My friend resents that I didn't ask her to be my bridesmaid

What do you do when you have a wedding to plan – and a friend not content with being an ordinary guest? Read the advice of our resident sage Maddy Phillipps. (And see the foot of the story for where to email your own problems for Maddy's advice.)

DEAR MADDY: I’m in the middle of planning my wedding and I'm having some bridesmaid issues – but not with any of my actual bridesmaids. One of my friends is very upset that I didn’t ask her to be a bridesmaid and it’s starting to really affect the whole mood around the wedding preparations. She can’t accept that I just want my two younger sisters to act as bridesmaids. She brings up the issue every time we see each other and has started complaining to some of our mutual friends about the situation, which is making things uncomfortable for everyone. I do still want her to come along to the wedding, but I’m worried she’ll just sulk through the whole thing. And if I don’t invite her, that really would be the end of our friendship. What should I do? Regards, Fiona

MADDY WRITES: Unfortunately, pi**ing-people-off-with your-wedding-choices is basically a universal law of physics. Admittedly this law has never been explicitly acknowledged by anyone who actually understands physics, but think about it. Per Isaac Newton in seminal text The Principia, which I have definitely read, every action has its equal opposite reaction. So, it’s no wonder that everything about the celebration of love that is a wedding – the guest list, the seating plan, the allocation of roles in the ceremony and reception – is virtually custom-designed to generate an unpredictable constellation of rancour around who is most loved, favoured, appreciated, etc etc. It’s not a question of “if,” but “who,” and it’s just a shame that here the “who” is your best friend, not those weird second cousins with startling underbites you met once at age two and have never seen since.

Anyway, that’s a very long-winded way of saying that you’ve done nothing wrong here – who you want in your wedding party is up to you, and it’s not your fault that your friend misinterpreted your decision as an indictment on the value of her friendship. Still, as you do value her friendship, uninviting her is off the table, and it doesn’t seem like time is healing this particular wound, so I think it’s worth making some pre-wedding efforts to clear the air.

Remember, your friend is feeling side-lined and unvalued – that's what's driving this whole thing – so your goal is to reassure her that the opposite is true. This starts with proactively raising the subject, instead of waiting for her to bring it up again. Ask her out for a bougie lunch or something similarly treat-y to show her you’re prepared to set aside time for her and her alone. When you’re sufficiently caffeinated to broach the wedding topic, start by asking her how she feels and why. Feeling unheard is often what upsets people most, so listen, listen some more, and avoid interrupting or criticising at all costs – they’re her feelings, and she’s entitled to them, no matter how unreasonable you secretly think they are (if necessary, release your frustrations via a judicious stab of your burrata).

Once she’s had plenty of space to say how she feels, try to validate her feelings. This doesn’t need to be complicated! Something as simple as “I completely understand why you’re so upset” will go a long way. Then, briefly reiterate the basis for your decision. Normally, there’s no way to explain why you didn’t choose someone as a bridesmaid without implying they ranked too low on the friendship hierarchy to secure selection, but here the family connection was the sole deciding factor, so I think you can safely remind her that you ended up going with a sibs-only policy for simplicity’s sake. Before she has time to argue, immediately launch into heartfelt reassurance about how much she means to you, how much you love her, how she’s your best friend, and how happy her lovely smiling face will make you on the day.

As part of this reassurance campaign, I wonder if you can ask her to take charge of some other wedding-y role or task, like planning the hen’s do if you want one, or helping with dress shopping, cake tasting, and so on? Seriously, maybe she’s just dying to be balls deep in a Gantt chart, and if so, why not let her indulge in the titillating pleasures of Google Sheets? Keeping her busy is also a great strategy for the ceremony itself – if she’s sufficiently distracted by various logistical stressors, her mental capacity for sulking will be nil. Result!

Of course, I can’t guarantee any of this will work, because ultimately she’s responsible for her own feelings. But if you make all reasonable efforts to repair things, and she’s still moody on the day, at least you can rest assured that it’s 100 percent a “her” problem and zero percent a “you” problem, leaving you free to glide through the ceremony and reception with appropriately thermonuclear levels of radiance, elation, and serenity. Good luck!

Maddy Phillipps is a barrister, freelance writer and clinical psychology student.

EMAIL your life problems to dearmaddy@tvnz.co.nz.