AIBU to consider ending a lifelong friendship over this?

[TheNavySwan]

Need some outside perspective because I feel like I’m going mad.
Bit of a long one — thanks in advance if you read this.

So I’m currently debating whether to stay friends with my lifelong best friend (we’ll call her Sarah) after I feel like she’s totally stabbed me in the back.

Basically, there’s another girl (Beth) — someone I’ve known since we were actual babies — who recently got married. Sarah only knows Beth through me. They’ve never been close on their own, barely know each other. I was originally asked to be Beth’s maid of honour, and I accepted.

But at the time, I was dealing with a lot — uni stress, a horrible breakup with a manipulative ex, moving home, and some mental health stuff. I got overwhelmed and told Beth I couldn’t do it anymore. Not proud of it, but I was in a really bad place and not thinking clearly (my ex had a lot to do with that).

In a bit of a panic, Beth then asked Sarah to be her maid of honour instead. Sarah accepted (which I kind of understand, since she was put on the spot). Later on, I broke things off with my ex and started to feel more like myself again, and I reached out to Beth to explain the situation and told her I regretted stepping down.

Beth then offered for me to be a bridesmaid instead, but after a bit of back and forth, we ended up agreeing to share the maid/matron of honour role — since Sarah is married and I’m not. So at that point, all seemed okay again.

Fast forward — time goes on, and neither Sarah nor I actually help Beth with any wedding stuff. Sarah just had a baby, so she’s been busy, and I’ve still been trying to get my life back on track. So we were kind of in the same boat. But then, out of nowhere, Beth sends me this nasty message saying she doesn’t want me at her wedding anymore because I’ve not helped at all. And I’m thinking — okay, but Sarah hasn’t either, yet you’re still best mates with her? Why single me out?

Anyway. The plot thickens.

Turns out, Beth has apparently been lying about her nan being dead for SIX YEARS. I only found this out recently after our mums bumped into each other at the shops, and Beth’s mum let it slip that the nan was very much alive up until 5 days ago. I mean — who lies about that? It’s beyond weird and really rubbed Sarah the wrong way too, especially since she lost her own nan a few years back and was genuinely hurt.

At one point, Sarah even said she wasn’t sure if she was going to the wedding anymore after hearing about all the lies.

But then the wedding comes around and guess what? Sarah still goes. After all that, she still chose to show up and celebrate someone who had been awful to me and who’s clearly not honest or genuine. It feels like a massive betrayal.

Now I’m left feeling like maybe this is a sign from God and He is removing toxic people from my life for a reason. I recently found out I’m pregnant, and honestly, I just don’t want all this drama in my life anymore. I’m trying to protect my peace and do what’s best for me and my baby.

So AIBU to seriously consider cutting off Sarah for still choosing to be friends with Beth and going to the wedding, despite everything?

If you made it this far, thank you so much for reading!

Appreciate any honest thoughts.

This is a waste of time and effort. you are all better off getting on with your own lives and stop worrying /thinking about / analysing what everyone else is doing.
Relationships ebb and flow then sometimes break up as they run out of steam. Friendships are just the same, in this case, Beth was the third wheel and it changed the dynamics of your friendship with Sarah. Sarah obviously regards Beth as a friend and has chose to stick with the friendship.
It's a shame that you have been friends with Sarah so many years but a long friendship, like a long marriage doesn't mean you will go off into the sunset together and eternity.

If I discovered a friend had lied about their grandmother not being dead, I would assume that there was a reason behind it - e.g. that gran had cut off friend's family, I once had a difficult situation when a friend I had not seen for a bit sent me a lovely note in a Christmas card with condolences on my mother's death when my mother was very much alive. I couldn't really think of a way to say that that wouldn't sound callous and/or leave friend mortified and embarrassed, and in the end I just let it lie because, as in fact proved to be the case, it was highly unlikely friend would find out the truth anyway.

In any event, in this situation, I wouldn't jump to being mortally offended, I would at least inquire into my friend's reasons.

This

I agree. You seem to be the one who has been the spider in the nest here, trying to decide over everyone.

To not even go to the wedding, and get pissed off when Sarah does, is unforgivable OP. But you will never see it yourself. Because it’s all about you.

It doesn’t make much sence.

Friend recently married; Uni stress? Youre 30, manipulative ex, but pregnant?

Whats the time line here?

You don’t ’break Up’ and friendship - you dip in and out - don’t bite your nose off to spite your face.

No it doesn’t. It’s a Tik Tok thing.

What's Sarah done?!

neither Sarah nor I actually help Beth with any wedding stuff. Sarah just had a baby, so she’s been busy

She had just given birth ffs, and you take that as an excuse not to bother?

Given birth, so she couldn’t help as much with the wedding.

This is very childish and you don’t sound great either. Also, Sarah can’t just not go to Beth’s wedding because you’ve fallen out with Beth, that would be so weird.

Is this a reverse? You don't cover yourself in glory here OP.

You all sound like you have a fair bit of growing up to do.

You haven’t exactly covered yourself in glory here.

You stepped down as MOH, then decided you wanted to be it again, pushing the person who stepped into the role out of it. Then you do absolutely nothing to help in the run up to the wedding. Seems you wanted the glory on the day with no effort beforehand.

If she lied about her Nan being dead, there must be a reason. Or maybe she was talking about a paternal grandmother.

Your em dashes are short, OP’s are long like when you get AI to write something.

That's unalive not undead, two very different things.

Ah you are right, unalive. 😂 Both weird, although zombies I can understand a bit more than unalive.

Are you confusing this with "unalive" which young people use on social media as they think you get banned for saying "dead"?

Undead DOES mean zombie and has done since long before Tiktok was created.

I'm really curious about the timeline here. Even assuming you were attending uni as a mature student, in the time that you were with an abusive ex, broke up with him, got together with someone else and got pregnant, Beth has been planning her wedding this whole time? Is that right?

But in any case you sound like you've been trying to sabotage Beth from the start, to be honest. You just don't sound like you like her very much. First of all you dropped out of an important role at her wedding, which might be excusable given the circumstances, but then you essentially demanded to be reinstated despite your other friend being asked to take on the role. You then knew you were doing nothing to help her plan and instead of being a friend and taking steps to rectify that, you instead just felt comfortable in the knowledge that Sarah was doing this as well. How do you think this would have made Beth feel?

My gut instinct is that you're in denial about how close Beth and Sarah are.I expect Sarah has been helping her as much as possible, given that she's had a baby, while you've been using what Beth sees as a pretty played out excuse at this point ("getting my life together") while actively being in a relationship stable enough to get pregnant. If you were both being equally as withholding of help with the wedding, it makes no sense for Beth to single just one of you out, she'd have cut both of you off.

To me it sounds like Beth has come to the realisation that you don't actually like her very much and has cut you off accordingly. Why she lied about her grandparent dying, I don't know, but there could be a very good reason for it. Maybe Sarah approached her and talked it through, like an adult, and decided that whatever the reason behind Beth's lie, she didn't want to lose a friend over it.

I would absolutely advise you to do as you say, and move on from this. Beth and Sarah will be fine without you, and you have a baby to focus on.

I think this is fair.

However, OP — (1)why are you longterm friends with someone you appear to dislike and tolerate mistreatment from?

And (2) you will be much happier once you come to terms with the fact that the only behaviour you can ever control is your own. You cannot, for instance, dictate who your friends befriend, how they respond to your errors and failures, or their own stress responses/lying.

I can kind of see why OP might be annoyed with Beth (although I think OP’s more to blame for the breakdown in that relationship ), but really can’t see what Sarah has done wrong here.

I’m sorry, you sound really immature.
She might see it like, you let her down twice, Sarah had a more understandable reason when you both let her down.
Yes she’s lied, which isn’t great.
The whole ‘we’ve been friends since we were babies’ doesn’t mean you have a strong friendship, more like a long one.
Hopefully you’re feeling happier now and can move on from this friend.

So because you don't get on with someone it means your friend isn't allowed to either? Very immature.

Yes thank you, I replied earlier about it.

Sorry op, but I agree with this. As if Sarah would not go to Beth's wedding because you two had fallen out. She probably saw that Beth needed her support after losing one of her maid of honours. Who knows what Sarah was doing behind the scenes to help and the dead Nana, you don't know what is going on there. I would in no way drop Sarah, lifetime friendships are rare. Dumping her over wedding drama and because she wouldn't blithely pick your side sounds very unfair to me. Sorry this has been so upsetting for you, being dropped from Beth's wedding must have been really hard and it sounds like you've been through some traumas. Good luck with your pregnancy and I really hope you work it out.

My gran on my dad’s side remarried in her late 60s so while I often called him by his first name, to other people I’d say he was my grandad to avoid confusion. this meant in practice I went to 3 funerals for men I called grandad when talking about them to friends.

So are you 100% certain the person who has just died is the same person she said died 5 years ago? There’s not a step grandparent or great grandparent mix up?

Not sure where Sarah is to blame in all this. So she still attended the wedding (was she still matron of honour?). Beth was the one who lied (unless she was talking about her other grandmother) and frankly you admitted yourself you’ve done nothing to help her, so a text from her was not really a surprise especially as you asked to take on the role again.
So it seems more your relationship with Beth has run its course and Sarah just got caught up in it.
And you do not come out as any more mature than they do - you’re the one who has posted about it on here.