**I am NOT OOP, OOP is u/IsopodSubstantial465** **Originally posted to r/AITAH** **AITAH for removing my fiancée’s friends from the wedding...
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The original was posted on /r/bestofredditorupdates by /u/Choice_Evidence1983 on 2025-11-01 04:04:06+00:00.

I am NOT OOP, OOP is u/IsopodSubstantial465

Originally posted to r/AITAH

AITAH for removing my fiancée’s friends from the wedding party after they confronted me about my family’s gifts?

Thanks to u/soayherder for suggesting this BoRU

Editor’s note: changed letters to names, added paragraph breaks for ease of readability

Trigger Warnings: harassment, possible racism, manipulation, gaslighting, past trauma

Original Post: July 23, 2025

My gf/fiancé (32F) and I (33M) have been together for four years. We met through common friends and after a while of casually hanging out we began dating and now are engaged. She has a core friend group of four people (including her). Two guys, one of whom is her cousin, and a girl, and they have been very close since childhood.

When I had first met the other three, before we had begun dating, they seemed like nice people. Fun to hang out with. But when I was reintroduced to them as her bf, things were different. I knew they were judging me which is fine. I knew there would be a “friends test” I would have to go through. But now four years later, it still feels like I am being tested.

So, for some background. My gf is sweet, caring, empathetic and sensitive. She has been hurt in past relationships. We have spoken about it briefly. She gets upset when we talk about it so I have never pushed her much. But from what I know while she was never physically abused, they were still toxic relationships. May have involved emotional abuse. Considering that, I get her friends being protective.

Early when we were dating and gradually became serious, her friends always found ways to, I don’t know how to explain this, show me my place in her life (if that makes sense). They would whisk her away if we were together, barge into our dates. She shares everything with them so they knew where we were going on dates. The only way I could get her to myself is if I planned a surprise getaway. But how many of those can you do?

When I reached my saturation point, we talked. She has a blind side with them and never noticed what they were doing. After I pointed it out and she saw it happen the next time they did it, she called them out. Threatened to stop talking to them. After a bit of bickering, they relented and apologized. To her. Not me.

Anyway, things got much better after that. Cut to recently. I know she is the one for me. I love her immensely. In my culture, we don’t have the whole proposing with a ring, but I knew she has always wanted that. I picked out a ring that belongs to my grandmother. It is part of a jewelry set. In our tradition, when we get married the new bride is welcomed to the family with the elders presenting her with heirloom jewelry. I know my grandmother will be giving her the remaining jewelry set as a wedding present. My parents and other elders in the family will also be gifting similar things.

The thing is these sets they are traditional. I guess what I am trying to say is that they may be too gaudy by modern standards. My gf loved the ring even though it isn’t like the more conventional engagement rings. I know all these sets she will eventually get she won’t wear. Probably ever. She likes to keep her style simple. But I just thought that gold is an asset, even if she doesn’t wear them, there’re hers for any other use in life.

My gf knows all of this. She never said anything about it. Cut to a week back, the trio came over when my gf wasn’t home. They said that I was being selfish. That under the garb of tradition, I was forcing my gf to accept gifts she doesn’t want. Mind you, we do have a bridal registry set up and I know for a fact many family members, friends and colleagues have already selected items from there.

I told them that what my family gifts to my gf isn’t their business. They said that I was no different from her past partners. I was also being emotionally abusive and gaslighting her. My gf had previously asked me to make her two guy friends my groomsmen. My brother is my best man. And I had agreed to make her happy. But after what they said, I told them then that they were no longer my groomsmen.

When my gf got back I told her what happened. While she agrees that her friends had no right to comment on the gifts my family give her, and she clarified that she does not share their opinion, she does feel I went too far and overreacted by removing her friends from the wedding party. She had always wanted all three friends to be a part of her wedding and my rejection now means that won’t happen. AITA?

AITAH has no consensus bot, OOP received the majority of NTAs

Relevant Comments

Commenter 1: NTA I wonder if the past relationships of your gf were truly abusive or if her friends gaslighted her in believing they were

OOP: This is difficult for me to find out. Like I said she doesn’t like talking about it and the only other way I could find out is if I snooped around behind her back. And I just don’t want to do that to her.

Commenter 2: I’m so sorry this happened. Being a groomsman is an honour- not a right of passage because they are friends of the bride. They have disrespected you and do not deserve the privilege of standing next to you during the ceremony. NTA - choose people that support and love you.

OOP: Thank you for the support. I am determined on not taking them back as my groomsmen and have already reached out to my cousin and a close friend to fill in. They have happily accepted.

OOP on the discussions of gifts with his fiancée

OOP: We have talked about the gifts. When I said elders, it will only be my grandmother, my parents, my uncle (mother’s brother) and aunt (father’s sister) who will be gifting her the heirlooms. Most others will be gifting from the registry. I had told her that if she doesn’t want the jewelry then all the above people will pick something from the registry. The jewelry will simply be kept aside for my sister. She said that while the jewelry isn’t somthing she would usually pick for herself, she still thinks they are beautiful pieces.

I am Indian and sometimes when she attends my family events, she does wear saree. Looks gorgeous and she carries it so well. She says when she attends such events post marriage she could always wear the jewelry then since it wouldn’t look out of place.

I believe her when she says she loves the engagement ring and that she’s okay with getting the heirloom jewelry as wedding presents.

She said she had talked to her friends about the gifts and shown them pictures of the sets she was going to get. She never said she didn’t want them. They assumed based on the fact that they aren’t things she usually likes.

Commenter 3: Your gf does not want to choose between you and her 3 friends. The 3 friends do not want to lose the gf to you. You need to stand your ground! Until/unless your gf clarifies her relationship with the 3 friends, a marriage would be doomed.

OOP: I know if I pushed her to choose she would probably pick me. I say probably only because nothing is 100% sure in life. But I also know it would break her heart to do so. I worry that if that happens she may resent me in later life for being the reason her childhood friendships broke.

Commenter 4: When you two get married the friends should quietly show up less. You say your culture a lot. If your a different race, then believe racism is what’s happening here. Seems the friends are picking on you. Maybe her other relationships weren’t toxic. Maybe the other boyfriends just told the friends off and put them in their place. Besides picking friends, any other flaws your fiance might have?

OOP: I am a different race. I am Indian. I am not sure if race is the issue. While my fiance, her cousin and the non-cousin guy friend are white, the girl in the group is biracial. And in our larger circle of friends, there are people from many different races. That doesn’t tend to be a problem. Her three stooges have always given me the cold shoulder, but I’ve never really gotten racist vibes from them.

While I don’t get along with her core trio, I am on good terms with her family. He parents and younger siblings have been very warm and welcoming. Even her work friends and colleagues are nice.

I am sure my fiancée, like everyone else, has flaws. But not sure how fixating on that will help?

Update: July 26, 2025 (three days later)

Update: AITAH for removing my fiancée’s friends from the wedding party after they confronted me about my family’s gifts?

Buckle up! This is going to be a really long post, so I decided to post the update separately. My first post is here: Original Post

First up, thank you to all the people who shared their support and for the comments that eventually led to a lot things getting cleared up. I knew asking for advice on Reddit is a double-edged sword. While many of the comments were helpful and encouraged to me seek some much-needed answers, others were…

Content cut off. Read original on https://old.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/comments/1olemxn/aitah_for_removing_my_fiancées_friends_from_the/

  • Spacehooks@reddthat.comMEnglish
    1·
    8 days ago

    Comments 3:

    The news of the three getting booted out of the wedding and our lives immediately spread to our circle of friends. Mostly cause the stooges wanted to spread their lies to gain sympathy. They were reiterating their BS about me being abusive and how I am trying to isolate her by removing them from her life. But a lot of our friends were aware of the shit attitude they had towards me for the longest time and didn’t believe them outright. They reached out to us and we shared our side. Now most of our friends are backing our decision to go NC with them, barring a few who have taken a more neutral stance and even fewer who believe that they were beings idiots but deserve a second chance since they’ve been friends for so long.

    Her younger brother, who is dating the girl’s cousin, also thinks she overreacted. He believes going NC with such old friends was too harsh, especially since their sabotage failed and we are still together, so they deserve a second chance. He is just 21 and an idiot. Neither of us cares about his opinion or the opinion of anyone who says, we’re being too harsh by going NC.

    The trio’s parents, especially Ray’s, have also been creating noise. Turns out, they (Ray’s parents) may have known about what the stooges were doing. They were apparently very enthusiastic about the idea of my gf becoming their future daughter-in-law. That is not happening.

    We have been bombarded with messages over the last 12 hours from friends and family and, of course, the stooges. Most have been supportive. Some judgmental. The trio has been messaging my gf constantly. The last we checked there were nearly 80 messages from them. She hasn’t read any. Says she wants nothing to do with them ever again. If this behaviour continues we will looking into getting a restraining order. Not sure yet if we have the grounds for it. But we’ll see what can be done.

    I think the worst of it is behind us, but the situation is still messy. My gf wants to start individual therapy, and we have both agreed to begin couples counseling. We love each other. We want to do the work. We just need things to settle down a bit more before we move forward with the wedding.

    I think the best part in all of this is that now not only will they not be the groomsmen when we do get married, but my gf has also replaced her Maid of Honor with her another close friend. Not only will the trio not be a part of our wedding party, they have been uninvited from the wedding, along with their families. We might even kick her younger brother out of the wedding if he continues to yap about us overreacting. But we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.

    I feel lighter already, but I know my gf is hurting. She is putting up a brave face now, but it will take some time to get over this. I hope therapy will help, her and us both.

    TL;DR: My gf’s childhood friends tried to sabotage our relationship by spreading lies, including telling at least one of her exes she had schizophrenia. They also tried to stir conflict over heirloom wedding gifts to create a wedge between us. After I confronted an ex and played a recording of his claims, my gf was devastated but confronted her friends, who admitted they wanted her to end up with one of them (Ray). She cut them off completely. The wedding is postponed, but we are still together, starting therapy soon, and planning to move forward—without the toxic trio or their families.

    Edit/s:

    Can’t update an update so lets call these edits or clarifications-

    1. We have indeed gone NC with them but haven’t blocked their numbers yet. We will not be blocking their numbers till next weekend. Just giving them more time to dig their own graves. After that, we will document the messages for posterity and then block them

    2. In due time, we re looking into sending cease and desist letters on the grounds of defamation and slander. Its only been 3-4 days and a lot has happened so fast, we need some time to just calmly think about our next steps

    3. We have shared the recording in a common friends group chat. If that finds its way to social media somehow, well so be it

    4. For all those claiming that this is a fake story, AI post, a creative writing exercise, all because I started the post with “Buckle Up,” to them all I have to say is, Enjoy: https://youtu.be/nzexue59Vv4

    Relevant Comments

    Commenter 1: Wow what an update! I’m so sad for you gf but also glad it’s all out there. Holding off on the wedding until she is in a better place mentally is a great idea. I wish you two the best going forward and I really hope you never have a reason to post an update unless it’s “we got married and it was perfect!”

    Side note. Your gf reminds me so much of myself when it comes to how she handles confrontation. I found out as a late diagnosis that I have ADHD (it presents differently in females and often overlooked) and because of the ADHD I also suffer from Rejection Sensitivity Disorder (RSD) I don’t know if she could possibly be suffering from this but it was so eerily similar how you described how she handles confrontation that I wanted to bring it up. It’s worth looking into. I’ve come a long way since then know that I have a basis for why I react that way to confrontation.

    OOP: Thank you for your well wishes and the suggestions. I’ll tell her about it and maybe she can bring it up with her therapist she starts her sessions.

    All of this in three days?

    OOP: Pretty much. We had most of our discussions the day I posted the first time. I had always known one of her exes was within my circle of acquintaince. I had just never wanted to snoop. But I did. We met up early the next day. It didn’t take that long to get the BS from him. From there things snowballed. We confronted the idiots that night. I wanted to wait a fews days, but she didn’t. Said if she needed to get it all out when she was angry. And now here we are. She took her anger out on them, I am ranting on Reddit.

    Commenter 2: Did you tell the ex that he dumped a nice girl because of some lies?

    OOP: I did. But he didn’t seem to believe me. Just shrugged his shoulders as if to say is wasn’t his problem either way. He spent time with her. Never saw any obvious signs for anything and chose to believe her friends. The way I see it, it was his loss and my gain.

    Could OOP and his fiancée elope instead? No need to have outsiders’ opininos on ruining the relationship

    OOP: Ha! That’s actually a great idea! But I am Indian and it already took a lot to convince my family that we didn’t want a big Indian wedding. I love my culture and heritage but both of us agreed that a simple Christian ceremony would be more ideal for us than 3-4 days of extravagant rituals and traditions. But eloping would disappoint both sets of parents. They have been so supportive of us, so we don’t really want that.

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