guest drama

[staceybelle]

So, there''s this girl in my law school class. I''ve been agonizing over whether to invite her to my wedding. She was in my study group last year, but we haven''t spent any time together outside of school this year. She is one of those people who is always trying to give the impression she''s better than everyone else, and she constantly puts down people in a sly, snarky sort of way. She''s always trying to be invited to things, but when she is invited, she acts like she''s too good for the company she''s in. (There are a couple of people in my class whose weddings she as all but invited herself to.) She''s also very competitive and aggressive, especially about making law-related contacts, and because FI and I know quite a few attorneys I''ve been a bit concerned that she''ll use my wedding as a networking opportunity. But my study group was really close last year, so I decided it would be better to invite her to my wedding than to risk offending her, because I''m inviting everyone else in the group.

I did decide, however, that I wasn''t going to invite her to the shower, because it''s a smaller gathering and I thought there wouldn''t be enough of a buffer zone between her and me for my patience and sanity. (FI has a couple of relatives who really stress me out, and I had to invite them, so I thought that would be all the snarkiness I could handle over a two-hour brunch.) I did invite some of my law school classmates to the shower, and though I tried to discreetly spread the word that this girl was not invited and not to mention the shower around her, word got back to her. On Monday, I missed class, and some of my friends said that while everyone was waiting around for class to start, she bad mouthed me in front of the whole class for not inviting me to the shower. She said something along the lines of, "Well, I heard so-and-so was invited, and so-and-so was invited, and so-and-so was invited, but I wasn''t invited."

I understand that she may have been right in feeling a little hurt, and I am truly sorry that I offended her. I also understand that she might think she''s not invited to the wedding because she wasn''t invited to the shower, which is not the case. But I don''t feel that it was mature or appropriate for her to act like she was entitled to receive an invitation, especially since we haven''t been in close contact this year, and a shower is a smaller, more intimate affair than a wedding. Part of me wants to extend the wedding invitations I would have sent to her and her boyfriend to someone I''d rather invite, because if I''ve been bad mouthed around the law school already, why would more bad mouthing matter?

Am I out of line here? What would you do?

 

[sred2]

I personally wouldn''t invite her because I wouldn''t want to stress about what she would be doing while I''m trying to have a good time... but that''s just me

 

[LostSapphire]

And why, tell me, are you seriously considering inviting her to the wedding?

Read your first paragraph again: I don''t understand why she''s on the list for the wedding, let alone the shower!

Some people love drama, be it positive or negative. Can you honestly say that she would bring any sort of positivity, good energy or karma to your big day???

 

[Haven]

Do not invite this woman to your wedding. I''m a big believer in surrounding yourself with positive energy, and this lady doesn''t have it.

It''s your wedding day, you will be saying vows of marriage to the man you love in front of a lot of people. Make sure that they''re all worthy of being there for that special moment.

 

[choro72]

When my friend got married, there were a group of us in grad school. One of the girls was very competitive, always making sure that she has achieved more than we have (letter grades, amount of work put in, how much she exercised, how much weight she lost). Long story short, my friend decided to invite all of us but her. We had a good time.
Don''t invite her. You are not obligated to, even if she is in the study group.

 

[staceybelle]

Thanks for your comments, ladies. I suppose I felt like I needed to invite her because if I didn''t, there would be an episode similar to the one which has already happened. I think that approach was wrong from the beginning, but I know it''s wrong now. In law school they always talk about how you shouldn''t burn bridges, because the people you''re in school with are the people you''re going to practice with, etc., but I think this is a bridge that would have been burned no matter how carefully I tried to avoid that outcome.

I found out from a mutual friend tonight that she couldn''t have come to the shower even if I had invited her -- she was on vacation for Spring Break. So this tumultuous uproar arose from her being upset that she couldn''t turn me down.

 

[LegacyGirl]

No one I went to law school with is invited to my wedding.

 

[cara]

This woman is a child. Remember that. If you only planned to invite her to avoid a tantrum, that was probably the wrong call, as clearly she is capable of throwing tantrums over slights real and imagined.

But if you were inviting her because you were inviting others from the same group and wanted to spare her feelings, that was a reasonable decision at the time and you should not feel bad for that impulse. Clearly the woman has overly sensitive social radar.

So make a new decision now based on the new evidence. If you fear she would make any kind of scene at your wedding, don''t invite her. If you actually feel bad for her and think she would behave, maybe consider ignoring her antics over the shower and invite her anyway. Either way, she has her own demons to live with, and there is no need for you to feel guilty over your actions, as her reaction to your reasonable actions is her problem.