Gay bridesmaid devastated as sister bans girlfriend from wedding and says straight man is her date
A queer bridesmaid has shared her heartbreak with the internet after she couldn’t bring her girlfriend to her sister’s wedding. (Pexels)
A bridesmaid has opened up to the internet for support after she confronted her family for not inviting her girlfriend to her sister’s wedding.
The anonymous woman shared her story on the subreddit “Am I the A**hole” and asked other Reddit users if it was wrong of her to ask that her long-term girlfriend be invited.
The woman described herself as “openly gay” and explained that for the wedding, she would “have to walk down the aisle beside one of the groomsmen, stand beside him in some pictures and sit at a table with him”.
The woman said this wasn’t a problem initially as she “assumed my girlfriend would be invited to the wedding” as her plus one. But when the wedding invitations were sent out, she discovered that her girlfriend wasn’t invited and she wasn’t allowed to bring a plus one.
“When I brought this to my sister’s attention, she said the groomsmen (I’ll call him John) is my date,” the woman wrote. “She told me John is single so it makes sense to ‘pair us up’ and have us be each other’s dates.”
She described how “every other guest” – including the “maid of honour, the best man and all of the other bridesmaids and groomsmen” – were given a plus one. The woman added this was despite “none of the other wedding party members” being married, and the wedding’s guest list wasn’t exclusively “spouses only”.
The move “came out of the blue” to the woman, especially as some months earlier she’d shown her sister a picture of the dress her girlfriend had bought to wear to the wedding.
“My sister’s exact words were ‘I can’t wait to see her wearing it’,” she said.
“She didn’t even have the courtesy to tell me I wasn’t getting a plus one or my girlfriend wasn’t invited.
“I found out when I got the invitation.”
The woman, who has been out for 15 years, explained that she has “nothing personal against” the groomsman she’d been paired up with, who she said is a stranger.
“My girlfriend of 3.5 years has been welcomed to family events and holidays with no negativity,” she added, with the family even joining Pride events. “Everyone knows I’m gay, and it’s never been a problem but now I feel like it is.”
She recalled how her sister complained to their parents, who in turn “sat me down” and said it was “her day”. She was told by her parents that it was “self centred” of her to “demand changes to the guest list”.
The woman said she is still “shocked” by the confrontation and is even considering not going to her sister’s wedding. But she didn’t want to “disrupt the wedding” by forcing her to find a replacement bridesmaid in “under 6 weeks”.
“I feel like [it’s] homophobia no matter what my sister and parents say to that,” the woman wrote, finishing the post. “Was it wrong of me to ask my sister to add an extra spot to the guest list?”
Despite her worries, several commenters believed the poster was not the ‘a**hole’ in the situation.
One person joked this is the “only time” when they would advise using the “pull-out method on wedding night”. They also agreed with the woman that it is homophobic of her parents not to let her bring her girlfriend, saying that she is only “asking for fair and ethical treatment” while her sister is “being foul”.
Another person advised that she shouldn’t feel “guilty about dropping out of the wedding” because six weeks is the “same amount of time you were given to find out your gf isn’t welcome”.
“Had you known from the beginning that she wouldn’t be welcome [and] you’d be forced to have a pretend heterosexual date with some rando then you probably wouldn’t have accepted to begin with,” they added.
