt you—especially someone who was never family. If you don’t want to see your cheating ex at YOUR family gatherings, that’s your right. Further, he should be reminded of that, too. If your mom is advocating for him, it’s time to do the same for yourself.
Set reasonable, specific boundaries with your mom (don’t invite him to family gatherings; don’t ask me to forgive him) but beyond that you have to recognize that your mom is her own person; she’s also living this life for the first time; no one’s actually figured it out, so sometimes people behave in weird-ass ways (as you know). Tell her what you need, and then you’ve done what you can do. I saw a tweet months (years?) ago that I think about constantly; it went something like, “y’all have learned to decenter men, now let’s talk about decentering your parents.”
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