is DH in the wrong?

[atlanta6545]

Posting on behalf of DP, soon to be DH.

We are getting married in a couple of weeks. The original big wedding has been hugely affected by COVID. Our wedding was in my home country but because of Covid we couldn’t meet legal requirements, so we were having a small legal ceremony in UK (only witnesses) followed by abroad. Abroad has been paid for and to not lose money we’ve had to postpone. Now the UK wedding is becoming the main event and we have invited close family and friends. We have paid for a venue, all drinks, food etc.

DP has felt as though his best man has been useless. Our hen and stags were cancelled so we threw a BBQ so that a pre-wedding celebration still took place. The Best Man had an excuse not to come, but the excuses keep coming so we want to know if he is unreasonable for being upset. If he is BU he will leave it, if he isn’t, he will confront.

• BM’s girlfriend will be 36 weeks pregnant at time of wedding
• wedding is 2.5 hours away by train from BM’s house
• BM didn’t come to BBQ because his girlfriend is pregnant (although she was also invited), she would have been 32 weeks pregnant. Her pregnancy isn’t high risk.
• BM’s girlfriend doesn’t want to come to wedding due to her late stage which we understand completely.
• BM will only come until 8pm (wedding is at 430pm) so he can go back home to gf
• BM has just said he will not be doing a speech
• BM was never coming abroad because of his girlfriend’s due date which we understood so he was going to be our witness for register office wedding.
• DP asked BM for suit measurements over and over and BM ignored him for months. Eventually BM confirmed he was coming and gave measurements so DP has paid for his suit outright.

DP is upset that BM has organised nothing. When stag was cancelled he just got a text to let him know. Nothing was done even virtually to commemorate (stag was when restrictions are as they are now).
He’s also upset that now our whole wedding plans have had to change and the wedding is now local to most people (BM will be travelling the furthest) that he is not willing to even stay overnight to ensure he can party or be present. He is further upset that he is outright refusing to give a speech, saying he wants to do it at the abroad wedding (which isn’t even a wedding now!) in a year’s time.

As I know a lot on here hate abroad weddings and especially would wonder why we would have two, it is only because of Covid and if we didn’t postpone it we would lose a lot of money. We are not expecting people to come if they don’t want to but most do as we are covering the full cost of all guests. We are choosing to just get married now and start our lives together as husband and wife.

YABU - BM is entitled to do as he wishes
YANBU - he sounds like a shit friend

He doesn't want or have time to be the best man I'd let him off the hook and step back from the friendship a bit tbh

He should have been excused from the wedding long ago. An honest conversation needs to take place between him and your DP.

So basically he is now just a random guest?
A fleeting one at that.
Sack him off imo.

The fact his gf is very heavily pregnant excuses him from everything apart from 1) the speeches and 2) the stag do. (But in his defence maybe he felt he didn’t need to rearrange anything once the BBQ had been sorted?)

dh needs a new bm this one is telling you in around about way, he's not interested but then his gf is possibly driving this, to a degree understanable. But i think it's more he can't be arsed.

Why has he asked him to be Best Man? My MOH was pregnant at my wedding … she couldn’t drink, and didn’t stay late, and couldn’t come on my hen … but it didn’t matter, we had been friends for 25 years (40 years now), and I wanted her to be with me when I made my vows.. and that was enough.
My husbands BM didn’t make a speech, he’s very shy and it would have been awful for him, but him and my husband have been friends since primary school.

What does your husband want out if a BM? If this friend can’t give him what he needs, best to get someone else.

Not wanting to stay late or attend the BBQ are reasonable. If she's pregnant it isn't surprising if she is avoiding socials and he's a good partner for supporting her.
Not doing a speech if he's there is a bit limp. Not helping organise anything would depend on what else he has going on in his life.
In your DH position I would be feeling a little disappointed but if the friendship is so good he was picked as best man, I wouldn't be thinking of confronting him, but I would be having a open minded chat about the fact that I had hoped he would feel it was an honour but perhaps it's become a burden and is he ok or would he prefer me to find someone else. If he's such a good friend he can be best man surely you could say to him you feel disappointed he isn't wanting to do a speech if he's there anyway and that you feel disappointed he hasn't helped organise things as is traditional but you'd like to chat about it and see what's going on with him rather than assume he's just letting you down.
If you can't have an honest man to man in a non antagonistic way about it then it's he that good a friend really?

I agree with @YelloYelloYello. His gfs heavily pregnant, give the poor man s break. Imagine this written by the gf if he was doing everything. 2.5 hours by train is a huge journey and could prevent him being there to see his baby born if she goes into labour

I’ve voted YANBU but I think some people have ludicrous expectations of BM/MoH etc - there is no reason not to arrange your own stag / hen

2,5 hours away from a 36week pregnant partner isn’t ideal.

Just rescind the offer and choose someone else or do without.

I would be asking him to step down as BM, he’s been quite flaky.

That being said, his girlfriends pregnancy might not be high risk, but pregnant women are more vulnerable to Covid. So I could understand them not wanting to attend the BBQ and attending the wedding, by public transport, is increasing her risk at the riskiest stage (due to Covid).

Just to be clear - DH did organise the BBQ and invite BM but he said no because of gf. He has tried to also do a Zoom call between him and the other best friend (groomsman who is not coming to the wedding at all!) However, he is still out and seeing other people (without gf) according to social media.

Just to give a timeline: DP asked BM before his girlfriend was pregnant. BM never spoke to DP about the pregnancy or how it could affect anything, we found out about the pregnancy from Instagram and did the maths based on due date (she is due 3 weeks after the wedding but I haven’t ever been pregnant so I am unsure how weeks work or if my numbers add up. I just know she is due 20 days after the wedding).
BM said he wanted to come abroad without girlfriend but we said that was probably a risk, and then postponed it.
BM said he would come to wedding alone (completely fair) but will only come for 4 hours, won’t do a speech and hasn’t asked about anything else - for example, he barely knows where it is / what the plan is etc.

I think that he doesn’t want to be BM and wants to be excused. I would do him the favour.

A lot of it may be due to the fact that late pregnancy is high risk for Covid and she may not be vaccinated.

Completely right that he shouldn't be 2.5 hours away from his partner at 36 weeks PG. 2.5 hours by train could many hours away during the night.

It's abundantly clear the friendship is one sided and the BM has zero interest.

Leave him off.

Mind you I do think expectations are huge now a days.

MoH and BM did NOTHING bar mind the ring in my day.

I mean nothing.

I would think long and hard before saying yes to MoH today!

Can you imagine the other side of the coin written by gf.

My dp wants to go to a wedding 2 1/2 hours away, and I’m 36 weeks pregnant. He’s best man (planned before pregnancy) and has said he will only go for a few hours. Bride and groom are kicking up. Who’s unreasonable?

Regarding best man’s (and chief bridesmaids) responsibilities, that seems to be something that has gained momentum in recent years. In the past, all the best man had to do was to turn up, hold the rings and make a speech. Now they’re expected to be involved a lot more.

I wouldn’t want my DH being 2.5 hrs away when I’m 36 weeks pregnant. Especially if those 2.5 hours had to be made by public transport, so if he got stuck there is nothing he can do about it. Yes in a car, he can still get stuck in traffic but as soon as it’s moving, he can find alternate routes. If a train is cancelled, the tracks are too hot, it’s rained, he really is stuck.

It also doesn’t matter that her pregnancy isn’t high risk, or that she hasn’t told you if the pregnancy is high risk, but covid in the third trimester can be quite serious. If she caught it, she doubles her risk of stillbirth. She has an increased chance of being hospitalised because her lung capacity is reduced and they have to consider her and the baby. They may have to induce labour early to give her treatment, which comes with additional problems for the baby in later life. She may or may not have had the jab because it’s a very personal choice as to whether to have the jab at this stage. Even if she has chosen to have the jab, it’s likely she’s only on her first jab as pregnant women were still called up with their age group. Not attending the BBQ, he sounds like a supportive partner. Attending the wedding until 8.30 sounds like a good compromise and means he doesn’t have to spend a night away or worry about the last train being cancelled. The difference with him attending the wedding at 36 weeks means that if she does get covid, she won’t be induced too early and the baby likely won’t have any problems as a result of being delivered at 36 weeks. However, if he picks covid up at your wedding or on the train getting there or back, she risks giving birth alone.

I organised my own hen do. DH organised his own stag do. So I personally don’t have an issue there. We knew our best man and maid of honour had their own lives and stuff going on. We also wanted local stag/hen dos and neither best man nor maid of honour were local, so we arranged it as we knew the area.

With regards the suit measurements, is he always reliable? Is he usually sending things far in advance. If he says he’ll book a table (pre-covid), does he do it there and then or does he sit on it for weeks and then book something last minute? If he’s always on the last minute, that isn’t going to change for your wedding. If he’s usually on the ball, he either has stuff going on or he’s been wondering about whether he can make it and be there. Possibly due to his partner having their baby at the same time. We are due to go a wedding close to my due date and DH is reluctant to be a part of the wedding, not because he doesn’t want to be there for the groom but because we can’t commit and he doesn’t want to let anyone down.

The speech is annoying. I personally chose not to make anyone give a speech that didn’t want to. So DH didn’t do a speech, which worked better as I’m not keen on a man speaking for me. He could also be saying he’s not doing a speech in case he can’t be there on the day and therefore he’s not letting you down. Have you made it clear that this is now the main wedding?

I think confronting him will likely be the end of the friendship. Surely there is a reason your partner asked him to be a best man and I would hope that is strong enough not to confront over this. I would have a gentle word with him and ask if he would really rather stay with his partner due to the imminent arrival or not be in a position where he is potentially letting you down at the last minute. Her pregnancy isn’t high risk at the minute but her pregnancy could move to high risk at any point.

The final few weeks of pregnancy are honestly hell. I’m not sure whether you have children or not but if not perhaps you aren’t aware. There’s no way I’d want to travel 5 hours (round trip) at 36 weeks especially in the middle of summer. They’d have to stop every 30 mins for her to pee somewhere for starters and she’d be so uncomfortable stuck in the car for that length of time. I feel her pain, I’ve had 3 summer babies now and it’s so exhausting.

I’m also going to guess that covid is an issue for them. I was petrified of catching it during my pregnancy last year, we didn’t go near anyone at all. I’d read horror stories about women needing to be placed in an induced coma and their babies being born via emergency c-section.

Also think that she’s concerned she may go into labour which is always a possibility at that stage and that they’d be 2.5 hours away from home.

It isn’t an ideal time for them basically and I think you may need to find a new BM.

Oh yeah, she’s probably also worried about him catching it at the wedding and missing the birth as a result. I wouldn’t want to do this in their shoes either.