Friends cancelled wedding

[Newlywedgal]

I got married late last year (39/F) and had 7 cancellations (one family of 3, a friend with a friend plus one and a couple) at the very last minute.

The family cancelled the evening before at about 7pm. Her reason was she could not make it due to transport issues.

The friend with +1 cancelled as she had missed her 6pm train. She had been texting me that morning to say how excited she was about coming to the wedding, asking me lots of questions about my new husband, how we met, could she look after his elderly family etc.

The other cancelled at 11.30am on the day of the wedding (wedding at 2pm) to say she could not come as she had a headache. She too, was also texting me asking many questions about my wedding planning the week before and how it was going, lots of questions about where I would be living - what I would be doing with my property now I was married woman and also where we were going on honeymoon. She said it was 'ok for some' that we could go on a honeymoon as she had not been able to afford to do that following her wedding. She also asked me if I was having to work after my wedding, now I was marrying a 'wealthy man'.

The wedding was in a major city to avoid people having to travel too far.

I ended up a mess the evening before the wedding, trying to rearrange the tables etc - I was already very anxious about the wedding day.

A week or so after the wedding I sent each cancelling party a message to tell them I was sorry they could not make it, and not to worry about it. I have not heard a word from any of them since.

I have been lucky enough to attend so many peoples weddings / hen parties / baby showers / 1st/2nd birthday parties of their children when I was single happily to cheer them on for their life events.

I am very happily married now to a lovely man and the day otherwise was a success, but over Christmas time I felt very sad that I did not hear from these people again.

YABU to never speak to these people again and try and reach out
YANBU just let them go

Thanks

I wondered about this.
Do you think it's almost like preparing an alibi in advance?
She knows she's going to bail, but if she makes everyone aware of what a great event, how excited she is etc...
then she hopes that people will be more likely to believe the bail out excuse "Oh it must be genuine because she was so excited to attend,"

This is one of the reasons we didn't want a big wedding. Apart from my mum wanting me to invite great aunt Gertrude who I haven't seen since I was 2, our thought process was that we would just have a party. Those who turned up were the ones who would turn up because they wanted to see us, and we would tell them at that point what the party was in aid of.

We did the first part, and got married in a registry office with less than 10 people present. The party bit hasn't happened due to ill health and covid, and is probably time expired now. Was a good plan though.

I have to agree that this did not happen back in the day.
Things were different then I feel and weddings and invitations were much more formal.
Wedding invites were sent out by post, and I’m sure they had a specific date by which you had to respond in writing. It sounds so odd now but it made a huge difference. You bought an acceptance card wrote on it, and sent it back in the post! Or a card which said unfortunately you could not attend. Either way, these cards were readily available from card shops.
Nobody who said they were attending didn’t attend. I think the only exceptions were either if you were in labour, or dead.
I do think there is something in the fact weddings are just not viewed in the same light now. Many people don’t want to attend due to the cost plus it can be seen as not that important.
You get people who already have children, often not specifically to the person they are about to marry, already living with their future spouse, in houses that are fully furnished, they ask for money, hold the wedding in very expensive places. Often in the middle of nowhere expecting guests to pay extortionate rates to stay there with eye watering prices even for a glass of pop. Sometimes even telling guests what they can/can’t wear which means buying a new outfit.
Again in the past weddings were held in the local church or register office. The reception was within walking distance of this where there was a very cheap bar. Everyone could either walk home or afford a taxi home. Plus you could buy the couple an affordable gift from the wedding list. You knew they would appreciate it too.
I do think people balance the cost of attending
a wedding with the benefit if going, and how special it is. Unfortunately they see it as spending a lot of money, just to see a couple marry who are already virtually married, and already have a family. It doesn't feel that special like it once did.
I don’t think it’s acceptable to do what the op’s guests did though.
I would let them be the first to make a move and contact you.

Your wedding was just a couple of weeks ago then. So it's unreasonable to cut them off but not unreasonable to wait and see if they reach out to you. I'd be gutted if transport problems meant I couldnt attend a friend's wedding but that could be an excuse covering something else. The couple may have split up.

I have a similar experience. A group of us met on a course and one woman love-bombed the rest of us on our WhatsApp group. What special, beautiful friends we were, GIFs of hearts and puppies and whatnot. A bit dramatic but ok, that's her way, and quite sweet and flattering in a way.

She was always massively keen to meet up, whether the event was just a coffee or involved travel, tickets and restaurant bookings. These took forever to organise, partly to accommodate her schedule, but no problem.

Then inevitably on the morning of the event, we'd get the 'sorry, can't make it' message, usually due to a sudden episode of terrible mental and/or physical health. Complete stress for whoever organised the event, and they'd sometimes find themselves out of pocket too. After a few rounds of this, our sympathy ran out and the group disbanded naturally anyway.

It sounds very similar to your unusually obsessed but vanishing texters OP. I wonder if it's a woman thing? I've never heard of men acting this way, though maybe I don't know enough men!

I think it’s disgraceful that so many people don’t turn up , that wedding meal prob cost £85 a head and the bride n groom may have struggled to fund the wedding and then are let down at the last minute

There's something very strange about all their excuses. One hasn't met your now-husband and was asking on her way to the wedding what he's like?

How long had you been engaged to him? Is this your first marriage? Were these friends not talking the wedding seriously for any reason?

I agree with this re the over the top message before.

Someone I considered a good friend text me on the morning of my wedding to say she and her husband had a cold and so couldn’t make it. I replied to say sorry to hear that, hope you get better soon.

Never heard from her ever again. I refused to reach out to her as I thought the onus was on her to send a wedding card in the post, or text me when I got back from honeymoon to arrange a coffee or something.

10 years and still waiting 😂 Obviously not as good friends as I thought!

OP you sound lovely, it’s totally understandable to be disappointed and you would be justified in letting the friendships slide. A wedding is an important event in someone’s life and those excuses are lame.

I do think that many people struggle to celebrate others successes; including friends and family. Whether this is a promotion, getting married, having a baby, buying a new house, planning an amazing trip, etc etc. True friends will lift you during the difficult times and celebrate with you during the good times. Fair weather friends are tedious and cannot be relied upon. Try to focus on the friends who did make the effort and who shared your special day.

A supposedly good friend text me on the night before my wedding asking if she could bring this guy she had just left her husband for instead of her husband. When I said no we didn't want any strangers at the wedding and it wouldn't be appropriate given her husband was our initial guest I also never heard from her again. She got back with her husband six months later and cut most of us from her life out of embarrassment I think.

I do think some ghosters are just unable to cope with shame or guilt so have to cut people instead of apologise and make good.

We had a handful of people just not thrn up to our wedding, no message before and no acknowledgement since bar one who had a bit of mental breakdown on the day and was going through a divorce etc, so I understood that. The others were very long time friends of my husband and he seemed unbothered!
I always think best not to force a friendship, real ones will show up

Oh, I don't know. I guess I'm a bit more forgiving. Last minute cancellations can be for any number of reasons, and sometimes people don't want to give too much info. Maybe the couple had a massive argument the night before and couldn't face acting polite, etc.

As for place settings, I wouldn't have worried about in unless the numbers were very small and gaps would have been noticeable.

The polite thing for your friends to do would be to send a card or gift in the mail, with condolences for missing the event. If they haven't done, then that shows lack of manners, but I wouldn't necessarily write them off forever.

My best friend told me whilst AT my wedding that she would stay for the ceremony but would pop off after as her dad was waiting. I told her the meal was over £100 for her and her mum and if she wanted to do that then she should have told me a lot earlier than half an hour before. I was upset - she also turned up casually dressed as if she was popping out somewhere that wasn't her best friends wedding.
After, I decided that if she contacted me afterwards then I'd try and forget it and move on, and if not then I'd forget her and move on. It's been 20 years and she's never tried.
She was my witness so my certificate brings up pain each time I look at it. I have no idea why she behaved like that.
They clearly don't care OP so just leave them be. My friends who did come for the whole wedding are still friends I speak to. It speaks volumes.

That is shockingly rude. You've just reminded me of a close friend who said she'd leave after the meal for a random reason too.

I would never speak to any of them again, simply because they’ve had the opportunity to keep in touch, but they have not replied to you. You don’t need people like this in your life, they’re not genuine friends, let them go and don’t look back.

At our sons wedding at the church 4 people were not in attendance.
One of the groomsmen texted to find out where they were.
Reply was they 'forgot'. Stag party was the Saturday before.
2 ladies that we meet in the pub were outside watching the wedding.
Told them to come and have a free meal. They phoned their husbands
who came as well. At least the food didn't go to waste.

The absentees weren't even embarrassed. None of us haven't spoken to
them since.

I had quite a few that didn't turn up to mine but I hadn't bothered with a seating plan.

It doesn't sound like you were massively in touch with them before if they didn't know how you met your husband or anything about your plans? Each of them didn't know that others had called off and so they viewed it as a 1 or 2 person cancellation, potentially with legitimate reasons (if no other transport options were available and because of illness) rather than a big issue. I wouldn't have rearranged all the seating at that late stage - you could just leave seats empty or ask the venue to set eg a table of 10 for 8 only and space folk out. No one would judge given it was last minute.

😂Well done! This made me snigger so much in bed that I woke up DH!

Some people's get really weird when others get married and they may be left on the shelf or they can't find someone to commit to them, both men amd women. There's often an undercurrent of jealousy, that carries if you buy a house before peers or have kids before peers. The begrudging Jealousy just lingers forever it seems, until they do things themselves. It's hard to stomach but they eventually stop when they realise life isn't a contest and how bitter and pathetic they have been..

I don't think they were good reasons to cancel (unless the headache is like the ones I can sometimes get where you can barely move, let alone attend a wedding).

I wouldn't write them off just yet though. Your wedding was 'late last year' so that's very recent. Hardly any time at all. There's been Christmas, which is busy for people, new year, just a couple of weeks into the new year - and they may not want to bother you, giving you space as newly weds.

Blimey. I’d just let it go and see what happens. You never know what’s really going on for people or what they’re going through. Maybe they’re disorganised flakes, maybe they’re dealing with terrible health issues - who knows! If you sent them a lovely note maybe they feel everything’s ok and there’s nothing more to say? Who knows. I wouldn’t cut them off personally because my friends are human and unpredictable and life’s too short. But if you weren’t that keen on them in the first place don’t pursue it. Enjoy your marriage and try not to dwell.

It might not have happened as much pre social media, but my cousin didn’t turn up twice - once to my db’s wedding and once to mine - same excuse: she’d forgotten she had to work (solicitor, so unlikely as she didn’t do criminal law). Another couple just didn’t arrive, which I wasn’t aware of but our mutual friends were worried that there’d been an accident. Never heard from the friends again and my cousin basically cut her entire extended family after the wedding - haven’t seen her for 25 years now, which is a bit sad.

Weddings are very emotive but try not to lose friends over this if otherwise they're people you want to have in your life. I missed my best friend from school's wedding because of train issues. She was very upset but decided ultimately to get over it because she wanted a relationship with me and I was very grateful.