To cancel going to friends wedding

[Watdidusay]

We have a close friends wedding to attend in 6 weeks. It's been booked about 6 months in advance. We've prepaid for travel, hotels, childminding and bought traditional clothing for the event. I'm in the wedding party.

Just received an invite to my SILs wedding today (DHs sister) for the same date. In 6 weeks time.
Different part of the country.

Family are all saying we have to cancel the other wedding. We are going to be out hundreds of £.

AIBU to go to family wedding instead just to make my life easier? Everyone is angry at me for even considering not going to DHs sisters wedding. I feel terrible.

Family are very, very rude. You do not throw away a commitment because you get another offer. There is not a hierarchy where any wish from family trumps anything else no matter how important because it's faaaaamily. The only people who have ever said that to me have had pretty toxic family dynamics.

If your SIL had really wanted you there she would have checked you could make it. Don't let DH go either. She sounds like she wants you to jump for her.

Of course you can't cancel on your friend. You are in the wedding party! You have to go! In laws can "be angry" but tough.

It sounds like your husband will be going to SIL's wedding and taking the kids. Establish that and tell your friend ASAP that you'll still be there but H and kids won't. It might be in time to save her a bit of money and rearrange seating. Cancel the childminder and save a bit of money. Then you can enjoy the wedding and have a drink and a dance childfree, win win!

Your SIL is bonkers announcing the date 6 weeks before and expecting everyone to be free. You could have had a holiday booked, or surgery or wait ... another wedding to go to!

It is entirely unreasonable to demand that you attend, if it is short notice and they did not check the date with you.

Stand firm.

Let your DH go if he prefers, but stick with the plans you already have in place, if that is your preference. In-laws can complain, but in the end the dust will settle

It’s not normal to require your presence in just 6 weeks time without any advanced warning. What if you’d just booked a holiday, surgery, major job thing, conference. If you are part of the wedding party, I think you’ll have to stick with your friend’s wedding and your husband will have to go to his sister’s. It’s unreasonable for anyone to be cross with you.

Anybody who arranges a wedding with six weeks notice - without checking with close family members as to availability - should be able to accept that some people have prior plans and may not be able to attend. Engaged for three years and four kids means you can afford to be thoughtful about the date. I mean at this rate, are you sure the six week nuptials are going to come off - it all sounds a bit chaotic.

Go to your friend’s. Six weeks’ notice is ridiculous unless it’s shotgun!

Friend's wedding, definitely.

The other wedding was booked first. Your SIL can’t expect everyone to cancel their plans on that weekend to attend her wedding with only 6 weeks notice. SHE is being very unreasonable. Take no notice of them and enjoy your friends’ wedding!

You go with the invitation you accepted first. Because that's what anyone with manners does and if you don't then it will probably end your friendship as well as losing you money.

With time, your DH's family will likely forgive you for not going. If you had a holiday booked, would they expect you to cancel it to attend SIL's wedding? If the answer is yes then they are totally unreasonable people. But who sends wedding invitations 6 weeks beforehand with no prior warning and expects everyone to drop everything to attend? Contact SIL directly and explain, offering to take them out for dinner or something similar afterwards. The short notice would make me wonder whether there was something wrong. Or maybe their dream venue had a cancellation and offered them a discount.

@Watdidusay I organised a late wedding (25 days notice) so expected that lots of people would already have plans so wouldn't be able to come.

Go to your friends wedding. It would be unbelievably rude to cancel.

Your SIL cannot possibly expect everyone to be free at such short notice and if she expects people to drop their plans and come to the wedding then she is quite the bridezilla bitch.

The only one being unreasonable is your sil

if I was your friend I’d be very angry if you dropped out now. Don’t do it!

I checked with close friends and family about our wedding date before booking and it was still over a year in advance

six weeks may have been normal in the past but absolutely not any more

You have to go to the Friends Wedding!!

Your PIL are not very nice people if they can’t see how unreasonable they’re being, so I suspect if you give in to them now, they’ll be plenty more ridiculous demands from them in the future.

If you make a stand and hold firm, they’ll know they can’t dick you about or hold you to ransom as you won’t capitulate.

ALWAYS stand up to the bullies.

We have a rule that we go with what is in the diary first.
Years ago my BiL expected Husband and me and 4 kids to fly back from USA in the middle of a holiday (Husband was working there so I had taken the kids out for the school hols) for a wedding with 6 weeks notice.
We didn't. I let husband take the stick but - as in your situation - we would have lost loads of money (and had the hols all planned out). GOOD LUCK

You must apply the 'law of lesser pissers'. It's a situation where, nomatter what you do (and through no fault of your own) you're going to piss someone off. But, you have to live with yourself and your decision... so choose the option that will piss YOU off the least, where you are true to yourself and what you think is right, because you don't want to live with the regret of doing the wrong thing. Therefore, go to yoir friend's wedding ... the concession to your sister-in-law's wedding could be that your husband goes to it? But that part of it should be his decision and he should apply the law of lesser pissers too.
This is on your sister-in-law for only giving 6 weeks notice.
You can send a nice present or gift of money in a lovely card stating how much you would love to be celebrating with them but unfortunately due to your prior longstanding commitment and being in your friend's wedding party, you can't be there, but you wish them every joy in the world etc etc and look forward to doing something to celebrate with them in the coming months after the wedding (maybe suggest something )
Your PILs will get over it, it is what it is! Good luck

It's not your fault that your SIL didn't bother to check, at the very least, with her immediate family that they would be available. Arranging a wedding, and giving people 6 weeks notice, and expecting no one to have other plans, is ludicrous.

You're attending your friend's wedding, not simply as a guest but as part of the main wedding party. You can't just pull out! You'd be letting your friend down and wasting a lot of money. Your friend would be extremely upset with you (and rightly so!).

What's your husband stance on the situation? Is he supportive of you attending your friend's wedding and him attending his sister's? Or does he agree with his family, that you should ditch your friend's wedding?

Your SIL doesn't get to be arsey with you or the rest of the family, she's the one who didn't check before booking her wedding! That's on her, not you. I would be telling her that too! Regardless of what your SIL and the rest of your husband's family think, you need to go to your friend's wedding. Your SIL is being very unreasonable.

If I were the friend and you cancelled on me because of your unreasonable batshit SIL I'd be incredibly offended and upset.

This happened to me. My friends wedding had been in my diary for over a year. We had 6 weeks notice that my SIL was getting married. It was the day before but she lives in Europe. My MIL was enraged when I said I couldn’t come and in the end we flew to my SILs wedding, attended the ceremony and meal, left the party, flew home to an airport near my friend, arranged an early check in at the hotel, had 3 hours sleep and then went to my friends wedding. This was when we had very little disposable income and it cost us a fortune. It was a crazy weekend.

Having read just the OP posts, I think your in laws are being very unreasonable here. If you pull out if your friend’s wedding at this late stage, you’ll really upset her/him and possibly lose the friendship. The compromise is you to go to your friend’s and your DH to go to his sister’s. They must see that their position is completely unreasonable for you and your friend!

Your in-laws are rude as fuck - don’t cow tow to their bullying shit.
you and DH are adults - you do what YOU feel is right. You go to your friends wedding.

Then they are being ridiculously unreasonable.

If I were you OP, I'd honour my commitment to my friend and go to her wedding. Your husband can go to SIL's wedding. If she wanted you all there, she should have considered checking your availability at such short notice before booking her wedding. Don't feel guilty or bad about it.

Let your parents in law be mad 🤷‍♀️
you cannot back out of your friends wedding

Your DH is being very manipulative.

Tell him clearly that you will NOT be attending SiL's wedding as you already agreed to be in your friend's wedding on that day. And NOT to ask you again as you won't be changing your mind.

He can drop out of going to that if he wants to, but you will not.

PiL can be as upset as they like, but that's what's happening.
They sound awful btw, and I'd be celebrating if they went LC or NC because of this. The less you have to do with them the better.

You either feel miserable letting your friend down and missing being there for her, or made to feel miserable by the ILs. The latter you have some choice over - you know you haven't done anything wrong and they are being unreasonable, and your SIL has been unfair to do this at short notice. So just keep telling yourself you've done nothing wrong and they are being assessed.

We got married at fairly short notice actually. One relative already had something booked and paid for that couldn't be moved, so he went to that. No guilting him on our part, it was our fault and we apologised to him.

You know what the right thing to do is, but are doubting yourself because of your in laws’ unreasonable expectations. You know they are being unreasonable, keep reminding yourself of this.

you must go to the wedding which you committed to. Make that choice and communicate it unemotionally. Send a message or ring SIL directly to tell her. Any reasonable person would understand. Don’t engage with the parents in law, it will be like talking to a wall as they are being emotional rather than logical.

then let your husband decide what he does himself. It sounds like he’ll go to SIL wedding. In which case he needs to contact the friends - himself- to explain the tricky position he is in and explain his absence. Tbf it’s a reasonable excuse even if the short notice itself from SIL is not.

make the decision and sit back. You are in the right. Don’t be shouted down by people who are being both emotionally manipulated and emotionally manipulative in turn.

and enjoy the wedding!