Maid of Honor vent (very long just warning)

BrennaAshley

So I don't really expect any sort of advice from this because what's done is done in this sitution (however if anyone somehow has advice on this topic I'd be happy to hear some) but I more so just needed to vent because this topic has been giving me a stomachache for months now and I don't want to bug my friends about it more than I already have.

So basically I knew the topic of who was going to be my MOH was going to be a difficult topic long before fi and I even got engaged.  I'm very blessed that I have really wonderful friends and cousins in my life.  All of whom feel like sisters to me (I don't actually have any biological sisters).  So when we got engaged I avoided the topic of bridal party for some time.  I wanted to take time and think about what I wanted to do.  Everyone was great about this and no one pressured me to make any decisions.  I finally decided that I had 2 women in my life and I really wanted to have both of them be my MOH.  One is my younger cousin who I have loved since the minute she exited the womb.  She and I have always had a very special bond.  It's even been a joke at family gatherings because we defend each other even unrationally.  The other person is a friend of mine whom I've known for about 5.5 years.  Now this is actually a short time in comparison to the other girls in my bridal party.  However in the 5.5 years she has helped me through some very difficult times and I have done the same for her.  We have become ridiculously close.  I met her 3 weeks after I met my fi so she has known our relationship since it started.  He loves her almost as much as I do.  I also knew that she would work well with my cousin.  I talked to my cousin about the idea first and she loved it, she is starting her first year of college and thought it would be great to have it be a team instead of just depending on her.  

Now all of this is hunky dory. Except I have 2 other very good friends whom I have known for much longer than I have known the girl I actually asked to be my MOH. One I have known for 19 years and the other I have known since I was born. I knew picking the friend I did as my MOH was going to be difficult to explain to the 2 other girls, but fi and everyone was telling me that I had to pick the person I wanted. The friend I have known for 19 years is lovely but not very dependable. The girl I have known my whole life is close with me, but we have some strong fundamental differences and I have learned to stay away from topics that broach those differences because she is not good about understanding others point of view.  I spoke with the friend whom I have known for 19 years first, and she was actually relieved that I wasn't planning to ask her. She is not in the best spot financially and was worried I would ask her and she would have to say no. So that conversation was easy! *phew*. We even laughed about how stressed we each were over the topic.

Now I needed to talk to my other friend.  I knew this conversation was going to be way harder.  This girl was my neighbor growing up.  She is 3 years older than me and has always felt like my big sister.  She got married a year ago and I was her MOH.  I knew she expected to be mine.  I even went as far as considering have 3 MOHs to make her happy.  Then my fiance pointed out the ridiculousness of that idea.  That I wasn't doing it for me, that I was doing it to make her happy, she would be being put in that place out of pity, etc. etc.  He also pointed out how different our lives are.  When she met her now husband she alienated herself from everyone.  Me, her so called closest friend, didn't even know about the relationship for a couple of years.  Her life pretty much revolves around her husband, his 2 children (he is much older than she is and was married before), and his friends (who are closer to her father's age bracket than her own).  When she got married I asked her who of her friends she was inviting to the wedding and it was me, her other bridesmaid who lives out of town, and 2 friends from H.S. who she talks to on occasion.  She just lives a very different life than I do.  My fi and I have created a life surrounded with lots of friends and have encouraged our separate friends to become friends with each other so we can all do things together.  My fi's point was that I had a much larger picking pool than she did because of the different ways we have chosen to live our lives.  I don't blame her for her life choices, she is very happy with her life.  It just means that we end up having different options than the other person.

So I finally manned up and asked her to be a bridesmaid and explained who was going to be the co-MOHs.  She held it together in front of me but I know her well enough to know she was trying to hold back tears.  Then my MOH called me right after work today and told me that my friend had emailed her.  I asked if she seemed mad.  She said no, but it's clear she's upset and thinks she should have been the MOH.  The whole email was about how long her and I have known each other, how I was her MOH and how she had all these ideas for when she was mine.  How she's like my big sister and how close we are.  So now I basically feel like a bag of crap.  I hate knowing I hurt someone I love so much, I'd almost rather her be angry at me about it.  It's so much harder to deal with hurting someone.  What's done is done and I know I can' change it but I just feel awful.  I suppose the stomacheaches are going to keep going on for awhile.  So sorry for how long this is, just needed to get it all out there and vent!