Long story short – when I got engaged to my fiancé last
year, I immediately knew I would ask my two best friends and co-workers (man
and a woman, “Jane” and “John” for my purposes here) to be my “best people” in
the wedding. Jane and John had been my
best friends for years, and we would spend nearly every weekend with them and
their families (both married with multiple children).
About 1 month after asking them to be in the wedding, I discovered
that they were having an affair with each other. I was supportive of the
relationship if they “did it right,” meaning that they figured their relationship
out and either decided to end the affair or separate from their spouses.
Ultimately, it ended very poorly. Jane’s husband discovered the affair, and she
ended up separating from him (not divorcing though, that’s a whole other story),
while John decided to stay with his wife. Somehow, I was the only one at our
workplace who knew about the affair, and became the manager of all of the
insane dramatic terribleness that followed.
I felt that I was treated very poorly, to the point where my fiancé wanted
me to go to my superiors and tell them about the affair because it was
impacting my life so significantly. I
did not because I felt it was not my secret to tell, and still feel that way
today. It was quickly decided after
their affair “ended” that Jane would remain the MOH while John would step
down.
In the ensuing months (it has been 6-8 months since the
affair “ended”) I feel that I have increasingly been abused by my MOH. Some of her transgressions have been so awful
that the therapists I have seen have repeatedly asked me, “so why are you still
friends?” In my heart, I like to think
she is still the same person that became my best friend all those years ago,
but she is quite different now and I only maintain my friendship with her
because I have seen the consequences of rejecting her firsthand (it is NOT
pretty). Ultimately, I only remain her
friend in order to maintain peace at work, which I am contractually obligated
to remain at for another 1.5 years. My fiancé
and I tried so hard to be supportive, thinking that the ship would eventually
right itself, but unfortunately my resentment has just grown and grown over the
last months and it’s reached a boiling point.
I have decided to ask Jane to not be in the wedding, and in
my head I feel like this is in the best interest of our friendship, whatever
that may be. I don’t feel like it is fair
to hold some of the terrible things that she did against her, because I do sympathize
that this has been an awful time for her.
However I cannot support the horrible decisions that she continues to
make, nor can I support the way she treats me.
The only way that I can think of even approaching this conversation is
to tell her that, in the best interest of our “new” friendship without John, I
need it to truly be new. Every
time I think about the wedding, I just think about both of them and how
those years of the truest friendships I have ever known are lost forever. I just get angrier and angrier, and I can’t
bring that resentment into our current friendship (whatever that may be – she has
treated me poorly, but would I handle it better if I didn’t have this
resentment inside? I think – hope – yes).
My wedding isn’t until fall 2022, so there is still quite a bit of time
to figure things out.
I would deeply appreciate any insight or advice you all have. Thank you all so much