Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Sorry, ANOTHER babies at weddings thread, but I would like your views on this - AIBU?

506 replies

champagnesupernova · 28/02/2008 22:41

I have a q good friend (ex-colleague, she was my boss but we've kept in touch) who's a good deal older than me, been big on career and so never got round to having kids.

Having been with her man for over ten years he finally gets round to popping the question and setting the date.

She tells me this the day I've arranged to meet her to tell her I'm pg with number 1. Big all round

Turns out the date of the wedding is 3-4 weeks after my baby's due.

As I said we're q good friends, so imagine my delight when a save the date card comes.

And then the invitation arrives addressed to Mr and Mrs Supernova (no mention of the bump, but it's not born yet)

I reply very early and in the reply card I put "Mr and Mrs Supernova and infant" and add a note saying I know planning a wedding is v complicated, just want to say that as it's so early and I"m planning on b/fing I'll have the baby with me, but I've heard they sleep for ages so hopefully it won't be a problem Wanted to check you're okay with this.

Met up with her today and said are you okay with this.

She's not and basically doesn't want us to come as she's worried about saying no to other people with babies and not us and annoying the other guests (most of whose kids will be grownup)

I am really really really by this.

She invited us. Knowing we were going to have a brand new baby. She could have just not invited us and said they were having probs with numbers and I wouldn't have been any the wiser. Now I feel that I've misread the invitation and that I've been UNINVITED.

AIBU?

OP posts:
Chequers · 29/02/2008 20:59

Message withdrawn

Kimi · 29/02/2008 21:07

Hello chequers.....

PrincessHunker · 29/02/2008 21:08

There's no point her going. I posted to say just that very early on on this thread. But I will not have bf lunacy from any of you, OK?

(I think my crown's too tight...)

Chequers · 29/02/2008 21:13

Message withdrawn

ElfOnTheTopShelf · 29/02/2008 21:15

I went to a wedding reception a week after having my baby by c-section. I personally would recommend *not& going because for me it was a difficult time, I was still trying to get breast feeding sorted, I still felt like shite from the section, the last thing I really wanted to do was to dress up with my sore tummy, leaky boobs and random emotions of sobbing every five minutes over anything.
Stay at home, snuggle up to your baby, and try not to take it too personally about your friend.

babyinacorner · 29/02/2008 21:25

the bride might be getting married somewhere other than a church where numbers are strict (and newborns are counted) and maybe she has lots of her own family to invite and 'shockingly' hasn't planned her wedding around one of her friends having a baby at the same time!

bekkaboo · 29/02/2008 21:25

The most important thing is that you enjoy your early stages with baby as you dont get it back. I hope your friend has a good day and honestly when the time comes it will be last thing you feel you've missed if you et what I mean, you'll think thank god I haven't got to go the wedding today and crawl back into bed to catch up.

Ill leave at that

tortoiseSHELL · 29/02/2008 21:31

Bekkaboo, I totally agree with that! Once the baby is born, you really won't care about the wedding!

susiecutiemincepies · 29/02/2008 22:26

I cant believe this is still going on ( she says, bumping it again )

Tortoishell : good on you for fighting your corner so valiantly really, i'm being genuine. Well done.

To the OP : so, you have your thread here, with many many answers, both for and against with which to peruse at your leisure. I hope you find the answers somewhere buried in this thread. good luck with the rest of your pregnancy, and take care.

Oh and also, I really do hope you can re kindle your relationship with your friend post wedding, and post-nataly when you will both be feeling relieved and relaxed about not having such huge life changing events looming ahead of you. ( both of which are utterly self absorbing, and rightfully so )

RIP thread. >

nappyaddict · 29/02/2008 22:31

maybe she knows someone else who has a young baby who wouldn't take the baby out. she can't very well let the op take hers if there are other people with younger babies who she's not invited either.

Original poster
champagneSupernova · 29/02/2008 23:18

OMG at the number of posts on my thread!!!

I posted last night when feeling and [shock[ and haven't been able to check back in until now!

Thanks to all who've posted.

OP posts:
Original poster
champagneSupernova · 01/03/2008 00:09

I've had a fair amount of time to reflect on this and then reading all your v helpful (and some v funny) replies.
One thing I forgot to mention in the OP is that this baby will be a PFB and I will be Clueless New Mum at the wedding too.

In answer to those who were asking if I'd had a change of heart, my thoughts in no particular order: -

  1. I think that I possibly over-reacted to the situation (pg hormones maybe? )
  2. I think that as someone who doesn't have children, she really doesn't know that a 2-3 wk old couldn't really be left with a babysitter.
  3. It is her day and she can have who she wants and she doesn't know that if the baby started crying during the vows that I would of course leg it out the back.
  4. All of those who are saying in various guises that at 2-3 weeks post partum, I'll be knackered, sore, praying my boobs don't leak and a strange shape with nothing to wear are probably right.
  5. DH and I have just looked at the logistics of getting to the wedding and I think I was trivialising it.
It was a big ask and was going to be a long day even if I was just pg, let alone lugging a baby in a pram we may not be used to etc etc etc

FWIW (and sorry to pick out just a few names but I'm knackered) the posts that are really ringing true in my ears are: -
journey "think OP was rude sending a reply with "..and infant" That was presumptious. So you invite your baby and then ask by the way can my baby come along! Very bad manners in my opinion."

Guilty as charged. But it didn't say NO CHILDREN in the invitation info so I explained that if we were coming I'd have to bring the baby and I was asking not telling.

Fourplusone "Perhaps she just asked you to be polite after hearing you were pregnant, but did so on the assumption that you would probably politely decline!"

Distinctly possible and something that hadn't occurred to me.

Cod "bin the barren bitch!" made me LOL but I think I'll try and stick with: -

Squiffy " If I dropped my mates every time one of them was a bit thoughtless I'd be pretty lonely."

And a little part of me is thinking that hopefully the bride will be thinking what tortoiseshell said "be honoured that the OP is even considering going 2-3 weeks after having a baby."

Part of me is also perhaps recognising that tortoiseshell is also right when she says "Whereas the OP wants to be a part of her event, and wants to help her celebrate her marriage, even though she herself will have undergone a huge physical event and will probably be exhausted and have all the emotions that go along with a new baby. The OP seems much more interested in her friend the bride than she does in the OP."

And finally corriefan's point that "I honestly think they are not trying to be vindictive, they don't understand about breastfeeding- have probably barely given it a second thought, they just think "I do not want my precious day interupted or possibly upstaged by a crying baby". Why else would they do that? not just to upset one of their friends, surely? I'd say don't go, be apologetic but clear about why and arrange an evening to watch the video or something together but don't be miffed she has to do what she wants."

So in short, I won't be binning her, I do feel more than a little for overreacting about it and for making assumptions about the baby but as many other posters have said, it's just a wedding and I'll be better off at home with my baby.

Many thanks again
champagnesupernova

OP posts:
nappyaddict · 01/03/2008 00:59

champagne - i think it would have been better before you sent a reply back maybe if you'd rung to check about the baby. by putting what you did in the reply card a lot of people would have felt like they weren't being asked, rather being told. adding i just wanted to check you were ok doesn't make saying i'll have the baby with me a question really does it. it makes it look like you've assumed the baby can come, which you did.

i know of someone who was expressing with a baby of a few weeks old to go to a wedding so it is possible but not always. if you feel up then maybe you might change your mind and go for an hour or two but if you don't i'm sure the bride won't be offended.

hazeyjane · 01/03/2008 06:57

I'm sorry - "Bin the barren bitch", made you lol? - I thought you were her friend!

AitchTwoOh · 01/03/2008 09:18

she is, hazeyjane, and she's come to a very good decision re this wedding. cod's posts have that effect on even the most saintly of us sometimes.

onebatmother · 01/03/2008 09:33

it was v funny..

Bablefish · 01/03/2008 09:58

So in short, I won't be binning her, I do feel more than a little blush for overreacting about it and for making assumptions about the baby but as many other posters have said, it's just a wedding and I'll be better off at home with my baby.

Many thanks again
champagnesupernova

Just A wedding! And you are just having a baby, millions of women do it daily, don't make you special. And just because you think it is the most wonderful baby in the world don't mean some poor woman wants a screaming baby at her wedding.

I think you have over reacted big time and if anyone was dumping the friendship it should be the poor barren bitch you find so funny, having a baby is not the be all and end all for a woman unless they have a sad life with nothing else in it.

I hope her real friends enjoy a lovely day with her.

BibiThree · 01/03/2008 10:03

We didn't invite children to our wedding, but babies (of which there were 3) were obviously invited. All the other children in our families were early teens anyway.

AitchTwoOh · 01/03/2008 10:11

jeez, give CS a break, bable, she doesn't need her head kicking in over this...

Chequers · 01/03/2008 10:50

Message withdrawn

Lulumama · 01/03/2008 10:54

well, praise be !! an AIBU thread , where the OP reads the responses and does not get all defensive and accuses everyone not agreeing with her of being howwid bullies!!

woo hoo !

sounds like you are being supremely pragmatic about this , supernova! well done, and am absolutely not being patronsising

WideWebWitch · 01/03/2008 10:55

Oooh, my views on this haven't changed. I wouldn't go in your situation. Will read threa dnow, only read OP.

WideWebWitch · 01/03/2008 11:00

Have skimmed and agree with tortoisehell and cod: ditch the bitch.

motherinferior · 01/03/2008 11:05

Actually I'd reverse that, Bablefish - millions of women get married every day, many of them prancing up the altar thinking they're some sort of effing Princess.

WideWebWitch · 01/03/2008 11:12

and I think it's pretty safe to say that babies last longer than most of the marriages.