Woman threatens to bail on best friend's wedding; 'You want me to be MOH but NOT be in any photos?' AITA? UPDATED 4X
When this woman is super close to backing out of her bridezilla friend's wedding, she asks the internet:
"WIBTA for not attending my best friend's wedding after she asked me to be MOH but NOT in her pictures?"
My (F27) best friend (F27) is getting married in February. She has been planning her wedding for 2 years and I have been actively helping her the entire time as her maid of honor.
I am extremely excited for her to get married, but she is slightly controlling. She's the kind of girl that has to have everything perfect or it's completely ruined. But her wedding, her rules.
Well, I found out I was pregnant at the beginning of October and am due toward the end of June. This is my first baby and I have struggled heavily with fertility issues so this is a literal miracle baby.
My husband and I had literally just given up hope in trying for a little while this past summer. I will be in my second trimester during the time of her wedding. Well, I told my best friend last week and she seemed... upset.
She wasn't too happy that I was pregnant and her first question is if I would fit in my bridesmaid dress.
The dress is extremely flowy and I told her that I should be just fine, and if not I'll cover the cost of any alternations/buying another dress (I bought my dress in the first place anyways). Like literally her first question, not even congratulations.
I tried to shrug it off and just assumed she was stressed. Her bachelorette party is next month (I've been exclusively planning it) so I just reached out with the final details to her to confirm everything.
During the phone call she tried to make me feel bad that I wouldn't be drinking with the rest of them and that it wouldn't be the "bach party of her dreams" and I told her it would still be fun. That upset me even more, but I just tried to shrug it off once again.
Today she called and told me she had a "hard decision" to make but she's been thinking about it and while she would like to keep me MOH she doesn't want me in her pictures.
She said that my bump would be too distracting, she didn't want her pictures to turn into a "maternity photoshoot" and that she just didn't feel comfortable with it.
However, she still wanted me to pay for the bachelorette party, help her plan the wedding, and wanted me to do almost everything MOH except be in pictures and she was debating if she still wanted me to give a speech.
She then sent me a bunch of bag-like dresses to choose from as my new dress since I won't need my MOH dress.
We have been best friends since we were 10. I would have never in my wildest dreams expected her to act this way. WIBTA for dropping out of her wedding?
I really don't feel like paying for, and being supportive of, a person who treats me like a disposable mooch after years of fertility issues. But I also feel like I may be overreacting as some of my friends said that I would look odd in the pictures. Thoughts?
Before we give you OP's updates, let's take a look at some of OP's relevant comments:
I cannot explain how I'm close enough to this photographer that if I wanted pictures she would take them for me on a random Tuesday night if I wanted. My friend is not going to risk her literal career over my pregnancy and I'm not going to ruin her photographs because I'll have a small little baby bump.
ALSO ALSO ALSO at my wedding, I DID have a photo shoot of just her and me replicating photos of our childhood (we are both only children so I thought it would be a sweet almost sister-like thing).
She suggested it and I loved the idea so I paid extra to set up two separate scenarios of us to commemorate the moment. I never felt like it took away from my day and I love those pictures, it took at most 15 minutes and my husband was our hype man in the background. I
never even suggested or even planned on suggesting we get pictures of me pregnant or just my belly or whatever she was thinking. I don't know who she thinks I'm randomly going to become pregnant but it hurts my feelings so deeply.
In retrospect, I should have been more off-put about the drinking comment. Idk I just thought to myself that she was upset because we were known for our party days and I was going to allow her to mourn that, but to shame me for not drinking after trying for years for a baby was... weird.
Like what response was I supposed to give? Sure because you're upset I will now drink! Too bad for my poor miracle baby! Also, I'm still incredibly fun not drinking. She knows I can have a good time either way. Sorry, just thinking out loud in the comments haha.
I don't want to back out. I am mostly so scared to lose our friendship. I have no siblings and she has been like a sister to me for nearly 18 years. I keep trying to justify her behavior or find a way out of this without wrecking the friendship and I don't know what to do.
About her other friends. I'll be honest, a lot of them are her college friends/co-workers that I have nicknamed her "yes men" and she knows I do. They weirdly worship her and will hang on to her every word.
She runs a really successful business so I know WHY they do, but it's still so weird to me lol. There's one other girl from HS on there that we are both friends with who is on my side 100% (aka why should I not be MOH because I might have a small baby bump)
and I've been talking to about how to go about this, but I don't want to make her give up such a long-running friendship either so I told her not to worry and that I would work it out. She can make whatever decision she wants, but I don't want her to feel forced to give up a friendship over an argument that doesn't have to do with her.
My husband wants me to cut her out. It uh... definitely hurt and opened my eyes. I think I let things slide too easily for me but I know how I absolutely wouldn't let this happen if this was my husband and child situation.
And technically my child IS in this situation. I've taken this more as an offense to me but I'm starting to realize how it's a hit to my baby.
About the bride...to be honest, this is kind of how her behavior is. She grew up extremely spoiled and wealthy (and I did not) so I think some of our friendship has been me justifying her actions because her parents just "never said no."
When we went off to college our freshman year, she literally moved off campus for half a semester because her roommate in her dorm made a joke about her major. I remember at the time thinking "that's extreme but that's just my bff!" and laughing, but that is very much her personality.
When she is great and everything is going perfectly, she is fantastic and the best person in the entire world. When things get a little dicey, she tends to be a little less great bordering on mean.
However, her actions have never been toward me. I should have probably known that one day it would get there but since we had 17 years of basically argument-free friendship, I just thought she would always be the person that sticks up for me and I would always be the person that evens her out/calms her down. AITA?
Before we give you OP's 4 updates, let's take a look at some of the top responses:
seaokra writes:
My mom was close to due at my aunt's wedding. She had never thought she could get pregnant and offered to step down as a bridesmaid. Aunt would not even let her finish before saying nuh uh, can't get out of it that easy and demanding that Mom tell her any way she could make the wedding easier on the heavily pregnant lady Mom was gonna be.
At the wedding, Mom says she looked like she was smuggling a beach ball and people kept asking her when she was gonna have that baby already. (which Mom says cursed me, her due date was late July/early August and I made my debut in mid June) My aunt was LOVING it and begging to feel her belly all night. Oh, and I kicked my uncle during a dance apparently.
Then I was born on the last day of their honeymoon. They didn't even drop off their stuff, they ran straight from the airport to see Mom and me. My aunt was utterly delighted and apparently told me several times. "You are my very youngest wedding guest!"
She "got me back" for stealing all her bride light though. (Very much a joke, she never even accused me or Mom of any such thing) For my sixth birthday I got a cousin.
I was stoked and still remember thinking he was as least as great as the eight-color ballpoint pen my dad's bass player gave me. (Much grumbling was done about how I got a lot of really nice gifts, but my favorite was that cheap pen. It was cool though, wrote in eight colors. xD)
In hindsight, they should've done more double birthdays for us. Mom and Aunt always helped each other with the parties anyway and they had two kids born on almost the same day (I made it out before midnight, he was a few minutes late) it would've been way easier.
We both loved the few double parties that were done so I'm not sure what stopped them. We honestly got along as well as any two kids with a six year age gap, I doted on him and he swayed between adoring/looking up to me and wanting to be MY protector. We're still in the second phase actually.)
Our Sweet 16/10th would've been epic! (Actually we did spend my 16th/his 10th together. No party though, we watched monster movies with a couple of my friends and his best friend, ate pizza and painted the boys' nails. he brought me a fancy cupcake for my candle and I stuck his into the cheesecake I made.)
jokhosk writes:
Modern wedding culture has gotten beyond ridiculous. It’s become this thing where everyone makes such a big deal over the bride and the pictures and the bachelorette that many modern brides either look forward to it as a rite of...
passage where they fully deserve to get everything they’ve ever wanted handed to them, or feel it as an anxiety-inducing pressure for everything to go exactly as planned because they’ll be the centre of attention.
Brides asking bridesmaids to cut or dye their hair or behave like personal servants, week-long destination bachelorette events, handing out and rescinding positions in the wedding party like court favours. It’s ludicrous.
Gone seem to be the days where the bachelorette or the shower were just generous gestures by close friends or family that the bride had no hand in planning, nor even an opinion about.
To me, being pouty or angry about the bachelorette someone threw you is like having a tantrum about the free birthday party someone threw you. The sheer audacity.
Not to mention the reverse, where people / guests seem to feel that as soon as it’s called a wedding, they’re entitled to an opinion about everything. At every wedding I go to, I hear guests nitpicking the choices made.
As if anyone would go to a birthday party or a random event and do that. I’ve seen people freak out over what the dress code is or whether or not it’s child free - again, for every other party in life, if you’re not fond of the terms of the invite, you just don’t go!
I’ve seen lifelong friendships destroyed over a bride’s entitlement and selfishness. I’ve seen families in turmoil over who is paying for what, who had an opinion of what, who is or isn’t going for whatever reason.
Weddings are SUPPOSED to be about the marriage, about the couple. But oftentimes it’s just a time of strain for the relationship and no one actually talks about the marriage, in the lead-up or afterward.
Gifts are supposed to be kind gestures and generous contributions to make sure the bride and groom get what they need to make a life together...
not for the bride and groom to outfit their home with exactly whatever specific luxury items they’ve ever dreamed of, and damn you if you don’t spend as much as the bride and groom CHOSE to spend on your plate.
Weddings are meant to be a community pulling together to support a couple getting married, whether it’s in a church or a town hall.
Guests and the wedding party are meant to be there as witnesses of your marriage, and people who will support you moving forward in your marriage, not people to help plan / witness your epic Instagram-worthy party.
photobacreteach writes:
NTA. What a selfish, horrible thing for one person to do to another. The fact that she is supposed to be your best friend is just... Wow.
Tell her that you hope she has the wedding of her dreams, but you can no longer support her in it. It isn't even about the photos, it's about how all the support is completely one sided.
She not only didn't congratulate you, she has almost shamed you for "messing up her big day." I mean, how dare you get pregnant and have YOUR dreams come true! Don't you know that it's really all about how she feels?
Don't allow her to take away any of your joy over this wonderful pregnancy! Instead of wasting time on a woman who has shown you so little love, spend that time with the people who care about you and this new addition to your family. Congrats!
leanna5 writes:
NTA at all. If anyone makes you feel bad about this decision, they don't love you enough. Good to know who's really your friend right now that you're expecting. I would be thrilled that a marvellous time in my Best friend's life it's gonna be portrayed forever in my wedding pictures.
Too happy friends having their dreams come true. As she's your friend and you know her all your life, you should consider being very clear about the reasons you have to miss the wedding and how she hurt you.
You have to be direct with this kind of people about what they did wrong, so they won't turn the story around. Just tell her that not being in the photos is mean and cold, and you don't need those feeling around you right now.
That you're sorry that she feels this way about your pregnancy not to even say congratulations once, but you have people in your life that a actually loves you and treats you according to that feeling; wish her good luck and shut down all contact for your own peace of mind.
What's next, your kid won't be invited to her kid's birthday cause his hair doesnt match the theme?. You're a person that cared about her, not venue decoration.
And now, OP's first official update:
I'm going to bed now but I've collected my thoughts enough to know that I'm going to call her tomorrow and have a very blunt conversation, hopefully I can get her in person. I'm either in her pictures as MOH with the dress I have or I'm not in her wedding/attending at all.
I'll also be speaking about how her actions have made me feel and how her lack of excitement about my pregnancy (despite me holding 110% enthusiasm for 2 years for her wedding because I am excited for her, but also because I know it makes me feel good to have people excited for her) has deeply wounded me.
I know it's going to be a friendship-altering conversation and I am not excited to have it, but I will let you know what ends up happening. Thank you all for the support and kind words. I normally am a very anti-confrontation/water off a duck's back kinda person, but all these comments telling me I deserve better have been very encouraging.
OP's second official update:
I want to first say a big thank you to all the wonderful comments of congratulations and support. I often try to be very level-headed about things, sometimes to the detriment of myself, and also still wanted to be a part of the day since she is my best friend and we have grown together for so long.
I am someone who really values integrity and I felt like if I dropped out, I would be betraying a core value of mine. And many many many people reached out to me for an update, so here it is:
I sat down with her and had a very long and blunt talk. I even brought out the post to show her that I am not crazy about some of the points I made. I told her about how deeply my feelings were hurt by her words and actions. I told her I couldn't understand why I couldn't be a full MOH and be included in pictures.
If I were to be fully honest, she almost convinced me that the whole idea of just keeping me as MOH but with no pictures was for my benefit. She told me it was to take the "stress" off of me for the day and to make sure I didn't feel uncomfortable with my "new weight" but I knew it wasn't true.
I knew she just didn't want me to be in her wedding party with a baby bump but wanted my money and planning expertise (I've withheld this information but I am a wedding planner with many connections, however, I wouldn't cut any of them off due to a falling out.
I am not planning her wedding as I felt it would be too much for me because I would want it to be to a level of perfection I couldn't achieve, but I did hook her up with another planner friend who is incredible but she has utilized me for free a lot).
I think I realized all too clearly in almost an instant that the second she got engaged that our friendship became a business-partnership to her, whereas it never changed for me. For the past two years, what I thought were friendship-bonding experiences for me I realized were merely free expenses for her.
In the end, I decided to step out of the wedding as MOH. I will be sending all the information I have to our joint friend who is in the wedding party and will still be paying for that friend's portion of the bach party instead of the whole thing, as I know it will put that friend out of money which I feel awful about.
I have been uninvited to the wedding as a whole, which was not unexpected. My friend was very angry and upset with the conversation and said some deeply hurtful things that will take me a long time to recover from.
To say I am devastated is an understatement, as I expected this woman to be the godmother of my child. But I feel extremely relieved to have discovered this before the birth of my child. Now my baby's life will be filled with people who love them unconditionally. and the same goes for me.
Update 3:
I promise I am only paying for my one friend who is not the bride! The price is significantly lower, and if my friend (who is debating on even staying in the wedding party) goes the trip would be a huge unexpected cost to her that I can't have that weighing on my heart.
She is in a very overworked and undervalued profession that rarely gets a break, so I'm taking it as a way to give her a well-deserved paid vacation since I know I planned a kick-ass bachelorette party.
If she doesn't go, I think we're going to plan our own girl's trip at an all-inclusive resort for a little TLC since she already has the days off! Either way, it's a win for her! I personally will be using the week either way to get a massage and maybe a small get-away with my husband. We're working out the details!
Update 4:
Hi! OP from the post here. After reading all the comments on my post about how my friend was such a "bridezilla" I was advised to check out this sub and saw my post crossposted here haha.
I do know that people use reddit a LOT for creative writing (I've actually never taken to a reddit sub for moral questions like this but I honestly felt so gaslight by the bride and her "yes men" bridesmaids that my request to be in pictures would ruin her whole wedding that I felt actually crazy and...
didn't know where else to go because it was embarrassing to ask my other friends that knew us) but I can tell you that this is a very true story of a devastating moment in my life.
I think I obviously wrote the post in a very black-and-white manner with super basic details, but there is so much nuance to relationships that can't be put into 3k words. I just told the story from my perspective, which in the moment I wrote it was filled with hurt.
But the reason I'm writing this comment is not to tell you to believe me (little creepy for people on the internet to do and also why should you care about my life either way?) but it is to explain me paying for the entire bach party.
I grew up extremely poor and got married young (20, we had dated since 15) because my husband and I were excited to start our lives together and didn't really care about the "perfect" wedding at all.
To me, weddings are all about feeling and people. We couldn't afford much of anything and I planned my entire wedding and only spent the largest bit of money on the photographer.
We literally got married in my bff's family's backyard (it's huge and gorgeous) and my mom's family was kind enough to make all the food and I did all my flowers, DIY decor, etc.
Anyway, this is my long-winded way of saying that I did not even plan or THINK about a party for myself as I was young and couldn't afford it. I had 3 bridesmaids that were in college and we were also all incredibly poor and I didn't want to make them spend anymore money than the dresses for the wedding.
My now ex-BFF surprised me with a fully-paid trip for me and all of my bridesmaids to what was honestly my perfect bachelorette party. Thinking about it now still brings me tears and I had no idea she was going to do it. Obviously, her family paid for it, she grew up very wealthy, but the gesture still touches me so deeply.
I promised her I would do the same when she got married. I loved planning my own wedding so much I actually changed my major in college to event planning & management and now plan weddings for a career and I love it!
And I do pretty well! I could luckily absolutely afford to pay for the entire trip for my bff's bach party like I promised her I would (minus everyone's travel, I'm not paying for 6 plane tickets but I'll absolutely pay for a 3 day stay in a Vrbo easy). It was my gift to her, as she gifted me years ago.
Sorry for the long winded post. I saw a lot of assumptions on the OG post but it was overwhelming to have so many responses to every single comment I posted, as I thought that my post wouldn't get more than like 10 views and maybe a helpful comment. It felt much less daunting to answer it on this forum. Hope this clarifies that for you!
Update 4:
This happened a few days ago so honestly there has not been much of an update other than what I gave on the post. I told her I wouldn't be her MOH unless I was in pics, she kicked me out of her wedding, and we haven't spoken.
To me, our friendship is over and I don't know if there is anything that could be done to restore it. So I don't know if you would call it graceful, but I can confidentially say I am no longer her friend.