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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Would it be bad if I never go to any hen do’s, weddings, kid related celebrations?

118 replies

yeahthisisit · 30/08/2023 06:48

I think I’m going to get called all kinds of names here, but I’ll risk it.

Never had any luck with love and lost all hope by now.

But everyone else is celebrating partners and kids and I just don’t habe it in me to go to these.

And since I have no expirience of celebrating these things and having someone turn them down, I’ll ask you.
Is it bad?

OP posts:
Lelophants · 30/08/2023 07:35

Honestly, you sound very negative. If you never go to anything, what do you do? How are you being a friend? How are you ever going to meet anyone if you refuse to live?
you’re basically making sure you have no friends.

Poppins2016 · 30/08/2023 07:35

PP saying about celebrating me, no one celebrates single person’s apartments etc.
These have always been couple’s things.

But they do? Or at least, my group of friends does. Great excuse for a get together! We celebrate new flats/houses, jobs, promotions, life events, etc... doesn't matter whether you're single or have a partner.

From what you've said, OP, I'm wondering whether you a) assume others won't celebrate, so don't ask them to join you (in which case, ask them!) or b) potentially could do with widening your circle of friends to include people who value you more

NeedToChangeName · 30/08/2023 07:36

I feel your pain. I was single for a long time and found weddings etc difficult. But I still went, to support my friends. One time, I knew no one apart from bride and groom, so I slipped away after the meal

If you choose not to go to these events, you may find friends drift away

Maybe you could limit the events eg go to family / close friends only

Clarinet1 · 30/08/2023 07:36

I’ve been single for -gulp- 30 years but I have friends of all sorts and I’m very happy to go to their dos because I’m pleased for them and I usually have a good time!

Velvian · 30/08/2023 07:39

How old are you @yeahthisisit ? In what way do you think that you are not normal?

YourNameGoesHere · 30/08/2023 07:41

Poppins2016 · 30/08/2023 07:35

PP saying about celebrating me, no one celebrates single person’s apartments etc.
These have always been couple’s things.

But they do? Or at least, my group of friends does. Great excuse for a get together! We celebrate new flats/houses, jobs, promotions, life events, etc... doesn't matter whether you're single or have a partner.

From what you've said, OP, I'm wondering whether you a) assume others won't celebrate, so don't ask them to join you (in which case, ask them!) or b) potentially could do with widening your circle of friends to include people who value you more

Agreed. My friends and I celebrate lots of stuff. A new apartment, new job or new pet for example are all just as exciting for a single person as they would be for a couple.

Do you actually ask friends to celebrate these things with you, unless they are shit friends I'm sure they would be delighted to join in your happiness.

QueSyrahSyrah · 30/08/2023 07:41

PP saying about celebrating me, no one celebrates single person’s apartments etc.
These have always been couple’s things

Are they? I was single when I bought my flat and when I turned 30 but friends came and celebrated my housewarming and my birthday party.

Clarinet1 · 30/08/2023 07:42

PS recently had a party for a landmark birthday and we all had an enjoyable evening and I got lots of presents and thank yous.
Also, my DM passed on a saying to me from my Great Grandfather - “(S)he who would have friends must show him/herself friendly”. In other words you have to make a bit of effort (however nerve-wracking it may be.

Doingmybest12 · 30/08/2023 07:42

I don't think it's good to make a rule about things that you then live up to. I would take invitations individually and make decisions one by one. Its sad for you and your friends if you can't take part, enjoy or take pleasure is any of these things ever. I would worry you'll add more things to the list of things you don't do. Is there anything you do enjoy and want to do more of.

Middleagedmeangirls · 30/08/2023 07:45

It's fine to decline any invitation to anything if you do it promptly and politely. However if you decline everything you will probably end up being isolated and given that you sound lonely and unhappy at the moment isolation might make you feel even worse.

If you want to decline these milestone events then I think you will need to pit more effort into maintaining friendships by being proactive in issuing your own invitations to the people that matter to you. Invite them out for coffee/round for pizza/ arrange to go for a walk. Nothing big or expensive, just to let them now that they matter to you and you want to spend time in their company.

I have had most of the big life events you feel excluded from and I still dislike big noisy gatherings to the point that even as I was being prepped for (scary) emergency surgery 2 weeks ago a tiny part of my brain was thinking "Yay, this gets me off the hook for X's hen weekend in September!' But I'm still fond of X and will make plans to celebrate separately with her when I'm fully recovered.

And never say never to big life events - my DSS didn't meet her life partner until she was 39 and had her first baby at 44.

LylaLee · 30/08/2023 07:46

So, OP, you're never going to have a 30/40/50/60/70th big birthday you want friends and family to attend?

Yes, it would be nice if it was like in the movies and all a big surprise party for you, but sometimes you need to make the arrangements yourself.

Can we all meet at Angelo's next Saturday to celebrate me moving into my new (rented) flat?/to celebrate getting a new puppy/ that I finished working on a quilt cover which has taken me 3 years to crochet?

There's no police who will come and say "you can't celebrate that."

If you're close, you've probably had the conversation that you don't plan on entering a relationship or having children. So they will know they are unlikely to go to your hen party in Spain/christening/wedding. (Few people who aren't enormous pieces of shit will look at a loved one and say 'nah, no one will ever love them.' labels like that, we usually put on ourselves.) So they will be happy, for once, to celebrate you.

But if you have form for snubbing, there might not be anyone answering your calls to invite.

amprev · 30/08/2023 07:54

Presumably the invitations are from different people and not the same person you consistently decline? I think the worst outcome of always declining is that you'll be categorised as the person who we invite but we know won't come. If this isn't a problem to you, then go for it. Personally I would bite the bullet and attend the occasional function just in the interest of maintaining friends/family connections.

ErosandAgape · 30/08/2023 07:55

yeahthisisit · 30/08/2023 07:27

I appreciate the sentiment that I could magically meet a partner in these events, but I’m not ’normal’, so it’s highly unlikely I’d meet someone.

PP saying about celebrating me, no one celebrates single person’s apartments etc.
These have always been couple’s things.

I just can’t deal with the pain.
And spendind all the money on other’s and never getting in return.
It’s different if you have/will have these things, and a double income, and it will be returned to you.
But right now it’s so one sided and sometimes the questions and digs at me still being single it’s too much.

I don’t accept that celebrating a new house/apartment is a ‘couples thing’. I have a few close friends who’ve been single as long as I’ve known them (30 years in one case), and have celebrated housewarmings, promotions, an adoption, birthdays etc.

TarquinOliverNimrod · 30/08/2023 08:03

As I get older I turn down more and more events I just don’t enjoy. I have a baby but I avoid baby showers, I think they are tacky, I’m married but avoid hen dos, again, they are tacky and I don’t enjoy spending my very precious time with groups of random women with little in common with one another.

So, I won’t go to these events. But I love weddings and christenings, I will jump at the chance to go to one of those type of proper ‘life’ events.” Just do what makes you happy.

And never say never to finding someone. You say you’re not ‘normal’ but we’re not all homogeneous, there will be someone in this world who also isn’t ‘normal’ who may be right for you. What’s ‘normal’ anyway? 🤷🏻‍♀️

WhatNoRaisins · 30/08/2023 08:05

You don't have to say you'll never do these things again and stick to it OP, you could just take a break from them for a while.

I agree with PP that longer term you would need to weigh up the pros and cons of withdrawing to protect yourself and the possibility that people will give up on you if you don't engage with them.

21ZIGGY · 30/08/2023 08:11

I get where you are coming from, im 41 no partner or kids and dont expect marriage and wouldnt have kids now even if i had apartner. I go to my friends hens weddings christenings birthdays ( adult and children) because they are my friends - some are school friends, most of tge rest are uni friends so all very longterm. I want to be in their lives. But it sounds like its hurting you to see things you may never have? If so, can you address that with your friends and let them know where youre coming from so itsnot a case of walking away from them entirely which, as others have said, if you just stop going to stuff you will drift apart in all likelihood

Original poster
yeahthisisit · 30/08/2023 08:24

But they do? Or at least, my group of friends does. Great excuse for a get together! We celebrate new flats/houses, jobs, promotions, life events, etc... doesn't matter whether you're single or have a partner.

No, the home celebrations have all been for couples.
Jobs haven’t been celebrated, congrats has been said but that’s it.
I don’t really know what anyone would celebrate when it comes to me, nothing that has societal statu and currency.
Like a celebration to acknowledge how I’ve always been single, so done everything on my own and survived this couples world standing alone! Not many could do this.
I do think that makes me a strong person, but I doubt anyone else would be on board with that 😃!

OP posts:
WhatNoRaisins · 30/08/2023 08:29

Would it help to focus less on celebrating and just on spending quality time with people who make you feel good about yourself?

ErosandAgape · 30/08/2023 08:32

yeahthisisit · 30/08/2023 08:24

But they do? Or at least, my group of friends does. Great excuse for a get together! We celebrate new flats/houses, jobs, promotions, life events, etc... doesn't matter whether you're single or have a partner.

No, the home celebrations have all been for couples.
Jobs haven’t been celebrated, congrats has been said but that’s it.
I don’t really know what anyone would celebrate when it comes to me, nothing that has societal statu and currency.
Like a celebration to acknowledge how I’ve always been single, so done everything on my own and survived this couples world standing alone! Not many could do this.
I do think that makes me a strong person, but I doubt anyone else would be on board with that 😃!

I think you’re misunderstanding — the couples in question presumably held the celebration for their own new house/apartment? Why haven’t you thrown a housewarming party of your own? The last two housewarmings I’ve been to have been held by single people, one of them childfree and very longterm single. I was at a single friend’s 50th birthday party last month — that doesn’t require any social currency or ‘status’ whatsoever, just having been alive for 50 years. You decide what you want to celebrate about yourself.

ChocolateRaisin09 · 30/08/2023 08:36

I had a friend who was single a long time and while we were all getting married and some of us having kids she swore off marriage and threw herself a huge birthday party. She had amazing hobbies and travelled and made loads of friends, her life is so much more interesting than mine. Now we are 43 (not old I know!) and she has got engaged to someone as interesting as her and they have a brood of dogs. They travel, socialise, have separate and together hobbies, and seem really happy.

I guess my point is, you never really know. But a relationship doesn't need to be the be-all to life. And you have to love yourself first! (Cringe.)
Have you had any counselling?

HelpMeGetThrough · 30/08/2023 08:42

It's not bad to not go but gosh wouldn't life be boring without all the little get togethers, parties, celebrations and happy events.

I can happily live without any of that.

You end up being around people you either can't stand, or can stomach for about an hour and then want to get out of there.

ErosandAgape · 30/08/2023 08:43

HelpMeGetThrough · 30/08/2023 08:42

It's not bad to not go but gosh wouldn't life be boring without all the little get togethers, parties, celebrations and happy events.

I can happily live without any of that.

You end up being around people you either can't stand, or can stomach for about an hour and then want to get out of there.

Honestly, my question here is why you dislike your friends so much?

YourNameGoesHere · 30/08/2023 08:44

HelpMeGetThrough · 30/08/2023 08:42

It's not bad to not go but gosh wouldn't life be boring without all the little get togethers, parties, celebrations and happy events.

I can happily live without any of that.

You end up being around people you either can't stand, or can stomach for about an hour and then want to get out of there.

If you hate spending time with your friends and you can't stomach being with them for an hour then why are these people your friends?

HelpMeGetThrough · 30/08/2023 08:46

Honestly, my question here is why you dislike your friends so much?

I generally don't like many people that much. I have people that I see once or twice a week for a sport I do, but just consider them people I know and not friends, as I don't see them outside of that and don't want to.

Monkeytoy · 30/08/2023 08:49

I know you should never ask, but I am wondering how old you are OP?