My friend “Debra” 55-year-old woman have known each other since school days. Debra recently got engaged to her BF after dating him for 2 years. This is going to be Debra’s 6th marriage, and the wedding took place today. I was supposed to be her maid of honor again, so I was looking forward to it. 2 days ago, I called Debra and told her that I won’t be able to attend the wedding.

My ill Mother recently broke her leg and needed someone to stay with her for a while.

Debra was a bit sad, but she understood my emergency situation. She made a joke about how she’ll have to drink double the wine to make up for my absence.

I chuckled and joked back, “Don’t worry, I’ll just come to your 7th wedding.” The call went dead silent and she just hung up on me.

A few hrs later, I received several aggressive texts from the Bridesmaids. They said I was a B for making such a cruel joke, and that Debra had called them crying about how I “made fun of her.”

I feel bad and I’m wondering if I went too far.

Here are what netizens think:

• It’s not the nicest thing to say to someone when you are the made of honor and you are dipping out last minute for a low-level emergency 

• My dad’s aunt was married 8 times for a similar reason (she wouldn’t live with them before marriage) One of those marriages was actually to the third husband, again, but then she divorced him a second time. I always thought maybe she was just a huge optimist and thought each time “hey maybe having a man in my space will be alright this time!”

• Are we in the same family? Lol my aunt just had her 6th wedding and this was her reasoning. Let’s ignore the fact that she’s has in fact cheated on all the other husbands but it’s a sin to not be married. LOL

• At how many marriages does it become OK to joke “LOL this one will fail too!” right before it?

My daughter is 22 and she wants to move out soon. She is planning on moving out with her best friend. It doesn’t make much sense economically.

My daughter doesn’t have a high salary and the way things are going if she moves out she will take years to save up for down payment. She wants to buy a home and living with us she can save a lot of money.

Another factor Is that her best friend has a boyfriend and I have heard her best friend talking about moving in with him. So it could also be a situation where my daughter will have to find a new roommate after a year. It doesn’t make sense at all.

We were talking about moving and she asked me what I thought of it. I told her that it didn’t make sense financially if she wanted to move out and she will have to delay buying a house. I also mentioned that she could have to find a new roommate if her friend got serious with her boyfriend.

She got upset and irritated. She said she would deal with it and she ended the conversation quickly.

My husband thinks we should just let her make her own decisions and mistakes.

Here are what netizens think:

Your daughter has an opportunity here to spread her wings and experience some independence. You are falling for entirely natural parental instincts to shield your child from any possible negative that might happen.

What I’m seeing here is a sort of struggle toward maturity. Mature enough to want to move out but still wants approval from parents for what she does–to the extent of getting unreasonable when it’s not forthcoming. Possibly moving out after being advised not to will help her become her own person. We can hope.

When I get asked for advice by my adult daughters, I generally always start with, “Well, it’s your decision and I will support you no matter what you decide.” Then I give them the pros and cons as I see them.