Photos: Sleeping In The Aviary at the Hexagon (11/18/11)

Maid of honor isn’t honoring her commitment

Chicago Sun-Times November 10, 2008 | Ellie Tesher Dear Ellie: I asked my best friend last spring to be my maid of honor. She wants to participate in a two-day bike ride to conquer cancer five days before my wedding. She’d be missing dinners and bridal party get-togethers while she’s gone.

I’m terribly afraid that she’ll come to my wedding exhausted and unable to help as she’d promised. She just lost someone to cancer, but there are tons of other fund-raisers she could go to.

Am I being unreasonable to ask that she not participate in this ride? go to website maid of honor

Anxious Bride Dear Anxious Bride: Rise above the negative bridal impulse towards self-absorption and recognize this truth: Loss is as powerful as beginnings. You both have deep emotional investments in the events to come — her ride for cancer is a tribute to the person she loved and lost; your wedding is a celebration of love to last.

As best friends, you should embrace each other’s meaningful moments. Consider some compromises: 1) Accept that she helps you ahead with as many details as possible, then comes back and devotes herself to M-of-H duties. 2) Assign a backup person to be chief helper during the two days she’s away. 3) She accepts the role of bridesmaid, and you ask someone else to become first maid.

Main objective: Save the friendship with mutual respect and understanding.

Dear Ellie: My mother, 82, owns a small business; my sister has been her unpaid bookkeeper for 10 years. My mother didn’t trust her, they fought, my sister resigned.

Should I cut her out of my life? I can’t take her drama, nor money problems (bankruptcy), which I suspect she caused herself. Should I detail all of her mistakes and cost to my mother to the whole family?

Used to Be Close Dear Used to Be Close: Revenge on a family member leaves a bitter taste. The more you discredit her to others in the family, the more they see you as flawed for exposing the family dysfunction. Clean up the mess for your mother the best you can, just as you’d do if someone else caused it.

If necessary, get a third-party professional involved to help retrieve difficult information from your sister, rather than have to descend into accusations and denials. A tax lawyer may be able to supply someone who sorts through the stuff. in our site maid of honor

Clearly, your sister was not qualified for this job, and she was left with it too long. Perhaps others in the family — including you — bear some responsibility for not paying more attention, for choosing “unpaid” service for a decade rather than paying a professional. And for not recognizing that someone with financial problems shouldn’t be given this job.

I suspect that you feel this “hate” because it’s confused with anger at yourself. Take care of mom and business, and then try to see your sister’s behavior realistically.

Ellie Tesher