For best friend / bridesmaid to reject abroad hen do?

[Reignydays]

I am the bridesmaid for one of my longest and closest friends getting married in Spring 2025.

Bride and MOH have put a message in the hen do group chat this morning that the plan for hen do is a 5 hour flight and 4 night break in April, about a month before the wedding.

I have just come off maternity leave and working part time. I do not know if I will be comfortable leaving DC for that amount of time nor can I afford it. I also have another 2 weddings in 2025 so 3 hen do’s next year.

I feel like as a best friend and bridesmaid I should go to her hen, but I just do not think I can afford it or be able too.

I worry that everyone else will think I’m being unreasonable in the group chat and she will question if she wants me to be bridesmaid.

The statistics on divorce suggest that she might have several “Hen Do’s” before she’s finished. Saucer of milk anyone.

Hi op,

sending warm hugs. Becoming a mum and especially if you are one of the firsts in that groups is a hard task.
The others just don’t realize and have no clue neither would be able to until they are mums too…So you might just have to look not so great and to be « one of these girl whom change when they have their baby ».

It is a tough one but :

• put yourself and baby first. You are the whole world for your baby.
• don’t let yourself be pressured into anything you already think « no ». That won’t change. Probably intensifies after birth.
• if they are friends, they will understand

Hope this helps 🌺

With a small baby you've got a perfect excuse. Even pre baby I wouldn't want to go but now when I get invited to this sort of ridiculous thing I just say I don't want to leave my one year old. It's true but it's also a convenient reason because I hate this sort of overpriced organised 'fun'.

You have very valid reasons not to go, so don’t. All this hen do abroad stuff is expensive nonsense. If you can’t afford it, you can’t afford it, end of.

Tell her sorry but it is beyond your budget but will take her out for lunch just the two of you.

Plus, you’ve just had a baby, who is your priority, not a hen do.

This is interesting, in that there’s been a few hen trip threads where it’s not the bride but the MOH /mother of bride being a nightmare, expecting several days and thousands spent, with a bride who is much more understanding.

sounds like the bride might have an idea of a “hen do of her dreams” but when faced with reality wants the people more than the place. which does actually reflect well on her.

It is so so so fucked up for them to ask you this when you have a young baby. You are SO not being unreasonable.

Saw your update after I’d posted - glad it’s been resolved and the bride has been sensible about it.
Some of these hen do’s are way over the top and totally unnecessary in my view.

I'd say no but suggest something local for you both to do before the wedding

I did not go to my best friends’ hen do abroad as I couldn’t afford it. Could care less what others thought - it was just my bf’s opinion thay mattered and she understood. Do what you need to do ❤️

Just say no

How many have said that they would like to go?🤔 😬🥴

You'd have to pay me to go to Dubai

Why do people keep saying Dubai? OP said 5 hour flight. DXB is a 7/8 hour flight from the UK!

Dubai is about 10 hour flight, no?

Totes beside the point i know

This exact thing happened to me 16 years ago! Lol. And I got a lot of grief for not going, my daughter wasn’t even 1 years old, I worked full time, and I wasn’t prepared to miss out on my precious weekends with her, never mind the cost of it! It got in the way of the friendship, I felt pushed out on the wedding day, and the friendship fizzled out. I haven’t seen her for 10 years. It still hurts that I was left to feel in the wrong for putting my daughter first.

I don’t have any kids and wouldn’t spend that on a hen do 😂 hen dos have gotten so out of hand in recent years it’s becoming crazy. It’s tough as well just using the annual leave at work if you don’t get a lot or you’re a teacher with specific times of leave assuming you also want a holiday with your family/partner.

Glad there are other people saying it’s too expensive in your group chat! I think naturally sometimes people just get carried away when it’s their wedding. It’s the centre of their universe and it’s exciting! Sometimes people just need to be brought back down to earth.

personally i would never go abroad for someone's Hen do. If im spending my time/money on a holiday then im going where i want to go and doing what i want to do, not going on a big piss up to just prance around a bride to be.

Like whippee doo your getting married, what's the big deal i really dont understand it.

I’ve been to two hen dos abroad over the past 10 years or so - Berlin and Madrid. Both were great trips, organised to make sure that Bride to-be had a fab time but also to ensure everyone who was going could afford the travel and any activities whilst there. Thankfully we’ve got a good, close friendship group who feel able to be honest with each other about our financial situations, kids, partners etc without feeling judged.

I’ve also been to some great hen dos in the UK, including two of my own! I got married abroad in 2019with only a small number of immediate family and best friends, which meant we had a mini hen do meal in Rhodes a few days before the wedding. This included my Mum, the gfs of both of my DH’s half brothers and his Dad’s gf. His Mum (my MIL) would have been there too, but was sadly too poorly to travel after a stem cell transplant.

As the wedding group was so small most of my friends missed it but insisted on me having a hen do in the UK before hand. In order to accommodate a few friendship groups and their availability (and honestly not at my insistence), I ended up having two UK dos - one a meal and drinks in Manchester and the other a local meal for a small group who weren’t available for the Manchester do but really wanted the opportunity to do something to mark the occasion with me.

Maybe offer to help the MoH with organising/planning the alternative trip/celebration? I’m sure she’ll appreciate the help and it will demonstrate you aren’t being deliberately difficult or ornery re the original plans and are committed to doing your bit as a bridesmaid.

A four night overseas break is a holiday, not a hen do. To expect people to take annual leave and fork out the cost for a holiday they didn’t choose for themselves is unreasonable.

It sounds like there is a MOHzilla here and less so bride, which is a new one on me

Bride has accepted that people are not up for it by the sounds of things but now the MOH is talking about hen do of dreams and passive aggressive digs to those without kids

Someone just need to call her out saying just because bride is getting married it doesn’t mean I am going to spend a small fortune in being in you and brides instagram photoshoot. Because let’s be honest if social media didn’t exist a lot of these types of hen do’s wouldn’t happen

MOH has sent us a separate message in a new group chat to say that she wants to know all our budgets as she wanted to give bride the hen of her dreams lol

How do these people exist in such a bubble that they are unaware of other people's lives ?
I would reply that I am not going in to detail of my finances with her, but would love to go out for a meal / drink / dance locally if that were on offer.
I'd put that in the group chat too, so other potential hens feel a bit more confident to say the same.

People can expect what they like. Id NEVER spend that amount or anywhere near it on a hen do.
So rude and selfish to expect people to cough up and put themselves out so much just because it's important to them.
Too old for these silly pathetic games.
No. No. No.

Thats what I thought. The bride won't even care about them . She just wants them there to look popular and good on her Instagram.