I had an amazing bacheorette party thrown by one of my bridesmaids. I live in Michigan and was ready at 8am on the day of the party to be brought to an undisclosed destination...
My maid of honor and another bridesmaid drive me to Indiana to meet up with the bridesmaid who planned the party. I still am unsure where we are going but the drive continues. All day my bridesmaids messed with me about the days events. Long story short we end up in downtown Chicago!
The days events lead me to Navy Pier for some tourist style fun and we head back to the hotel to meet up with the final bridesmaid. They tease about having a stripper but when there is a knock on the door it is a make-up artist to do our makeup for the night! (AWESOME!!!)
We get ready, go out to dinner, have a cocktail at a bar downtown, and then they tell me that we are going to a flaming baton show. I have no idea what to expect here, but I'm imagining girls throwing batons that are onfire....
Truth be told we enter a club called Batons and I realize we are going to a Drag Show!!! It was phenominal and a total blast. The wild party had begun...
After the drag show we have another cocktail and shots, we play a bit of pool, and then we're off to our final destination. A club with VIP access and bottle service at our table. I love to dance so the night couldn't have had a better ending. The girls all let their hair down and everyone enjoys themselves.
This brings us to the meat of this discussion. (And these are the facts as told to me by my sober maid of honor.) It is 1:30 and I have reached my limit on alcohol. I'm giving my girls the "I'm sleepy" sign and asking if we can head back to the hotel. All of the girls can see that I'm getting a little unsteady on my feet, but I'm happy as can be and content that we are leaving the club soon. Time passes and we haven't left yet, I ask why and the girls tell me that the party planner, we'll just call her Amy, needs to be found. No big deal, so we wait. More time passes and I begin to worry. I don't understand why no one can find her and start getting upset out of worry. The girls calm me down and prevent tears at the club and eventually Amy is found on the dancefloor...it was more than an hour later. The tab gets paid by Amy who had to get her id back, and outside we go to grab a cab.
The drama begins at this point because I am upset that Amy knew it was time to go and it took more than an hour and a half to find her and pay. I tell her that I'm mad and she gets mad at me for being upset. (alcohol has obviously taken over... on both of our parts)
We make it back to the hotel safe around 3:30 (2 hours after I originally wanted to leave), and I am still upset in the hotel room and I am venting about the situation and the fact that Amy disregarded my wishes and refused to leave when the group was ready. I know from my bridesmaids that I also said "just watch, Amy is going to turn this conversation around and I'm going to end up being the bad guy." Amy had been outside smoking and returned to the room to hear the venting of the group. She sat outside the room for a half an hour listening to what was being said and then the tears really started flowing.
She is devistated that I would talk about her and insults fly, I do not recall what our conversation entailed but I do know that she asked me "why did you ask me to be a bridesmaid?" At one point I got so mad that I ended up hyperventilating in the bathroom and crying uncontrollably. Talk about an awful ending to the night right? Sleep finally occurs around 5:30am.....
The next day I woke up to a huge hangover and the thought that we would simply be able to laugh off the drunken drama and move on. Afterall, it was a great party, and I love my girls to death.
It was wishful thinking on my part because the morning brought upon on the most awkward lunch and drive back to Indiana. At one point I tried to make light of the subject and asked Amy "so what, do you hate me now?" her response was "hate is a strong word" and then mumbled that she didn't dislike me. She also stated that she didn't want to discuss it because she didn't want to cry. Fair enough.
This leads me to email her regarding the situation. I put my thoughts on paper to ensure I didn't say anything out of anger and to extend the olive branch in hopes of getting over the drama.
We end up having a phone conversation on Monday and I let her get everything off of her chest. There are moments in the conversation where we are back to our old selves but Amy insults my bridesmaids by saying that the only reason they talked about her in the hotel room was out of jealousy because she is pretty and a good dancer. (nevermind the fact that the real reason was because they didn't want me to be upset and were trying to diffuse the situation)
She also insults me by likening me to a bridesmaid in her wedding who she only allowed to stand out of a sense of obligation and to hopefully fix the broken friendship (backstory: this girl was an absentee bridesmaid who had previously slept with a former boyfriend of Amy's...now that's drama!)
In my 14 year friendship with Amy we have never had anything close to girl drama aside from the drunken bachelorette. Our friendship has changed in the sense that a bit of the closeness has been lost, but all friendships go through changes and I made it a point to state several times that "I know our friendship has changed but it doesn't mean that I love you any less"
The conversation continues and leads Amy to say that I am now in a different friend category and that her trust in me had been shaken to the core. She did offer an apology for not returning to the group and offered her explanation.
She went to the bathroom getting ready to leave, and when she attempted to walk back to the table the club was so crowded that she experienced a bit of claustrophobia. She went to a place in the club where there was a bit of room and calmed herself down. After calming down she was going to come back to the table, but a good song came on and instead she began dancing. And after that song, another good song came on so she may have danced for 4 or 5 songs before the maid of honor found her, grabbed her by the arm, and said "its time to leave" She also offered up the fact that her husband had also been pissed off at her in the past for "getting lost on the dance floor"
As we began wrapping up the conversation Amy says how she hopes that things with the girls arent awkward at the wedding, and my respnse is that it won't be an issue because they will let it go and move on. Amy responds by saying that "oh, I won't be able to let it go that easily" And that brings me to the final comment made by Amy....
She ends the conversation by saying how "she is giving me a second chance, and that we would talk soon" And to me...the fact that she says she is giving me a second chance means that she sees no fault in her actions that night when she was dancing knowing that it was time to leave, that she is not sorry for anything, and that she is going to hold a grudge. And that comment basically negates any apology made earlier in the conversation.
Alright, if you have made it through the long winded details...thank you for listening. I posted this drama to get an outsiders perspective. Granted I realize you don't have Amy's side of the story, but I tried my best to keep the facts true and made sure to include her explanation. The bottom line, we were talking about her in the room, and I apologized that night. I am also sure that whatever was said when Amy wasn't in the room was said at some point to her during the night. My sober maid of honor said that I did not call Amy any bad names and that I was venting about the situation, not Amy as a person. Amy did offer up some insight and said that she couldn't believe that I would actively participate in any conversation about her.
That night, I was upset because Amy's wants and needs outweighed mine, and it was my bachelorette party, and as Amy put it, it was my time to be selfish and my night to shine. (one thing about me....I'm usually the go with the flow girl...the one who is laidback and easy going, who will do whatever if that's what everyone wants to do....)
Do the nights events as you have read them warrant an upheaval of a friendship? I am truly upset about the sober conversation with Amy, because her words were hurtful and insulting not only to me, but to my bridesmaids as well. I have not discussed these feelings yet with Amy because I am far too upset. Also, if she feels that she is standing in my wedding now out of a sense of obligation....I just don't know how to handle that.
Please help! I am sad, and frustrated at how things are turning out.