Wedding Invite Assumptions

[RatalieTatalie]

theres a largeish group of us who are all friends from school, all in regular WhatsApp contact, meet up throughout the year etc. Within the group some are closer than others due to living closer etc, but no rifts or drama.

we all get hen invites a few months ago, everyone agreed and paid. Now wedding invites have come out and all but one girl have them!

I now feel really conflicted about going to the wedding as I can’t understand why you wouldn’t invite all of us (there are plus ones going, so if I was organising it I’d have picked the friend over partners as it’s apparently a space issue). Especially after inviting someone to your hen do which you know will
cost them time and money to come and celebrate with you.

Totally understand that someone’s wedding guest list is their own and wouldn’t dream of trying to interfere. And that no one is entitled to a space. I just couldn’t picture myself so obviously excluding someone, who has now had to find out via everyone else slowly piping up about receiving invites on the group chat.

Would it be unreasonable for me to decline the invite (without saying why obviously) and let the other girl believe I wasn’t invited either so she doesn’t feel alone?

Ugh. I've been at several hens as just an evening guest 😞

Well this would really change my view of the bride. I know numbers are tricky to manage at weddings, but you don’t invite a friend group like that and leave one out. Especially if you’ve invited them to the hen. I would definitely be pulling out of the hen if I was her, and asking to be reimbursed.

Friends should come before someone's latest boyfriend.

Please don't mislead your friend as to who was/wasn't invited. She deserves to know the full truth so she can reassess her relationship with the bride accordingly.

Did you expect an invite @Dottoto the wedding all day ?

I can understand numbers and restrictions. But if the bride was a decent friend she would have explained to your friend before hand. I don’t think I would want to go on the hen for the bride in this situation. Maybe the bride and the friend are more acquaintances than friends but still rude.

I think it's bad enough expecting someone to shell out on your hen do if they're just an evening guest, let one not invited!! I was invited on a hen for a (close) friend, spent about £400 on the hen only to find out through chat on the night that I wasn't actually invited to the wedding 😂 I enjoyed the rest of my night and then never spoke to her again.

I don't get how 1 girl being left off the list makes that much of a difference to her overall numbers/figures.

I know a girl who has 9 uni friends, she invited them all. No partners.

I think I would talk to the bride, how would she feel if someone did that to her.

She should have invited the friend and left a plus one on the standby list.

Well it's embarrassing to be the only hen who wasn't.. I met the standard to receive the couple's gift list tho 😂

wow rude come to my hen spend money but youre not coming to the wedding

have you spoken to your friend yet about this is she upset

I think anyone invited to a hen do would get an invite to a wedding.

especially expected to fork out money for the hen

Bride should do the decent thing and give that poor woman a refund. What a horrible thing to do to someone

I agree - pretending is a bit mean, really, even if you mean well. She'll feel worse when she finds out.

On one hand, I don't know the ins and outs of your group but just being on a WA group with others shouldn't necessarily mean you get an invitation to a wedding. But, it's pretty crap to invite her to the hen do, and if it's a large group, for her to be the only one not invited. I'd assume from this that they were less close but is that true?

That’s unacceptable if she was invited to the hen, I hope she Dosen’t go to the hen, even if she has paid, they could have surely fitted one more in

I had a similar situation but from the Bride's POV. I was part of a group of 6 close friends who socialised together weekly, and there was one other friend who was very close to 2 of the group but only joined the group socialising maybe 3 or 4 times a year.

I didn't even have her phone number, had never seen her on her own or spoken independently of the group, so when we were tight on wedding numbers we didn't invite her.

One of the original 6 chose not to come to our wedding, last minute, because she thought the 7th friend should have been invited. Upsetting at the time but I respected her decision, she came to respect our reasoning and actually 3 years on we're closer friends than ever. As it turned out the 7th friend was actually away the week of the wedding so wouldn't have come even if she had been invited.

All that said, I would never in a million years of invited her to the hen do knowing I wasn't inviting her to the wedding!

Do you actually like the bride or are ye only so so friends?

bride is being an absolute fucker.
If i were the non-invitee i would be putting one massive message in the group, tagging the bride and telling her so. And then exiting stage left.

It is MASSIVELY bad form to invite people to your hen do but not the wedding. Classless.

Easiest thing to do here would have been to invite all this group of friends with no partners.
...Hi ladies space and finances are a bit tight so if you don't mind i thought I'd invite you as a group rather than with partners while you all know each other...

yes definitely true to say they’re less close and so if you weren’t inviting people there’s a couple of people that would make sense in the group due to distance and life stages etc.

we’ve all been friends since school, speak 3-4 times a week minimum on the group chat, all meet as a whole group at least once a year, but people meet weekly/monthly/quarterly whatever within that because they live closer, have children the same age or what have you.

other people in the group have had weddings where some haven’t been invited, but never just one person and they also weren’t invited to the hen. I think this just feels a bit more personal because it’s just one person this time. And the mixed message with the hen weekend.

I know someone that did exactly this. You should never invite people to your hen do and then not your wedding. Why do people do it? Just so they can post on social media and make it look like they have a big group of mates.

If you are going to let someone pay to attend your hen do, you should absolutely invite them to your wedding.

Absolutely terrible -“attend my hen do where you’ll pay an arm and leg and make it all about me me me, but when it comes to me paying for you to have a space at my wedding, sorry no can do” Stingy bastards!

That said, I wouldn’t not attend just to make the other girl feel better. You could end up in a rift with the bride and awkwardly put yourself in a situation. I guess it all comes down to the closeness of the relationships and the relationship you want with the bride moving forward.

Tbh I find the hen do culture really weird and narcissistic these days. Most people want you to go away on expensive holidays, taking multiple days off annual leave to do and pay for a bunch of things that you’d rather not do. Good luck OP! X

Absolutely this!! All the partners are lovely, but we rarely meet as couples, especially as we’ve got older and time is harder to juggle with kids etc.

Really sweet of you but I don’t think it’s on you to pretend you weren’t invited.

That’s a shitty move by the bride, I’d be very upset if I was at the hen but not welcome at the wedding.

Well, the hen do is going to be awkward... is excluded friend still going to go? I think in her shoes I'd ask for my money back (or just lose it) than make the effort to travel and sit through the meal, games, wedding talk, urgh. The bride has very bad manners, at best.