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Bride Doesn’t Want Pregnant Maid Of Honor In Wedding Photos Because She’s ‘Too Distracting’

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While one does want to plan around having a child, being in a good financial place and with a proper home to raise them in, there is one all too important matter you can seldom plan around.

When to conceive.

While some parents become pregnant almost effortlessly, others are not so lucky, requiring extra help and multiple tries.

More often than not, they find themselves getting the good news when they least expect it.

Such was the case for Redditor ColdAlfalfa1554, who after a long, often hard journey was finally pregnant with her first child.

Complicating the timing was that the original poster (OP) became pregnant just ahead of the best friend’s wedding, for which she was to be maid of honor.

While the OP didn’t think this would be an issue, her best friend thought otherwise, and began making several changes to her plans regarding the OP.

This led the OP to consider a somewhat drastic decision, eventually leading her to the subReddit “Would I Be The A**hole” (WIBTA), where she asked fellow Redditors:

“WIBTA for not attending my best friend’s wedding after she told me she doesn’t want me to be in any photos but still wants me to be MOH?”

The OP explained how her recent good news was not good news at all to her best friends, amidst fears it would interfere with her wedding.

My (27 F[emale]) best friend (27 F) is getting married in February.”

“She has been planning her wedding for 2 years and I have been actively helping her the entire time as her maid of honor.”

“I am extremely excited for her to get married, but she is slightly controlling.”

“She’s the kind of girl that has to have everything perfect or it’s completely ruined.”

“But her wedding, her rules.”

“Well, I found out I was pregnant at the beginning of October and am due toward the end of June.”

“This is my first baby and I have struggled heavily with fertility issues so this is a literal miracle baby.”

“My husband and I had literally just given up hope in trying for a little while this past summer.”

“I will be in my second trimester during the time of her wedding.”

“Well, I told my best friend last week and she seemed, upset.”

“She wasn’t too happy that I was pregnant and her first question is if I would fit in my bridesmaid dress.”

“The dress is extremely flowy and I told her that I should be just fine, and if not I’ll cover the cost of any alternations/buying another dress.”

“I bought my dress in the first place anyways.”

“Like literally her first question, not even congratulations.”

“I tried to shrug it off and just assumed she was stressed.”

“Her bachelorette party is next month, I’ve been exclusively planning it, so I just reached out with the final details to her to confirm everything.”

“During the phone call she tried to make me feel bad that I wouldn’t be drinking with the rest of them and that it wouldn’t be the ‘bach party of her dreams’ and I told her it would still be fun.”

“That upset me even more, but I just tried to shrug it off once again.”

Today she called and told me she had a ‘hard decision’ to make but she’s been thinking about it and while she would like to keep me MOH she doesn’t want me in her pictures.”

“She said that my bump would be too distracting, she didn’t want her pictures to turn into a ‘maternity photoshoot’ and that she just didn’t feel comfortable with it.”

“However, she still wanted me to pay for the bachelorette party, help her plan the wedding, and wanted me to do almost everything MOH except be in pictures and she was debating if she still wanted me to give a speech.”

“She then sent me a bunch of bag-like dresses to choose from as my new dress since I won’t need my MOH dress.”

We have been best friends since we were 10.”

“I would have never in my wildest dreams expected her to act this way.”

“WIBTA for dropping out of her wedding?”

“I really don’t feel like paying for, and being supportive of, a person who treats me like a disposable mooch after years of fertility issues.”

“But I also feel like I may be overreacting as some of my friends said that I would look odd in the pictures.”

“Thoughts?”

Fellow Redditors weighed in on where they believed the OP fell in this particular situation by declaring:

  • NTA – Not The A**hole
  • YTA – You’re The A**hole
  • NAH – No A**holes Here
  • ESH – Everyone Sucks Here

The Reddit community agreed that the OP definitely would not be the a**hole if she opted out of her best friend’s wedding.

Everyone agreed that the behavior of the OP’s best friend was not that of a friend at all, and that she was greatly taking advantage of the OP, with many questioning if it was healthy for the OP to keep her in her life.

NTA.”

“Tell her you have made the ‘hard decision’ to ignore her wedding.”- ServelanDarrow

“Hard decision for her but SO DANG EASY for you, right?”

‘A wedding is a blip.”

“Being a Mom is for the rest of your life.”

‘Congratulations, OP!”

‘So happy for you and your husband!”

“NTA.”- Runns_withScissors

“NTA.”

“Imagine thinking that the presence of a pregnant woman in a photo is ‘turning it into a maternity photo shoot.”

“She seems surprised that pregnant women exist outside of designated maternity related activities.”-Extension_Ad_972

“NTA.”

“Photos are a way to preserve an event and revisit the day.”

“She doesn’t seem.to concerned about you not being in the pictures/memories.”

“Read your post to yourself, but change references to you to someone else’s name.”

“What would you tell that person?”- crazyeagles62

“NTA.”

“Not only would I drop out of the wedding but I’d drop out of this farce of a friendship.”

“No friend worth having would have responded to your happy news with anything less than genuine excitement for you.”- NUT-me-SHELL

The OP later returned with an update regarding her decision, as well as where her friendship with the bride currently stands.

“I want to first say a big thank you to all the wonderful comments of congratulations and support.”

“I often try to be very level-headed about things, sometimes to the detriment of myself, and also still wanted to be a part of the day since she is my best friend and we have grown together for so long.”

“I am someone who really values integrity and I felt like if I dropped out, I would be betraying a core value of mine.”

“And many many many people reached out to me for an update, so here it is.”

I sat down with her and had a very long and blunt talk.”

“I even brought out the post to show her that I am not crazy about some of the points I made.”

“I told her about how deeply my feelings were hurt by her words and actions.”

“I told her I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t be a full MOH and be included in pictures.”

“If I were to be fully honest, she almost convinced me that the whole idea of just keeping me as MOH but with no pictures was for my benefit.”

“She told me it was to take the ‘stress’ off of me for the day and to make sure I didn’t feel uncomfortable with my ‘new weight’ but I knew it wasn’t true.”

“I knew she just didn’t want me to be in her wedding party with a baby bump but wanted my money and planning expertise.”

“I’ve withheld this information but I am a wedding planner with many connections, however, I wouldn’t cut any of them off due to a falling out.”

“I am not planning her wedding as I felt it would be too much for me because I would want it to be to a level of perfection I couldn’t achieve, but I did hook her up with another planner friend who is incredible but she has utilized me for free a lot.”

“I think I realized all too clearly in almost an instant that the second she got engaged that our friendship became a business-partnership to her, whereas it never changed for me.”

“For the past two years, what I thought were friendship-bonding experiences for me I realized were merely free expenses for her.”

“In the end, I decided to step out of the wedding as MOH.”

“I will be sending all the information I have to our joint friend who is in the wedding party and will still be paying for that friend’s portion of the bach party instead of the whole thing, as I know it will put that friend out of money which I feel awful about.”

“I have been uninvited to the wedding as a whole, which was not unexpected.”

“My friend was very angry and upset with the conversation and said some deeply hurtful things that will take me a long time to recover from.”

“To say I am devastated is an understatement, as I expected this woman to be the godmother of my child.”

“But I feel extremely relieved to have discovered this before the birth of my child.”

“Now my baby’s life will be filled with people who love them unconditionally.”

“and the same goes for me.”

“Once again, thank you all.”

“I appreciate your assurances and help more than you will ever know!”

It’s understandable that the OP’s best friend would want to be the center of attention on her wedding day.

However, it is still possible to be happy for someone else, even on one’s special day.

It’s equally difficult to understand that the OP would ever hope to “distract” from her, after all the time and effort she put towards her wedding.

One can only imagine the OP’s friend will realize what a good friend she is, when she is noticeably missing on her wedding day.

Or when she finds herself without an invitation to the OP’s child’s christening.

Written by John Curtis

A novelist, picture book writer and native New Yorker, John is a graduate of Syracuse University and the children's media graduate program at Centennial College. When not staring at his computer monitor, you'll most likely find John sipping tea watching British comedies, or in the kitchen, taking a stab at the technical challenge on the most recent episode of 'The Great British Baking Show'.