to not be willing to leave behind my newborn for my friends 'no children' wedding.

[alannabanana]

so this wedding is taking place in august by which time i will have a roughly 8wk old newborn. i already have a 17 month DS for whom childcare has been arranged, but i have always said that leaving the newbie will not be feasible as i will be breastfeeding (boobies willing!), and to be honest the venue is a bit of a drive and i would not be able to enjoy myself knowing i had left such a young dependent baby with someone else. (i should say at this juncture that the very kind friend in question who would be taking care of DS and the new baby has v little experience of babies but great with toddlers, and ordinarily i would only trust my mum with the baby but she, and indeed my ENTIRE family, will be on holiday at the time of the wedding.)
i stipulated all this months ago to our supposedly close friends - the bride and groom - especially the part about my family being away and DH's family not being an option because they live nowhere near us, and they seemed ok with us having to bring the newbie, but have just received a phone call tonight saying that actually no children means NO children, even tiny babies. now, DH is actually more upset about this than me as the groom is one of his oldest and closest friends - i am of the opinion that if they don't get that you can't just leave an 8wk old baby willy nilly then theres nothing i can do to convince them - but poor DH is actually quite hurt that his mate has effectively withdrawn our invitation to his wedding, and i think he's well within his rights to be hurt, and a bit cross. is this unreasonable you think? im hoping that this doesnt spell the end of our friendship with them but it is disappointing.

my cousin's future SIL had her baby at my cousins wedding. this tiny baby girl cried and wailed all the way through the ceremony, reducing my cousin to tears of frustration at having to repeat practically every line, and then a work colleague's toddler raced around the reception grabbing drinks and finished with being sick on the mother of the bride's shoes.

equally, i have been to many weddings with children that have been lovely.

but i can see why they wouldnt want children there. one of my friends got married 6 weeks after my DD was born, and we took them out for a fantastic meal/piss up after their honeymoon because i couldnt attend [although DH went]

i dont see why this is a big issue. if you dont want kids at your wedding, dont have them.
if you cant take your kids but still want to celebrate with the couple, then do something at a later date.

why there has to be all this 'childfree couples are so selfish and uncaring' rubbish i dont know.
if they are truly your friends they'll be sad you cant come but will understand.

and if they dont why the hell are you going to the wedding anyway?

Op, you do what sits best with you. If you go without your baby then presumably you won't feel the same about the whole event anyway.
For what it's worth, my wedding was at a lovely country house and I wanted it to be fairly adult. The afternoon was champagne and canapes and I invited my nephews and nieces but asked other friends if they would mind not bringing children. That is because I don't have a big family, so the event wasn't a meeting of two families as such, but it was a great opportunity to treat our friends. There was one tiny baby in the ceremony, but they asked if she could come and said in advance that if she cried they would take her out. My other friends were fine and enjoyed going to an event where they could relax without the children, just for one day!
However, I requested that we be completely child-free in the evening because we were having a 3 course meal, with a much smaller group, more like a big evening out with friends. I knew children would be tired by then and there would be nothing for them to do. Also, my nephews and nieces lived close enough to be dropped off home with a babysitter. My brother and sister were great about it and got babysitters. My SIL and BIL took huge exception to this, wanted their 5 and 8 year olds at the evening meal as well. I politely declined and they impolitely made a huge fuss, tried to get MIL to sort us out, then decided not to come. Their choice, it meant we could have two more friends with us.
Long post, but what I'm trying to say is that I don't think it is bridezilla for people to decide what sort of day they are going to have, and whether or not they want children rushing around the place or not. I don't think people should have a great family shindig imposed on them and I don't think it signals the end of society that some people choose "no children".

I'm always boggled at the breeder-culture mindset which insists that all weddings have to involve babies and children. Lots of people ban kids from weddings because they would rather use the space for their friends rather than an infant third cousin they've never met. And it's idiotic to insist that weddings should be about faaaaamly (like some soap opera prole) given that to substantial numbers of people, friends are much more important than family and quite a lot of families are actually pretty toxic. People who are paying to host a party get to decide who to invite to it, end of.

Islandofsodor what I forgot to mention in my thread was the brides DD was perfectly happy till her grandma grabbed her dummy out of her mouth then all hell broke lose. Why the grooms parents didn't offer to take her out was that they had already asked when the arrangements were being made if she would like the grooms sister to look after the DD and if she got restless she could take her out and they were virtually told 'no way' I am looking after her.

It's all numbers, isn't it?

We invited my nieces and nephews. If we'd invited our cousins' children, there'd have been over 40 children under ten. So we limited the extended family and friend invites to adults only unless they couldn't make alternative arrangements. Most people were happy to leave their children, one (lone parent) brought hers - which was fine, much better than her not being able to come, and we had a manageable number & no (I hope) offended guests.

And now people get married older, often it's not just one child, it means inviting all the friends' children, which can be a huge number!

A bit of flexibility all round usually works...

I think having a wedding where you feel obliged to invite a bunch of people you don't like purely on the grounds that the are family is even more absurd. Is it weird that I actually like my friends' children? I wouldn't invite them without their parents (that would be odd) but they do count as people.

LOL at breeder culture SGB. Having left it until 42 and having a very small number of children, I am hardly a big advocate. I'm the first to narrow my eyes at children wailing in restaurants in the evening

I wouldn't dream of inviting my cousins incidentally - don't like them and haven't seen them for about 10 years. Ditto aunts and uncles. No way would they supercede friends. I've always thought that bizarre

Family might be less exciting/groovy on the dance floor, but very few friends actually have the vested interest in your life that family often do.

So the aged auntie that has known you since childhood and has a close relationship with your parents, but with whom you have very little in common, is actually much more likely to have a sincere and genuine interest in your marriage than your latest work colleagues.

Dysfunctional families aside, I think quite a lot of couples don't take those long-term family links into account when planning their wedding and guest list.

i think the thing thats jarring us the most is that our friend the groom didnt put up more of a fight to keep us at the event. i mean the inflexibility of their no kids rule means we can't go, and he seems very ok with that, which kind of makes us think '...oh, well, there you go. guess we werent that important to him afterall.' i know that prob sounds over-sensitive but remember i am heavily preg and allowed a little emotional hormone-athon!

I didn't grow up in the same country as my family and have barely seen them so my friends are my family - I've known most of them for 20+ years. No, none of them knew me when I was a baby but that' irrelevant. They know me which my extended family don't. I am very close to my immediate family - I think that happens when you move around a lot

We didn't invite children to our wedding and even after having three kids of my own I don't regret this decision or feel I have to justify it. It was our day, and a pretty grown up affair that wasn't suitable for kids......most of our friends at the time didn't have any so it wasn't a huge issue. Having said that, since having children I now GET the fact that you can't leave a newborn behind....at the time I was totally clueless and felt I needed to enforce the policy to be fair ( as my sil was upset that her three toddlers weren't invited.....). If I could go back and do it again I would have been more flexible with the friends that had an eight week old baby but I truly didn't know the difference......I don't think I had even held a baby before at this point in my life and wasn't wholly convinced I was ever going to have any myself!!!! So, yes I was ignorant but my friends with the baby forgave me and we laugh about it now..... They understand that at the time it was the most important day of my life and the feeding patterns of newborns weren't on my priority list! It's theircday and their party.....it won't wreck your life not to go (and perhaps let dh go) but it will put a damper on their day if you make it an issue. They are ignorant and childfree....honestly there is no malice involved and the situation is probably causing them stress already. Be the bigger person and let them have their day in the smug knowledge that one day soon, when they have kids, they will learn!!!

I'm just waiting for the post from a mumsnetter who's told not to bring her bump to a wedding - it will get in the way, be a distraction, cause her to make a noise through the ceremony and isn't appropriate at an adults only party. Surely she can leave it with someone...

Op - YANBU.

'I think the thing thats jarring us the most is that our friend the groom didnt put up more of a fight to keep us at the event. i mean the inflexibility of their no kids rule means we can't go, and he seems very ok with that, which kind of makes us think '...oh, well, there you go. guess we werent that important to him afterall.' i know that prob sounds over-sensitive but remember i am heavily preg and allowed a little emotional hormone-athon!'

alannabanna - I'm sorry but he's not made it so ni e if you can go
me and dh have gone to loads of weddings on our own
your dh will have fun with his mates and will support his close friend
the three of you don't have to be joined at the hip

Lady Biscuit, my post wasn't directed at you.

It's just that these threads seem to focus on the wedding as a big party, where lots of drunken mates having a laugh, or the photos looking good, or no disorderly children (at whatever inconvenience or cost to feelings) is a priority.

Whereas I see a marriage as a major life event, when the couple should consider those people who have been important figures over the course of their life, and also take into account the feeling of their own parents - for example, I invited friends of my parents who had babysat us and supported my parents, through difficult times when I was young.

And although I hadn't seen some of them for years, they were all delighted to be invited and very emotional to see me starting my married life. So I don't regret that decision at all - our mates came later and it was great, they just got very, very drunk . But they weren't emotional about the event, it just didn't have any particularly special meaning for them.

I find all this 'if we all can't go then none of us will' a bit wet tbh
< prepares to be flamed>
I'm not that keen on weddings and would merrily send dh off
that way you can leave him with the baby further down the line for a weekend away with the girls
some of my family and friends are shocked when I go away without dh and dcs, they do everything together

I don't really understand the whole 'noisy children will ruin my wedding' thing... what are weddings about if it isn't real life and a few thins going wrong and laughter and tears and family - which involve having children? I love the inevitability of a baby having a wail in a marriage service, or the kids having their own little party at the reception, it really adds to the occasion for me and no, i'm not being sarcastic!

But still I would wager that the 'no babies' thing is because they haven't got the money to cover everybody's kids and think somebody will be offended if a wee baby turns up when others have been told to leave them at home.

things !

YANBU. Feel really sorry for your DH. A similar thing happened to us after DD was born. We did not go to the wedding and managed to get past it and remain friends.

Don't get how people have the nerve to stipulate 'no children' at weddings really. We're getting married soon. Alot of our friends/family have children. Didn't dream of not inviting them, just the way it is. We've arranged an entertainer as there's going to be so many of them there (and our budget is tiny and massively stretched already)! Not my ideal wedding, a clown and balloon models, but it's important to me that everyone has a great time. It's alot to ask when you invite people to a wedding IMO, it's expensive (outfits, travel, accommodation, gifts), and hard work, I wouldn't dream of making it any harder.

Sorry ww, I didn't think it was really. It just sparked a thought in my head and I think we're both coming at it from the same POV in a way - I would want people that love me at my (mythical) wedding, not people who don't know or care for me just because we happen to be related. I'm in my 40s so I think friends assume a different level of priority. I have known my close friends for 25 years or so - unless there is a major falling-out, I'd hope they would be for the next 25 years. We go to our parents' funerals and really are extended family in a lot of ways and our children have grown up together. I've never even met my cousins' children!

No worries LB . Is just interesting how people view their wedding/their wedding invites. And I think people tend to take a pretty short-term view, on the whole - whether that's not understanding the needs of newborns, or the meaning their marriage might have to their aged aunties, or the competing demands on the happy couple!

Don't go, don't even consider it, consider only your and baby needs.

But don't let it cost the friendship, deal with it politely and just accept it's something that you will never really understand but because of the length of your dh's friendship with groom and tha fact that dh is hurt about it, move on past and forget the whole mess.

Dont know how people have the nerve? Ermm possibly because its their big day and they can stipulate what the fook they want? People dont have to oblige them but of course they have 'the nerve' fgs.

"So we said no to everyone and if they didn't want to come then tough"

That is what I have against child-free weddings. What a shitty attitude . Thank fuck no one I know is like that.