Feeling very hurt by close friend's behaviour on my wedding day?

[littleduck]

I had a close group of girlfriends at school, one in particular, and we had known each other for nearly 20 years by the time I got married.

I asked this close friend to do a reading at my wedding and she agreed. The wedding was planned for the same day as her birthday and she knew quite a few people who were coming along - so double party for her, or so I thought.

She rang me about 3 months before the wedding asking if it was still going ahead on her birthday. Was a bit surprised at her question as clearly I would have told her if the plans had changed but I said yes, all going ahead as planned, why?

She was hardly in touch before the wedding and couldn't make my hen do as she was away on a trip overseas. I said I was sad she wouldn't be there and would miss her and her response was more or less that she'd already made her plans so I'd just have to get on with it.

Anyway we got to the wedding day itself and she did the reading. The reception was a late afternoon/early evening fizz and canapes do as we were on a tight budget. DH were due to leave at 8. Just after the speeches she came up to me and said she was leaving as she had to go to her birthday dinner. I said we'd only be another half an hour or so and was there any way she could stay to see us off? She said no, they had a table booked, and left taking her sister and two other guests with her.

I was really really hurt by this, to the extent that I was in tears on my honeymoon about it. She had had nearly a year to telephone and ask me about the timings and could easily have arranged her dinner for a bit later - the wedding was in London and she lives there too, and most places are open quite late on Saturdays. Or if she had to leave early, she could at least have told me in advance.

I later found out that she didn't have a table booked anywhere at all, she was just having a dinner at home.

There are other things too but I won't go into them.

Thing is, her sister got in touch a few years via Facebook and we have met and get on fine. I explained how upset I was by what my friend had done and the sister was genuinely mortified, I don't think she knew that my friend hadn't discussed it with me.

Weirdly the ex friend came running out of a pub the other week to say hello as I was walking past with DD. I hadn't seen her for years and kind of wondered why she bothered although of course I was polite to her.

I just think that someone who was really my friend would not have behaved as she did - especially if you have a major part to play in the wedding, surely it's a bit off. The reason I ask is that seemingly she thinks I am unreasonable and selfish for being upset by what she did.

Your thoughts....

I wouldnt of planned a wedding on my best friends birthday .

It was the only weekend we could get the church and reception venue we wanted otherwise it would have been a wait till the following year.

when you asked her to do the reading did you acknowledge that it was her birthday? did you say something like "I hope you don't mind but it was the only day we could get the venue (insert other reason or even white lie)." did you get her a birthday present? did you thank her in the speeches and wish her a happy birthday? because if you didn't it's possible she felt a tiny bit hurt and decided to leave early.

I agree with others though that crying on your honeymoon was pretty over the top and that you're possibly over-thinking this. if you enjoy her company call her up and have a coffee with her. see where it goes. maybe nowhere. maybe somewhere different from where you were before. but you were once good friends - isn;t it worth a couple of hours of your time to catch up and see if there's still a friendship there?

Thanks for your posts. Most of them have been fair and well thought out and are appreciated. As I said there is more to the whole situation than I wanted to bore anyone with here but at least I have some thoughts on this one aspect.

If you want people to take account otehr things then you need to mention them not mysteriously allude to them.

For a very close friend I would have either changed my prefered venue or talked to her first about it (not to get her permission but just to let her know that any other day wasn;t possible).

I just don't get being upset about her leaving 30 mins earlier than you. And if I was your new DH I would have been pretty pissed off with even a minor sob on my honeymoon because of 30 minutes of a friends time.

But if there are other things then perhaps you aren;t as good freinds as you think you are and you need to get over it - you are both gorwn-ups (I assume) you can choose your friends, you don;t need to torture yourself or her with this a moment longer. Just forget it.

I'm obviously in a minority here but I would have been very upset too - people can celebrate their birthday any day and I'd expect a close friend - one that I had actually involved in the wedding by asking her to do a reading - to make my wedding their priority on that day.

I think you are being perfectly reasonable and she was not. I think her behaviour was pretty appalling actually (and I don't think much of your wedding guests who left along with her!).

honestly, what a FUSS people make about their weddings, they lose all sense of perspective. for the record, most wedddings are a pita. cost a fortune, load of hassle, have to buy new frock/shoes/present... i really cannot stand them for the most part.

I'm with you Aitch - can't imagine falling out with someone I considered to be a good friend over 30 mins at the end of a wedding day, its not like she missed anything important and was there presumably from lunchtime until 7.30pm. Maybe she's like me and AItch and she just didn't consider it would be any big deal. Why would she mention it beforehand (unless you invites specifically said 12.30- 8pm) maybe she just assumed would be over in time for her to leave at 7.30pm.

If she'd left in teh middle of the service or the speeches I would think you weren't being unreasonable but 30 mins before you leave - sorry I really don't get it though obviously other people do.

Makes me glad I never got married.

We-ell,
As you can probably tell from the responses on your thread, different people ascribe really varying levels of importance to weddings and birthdays.

My SIL will never forgive me and DH (genuinely: that is not just a figure of speech here) for asking her to re-schedule her 40th birthday weekend spa jaunt (which was not even on her actual birthday) so we could have our wedding at the one a time when my overseas relatives could attend. That was apparently an unpardonable sin, even though we asked her to months in advance, all her guests were able to attend the new date, we paid all the associated costs and got her some flowers. Because her 40th was far more important than our wedding.

I wouldn't be too hard on your friend, personally (about this one thing at any rate; sounds as though there is quite a lot of other stuff). It probably wasn't a snub, she just didn't think leaving half an hour early was anything bad or significant.

She's rude and vile

I would have been devastated and I would NEVER treat a friend like that.

mind you, i lost a friend over our wedding because she took it badly that she wasn't invited, and turned out to be a real bitch about it. (i literally had two of my friends at the wedding, it was abroad and very small). it kind of didn't even occur to me that she would want to come, as if i'd just had a baby i wouldn't have been arsed to have to take a child to a city wedding. this, from someone who is against marriage in principle as well... utter weirdo and put me off having a big party when we came back as i felt by that point i really didn't want her there...

as it was, the people we did invite were firmly instructed that they mustn't feel any obligation whatsoever as we understand weddings are a pain. they all came, though, which was really nice.

she's not your close friend, or certainyl wasn't bt the time you got married.. you say she was hardly in touch before your wedding and you think she didn't like your DH much.. so really, it sounds like you were trying to cling on to the friendship, depsite it being not as good/close as it once was

she left 30 minutes early, she came to find you and told you...

bearing in mind your reaction, i am not surprised she did not tell you sooner.. yuo cried on honeymoon??

you also say there are other things and she retracted her invitation to you to be her bridesmaid.. so wha do you get out of this friendhsip?

people grow and drift apart or find out they odn't have anything in common

it's not a crime

pull up your big girl pants and move forward!

was it her 21st, or any other significant b'day?

If it was an 'ordinary' b'day I am amazed that she asked if you had changed the dat, if it was a significant b'day i am amazed that you set your wedding day on it and became upset whe she left...you both seem to expect quite a high level of demonstrating absolute loyalty.

Maybe she was expecting the wedding to finish a little sooner, and was celebrating her b'day with people who were not invited to your wedding.

you need to get her digitally removed from all wedding photos and then send her the bill for reprinting, then hunt down all her close family and inflict a small slight upon them and then only then will she understand the magnitude of her crime against humanity

Now that is a good idea.

I don't think YABU at all and I am really a very thick skinned person.

She left her friend of 20 years' wedding to go home and have a birthday dinner? What a bitch.

littleduck I actually think some of the posters on here have been a little harsh on you, but we all react in different ways.

The fact that your old 'friend' did a reading at your wedding indicates to me that you regarded her as a very dear, close friend. As such she absolutely should not have made a point of leaving your wedding early just to go a poxy birthday dinner at her own house when it wasn't even a big year for her.

Yes, weddings for the most part are a bit of a bore, but not when it is one of your closest friends' weddings. I know personally that my closest girlfriends would have been very unforgiving if I'd decided to leave their wedding early to go off for my own b'day meal. But I'd never even comtemplate it - because a wedding is a BIG DEAL.

Gosh, I'm rambling a bit. So, no, YANBU at all, in my opinion. What I would say is now is definitely the time to get over it and move on from this 'friend' if you can - she obviously didn't value your friendship as much as you did hers and as such is not worth crying over any more.

Its sad when you lose a good friend. My Maid of honour arranged the hen weekend, was the first person I told, my youngest daughters god-mother, was there the night I met my now DH, shared our family life, we'd been friends for 12 years. A week before the wedding she dumped me. Never spoke to me again, despite my calling her - she wouldn't answer my calls, apologising (I'm not entirely sure for what, but I am genuinely sorry as I must have hurt her in some way - she never spoke to me again to tell me), sent her cards, emails. Not a word.

And I wasn't a diva, infact, it was all very relaxed. I still thanked her in my wedding speech. I was calling her the day before from opposite her house asking her to meet up with me.

I miss her a lot and there is a gap in my life.

But we have to move on and leave them to their decision not to be part of our lives. Sadly.

I think you should let it go now.

I can understand wanting to leave early/prioritise an elderly relative's birthday (someone mentioned above a 70th) as that is a very special event.
What I don't get is adults making a huge thing about their own birthdays. Surely, apart from "special" numbers, birthdays are really more for children? Adults who make a big fuss about their own can come across as very childish and self-absorbed.

Actually, I think your friend did behave very oddly and selfishly. I found the fact that she took two of your guests with her really really rude, esp as it was a small wedding and had such an early finish. I wouldn't dream of ducking out early when I was part of the wedding party, but people do. My friend's bridesmaid insisted on leaving her wedding early and that the bride's father leave the wedding to enable her to collect some stuff from his home (the wedding party set off from there). She was jealous and attention seeking. HOwever, my friend has been able to get over this - though I doubt it will ever be entirely forgotten and forgiven. THis was at a wedding that went on until 11pm and was fairly large, so her disappearance, though inconvenient and rude, was not as noticeable as it would have been at yours.

ahem. as can brides. this is clearly a case of an irrestistible force meeting an immovable object.

except of course that the woman had no idea that she had caused such offence, nor had her sister, and she clearly can't remember much of it judging by the way she bounded out of a shop to happily hallooooo the OP.

just dust it off and be pals again, OP, you know you want to.

A close friend getting married on my birthday.....

That is a one off event vs an event that happens every year. I would have definitely have prioritised my friends wedding and simply had my birthday dinner next day.

Honestly life is too short to go around upsetting people like this. It is not as if she was 5 years old. She was, I am guessing mid 30s. Big deal if you have a dinner the next day.

If I were doing a reading at a friends wedding I would consider it an honour to be asked and would stay until the end.

Yes rude.

However, people see things very differently as you can see from this thread.