Bride replaces bridesmaid days before the wedding, 'my heart literally dropped.' AITA?
"AITA for replacing my bridesmaid days before the wedding?"
| (26F) am getting married in four days. I'm not the pickiest person. I told my bridesmaids two things they absolutely had to do were have silver shoes and purchase a burgundy, mesh, floor length dress from azazie.
I have 8 bridesmaids all with different body types, so I said they could pick any style they were comfortable with as long as it met those three requirements. About a month ago, my matron of honor (Liz) advised me to ask all of the women if they had ordered their dresses yet because the delivery date was getting close to the wedding date. l followed her advice and sent a message to the group.
Everyone responded that their dress was delivered or almost there except for one (Sam). Sam responded with "I have a dress". The wording made me uneasy, but Sam is known for not being the best texter. The kind where the wording is just kinda off, almost like a grandparent figuring out texting.
So I figured she meant she had the dress already. Last night, I'm talking to Liz and ask if I'm overthinking Sam's text. She tells me no and that I should ask for a picture of the dress. I didn’t want to because I trust my friend, and there's no way she meant anything other than she has the right dress.
Right? I texted her anyway saying something along the lines of having seen everyone else's dress but not hers and asked her to send a picture. Her response was "cause I already have a maroon dress". My heart literally dropped. The only thing I could do was respond no, that's not the right color.
Sam texted back confused and insisted I said the dress had to be maroon and chiffon but nothing else. I have the screenshots showing in December what I asked for with examples from the website. After that it was just repeated versions of her saying she can't be in the wedding, she's sorry for ruining everything and messing up, that she's such a sh^t friend, and how she can't afford a dress right now.
From there I stopped answering. I asked for next to nothing from her for my wedding. I didn't require her to help with anything or come to any of the wedding events (no dress fittings, showers, or bach trip). I just asked this one thing, and she couldn't do that. It honestly feels like my wedding day just wasn't important to her and straight up disrespectful. Here's where I may be the ahole.
Liz was a bridesmaid in a wedding a few months ago with the same details as mine for bridesmaid dresses. She pulled out the old dress and it matches perfectly to the dress she bought for my wedding. This dress also happens to perfectly fit another friend of mine (Gabby) who was with us.
I now have Gabby taking Sam's place in the wedding. Sam is still invited to the wedding, but she's not a bridesmaid anymore and won't be walking down the aisle. I feel absolutely horrible and have barely slept tonight, but my fiancé is insisting that l've done nothing wrong. So, am I the ahole here?
Here's what top commenters had to say about this one:
Comfortable-Sea-2454 said:
NTA - as far as bride "demands" go yours were very simple. If Sam couldn't afford a new dress and/or shoes she should have said that from the start.
DiTrastevere said:
NTA - Sam absolutely should have come to you as soon as she realized that she couldn’t afford the dress you were asking for. She didn’t even give you a chance to work with her on this, and she was deliberately cagey when directly asked about her outfit (and deliberately tried to convince you that you were at fault for this).
She had so many opportunities to handle this like an adult, and she dodged them all. It is entirely on her that she’s no longer a bridesmaid. I hope she grows from this experience.
Wild-Pie-7041 said:
ESH. Her for not being upfront. You for not checking in earlier to confirm all your bridesmaids bought and received dresses that met your expectations since this was obviously a dealbreaker. I also feel bad for Gabby (who is not an AH), who’s included at the last minute only because someone had a dress and she’s the right size.
Here_IGuess said:
NTA. The problem isn't the dress. The problems are how she chose to handle the entire situation, her lack of honesty, and not caring about your feelings. All Sam had to do was tell you earlier that she couldn't afford the dress so you could have made something else work.
That could have been allowing more color or dress variety for everyone, helping with cost, or asking her to step down. Purposely not telling you and trying to mislead you until the day of the wedding isn't acceptable.
Replacing her is fine. You aren't doing anything wrong. You're even fine with her attending. There's no reason to feel guilty. If she chooses not to attend the ceremony after this, that's on her too. Congratulations on your upcoming marriage.
fungibleprofessional said:
NTA because Sam was misleading you up to the last minute after you were clear on dress detail, and Sam obviously intended to just show up to your wedding in a non-regulation dress without warning. I’d like to think there could have been workarounds if Sam had been up front about her situation early on. But that’s not what Sam did.
Tattedtail said:
I vote NTA, given that Sam herself said that she can't be in the wedding. It sounds like she didn't want to be a bridesmaid in an off-colour dress, that she stepped down and you filled the slot.
I do wonder if it would have been worth checking the colour of the maroon dress. Some maroons are very close to burgandy, and a wedding photographer could probably tweak the color in post.
However, I did check out the website you asked everyone to order from... And their burgandy chiffon looks really consistent across designs. So even a close maroon would probably be noticeably different in-person.
(I was in a bridal party where we were just told to get a "blue" dress. We found out on the day that 3/4 of us had periwinkle blue dresses, and the other bridesmaid had one that was closer to sea glass.
She was HORRIFIED, and so stressed that she would stand out and look odd... But the bride just put some extra bling on her, shuffled the order, and suddenly she was the maid of honor. It was a really sweet solution.)