AIBU Disagreement on wedding seating

[RoyalnGeneral]

Wedding one. Some details changed but I am not any of the four people involved.

I have a friend, Alice who suffers from anxiety (relevant). Alice got married to Ben about 18 months ago. Ben is a laid back ‘try to keep everyone happy’ type of guy. Alice and Ben are friends with another couple, Carl and Donna. Ben and Carl have been best friends for over 20 yrs. Alice and Donna worked together for several years but now work at different organisations.

Carl and Donna have announced they will be getting married next spring and Carl asked Ben to be his best man. Planning was going well until seating arrangements were discussed when it turned out Ben would be sitting at the top table while Alice would be at a guest table. Alice was upset and said she didn’t know anyone at the wedding and didn’t want to sit with strangers. She wanted to sit next to Ben at the top table.

Ben spoke to C&D and asked if Alice could sit with him. Carl and Donna said no, they understood it wasn’t ideal but that A&B would only be separated for a few hours. Alice said if she couldn't sit at the top table then she wanted Ben to sit at her guest table and do his speech from there. C&D refused again as they wanted Ben at the top table with Carl, so he could do the toasts/ read the messages/ keep people on time.

Things went back and forth without resolution, then last weekend Carl phoned Ben and uninvited him from being best man. A&B are still invited to the wedding and can now sit together at the guest table. The new best man will sit at the top table. The best man’s wife will be sitting with friends at another guest table.

Alice told me about this last night. She was taken aback that Ben had been uninvited. She said that at her wedding she hadn’t cared about wedding party only at the top table. What was important to her was that her guests felt comfortable and she didn’t think it was fair she had been expected to sit by herself with people she didn’t know.

I said that while Alice hadn't minded who sat at the top table at her wedding, Carl and Donna seem to want a more traditional approach. Also, C&D have accommodated Alice’s request to sit with Ben, although not in the way Alice expected. Carl will now have his best man with him at the top table, as he wants, and the best man’s wife will be sitting with people she knows, so perhaps it is the best compromise C&D can come up with, given the circumstances.

Alice disagreed. She said C&D are overreacting and she doesn’t see why she couldn’t been seated with Ben in the first place. She isn't sure she wants to go to the wedding now as she thinks it will be awkward.

AIBU to think Alice should have accepted C&D’s initial refusal and not continued to insist on sitting with Ben?

I know Alice’s anxiety means she finds these situations stressful so perhaps C&D could have been more sympathetic. But it’s C&D’s wedding day which I tend to think puts the onus on A&B to try to accomodate their friends' wishes.

Exact the same scenario happened to me with my husband who was neat man I was Inktitlaly nervous at sitting with strangers on my own but I sucked it up and went and sat on my own for the first half while my husband sat at the top table as ultimately it wasn’t about me .

Best man

I also think that, given the silence, the OP is Alice

@ChicCroissant - Sadly, I've seen so many friendship and family groups who have basically been 'trained' to put one person's anxity first. They find it so normal that they would centre plans on making sure the person with mental health issues isn't triggered by anything, they lose sight of what's 'normal' behaviour.

So I can completely see if the OP is also a friend or family member of Alices, that she would also assume Ben would at least try to sort this in a way that suits Alice.

It's become their normal.

@RoyalnGeneral - perhaps think about your own relationship with Alice, do you always meet where she wants, fit round her needs, do you stop to think where does her anxity stop and her preferences start?

Has Alice been allowed to think it's normal for others to fix things in a way that suits her?

Alice needs to get a grip of herself

We've got an Alice in our family @DisgruntledGuineaPig - one of their recent complaints was too many tourists at a known tourist spot. Any time I see them my stomach is in knots of tension because you are just waiting for the problems to start. It is a shame.

@ChicCroissant - funnily enough, I'm meeting our Alice this evening! I know what you mean - they are so draining to be round.

OP - I'd tell Alice that they probably had an idea of how the Best Man would be involved in the running of the day, they might need him to be involved with rounding up groups for photos on the day, getting ready and travelling with the groom, perhaps helping with looking after elderly relatives etc. They might have looked at Alice not being able to be alone for the meal (and I agree, with that much link between them, it's unlikely Ben is the only person Alice knows at the wedding) and realised Ben would struggle with being a Best Man.

Alice, Carl and Donna have all behaved badly, in my opinion. Alice should have explored other compromises, such as arriving after the meal. Carl and Donna were unreasonable to be so precious about who sits at their top table - it's only a meal - it isn't as though Alice was asking to stand next to the bride and groom at the actual ceremony.

This is what happens when entitlement and selfishness meets entitlement and selfishness. Alice has spoiled the day for herself; Carl has lost his first choice of best man - poor Ben is caught in the middle - everyone loses.

I think that's a bit harsh on the B&G tbh Screaming.

We've no idea what compromises/limitations/pressure they have aside from Alice on who sits at the top table.

It maybe already "oversubscribed" with with addition of step parents for example.

In my case the size of the top table was limited by both the width of the room and catering tables that constructed it, plus allowing access space at both ends for catering staff.

It wouldn't have been simple to just add another placement.

They simply might not have wanted the table to be unbalanced (eg if the maid of honour was single).

Even if there was no definitive reason other than they wanted a traditional seating arrangement then that's up to them. It's their wedding.

Where do you start to draw the line?

If Alice gets to sit where she wants then what about every other guest? Do they all get a say on who they sit next to? Would you turn up at a wedding and throw a hissy fit because you wanted to be on table 2 rather than table 4 and seated next to two specific people?

Is she any more special than anyone else attending the wedding? No of course not; given the relationship described she's a lot less special than a lot of other people at the wedding (neither family or a lifelong friend), she's just married to someone who is (or was) part of the wedding party as a result of a long friendship.

She's the person whose behaved badly here (along with her husband for enabling her) and repeatedly pestering the B&G to give in to her demands.

Frankly, I'm not surprised they have ditched Ben as best man and in fact am pleased they've stood up for themselves and not allowed themselves to be manipulated by Alice's childish, self absorbed antics.

It never ends with people like this - a classic give and inch and they take a mile, as perfectly demonstrated by her current moaning (having got the seating option she wanted, just not on her terms) and further escalating by threatening not to attend (which she could have done initially and saved this whole drama) thus having prevented the grooms choice of best man for no reason whatsoever other than her selfishness.

Carl and Donna were unreasonable to be so precious about who sits at their top table - it's only a meal

It’s their wedding. It’s not precious of them to want it to be about them and have it the way they want. Selfish and entitled is a guest declaring that if she can’t sit at the top table then DH has to sit on her table and do his speech from there. Ridiculous that, after telling Alice no, she tried again & again to have things her own way on their special day.

Alice is an idiot, and certainly needs to grow up. She should have done what c and d wanted.

Wow, Alice is a PITA. Most people have some form of anxiety, and what used to be called shy in social situations - which I am, also. Why do some people expect everyone to bend over backwards to accommodate them? It’s up to the shy person to deal with it. Alice needs to learn to cope, not expect everyone to bend to her will and wishes.

So does Alice never go out on her own without her husband, doesn't have a job etc? Oh but she does. So she's just being a fucking princess and has already managed to put a downer on the wedding for the bride and groom.

Nerves do not equal anxiety.

They do. Anxiety is a feeling and people without anxiety disorder feel it too. However, in someone with anxiety disorder it's much, much stronger.
"I was anxious about x"
"Y made me quite anxious"
Are normal sentences and normal feeling. Unless of course it is na anxiety disorder where that feeling runs stronger.

Wow. More responses than I expected. Okay, thanks all. No, I’m not Alice, or any of the other three.

The context is the wedding actually happened a few years ago. Alice and Ben did attend in the end but afterwards Carl and Donna faded them out and the two couples are no longer in touch. I don't know if C&D chose to do that as a result of the seating issues but it seems like a reasonable assumption.

Alice has form for being quite demanding and this incident is not an isolated one. It's difficult sometimes to disentangle what is a result of her (diagnosed) mental health issues, and what is her being unreasonable irrespective of her mental health issues.

I think Alice needs to start seeking more help with managing her anxiety because these incidents are having negative consequences, but it's difficult to convince Alice because she doesn't think she's being unreasonable. She says about this instance that no one would have wanted to sit on their own and it wouldn't have hurt C&D to have an extra person at the top table. I posted to get a feel for what the consensus was.

To those asking if she really didn't know anyone else to sit with at the wedding - I don't know. She says not and I have no reason to disbelieve her. I do think her actions were motivated by anxiety rather than attention seeking. This is the kind of situation she gets anxious about.

what used to be called shy in social situations

Yeah it’s fairly normal to be apprehensive in sitting at a table where you don’t know anyone.

It’s also fairly normal to deal with it, and even look forward to talking to new and interesting people and finding out about them.

I used to be pathologically shy - I was told that this was actually quite a self-centred view of the world and no one was looking at me. And that I should look beyond myself and try to find out about other people and be interested in them.

Also, good manners and polite small talk go a long way in these sorts of situations.

Alice is way out of order! Her poor husband missing out because she wouldn’t let it go. I understand anxiety can be awful and not something she can control so maybe the selfless thing to do would to not go to the wedding and let Ben be best man..how sad for Ben and the groom.

Just read update.. show her this thread.

If it happened a few years ago what is the context of it now being discussed? . Is Alice still going on about it and is annoyed that the other couple have ‘dropped’ them as friends? It might not have just been for that reason, perhaps Alice is incredibly demanding and needy in other ways and C & D had just enough (& maybe felt Ben was an absolute wimp not to put his foot down).

'Wouldn't have hurt them...' to make her wants central to their thinking. How does she know?

The person I know who's like this, also thinks she knows better then everyone else what is good for them (despite failing to ask relevant questions or listen to the answers, so actually knowing very little about what other people need or want). Lives in a fantasy world constructed from her own assumptions.

DeRigueurMortis I agree there might have been practical constraints that meant Alice couldn't sit at the top table, but that wouldn't have applied to the other solution Alice and Ben proposed - that Ben sat with Alice at a guest table. I don't see why Donna and Carl couldn't have accepted that solution - Ben could have made his way to the top table to make his speech and then sat down with Alice again once he'd finished.

Of course, as I said, there are other ways in which Alice could have compromised if Donna and Carl wouldn't. My point was that (it seems) neither 'side' was prepared to budge an inch.

I think it's unfair to brush off Alice's mental health issues - the OP says these are diagnosed issues. If she says she'd struggle to sit with strangers, why do people not accept this? Where Alice was at fault was in not offering any solutions other than those that exactly suited her wishes - she's not at fault for having MH issues.

As I said, I don't think it's a straightforward case of either Alice or Carl and Donna being U - they all could have handled this problem in less selfish, more adult ways.

Op please don't show her this thread.

I used to suffer with an anxiety disorder and was always being told by family how selfish I was, I believed it & it would trigger suicidal thoughts, I thought I was just pathetic and it would be better if I was just gone.

I started to get better after I was in a car accident & had the same physical reaction as an anxiety attack. Time slowed down, voices sounded echoey & far away, background noise was deafening, my hands were soaking wet, my brain felt like it wasn't working properly. I realised that in an anxiety attack adrenaline was flooding my brain, it was a real physical fight or flight reaction, not something I could just 'get a grip' with.

Because everyone has anxiety lots of people think they know what an anxiety disorder is.