No Plus 1 for DP given these circumstances

[UnhappyWeddingGuest]

So, I've known the bride well, like part of my family for almost 14 years. In June this year we went on a weeks girls holiday together as she was resolutely single. My teenage DCs are part of her wedding party. She is also Godparent to both DCs

However AIBU that I am devastated to find out my seriously committed DP of 2yrs only being extended an evening invite. ... OK so she hasn't met him, but then again I have never met her intended!

I cannot believe she is serious. Her wedding is 1.5hrs away and she is expecting me to organise getting DC's to wedding party dress/suit fittings and the actual wedding morning at her house.... then for me to hang around for 5 hrs to watch her get married / eat with strangers and for DP to join us for the evening only. I am super proud the DCs will be part of her day, both DP and I are, but situation is insulting. - although I haven't told DP yet -

DP was going to pay for us to stay in a hotel near the venue for Friday and Saturday nights. But now why would he want to?

Seriously thinking of declining altogether. I am sure she can work out the logistics and care of my under 16's without me.

UPDATE: Just spoken to both DCs separately. DS says he will feel too awkward without me for moral support and that DP is a bigger part of all of our new rebuilt lives (after DH ended his life) than the bride. DD -whom has waited all her life to be a bridesmaid and was so excited earlier this week when she was fitted for her dress - was even more pointed in her response at the thought of DP not getting a full invite .... and immediately said she didn't want to be a bridesmaid if DP wasn't counted as part of our family.

• lets not forget that my adopted DS 6 has not been invited at all - but I understand that as she doesn't want children at the wedding and her Maid of Honours DS the same age has also not been invited.... (but MoHs DP has)

Pls help. What do you think I should do and how do I politely get my point across fairly and without malice?

I think you should talk to your DP first.

I don't actually think the bride has been horribly rude here. It seems to be common these days to have different tiered guests. I think the bride will be genuinely shocked to hear you are so upset about it.

When my SIL got married the church was quite small so they could only invite a limited number of people to the actual ceremony. Perhaps that is also the case here.

A boyfriend who doesn't live with you isn't part of the family.

I think your friend has been unspeakably rude and I would be upset too. Your DP is your partner. I wonder if the bride has invited anybody else's boyfriend/girlfriend/partner. DH and I were engaged zillions of years ago, we didn't live together until we got married but we were still invited to our friends' weddings as a couple.

I think our friend is planning a wedding and a party rather than a marriage and I think that's very sad.

Just reread the entire thread calmly. thank you for all your comments and opinions.

I don't think that either of you is being intrinsically unreasonable. Accepted etiquette is (or seemed to be, back when I got married) that you must invite spouses, fiances or live-in partners; non-live-in boyfriends or girlfriends were decided based on how much space you had and whether you had a personal relationship with them (so if you were pushed for space and had never met a friend's live-out boyfriend it would be perfectly normal not to invite him). On the other hand you really feel that you need your DP's practical and emotional support on this occasion.

Please call the bride and actually speak to her rather than just declining. I know when we got married one guest asked us if he could invite plus-one X, because reasons Y and Z and we said yes, absolutely, because that guest was important to us and we understood entirely why he wanted the plus-one there. I'm sure she has wiggle room at this point.

You invite neither or both always.

Unless, you have a group of friends who all know each other really well.

My old school friends didn't have plus ones when I got married (2 didn't have BFs and the one who did was hay making) they were fine because they were old disco attending pup crawling mates.

OP has stated that she and her partner will be living together soon, well before the wedding.

If OP thinks of someone as her partner or family then that's what they are to her.

Also, given that the bride has raised this about 6 months before the wedding, and mentioned the hotel weekend, she knows OP's plans and expectations included DP.

Why the bride chose email for the news is her business, but it means OP can think before responding. I suspect the bride expects a response and hopefully there can be an honest conversation.

I'm sure she has wriggle room too. I'm embarrassed to talk to her about it but will force myself.

She has already made it clear in an email that "I understand you are wanting to have a nice weekend away with DP too, so he will be able to join us for the evening celebration but we really are stretched for places for the wedding breakfast so that won’t be possible. This will be the same for everyone sorry!!"

Do you know, if your DC aren't that bothered about being part of the wedding, I'd be minded to e-mail back. "Sorry to hear that you are so stretched for numbers, as you wanted us to play a major part in your day but don't have the basic courtesy to invite my partner to your wedding and treat him as my equal, we are unable to attend your wedding at all. Hopefully this will mean that you will have some more spaces available for the A List for whom your wedding breakfast is intended".

So sorry that you have decided to treat my dp as though he is a second class citizen, but that means I too am relegated to 2nd class, and if we aren't equal to your other first tier guests, then unfortunately, I cannot afford to use two days of annual leave for your wedding and spend the equivalent of a short family break on accommodation so we can attend.

I really think the attitude in relation to weddings is well and truly out of hand. The guests need to be treated like guests again.

And actually why should he get a plus one. He's your partner; he has a justified reason to attend and should have a proper named invitation.

I can't understand why you can't go over, let the kids dress themselves while you go out. You then go to the blessing, and take lots of photos so you don't have to make much small talk.

Then you make excuses at the reception, and pop off to the hotel where you can have a lovely time with DP with no children in the house before you attend the evening do together.

I went to a wedding where I knew the bride and groom, and my DP was the best man, and seated miles from me. Apart from that I didn't know anybody, and I admit it was hard work being on my own at a family celebration. However, there are always a number of people at a wedding who don't know everyone, and usually everyone is on their best behaviour and trying very hard to make sure everyone else has as nice a time as possible.

NearTheWindmill I would love to have the courage to send that.

Instead I diplomatically replied "I'm delighted you have met someone and am quite upset I haven't met him yet!!!!! To celebrate your engagement we, that is DP myself and the DCs would like to invite you both to share something sparkly and alcoholic over dinner with us during January, perhaps in xxx which is about half way.

Let me know which Fridays you are free to come.

Warm wishes for a wonderfully happy New Year to you both

OP

I so wanted to add the comment that was suggested earlier and invite her alone to the dinner and suggest her DP is welcome to join us for deserts and coffee.

Now I'm smiling.

Sorry, but I think YABU. The wedding day is about the couple and they can invite who they wish.

I think HowBad has the right idea.

Don't lose a good friend over this. Really, don't. Think long and hard before you risk that. Weddings are shockingly expensive. Think about how much juggling she is having to do to include the people who really matter to her. She has told you how important you are by including your DC in the wedding party.
Adults can drive and eat without someone to hold their hand. And they can entertain themself for a few hours before joining a wedding in the evening.

I can actually see exactly where you are coming from, but that doesn't justify it. Stop with feeling like a victim and get on with enjoying the wedding of a good friend, in whatever role each of you has been given.

I can understand why this has hurt you so much.

I think if it were me, in your shoes, I would think of declining the whole thing all round. She wants your two older children playing "big" parts, you elsewhere, your DP there in the evening and your 6yo not there at all.

Even without the emotional upheaval of the whole thing, and the idea that 1/2 a family are very important but not the other half, logistically that sounds like a nightmare. If that was us, and DH was invited to a wedding with one of the kids, and me for the evening, and the other kids to stay at home, it would be declined. Not doable. And odd, frankly.

incidentally, MN wedding etiquette advice is often bollocks, having followed it myself twice, and come a cropper! You need to decide what to do within your own family and circs

About 20 yrs ago my parents were invited to the wedding of their very close friends' daughter - we had been neighbours & like sisters from birth til they moved away when friend & I were 12. Neither my live-in partner nor I were invited but no issue for us. Some weeks later we were invited for evening only (& this would mean a 6 hr round trip). We accepted. A very short while after we were invited for the full-on event. We accepted. On each successive invitation my faux aunt started with something like 'you are smart enough to realise why you're being invited at this late stage'. We weren't offended, we realised that we were some way down in the pecking order but I was happy to be included as a guest.
To see someone who has meant a lot to you on the most important day of their life is something special.

This is a very difficult situation as the reality is that a lot of couples getting married are severely restricted by numbers and costs. I think doing the guest list for a wedding is very stressful. I come from a huge family and my DH has a huge circle of friends but for our wedding we could only have 58 people- so 29 each, which is nothing. It just wasn't physically possible to invite everyone's partners to the actual Wedding Day event, though we did invite them to our evening one. We didn't expect all the partners to turn up for the evening event as our venue was about a 50 minute drive away but we honestly had no other option. We also did not invite anybody's children. At just over £80 a head it was ridiculous to think we would have to turn people away that we knew and wanted to be there in order to make space for partners we'd never met or someone's young child. My DH invited one of his friends, who he'd known for about 10 years, to the whole day event but didn't invite his partner as although they had been together for about 18 months we hadn't actually met her - so why should my husband turn away one of his other really good friends just to make way for a woman he has never met just because she is going out with his friend? It's very unfair to expect people to do this. Some couples have plenty of money to spend on money's or have parents who contribute etc so don't have to be so restricted with the guest list, but for some couples it really is just impossible to have everyone there. FWIW my DH's friend didn't come to the wedding because he was in a huff that his partner wasn't invited and all it did was make him look petty and immature - needless to say the friendship has never been the same since. I think you would be very silly to let this affect things with your friend - don't be so quick to judge her and just accept that decision like this aren't easy for the couples getting married, I'm sure your friend feels bad enough about it and probably just needs your understanding.

You call that a diplomatic reply?
I call it a passive aggressive one.
"Quite upset" you haven't met him yet? Unnecessary. You should have just said you'd love to meet him.

I also think it's a bit off that you've only now added that she didn't explain and apologise in her email about you boyfriend not being invited.

And out of order to start discussing with your kids before your boyfriend!

I think you're making a meal of it re the 90 minutes, too. I just drove that yesterday on a day trip to family. Some of us on here do that as a daily commute!

And if you don't want your boyfriend to pay for a hotel when he's not going - how about YOU pay for it? Sorted. It seems to me like you are looking for problems.

Is she a lot younger than you? You said many guests would be? I'm thinking it might be quite common for single invitations in that age group - afterall, many more partners are more transient.

You haven't met her fiancé, she hasn't met your boyfriend... I just kind of wonder how close you really are? She may well love your kids, as she was part of bringing them up. But - you were here employer. I have a couple of nanny friends who are still in touch with and like their ex employers, but they're not best mates, and never were. Is there a tendency to think of a nanny as part of your family, in a way they don't feel it themselves?
Anyway, that's by the by.

Whether people like separate evening lists or not, they are common enough in this country as to be accepted as normal and not the crass work of individual oddness. She's included a boyfriend she doesn't know, and not shied away from emailing to apologise for it being evening only.

Give her a break!

Writer can I just ask why you didn't choose a larger venue where you could accommodate all the guests you wanted there? No malicious intent in my post, I'm just curious.

I am not a fan of 'Evening Only' invitations.

I get that couples are not intending to cause hurt and offense but they often do. To diminish people's feeling because it's apparently normal these days is to lack empathy.

Unhappy - I simply wouldn't go. This shouldn't be causing you so much hurt and stress.

I really don't understand weddings nowadays with B lists, no partners and no kids.

We invited plus ones for all guests, even if I didn't know them. Everyone was invited to the wedding service and the reception - which included food and then a dance in the evening. And all children were invited.

If there wasn't space/we couldn't afford it, we would just have had a smaller wedding.

Some people came without their kids, other without plus ones, but they at least had the option.

Nobody was offended. This "It's your wedding you can do what you want" seems to be an excuse for all kinds of rude shit.

""Quite upset" you haven't met him yet? "

And yet she hasn't met your "seriously committed" partner of two yrs either??

Are you as friendly as you think?

So in fact she has explained why she can't squeeze him in to the wedding breakfast, apologised, and confirmed that it will be the same for everyone, ie not a personal slight against you as you seem to think.

Maybe you feel she should have chosen a larger venue and/or gone deeply into debt to fit in partners she's never met, but for her sake I hope everyone whose partner she's invited to evening only hasn't reacted as you have!

If you've not met each other's partners you are not as close as you suggest. That makes sense given you are her ex employer.

We were quite restricted on venues because we needed it to be easily accessible to several elderly/disabled relatives and needed to be part of a hotel so they could rest in the day if needed.

We only had about 35 people to the day part and then had cousins and friends to the afternoon/evening.

I didn't do plus ones to people I had never met. I didn't want to look back in ten years at my wedding photos and not know who loads of people were. We invited one plus one in the end, a new partner of a family member for special reasons after they specifically asked for an invite.