{Confession} “I wish my wedding would go away.”
I’ve tried three times to come up with happy, inspiring things to say to you. I’ve tried to put together a fun, inspiring project that will emanate positive juju out there, for the world to lavish. I’ve tried to Fake-It-Till-I-Make-It. But you know what? This week, I have my first confession for you. I just want my wedding to go away.
This is my stressed face. I am so lovely.
I know. You probably just fell off your chair. I’ll give you a moment to recover. I’ll be here once you’ve worked through the, Brides don’t say things like that! And the, Oh my goodness, that girl just cursed her wedding! And the, She kisses her momma with that mouth?!
Good? Good. Because you know what? It’s just a fact. And it really ruffles my feathers (which are peacock, and made of watercolor paper, and absolutely lovely) that there is an expectation of perfection put on brides. It’s just… you know what? It’s just plain unfair. And if no one else will say it, I will. There are days when I just want my damn wedding to go away.
I don’t think this makes me a Bad Bride. I also don’t think it makes me a Bridezilla. {Maybe blogging about it does, but I’m willing to don the moniker if that’s what it takes to get this heard.} What it does make me is a human being, who just shaved 8 months off her prep time, planning the biggest party of her life. I’m overwhelmed. I’m trying to balance this against the rest of my life, and keep everyone I love happy, and I’m sticking to a budget for the first time in my natural life. It’s hard. And sure, there are good times, but it’s not always easy and it certainly isn’t always fun.
I realized that I did not always like my wedding when I called my mother this past weekend to report on the third hotel we’ve prospected for our out of town guests to stay in. The project had eaten the whole weekend and I was dangerously under-caffeinated and was having a hard time recalling the last time I had been able to just relax. “Mid-October” was the best I could come up with. I mentioned to my mother that I having a hard time keeping a positive attitude, and she cheerfully chirped, “Well, smile Honey. This is what you signed on for!”
The anger, oh the anger, at being told to cheer up. I’m not proud of my disposition, or my mood, and I certainly don’t mean to make excuses for it. Bad Moods don’t need excuses – bad moods are just a fact. They’re a natural part of the emotional process you’re going through, as a bride. They happen. Trying to squelch them out or ignore them doesn’t always work. Sometimes you just have to ride them out.
And you know what? That’s fine. It’s OK. There are going to be days when you don’t like your wedding. There are going to be days when you beg your fiancé to please have mercy and just elope. There are going to be days when you’d sign over the rights to your first born if someone, anyone else will just handle the overwhelming pile of phone calls you have to make and e-mails you meant to respond to last week. You contemplate changing your name, just so you can ignore everyone who asks for you.
You are not a Bridezilla until you start making other people cry. You are not a Bad Bride if you find yourself wishing that magical wedding elves would take over the meticulous detailing of your wedding day. You’re just a normal human girl who is reacting to an insane, heightened level of expectation on your shoulders. You’re balancing it all against staying on your budget, and you’re really doing your best not to verbally assault your bridesmaids. You can only budget, beg, barter and plead so much before you tap the last of your emotional resources. Nobody expects you to go on like this forever, even if it feels that way. I promise.
You are a good person in just plain weird circumstances. You are allowed to wish your wedding would just go away. I’ve found that when I get into a mood like that, the best thing I can do is just walk away from my planning, and leave it alone for an hour or two. I’ll go cuddle up next to The Groom and politely request he not ask me anything about The Wedding until I bring it up again. I’ll read a book or watch a movie that has nothing to do with weddings. I’ll have a glass of wine and dream about what recipes I’ll be testing in the upcoming days.
I give the wedding a time-out. I give myself a time-out. Before either of us can irreparably damage the other.
I do this because the best solution when I’m writhing in agony as my wedding tap-dances on my last frayed nerve, is always to hire the first wedding planner I can find, no matter how outrageous their charge. It’s not a real solution. It’s just the stress getting the better of me. So I take a little break from the wedding, and when I feel like playing nice again, I remind myself one of the best pieces of advice I’ve received in this wedding planning process:
“Try to make the most of being engaged. You’re only engaged for a limited amount of time. You get to be married forever.”
Somehow the mixture of a brief reprieve and those words sets the world right again. I feel like a sane human being who can handle a couple hundred paper flowers and a phone call to her mother. I start feeling like my wedding and I can be friends once more, and get back to work.
It’s not about being impervious to stress—remember that. It’s not about being perfect or keeping it all together and balance. It’s about understanding your stress symptoms, recognizing when you’re at you’re breaking point and handling it as responsibly as possible. Sometimes we find ourselves in an irrational, angry place. We’re allowed to visit, every now and then. Just remember you don’t want to live there full-time.
Remember that it’s not permanent; it’s temporary. And the other land that you live in, the one with all the flowers and cake? It’ll still be there, waiting to welcome you back, when you’re feeling a little more fresh-faced and can-do. In the meantime, don’t hesitate to reach out to your fellow brides. There are hundreds of us out here who also wish our weddings would just go away, who won’t tell you to calm down or to smile. You can be miserable and ornery and outright petulant. You don’t have to be alone. Don’t forget. We’re all in this together.
And you can always do what my friends on Grey’s Anatomy recommend: Dance it Out!
-MM.
Ah! Right on sister! Thank you! I'm not crazy!
I recently realized that I was not having the-absolute-most-amazing-fun in the world with My Wedding. Chalk this up to guestlist slashing stress and a weird run-in with our venue owner over a band we were trying to ensure would comply with the acoustic/minimally amplified rules. I also realized that almost EVERYTHING that I was looking at in my spare time is "wedding." Blogs, newsletters, magazines, emails I had signed up for – you name it, I had access to it, in the interest of Gathering Great Research for The Wedding.
So, I recently told myself "Whoa. Just whoa." I've unsubscribed from the blogs, newsletters, and emails that really don't bring sparkle to my day, and, more often that not, leave me feeling as if this might just be more of a full-time job than I have time for. I fill The Wedding space with the hilarity of BAB and leave MS and her amazing DIY-ness just a small sliver of the pie. I started reading a novel and cuddling up with The Groom, sans laptop, a little more often. (The Groom has been awesome, but let's be honest, all of the 78 bajillion little questions/ideas/details just don't occur to him the way they do to me. He's great at tackling them when I voice them, but it was me wrestling with them.)
Anyways – I ABSOLUTELY agree. Thanks for this post. Happy Wednesday!
I happily agree with you. Sometimes there are days I wish the wedding would just cease to exsist. Goodbye to all the flowers, cake, lace, shoes, DIY projects, and 'details! details! details!'. Bleck! I want a nice, lovely, memorable wedding, but not at the expense of my sanity or the well being of my relationship with my hubby-to-be. Your confession is not bleak, depressing, or cause for people to run and hide. Your confession is simply this: REFRESHING. From myself and all the other brides out there who don't feel like a wedding cheerleader on crack: THANK YOU.
Dare I remind everyone the real focus should be on the Marriage? They certainly last longer, cost more, frustrait infinitely and are The End of everything you are doing. Weddings today are about The Stuff, and not The Substance.
Just a little Reality Check.
Carry On.
Wow Scoobie. Way to miss the point. It's perfectly natural to feel stress for all the reasons Mallory listed. You don't have to be planning a "Platinum Wedding" to sometimes get caught up in the chaos. I don't think she's lost sight of her marriage – in fact the way she deals with the wedding stress shows that she has her priorities in tact.
Brides today are set up with a giant double standard. They are supposed to have the attitude that they don't care about the details, but at the same time the weddings are still expected to be perfect. Even if you fight hard to push back against these pressures, it can still get to you from time to time. Good for you Mallory, for bringing this "dirty little secret" out in the open for discussion!
I enjoyed reading this! I have been a bit stressed out myself with trying to even START planning–family emergencies and deaths are a big halt on wedding planning :/ — but I realize I'm not even in the middle and definitely nowhere near the end with this…hehe.
But this was nice to read and be reminded that we all are indeed human and are prone to this things AND that we all are not engaged forever…Thank GOD
!
Thank you for the post!
I have been engaged for over a year now, and I totally sympathize. There's so much pressure to set everything in stone ASAP as soon as you get engaged! First there's pressure to plan, and then there's planning-induced stress, and then event-induced anxiety…AGH! I feel there's many brides in your same situation Mallory, who are just afraid to admit that they're ready to rip their hair out over the whole ordeal. To those brides, I say – maybe it's time to reassess your sitch. Pitch a tantrum, scale back your plans, elope, whatever it takes. Preserve your sanity, at any cost!
Dude, seriously? TAKEABREAKTAKEABREAKTAKEABREAK!!! Step away from the wedding…
And, also, yes the focus should be on the marriage, or whatever, but first you have to get through the wedding. Which is a lot of work, and time consuming, and brain consuming, and a lot of work that deals with stuff you don't want to deal with, like arranging things and paying for them, and staying on schedule. It can be an entirely separate life, you know?
As far as the marriage is concerned, that just has to do with your relationship. You know your limits, and hes right there. Communicate, ask for help, lean on him, 'cause there he is. You'll be fine.
Your wedding doesn't have to be perfect, because everyone has a different definition for that. It just has to be YOURS.
Thanks for this post! I frequently feel like I want to hide in the pantry or the bathtub or a Vegas wedding chapel to get away from my wedding. It's like it's grown legs and walked all over my life. OK…calming down…breathe….breathe….
I completely agree. I love planning events, but weddings are their own beast… it's more emotional and meaningful to everyone, which means a bunch more opinions are being thrown in. I was getting extremely overwhelmed and emotional way too often, when my fiance and I came up with this idea:
I send a "Weekly Wedding Recap" email to our families every Monday. It lets them know what we're working on that week, what meetings/decisions we've made, and lets them know what we're going to be tackling next if they have input. That way we don't have to tell everyone the same thing on separate phone calls, they aren't asking us about wedding stuff all the time, and it holds us accountable as well. I can say "This week we're picking a cake baker" and know that by the next week we'll have a decision made and ready for the email. It's helped keep the wedding talk/insanity down a bit, which leaves more time for me and my fiance to spend together!
Thank you, thank you, thank you for posting this! I've felt this way for most of my engagement (which has already been a year). I think these feelings are only amplified by working with a small budget, it only adds to the stress of an already stressful process. Plus, may I just say that the price of wedding relating items (catering, photography, cake, etc) is just CRAZY! When all hope was feeling lost the other day I realized that when I feel this way I have to remind myself that I'm doing this because I'm marrying my best friend and he is worth all the stress in the world.
You ladies are absolutely amazing!!! I can't tell you how validating it is after a long week of wondering if eloping isn't just easier, to hear that I am not alone.
FutureMrsYoung & JuniperHomeVntg – I, too, will be engaged just over a year when we get married. And I planned on being engaged until November… It's a very long time to live in a heightened state of GOTTAGETITDONE. I feel your pain. I've found a great stress reliever is one bar of chocolate mixed with one cup of wine.
Taleitha — we bumped the wedding forward because we have someone in our close family got some tough news, and November just seemed too far away. I know how you feel. You and your family are all in my prayers, and don't hesitate to shoot me an email if you'd like help just getting started. Sometimes, the best way to make progress really is just one step at a time. 
My dear, you are not alone.
I also LOVE Laura's point about the double standard — it's horrible and unfair. It's impossible to keep everything from falling through the cracks if you're not going a little batty to make sure you've FOUND all the cracks. GeekyHostess's idea of the weekly e-mail update is brilliant, as is HearHear's e-purge of her electronic clutter! Both are great ways to focus a little, which helps weed out peripheral stress. The e-mail update is particularly smart because I don't operate in a world without deadlines. It creates a little space to get things done, and some serious accountability (because Lord knows there's no boss as consistent in follow up as a mother who needs details about a wedding!)
Liz, a wedding that gives you a separate or double life? YES. YES YES YES. Especially around my single girlfriends, any of my professional contacts and all the Groomsmen.
It's really hard to just turn it off – it's on my mind all the time! But I don't want to be THAT GIRL who eats sleeps and breathes nothing but her wedding. That's where the aforementioned wine and chocolate come in. 
Bekah!! My wedding, too, has grown legs and is walking all over my life. And, sadly, mine does not appear to be housebroken. Do you know how hard it is to get glitter out of carpeting?! Impossible. IMPOSSIBLE!
And Scoobie. I understand what you're saying, and I don't necessarily disagree with you. There is a lot of STUFF involved in planning a wedding. Any time I get overwhelmed, I whisper softly to myself, "Preacher and a witness." That's all I need to get married to The Groom, and that's all that matters. Anything else that goes right that day… bonus. Anything that goes wrong but doesn't stop us from getting married? Whatever. THAT'S my perspective. But who doesn't like racking up bonus points, right? Our wedding day– the actual ceremony and the party — that's not about Just Us. It's not about our marriage, or our relationship. It's a celebration that we're planning for our families. To look at it as just being about us and being about our marriage is a little tunnel-visioned for how we want the day to play out. We're joining two huge families, and there's a lot of STUFF to take into consideration… Our guests range from 9 years old to 97 years old. Bedtimes and diets vary. Necessary amenities vary. Half the family (my side) is traveling 5 hours to a town they can't navigate on their own. These are all things that affect my wedding… not my marriage.
And you better believe that if they're not handled, I'll hear about it, every Holiday, birthday and Christmas news letter for the rest of my natural life. I choose some of this stress because I care about my whole family, each of my guests, being comfortable and happy on my first day as a wife. I can take care of tying up all the loose ends now, or I can run around like a mad woman on the day of my wedding. I choose to take care of it now, and Right Now, that's stressful. And I own that– most of the anxiety, I brought upon myself. My mother was right. But that doesn't mean it's not there, and it doesn't mean I can simply ignore it. And to be honest, I think my marriage will be strong because my future husband and I are working through all The Stuff together. 
So one doesn't necessarily make a statement about the other.
Oh, fabulousmsmoxie, what an elegant reply. We too believe the ceremony is for Just Us. That's why my dear, v. spiritual cousin is presiding over the ceremony while we technically marry each other (permitted in our state) and why we'll be arranging the guest's ceremony chairs in as much of a semi-circle as possible so that we're surrounded and encircled by those closest to us who will witness the ceremony and bear witness of our marriage.
We too believe the reception to be a celebration of the just-occurred ceremony, and a celebration of the just-created new family. That's why won't be having "sides" at the ceremony, but rather a sign encouraging all to sit where they please and get to know a new "family" member. That's also why I'm overly concerned about how much and what kind of info goes on the website (what would I want as a guest in a foreign place), what kind of chairs are the most comfortable for the oldest and youngest and in between, yet budget-friendly, and what kind of decorations say "welcome home" and "hooray!" at the same time. I could care one wit about the actual stuff. It's the feeling that we're trying to create for our guests – one that says, without directly saying it, thanks for coming, welcome to our beloved state, welcome to our hearts, we tried to think of all we could to make you comfortable, please sit and stay a while, and please come back sometime soon.
One of my most favorite aspects of the whole planning process is discovering who I am as a Bride, who the boy is as the Groom, and who we are a couple. The delight and glee that comes from discovering that the Groom is just as compelled by a certain ceremony music idea or a certain set of dishes as I am is priceless. I wouldn't change that for the world. I just, as you said, needed a little less e-clutter.
Happy planning and Congratulations to all. I have a feeling we'll all be just fine.
I was here just a week ago!!! I was completely miserable from the very beginning. I never really wanted a wedding, but a day after I got engaged, my fiance's mother was asking me all about my "dream wedding" and letting me know that she wanted to help make it perfect for me. Cue the evil, inward thoughts: "What is my dream wedding? I should think of something amazing!" PS: We wanted to be married within six months. So, after spending an entire week trying to dream up a destination wedding, then a B&B wedding that friends and family would still be able to attend, it hit me: I never cared about my wedding before. Why start now?? An hour later, I was venting to a friend and she was telling me how happy she was that she chose to elope. A glass of wine and a couple more hours later, I realized that while I didn't have a dream for my wedding, there were plenty of people I know who would love to make it, so I decided to make the wedding simple, but about them. I'm splurging on myself – my dress and my hair – but other than that, just trying to find places and vendors that are pretty, if not "dreamy," and serve the purpose… after all, the goal is to come out of this thing married to the man I'm so in love with.
It also really, REALLY helped when my mom offered to narrow down the choices for the locations for me. But I never would have been able to accept her offer until I let go of my obsession over "dreaming up" my fantasy wedding. Now I can focus on other things like colors, buying my dress, my bridesmaids, etc., and it is starting to be a really fun experience!!
Bless you for writing this post – this has been my life for the past two weeks and counting.