Trouble in Paradise
sunniedaze
member
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Overwhelming Wedding
Hi, I'm getting married in about 7 months and no one has been helping me with the plans. I don't know anything about wedding stuff except from what I have read in my books and online. It is really hard and stressful. We are on a tight budget and I don't know how to make it all work. I didn't even want this big affair. I wanted to elope. My fiancé is now trying to help after we almost broke up. But he just doesn't get it . He doesn't understand that certain things have to be done certain ways for weddings. His line is whatever you want or who cares about anyone else's ideas... Stuff like that doesn't make the decisions or get things done. I have barely any family left and no living parents, so no one can teach me what is what. I guess I am just stressed and frustrated with it all. I just need help with this.
Thank you
Thank you
Re: Overwhelming Wedding
Some backstory about that will help. It will help us give you a better answer...and I don't want to be a wet blanket but depending upon what the problem is, perhaps you and he need to stop and take a breather and perhaps rethink getting married at all.
It's essential that the 2 of you agree on EVERYTHING, whether it's finances, religion and other issues --- and yeah, even what kind of wedding the 2 of you wish to have.
If you are in disagreement about what kind of wedding that you and he are having, I suggest you stop the planning now, sit down with him and have a heart to heart discussion: "Listen, I am not keen on having the wedding that is being planned; I want something smaller and lower key. I want to do that" and see what he says.
If you cannot agree on a wedding, then what will you agree upon once you are married? And what will you agree upon when there are key issues that will affect you and him indefinitely? See what I am getting at?
That you do not want the wedding that's planned and that he keeps saying "oh whatever you want" shows me he isn't listening to you!!!! It's essential that he do so!
Cool the wedding plans stat and have a talk with him asap.
And yes, why did you almost break up? Backstory would be great.
Admittedly, a wedding and planning it is NOT a guy thing. Guys generally don't care about flowers and music and what the ladies will be wearing and who your loud and drunk Uncle Mort is going to sit with, etc --- but it should not be as such that he's acting the way he is acting.
Talk to him.
Do it TODAY.
And if you have other issues and they are big ones, perhaps it is best if you cut your losses and go. Those issues will be there after the I DOs are said and the festivities are over. A marriage doesn't change a person nor does it eradicate issues you have right now.
For the record: I too have no parents and a very miniscule family --- so I see where this is at with you. I have been there. And I planned the whole thing myself (FI helped where he could --- and indeed, you can see from that that a wedding isn't all "a girl thing" -- he still helped with who sat where, what the guys were wearing, what to get the guy attendants as thank you gifts, he drove me here or there for brow appointments, we went and saw all the vendors together, etc)
Anyhow - OP, what is it you feel you "have" to do? Why did you two almost break up? Why CAN'T you elope?
And I fully agree- you can never make everyone happy. So stop trying. You need to take your guests comfort into mind, but that doesn't mean you have to take every last person's opinion into account if their opinion doesn't work for the bigger picture.
~Benjamin Franklin
DS dx with celiac disease 5/28/10
OP - here's what matters most to wedding: food and drink. Pick a good caterer, have drinks available free of charge, and don't fret over the other things like monograms, decorations, or outdoing someone else's wedding. Feed your guests. Let them drink. Have some music playing and you'll have a fabulous wedding.
If you can't afford full open bar, which is totally normal, then offer something like one wine, one beer and one signature drink or just a signature drink. (Don't do cash bar, please.) If you can't afford a DJ or a band, just have an iPod playing music you like.
Colors, invitations, bridesmaids dresses, etc... blah. If you find it stressful then just don't worry about that stuff. My Maid of Honor picked a purple dress to wear so I picked purple and white flowers. I made everything tulips since they were plentiful in spring and came in all colors.
Good luck! Don't stress over the small stuff.
I would never suggest not feeding guests! I meant the traditions like flowers, dress, colours, all the little details that seem to get so many people's panties in a bunch. I couldn't believe the things my MIL cried over: cupcakes, using yellow as a wedding color, my DH wearing a suit instead of a tux, my bridesmaids not having matching dresses, not having a choreographed first dance, not having a DJ, etc, etc etc. I fully agree - feed your guests and provide booze if you can. Figure that part out first and you'll know how much you have left for the other stuff. I saved a lot by having an iPod instead of a DJ, getting a friend to do photos, and making a lot of the decor stuff myself.
Meet each other halfway.
If you do not wish to have a big wedding, a traditional wedding or whatever wedding it is, why should you be railroaded into it? Find a compromise. Settle for half the guests, if this is a largish wedding, rather than what you originally decided on.
I don't know, the ceremony has way more strict rules and traditions than the reception, which is more informal. I felt forced into having a huge church wedding because my DH's family refused to come if we didn't have one. Never mind the fact that I'm not catholic and my DH gave up on church years ago. So I hated my ceremony. Everything about it was unfamiliar, not "me" or my DH at all, I didn't get to promise what I wanted to promise, and half the service was in a language I don't even understand. The reception was where I did what I wanted. (Make promises to my DH, eat good food and dance with my family and friends.) I think the ceremony is where a lot of people get their panties in a bunch.
I agree with you to a point.
But, if the bride and groom only eat lettuce and bacon, feeding that to their guests is rude.
That's all I'm trying to say.
I'm still waiting to hear what, exactly, has to be done a certain way for a wedding that your fiance just isn't understanding.
And I'm going to say it - if planning a wedding is this stressful for you, if you can't do it without someone holding your hand and you and your fiance are threatening each other with breaking up over it...........how in holy heck are you two going to actually, you know, make it through life together? Because good Lord - planning a wedding was easy peasy compared to raising a family and being an adult over the last 10 years. The wedding was nothing but a big fancy party. Life is hard. Having a party isn't.
I kind of get what you're saying, but I also think you're lucky if your wedding was easy. I hate weddings in general and didn't even want a wedding, but if was surrounded by crazy people. Weddings sometimes seem to create an open season of terrorizing the bride. If your family wasn't like that, you're lucky! My ILs were insane, and freaked out about every single aspect of the wedding (and they only knew minor details because I knew not to tell them anything) threatened not to come to my shower, the wedding rehearsal and the wedding (which we just ignored, and they did show up, but it was VERY awkward, refused to smile in photos so all our wedding photos look like they were taken at an execution, etc. etc. etc. It was horrible. All I could do was go ahead, not tell them anything about the wedding, ignore their threats, but it was still stressful and unpleasant. And my own brother and his wife turned crazy too, and chose not to come for family photos at our wedding, because SIL was taking her 3 year old to have her hair done. So...no, it's not always a fun party. I would rather re-do giving birth to my son (and I didn't have drugs!) than re-live my wedding and the weeks leading up to it. It was like everyone had taken crazy bitch pills.
There is no rule book that says you HAVE to do your wedding a certain way. I broke the local rules, did something entirely different than all my friends, family and acquaintances - who all basically had the exact same damn wedding. I had it at an entirely different venue and did it completely the way WE WANTED IT. I did it all for under $7000 and had 125 guests. It was absolutely lovely. Even tho I am now divorced, people to this day tell me it was one of the their most favorite weddings.
Why? Because I didn't buy into all the bullshit that my wedding had to be a particular way.
Do what you want, how you want it, when and where you want it.
It is NOT worth the damn stress.
If you do decide to have the wedding keep it minimal and feed the guests. People will remember the food before they remember the flowers.
Love: March 2010 Marriage: July 2013 Debt Free: October 2014 TTC: May 2015