My clique of friends [23/24F] planned a grad trip for months and we are supposed to go in end April or early May but one friend is pregnant and wants to cancel and go another year.

Hi reddit. I need your help on how to navigate this situation with minimal hurt feelings. I have a clique of friends. There are 5 girls including me, Kayla, Aly, Erica and Alexa. Over the 4 years in university, the clique has expanded to include our SOs and now there are 10 of us. We are all in our last year of university and we have been planning to tour Europe after graduation. It is meant to be a fun graduation trip for us.

We have all been extremely excited for the trip. 8/10 of us are studying law and we have secured job positions in different companies. Our last semester ends in late April and we will officially graduate in mid-July. After official graduation, those of us taking Law (8/10 of us) will have to hit the books again and take the bar examination and then immediately start training. There will be very little time to go for such a trip when we start working. All of us have been looking forward to this trip immensely. We started a group chat where we talk about possible places to visit and frequently edit our possible itinerary. Last December Alexa found out she was pregnant. She is keeping the baby. This leads us to problem number #1. Her relationship with her SO, Adrian, has ended very acrimoniously. Adrian says Alexa sabotaged his birth control and stopped taking her birth control to trap him with a baby and Alexa vehemently denies it. It is basically a she said-he said situation. This leaves the rest of us in a very awkward position. Alexa and Adrian have been dating for 1 & 1/2 years and during that time, he has become very close friends with the rest of us. Even though we have known Alexa for longer, I actually get along better with Adrian and enjoy his company more. Being friends with both of them is becoming very exhausting and challenging.

Onto problem number #2: Alexa would be close to 6 months pregnant when we leave for the trip and we would be travelling for more than 2 months. The travelling would be very hard on her understandably. Despite this, none of us are keen to cancel the trip as we have been looking forward to this trip for ages and would not be able to go for another one soon if we cancel this trip. Also, Aly and Kayla come from lower income families and have taken on additional part time work to save for this trip. They have saved penny by penny and I do not think it is fair to them who have juggled their studies and work to save for this trip, to cancel the trip. We have still been updating the group chat regularly. On Saturday Alexa suddenly says ‘haha guys, my baby will be born in August. We should go on the trip next year.’ In the group chat. I think she expects us to cancel the trip. Nobody replied to the message except Erica who just said ‘lol’. A few hours after that Alexa says into the group chat ‘btw guys the baby shower is planned on 16th June and I want everyone there!! ;p’ 16th June is right smack in the middle of the trip we are planning. It would be awful to skip her baby shower but this trip was planned months in advance. She just made the situation so much more awkward. Is it okay to have baby showers nearing the due date? Or even after the baby has been born? When can the earliest baby shower be done?

Problem #3: I have spoken with the rest of the group privately and all of them have expressed desire to continue with the trip as it is but no one really knows what to say to Alexa. Any suggestions? Adrian has also expressed interest in coming for the trip.

Problem #4: I don’t know what exactly happened but something has changed the group dynamics. Erica, Aly and the other SOs are starting to really dislike Alexa. Especially Erica who can be very cold towards Alexa now when she wasn’t before. She says Alexa is in the wrong and is siding with Adrian on this issue although I do not know how she knows so confidently that Alexa is wrong. I am neutral on this issue and am not taking sides yet.

Ugh I feel like I’m in such a sticky situation. Please help me reddit. How can I tell Alexa we do not wish to cancel the trip even if it means having to skip the baby shower? Should we still include Adrian in the trip who still really wants to go?

tl;dr: Grad trip planned months in advance, friend is pregnant and wants to cancel trip that some of us have been saving for and looking forward to. Friend's relationship with SO also ended badly and her SO is our close friend making the situation awkward.