Years ago, I moved to a new state with my husband and joined a local 20s/30s group on MeetUp.
Starting a new life in a new state is hard, and I wanted to find some friends.
MeetUp seemed like a great place, but boy, was I wrong.
I became friendly with the organizer of the group, who I’ll call Jane.
Over a period of 5 months, Jane and I hung out about 5 times at MeetUp events.
Then, she asked me to meet for coffee.
Our coffee outing was pleasant enough, and we discussed her plans for her wedding.
The wedding was to take place the next year.
At that moment, she said “I have a proposal for you,” pulled out a Ring Pop.
She asked me to be a bridesmaid in her wedding.
Flabbergasted, I accepted.
I know what most of you are thinking. Red flag, ahoy!
Now’s a good time to mention that, at that time in my life, I was very socially awkward.
I had trouble making friends, and the fact I was in a new place didn’t help.
Because of this, I was terrible at spotting red flags.
On my drive home, I reasoned that the wedding was a year away.
This allowed us plenty of time to become good friends. Planning a wedding can do that.
Also, she might be having an enormous wedding party that just needed one more woman to even out the sides.
Over the next year, I saw her at a few MeetUps, but we only met twice together for lunch.
It wasn’t what I expected would happen. Most people meet up often while planning a wedding.
At lunch, she spoke about the terrible expense of the wedding and having to work odd jobs.
She pressed me to buy a shake from her or body wrap.
She was selling ItWorks. I guess at this point, I should be happy she didn’t try to recruit me into her MLM.
I politely declined but paid for lunch both times.
We dealt with wedding matters by text and phone. It wasn’t easy.
She also sent bridal shower invitations by email
And that’s when another surprising thing popped up.
The invitation had my and two other women’s names listed as officially throwing the shower.
It was my name, her best friend’s name, and finally, her sister.
This clearly wasn’t an “evening up the sides” situation nor was it a big wedding.
I immediately called Jane to ask if I should be doing something.
She laughed it off, “Oh haha that’s just a formality. But actually, I need you to pay for a third of the food being served.”
At that point, I felt a bit dumb.
I hadn’t been to many weddings outside of my own family.
I forgot I was expected to contribute to such costs.
The day of the shower came, and I had my morning planned out:
I would go to the gym, go to the bank, shower, and dress, then drive the hour away to her shower.
Still at the gym, I got a text from her “I need you to go to the venue 2 hours before the party to be there for the food delivery.”
There was absolutely no way I could be there in time on such short notice.
I politely said as much and apologized, explaining the situation.
Jane pushed back, “I really need this support on my special day.”
I replied again, “I’m sorry, but I couldn’t get there in time even if I left the gym right now and went straight there. I could have been there if you asked yesterday.”
I offered to show up 30 minutes early to at least help set up.
After rushing around and speeding in my car, I arrived approximately 30 minutes before the shower was to start.
Jane introduced me to her mother and best friend, and both remarked, “Oh so THIS is [my name].”
As we set up her mother passive-aggressively commented, “Weddings are SO much work; everyone really needs to pitch in.”
Irritated, I kept thinking “I don’t even know you people.”
As we were setting up, the caterer dropped off the food.
That was odd because Jane said I needed to be there two hours ago for the delivery.
I noticed she handed over a wad of cash to the caterer, realizing she never mentioned it would be cash on delivery.
I only brought my share in cash.
That meant I would have had to pay him the full amount if I’d gone earlier.
As if that wasn’t enough, I gave her my amount for the food, and she said I was short the amount her friend and I were splitting.
I questioned, “I thought it was your friend, sister, and me splitting this.”
Then, she mumbled, “My sister can’t contribute right now. I’ll just pay her 1/3.”
That was fine, whatever. But, how was I short?
Then, her friend and family were really curt with me for the rest of the shower.
That left a bad taste in my mouth, and I left kind of pissed off.
Not wanting to be a jerk, I pushed my feelings aside and tried to have a positive attitude about the upcoming wedding.
A month before the wedding, Jane reached out to plan the bachelorette.
At this point, I was beginning to feel like an ATM.
Especially since she was coming up with all these pricy suggestions and extras.
She invited me to get a Brazilian blowout with her before the bachelorette, “Just the two of us.”
I accepted, and apparently, she began to notice how I started to feel like nothing more than a cash machine.
She remarked, “Oh great I think they have a two for one special so it shouldn’t cost you much!”
Two weeks before the wedding and one week before the bachelorette, I visited a new hair salon.
I wanted to get highlights but ended up getting a nasty scalp fungus.
I ended up having to go to the doctor.
My doctor gave me medication and told me some hair would “probably” fall out.
He also said I definitely shouldn’t have anyone else handle my hair for the next month out of caution.
That shouldn’t have been a problem, but I told Jane by text and she flipped out.
She lost her mind saying that this would ruin the Brazilians and the stylist she was having us pay to use the day of the wedding.
I get it, so I offered a compromised.
I told her “I can do my own hair as close to the style you want as possible.”
Apparently, that wasn’t good enough.
She said me doing my own hair would “ruin the aesthetic.”
Ruin. The. Aesthetic.
Then, she got her mom in on the texting conversation.
Jane said she had been a barber and my fungal infection was “no big deal.”
She also announced that the stylist could just “work around it.”
Mind you, she hadn’t asked the stylist about this to see her preferences on the matter.
To add insult to injury, her mother said I was being “very dramatic and making a big deal out of nothing.”
It was then that my “f*ck this” switch was flipped.
I spent more time with coworkers than I did with Jane.
Who was this woman, anyway?
On top of that, I’ve spent less money on family in one year than I had on Jane in that same amount of time.
Then I realized something.
Until that point, I felt so pressured to be nice to a virtual stranger, and I didn’t know why.
I told Jane I was done, and she responded with a wall of text.
That was when I finally saw why she’d chosen me in the first place.
Basically, she had already gone through three other bridesmaids and one best man.
Apparently, I was “one more person letting her down.”
She said her sister was also out but would “be there physically” on her wedding day.
Was her sister out because she was also sick of her crap?
With how she was reacting, I was beginning to see a pattern.
She said she already printed the wedding programs, and I was ruining everything by quitting.
I was definitely the bad guy for quitting, but I felt immensely better afterward.
Being part of that wedding felt like being a guest star on a drama with a plot about which I knew nothing.
Jane went on to have her wedding.
I didn’t go back to her MeetUp group but noticed a few months after the wedding there was a $5 fee to join it.
Jane clearly didn’t learn her lesson, but I did.
I’ve worked to form more healthy adult friendships with other women.
-- Bobcatluv
