Wedding Invite to Husband Only

[MiniOneFree]

A wedding invite arrived by post today, we were expecting it and excited to open it.

Only my husband's name is on the front.

On the back it says 'this invite is just for the guest(s) named.

It's the reception only from 6pm, at a hotel, so not the actual ceremony.

This couple (let's call them Amy and John) came to our wedding in 2022. John is an old school friend of my husband's. They are in touch all the time. I met Amy at our wedding, she seemed friendly but as with weddings I didn't get to talk to her much. She made a comment which I do remember about my husband punching above his weight, which not only offended my husband but also we felt was a bit weird and rude as was in front of a group of around ten people who all laughed.

I want my husband to go to the wedding, if he wants, but would rather he didn't, but I don't want to stop him.

However he says he will decline and tell John we are away. However I want him to be honest and say he's not going as I've not been invited.

I think it's completely astonishing and I can't help but take it personally.

Is excluding wives and husbands a thing now ( like not including children) ?

Is it understandable to be so upset about this or AIBU?

And being pushy is impolite, but assuming people will be pushy is much worse.

I declined an invitation on this basis - also because it was evening only and the middle of nowhere. But I lied and said I would be away.

But the people you’re discussing don’t come under the category of ‘some random person’. They are the nearest and dearest of, you say, your friends.

Whenever you host, your guests are the priority. How does that fit with snubbing their partners? (Again, I assume anyone who prefers not to attend has the presence if mind to decline.)

But as we see so often on MN - including on this thread - there are far too many people about who just don't grasp that the only person/ people invited is the person named on the invitation. That is why they have felt the need to underline it.
If you read all the posts, you will see there are STILL people suggesting they ask the couple if it is a mistake.

Yeah I really don’t see it like that, my priority on my wedding day was me my husband and my children.
It wasn’t personal, I wanted the venue I wanted, I wasn’t going to downgrade to make the budget stretch to include people I’d never even met.
The guests at our wedding who didn’t get a plus one invite were sat on a table with people they knew.
If I could have afforded there partners I would have invited them but I couldn’t, I don’t feel bad about that.

Clearly they AREN'T the "nearest and dearest" though, are they ?

OP has only eve met the bride once, very briefly for a chat lasting about one minute, and that was 4 years ago. They can hardly be described as acquaintances, let alone friends or 'nearest and dearest'.

Please read what I said. To quote myself, with emphasis on the bit you missed:

’But the people you’re discussing don’t come under the category of ‘some random person’.

They are the nearest and dearest of, you say, your friends.’

What is tricky about that sentence?

It bears no relevance to your comment.

There is another thread just started where poster has received a wedding invite with no plus ones as have her friends. Absolutely not bothered and is looking forward to catching up with friends.

I understood what you meant. But I still think the previous poster has a point. Just because someone is the nearest and dearest OF a friend, that doesn’t necessarily make them special to you. Why, in the eyes of some, can people only exist as one half of a couple?

I’m single, so my nearest and dearest are my parents. For someone else it might be an adult child, or a sibling. Should they be invited too?

That OP expresses surprise. She is engaged, and had not realised that this is common.

In both senses of the word, IMO. It’s putting your personal experience, and maximising your gift haul, above the preferences of your guests. Who can always decline if they don’t know you well enough.

Times change and the OP on the other thread is willing to adjust. But it is undeniably about taking a self centred, as opposed to communitarian, view of what a wedding celebrates.

I'm genuinely sorry if I upset you. My poorly worded attempt to say that times change - i shouldn't have used your situation as an example perhaps as I don't know what it is.

The actual point is that regardless of anyone's views on tradition/etiquette, married couples are not one unchangeable unit any more. Gone are days when wife was "Mrs John Wilson" who couldn't have a bank account. As such, as it's common to re-marry, to have kids without being married, to divorce, to live with a LT partner, etc.

Marriage is a state of being at a particular time which might or might not persist. You don't become a single unit. A married person is still an individual with friends outside the marriage. Weddings are expensive and not wanting to double every invite at the expense of people the couple actually know is understandable.

@poetryandwine the OP hasn't seen the bride (or the groom I don't think) since her own wedding 4 years ago. She isn't in touch with them. How communitarian is that!

Surely better to invite people you actually speak to.

Good for her! 👍

Doesn't mean other people aren't entitled to feel differently.

NEWSFLASH!!!!!!!!

PEOPLE ARE DIFFERENT!

@Bunny65 · Today 09:01

The whole thing is weird, particularly the bit on the invite saying it’s only for the person named.

Yes, this. ^ It's coming across as being written by a 14 year old girl, who wants to make sure another girl she doesn't like doesn't come to her party!

Immature and unclassy.

It's a bit unusual but if for example they decided all evening guests are no plus ones, they might have foreseen the issue and just wanted to avoid dozens of messages "just checking if there's been a mistake" as people on here have been suggesting OP do.

So if you have limited places who you can invite, and you have one space left. Do you invite the spouse of someone, this spouse hasn't seen you, spoken to you or shown any interest in you for 4 years or do you invite a friend who you communicate with on a reasonably frequent basis and is interested in you and your life?

Nah, I think it's because they want to head off assumptions that people they barely know (like OP) will expect to rock up, whereas they are inviting their mates and not their mates spouses.

Don't you go to events without your partner? I do. because we have separate social lives as well as having shared friends.

Who is ever talking about budgeting for one person? You can have one less appetiser choice recover the cost of one person, or something similar. If you aren’t living beyond your means, you can even extend your budget.

@poetryandwine - but why would you?

It's been four years since the OP got married and met the soon-to-be bride. She hasn't pursued that acquaintance in the slightest in that intervening period, from what she has posted. Why would she want to "extend her budget" or restrict her choices to include a woman who hasn't been bothered to see her more than the once?

Good manners?

Yes, @HeadyLamarr , this would have been my reply. Especially because this couple attended OP’s wedding.

Presumably the 2/3 of responders who voted that OP is NBU feel similarly.

It doesn’t matter whether the OP has seen the bride lately. The point is the bride was invited to the OP’s wedding, the men socialise regularly, and it would be basic courtesy to invite them both back. And if it was really down to money/places you would expect the groom to be to have mentioned that beforehand to avoid offence.

@poetryandwine our wedding venue was limited to 40 people, so limitation wasn't down to cost for us it was literally bums on seats. So we chose guests we were communicating with regularly.

You do you. I couldn't take offence at not being invited to a do of someone I'd never bothered to get to know.

Personally I think it's rather outdated to think wedding invitations are reciprocal. (Or birthday parties, or whatever)

I've been invited to plenty of wedding whom I subsequently didn't invite to mine, and I invited people to mine who didn't invite me to theirs. You invited the people you want to see at that occasion, and only those whom you can afford to invite.

If, given the ages of the OP's children, this is a second marriage, it's frequently been my experience that these are less formal affairs anyway.

Things can change in four years. The fact that OP’s husband is a “close friend” but still only an evening guest suggests they have.