AIBU?
Wedding plus one
LavendersBlue32 · 25/09/2022 17:51
Hi everyone!
I received an invitation to a good friend's wedding but there wasn't a plus one. My partner and I have been together for a year and we have recently moved in togther and so I had assumed he would be invited.
I was going to reach out to my friend and ask that as it appears to be a smaller and intimate ceremony and meal, would it be possible for me to invite my partner along for the larger evening reception and I will pay whatever the cost is for an evening guest.
I appreciate weddings are a bit of a minefield with many people having different opinions, but this is a good friend of 20+ years and if the tables were turned, I would feel quite upset if I was unable to attend the wedding of my partners good friend.
Thanks everyone in advance for any advice/opinions.
LavendersBlue32 · 25/09/2022 18:20
candycaneframe · 25/09/2022 18:19
@LavendersBlue32
It's their event
You don't ask to pay for your own plus one, you don't mention it at all
It's ghastly you even considered it.
I said in an earlier comment that after hearing opinions. I wouldn't be asking to invite and pay for my partner to come in the evening.
candycaneframe · 25/09/2022 18:24
Gensola · 25/09/2022 18:22
@candycaneframe I think it’s ghastly and cringingly rude to invite one half of an established couple to your wedding 🤷♀️
It's a small wedding.
It's their event
The op and you don't really have a say
The op can just choose not to go, which would be childish but that's their option
LavendersBlue32 · 25/09/2022 18:26
Something I just want to add. There hasn't been one event that my partner has attended whether it be a birthday party, christening or wedding where I haven't been invited in the year that we've been together.
This is the first event on my side and it's hurting me to know that I have been to many fantastic events with my partner but he can't come to one of my friends weddings - as an evening guest!
LavendersBlue32 · 25/09/2022 18:27
candycaneframe · 25/09/2022 18:24
It's a small wedding.
It's their event
The op and you don't really have a say
The op can just choose not to go, which would be childish but that's their option
Gensola · 25/09/2022 18:22
@candycaneframe I think it’s ghastly and cringingly rude to invite one half of an established couple to your wedding 🤷♀️
A small wedding ceremony. An evening do with a further 100 guests is not small in my opinion.
Willbe2under2 · 25/09/2022 18:27
We didn't invite partners or plus ones to our wedding unless they were our friend as well (not just x's partner). Had we done so we quite simply wouldn't have had room for all our friends and family. We did say partners could come to the evening do but most of them didn't - they're not joined at the hip! Similarly I've been to weddings without DH, and he's been to weddings without me - it's really no big deal.
MrsSkylerWhite · 25/09/2022 18:28
Crappydoo · Today 17:59
MrsSkylerWhite · Today 17:53
I would decline if my husband/partner wasn’t invited too.
Why? What do you think might happen? A year isn't that long so I'm assuming OPs friend doesn't know their partner that well. If I was having an intimate wedding I wouldn't really want someone there that I didn't know very well regardless of cost.“
not sure what you mean by “what would happen”. Nothing very much, I expect. I wouldn’t enjoy it as much without his company though and personally wouldn’t have dreamt of not inviting someone with an established partner to our wedding without them. I think it’s rude.
LavendersBlue32 · 25/09/2022 18:29
Willbe2under2 · 25/09/2022 18:27
We didn't invite partners or plus ones to our wedding unless they were our friend as well (not just x's partner). Had we done so we quite simply wouldn't have had room for all our friends and family. We did say partners could come to the evening do but most of them didn't - they're not joined at the hip! Similarly I've been to weddings without DH, and he's been to weddings without me - it's really no big deal.
I don't think you need to be "joined at the hip" to want your partner to attend the wedding of a close friend of 20+ years as an evening guest.
If this was the wedding of a work colleague for example, I wouldn't expect my partner to be invited.
Gensola · 25/09/2022 18:31
@candycaneframe no, I’m aware I don’t have a say, just like I don’t have a say in people saying please and thank you, or people following other basic behaviours of courtesy. I would politely decline an wedding invitation that didn’t include my husband and I don’t think that is childish at all - it’s similar to child-free weddings where people decline because they don’t want to leave their kids / fork out for a babysitter. That’s not childish either. It’s an invitation, not a compulsory event.
Whataretheodds · 25/09/2022 18:33
LavendersBlue32 · 25/09/2022 18:23
I completely and wholeheartedly agree.
Gensola · 25/09/2022 18:22
@candycaneframe I think it’s ghastly and cringingly rude to invite one half of an established couple to your wedding 🤷♀️
Have the bride and groom met your partner? Do they know you live together?
LavendersBlue32 · 25/09/2022 18:35
Whataretheodds · 25/09/2022 18:33
Have the bride and groom met your partner? Do they know you live together?
LavendersBlue32 · 25/09/2022 18:23
I completely and wholeheartedly agree.
Gensola · 25/09/2022 18:22
@candycaneframe I think it’s ghastly and cringingly rude to invite one half of an established couple to your wedding 🤷♀️
Yes, they know we live together.
candycaneframe · 25/09/2022 18:35
Gensola · 25/09/2022 18:31
@candycaneframe no, I’m aware I don’t have a say, just like I don’t have a say in people saying please and thank you, or people following other basic behaviours of courtesy. I would politely decline an wedding invitation that didn’t include my husband and I don’t think that is childish at all - it’s similar to child-free weddings where people decline because they don’t want to leave their kids / fork out for a babysitter. That’s not childish either. It’s an invitation, not a compulsory event.
Do you honestly not understand that someone's husband is different to their boyfriend when it comes to invite etiquette?
Kite22 · 25/09/2022 18:39
KosherDill · 25/09/2022 18:00
No. It is a massive insult to your host to imply that what they are offering is so substandard that you will pay out of your own pocket to upgrade their hospitality.
If you can't make conversation with people under the same roof for a few hours, without a partner, it would be better to decline. No one is owed a plus-one.
Absolutely this.
I am glad you have now accepted that OP.
You said yourself, it is a small intimate wedding, so that obviously means they won't be inviting people they don't know well. As the bride is "a good friend of 20 years +" , then presumably you will have met other folk who will be there. Though frankly, even if you hadn't, it is still perfectly possible to go and spend a pleasant couple of hours with other people she is friendly with as a one off.
I find it amazingly rude the number of people on these threads who seem to think it is acceptable to go back to people who invite you to something, and ask them to change things to suit one guest. 
As is always said, if you don't want to go to the event you have been invited to, then decline the invitation, don't try and change the event.
Dinoteeth · 25/09/2022 18:41
LavendersBlue32 · 25/09/2022 18:35
Yes. They've met on many occasions.
girlmom21 · 25/09/2022 18:33
Has your partner spent any time with your friend?
Op I'd decline the invite. I'd view it as they don't like your partner and don't want him there for whatever reason.
Weddings are the most couply events ever. I attended far too many weddings as a singleton and hated it.
SpongeBob2022 · 25/09/2022 18:43
I don't think you should ask for him to be able to go...given that they've presumably considered their guest list and made a conscious decision not to invite him. I think it would be embarrassing.
To be fair though if I had a guest like you though who I really wanted there but who didn't know anyone else then I'd invite their partner too. I wouldn't automatically ask everyone's partners though. I don't understand the attitude of refusing to go somewhere without a partner.
At my wedding DH had a friend who was coming a long way so we invited their partner too even though we didn't know him. They then returned the favour when they got married the following year but when we realised that one of their other close friends wasn't invited to the ceremony due to numbers I didn't go and he went instead. Not you OP but some people on here sound very entitled.
DottyLittleRainbow · 25/09/2022 18:51
At the end of the day it’s your friends wedding and they get to invite who they choose. Do they even know your partner, have they met him?
A very close family member of mine brought their fairly new boyfriend to my small wedding, I’d never met them before that day and it was really awkward. Wished I’d said no but didn’t want to cause a fuss.
It’s an intimate day and ultimately their prerogative.
Yeahrepublic · 25/09/2022 18:53
Whilst you've obviously been together a while now and I can see why you'd be annoyed but how long had you been a couple when the wedding was planned and booked and when numbers were decided on?
It's really difficult trying to decide who to invite.
I didn't invite anyone I hadn't met properly so a couple of people's boyfriends didn't get an invitation. They did know several other people there though and came as a group.
I'm surprised you don't know many people at the wedding of such a long standing friend.
@LavendersBlue32 you mention that you would delay getting married so you could afford to invite everyone you want. Would you really add 6-12 months to your wedding planning so you can invite people on the periphery of your life?
Cost isn't the only factor, maybe they've chosen a venue they love with limited numbers. Maybe even though they have 100 evening guests there are people closer to the couple than your boyfriend.
Yeahrepublic · 25/09/2022 18:55
Hollywolly1 · 25/09/2022 17:56
Tbh it is really rude of your friend to expect you to go on your own,even if you had no partner it really should be a plus one
That's completely unrealistic. Giving people an automatic plus one is crazy as inevitably people will just bring a random with them and might actually feel pressured to find someone to take!
I couldn't have afforded to give all my single friends a plus one in case they got a boyfriend/girlfriend before the wedding.
Are you a Kardashian with an endless budget?
LavendersBlue32 · 25/09/2022 18:55
SpongeBob2022 · 25/09/2022 18:43
I don't think you should ask for him to be able to go...given that they've presumably considered their guest list and made a conscious decision not to invite him. I think it would be embarrassing.
To be fair though if I had a guest like you though who I really wanted there but who didn't know anyone else then I'd invite their partner too. I wouldn't automatically ask everyone's partners though. I don't understand the attitude of refusing to go somewhere without a partner.
At my wedding DH had a friend who was coming a long way so we invited their partner too even though we didn't know him. They then returned the favour when they got married the following year but when we realised that one of their other close friends wasn't invited to the ceremony due to numbers I didn't go and he went instead. Not you OP but some people on here sound very entitled.
Thank you, I appreciate that.
I just thought it would have been nice to have my partner whom I live with be able to attend the evening do.
YellowTreeHouse · 25/09/2022 18:56
LavendersBlue32 · 25/09/2022 18:55
Thank you, I appreciate that.
I just thought it would have been nice to have my partner whom I live with be able to attend the evening do.
SpongeBob2022 · 25/09/2022 18:43
I don't think you should ask for him to be able to go...given that they've presumably considered their guest list and made a conscious decision not to invite him. I think it would be embarrassing.
To be fair though if I had a guest like you though who I really wanted there but who didn't know anyone else then I'd invite their partner too. I wouldn't automatically ask everyone's partners though. I don't understand the attitude of refusing to go somewhere without a partner.
At my wedding DH had a friend who was coming a long way so we invited their partner too even though we didn't know him. They then returned the favour when they got married the following year but when we realised that one of their other close friends wasn't invited to the ceremony due to numbers I didn't go and he went instead. Not you OP but some people on here sound very entitled.
Nice for you.
Not nice for the bride and groom to have a virtual stranger at their wedding.
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