Hen Party Abroad

[Strawbfields]

Hey,

I am a bridesmaid for a good friend who is absolutely insisting on having a 4/5 night hen party abroad in the summer holidays next year. Like the majority of us, I have been unable to get away with my OH or family due to the pandemic and I'd rather prioritise my family. The cost is looking to be in the region of £1000PP by the time we factor in the holiday cost, spending money and all the added extras that come with hen parties. (The brides DM is covering the brides cost)

I just think with everything that we have all gone through over the last year, it would be far better to hire out a lodge with hot tub etc and have a great time in the UK at a 1/4 of the cost.

It might also be worth mentioning the wedding has been postponed by a year due to the pandemic and a few of the girls circumstances have changed. If the wedding itself was abroad then that would be completely different, but I think it's a bit much just for a hen weekend. AIBU?

£1k to share a room with 3 other people? Bloody hell, no way!

@PeggyHill

so I guess you could say I'm a hypocrite if I'm willing to pay for my parents holiday for my own wedding but not pay £1000 to go on a hen

Nope. That wouldn't make sense. Two completely different situations. Whatever you pay for your parents at your own wedding is absolutely nobody else's business. If this friend called you a hypocrite for that then she would be unbelievably self centred and entitled.

This.

@alibongo5

£1k to share a room with 3 other people? Bloody hell, no way!

And she'll be the type to demand everyone pays for her, too.

Wow what a bitch and the rest-i cant believe the one who said she cant afford it herself made you feel worse-youve got a year to save-yeah for my own holiday thanks

its not up to other people what you do with yourown money

i hope you havent know her a long time id be so disappointed if a good friend treated me like that

I’d put money on the bride/mum/sister/BF have booked a luxury suite whilst the plebs have bog standard accommodation.

They’re annoyed because you’ve unbalanced the books and they’ll all have increased costs.

Wait till they get the ‘exclusive pool bar’ ‘spa treatments’ ‘days out’ and exclusive bars and expensive restaurants demands - it’ll all go tits up!

A few posters have said that they expect her to look back in a few years time and be mortified at her behaviour. Does this actually happen? Do bridezillas tend to have Damascene conversions? Strikes me as more likely that they just continue pissing people off for eternity.

I agree with PPs that the £1k is the tip of the iceberg and you'd have probably had to pay three times that much including gifts, clothes, drinks etc.

My wedding to DH about 5 years ago cost under £2500 - including the honeymoon which was admittedly really shit only two nights in the UK, but we were skint. But guess what, we are just as married as all these idiots who start married life with £20K of debt from all their grandiose schemes. And we would not have dreamed of expecting our guests to pay for anything or asking our bridesmaids to buy their own dresses.

Yes I would hope she will look back and realise how badly she has treated the OP

@DdraigGoch

A few posters have said that they expect her to look back in a few years time and be mortified at her behaviour. Does this actually happen? Do bridezillas tend to have Damascene conversions? Strikes me as more likely that they just continue pissing people off for eternity.

They don't really change quickly I don't think, not until a few years after the marriage goes tits up. If they've got grabby mothers and MiLs and grooms and FiLs then they just dig in for grim death, because they're brainwashed by it.

About 4-5 years, then.

£1000 is so much money, I'd never expect any friend to pay that

How sad that the hen abs wedding isn't about friendship but about extravagance and showing off

She should want you to come, hasn't even asked if she could help or an alternative

What a brat!

@cansu

There is a simple solution. say privately to friend. It sounds amazing but I can't afford it. I hope you have a great time. Then don't discuss it.

Agree.

But that wouldn't make such an entertaining thread

I think we can guarantee that someone, may be not just one, in that hen night group is damn envious of you for having had the bravery to extract yourself from this wanky circus. They may be cross with you but only because it’s made it harder for them to do the same.

Just imagine putting your friends in the position of having to spend so much. I’m afraid I’m old school too. My hen do was a meal in a reasonably priced restaurant which I chose based on my friends who I knew were most likely to have money struggles, precisely so they could come too and relax. We had a ball and no one had to quietly panic about what it was costing. I paid for the booze and everyone picked up their own tab.

DH and I had a very cheap wedding. This might not sound romantic to many but after a trip to the registry office, we had a glorious wedding party with dear friends and family members at a music event, which meant that friends from all over the world attended. Some of the bands played at our do, as they were friends and we put on a big BBQ with a cheap bar. The money we saved went towards renovating a family property at a seaside tourist location. We spent a few years finishing it, doing up the place room by room. Friends used to come too, and spent half the time on the beach and then helped with the renovation. A more distant mate of DH who has never lifted a finger to help us, messaged him a couple of years ago because his fiancé wanted to hold her hen do at the French Riviera and got wind of our place. She expected me to host her and a gaggle of friends. I hadn’t even met her before. Oh, and they expected DH to drive up the night before the wedding across the UK in his 1950s car because the bride wanted to be chauffeured to the wedding in a vintage car. We were supposed to provide all of this without any financial contribution by them. Oh, and we were only invited to the evening part of the wedding. We declined politely and blocked them. It never ceases to amaze me just how blinkered and entitled people become and how they assume their wedding is as important to anyone else that they would set aside all of their time, money and resources. I don't do hen parties that go beyond either a meal or some drinks on my home turf and won't spend more than a day on such occasions. It's not even the finances as such but I don't want to use that much of my precious holiday time.

She said my lack of interest in the wedding coupled with my "lack of enthusiasm and pessimistic attitude towards the hen" means I am not what she expects of a bridesmaid and would prefer I wasn't involved going forward. She did however say I was "welcome" to attend as a guest.

She's a self-absorbed bitch, and OP you are well out of it. You are no doubt a nicer person than I am - I would be inclined to tell her I also would prefer not to be involved going forward, in the wedding and in the friendship, and that I would most definitely not be attending the wedding.

That's an ignominious start to a hen do -- bride binned off for boiler .

Couldn't have happened to a nicer person though.

She sounds super riled if she’s got the fiancé sending poison pen texts.

Maybe you’re not the only one to pull out.

The nuclear reply would be to say ‘sorry I can’t be there at your wedding, I’ll try to make the next one’ smile

I love this.
I think you can afford to make @LandoftheFree's brilliant parting shot after all the snide remarks. Bridges are well and truly burnt and I think you've seen her for what she really is anyway.

Just a warning OP that while you definitely sound better off without this woman and her associates in your life, when the adrenalin wears off in a few days, the loss of the friendship may hit you like a train, especially if it's been a long friendship. It can be almost like a break up. So be kind to yourself and lean on those around you - you have done the right thing.

When I got married both my bridesmaids did nothing for my wedding. They didn't offer and I didn't ask. Neither came to my local city hen do for an afternoon of drinking (both are incredibly introverted and one doesn't drink). It would never have occurred to me to demote them, I wanted them there to support me on the day.

One of them is my sil and her wedding and hen/stag cost us £1000 as a family- as she was family (and I was a bridesmaid) we paid, but no way would we have been happy paying that for a friends wedding and hen do.

I'm glad you stuck up for yourself but sorry she turned out to be such a dick.

Wow!

How selfish can some people be!

I worked it out in Aus $$ but that's $30 a week she expects you to put aside, plus any extras that you also have to pay for.

On top of that she isn't even paying for herself!!

Sorry to say it but she is not a true friend, she is just a show pony wanting to surround herself with a bunch of people who make her feel special.

I am sorry that she cut you off but I am glad it happened before you forked out all that money.

Tell her to jog on and find another idiot to make her feel special. You dodged a bullet.

You sound well rid of this circus op

So glad I don’t know people like this

Just wow. I'm put in mind of the bridesmaids in "Muriel's Wedding".

Or Mean Girls. She sounds like she is the queen bee of that group with all her little workers faffing around her.

How long had you been friends with her OP?

Weddings bring out the special in some folk don't they.