attending my ex-fiance's wedding

[Calendula]

Has anyone here attended the marriage of their ex-fiance to someone else or even had the opportunity to do so? If so, how did you feel about the whole thing, before during and after, and why did you go or not go?

 

My ex-fiance and I split about a year and nine months ago. We were together for almost four years and lived together for three of those years. Looking back, I don’t think either of us was ever truly happy during our time together, even though we did love each other, and we did our best to try and make it work anyway. In the end, the split was mutual and we’ve managed to develop our relationship into more of a distant but trusting friendship. Even though we both still live in the same town, we don’t hang out and we’ve both made a point of moving on with our lives separately. I know without a doubt, however, that if I ever truly needed him I could count on him to be there for me and vice versa.

 

Since we broke up, we’ve both moved on with our relationships as well as other areas of our lives. About nine months after my ex-fiance and I split, I reconnected with an old love and he and I have been in a serious LDR for the past year. Even long distance, I’ve been happier with my old love than I ever was while living with my ex-fiance; he is my true partner and we’re doing all we can to reconnect our lives and build our future together. My ex-fiance’s new girlfriend moved in with him at his new apartment and they became engaged to get married as of this past New Year’s (1 yr, 3 mo after our split). The wedding (between my ex-fiance and his girlfriend post-me) is in just under two weeks and I’ve agreed to make their wedding cake and attend the wedding and the reception.

 

Today was the first time that it all really hit me and I’ve spent about half the day either sobbing and writing in my journal or trying to nap off my emotional stress headache. It took me a little while to figure out why I was upset by all of this, and the best I can figure is that I cry out of relief for what could have been but will now never be (me marrying my ex-fiance), appreciation for what might never have been (me reconnecting with my old love), and for all the pain and struggles of the past (loss of my old love, all the pain of my relationship with my ex-fiance, the struggles I’ve been through recovering since we split almost two years ago). Things couldn’t have turned out better for both of us (me and my ex-fiance), but I still cry and I’m not quite sure how I’ll cope with the actual wedding. I’ve asked my love to attend my ex-fiance’s wedding with me, and I’m hoping he’ll understand and be willing to support me through the event. I want him to be there with me so I can hold his hand and dance with him, and so he can get an idea of how much I really do love him and what I’ve been through trying to find my way back to him.

 

Thoughts, experiences, insights?

[Calendula]

So I've got an additional question to add:

 

What would you think if your SO was asking you to come to their ex-fiance's wedding with them?

[Beeotch]

I'm going to be very frank with you:

 

I think 1 year and 9 months is a bit quick to break up with someone (whom you were engaged to), still be "friends" and then have enough of a foundation to marry someone else. I personally would not marry someone who was engaged to someone else only a year and some months ago whom he is still friends with. That is very strange.....

 

The friendship isn't a crime, mind you, but I think that the time frame of everything makes it questionable and too close for comfort.

 

What I am having a hard time understanding is, why would you agree to make his wedding cake??? If he invites you to his wedding, that is not within your control, but to make the cake, that is weird! Like I said, esp since you were engaged to him less than 2 years ago. I could understand if you had been engaged 5 years ago, then it would be more far removed and a bit more normal I suppose.....but it makes it very strange that in less than 2 years you would be at this place. I could never sit there laboring over a cake for the wedding of my former fiance who we only parted a year and some months ago! It would be very strange and feel like a conflict of interest for me, even if I didn't want him back. For example, my ex before my most recent, I will always love him although I have no interest in being with him again. I know he will be there for me and we're friends, if he got married though, I could not make his cake or be a part of his wedding in a huge way. I don't even know if I would go...it's just one of those things that would illicit some strange emotions and just be weird for me, even though I am not crazily inlove with him, it just seems inappropriate.

 

Unless you have a child together (where you inadvertently are more in tune with their life and their marriage would affect your child and the dynamics), I find it very odd that in 1 year and 9 months post break up, you are that cool with your ex to make his wedding cake! It sounds like a movie! I don't get how you go from being friends at a distance who don't hang out, to making cakes at his wedding. I don't see why he would find it appropriate to ask you (or for you to offer)...I wonder what his fiance thinks of this. Does she know? Was she the one who asked ?(if so, it changes things, but that is still weird too)

 

Long story short: I would not ask my ex fiance of less than 2 years to attend my wedding, I would neither offer nor accept an invitation to make his cake, I would maybe send a gift but probably not attend the wedding and certainly would not ask my current boyfriend, who is LD, to attend my ex fiance's wedding with me....sorry but it is just very uncomfortable in many ways and seems disrespectful to both of your respective partners. If my S/O was involved in the wedding plans of an ex they were engaged to less tha 2 years ago...it would be a red flag. Quite frankly, if I were dating a man who was engaged a year and some months prior to me, who then asked me to marry him, I would think it were too soon and if his ex fiance was making my cake and she was also invited to the wedding...I would think it very odd and would have no part of it.

Edited May 24, 2011 by Beeotch

[Calendula]

I have been told before that my life seems a bit surreal at times.

 

I know the time frame may sound short, but a lot can change in a year and a half and the timing isn't really an issue. Our split and the subsequent evolution of our relationship into a trusting yet distant friendship was one of the best things that could have happened for us and the process started well before we officially ended the engagement. We were always better as friends, and most of the strain during our time together came from trying to make our relationship more romantic than it naturally was combined with differences in lifestyle, background, and personal outlook. The person he's with now, who he is marrying, is much more suited to him than I ever was and I truly am happy for him. I think they stand a much better chance of finding happiness together than he and I ever did. They had known each other as casual friends while he and I were still together, but I never had a problem with it, and their relationship didn't change from friendship to romantic until several months after he and I were separated.

 

I'm happy to make the wedding cake for them and agreed to do so when he asked partly because I have experience doing such things (I worked in a bakery growing up) and partly because it is my way of supporting this future relationship of his and contributing to his wedding. She thinks it is awesome that I'm willing to do it, spent some time talking with me about design, and is looking forward to seeing it.

 

I think part of what makes me emotional about the whole thing is the sense of closure that it brings to my past relationship with my ex-fiance. Sure, we didn't work out, but his relationship with me helped him get to a point where he could move on from some very negative events from his past and find someone else with whom he could be even more compatible. For me, my relationship with him taught me a lot about myself, taught me a lot about what I really wanted long term (and what I didn't want), and helped me to truly appreciate the man I am now with and want to stay with. While my relationship with my ex-fiance also cost me a lot in various ways, I don't think I would have found my way back to my current partner (who is also my first love and my boyfriend of 4 years prior to my ex-fiance) if I hadn't worked through all the **** with my ex-fiance.

 

Part of the reason that I want my current partner there with me is for emotional support as I try and leave the remnants of this part of my life behind me and move on into my relationship with him (my current partner). I've tried to tell him this, but I'm still not sure whether or not he'll decide to come. He seems to understand the friendship dynamic I have with my ex-fiance, but sometimes I do have my doubts. I do, however, know that my partner can have no doubts that I love him, choose him, and only want to be with him, as I've made this clear to him as best I can on many different occasions. I don't think what I'm asking of him is disrespectful, but I do recognize that it will not be an easy thing for him to do.

 

I do my best at all times to base my personal relationships on open and honest communication, and I wouldn't have stayed with either my ex-fiance or my current partner (in the past or currently) if they didn't feel and act the same way. As I see it, there therefore isn't any sneakiness or weirdness in all of this, just strong emotion and an appreciation of the past as an experience to be learned from.

[Beeotch]

You seem to have things together

 

Truth is often stranger than fiction and what you're explaining makes sense and is reasonable rather than some strange mess lmao! From the outside looking in, it can at first seem like a situation that is not kosher, but I do get that living it, it may very well be not as strange esp since from what I'm getting, the relationship didn't end in some passionate rage, but had always had more of a friendship vibe to it. So I can see how making that transition would be easier than 2 people splitting in the usual way where things feel unresolved, one person still wants the other and all that.

 

I also understand the feeling of finality and closure of a chapter of your life and the emotions that can cause that have little to do with secretly not being over your ex. It makes sense!

 

It's great that your bf is understanding of this and if he is, then he should definitely support you at this wedding. Although if you start crying there, it may lead to him feeling a bit strange as to if you are happy and sentimental at weddings in general or are secretly upset to lose your ex So yes, I can see how it takes a mature man to decide to be in that scenario with you, and you have been mature and thoughtful in considering that it may be weird for him. Don't be too hard on him if he chooses to opt out, if he does, ask if you can bring a gf instead and support the ex and have fun without having to be judged by the beau.

[Calendula]

While I often manage to fool myself and others into thinking that I've got it all figured out, I know in reality that I don't.

 

I visited my ex-fiance this afternoon and while we were talking I realized that I still irrationally blame him for things I don't currently like about where my life is now. I blame him even though I know for a fact that none of my choices, including the ones I made through inaction, were his responsibility or in any way his fault. He never made me do or say anything. He never even really asked me for so much of what I gave.

 

I think that my current set of mixed up feelings and the challenges I see myself facing during my ex-fiance's upcoming wedding may be more a matter of me coping with my choices of my past and where they've gotten me to (or not gotten me to), rather than about anything having to do with me and him directly....

 

Sometimes it seems so much easier to blame someone else for you not having accomplished a certain goal in your life than to take responsibliity for all the choices you have and have not made which actually led you to where you currently are. It is so much easier to see and criticize faults in others than to acknowledge your own faults and weeknesses and then take action to correct them.

[EricaH329]

Calendula!!! I've missed you so much! I'm very happy to see you posting again!! Unfortunately, I wish it would have been under different circumstances

 

It sounds like you've realized a lot emotionally. In my personal opinion, still harboring feelings that make you sad (or upset in any way) regarding your ex fiance, doesn't sound like something you should try pushing. What I mean by that, is if you go to this wedding, I have the feeling you may experience worse emotions.

 

I know you want to be there for him, and perhaps going may bring some finality to all these emotions you are experiencing now. But it could also backfire. I suppose either way, it'll be a chance you take.

 

As far as bringing your current love, if I were in that position, I don't think i'd mind much. Considering they are getting married, and there isn't much of a chance to rekindle anything, I wouldn't feel any particular way about it. I'd actually be happy that you decided to invite me, instead of leaving me out.

 

This is all my opinion, though. It's a difficult situation to be in, i'm sure. I'm sorry I couldn't have been more of a help.

[Calendula]

Hi Erica! It is good to see you still on LS and I'm glad you found my threads. I hope things are going well for you. I've been doing fairly well lately (part of the reason I haven't been hanging around LS) but this situation caught me off guard emotionally and I figured I could use some outside input to help me work through it. At this point any input is helpful.

 

My mixed up feelings aren't really about my ex-fiance and our past relationship as much as they are about me working through some remnants of my past. I'm still struggling to work through a number of things that I directly associate with my relationship with my ex-fiance, even though I recognize that that association may not be entirely rational. It is so much easier to cast blame than to accept responsibility for your own past choices and I'm trying my best not to blame my ex-fiance for things that were never his fault.

 

It's funny how tears can come from so many emotional places simultaneously: relief, happiness, fear of future loss, regret, pain, past loss, dissapointment, unmet needs, lonliness...

 

I feel some of these things and more, and yet so many of these feelings are not founded in fact, in what I actually have today. Why am I upset? Why do I cry? I've gained so much of what I've wanted and I'm well on my path to getting the rest of it. I have no doubts as to my abilities to reach my goals, and yet still I cry.

 

When I look back, so much of it still hurts, so much of it still brings tears to my eyes. Trying so hard to make something work that just wasn't meant to be, trying to create the impossible, leaving the man I truly love (who I now know is my true partner because of the fact that I left him) for someone who could never be good enough for me, the pain and loss all three of us have experienced in the past 7 years, somehow again finding my way back to my partner, my ex-fiance finding happiness as a result of our relationship and it's end... So much culminates in this one event. My emotions are tied to so much more than simply wanting someone you can't have - I don't even want my ex-fiance, I'm actually relieved that it ISN'T me he's marrying.

 

My hope is that by the time the wedding arrives I will have been able to work through all of these mixed up emotions and be able to be there for him to support him as a true friend. And if my partner decides to join me for the wedding I know I'll then cry for another whole set of reasons related to him; out of joy, amazement, appreciation, anticipation, happiness, hope for the future, and love, but also desire for what I cannot yet truly have (we're LDR), fear of loss, the pain of distance, future uncertainty, and stress about what still must be done to get to where we want to be. So many tears...

 

Perhaps you can understand the reason my threads are currently in the 'Coping' forum...