'AITA for refusing to be maid of honour over a bridesmaid, causing her to get fired?' + Update
"AITA for refusing to be maid of honour over a bridesmaid, causing her to get “fired”?"
bridesmaidultimatum
The people in this story are my best friend “Jane”, her brother “Elliot”, and his girlfriend of two years, “Kathy”. Jane is marrying her fiancé Tom in July and she asked me to be her maid of honour.
This was sort of expected as Jane is essentially a sister to me. I was surprised, however, that she asked her brother’s girlfriend, Kathy, to be a bridesmaid. Jane later confided that Kathy had kind of pressured her into it and she had done it to make Elliot happy.
The issue is, Kathy hates me. Like seriously hates me. She blames me for all the issues she has with Elliot and Jane’s parents, and for her not having a better friendship with Jane.
She also thinks I am trying to steal Elliot from her (I’m not) but also cannot handle whenever he and I disagree on anything and will go way overboard defending him and arguing with me. I was determined to put this all aside for Jane, though.
This was actually not going too badly, but last weekend we went to a bridal shop to choose bridesmaid dresses. Jane mentioned that she wanted me and Elliot to walk down the aisle together, and Kathy lost it.
She called me desperate, crazy, a pick me, a fake, fat, and a bunch of other things. Looking back, I probably should have said more than I did, but at that moment I could see how everyone was looking at her, and I didn’t want them looking at me the same way. So, I literally just said “yeah I’m not dealing with this. Either she’s out, or I am” and picked my stuff up and left.
(I apologised to Jane for the drama and offered her a long weekend of babysitting and some flowers to make up for it and she accepted so we’re ok now). Because of this, Jane has said that Kathy can’t be a bridesmaid anymore because she wants me as maid of honour.
This has caused issues with Kathy, and Elliot by extension. Both Elliot and Kathy have apologised and said Kathy will behave better for all the wedding events, but I’m not willing to budge. Jane’s mother and my mother both think I should drop the ultimatum, and I don’t want to make things hard on Jane, so I’m rethinking.
But I know there’s other things she will try to cause issues with me over and I just don’t know how long I can keep being the bigger person with her. So AITA for causing this drama?
Here were the top rated comments from readers in response to the OP's initial post:
lihzee
"She blames me for all the issues she has with Elliot and Jane’s parents, and for her not having a better friendship with Jane. She also thinks I am trying to steal Elliot from her."
Why? This all seems kind of suspicious. She obviously behaved horribly, but I don't understand why she hates you so much in the first place, or why she feels like you're to blame for issues she has with this family. ETA - NTA.
The OP responded here:
bridesmaidultimatum
She feels like Elliot’s dad hates her because he wanted Elliot to date me (this is not true. Idk why he doesn’t like her). She apparently thinks there’s no room for her and Jane to be close because Jane “already has a sister”.
Genuinely don’t know why she thinks I’m trying to steal Elliot, we have never been close/friends. I have never given any indication that I want her bf, we annoy the ever loving crap out of each other 🤷♀️
lihzee
Very strange. Well, you're NTA. She brought this on herself with her terrible behavior.
Excellent-Count4009
NTA. "so I literally just said “yeah I’m not dealing with this. Either she’s out, or I am” and picked my stuff up and left." ... a very adult and deescalating reaction. You handled that situation well.
LemmePet
NTA. Sounds like Jane didn't really want her to be her bridesmaid in the first place and you gave her an out without compromising her relationship with Elliot. Don't budge. See if you can find out what Kathy's deal is because this isn't normal behaviour.
Five days later, the OP returned with an update.
"UPDATE - Brother of the bride’s girlfriend lost it on me and got dropped from the wedding party as a result"
bridesmaidultimatum
So, I saw a lot of people saying they wanted an update and people were really kind offering advice so thought I would provide some closure on this saga. I decided that it would be best to speak to Jane and confirm how she wanted to play it.
I told her as much as I don’t want to deal with Kathy I’m not seriously going to stick to the ultimatum. Jane said she is definitely not having Kathy as a bridesmaid, and that she’s sorry it even came to me having to say that. We agreed that Jane would handle any questions about Kathy and say that it wasn’t about my ultimatum.
On Jane and the bridesmaid thing, a lot of people were saying her aesthetic choice didn’t make sense, and you were partially correct. She admitted she mostly just didn’t want Elliot and Kathy to be photographed together. I told her she’s a complete moron (affectionately) for not telling me because we could have prepared this better.
Elliot and I also met up to talk. He explained that Kathy has a bad relationship with her family, that’s why she was really hoping to bond with his. He also said she has a lot of insecurities and that she projected a lot of these issues onto me.
As for why, he shed some light on this, too. Elliot’s best friend (my family by marriage) shared some things with her and kind of over-egged some stories and it set Kathy on this path of thinking I was Regina George, basically. Elliot has tried to correct her but she won’t hear it.
As for her thinking I’m trying to “steal” him, some of you were right. She does think that my hanging out with his family means I must not dislike him as much as I say. She thinks because I have a history of dating people close to him (two people years apart) that I must secretly like him. Elliot agrees this is crazy but Kathy just won’t let go of this idea.
As for us walking together, I said I would support him asking Jane if he could walk with another bridesmaid but that if she insists, I’m going to be on her side and Elliot agreed that was fair.
He said he’s been trying to be understanding of her issues but he sees now it was wrong to force the bridesmaid issue and he’s going to focus on helping Kathy in a way that doesn’t involve everyone else from now on. I left it there in regards to Kathy because it’s not my place to comment.
Our conversation actually turned out to be pretty productive. Elliot and I aired out a lot of things from when we were kids that I guess were overdue a conversation. We’ll never be best friends but we are getting a joint Father’s Day gift for his dad, so that’s something.
I’m still going to be as civil to Kathy because honestly she clearly has a lot bigger issues than whatever issues she has with me and adding to it just seems pointless. That’s that. All’s well that ends…decently, all things considered. We will definitely be watching her for any drama at the wedding but for now that’s it.
Here were the top rated comments from readers in response to the OP's update:
RutilatedGold
Wild that Eilliot is still attracted to this girl after having an insane meltdown in front of his family, but ok.
The OP responded here:
bridesmaidultimatum
I was wondering about that ngl but we are definitely not in a place where I can bring that up 🤐
tastefulbasicfluff
What I don’t understand is that she’s shocked that his family isn’t her biggest fan… so logically it must be because of you…absolutely nothing to do with the fact that she has the emotional regulation of a 6 year old 🫠
The OP again responded:
bridesmaidultimatum
There’s so much more to all that than I could include in the post. I swear this woman thinks I am every bad dream she ever had come to life…even though I’ve said like 39 words to her.
beachpellini
I remember commenting on the last part last week... I still think she needs to be prepared for if and when Kathy hears about the joint gift and things get even worse.
matchamagpie
I think OP handled this well but I do think the bride was causing unnecessary drama with the whole "I don't want Kathy to be photographed with her boyfriend so I'm going to pair the MOH with a groomsman who isn't the best man" thing.