SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

On DD my childhood friend who lives abroad happened to message me and I ended up telling her what had happened. She knows my husband, was bridesmaid at our wedding, godmother to our children etc. anyway she sent a couple of messages of support then I heard nothing for 9 months until she asked how I was on my birthday and mentioned 'must he hard to forgive eh?'.

At Christmas she messaged to say she was getting married and asked me to be there. I then received the invite through the post saying only I was invited not my husband.

I politely declined the invite and when she questioned this I explained I couldn't afford to just take myself abroad and would feel socially awkward at a wedding on my own. She then replied 'yeah I thought you might but if (my husband) comes I'd have to say something seeing as what happened lol'.

I'm gutted. She has every right to invite who she wants to her wedding but to know she will basically never accept my husband or my decision to reconcile really stings. And to put lol at the end of the message rubs salt in the wounds. I swear she thinks infidelity is catching as her relationship is far from perfect (she has confided in me he going on all night drinking binges and they haven't been intimate in over a year).

I have no idea how to reply to this. Has anyone else lost friends due to their decision to reconcile?

It is sad but just from what you say, it might be better if you didn't attend a ceremony that is going to tie her to a man that goes

on all night drinking binges and they haven't been intimate in over a year.

She does sound like she is in denial about her own relationship.

Don’t worry. You can go to her next wedding. Lol. Seriously, what a non-propitious start. No sex for a year? Drunken binging? Not many people can stay married to someone who has already partnered with the bottle. She undoubtedly has redeeming value or you wouldn’t have remained friends for so long, but her judgmental attitude crosses into comedy. Read "To a Louse, On Seeing One on a Lady’s Bonnet at Church", by Scotland’s national treasure, Robert Burns. It contains the famous conclusion about the wish to see ourselves as others do.

Evio, that sounds very similar to what I am experiencing (turned to SI for advice, too).

It doesn’t feel fair that, on top of all the other losses, one also has to deal with losing friendships. I just do not want to feel forced to choose between my WH and my friends. Sadly, there aren’t many people who can sit with ambivalence and contradictions ("I disapprove of my WH's choices, yet I stay"). Even those who genuinely try to rebuild their relationship with him are sometimes struggling.

I read your friend’s attempt at humor as a sign of insecurity. I feel that many people use this kind of behavior to cover up the discomfort of a topic that hits too close to home ("if it can happen to her, maybe it could happen to me too").