The Uninvited

QUESTION: Recently a friend of mine got married and I didn't get an invitation to his wedding. We've been friends for several years and I was surprised when his wedding came and went without a peep from him. I'm going to ask him about it, but I wanted to see what this blog was about. Before I go too far I think I should make it clear that he and I were 'friends with benefits' for about a year. He wanted to be more than friends but that wasn't what I wanted, so we stopped 'the benefits'. Over the next year he dated a few other women before getting engaged and married. But I thought we were friends. Am I wrong for thinking I got dissed?

CHUCK: Are you wrong for thinking you got dissed? Um... No, not necessarily. But maybe not for the reasons you think.

When a man is getting married, he's forced to contribute to all manner of decisions he never thought he would have to make. Color schemes, menus, deejays, tuxedos, limos all have to be picked out. Whereas women either have some idea or affinity for the things to be decided on, some men may be asked their opinions on stuff they could care less about, like centerpieces. And it all costs money.

So when the final guest list is put together, sometimes hard choices need to be made.Maybe your friend was forced to make a choice between a relative and you. Maybe keeping you on the guest list would have meant making an uncomfortable explanation to his fiancee. Who knows.Not inviting you may not have been personal.

It may have been, though. Men have platonic 'women friends" and unplatonic "girlfriends." And your year as "friends with benefits" may have muddied those waters. Especially since he wanted to actually have a romantic relationship with you. No guy in his right mind is gonna invite to his wedding someone he looks on as a girlfriend.

Try not to feel insulted about this. Your relationship with your friend may not now be what you thought it was. But that relationship was going to have to change anyway.

GARLAND: I see how you could feel that there may have been a diss with your lack of invite to your 'friend's' nuptials. As a man, I don't think that you were though.

See, a diss is usually something deliberate and malicious and meant to sting and offend. I think your friend may have fallen into one of many booby-traps for the man getting married. Chuck hit hard on a couple. Your friend may have had to cut his invite list down quite a bit, depending on how big the families are, how small the church is, and how deep their pockets were. He may have had to cut YOU AND OTHERS from his invite list that he would have wanted to be there. So, you may be coming down on him a little harder than you need to.

On a different note though, you mention that you were "friends with benefits" and that he wanted to be more than friends - you didn't, so he found somebody else that did. There are two things in that situation that you have to consider from his perspective:

ONE - Regardless of what you call your relationship with him, you ARE an ex-girlfriend when it comes down to the wedding invitation list. Most decent guys aren't trying to have their ex-girlfriends at their weddings. No bride wants to share one of the most special days of her life with a woman who used to be her husband's lover back in the day!

TWO - Here's the deep one... your friend may have been in love with you, and you may not have even known it. He may have wanted YOU to be that woman in white walking down the isle to share your life with him. But, you didn't want him like that, so he left you to find someone who did. Maybe he felt that if you didn't want to wear white for him, then you shouldn't be around when someone else does.

Now, okay - that last one was a little deep. Sometimes I can be a romantic in my heart and that kinda' came out in that answer. Any of me and Chucks answers could be right and they all could be wrong. But, in my heart, I don't think he dissed you per se, and I don't think he set out to offend you, I just think he just measured his responsibilities and priorities and did what he felt was best for his wedding, his wife and his marriage.