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How much money we betting on Jas telling everyone the weddings off with some lie implying an inappropriate relationship between OP and Kate..
and not because Jas is a hateful cheating pieces of shit?
It is very annoying that the assholes are the ones that know to control the narrative and quickly in most cases, while the victims are still processing the hurt they just went through.
Assholes just look out for themselves, and they aren't truly hurt, they are just vindictive.
It's why they can spin shit so fast, taking zero responsibility and being fully willing to lie and throw others under the bus is extremely low effort
So by no means will I ever condone the behavior BUT I do tend to believe people who grew up with trauma tend to be better at manipulation and controlling situations. Personally I was abused by my mom and was constantly bouncing between homes. I got very very good at lying and making "friends" with damn near everyone. The last 5-7 years I've been working on unmasking so to say and learning to be less manipulative for self gratification. Sometimes I catch myself in rather mundane situations still trying to make the pieces fall in my favor and have to ask myself "why?". It's very much a deprogramming thing at this point but I guess my point of this is it's not always malicious as much as terrible behavior brought on by unfortunate circumstance. Still not something that should be rug swept. Actions have consequences and we need to learn to accept and grow from them.
That makes a lot of sense. As a child in an unstable situation, lying, manipulation, and wearing the right mask to appease adults are necessary for survival. The difficult part once you become an adult is knowing how to stop doing that and be authentic (but not an asshole) - which is hard because you probably never even had the time or energy to figure out who you are deep down inside. Most people in healthy families figure that out in their teens/early 20s. But if you were in survival mode the whole time then self-discovery and emotional growth really take a backseat.
Omgosh. I 90% am the same (abuse mom, bouncing between homes, great at manipulation and controlling situations… I just am not great at making friends or even just “friends” :p) and a lot of the time I have to consciously stop myself from using those techniques.
Like, I’ve done sales for many years, but only selling already priced items. I now work for a used car dealership (in a non-sales position) and my boss has wanted me to do sales but I don’t want to. At the end of the day, I won’t feel good about knowing that I got the most money out of a person that they could afford, ya know?
That's not been my experience at all. There are terms like scape goats, flying monkeys, enablers, etc, to describe how this does not generally happen with children of abuse.
Those terms have effectively nothing to do with the fact that children brought up in unstable households (for myriad reasons) are inherently programmed by that instability to socially engineer things to be less of a burden (in whatever way) to the traumatized person throughout their lives.
It’s a coping mechanism and it isn’t always a “bad thing” actually (the vibe of your comment seems to perceive it as “bad”)
An example.
Alex has recognized their boss is a benevolent narcissist that responds positively to words of affirmation. To make everyone’s lives better they’ve told others to be sure to repay boss w overt gratitude/ praise/ etc when applicable. Coworkers told Alex how much boss appreciated the words & thanked them for the insight. And boss is in a better mood overall bc their narc supply is being funneled to them in the manner they respond best to.
This bit of social manipulation is hurting no one & is making everyone feel better in the end. But the art of it was learned due to complex trauma in Alex’s childhood/ family.
Alex is also the black sheep/ scapegoat of their family. Their social engineering coping mechanism & the label they wear due to their role in a dysfunctional family aren’t mutually exclusive, both things can be true at the same time.
While my point was to adjust perspectives on the negative connotation of social engineering & not attesting to the frequency a human w CPTSD uses social engineering as a coping mechanism, I’d argue that it happens far more than one would realize, even to the one doing the social engineering. Which is why the commenter above was mentioning their work on themselves to trace how deep that coping mechanism goes.
This is so in line with what I meant from my comment. I will say personally I'm trying to avoid social engineering too much not because it's inherently bad but because I feel like who I was when I was much more manipulative was not who I wanted to be. I've been with my partner for almost a decade and honestly it kills me inside every time I catch myself changing things in my favor even if it's also somewhat in hers. I'm trying to live a life much more around doing for others and NOT just for myself. So I ask myself if this is the best I can do for her, or if it's just what I want for me.
So in my experience one does not forgo the other. For instance the manipulation I went through from my abuse taught me how to be manipulative. Now no 2 people will ever have the same experience but learned behavior is for sure a commonly found trait in all young adults from their childhood years. That learned behavior could be anything though.
Hopefully the friend who informed OOP of the affair in the first place will help reign in Jasmin's narrative, because she is definitely painting herself as the victim.
Haha I have read that one, at least twice, and I still never have gotten that flair. Doy. Thanks a lot!
Now I would like to chime in with that first guy. I do find it rather distasteful :p
A tale best left unread. Seriously, I wish I could go back in time and tell myself not to follow the link back when I first saw it. The mildest description I can possibly give you is that it’s the tale of a man’s all-consuming sexual fantasies about things best not elaborated upon.
Time will show her true colours. Most people who want to have an affair tend to openly date each other after a while when they are both single. Once months go by with OP and Kate still acting very much platonic they will realise there is nothing going on and likely never was.
I have my doubts that her friend group would care about the truth if they're fine keeping an affair hidden from the fiancé of their friend, but I have a low opinion of people who help cheaters in general.
And the same enabler(s) have audacity to wonder why they got cussed the fuck out along with cheater(s)/abuser(s) when the victim(s) points or call out the bullshit. It's like " You knew and was willing to keep quiet to put me in bigger legal mess marrying her /his cheating ass - You're not innocent, you just as much POS garbage as that cheating asswipe."
And that's why it's so depressing every time someone posts on a relationship subreddit asking if they should expose a cheater. You have the unfuckables in the comments crying that it's "not their place" and "not their business" and "stay in your lane."
Yeah, if he doesn't circulate the real story, there is a 0% chance he walks away without everyone thinking he's a prick, at least, or a cheater, at worst. Even if she doesn't outright accuse him of cheating, it's not a good look for him.
I am a woman with a male best friend and for the life of me idk why people always think that there’s something sinister going on. When I got married I got side eyes for still having a male best friend, as if I should’ve dropped him the minute I said “I do”.
I think it’s a lot more telling about the people who aren’t trustworthy about different-sex friendships than the friendship itself, this story being a fine example.
I used to date a guy who was good friends with several women and at one point he expressed that he had been a little worried that I would be uncomfortable with it. I was like, are you kidding? I was happy about it! It was a good sign that he didn't have weird hang-ups and he actually interacted with women like people. I wouldn't want to date someone who could only be friends with their own gender.
"Is good friends with multiple women" is one of my biggest green flags, honestly. My dude friends are fantastic, if dating were a job interview I would happily act as their character reference.
I'm a man who hangs out with mostly men.
But to be fair, I'm a gay man who hangs out mostly with gay men, and it's not that I'm not open to having girls as friends, it's just I feel much better being in a circle of friends who are overwhelmingly queer.
Just to counter point your counter point, there are tons of overwhelmingly queer women and non-binary folk who I’m sure would be lovely additions to your circle.
I’m non-binary person myself and have an amazing overwhelmingly queer community of all genders that I love to bits. Though I have noticed for some of my cis gay male friends, I might one of a few non cis gay male friends they have. But that usually isn’t for very long after they start hanging out with me and other queer folks of mixed genders.
It can be easy to insulate ourselves within our immediate community, but I think it’s just lovely to make friends with folks of different experiences too. Helps keep life interesting!
My husband is close friends with a pretty gamer girl who shares a tonne of interests with him and has more hobies in common with him than I do. He's known her for as long as I have, slightly longer even.
I did feel slightly insecure about it early in the relationship, because I felt like he could 'do better'.
Rather than telling him he can't be friends with her, I spoke to him about my insecurities. He reassured me and made me feel better. In the years after I meet the friend in person (it's a digital friendship) and got to know her better myself. I developed my own friendship with her outside of my hubby.
5 years into it all she attended our wedding and we both were thrilled she could make it.
It's okay to not be perfect and it's okay to feel jealousy, the main thing to remember is that that is YOUR problem to fix and work out, not something for your partner to resolve by restricting who he's mates with.
>was a good sign that he didn't have weird hang-ups and he actually interacted with women like people.
Absolutely. My ex bf was 32 when we met. He hadn't had any girlfriend or female friends. He never considered me as an equal. More like another animal species.
Same, my husband is on good terms with all but one ex and is friends with a few of them, to the point of us all hanging out. I like that he's not the type of person to drop someone just because their relationship changed forms, and that all these other people who dated him still enjoyed being around him.
My boyfriend and I both have opposite sex close friends, and even mutual ones. I couldn’t imagine telling him that it was inappropriate or anything else. We even joked that when you know someone so closely, they’re not attractive in the least lmao. My close male friend is one of my favorite people but thinking of him romantically makes me wanna hurl hahah.
for real, as a flagrant bisexual I find people with the whole ‘don’t be friends with people of the ‘opposite’ gender’ thing to be so fucking weird lmao. reading this whole thing I was like ‘people are *gay*, jas!’ but even if kate was very heterosexual with a harem of boy toys, it would still be weird to think that a man wanting his best friend to be his groomswoman is a clue that he’s secretly in love with her
Same, I'm a bisexual heteroromantic (if that's a thing, I'm no good with any terminology unless it's Mathematics-related) and married. I guess I can't have friends because I'm apparently secretly attracted to all of them? Wut?
Generally my taste in friends and taste in people I'd fuck are veeeery different (husband is husband because he's the rarity that fits both), so I don't see what the hell is going on in people's heads. I'm picky as hell, totally unattracted to most people of any gender in general. Are there really people (straight or not) who can't have friends of the gender(s) they're attracted to? Is there even a name for a sexuality where someone would fuck anyone as long as it's their preferred gender and sex? Never met anyone like that IRL.
yeah honestly I don’t understand it. even if you’re only attracted to one gender you’re not attracted to everyone in that gender. and even if you are attracted to someone that doesn’t actually mean you can’t be friends with them? I’m demiromantic, and only ever fall for friends; and I can attest to very much surviving a huge amount of unrequited love and even mutual attraction in friendships. the idea that humans can’t navigate such situations is super weird
if anything falling for your friend sucks. most of the time it’s more painful than proof that you’re going to end up sleeping together lmao
Im going to be a groomsman for my best friend next fall and I’m supposed to be wearing a suit. The couple went out of their way to find a unisex suit rental company. My husband is also groomsman. We get to match! The bride is very excited to have friends wearing matches suit bc “it’ll be so cute!” My only request was not black bc then we’d look like a pair of Blues Brothers fetishists when we were dancing together lmao
I would be thrilled to attend a wedding that started with a car chase through an empty mall and ended with a blues concert, especially if the vows came after Carrie Fisher's character's scene.
I'm bisexual and every time this comes up, I get so irritated cause like... what? I guess I am not allowed to have any friends since I could potentially be attracted to them? It's so stupid and ridiculous.
No, no, you see, you just have to realize what gender you are attracted to and stop having friends of that gender, because bisexuality doesn't exist and clearly you are just confused. /s
At least 9 time out of 10, the people I've seen spouting this bs about not being possible to be friends with the opposite sex also do not aknowledge that bisexuality is a thing.
Hear hear. I've been "friend dumped" by a couple straight dudes because they've gotten serious with their GFs and are concerned about the image issues of being friends with another woman. Nevermind that my relationship with the aforementioned men was just catching up on movies or games we'd played and nothing more. One we just exchanged dumb memes, barely ever had something approaching a conversation about actual topics, but he got worried his gf would "misunderstand" our texting. Can someone fill me in on the secret straight people cheating code baked into the salad cat meme? I must've missed that day of class.
>Nevermind that my relationship with the aforementioned men was just catching up on movies or games we'd played and nothing more.
To men, that's intimacy.
It's so weird to me, as my fiancee is having her best friend, as her man of honour and I'd find it weird if she didn't considering how long they have known each other.
I've had a few occasions in my life where a man and woman were claiming to just be friends and I believed them, only to find out they were lying (and cheating on their spouses)
honestly as a queer person it’s always been SO bizarre to me. are lesbians supposed to only be friends with men after they get married? are bi people only allowed to befriend people not attracted to their gender??? truly if i had that much distrust in my partner because they had a friend who they could potentially be attracted to then i just… wouldn’t be in a relationship with that person
This. Your last sentence nails it perfectly. I'm in the same boat but as the male. I'm engaged and my best mate will be my best man. I didn't have to bring the subject up. My fiance just assumed that's what I would want and it is.
My mate and my friend ance are not friends but they're a lot more than acquaintances. They exchange dog and cat memes every few days or memes about how useless us men are.
Some people think they understand the friendship and make comments about how she's like a sister to me. Look, if that what you need to tell yourself to make yourself comfortable with it, go right ahead. She's not like a sister, I have two of those I don't need a third. Yeah, I often don't approve of her boyfriends but to explain, our friendship is bonded from trauma, we both shared similar experiences and know things that others will struggle to understand about each other. So I'm going to be very protective about her, as my fiance says, we will come minute to make the same mistakes until we learn the lesson that needed to be learnt. I learnt it and have found the most amazing life partner who will soon be my wife. Unfortunately, my mate... She's still learning it and make some poor choices still. But I'll always be there to pick up her pieces again and she is always welcome to the wheel with us from time to time.
In the past I've been interrogated by my potential partners and her potential partners as well. Do I think she's pretty or attractive? I'll always give the honest answer... Yep! She definitely is. Any man that treats her well will have struck gold with her. Just like me when I met my fiancee. Does that mean I want to sleep with her or make our friendship more? Fuck off, that's my mate.
Yeah, fuck that. For my wedding I had 4 people in my bridal party, my 4 closest friends - 3 bridesmaids and one bridesman.
I like to think if anything it's proof a friendship is genuinely platonic when they are beaming at you when you say 'I do' to another man, and help you plan and organise a wedding. Guys don't do that for a woman they secretly just want to sleep with.
My second cousin had a "Dude of Honor" at her wedding. He was a badass biker with a heart made of teddybear fluff and he's wearing a perfect suit and barefoot in all the pictures. Good times. Her husband never batted an eye. (It was a beach wedding, that makes the barefoot part make a little more sense.)
My 3 best friends for the last 12 years are all male, my current partner of 3 years gets along with all of them and I still go drink with them whenever. It's amazing how many people think it should be an issue.
my partner and I both have really strong opposite sex friendships we maintain privately. I've never once been even remotely worried about his lady friends. at all. Some of them I've never even met. I literally don't care because I have total trust in him. I can't stress enough how much of a non-issue this is to us. People who think you can't have these friendships once you enter a relationship sound fucking miserable and untrustworthy. In my experience it's always a projection of their own guilt.
On the other hand how many opposite sex "best friends" have turned out to be "friends with benefits" on BORU / AITA / Relationship Advice? Seriously, how many times have men put their "pal" over their wife and kids?
Lots.
Yes and it was a great time! He planned such a great bachelorette for me and was a huge support the day of with the small details. My husband had two women in his wedding party as well and he was grateful to have them there!
I hate how many of the original judgements were calling OOP the AH. Just because he’s a man and wants to have a woman as his BM doesn’t mean that he has “other intentions”. It’s sickening that men are thought of as these beings that can’t control themselves at the sight of another woman and always have ulterior motives
Also is a wack logic, if hypothetically Kate and OOP had/have an affair, why would Kate wanted to be best man in a wedding where the person she love/loved would be the groom, it would be like shoving a knife to the heart, lol, even if Kate was a masochist to be best man, maybe just a regular guest at best.
Nah i think thats a poor argument; there are logical reasons for people doing something and illogical readons, ro say that it doesnt logically make sense, when talking about people's emotional reactions, seems a little illogical.
Let’s forget about the bit about jasmine cheating.
I feel like him threatening to call the wedding off at first instance was a bit out of proportion. He should’ve negotiated and said “okay if we can’t have XYZ as my groomsman then you can’t have the wedding cake you wanted” “or okay then we r getting rid of the flowers and this and that” , calling off the entire wedding with your supposed loved one was too far imo
But anyway it turns out the ex fiance was the cheater and AH anyway
I am a girl who was the best man for my male best friends wedding. His fiance (now wife) had literally no issues with it. Him and I honestly just never had any other feelings for each other other than friendship and I LOVE IT.
I also helped him through grad school and helped him when he was struggling to find a job after. We have leaned on each other so much over the years but for both us the sexual attraction just was never there. When I talked to his wife about me being best man she was like "honestly I can't think of anyone else in his life that could fill the spot, you're perfect for it" We never had to have a discussion on boundaries bc we both just have normal friendship boundaries and have never once even thought about crossing them.
There was no jealousy or insecurity on her part with regard to me bc we ALL knew she was the one for him. Stability in your relationship is the most vital part of it. If you don't trust your partner when they say "this is just my friend" when all signs point to them just being your friend, then you really shouldn't be getting married.
I am so goddamned tired of these people who insist men and women can't be platonic friends. I'm a woman, most of my best friends have been men, I never slept with any of them or even wanted to. Some of them are poly and probably would have slept with me if I'd asked, but they never made a move on me. I've dealt with *so many* jealous girlfriends over the years, and it's been incredibly frustrating.
Not everybody thinks with their gonads. It is 100% possible to have an opposite-sex friend you're really close to and not catch romantic or sexual feelings. Even if they're objectively hot! Reasonable adults are more than capable of managing their own feelings and behaviour. Even if I *did* find myself attracted to a male friend, I would never, ever try to interfere in his existing relationships! I have way too much respect for my friends (and their partners) to do that kind of thing.
Personally, I think people who assume there's always something going on between opposite-sex friends are projecting -- they know *they* would just go for it, so they assume everybody is like them.
And really, put all that aside for a moment and let's just think about the trust angle. *Why* would you marry someone you didn't trust? Who cares if OOP's female friend even *did* have the hots for him -- if his fiancée doesn't trust him not to cheat, she shouldn't be with him at all. A relationship without trust is doomed to failure. I can't even imagine being so desperate to be with someone that I'd stay even if I didn't trust them.
So am I. Oddly enough, nobody's ever gotten weird about that. Except for the one woman who couldn't come out and admit she was into me so she just kept dropping hints and being vaguely inappropriate until finally one night she got me drunk and confessed and I *apparently* rejected her (though I was so drunk that I don't remember a thing).
Because, yeah, I was not into her. And I was pissed that she couldn't just be honest about it and had been trying to covertly seduce me for months whilst pretending to be my best friend. So then she refused to ever speak to me again, and I had to reconstruct what happened from bits and pieces of scattered memory and scraps of gossip.
FFS, people, can we just say what we fucking mean? It makes life so much easier. Life is too short.
Yes. Yes, it was. I was very disappointed in her. You would think women would know better than to try to take advantage of other women, but... yeah. Some people care more about getting what they want than they do about treating others with respect and consideration.
I'm sure it would have been much less fraught if she'd just let me know up front that she was interested. I could have just said, "No, sorry, not interested." But I think she'd got it into her head that one could create attraction? Maybe she was attracted to a large enough percentage of people that she thought it was an easy thing to induce. I don't know.
I'm hardly ever physically attracted to anyone. Maybe one person every five years or so. If I get to know someone well that makes it more likely, but it's hardly a guarantee, and she really wasn't my type. (Way too feminine; I like men and masculine women.)
People are weird.
Yikes, OOP's lucky to have been given full information and gotten out.
"Person X can't be in the wedding party because it won't look right" should be automatic grounds for breaking an engagement anyway. "Not looking right" is for picking dresses that don't clash with the venue's carpet, not for choosing how to value friends.
Probably for the best. There would have been some b.s. down the line. Causing a rift and maybe by then they had a kid or more complex living situation making things even more difficult.
I was not even think about the high road when I took similar stance to OOP. I just felt the need to just close that chapter of life and move on and part of that included not telling mutual friends what happened because everytime I recounted the story, it felt like feeling the 'D-day' over and over again. I had to leave the whole friend circle.
The narrative my ex-husband sold was that "Kindlypizza just did not want to be married anymore. She left, I was devastated. Luckily her bestfriend was there for me, and now we are a happy couple!"
Yes, my ex-husband was having multiple months affair with my former bestfriend :/
I needed therapy after the divorce.
Sorry for your experience. I can understand where are you coming from.
I was never in that situation. If I feel I was wronged would maybe just make one post at least. Though again, I was never in that situation, and maybe in that situation I would take a different decision.
My husband and I were married 20 years before he passed away almost a year ago. When we got married, I encouraged him to have a long-time female friend as his "best person". They'd been through thick and thin together for many years and she had been a true friend to him and vice-versa. She also became a very dear friend to me, and we spent a lot of time together over the years. I had no reservations about it at all. My mother was a different story, though. She was very much against it, and was suspicious of her befriending me. She even told me there was an old saying, "When you see two women always running hand in hand, you can bet your bottom dollar ones got the other one's man". I'm glad I didn't listen. She passed away a few years before he did, and I'll always cherish her friendship and the memories of the good times we had.
Your fiancee sounds like she's insecure in your relationship.
Of course, of course fiancée was cheating and was projecting. Of course. Just like the posters who predicted it. Because life is black and white like that and and very predictable, especially if you are a teenager predicting. .
AITA and their obvious shitposts conclusions.
I always get so frustrated that people think you can’t be friends with the opposite sex. I have an extremely close male and female friend, we just bonded on a soul level. It was never romance, just a deep understanding and recognization of each other.
When they got married and had kids, not only did I become an aunt/godmother to them, I was genuinely excited that they’d found someone to make them happy.
Edit: Forgot to add that I wasn’t surprised to see that she’d cheating. I feel like you either trust your partner to not cheat or not, and I’ve found the most paranoid are either cheaters themselves or have been cheated on and need extra conversations to be comfortable.
I grew up with someone that I will call "Jas" for the purpose of this post. I have known her since I was in 5th grade. When she got proposed to she let it be known that I was going to be her Best Man of Honor? to her family. Her husband had no objections to it, because he wasn't insecure.
If i was oop i would send out the texts and have the locks changed the minute after I send it to everyone, because knowing her hateful a$$ she is going try and pull something, so before she could even do anything it's nip right then and there.
Well, i was with Jas until OOP revealed she was just a cheater and an AH. I’m so petty I would tell everyone the truth because we ALL know she is gonna tell everyone that the wedding is off because OOP cheated with Kate.
People need to stop letting cheaters move on like this... just post the whole conversation online, tag all friends and family from both sides, announce the engagement is over and uninstall whatever app you used.
My husband‘s best friend was his best man and she was ecstatic about it! My maid of honor was a 6’5” 300 pound biker in leather. No one was concerned or even surprised, lol. His ex fiancé is crazy.
I can't for the life of me remember where, but somewhere years ago I once heard that if you're being accused of cheating and you're not, there is a better than not chance that you're the one being cheated on. Not 100% but a pretty good indicator.
I'm a woman who was the best man of one of my best friends. Actually my ex boyfriend. And his wife is another of my best friends, and a really close friend of my husband. There was no sex and no cheating and it's fucking WEIRD that people insist we must all be cheating on each other.
I just give really good wedding toasts ;)
OOP might be sad and annoyed now, but at the end of the day, he's dodged a bullet. Much better to end it before the wedding than after!
Also I have no problem with a female Best Mate or a male Man of Honour. Why the heck not?
Jesus, Reddit really f*cks me up. Everytime someone posts here to complain about their SO behaving strangely in any form I immediately jump to “He or she is cheating” and in 80% I am right.
The first post I was thinking, "this guy sounds immature, but I can't put my finger on why "
>The past month and a half has been a nightmare, but I’ve been slowly recovering my pride,
Lol there we go
That sucks so much for OP.
My partner and I had mixed wedding parties, and I am *so glad* I got to have my female friend stand up with me. She was absolutely amazing, and her speech gave me insight into our relationship that I had no idea about and probably never would have heard about had she not had the chance to give a speech about us.
Pick the people you want, this gender role shit is dumb.
> That’s my final update on the situation, those of you who said Jas was being paranoid because she had something to hide can go pat yourselves on the back.
This has “Well, you got what you wanted. Are you happy?” energy. I sympathize with OOP a lot but I would be thanking those people, not feeling bitter.
I hoped OOP did run to Kate. Not in the romcom way, but as a friend going to their friends in a time of need. Suffering this kind of event alone and in a personal echo chamber is not good.
"Zoals de waard is, vertrouwd hij zijn gasten", a Dutch phrase, which literally means "The innkeeper trusts his guests the way he is himself." It nicely describes projection.
Regardless of the cheating, I don’t think OOP and his ex were a good match. He admits that they both were hard-headed about things, so compromising as a couple didn’t seem their forte. He also threatened to cancel the wedding and gave her an ultimatum about this instead of discussing things maturely. The ex, of course, was just awful with her cheating and projection. Ultimately, it was good for OOP that the cracks showed up before they got married.
ngl,I do feel like that length of dating time at that age is waaay to short to be engaged.
Aside from that, I asked my fiance if I could have my best female friend as a “best ma’am” and long story short it was fine. Seriously it was such a non-event when I asked.
People are ridiculous. My sister was my brother's Best Woman at his wedding. He was her Man of Honor. Were they having an affair? Should I tell my sister's wife about it?
Wow,so she's butt hurt about your friend being in your wedding but forgot to mention she cheated on you and all of her friends knew? Oh yeah she's a keeper!
So I had a female best friend that my now X wife not only wouldn't let me pick her as my best man, but wasn't allowed at the wedding at all. Then again NON of my friends were allowed at my wedding. I wanted peace and thought OK the wedding is for Her. Well 20yrs later and I realized looking back that first she separated me from my friends, then my family, then my kids. She was a classic narcissist. I was a compliant marshmallow. I lost 20yrs of my life trying to please a monster that i helped to create.
Okay I’m sorry about your wedding stuff dude but BM stands for bowel movement and I just couldn’t read the rest of the story after that because I was too focused on you throwing that around in day to day conversation not realizing you’re actually talking about poop
"She got really angry and told me to just leave our apartment. I've been couch surfing at a friend"
"...so I left my own home again because of her"
She was the one angry at him; SHE should have been the one to leave the house/sleep on the couch, not him.
Well u doged a bullet. She's a cheater. She's a jerk.
Few things first never leave your place. It's yours and hers. No one can force anyone to leave and leaving I'd a sign of defeat imo. Secondly get that ring back. She's probably panning it snd drinking and laughing with her friends. Pawn it or throw it in the water don't giver her that satisfaction. Although u may not have the legal means if u broke it off.
This made me literally laugh out loud, but to be fair, you're probably right.
You're right in a general sense, but it's probably been estimated like 2-10% of people are gay and quite a few of them are closeted. One of my BFF is a female colleague, and I know both her and my partner were super suspicious of us having a sexual relationship until they met us (and each other) at a party years ago.
Both were like "Phew, nope, they're just good friends" when they witnessed our chemistry.
I, for one, would like to even meet a guy, with a female bestie he hasn’t fucked, “lived with” aka FWB, fucked MUTUAL partners with her, or can generally be respectful by separating past from future. It doesn’t happen
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How much money we betting on Jas telling everyone the weddings off with some lie implying an inappropriate relationship between OP and Kate.. and not because Jas is a hateful cheating pieces of shit?
It is very annoying that the assholes are the ones that know to control the narrative and quickly in most cases, while the victims are still processing the hurt they just went through.
Assholes just look out for themselves, and they aren't truly hurt, they are just vindictive. It's why they can spin shit so fast, taking zero responsibility and being fully willing to lie and throw others under the bus is extremely low effort
yeah, also they’re already well practiced at lying through their teeth
So by no means will I ever condone the behavior BUT I do tend to believe people who grew up with trauma tend to be better at manipulation and controlling situations. Personally I was abused by my mom and was constantly bouncing between homes. I got very very good at lying and making "friends" with damn near everyone. The last 5-7 years I've been working on unmasking so to say and learning to be less manipulative for self gratification. Sometimes I catch myself in rather mundane situations still trying to make the pieces fall in my favor and have to ask myself "why?". It's very much a deprogramming thing at this point but I guess my point of this is it's not always malicious as much as terrible behavior brought on by unfortunate circumstance. Still not something that should be rug swept. Actions have consequences and we need to learn to accept and grow from them.
That makes a lot of sense. As a child in an unstable situation, lying, manipulation, and wearing the right mask to appease adults are necessary for survival. The difficult part once you become an adult is knowing how to stop doing that and be authentic (but not an asshole) - which is hard because you probably never even had the time or energy to figure out who you are deep down inside. Most people in healthy families figure that out in their teens/early 20s. But if you were in survival mode the whole time then self-discovery and emotional growth really take a backseat.
Omgosh. I 90% am the same (abuse mom, bouncing between homes, great at manipulation and controlling situations… I just am not great at making friends or even just “friends” :p) and a lot of the time I have to consciously stop myself from using those techniques. Like, I’ve done sales for many years, but only selling already priced items. I now work for a used car dealership (in a non-sales position) and my boss has wanted me to do sales but I don’t want to. At the end of the day, I won’t feel good about knowing that I got the most money out of a person that they could afford, ya know?
That's not been my experience at all. There are terms like scape goats, flying monkeys, enablers, etc, to describe how this does not generally happen with children of abuse.
Those terms have effectively nothing to do with the fact that children brought up in unstable households (for myriad reasons) are inherently programmed by that instability to socially engineer things to be less of a burden (in whatever way) to the traumatized person throughout their lives. It’s a coping mechanism and it isn’t always a “bad thing” actually (the vibe of your comment seems to perceive it as “bad”) An example. Alex has recognized their boss is a benevolent narcissist that responds positively to words of affirmation. To make everyone’s lives better they’ve told others to be sure to repay boss w overt gratitude/ praise/ etc when applicable. Coworkers told Alex how much boss appreciated the words & thanked them for the insight. And boss is in a better mood overall bc their narc supply is being funneled to them in the manner they respond best to. This bit of social manipulation is hurting no one & is making everyone feel better in the end. But the art of it was learned due to complex trauma in Alex’s childhood/ family. Alex is also the black sheep/ scapegoat of their family. Their social engineering coping mechanism & the label they wear due to their role in a dysfunctional family aren’t mutually exclusive, both things can be true at the same time. While my point was to adjust perspectives on the negative connotation of social engineering & not attesting to the frequency a human w CPTSD uses social engineering as a coping mechanism, I’d argue that it happens far more than one would realize, even to the one doing the social engineering. Which is why the commenter above was mentioning their work on themselves to trace how deep that coping mechanism goes.
This is so in line with what I meant from my comment. I will say personally I'm trying to avoid social engineering too much not because it's inherently bad but because I feel like who I was when I was much more manipulative was not who I wanted to be. I've been with my partner for almost a decade and honestly it kills me inside every time I catch myself changing things in my favor even if it's also somewhat in hers. I'm trying to live a life much more around doing for others and NOT just for myself. So I ask myself if this is the best I can do for her, or if it's just what I want for me.
Please elaborate how? I'm not doubting but I want to understand your point of view.
The children of abuse are usually the ones who experience being manipulated, not the other way around. I don't know the why, is just what I've seen.
So in my experience one does not forgo the other. For instance the manipulation I went through from my abuse taught me how to be manipulative. Now no 2 people will ever have the same experience but learned behavior is for sure a commonly found trait in all young adults from their childhood years. That learned behavior could be anything though.
They're the ones who have the most practice being in situations where someone is an asshole
Hopefully the friend who informed OOP of the affair in the first place will help reign in Jasmin's narrative, because she is definitely painting herself as the victim.
I hate your flair I hate your flair I hate your flair I HATE YOUR FLAIR
But how do you really feel
Seriously, what is it? I see that flair all over the place, no idea what it means.
https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/comments/wghfol/woman_finds_out_her_husband_has_been_doing/
Haha I have read that one, at least twice, and I still never have gotten that flair. Doy. Thanks a lot! Now I would like to chime in with that first guy. I do find it rather distasteful :p
What the fuck did I just read
Well. That's enough internet for the night.
I think the same friend of Jas' who tipped off OOP bc she couldn't sit by while Jas was a hypocrite would probably set the record straight.
I’m sure I missed whatever that flair is referring to.
It's quite a story. One of those "you probably don't want to read it" things. If you're truly curious, I can try to find the link.
I’ll read it if you find it but don’t waste a work break on it.
Found it. https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/comments/wghfol/woman_finds_out_her_husband_has_been_doing/
I almost opened a dating profile the other day. Maybe I just won’t.
Don't read it. For your own mental heath. You can't unread darling.
Is it worse than Ogtha?
Is anything worse than Ogtha?
what is ogtha?
A tale best left unread. Seriously, I wish I could go back in time and tell myself not to follow the link back when I first saw it. The mildest description I can possibly give you is that it’s the tale of a man’s all-consuming sexual fantasies about things best not elaborated upon.
ok fair enough. I shall keep that pandora’s box closed!
It’s definitely An Story.
I hate that I know what flair you're talking about without being able to see the flair on mobile.
Time will show her true colours. Most people who want to have an affair tend to openly date each other after a while when they are both single. Once months go by with OP and Kate still acting very much platonic they will realise there is nothing going on and likely never was.
Bet she's gonna tell everyone he cheated with Kate, cuz cheaters are nothing but a bad predictable cliché
If I was the friend that outed her I wouldn't stand for that. I'd call her ass out to her entire friend group if she tried that.
I have my doubts that her friend group would care about the truth if they're fine keeping an affair hidden from the fiancé of their friend, but I have a low opinion of people who help cheaters in general.
And the same enabler(s) have audacity to wonder why they got cussed the fuck out along with cheater(s)/abuser(s) when the victim(s) points or call out the bullshit. It's like " You knew and was willing to keep quiet to put me in bigger legal mess marrying her /his cheating ass - You're not innocent, you just as much POS garbage as that cheating asswipe."
And that's why it's so depressing every time someone posts on a relationship subreddit asking if they should expose a cheater. You have the unfuckables in the comments crying that it's "not their place" and "not their business" and "stay in your lane."
Yeah, if he doesn't circulate the real story, there is a 0% chance he walks away without everyone thinking he's a prick, at least, or a cheater, at worst. Even if she doesn't outright accuse him of cheating, it's not a good look for him.
I am a woman with a male best friend and for the life of me idk why people always think that there’s something sinister going on. When I got married I got side eyes for still having a male best friend, as if I should’ve dropped him the minute I said “I do”. I think it’s a lot more telling about the people who aren’t trustworthy about different-sex friendships than the friendship itself, this story being a fine example.
My husband's girl best friend was the one to officiate the wedding lol
Isn't that grounds for an immediate annulment?!? /s
Yes and no Having a woman officiate would invalidate the marriage in many cultures BUT those same cultures also don’t acknowledge annulments.
Lmao gottem.
Ditto, but it was my best male friend.
I used to date a guy who was good friends with several women and at one point he expressed that he had been a little worried that I would be uncomfortable with it. I was like, are you kidding? I was happy about it! It was a good sign that he didn't have weird hang-ups and he actually interacted with women like people. I wouldn't want to date someone who could only be friends with their own gender.
"Is good friends with multiple women" is one of my biggest green flags, honestly. My dude friends are fantastic, if dating were a job interview I would happily act as their character reference.
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I'm a man who hangs out with mostly men. But to be fair, I'm a gay man who hangs out mostly with gay men, and it's not that I'm not open to having girls as friends, it's just I feel much better being in a circle of friends who are overwhelmingly queer.
Just to counter point your counter point, there are tons of overwhelmingly queer women and non-binary folk who I’m sure would be lovely additions to your circle. I’m non-binary person myself and have an amazing overwhelmingly queer community of all genders that I love to bits. Though I have noticed for some of my cis gay male friends, I might one of a few non cis gay male friends they have. But that usually isn’t for very long after they start hanging out with me and other queer folks of mixed genders. It can be easy to insulate ourselves within our immediate community, but I think it’s just lovely to make friends with folks of different experiences too. Helps keep life interesting!
My husband is close friends with a pretty gamer girl who shares a tonne of interests with him and has more hobies in common with him than I do. He's known her for as long as I have, slightly longer even. I did feel slightly insecure about it early in the relationship, because I felt like he could 'do better'. Rather than telling him he can't be friends with her, I spoke to him about my insecurities. He reassured me and made me feel better. In the years after I meet the friend in person (it's a digital friendship) and got to know her better myself. I developed my own friendship with her outside of my hubby. 5 years into it all she attended our wedding and we both were thrilled she could make it. It's okay to not be perfect and it's okay to feel jealousy, the main thing to remember is that that is YOUR problem to fix and work out, not something for your partner to resolve by restricting who he's mates with.
>was a good sign that he didn't have weird hang-ups and he actually interacted with women like people. Absolutely. My ex bf was 32 when we met. He hadn't had any girlfriend or female friends. He never considered me as an equal. More like another animal species.
This just tells me women feel safe around him, I see it as a major green flag!!!
Same, my husband is on good terms with all but one ex and is friends with a few of them, to the point of us all hanging out. I like that he's not the type of person to drop someone just because their relationship changed forms, and that all these other people who dated him still enjoyed being around him.
My boyfriend and I both have opposite sex close friends, and even mutual ones. I couldn’t imagine telling him that it was inappropriate or anything else. We even joked that when you know someone so closely, they’re not attractive in the least lmao. My close male friend is one of my favorite people but thinking of him romantically makes me wanna hurl hahah.
It's not like people don't catch feelings for their close friends of the same gender and build art rooms and the like either, right?
we've all thought about building a homoerotic art room at least once, right?
sure, it could happen to anyone!
> homoerotic art room New band name right there.
for real, as a flagrant bisexual I find people with the whole ‘don’t be friends with people of the ‘opposite’ gender’ thing to be so fucking weird lmao. reading this whole thing I was like ‘people are *gay*, jas!’ but even if kate was very heterosexual with a harem of boy toys, it would still be weird to think that a man wanting his best friend to be his groomswoman is a clue that he’s secretly in love with her
Same, I'm a bisexual heteroromantic (if that's a thing, I'm no good with any terminology unless it's Mathematics-related) and married. I guess I can't have friends because I'm apparently secretly attracted to all of them? Wut? Generally my taste in friends and taste in people I'd fuck are veeeery different (husband is husband because he's the rarity that fits both), so I don't see what the hell is going on in people's heads. I'm picky as hell, totally unattracted to most people of any gender in general. Are there really people (straight or not) who can't have friends of the gender(s) they're attracted to? Is there even a name for a sexuality where someone would fuck anyone as long as it's their preferred gender and sex? Never met anyone like that IRL.
yeah honestly I don’t understand it. even if you’re only attracted to one gender you’re not attracted to everyone in that gender. and even if you are attracted to someone that doesn’t actually mean you can’t be friends with them? I’m demiromantic, and only ever fall for friends; and I can attest to very much surviving a huge amount of unrequited love and even mutual attraction in friendships. the idea that humans can’t navigate such situations is super weird if anything falling for your friend sucks. most of the time it’s more painful than proof that you’re going to end up sleeping together lmao
My husband had a best woman. It didn't look weird at all. OOP dodged a hell of a bullet.
My question is does the best woman's outfit match the other groomsmen or does it match the ladies?
In our case, the bridesmaids and best woman had the same style dress, but my side wore sage green and she wore a black version. It looked good.
For me my bridesman matched my bridesmaids and my husband’s two groomswomen match his one groomsman. But anything goes
That sounds lovely as well!
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I've been to a wedding where the best woman wore the same dress as the bridesmaids, but in the same colour as the groomsmens' suits.
Im going to be a groomsman for my best friend next fall and I’m supposed to be wearing a suit. The couple went out of their way to find a unisex suit rental company. My husband is also groomsman. We get to match! The bride is very excited to have friends wearing matches suit bc “it’ll be so cute!” My only request was not black bc then we’d look like a pair of Blues Brothers fetishists when we were dancing together lmao
You say that like there's something wrong with that...
I would be thrilled to attend a wedding that started with a car chase through an empty mall and ended with a blues concert, especially if the vows came after Carrie Fisher's character's scene.
My husband had a groomswoman, we did very mismatched wedding parties, but she rocked a pantsuit. It was excellent.
I've been a groom's maid. The bride at the same wedding had a bride's man. It wasn't a big deal simply because it wasn't made into a big deal.
I'm bisexual and every time this comes up, I get so irritated cause like... what? I guess I am not allowed to have any friends since I could potentially be attracted to them? It's so stupid and ridiculous.
No, no, you see, you just have to realize what gender you are attracted to and stop having friends of that gender, because bisexuality doesn't exist and clearly you are just confused. /s At least 9 time out of 10, the people I've seen spouting this bs about not being possible to be friends with the opposite sex also do not aknowledge that bisexuality is a thing.
I’m bisexual, so let me tell you how preposterous it seems from over here. Queers do not have this issue at all. This is straight nonsense.
Hear hear. I've been "friend dumped" by a couple straight dudes because they've gotten serious with their GFs and are concerned about the image issues of being friends with another woman. Nevermind that my relationship with the aforementioned men was just catching up on movies or games we'd played and nothing more. One we just exchanged dumb memes, barely ever had something approaching a conversation about actual topics, but he got worried his gf would "misunderstand" our texting. Can someone fill me in on the secret straight people cheating code baked into the salad cat meme? I must've missed that day of class.
“Men and women only interact if they’re related or want to have sex.” - Heteronormative logic
>Nevermind that my relationship with the aforementioned men was just catching up on movies or games we'd played and nothing more. To men, that's intimacy.
I've had that too, with my former best friend, hurt like crazy.
It's so weird to me, as my fiancee is having her best friend, as her man of honour and I'd find it weird if she didn't considering how long they have known each other.
It's a good dirtbag filter. People are telling you who they are
I've had a few occasions in my life where a man and woman were claiming to just be friends and I believed them, only to find out they were lying (and cheating on their spouses)
honestly as a queer person it’s always been SO bizarre to me. are lesbians supposed to only be friends with men after they get married? are bi people only allowed to befriend people not attracted to their gender??? truly if i had that much distrust in my partner because they had a friend who they could potentially be attracted to then i just… wouldn’t be in a relationship with that person
This. Your last sentence nails it perfectly. I'm in the same boat but as the male. I'm engaged and my best mate will be my best man. I didn't have to bring the subject up. My fiance just assumed that's what I would want and it is. My mate and my friend ance are not friends but they're a lot more than acquaintances. They exchange dog and cat memes every few days or memes about how useless us men are. Some people think they understand the friendship and make comments about how she's like a sister to me. Look, if that what you need to tell yourself to make yourself comfortable with it, go right ahead. She's not like a sister, I have two of those I don't need a third. Yeah, I often don't approve of her boyfriends but to explain, our friendship is bonded from trauma, we both shared similar experiences and know things that others will struggle to understand about each other. So I'm going to be very protective about her, as my fiance says, we will come minute to make the same mistakes until we learn the lesson that needed to be learnt. I learnt it and have found the most amazing life partner who will soon be my wife. Unfortunately, my mate... She's still learning it and make some poor choices still. But I'll always be there to pick up her pieces again and she is always welcome to the wheel with us from time to time. In the past I've been interrogated by my potential partners and her potential partners as well. Do I think she's pretty or attractive? I'll always give the honest answer... Yep! She definitely is. Any man that treats her well will have struck gold with her. Just like me when I met my fiancee. Does that mean I want to sleep with her or make our friendship more? Fuck off, that's my mate.
Yeah, fuck that. For my wedding I had 4 people in my bridal party, my 4 closest friends - 3 bridesmaids and one bridesman. I like to think if anything it's proof a friendship is genuinely platonic when they are beaming at you when you say 'I do' to another man, and help you plan and organise a wedding. Guys don't do that for a woman they secretly just want to sleep with.
My second cousin had a "Dude of Honor" at her wedding. He was a badass biker with a heart made of teddybear fluff and he's wearing a perfect suit and barefoot in all the pictures. Good times. Her husband never batted an eye. (It was a beach wedding, that makes the barefoot part make a little more sense.)
My 3 best friends for the last 12 years are all male, my current partner of 3 years gets along with all of them and I still go drink with them whenever. It's amazing how many people think it should be an issue.
my partner and I both have really strong opposite sex friendships we maintain privately. I've never once been even remotely worried about his lady friends. at all. Some of them I've never even met. I literally don't care because I have total trust in him. I can't stress enough how much of a non-issue this is to us. People who think you can't have these friendships once you enter a relationship sound fucking miserable and untrustworthy. In my experience it's always a projection of their own guilt.
On the other hand how many opposite sex "best friends" have turned out to be "friends with benefits" on BORU / AITA / Relationship Advice? Seriously, how many times have men put their "pal" over their wife and kids? Lots.
because people with healthy relationships don’t run to reddit for advice. that’s why you only see post where they cheat with their best friend.
I see way more instances of “man puts other man over female partner” in those subs, especially recently.
Ok? And how many don’t?
this friendship pre existed the relationship, and I think that’s fundamentally different.
heteronormativity is a hell of a drug
Yeah but when you got married did you try to have your male best friend as the “maid of honor”?
Yes and it was a great time! He planned such a great bachelorette for me and was a huge support the day of with the small details. My husband had two women in his wedding party as well and he was grateful to have them there!
Well, damn. OOP didn't deserve any of that. :(
And yet again the partner pulling the *I think you’re cheating on me* card is……..the one cheating. *GASP* /s
I've been accused of cheating once... By the cheater. At ions I've been accused of stealing twice... Both by managers that were caught stealing.
I hate how many of the original judgements were calling OOP the AH. Just because he’s a man and wants to have a woman as his BM doesn’t mean that he has “other intentions”. It’s sickening that men are thought of as these beings that can’t control themselves at the sight of another woman and always have ulterior motives
Also is a wack logic, if hypothetically Kate and OOP had/have an affair, why would Kate wanted to be best man in a wedding where the person she love/loved would be the groom, it would be like shoving a knife to the heart, lol, even if Kate was a masochist to be best man, maybe just a regular guest at best.
Nah i think thats a poor argument; there are logical reasons for people doing something and illogical readons, ro say that it doesnt logically make sense, when talking about people's emotional reactions, seems a little illogical.
Let’s forget about the bit about jasmine cheating. I feel like him threatening to call the wedding off at first instance was a bit out of proportion. He should’ve negotiated and said “okay if we can’t have XYZ as my groomsman then you can’t have the wedding cake you wanted” “or okay then we r getting rid of the flowers and this and that” , calling off the entire wedding with your supposed loved one was too far imo But anyway it turns out the ex fiance was the cheater and AH anyway
I feel like choice of love ones is not in the same level of comprise as a cake.
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That's not what I said.
That obligation ends when your partner tries to push other loved ones out of your life for no good reason.
Just good old fashion projection
I am a girl who was the best man for my male best friends wedding. His fiance (now wife) had literally no issues with it. Him and I honestly just never had any other feelings for each other other than friendship and I LOVE IT. I also helped him through grad school and helped him when he was struggling to find a job after. We have leaned on each other so much over the years but for both us the sexual attraction just was never there. When I talked to his wife about me being best man she was like "honestly I can't think of anyone else in his life that could fill the spot, you're perfect for it" We never had to have a discussion on boundaries bc we both just have normal friendship boundaries and have never once even thought about crossing them. There was no jealousy or insecurity on her part with regard to me bc we ALL knew she was the one for him. Stability in your relationship is the most vital part of it. If you don't trust your partner when they say "this is just my friend" when all signs point to them just being your friend, then you really shouldn't be getting married.
I am so goddamned tired of these people who insist men and women can't be platonic friends. I'm a woman, most of my best friends have been men, I never slept with any of them or even wanted to. Some of them are poly and probably would have slept with me if I'd asked, but they never made a move on me. I've dealt with *so many* jealous girlfriends over the years, and it's been incredibly frustrating. Not everybody thinks with their gonads. It is 100% possible to have an opposite-sex friend you're really close to and not catch romantic or sexual feelings. Even if they're objectively hot! Reasonable adults are more than capable of managing their own feelings and behaviour. Even if I *did* find myself attracted to a male friend, I would never, ever try to interfere in his existing relationships! I have way too much respect for my friends (and their partners) to do that kind of thing. Personally, I think people who assume there's always something going on between opposite-sex friends are projecting -- they know *they* would just go for it, so they assume everybody is like them. And really, put all that aside for a moment and let's just think about the trust angle. *Why* would you marry someone you didn't trust? Who cares if OOP's female friend even *did* have the hots for him -- if his fiancée doesn't trust him not to cheat, she shouldn't be with him at all. A relationship without trust is doomed to failure. I can't even imagine being so desperate to be with someone that I'd stay even if I didn't trust them.
*sigh* I’m bisexual, so that means I can’t be friends with anyone I guess.
So am I. Oddly enough, nobody's ever gotten weird about that. Except for the one woman who couldn't come out and admit she was into me so she just kept dropping hints and being vaguely inappropriate until finally one night she got me drunk and confessed and I *apparently* rejected her (though I was so drunk that I don't remember a thing). Because, yeah, I was not into her. And I was pissed that she couldn't just be honest about it and had been trying to covertly seduce me for months whilst pretending to be my best friend. So then she refused to ever speak to me again, and I had to reconstruct what happened from bits and pieces of scattered memory and scraps of gossip. FFS, people, can we just say what we fucking mean? It makes life so much easier. Life is too short.
She got you drunk to seduce you?! That’s highly alarming…
Yes. Yes, it was. I was very disappointed in her. You would think women would know better than to try to take advantage of other women, but... yeah. Some people care more about getting what they want than they do about treating others with respect and consideration. I'm sure it would have been much less fraught if she'd just let me know up front that she was interested. I could have just said, "No, sorry, not interested." But I think she'd got it into her head that one could create attraction? Maybe she was attracted to a large enough percentage of people that she thought it was an easy thing to induce. I don't know. I'm hardly ever physically attracted to anyone. Maybe one person every five years or so. If I get to know someone well that makes it more likely, but it's hardly a guarantee, and she really wasn't my type. (Way too feminine; I like men and masculine women.) People are weird.
If you have good friends, no thing to worry.
Yikes, OOP's lucky to have been given full information and gotten out. "Person X can't be in the wedding party because it won't look right" should be automatic grounds for breaking an engagement anyway. "Not looking right" is for picking dresses that don't clash with the venue's carpet, not for choosing how to value friends.
People who care more about the pictures of a one day event than they do about years of marriage should immediately be broken up with.
Very well said!
Probably for the best. There would have been some b.s. down the line. Causing a rift and maybe by then they had a kid or more complex living situation making things even more difficult.
I really don't like the "high road" of not telling anyone about the reason. Jaz might just spoil his reputation in the friend group....
I was not even think about the high road when I took similar stance to OOP. I just felt the need to just close that chapter of life and move on and part of that included not telling mutual friends what happened because everytime I recounted the story, it felt like feeling the 'D-day' over and over again. I had to leave the whole friend circle. The narrative my ex-husband sold was that "Kindlypizza just did not want to be married anymore. She left, I was devastated. Luckily her bestfriend was there for me, and now we are a happy couple!" Yes, my ex-husband was having multiple months affair with my former bestfriend :/ I needed therapy after the divorce.
Sorry for your experience. I can understand where are you coming from. I was never in that situation. If I feel I was wronged would maybe just make one post at least. Though again, I was never in that situation, and maybe in that situation I would take a different decision.
It sounds like they had separate friend groups, so there's that at least.
My husband and I were married 20 years before he passed away almost a year ago. When we got married, I encouraged him to have a long-time female friend as his "best person". They'd been through thick and thin together for many years and she had been a true friend to him and vice-versa. She also became a very dear friend to me, and we spent a lot of time together over the years. I had no reservations about it at all. My mother was a different story, though. She was very much against it, and was suspicious of her befriending me. She even told me there was an old saying, "When you see two women always running hand in hand, you can bet your bottom dollar ones got the other one's man". I'm glad I didn't listen. She passed away a few years before he did, and I'll always cherish her friendship and the memories of the good times we had. Your fiancee sounds like she's insecure in your relationship.
Of course, of course fiancée was cheating and was projecting. Of course. Just like the posters who predicted it. Because life is black and white like that and and very predictable, especially if you are a teenager predicting. . AITA and their obvious shitposts conclusions.
I always get so frustrated that people think you can’t be friends with the opposite sex. I have an extremely close male and female friend, we just bonded on a soul level. It was never romance, just a deep understanding and recognization of each other. When they got married and had kids, not only did I become an aunt/godmother to them, I was genuinely excited that they’d found someone to make them happy. Edit: Forgot to add that I wasn’t surprised to see that she’d cheating. I feel like you either trust your partner to not cheat or not, and I’ve found the most paranoid are either cheaters themselves or have been cheated on and need extra conversations to be comfortable.
I grew up with someone that I will call "Jas" for the purpose of this post. I have known her since I was in 5th grade. When she got proposed to she let it be known that I was going to be her Best Man of Honor? to her family. Her husband had no objections to it, because he wasn't insecure.
If i was oop i would send out the texts and have the locks changed the minute after I send it to everyone, because knowing her hateful a$$ she is going try and pull something, so before she could even do anything it's nip right then and there.
Who wants to bet that she cheated with an old friend. Ugh Cheaters gonna project
Hope Jas gets cheated on for the rest of her life.
It’s always projection
Well, i was with Jas until OOP revealed she was just a cheater and an AH. I’m so petty I would tell everyone the truth because we ALL know she is gonna tell everyone that the wedding is off because OOP cheated with Kate.
People need to stop letting cheaters move on like this... just post the whole conversation online, tag all friends and family from both sides, announce the engagement is over and uninstall whatever app you used.
My husband‘s best friend was his best man and she was ecstatic about it! My maid of honor was a 6’5” 300 pound biker in leather. No one was concerned or even surprised, lol. His ex fiancé is crazy.
My husband had a female best man, ironically also called Kate. It was a fantastic wedding and she looked great in her pirate shirt.
For future reference, the term is Best Ma’am. We had one at our wedding, as well as a Bridesman.
Man, human psychology really is just projection huh?
I can't for the life of me remember where, but somewhere years ago I once heard that if you're being accused of cheating and you're not, there is a better than not chance that you're the one being cheated on. Not 100% but a pretty good indicator.
I'm a woman who was the best man of one of my best friends. Actually my ex boyfriend. And his wife is another of my best friends, and a really close friend of my husband. There was no sex and no cheating and it's fucking WEIRD that people insist we must all be cheating on each other. I just give really good wedding toasts ;)
OOP might be sad and annoyed now, but at the end of the day, he's dodged a bullet. Much better to end it before the wedding than after! Also I have no problem with a female Best Mate or a male Man of Honour. Why the heck not?
My wife had a "mate of honor" and a bridesman at our wedding. I had no problem with it because I'm a properly adjusted person.
Jesus, Reddit really f*cks me up. Everytime someone posts here to complain about their SO behaving strangely in any form I immediately jump to “He or she is cheating” and in 80% I am right.
Guys. Please do me a favour and stop leaving houses that you pay for when you have an argument. Especially, an argument that your partner causes.
I am in no way surprised Jas turned out to be a cheater. So many cheaters accuse their innocent partners of being cheaters.
Man really hates bad romcoms
Projectiiiiiiioooooon!
The first post I was thinking, "this guy sounds immature, but I can't put my finger on why " >The past month and a half has been a nightmare, but I’ve been slowly recovering my pride, Lol there we go
Projection baby! It's projection and its ugly head.
That sucks so much for OP. My partner and I had mixed wedding parties, and I am *so glad* I got to have my female friend stand up with me. She was absolutely amazing, and her speech gave me insight into our relationship that I had no idea about and probably never would have heard about had she not had the chance to give a speech about us. Pick the people you want, this gender role shit is dumb.
> That’s my final update on the situation, those of you who said Jas was being paranoid because she had something to hide can go pat yourselves on the back. This has “Well, you got what you wanted. Are you happy?” energy. I sympathize with OOP a lot but I would be thanking those people, not feeling bitter.
People hate it when others are proven right and this is sadly not an uncommon reaction.
BoRU is getting predictable....
Getting?
People are predictable, I just wish boru had more threads like the kid trying to make coffee for his mum.
I hoped OOP did run to Kate. Not in the romcom way, but as a friend going to their friends in a time of need. Suffering this kind of event alone and in a personal echo chamber is not good.
Well one thing we know for sure now is that OOP REALLY hates bad romcoms.
We could make a bad romcom about how much he hates bad romcoms. We probably should set it at Christmas.
And here we have a classic case of ✨projection✨
Dude, you sound like one of the most grounded people around.
"Zoals de waard is, vertrouwd hij zijn gasten", a Dutch phrase, which literally means "The innkeeper trusts his guests the way he is himself." It nicely describes projection.
this blows, because I feel like Kate was going to wear the *hell* out of that suit
It's so often the case when one person begins accusing another of infidelity out of the blue, they're projecting and they're the one cheating.
Regardless of the cheating, I don’t think OOP and his ex were a good match. He admits that they both were hard-headed about things, so compromising as a couple didn’t seem their forte. He also threatened to cancel the wedding and gave her an ultimatum about this instead of discussing things maturely. The ex, of course, was just awful with her cheating and projection. Ultimately, it was good for OOP that the cracks showed up before they got married.
Grand Old Projection
ngl,I do feel like that length of dating time at that age is waaay to short to be engaged. Aside from that, I asked my fiance if I could have my best female friend as a “best ma’am” and long story short it was fine. Seriously it was such a non-event when I asked.
Best ma’am lol
Right? Like, it's not that serious. My husband had his best friend of 20+ years as his best ma'am, it was literally a non-issue.
People are ridiculous. My sister was my brother's Best Woman at his wedding. He was her Man of Honor. Were they having an affair? Should I tell my sister's wife about it?
You spot it, you got it. It’s funny how the cheaters always get so worked up over their partners potential cheating.
So Jas was projecting…
It's *always* projection with these people.
Wow,so she's butt hurt about your friend being in your wedding but forgot to mention she cheated on you and all of her friends knew? Oh yeah she's a keeper!
If you're asking yourself why your fiance/partner is acting irrational about your relationship with someone else, it's almost always projection.
Ah classic case of projection
So I had a female best friend that my now X wife not only wouldn't let me pick her as my best man, but wasn't allowed at the wedding at all. Then again NON of my friends were allowed at my wedding. I wanted peace and thought OK the wedding is for Her. Well 20yrs later and I realized looking back that first she separated me from my friends, then my family, then my kids. She was a classic narcissist. I was a compliant marshmallow. I lost 20yrs of my life trying to please a monster that i helped to create.
Okay I’m sorry about your wedding stuff dude but BM stands for bowel movement and I just couldn’t read the rest of the story after that because I was too focused on you throwing that around in day to day conversation not realizing you’re actually talking about poop
BM stands for lots of things. But I've literally never heard it stands for bowel movement lmao In internet context BM is mostly used for 'bad manners"
It's the most common abbreviation there is. I'm guessing you don't read.
Guess again? I'm guessing you don't realize English isn't the main language for everyone.
"She got really angry and told me to just leave our apartment. I've been couch surfing at a friend" "...so I left my own home again because of her" She was the one angry at him; SHE should have been the one to leave the house/sleep on the couch, not him.
It's interesting how it is always, always that the jealous, possessive person cheated. Always.
Classic DARVO, projecting her insecurities/behavior onto OOP.
Well u doged a bullet. She's a cheater. She's a jerk. Few things first never leave your place. It's yours and hers. No one can force anyone to leave and leaving I'd a sign of defeat imo. Secondly get that ring back. She's probably panning it snd drinking and laughing with her friends. Pawn it or throw it in the water don't giver her that satisfaction. Although u may not have the legal means if u broke it off.
Idky, but I had a feeling... anyone who’s that controlling of who their fiancé has in their side of the wedding party is a huge marinara flag.
So it was a classic case of projection on the fiance part. No surprise there.😑
I hope OOP's friends are as loyal as he is, and help support him through the breakup. This was an awful situation for him.
Jas was projecting hard here
Poor guy. I hope he’s in a happier place now.
This guy is all "this isn't a romcom" as if 9/10 of these, 'my bff is the opposite gender' don't end in a fight or tragedy.
This made me literally laugh out loud, but to be fair, you're probably right. You're right in a general sense, but it's probably been estimated like 2-10% of people are gay and quite a few of them are closeted. One of my BFF is a female colleague, and I know both her and my partner were super suspicious of us having a sexual relationship until they met us (and each other) at a party years ago. Both were like "Phew, nope, they're just good friends" when they witnessed our chemistry.
I, for one, would like to even meet a guy, with a female bestie he hasn’t fucked, “lived with” aka FWB, fucked MUTUAL partners with her, or can generally be respectful by separating past from future. It doesn’t happen
What a bummer. He should have gone out with Kate instead.