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Original poster

Does anybody regret their choice of bridesmaids?

69 replies

TopTabby · 28/02/2022 15:38

Because I do a bit.
Been married many years but I would do it all very differently if I was getting married now.
I had 3 bridesmaids: 2 adults, 1 flower girl
Flower girl was 7 years old & absolutely lovely.

Adult 1 was dh's younger sister, we weren't close & over the years she's done a lot to remind me I'm not immediate family.

Adult 2 was my best friend who left after the meal to go to another wedding!

I rather wish I hadn't had any tbh & definitely wouldn't if I got married now!

OP posts:
OnlyAFleshWound · 28/02/2022 18:09

No. I didn't have any and have never regretted that for a moment..never bought into any of the wedding bollocks.

MalFunkshun · 28/02/2022 18:10

No, I had two friends who I’m still close to 10 years later, my sister (ditto) and SiL. None of them particularly helped, but we were early 20s so doubt anyone had a clue how to be helpful 😄

Now parents and surrogate parents - I regret them because of the drama that seemed to come with any female of a certain age who could in any vague way claim to have a ‘mother’ role…

MsHampton · 28/02/2022 18:13

I don't regret any I had but there's someone I wish I'd chosen. She's been such an amazing friend to me over the years and I think it took me a while to appreciate how important she is if that makes sense?

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Weddings
PatchworkElmer · 28/02/2022 18:14

No I don’t regret it. We’re not as close as we were then but she was still a big part of my life at that time, and the right person to be there on the day.

Original poster
TopTabby · 28/02/2022 18:22

@PatchworkElmer
That's a really nice way of looking at it.

OP posts:
CMOTDibbler · 28/02/2022 18:24

Yes, tbh I was too embarrassed to admit I wasn't close enough to anyone to really be my bridesmaid. One of them I wasn't even really friends with by the wedding, and the other I didn't get a day invite to her wedding - she was my friend but I was very much on the periphery to her in retrospect.

TheIsaacs · 28/02/2022 18:37

Definitely I would do it so differently now. I’d only have two out of the four bridesmaid I had originally and I’d definitely ask other people too.

The two I wouldn’t ask now have both since got married and neither asked me to be in their wedding party as they had “so many other, closer friends” to ask instead. Very hurtful to find I wasn’t considered a close friend to either of them, when at the time they would have been very upset not to be asked to be my bridesmaids.

LadyCordeliaFitzgerald · 28/02/2022 18:39

Yes but I regret my whole wedding and would have much preferred to elope (which was my childhood dream wedding)

JammyCandy · 28/02/2022 18:40

@CMOTDibbler I felt like that - I knew none of my friends would pick me to be their bridesmaids so I didn’t want to pick them & had no one in the end .

LemonDrizzles · 28/02/2022 18:42

I often wish I had invited two people instead of another two people.

In a wider friendship group, I knew of a couple who I now try to see once a year...

LetsGoCrazyPurpleBanana · 28/02/2022 18:43

Yes. One was a school friend. We are friends on Facebook but she never replies to any messages. Never wishes us well when I post any it being our anniversary etc.

LetsGoCrazyPurpleBanana · 28/02/2022 18:43

*anything about it being our anniversary.

ButterflyBitch · 28/02/2022 18:46

Yes I had a friend from work as my bridesmaid instead of my oldest friends. I though as my oldest friends lived so far away that it would be tricky to sort dresses etc so I chose the person I was closest to at the time. Never see her anymore.

cptartapp · 28/02/2022 18:46

I had none. My oldest best friend acted as a witness and signed the register and the other did a reading in church.
Still friends 20 years later. Still glad I didn't have them as bridesmaids.
Glad I wasn't theirs either tbh. It was just a mutual understanding.

Byeckythump · 28/02/2022 18:47

I had two adult friends and a child. One adult and the child I am still glad to have had.

The other adult I’m still a bit cross about, she was a newish friend who was also engaged and made a big deal about being each other’s bridesmaids and planning our weddings together. So I sort of went along with it, got married first and then she said she was sorry but they’d decided not to have bridesmaids for her wedding! I knew she’d always wanted to be a bridesmaid and felt totally manipulated. Luckily her fiancé was missing from all our official photographs because their marriage only lasted 6 months, I think it was a classic case of wanting the wedding, not the marriage.

cushioncovers · 28/02/2022 18:47

Yes, she kept on about being my bridesmaid so I said yes she then did sod all to help me and bitched about the choice of dress. It was upsetting.

CurryLover56 · 28/02/2022 18:49

It’s funny as I always thought I would only have a couple but I ended up with four plus a flower girl & a pageboy! The adult bridesmaids were my best mate, my niece & 2 lovely girls that I babysat for when they were little. The flower girl was my best mate’s daughter & my oldest ( at that time only) nephew was my pageboy. It was perfect.

Zazdar · 28/02/2022 18:49

I didn’t have any. My husband didn’t have any of whatever the male equivalent is called either.

User48751490 · 28/02/2022 18:50

@Hen2018

I didn’t have any.
I wish I had just did this, looking back...
Blossom987 · 28/02/2022 18:52

I’m not married but there are a few people I wish I had never accepted being bridesmaid for. Two I don’t see at all now, one just drifted apart and I felt a bit used tbh, and the other we had a big fall out a year after the wedding over something unrelated but it was not repairable. I suppose it’s easier for me though as it’s their wedding pictures I probably ruin! I don’t have to look at them. But I wish I hadn’t put so much time, effort and money into it. So many women change when they become brides! I’ve definitely learned a lot from experiencing others get married before me. I would be very very cautious about who to have as bridesmaids, if any at all.

alwaysidentified · 28/02/2022 18:54

My cousin. Was BM at my wedding, spoilt more than you could imagine. When it was her turn not only did she not ask me to be her BM, as agreed for years BUT I could let that go as things change, but she wouldn't allow me to bring my six week old purely bf baby and two young boys knowing that the WHOLE family was invited so no childcare, I was a single parent and it WASN'T a child free wedding. She made it impossible for me to go. I've cut her off now but wish I'd done it years ago.

doodlejump1980 · 28/02/2022 18:55

I had my then SIL. She knew she was going to divorce my brother, so should have stepped back well before the wedding. Instead I have her catsarse smile in all my otherwise lovely family photos. 😡

pancakes22 · 28/02/2022 18:58

Married 9 years and my mind wandered to this earlier today so it's funny I should find this thread!! I was so afraid of upsetting anyone that I decided to just have family. 2 adults, 2 little. One of them didn't bother at all and I barely saw her on the day so it feels like I only really had my sister. I get really upset that I didn't have friends, didn't get that night staying with everyone with the stereotypical matching dressing gowns. I didn't have a fuss made of me and I didn't get to show my best friends how much they meant to me. I don't really know any other time when you can have that kind of situation again and it's something that I think about a lot and I struggle to move past those feelings of regrets. How
do you get over something you can never redo?

allfurcoatnoknickers · 28/02/2022 18:58

No - my only regret is that I only had one! I wish I'd asked one of my other girlfriends. I was FAR too warried about offending people, and now I'm older I realize that no one except me cared that much.

Holothane · 28/02/2022 19:01

No I had an older friend who was my maid of honour I totally refused to have great niece as flower girl.

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