It seems inevitable your bridesmaids will hate you at some point, this much is a given

hen I sat down to write my new book, My Hot Friend, I couldn’t resist writing in a slightly bonkers engagement storyline. In the novel, one of the characters, Claire, has a friend who gets engaged and Claire is devastated when she’s passed over for the job of bridesmaid. It made me think that my own poor bridesmaids would probably have only loved to have been passed over for the often taxing role after I was done with them.

In the book, the engagement hoopla soon spirals into a costly, over-the-top nightmare that, after some research, I realised wasn’t that far from the reality of a lot of these things. In my fictional ‘friend gets engaged’ scenario, there are bridal showers, afternoons of manual labour making handmade decorations for the wedding and a ferociously expensive pre-hen do in a luxury hotel in Ibiza during which all the attendees have to follow the same crazy diet the bride is on.

I felt well-placed to write this story having gone slightly bats**t during my own engagement ten years ago. In the grand tradition of brides, I too forced my three best friends to wear identical dresses, help me pee when wearing my wedding dress and, I’m somewhat ashamed to admit, there was also some forced crafting of elaborate bunting. I feel somewhat traitorous to my gender saying this but the bridezilla thing is a cliche for a reason. When it comes to spending a year planning for a party at which you are the centrepiece, things can get a little out of hand.

I actually don’t think brides are to blame. I blame the culture in which we are raised. It’s like we’ve all drunk the collective kool-aid and decreed that weddings are one of the most important days of a woman’s life. It’s pretty ridiculous when you think about it in the grand scheme of life. My wedding day was very nice. I loved having all my friends and family together at a party. It was very special. One of the most important days of my life? I’m not so sure. But try telling me that at the time. I was whipped into the bridal frenzy that takes hold of so many of us. It doesn’t help that you’re surrounded by people emphatically repeating over and over that this is ‘YOUR DAY’! That s**t can get into your head.

‘This is MY DAY!’ you start to think when the cost starts to climb higher than a good sized car.

‘This is MY DAY,’ you think petulantly when your mother starts trying to make you invite people she owes favours to.

‘This is MY DAY,’ you think incensed when your friends won’t take part in the multi-day, hours-long debate about to veil or not to veil. By-the-by, I seriously regret not veiling – it’s really the only opportunity to veil in your life unless you count the shepherd’s tea towel during the nativity play in national school.

It seems inevitable that your bridesmaids will hate you at some point. This much is a given. I think mine hated me for all the bunting – they were using a different word for it by the time we finished all 30 metres.

I’ve also hated brides I was maiding for for anything from making me pay for the dress to giving me her phone and lipstick for the day and making me act like some kind of sentient handbag. Unreasonable, I know. What can I say? It’s weddings, they make pr**ks of us all.

The hen party can also be a real friendshipender – this is especially true for the person who gets lumped with organising it. There are really only two ways it can go. Either you suddenly find yourself drowning in spreadsheets, trying to arrange a mini break for 14 people who are refusing to respond to your emails and confirm whether or not they have any allergies. Or you are an attendee who is understandably irate about dropping €400 on a weekend away during which you will probably spend two days circling the same pubs wearing a pink tiara and trying to dodge other hen and stag parties. I demanded a multi-day hen party and now often think I should write every one of my gorgeous, patient friends a handwritten apology letter.

A cursory glance at the subreddit, Am I The Ass**le assuaged my fears somewhat about being the most self-obsessed, unreasonable bride out there. AITA, as it’s known, is a forum where posters can ask a jury of their peers (aka internet strangers) whether or not they’ve been the ass**le in any given situation. Let me tell you, the wedding stories are pretty bad.

One bride asked her friend to leave the wedding to go home and change into something that covered her psoriasis because the bride ‘didn’t want her guests feeling queasy during dinner’. Another refused to allow any of her bridesmaids to be blonde for the big day so that she could be the only blonde in the wedding party. Maybe my bunting wasn’t so bad after all?