Is it ok not to go to wedding?

[DexyMidnight]

An old friend is getting married at the start of March. Let's call her Jane. Jane and I used to have a good friend in common (Sally) but Sally and I had a major falling out three years ago. I tried to make friends and apologise, but Sally wasn't having any of it and said she just didn't want me in her life anymore.

I was very cut up about all of this. My depression and anxiety, which had been under check, spiraled back out of control and i became quite ill again.

However, in the interim, lives have moved on. Sally and I each married our husbands. We both invited Jane to our respective weddings, but didn't invite each other (unsurprisingly).

While life has moved on, I have not. If anyone mentions Sally's name i get very upset. Hot, tight throat, panicky, tears. I am not proud of this and i know it's not normal. But there we are.

Sally lives overseas. Around the time of her engagement, Jane told me that Sally couldn't make it to her wedding for various weddings, including distance. Jane was sad but understood.

I found out, last weekend, that actually Sally can now come to the wedding. (This is confirmed, not just gossip/guess-work).

I have (privately) been in bits since I found out. I cannot face seeing Sally again and don't want to go to the wedding.

I've been a nervous wreck this week and have had to take time off work. I have cried for days on end. It is not that i think she will be horrid to me at the wedding - I know she won't speak to me beyond a polite hello - i just cannot face seeing her. If i do, i feel like it will be another blow to my mental health (I am already a mess) and if i am being honest, i just don't want to put myself through that.

Separately, i am also horribly afraid of getting upset and causing a scene at Jane's wedding.

AIBU not to go, even though all there is to fear is my own reactions?

Pretty much every poster on here has depression and anxiety at a bare minimum, so I think we do

Er, no we don't

Please don’t write a letter to Sally. That’s terrible advice. She doesn’t want drama and it would just be more drama.

Leave Sally alone and as you’ve decided to not to go, just apologise to Jane and wish her and her husband well. Don’t write a long explanation as this will just add more fuel to the fire.

Sorry ShutYoFace, I was being a bit rhetorical and attempting to be slightly humorous (failing, obviously). Not every last one of us. But certainly a very high proportion. Enough so that I think it's safe to say most of us do have an understanding of MH issues.

And I absolutely agree that you should NOT write Sally a letter, unless you do it purely for catharsis and never ever send it.

Don’t put yourself through it. Arrange to meet with your friend and explain everything you’ve put in your OP and if she’s a good friend she will understand it.

It’s only one day after all and your friend probably won’t wqnt any possible agro on the day anyway

If the decision is to give Jane a sanitised version of the truth (i.e., that OP is having some mental health issues, doesn't trust herself to stay composed and would therefore rather not risk spoiling the wedding), I don't know if doing it in person is a good idea. Given everything OP has said, it sounds as though it could go wrong.

I might not have gone through the MoB, but given she's involved now, perhaps it's best just to let her handle it as she sees fit. OP has already accepted that she's risking Jane's friendship.

I just reread the post where you explained your conversation with MoB, and she told you not to say anything to Jane. So given you've gone through her, do as she says and let her handle it.

Whitecurrants raises an interesting point.

OP, do you feel you had your say with Sally about what happened then? Maybe this is festering in you because you feel you never got a chance to tell her your point of view or tell her how badly she treated you?

It may be too late to speak to Sally about it now, but it may be helpful to write a letter putting in everything you feel/felt and take a walk to the park and burn it. I think, as Whitecurrants says, that could be cathartic. (I did this and it did help a bit).

After that, allow yourself to feel anger. Because what she did (refusing to accept someone's apology for something that wasn't that bad) is quite mean. You're allowed to feel angry. Rage at her. Swear at her. In the safety of your home.

I don't know much about the 5 stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance), has this something you have gone through with a counsellor?

Sorry been in meetings. Catching up. I won't send Sally a letter. I might write her one though, never to be aired. @Babyccino. No...not something i've had explained to me before. As i said in my view any counselling has been unstructured and therefore i've found it unhelpful. I would really like to do something with a positive goal and advice on how to get to that goal.

and @babyccino: no, i never got a chance to talk to her. She was too furious with me for spoiling the weekend and then she didn't want to speak when i got home. It's never been ventilated.

I don't know how important it is to Jane that i go. I assume it is important in as much as you have scarce invites to go round at weddings and have to make difficult decisions about who receives those invites. A few people couldn't come to my wedding (distance, illness, other engagements) and of course i was disappointed because we obviously wanted them to be there, we had invited them! But i understood their various reasons not for coming. There wasn't any drama or falling out.

I agree facing Sally might be good for you but i do not want to use Jane's wedding as a stage to explore whether that is the case. I am trying to do my best.

*for me! (sorry)

This might not be a "morally-correct" answer but honestly, it sounds like it just isn't worth the stress and anxiety that it is causing you.
A couple of days before the wedding get "sick", call your friend and apologise and maybe send her some flowers or champagne etc show that you hope she has a lovely day? You don't need to tell her that you're not coming because of the other woman, she might not understand how seriously it is affecting you.
I understand how you feel. I have an ex-friend who was really, really horrible to me and caused me so much emotional harm about nine years ago. She lives 200 miles away but I saw her near my house once about four years ago and was terrified of her seeing me. (I was in my car at the time and I actually ducked so she couldn't see me.) Even after all this time I get nervous if I see someone who looks a bit like her. I could never go to a wedding if I knew she was going to be there.

Sorry to hear you are going through this op.
I had to face an ex who had treated me badly. It was professionally, and I couldn'treally get out of it. I felt so so upset at the thought of v seeing him and the effect he would have on me. I was crying all the time.
I went to a therapist, and in one session she gave me some fantastic tools to take into the situation with me.
I walked out of her session knowing I could hold my own, and I was right.
I saw him and it was not loaded. I took all my power back. It was such a relief.

It just makes me sad that you are willing to risk your whole friendship with Jane for something that happened with Sally 3 years ago. There is a huge risk that Jane won't be as understanding as you think she will be.

and @babyccino: no, i never got a chance to talk to her. She was too furious with me for spoiling the weekend and then she didn't want to speak when i got home. It's never been ventilated

Then I think Whitecurrants has hit the nail on the head here. You feel Sally has denied you a chance to express your feelings. And that is really important for healing and (sorry for the cliché) - closure.

In the absence of being able to get that closure from Sally, try and get it from somewhere else - whether that's with a new counsellor, a good friend who won't stay blandly neutral, your family, your DH, an unsent letter - or a fresh thread on MN. Or all of the above.

Do you confide in people or bottle things up?

I urge you to get some constructive counselling. Friendships are too precious to risk losing like this, without at least trying to overcome the root cause.

I will Gazelda.

Yippee thank you for you help but i am trying now just to limit damage. I won't change my mind about going as i don't feel it would be best for me or for Jane. I'll just have to hope that she is not very bothered or that she is forgiving.

[Flowers] for @ohyes and @intomyheart

Hi OP. I found counselling for a fall out I had with someone quite useless too. What did work very well for me was a self-help CBT book. Afraid I can't remember the name now but it had a different goal per chapter and I set aside half an hour each evening to do it, which, along with the goals it set, gave me structure. Took about two months to finish and brought about a real change in my mindset and feelings towards the situation.

Hope that helps

Conker i will look for that book, if i can. Might PM you to see if you can remember anything else!

Just wanted to echo the one post above that mentioned EMDR. If you google 'EMDR Theory' there is a really useful web page that explains why it's thought it works and what it entails. I had it after a birth that wasn't by other people's standards "that bad" (a topic for another time) and realised the trauma did actually come from something related to hospital that happened as a kid, and I was being so pigheadedly determined to have a home birth that I didn't allow myself to create a contingency birth plan, and even consider the possibility that there was a big fat red oh-no hanging over my head. Anyway. My point is, some people expect a major event to cause trauma, but it just has to have been traumatic To You. I hope you can find something that works. I will also say that I have tried counselling once only and was so unimpressed, I really thought I could have done better myself. (I was 19 and arrogant OK? ) I'd chuck you a hug but seems like are the done thing here, so have those.