Really good wedding drama doesn’t just happen the day of. It begins with the engagement ring, and the fireworks keep happening throughout the showers, bachelor parties, and the big day itself. These Redditors came together to share their wedding woes—and they’re unhinged enough that they made us want to elope.
1. Second Class Citizen
My husband’s co-worker invited him (plus me) to his wedding. The reception was held at a big park complex with several other receptions/parties happening at the same time. Each had their own banquet room but the outdoor spaces weren’t cordoned off from each other or from the surrounding public park. When we entered the complex building we were asked our names and which wedding, checked off a list, and then each got a hand stamp.
We figured there must be issues with wedding crashers—but I still had a weird feeling about it. After a bit of mingling and watching the wedding party do some photos out the windows, they entered and the two buffet lines opened along opposite walls. We got in line and noticed the servers glanced at our hands. Then I heard one tell a couple behind us that the bride’s line was the other one.
I’m thinking, what?! Yup, guests were fed according to whether they were bride or groom guests. And there was a big difference. The groom’s side had a choice of hot entrees (prime rib or ham), while the bride’s had cold deli tray stuff to make sandwiches. It was obvious that the sides on the bride’s buffet were either homemade or grocery store pre-made stuff and the groom’s obviously higher-end and catered.
They did have shared champagne bottles at the tables, at least. It was so uncomfortable to be sitting there eating with people from the other line. People seemed shocked. I didn’t see anyone make a fuss but we didn’t stay long—we left after the bride and groom dance—before people started to drink more heavily. Later on, my husband mentioned to his co-worker that he’d never seen that at a wedding before.
His reply was astounding. He said his parents didn’t think they should have to shell out for the bride’s side because her family couldn’t afford a nicer meal. I’ve been to some “interesting” weddings, but that was the rudest.
2. Empathy Doesn’t Cost A Thing
This occurred in Austin, Texas. There is a free wedding chapel there with an Italian-sounding name. All the couple has to do is put down a deposit of $200 to hold the date. Once you're married, you go to the office and get your deposit back. And that's it! Free ceremony. Since we booked our wedding over a year in advance, the deposit was $400.
That was fine, since hey, we're getting it back anyway! Cut to six months before our wedding—and tragedy strikes. He was diagnosed with a rare cancer. He passed just one month later. I contacted the free chapel and informed them of what happened. I quite literally received zero condolences and was told that you are only reimbursed the day of your wedding, and not going through with the ceremony would result in forfeiting the deposit.
Even though I literally could not get married as one person was NO LONGER ALIVE, they would not budge. Finally, they sent a check for half the deposit. Mind you, every other vendor refunded me immediately, no questions asked, no certificate to prove it. Including the venue hosting the reception! To this day I can't fathom how a place would want to profit off the loss of a human being.
And how someone could sit there and argue this back and forth all day, again, with no apology for my loss thrown in. I hope it's obvious that this is not about $200 but basic human decency. To essentially penalize someone for their fiancé passing is sick to me.
3. Keeping The Receipts
My friend is getting married. Her maid of honor planned the bachelorette trip. I honestly think she did well. She asked us our budgets and checked to make sure the prices were okay before booking stuff. One of the events she had for us was a lazy day in, which included hiring a private chef to make us brunch. But just before the party, disaster stuck.
Unfortunately, the chef’s mom passed and they will not be able to do the event. Life happens, they’re working on sending the money back. I thought all was good, we’ll either find some private chef willing to book this soon, or we just change plans—no biggie right? Well…not so fast. I cook and bake a lot. Recently have been doing freelance recipes for a paper and decided I’m going to make my own food blog.
Most of the women in the circle know this, including the maid of honor, because I made her baby shower cake. This is where the drama begins. She messages in the group chat, saying, “Sooo…want to be a private chef and cook brunch for us”? Here’s the deal, I really have NO issue doing that, I like cooking for the ladies. But now this trip turned into a job for at least four hours on site.
That’s plus whatever time I need to make a meal plan, list, and buy food. I also know how much the private chef charged since we already spent the money. So I responded I had no problem doing that, but groceries will need to be paid for, and I want $$$—which was still 30% less than the private chef charge. Everyone was fine with that, even offered to help do prep work, grocery shop with me, and clean up after.
I thought we were good—wrong. The maid of honor was “confused” why I’d charge them and by extension the bride. In her mind, I should be doing this because I am a friend, not because I want money. She even said I made her bridal shower cake for free. Well, not true. The bride’s mom actually paid me. So this shouldn’t be an issue.
Then she accused me of causing her extra stress because If I don’t go with it she’ll be scrambling to find someone in time or making a brunch reservation. I told her I’m being reasonable, anyone she finds is going to be five times my price, and she’s putting this on herself. She called me six times in one day over it.
Not long after, I asked about the money we paid her already for the private chef. Specifically, if the PC has already reimbursed her. Again, this is in a group chat. Some hours roll by and someone answers with a meme of the little kid doing math. So then the maid of honor says yes, the chef has. So the natural next question someone asks was, “Well, what do you plan on doing with it? Can you give that money for the brunch, since she’s willing to do it”?
Radio silence from the maid of honor. Then she comes back saying she’s already spent the money on a “bridal gift”. I knew something was up. We asked how much she spent…she won’t say. We can do the math. If you’re giving us $0 back, then we know how much you supposedly spent, dumb-dumb. That’s suspicious. That’s weird.
The group chat is confused because we never agreed to it. It’s rude to spend other people’s money without telling them, etc. She also won’t tell us what it is because it’s “a surprise”. Then again she says it would have been a “wash” if I didn’t ask to get paid. That’s when chaos really breaks loose. The Elle Woods of the group is throwing around words like small claims court.
People have already purchased train or plane tickets (most halfway across the country, or more) at this point. We’re all going just like, “You better have my money or tell me what you spent it on QUICKLY”! No one’s really talking about brunch anymore cause we can figure it out whenever. It’s just food, we’ll be fine. But like—this lady has my money.
One of the women in the chat is the bride’s sister. She texts the bride about this drama. The bride comes back with some disturbing information. She tells us about it in another group chat—one without the maid of honor. We come to find out that the maid of honor has been struggling financially as her husband gambles most of their money away or buys gaming stuff.
They’re falling behind on bill payments. The bride has offered some financial help and as recently as this past weekend offered again. Instead of accepting, the maid of honor said she got some money from her mom (maybe half true) and instead wanted to treat the Bride to nail day for being such a good friend while she’s dealing with her problems.
That was something the bride turned down and told her to save/keep her money. The last text right now in the chat is from the sister that says, “Did you spend our money on your bills”? There is obviously no confirmation for any of this. If she did get some bridal gift worth several hundreds and didn’t tell us, it would be less offensive but she’s still in the wrong for spending group money without a check from us all.
Plus, she was trying to demonize me because she didn’t want to tell the truth. That’s when I decided to investigate on my own. I emailed the women she said she hired as the chef to see if there was any actual transaction. She said she did book with her! But before you cheer too much, last Wednesday the maid of honor called to cancel. As in, the whole bachelorette party is canceled.
I haven’t shared this with the group yet. I’m continuing my fact-finding mission and will come to the party with receipts.
4. Mas Drama, Por Favor
My wedding is this winter and since my engagement earlier this year there has been nothing short of telenovela-esque drama. My father disowned my brother for cutting into the family business and I have been "banned" from inviting him which I probably would have, had he not called me to curse me out.
My mother and father recently separated so my mother keeps telling me she "only hopes this is my one and only wedding". That’s not the most mortifying part. She also says how we girls "should stick together and be single". I thought she was joking, but no she is not. I have the fifteen voicemails to prove it.
Thirdly, my recently divorced sister said she won't be attending and how inconsiderate of us to get married while she's trying to get her life together. As you can tell, it’s my family causing the most trouble since we got engaged. It would not be an issue if only my winter wedding was not a few months away and the drama is only intensifying.
My mother made a scene at the in-laws' lunch, calling my future mother-in-law "a white, nosey bat". Now my mother-in-law does not feel safe around her. My brother also recently stole some clients from the family business so my father is only tightening the strict banning on my brother. Lastly, my sister has decided not attending isn't enough.
She is forcing one of my vendors to choose between doing business with my fiancé and I or being friends with her. Safe to say, I can finally have my "screw this, let's elope" fantasy out loud now. For twenty people, this is an expensive and emotionally costly event.
5. Happily Ever Three Days After
Basically, my ex-girlfriend's boss left his wife ON THEIR HONEYMOON, because she and he were having an affair. They had the wedding and flew off to Bali, but he was sneaking off into the bathroom to send my then-girlfriend intimate pics…from his honeymoon. I saw one of the pictures and confronted her.
She admitted to it and messaged him back to tell him that I had found out. His reaction was seriously deranged. My understanding is that he basically came out of the bathroom, told his wife, "I think this was a mistake. We shouldn't have gotten married”, got on a plane, and flew home. Left her there on her own. On her honeymoon. With no explanation.
In the end, I had to be the one to go over to her place and tell her what had really happened because he wouldn't own up to it. So I think the marriage lasted all of about three days.
6. Grow Up
My best friends were not able to have a big wedding as planned, so they decided to just get married at the registry office and have a big wedding when the pandemic is over. They were allowed to bring eight people with them because of the restrictions, and they wanted to have a small celebration afterward in the backyard of the bride’s parents’ house with the closest family.
Even though it was just a small wedding, they requested everybody to dress properly: men at least with a nice shirt, better a suit; women in a nice summer/cocktail dress or blouse. The groom’s brother told them that he NEEDS to be with them at the registry office, otherwise it would be unfair. Because he wished to be there, they planned to bring both their parents.
So for the registry office, it was gonna be the four parents, the maid of honor, the best man, and both their eldest brothers. The groom has no more siblings, and the bride has three siblings in total. The big day came and everybody was getting ready at the house of the bride’s parents. The groom’s brother arrived with his wife and daughter from a two-hour drive away.
Most of the people were already in their nice clothes and the brother was "surprised" everybody dressed so nicely. He wore sweatpants and a t-shirt. Even his wife and daughter did bring dresses, even though they were "just" at the celebration afterward. He said he did not know about the dress code and blamed his wife for not reminding him—which she did for sure.
The groom ended up driving home (even though they were short on time) to find a suit for his brother. He found one, so his brother was wearing one of his slightly-too-big suits, a shirt, and shoes from the bride’s dad. But still, he insisted he had to come with them to the registry office and showed up in sweatpants. In my eyes, this wasn't even a proper outfit for a normal day.
The whole morning was about him, because a grown man wasn't able to think of a proper outfit for a wedding.
7. The Long Con
This story started years ago…. on the day I was born. See, my big sister was the “baby” of the family before I was born. I came along just weeks before she turned nine years old, and almost every day since then it has been a competition between us. When I was in seventh-grade science, I aced science class. On a major test, I was able to name all the major muscles in the body.
At that time, my big sister was a nursing student. My mother asked me not to flaunt my success because my sister was “sad” over not doing as well. Almost every shirt, pair of jeans, etc, I bought, with my own money, ended up on her side of the closet because she “liked it”. My mom clearly favors her, although she will deny it.
Step into the time machine to 20 years ago, when my husband and I got married. Mom wanted every detail of my wedding to be just like my big sister’s. The invitations had to look like hers, the colors of the bridal party had to look the same, the first dance had to be the same song. After decades of living in my sister’s shadow, I finally put my foot down.
I threatened to elope rather than have a church wedding. My mom is very religious, so that was my trump card. She caved, and I was able to get what I wanted. Finally. My big sister was the matron of honor, not by my choice—but because my mom didn’t want my BFF from high school, someone I had been almost a real sister to for over a decade, to take the place of a blood sibling.
During the ceremony, big sis did the first reading. This was about ten minutes after I walked down the aisle and was sitting at the altar with my hubby. I had no idea what she had up her sleeve. My jaw dropped when she announced, before the bible verse, “This is one of the best days of my life. I’m so proud to see my baby sister finally get married, but this morning I found out I’m pregnant”.
There was a scattering of slow but polite applause on my hubby’s side, and my mom almost ran to the podium to embrace her. Even on my side of the church, with my other siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, friends, etc, was quiet. Dad was happy but looked angry. In the video of the wedding, which we watched later, you could clearly hear me say to hubby, “Are you kidding me”?
The rest of the ceremony, big sis cradled her flat tummy. But the story doesn’t end there. Time ticked on, and she never started to show. When mom asked her about it, big sis said she “must have misread the test” because she got her period two days after my wedding. Keep in mind that she is a nurse and it would have been her third pregnancy.
She brushed it off and shrugged her shoulders when a family member said it wasn’t the time to make the announcement. Her husband moved out of the house because of the drama, along with their two toddlers. The divorce soon followed. Last year, my big sister got remarried. It was her third marriage, and even though dad had passed on years earlier, she wanted the entire dramatic walk down the aisle.
She wanted me to be the matron of honor. She was VERY specific about the details of how I would look. I refused to have my mid-back-length hair cut into a bob. I hit the gym for hours almost every day and was able to fit into the backless dress in a size I hadn’t been since high school. It took months, but after 20 years and four kids of my own, I did it. It was an uphill battle.
At the last fitting for my dress, she took a close look at my skin and demanded that I take care of my dry skin so I would look perfect. The day of the ceremony came along, and I was the only member of the bridal party to walk down the aisle. My hair was in a beautiful updo, showing off my back, from the base of my skull to just above my butt.
It was a chilly day, so I kept my coat on until right before I walked. The groom’s side of the church was mostly silent, and there were a few chuckles on our side, but mom let out a gasp when she saw my new tattoos—which completely covered my back—every inch that the dress didn’t cover—and my new tatted “sleeves”. She was furious and shot me angry looks throughout the ceremony.
The tattoos, all henna, washed off within a few days. Revenge is a dish best served cold. And cooked low and slow.
8. Too Close For Comfort
My partner and I just got engaged this weekend. We already talked about what we would want our wedding to be like and have a pretty good idea what we are going for. We have a rough plan for the location, catering, dress code, and the wedding date. Instead of congratulating us, my brother-in-law went on a rant about us being inconsiderate towards him and his fiancé.
They got engaged in 2020 and are getting married in spring 2022. We are planning to get married in the fall of the same year. According to him, we are destroying his year by also getting married. We assured him several times that we are not planning on getting married before him and also don’t want to get married anywhere close to his wedding date.
Having to justify when we get married felt a little ridiculous to me. My future mother-in-law decided to also tell my fiancé that he should wait longer because it was so unfair that we were getting married 4-5 months after his younger brother did. She also proceeded to tell him that she thought my parents had paid him to marry me which is first of all untrue and second of all extremely hurtful.
We don’t even have invitations yet but the way they behave seriously makes me want to burn theirs.
9. The Final Boss Of Mother-In-Laws
My mother-in-law is a nice lady but something happens to her when a wedding is announced and she just loses her head.
Here's a list of the crazy things she's tried to pull during three of her son's weddings. My mother-in-law has tried to wear "cream" dresses to all three of her son’s weddings. Some were even lace. Some have sequins and rhinestones. Some were the palest of beige leaning into "champagne”.
She is a nice lady but I don’t know what gets into her head during weddings. She did wear that palest champagne dress to one of them. The bride was too fed up to deal with it anymore. At one wedding she tried to wear a full-length white fishtail ball gown with gold sequined embellishments and rhinestones. The bride burst into tears.
After the first dress debacle, which resulted in a very reserved bride in tears in front of everyone days before the wedding, every couple has pretty much tried to ban her from any further planning participation in their weddings. They devise whole strategies of trying to keep the weddings from her. Whole groups of people practice strategies to not give her information, so she can't mess it up.
Nonetheless, she persists. I've even had to tell her she can't wear what was a girl’s junior-sized mini dress to one of the weddings. The dress was tiny. Maybe a less than 5’ tall teen girl could have worn it appropriately. If she bent down or danced at all, as she is known to do, she would have shamed herself. I’m not being prudish. Ladies can wear short dresses.
Mothers of the groom don't need full-length gowns. She and I are the same height. There was no way it was long enough. We would have all seen her expose herself. And there are other incidents, too. She has shown up with her own dessert and appetizers to one of the weddings. There were four full-sized industrial baking sheets of food.
Her food was not properly refrigerated and in full sun. The event was fully catered by staff. Neither dessert nor appetizers had been asked for. The baking sheets were covered in tin foil and placed on the formal dessert table. This was not like a cookie table some people do, no one was asked to bring food for this wedding. She just decided to start catering it herself.
Her dessert was baked into the tin foil and she messed up the recipe badly. She can make this dessert well, but messed up and brought it anyways to the wedding despite knowing she messed it up. The making of these unwanted goods meant she was an hour late for the wedding and almost missed the wedding in the first place.
She had started these food trays the morning of...again, no one asked for this. She also tried to change the flowers for one wedding, while the bride and groom were overseas. This caused a ton of obvious tension and stress. She also scheduled a vendor at the reception from her personal friend as a "favor to the couple" and the vendor ended up charging the couple thousands for basic service that they didn’t realize they were paying for.
It was ridiculously above market price even for a wedding. They got scammed by her friend. Obviously, they were very annoyed to discover this on their wedding day. For one of the weddings, she decided to throw a huge day before the wedding day party for the whole family, against the couple’s wishes. And throw another huge party the day after the wedding party for the whole family again, against the couple's wishes.
They felt obliged to show up and they really wanted to destress before and after. At another wedding, she went and bought all this decor from thrift stores without the bride's permission. She wanted to be reimbursed for all of it. And yes, some thrift store stuff can be really cool. But this stuff was not. It was junk. So much so that she was storing it on her porch because she didn't want it in her house because it was so dusty and filled with cobwebs.
Well, that was the final straw for the bride. She decided to cancel her own wedding and delayed it for a whole year months before her wedding so they could reschedule everything without the mother-in-law being involved. She wasn't invited to be with the bride when she got ready that day. I don’t think she’s ever been invited to go wedding dress shopping with one of her future daughters-in-law.
Gee, I wonder why?
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10. It’s A Wedding, Not A Surprise Party
I got married this Saturday, it was a beautiful sunset ceremony by a bay. My sister-in-law was invited over a year ago, but declined to attend both the ceremony and reception because she was trying to quit drinking. Fine, totally understandable. I was disappointed but understood.
My mother-in-law convinces her to at least attend the ceremony and then leave before the reception. I say sure, no extra charge for chairs. The wedding happens, and my husband and I appear for our grand entrance after photos. That's when I see her.
My sister-in-law is standing at the doorway where we are supposed to enter with a drink in her hand. After the dance and dinner, my sister-in-law and her children and husband are still there. My mother-in-law comes over to apologize for her daughter and says, "Well at least so-and-so isn't here so sister-in-law can take their place”!
I responded, "No, actually there is a final count and so-and-so was already removed so they are three extra I get to pay for because everyone else had the decency to RSVP and show up”. My mother-in-law is between a rock and a hard place.
My husband turns to me and says, "Honey, I'm super angry at this too, but I can't kick my sister out. It's a bad look. And we can't let her crashing ruin our night”. He's right, of course. We have an amazing night and honeymoon. But it was still really annoying.
11. Getting A Head Start On The Drama
My wedding is in a few weeks and my bachelorette party was this past weekend. Months ago, when deciding on the trip, I asked everyone if the city we went to worked for everyone, and what price everyone would be comfortable with for an Airbnb. I also mentioned it was entirely optional and that I know it’s a big ask and would completely understand if anyone wanted to or needed to decline.
Everyone seemed excited and wanted to do it. So we all agreed on the city and Airbnb, so I asked everyone to let me know if there was anything anyone did or did not want to do while we were there so I could make an itinerary for us. My sister is my MOH and is a college student so I didn’t want to burden her with planning the trip and figured my other bridesmaids could help me plan.
Long story short, I sent an itinerary to the group a few weeks before the trip asking if it looked okay and to let me know if I should change or add anything. I included time for a scenic hike, pool time (it’s warm this time of year where we were), going downtown/shopping, karaoke bar, etc. I reserved all of our brunch, happy hour, and dinner spots.
I tried to go for more of a girls' weekend away versus a wild bachelorette party. Nothing wrong with a crazier bachelorette party but that’s not really my personality and my friends know that. The consensus from everyone on the itinerary was pretty much “That sounds good, thanks for sending”! No one made any other suggestions to me after I sent the itinerary or in the few months leading up to the trip, so I figured we would go with what I came up with. I was so, so wrong.
Basically, two of my bridesmaids ended up undermining the plan I came up with the entire time and we ended up not doing some of the outings I suggested because they didn’t want to, which is fine, but then wouldn’t offer alternatives. I also feel like they should have let me know back when I sent the itinerary so we could have come up with a different plan and things to do.
And it didn’t end there. One of my other bridesmaids told me that the whole weekend, these two were talking bad about me behind my back, and were mad at me and saying that I didn’t plan a good enough trip for them, etc—just saying some really mean things about me and the trip.
Without going into too much detail as this is already long, one of them was basically just in an obviously horrible mood the whole weekend and the other one snapped at me at one point over me not calling an Uber five minutes earlier than I did.
She caused a scene that ruined the evening while we were out on Saturday that caused us to end the evening early and head back to the Airbnb. That’s not even the worst part.
They were also apparently upset that I didn’t get sashes for everyone to wear or plan an expensive party bus or something. Which maybe I did drop the ball on some of that, but they could have suggested those things and if everyone was down we could have done them.
It seems like they expected me (the bride) to plan their perfect weekend without actually telling me what they wanted to do. I was always under the impression this weekend was more about what the bride wants while of course also being a fun weekend for everyone else too. It seems they have a different take on bachelorette trips/weekends.
Anyway, my feelings are definitely hurt and I honestly don’t know how to proceed from here. These are (I guess I should say were now) good friends of mine so I’m really confused. Part of me is worried they will behave this way on my wedding day and I feel like maybe I should respectfully ask them to step down from being bridesmaids and offer to reimburse them for their dresses.
Part of me also thinks doing that this close to the wedding might just create more stress and I should just leave them as bridesmaids but maybe nicely ask my other bridesmaids to keep them in check on my wedding day. The bridesmaid that informed me of their behavior already said she would do this for me.
Then once the wedding is over I will probably let the “friendships” with these two fizzle out. I would rather focus on my friendships with people who care about me instead of people that treated me like this, especially during what should be one of the greatest times in my life.
It’s unfortunate that they ruined it, but at the end of the day, it’s just a bachelorette party. I’m staying positive and focusing on the fact that I get to marry my best friend in a few short weeks!
12. She Needs A Taste Of Her Own Medicine
This is driving me absolutely insane. My mother will NOT stop trying to insert her friends into my wedding. Our budget is a firm 15k, so we are cutting a ton of corners and one of those is obviously our guest list. The 15k is our money, all my mother is doing is having it at her house to show off her property. She is, so far, only paying for our day-of coordinator.
However, she keeps trying to guilt trip us into inviting her friends because they’ll give us money. They’re family friends, so I don’t truly mind, but like...I already cut friends of mine off of the list. But that’s not even the craziest part. Just today, she came up to my fiancée and told (not asked, TOLD) her that her friend wanted to come to our taste testing.
Like, what? It’s a taste testing after business hours! If you want to get food with your friend, go out to dinner! My fiancée told her no and she was so taken aback. I am terrified of this happening more and more as we approach our wedding next June.
13. Notice Of Termination
One of my oldest friends and I have been drifting apart over the past three or four years. She's been a bit...weird, to put it nicely. When my fiancé and I got engaged, she texted me and started asking me about what she was wearing as a bridesmaid, etc. The thing is, I hadn't planned on asking her. But, I tend to be too nice, and a bit of a push-over, so I let her join the wedding party.
Yes, I realize that was my initial mess-up. So over the past year, she has become almost unbearable. She has stopped working and refuses to work at all anymore. She has self-diagnosed herself with: PTSD (allegedly from being "tickled too much" as a child), autism, and narcolepsy, along with a slew of other things. The crazy thing is, she doesn't have any of these things.
No doctor has confirmed it, and she switched therapists a couple of times, trying to find someone who would. She's been trying to get disability for these alleged ailments, so that she never has to work again. In the meantime, she has been mooching off her friends and family. She gets people to buy her all sorts of frivolous things; books, lingerie, vape supplies, art supplies, a $500 treadmill—the list goes on.
I've made SO many excuses for her because of our history together. I could probably ignore all that craziness if she hadn't been causing wedding drama too. The dresses I selected for the bridesmaids cost $30. Not $130. $30. I understand that she doesn't have money due to being unemployed, but that's her choice. She has had two years to save for this dress.
I've been gently reminding her to buy her dress over the past couple of months, since our wedding is coming up soon, but she's never got money. Honestly, I feel like if she can get someone to buy her a $500 treadmill and other expensive things she should be able to find a way to get a $30 dress. Not to mention, she owns her own house, lots of name-brand clothes, electronics, and a NEW MERCEDES.
She keeps dropping hints to the rest of the wedding party, hoping someone will pay for her. She's making everyone uncomfortable and angry. And on top of that, she's been messaging my maid of honor, who's planning my bachelorette party, and bossing her around, telling her what is and isn't allowed at the party, etc. It's not her party. So yesterday, I had finally had enough.
I told her, as politely as I possibly could, that she was demoted. I tried to take most of the blame and told her it was based on my own anxieties, and the fact that I felt guilty about adding to her stress and financial burden. Suddenly, she could MAGICALLY pay for everything and wanted to buy her dress. I told her I was sorry, but I'd made my decision and left it at that.
She's been bombarding me with texts and calls ever since, guilt tripping me and gaslighting me relentlessly. My fiancé, the rest of the wedding party, and my family all encouraged me and thought I made the right choice. If everyone agrees that it was the right thing, then why do I feel so awful? I don't want to let her back in, but I feel terrible...or at least I did until she called my fiancé about it.
14. Stealing The Spotlight
At my wedding shower, my future bro-in-law and his wife (who got married in April) show up wearing matching Mr and Mrs Shirts. They then promptly seated themselves on the bench at the head of the table that had balloons and decor tied to it for my fiancé and I to sit at during dinner. But it didn't end there.
After we ate, they then moved to the love seat that was sitting in front of the balloon arch and banner that was meant to be for my fiancé and I to open gifts in front of. There was plenty of seating at this shower and yet they waltzed in like they were the main characters.
I was just so irritated but my fiancé says they didn't mean anything by it and I'm overreacting. I didn't say anything to them, but now I'm afraid of what they may do at the wedding.
15. The Big Green Monster
My future sister-in-law is not a teenager. She's in her early 30s and can't stand that her brother and I are getting more attention than her. My future husband and I hate being in the spotlight for any reason, and aren't really talking about the wedding with anyone other than my amazing mother-in-law who is a professional wedding planner. But at Easter (we went to lunch with his side of the family) a few people asked questions.
Nothing crazy, but asking if a certain outfit would be appropriate, if I have a dress yet, stuff like that. Which I (and everyone else there) consider pretty normal for casual conversation. But not my fiancé's sister. This woman can't stand for there to be attention on anyone other than her.
She interrupted my husband’s grandmother asking about my venue to show us pictures of her cats. The same pictures she showed me the past three times I've seen her. His aunt asked about what I'll be wearing. Before I could answer, she started talking about how "she can't wear heels because she's so tall". How this was relevant I don't know.
But then she started showing off her options for outfits. All of them were either all black or white, for our spring wedding. I know she was looking for a reaction, and I nearly bit through my tongue trying to not give it to her.
But what upset me the most was whenever anyone brought up anything to do with our relationship (the wedding, our marriage, moving in together, etc) she immediately shoehorned her recent (relatively speaking, it happened in November of last year) breakup into the conversation.
They weren't in a super committed relationship, they had been dating on and off, and he just ended the possibility of them getting back together. Not saying that makes it any less heartbreaking, but I didn't think it was appropriate to talk about her break-up from six months ago during a conversation about someone else's wedding.
Like, why can’t she just be happy for us? I've gone out of my way to be nice to her, I made sweaters for those stupid cats to try and get her to like me. But us getting married is a threat to her getting attention, so I'm clearly the enemy.
16. Work-Life Balance
I asked my friend of five years to be the maid of honor, she says yes and I let her know the date of the engagement party a month before anyone else. She RSVPs on the invite as going—but two days before the event, she changes to "maybe going". I message her asking if everything is okay and if she got sick. She said she's fine but scared of large crowds, because of Covid.
I tell her not a worry and if she wants to meet for coffee nearby cause we live close to each other. She says she doesn't have the time with her busy schedule. The day after the engagement party, I see that people have tagged her in photos of some food blogger event that is an indoor restaurant that has 40+ people. So I felt betrayed and lied to, but wanted to clear the air.
I asked: “I have been wondering if everything is okay between us”? She replied: “Yep I've been busy”. I said: “It’s just I feel like you have been trying to avoid me lately, and I saw you tagged in photos at restaurants the day after my engagement and I feel cut that you lied to me about being scared of going out”. Her reply was infuriating.
She told me: “What I do with social media is my work. My content and other people's content who tags me is not on 'the day'. It's not even live. They are planned, edited, and promoted content. I'm sorry I cannot live up to your expectations of being available. I should not feel obligated to keep you posted with what I do or be there when you want me to. I have my full-time job as well as my content creation job and networking”. But the worst line of all was yet to come.
She said: “I do this every day and it is difficult to make time for non-content creators”. I said thanks for clarifying—and then she blocked me.
17. Hunting For A New Father Figure
My boyfriend and I are planning on getting married this November because we’re moving to a different country due to my boyfriend’s new job offer. We’re very excited to start our lives together so we started telling our family, most of whom are very happy for us. I told my dad we are getting married this November and that I’m very excited to start our life together.
His response was devastating. He told me: “November? No, that’s no good for me. I mean, you have to change the date. You know that November is hunting season and you know I never miss it. I can’t risk saying I’ll be at your wedding and then let you down when I don’t show up because I’m hunting”.
At first, I didn’t even understand what he meant, so I just said, “Well, let me know if you can make it”. But then after I pondered on what he said I became very sad, my very own dad can’t compromise to go to my wedding because he might be going on a camping trip that day. I’m his firstborn and I can’t believe he said that to my face.
Mostly I can’t believe I didn’t stand up for myself and uninvite him from my wedding. He has always been selfish, but I’m not sure I’ll ever get over his initial reaction.
18. You Had One Job
My husband and I got married last week. I had been super chill throughout the whole wedding planning and during the actual event. Because I know bad stuff happens and if anything goes wrong, or not exactly how we wanted, it's not that big of a deal and may even make the wedding more memorable for the guests. The one thing that I told my husband I didn't want to happen was I didn't want him smashing cake in my face.
I had a suspicion that he would find it funny to do it, so, during the planning, I flat out told him not to do it. I don't think it's funny, I don't want to mess up my makeup that took hours to apply, and I don't want cake on my expensive wedding dress. I told him I would be livid if he did it. He promised that he wouldn't. Well, come the cake cutting time, what did he do?
Smashed the cake in my face! It got on my dress, and messed up my makeup, just like I knew it would. I'm pretty sure his friends convinced him to do it, not that that makes it any better. I kept it together, went and cleaned myself up, and put on a smile for the rest of the reception. But afterward, I let loose on him.
I yelled at him that this was the ONE THING I asked him not to do, and he promised that he wouldn't. He told me I was being dramatic, that it's not a big deal, and we should just be enjoying our time as newlyweds. So was I being overly dramatic?
19. November Rain
We’ve been together for three years. We started wedding planning in October 2019. My mom and I have always been close, I thought the wedding wouldn't change that. I was so, so wrong.
At the start of wedding planning, she had opinions about EVERYTHING. My parents got married in November, my fiancé and I met in November, so we wanted to have a November wedding. I never wanted a summer wedding or anything outdoors because you can't trust Ohio.
Naturally, my mom had a fit that we wanted to be married in November, cue "It'll be cold. It gets dark at 7 pm you'll have to do pictures early...it's close to Thanksgiving". I can't tell if she had regrets from her own November wedding or what. Then, looking at venues was a nightmare.
She only ever thought about our side of the family and never considered my fiancé’s side when it came to distance and how far people would drive to the venue. When we finally found a venue she complained about us wanting to have an open bar, because our side of the family are not heavy drinkers. The rest of us however like the occasional beverage and want to have a fun wedding.
My fiancé’s parents stepped in and offered to pay for the bar so that way she wouldn't have a say in it anymore. And that’s not the most infuriating part. She keeps upping the guest list with people I don't know and don't want to attend, then complains about how expensive the wedding is getting. I try to explain "more people=more money" but then she suggests cutting my friends list.
Lastly, COVID-19. I was leaning toward postponing the wedding for everyone's safety. My mother feels like she's "lost a year of her life" with the shutdown and restrictions. People were actually losing their lives over the virus and she complains she's lost a year of her's because she can't go to the movies. My fiancé’s grandmother doesn't plan on attending which is a huge deal to me.
When I tell her the option of having a small immediate family-only ceremony this year (she states that the family will be divided and offended if not all my extended cousins come to the small ceremony) and then a reception a year later, she states that it won't be "special" and wants the full effect of my dad walking me down the aisle.
When I tell her we can do another vow renewal type ceremony next year (for the extended cousins and everyone else not invited to the small ceremony) she states it won't be the same since we'll already be married. There is no winning here. I hate not having support from her and feel like no matter what I do someone will be disappointed. I know I can't please everyone.
20. Sew Annoying
Okay, so my mom has been an absolute NIGHTMARE to deal with. From refusing any dress I liked, to demanding she walk me down the aisle since my parents are divorced, to freaking out over us having a sweetheart table instead of a head table, to causing a scene at my bridal shower and crying because I took a picture with my mother-in-law.
So she finally bought a dress at the most expensive boutique in town. Proceeds to hold it over my head for a few months that she’d better be in “all the pictures since she spent soooo much money on her dress”. This dress has been in for a few weeks now, and I’ve encouraged her to get it altered a few times as it’s a very layered dress and prom season is coming up.
The wedding is exactly four weeks from today. She texted me today that she had gone to get her dress altered. She said it was “huge” in both the chest and the waist. Then informs that SHE'S WAITING THREE WEEKS TO GET IT ALTERED BECAUSE SHE PLANS TO LOSE 20lbs.
Now, keep in mind my mom eats out every single day and drinks alcohol like it’s water. She doesn’t exercise. Her weight loss plan? She’s going back to work next week so she’ll be walking more.
I tried to explain to her it takes longer than a week to get a dress altered. She began to argue with me stating that “The seamstress says it’ll only take an hour, they do alterations right at the dress shop”. She refuses to give in. She says there’s no point in getting started on alterations now when she’s going to lose all that weight (which, for the record, she has been saying since she BOUGHT the dress and hasn’t lost any).
Then she changed her story to, “Well, it’ll only take like two stitches since it pretty much fits”. She absolutely refuses to listen to me that she needs to begin alterations, and she can’t wait till the week before the wedding. I’m seriously so frustrated at this point I feel like my head is going to explode.
21. A Black And White Issue
I’m really torn by this. My brother is about to be married. I am one of the groomsmen. My wife had informed me that our daughter, who is three, will be wearing a white dress to the wedding. I wasn’t sure if this was appropriate as I thought it was mainly brides and flower girls who would wear white. My wife didn’t care if any little girls wore white at our own wedding and others that she know say they don’t care.
My daughter will be the only child attending amongst about 80ish guests as she is the only grandchild in either family. There are no flower girls or page boys participating in the wedding. I try to be considerate as possible, as obviously it’s not my wedding, so I asked my brother whether there’s an issue with it. And he says it will be. White is strictly for the bride, which I respect.
Her wedding, her rules. And I don’t want any dramas. My wife’s reaction was chilling. She’s calling me out on it, calling me all sorts of names. Saying that I should’ve stood up for my daughter. Saying I should’ve kept my mouth shut and not mentioned anything and just showed up with her wearing her white dress. She wants the bride and groom to pay for a new dress (which was a hand-me-down from the beginning).
I am fine to go and get another dress but now it seems she won’t back down out of principle. I feel I did the right thing. But my wife’s reaction makes it seem like it wasn’t.
22. Control Freak
My husband and I are getting married in June, My S.O. is half Scottish, half Indian and my grandma has used disgusting racial slurs toward my S.O. For this reason, she is not invited to the wedding. But she’s not the only problem. My mom is a complete narcissist. She mistreated and neglected me until the age of nine when she abandoned me completely.
My only contact with her from the age of eight until 17 was an occasional letter. I was raised by my grandma. Mom and grandma have always hated each other. My mom however is insisting that she and Grandma have the right to be there. She has basically said that there is nothing I can do to stop them from turning up and I had better accept that.
She is insisting that she be placed in charge so she can fix the mistakes I've made in the planning. She's tried to cancel my venue in order to find a more appropriate one. The decor I've chosen is tacky owing to the fact that I have integrated some of the colorful elements of a traditional Indian wedding including music, and whoever heard of carnations rather than roses for a wedding. Somehow, it gets even more offensive.
In addition, she is insisting that Indian dishes in the buffet will make the whole place smell. My future husband wanted me to wear a sari for the wedding, but I wanted something more western so we came to the compromise that I would wear a white wedding gown for the actual ceremony and then a sari for the reception. This of course is not acceptable to mom, who thinks that since I have recently discovered that I'm pregnant, a white dress is inappropriate—as is the sari.
I have told her that I've spent a year planning this wedding and it is not about her. I am happy with the details as I've planned them and I will not be changing them. She told me that it was going to be a disaster and I would look back and be ashamed of my wedding day. I retorted that it was a chance I would take. I told her that she had her chance to plan her own four weddings and she was so unhappy with my plans she could feel free not to come.
She proceeded to have a full-on meltdown—and what she said was seriously deranged. She was saying that as the mother of the bride it was her special day and now it would be ruined. I reminded her that it was my special day not hers and told her that I only wanted happy supportive family members at the wedding.
It was then leaked to her via another family member what I plan to name my baby. Well, that really set her off. She said giving her such an Indian name was tantamount to abuse. I got over 200 calls emails, texts, and DMs from both her and my grandmother that didn't stop till 4 am. She showed up at my job the next day, having a full-on Karen-esque meltdown.
When I refused to comply with her wishes. I told her to calm down or I would have to call the authorities. She proceeded to destroy my office. My lamp and laptop were broken, office supplies, files, and coffee flew everywhere. I tried to leave the room but she pushed me down. Luckily, one of my colleagues had called 9-1-1 and they took her in.
Meanwhile, at my house, my grandmother had somehow convinced a locksmith to let her into my house. Various food stocks and spices were all over my kitchen and the tandoori (Indian cooking oven) was broken. She wrote several horrible slurs all over my walls in condiments. My house was trashed. My fiancé was livid, he was the maddest I have seen him, and he is not a man prone to temper.
When I got home I was in tears over the mess. His family came over to help tidy. Obviously, we had grandma arrested and then we will be suing the locksmith. I've gotten a restraining order and blocked them from my phone and all social media.
In my family, we do a thing called shedding the skin, an Irish wedding tradition, before a wedding. Basically, we make a list of our emotional baggage and burn it over a bonfire symbolically getting rid of it. The theory is that you can't start a new life while holding on to the past.
It's a bit of a party and members of his family and mine were present—but of course, neither my mother nor grandma. I posted a few pics from the event on social media. This morning my cousin called and told me my mother had created a fake account and stolen the pics. She then posted them on FB like they were her pics.
The post said something about "the rehearsal dinner for my darling daughter's wedding" and loads of people had sent her good wishes and congrats. That’s not the craziest part. She even photoshopped herself into a few—very badly. She then contacted my future sister-in-law and gave her a list of the “disgusting” things I allow my fiancé to do in intimate situations—most of which were lies and none of which is her business.
She then told her that she and her husband were uninvited unless he shaved his beard. She just doesn’t stop!
23. An Object Lesson
My sister got engaged about two years ago. I don’t hate her. We were never the closest of sisters due to our age difference but we didn’t hate each other.
Her fiancé (now husband) is a great man. I really am happy for them. So fast forward to the wedding ceremony, when the priest finally said, “Are there any objections,” I stood up and said, “I object (long pause) because this couple is way too cute for each other”! I had no idea the chaos I would stir up.
I really just said it as a joke. I thought it was something we could all laugh about at reception. But I could visibly see the color drain off my sister’s face the moment I stood up. After I finished my little joke, I didn’t really get any laughs. My sister looked away, pretending that she didn’t care but I knew she probably did. I sat down and the ceremony continued.
At the reception, I went to my sister and congratulated her, but she absolutely blew up. She told me my joke wasn’t funny and that I ruined her mood, her happiness, and her special day. I was shocked. It literally wasn’t even that big of a deal. I was joking, not actually objecting. I argued back with those points and she just walked away from me.
This morning, I woke up with tons of notifications from my family members saying I’m a jerk for doing that. But I think everyone was just overreacting, it was truly just a joke.
24. Upstaging The Upstager
My half-sister "Heather" and I never really got along. We both are 24. My father left my mother for her mother and we were born the same month 20 days apart. It has always been weird. It doesn't help that Heather's mom hates me and my mom. By extension, Heather and I didn't have the best relationship.
She has always tried to one-up me. Even though we both have a similar economic background. I can give examples of this but for the sake of the word limit won't write them here. So now my fiancé and I got engaged last month and had our engagement party this Saturday. We had planned it originally as a casual-formal event. Nice dresses but not "I am going to the Met gala ball" nice. More like "We are going to a good restaurant" nice.
Anyway, my cousin hits me up saying she has to show me something. It was a picture of the dress Heather was going to wear. This dress...Jesus. It can only be described as opulent. It was long and white. Strapless with sewn-in "crystals" and golden accents. I'm pretty sure it's a wedding dress but I can't be 100 percent.
This made me really mad. So I decided…not happening. And I came up with a plan. I started texting people telling them that there had been a change of plans. And that instead of casual formal I decided to make a costume party. My mother's side is crazy for Halloween so they were immediately on board. I told my father via text, and asked for him to relay the message to Heather and her mother—knowing full well that he would forget or leave it to the last minute.
Saturday comes along. Guests start showing up. Most of them in costumes. Some didn't have time to get one. We just provided them with fun hats and cheap wigs. Heather, my dad, and her mother come one hour late. As soon as she notices that everyone was either wearing elaborate costumes or weird accessories and she didn't stand out, she lost it.
Especially when my fiancé came along and inadvertently twisted the knife in. He told her that "her bride dress looked amazing for a cheap costume". She left crying and her mother and my father told me that I was being childish and I could have told Heather myself and not have tasked my father. Whoops!
25. Photoshop The Whole Man Out
Me and my fiancé Aaron are getting married soon, We got done with wedding planning—although my future mother-in-law basically disagreed with every arrangement we had. But a whole new issue came up recently.
Aaron and I were discussing the wedding photos and my facial scar that I had in my early 20s came up. Aaron suggested that we have this area of my face (where my scar is located) photoshopped, I laughed thinking he was joking—but he said it was for real.
I was taken aback, but he explained that this is what photoshopping is for and that these are wedding photos that last for years and he'd rather them be flawless. I looked at him and asked if he sees my face as a flaw, he immediately apologized and said absolutely not, it's just that all couples point out what should and should not be photoshopped to get the best wedding photos.
But then the dark truth came out. He then admitted it was his mom's suggestion and he saw that she had a point this time. I refused and we began fighting. Aaron said that I was being a huge overreactor and that it was not about the scar itself, but the overall look of the photos, and I was being too sensitive for no reason.
I had an argument with my future mother-in-law after she nicely tried to talk me into considering it, most of the women in the family agreed with her. Aaron kept saying this is what photoshopping is for, and lots of people do it because they're not happy with a certain area in their appearance.
I told them I'm different because I'm not bothered by my appearance nor do I want to change it for any reason or occasion for that matter. They went on to say I need therapy for me to cope with my past trauma but I don't think my refusal has anything to do with it. Aaron is visibly upset with my response.
He said he loves me no matter what and I was ridiculous to be so hung up on this non-issue and holding it against him and his family who want what's best for me. I don't know if this is just my past insecurities popping up and I'm not sure if I'm overreacting and getting offended for no reason.
26. A Penny For Her Delusional Thoughts
I have a friend who we'll call Penny. I met Penny at work about three years ago. We quickly hit it off and became good friends. I was supposed to be getting married in January this year but obviously, because of the pandemic, it didn't go ahead. It's now going ahead next January. Penny is one of my bridesmaids. The problem is, I've seriously gone off Penny over the last year.
I'm pretty sure she's a narcissist and boy is she increasingly unpleasant to be around. She needs attention constantly. And I mean constantly. She makes absolutely everything about her, including my bachelorette party. She's a huge show-off, she gloats, she's competitive...the list goes on. She has insisted on taking over from my maid-of-honor in organizing my bachelorette and has told her I have demanded things when I haven't because she wants them.
However, that’s not the biggest problem. The main issue is that she acts totally inappropriately towards my fiancé. We both spent some time with her this weekend and the list of inappropriate comments, touching, and just general behavior is endless. It makes my fiancé feel uncomfortable and obviously makes me feel angry and upset that she clearly thinks this is okay.
She can't bear us to be affectionate towards each other and she tries to get in between us when we do by trying to physically push her way in saying she wants a hug because she's "happy for us". My fiancé had to tell her to stop. But she just keeps it up.
She tried to play footsie with him underneath the table, leaned across and stroked his face, and told him she's missed him (the two have met a handful of times and my fiancé is very quiet and reserved so they haven't really spoken much and my fiancé would not consider her a friend), trying to hug him...the list goes on.
The first time she met my fiancé, she texted me as soon as we got home, saying, “Don't worry I don't fancy him," which I thought was very strange. She then added him on Snapchat and told me, "If you're wondering what the Snapchat I've sent to him is, don't worry, it's just a normal selfie with my daughter." I said to her "Why would I wonder what you've sent him”? And she didn't respond. Very bizarre.
The second time she met him, he came to pick me up from Penny's house. The second she heard his car pull up in the driveway, she physically pushed me out of the way, ran to his car, flung the door open, and literally jumped on him and hugged and kissed him. I was so confused. This continuing behavior coupled with her constant need for attention and validation is really wearing me down.
We're both sick of it and I find it really disrespectful. I have no idea how to broach this with her as I am really terrible at confrontation and to be quite honest, the thought terrifies me. We also have quite a few friends in common and I'm worried they will side with her and think I'm overreacting.
I am also quite confident that she will gaslight me and say it’s just the way she is with everyone and my fiancé is one of her best friends…this is definitely not true.
27. You Had One Job
This happened during this weekend, me being in my early 30s and my girlfriend in her late 20s. I was invited to a wedding ceremony of a colleague and could bring someone with me. I asked my girlfriend whom I've been dating for a year if she would like to join me and she was really happy because she apparently loves weddings.
Since we don't live together, I drove to pick her up so we'd have some time to spare before the ceremony. As she comes out, she looks really beautiful and has obviously put in the time to fix her hair and make-up. She's also wearing an off-white dress that was rather ornate.
As she got in I told her that she looked stunning, but I asked if she could change to a different colored dress for the ceremony. I'm not one for etiquette by far, but one of the few things I have heard everywhere is that you should not wear a white dress to a wedding unless you're the bride. Her reaction was chilling.
She became pretty upset and wanted to know what was wrong with her dress. I said that it would be inappropriate to wear a white or off-white dress unless you're the bride, and that it's like wedding law or something, trying to be lighthearted about it. She rolled her eyes and said that it was an outdated tradition about women and virginity and that when her friends got married everyone wore white and that it's not a big thing anymore.
I told her that I don't know what the dress code is for this ceremony, but since it's not saying "all white clothes" I still thought she should change to another color that’s not white or "almost-white"—because my colleague was getting married and we had no idea how she felt about it.
My girlfriend became really upset and told me that I was trying to control what she was wearing and that I was mistreating her, which honestly made me really upset and hurt. I said something along the lines of, "Well, you shouldn't go to a wedding with someone who mistreats you then," and then I told her to get out of my car.
She began to cry and wanted to apologize and give me a hug, but I just told her to get out, which she did. To clarify we never left the driveway by her home, I did not drop her off in the middle of nowhere or anything like that. I drove off and she called and texted me a bunch. I answered "I don't want to talk right now" and then turned my phone off and attended the ceremony.
The bride was the only one that was wearing white so I feel as if my gut feeling was the right one. When I got home, my phone had blown up with texts from her and her best friend saying that I was being inconsiderate and controlling and should apologize for my behavior.
I've vented to a few friends—most of them agreeing with me but some have said that it was a jerk thing to tell her that she could not wear her dress—because it had nothing to do with me. I feel as if I was in the right since it was my colleague’s wedding and it was better to be safe than sorry.
28. Timing Is Everything
My future husband and I have known each other for four years, and have been together for two. He has never really liked his sister as a person growing up. He and his parents say she's always been lazy and entitled, that she would never take care of herself, her room, or her chores.
They would have to yell at her to get her to shower because she smelled disgusting, and when she moved out, they had to air her room for months because it smelled so bad. Then there's the way she moved out.
She called CPS at 16 on their mom and stepdad to try to say that they were beating her, there was no food in the house, they didn't have clothes that fit, etc. CPS did nothing because it was obvious she was lying. So she whined to the grandparents about how mean everyone was and moved in with them.
So my future husband doesn't talk to his grandparents because he's livid with his sister for pulling all that stuff and upset that they were siding with her. At 18, his sister ran off to another state with her then-boyfriend and cut off contact with basically the entire family. She was No Contact for seven years.
Nobody really talks about the sister to me, and my fiancé barely mentions her, so I forgot she existed for most of our relationship. Recently, my fiancé started talking to his grandparents again. I honestly love the whole family and am so excited to have them all at my wedding, but I don't think too much about his sister because she lives so far away.
Then out of the blue last year, she sends my fiancé’s mom a picture message of a positive pregnancy test. At some point, before the baby is born, she starts talking to the mom saying that having family is important now because of the baby.
Fast forward and the baby is five months old and suddenly her now-husband is a monster and she needs to get the baby away from him. My fiancé doesn't believe her but his mom and step-dad go on a 10-HOUR DRIVE and miss work to pick up her and baby, bring them back 10 more hours, and this girl literally didn't plan at all. so everything she and baby have is on them or in the diaper bag.
They help buy her EVERYTHING; clothes for both of them, diapers, toys, a baby walker, a stroller, you name it. My fiancé’s mother gets his sister a job where she works. My fiancé and I do go over because we already had plans to take his kids, and he ignores his sister the whole time. I ask him that since she's here now if he would be okay with having her at the wedding.
His reaction said it all. He is a HARD NO. I'm okay with it because I'm not even inviting most of my family. A month goes by, things are kind of quiet, so my fiancé’s parents stop over now and again to chat or see the kids. My fiancé’s stepdad complains about how the sister isn't really helpful and has no idea how to even chop vegetables when she helps cook and how they have to show her how to be a functioning adult basically.
Well, it's no surprise to us that my fiancé’s stepdad has had enough and yells at the sister for not helping. She instantly calls her grandparents, who come pick up her, the stuff, the baby, and move her in with them. Again, they make his mom feel like garbage and tell her she's a bad mom, while she’s working a second job to help pay for the sister’s lawyer fees and planning to take her back to her old state for court. So she's still helping her, despite everything.
I personally don't mind my fiancé’s sister as an individual but I'm not a fan of everything. My fiancé is basically saying he doesn't have a sister anymore at this point. Now we're all caught up to last week when my fiancé and I mail out invites because the wedding is in September. We sent one to grandparents with their last name, and didn't say anything about the sister, who still has her ex’s last name.
My fiancé’s mom reached out and asked me if the sister is invited and I tell her that my fiancé is firm on her not being there. He was already upset with her and now he can't stand the actual sight of her. She has begged him to reconsider because her parents are going to blame her for not being in control of her…ADULT CHILDREN?
My fiancé says his grandparents don't have to come and anyone who has a problem with that doesn't have to come and I'm upset because I just want to have an enjoyable wedding. I am just trying to marry the love of my life and have fun with our friends and family. It sucks that people I thought were great are being garbage suddenly right before we get married like, why right now?
29. It Doesn’t Add Up
My brother and his fiancée are getting married in September 2023, and I am a bridesmaid. The bride's two sisters are both maids of honor, and are planning the bachelorette weekend trip for August 2023. I appreciate the advanced planning, so everyone has an opportunity to plan and budget for the trip.
But with that being said, we had a poll to determine the budget everyone was comfortable with, the results being: Up to $300—3 votes, Up to $500—2 votes, No preference—4 votes.
So with those with a preference, the maximum of 300$ won out, but we got the itemized budget today and they are requiring $499 from each of the 10 in the bridal party (this doesn’t even include the $100+ for the spa day and $50+ for wine tasting, so we're looking at closer to $700). This itself just made no sense.
Yes, a majority had no preference, but does that mean we automatically pick the most expensive options? With nearly $1,000 just to reserve a table/bottle service at a bar? I’m 24, about to graduate college, work part-time, and have $2,000 in emergency vet debt I’m still paying off. I live paycheck to paycheck, with little left over, so to spend $500+ on two days is just not something I can reasonably/comfortably swing.
Even a year in advance, I just cannot justify spending so much money when I have other responsibilities and bills. To add onto it, the $100+ for a bridesmaid dress, ~$150 for hair/makeup, wedding gift, and ~$200 for lodging for the night of the wedding, it's just getting to be more than I could possibly afford.
How do I say no to this bachelorette party even though they budgeted it out to $499 if all 10 people were to pay? I'd be forcing other people to pay more to cover my not paying, and (living with her) facing the bride-to-be after.
30. An Impending Sense Of Doom
My in-laws have always been difficult people, to say the least. My mother-in-law and sister-in-law both fully believe that the world revolves around them, my father-in-law doesn't leave the house and probably won't come to our wedding, and my stepdad-in-law defends the woman to no end instead of helping us get them all on track. The only in-law I like is my brother-in-law who is a gem.
Since the day my fiancé and I got engaged, it was all about my mother-in-law (and a little bit about my sister-in-law). The first thing she asked was when she could announce it on social media and was mad when we said we wanted to announce it first because in her opinion it was her news to share.
We went over there for dinner to celebrate and she talked all about what her dress would be like and how nice her husband would look in his tux and all the pictures she was going to take with him and my sister-in-law. I was then asked when I'd know who our photographer was so that she could reach out about all the different photos she wanted.
There's a long list of other things she’s pulled since then. She threatened to call vendors before or talk to them during the wedding to change things to the way she wants them, like the implementation of a money dance, a special dance for just her and her husband, centerpieces, etc.
She purchased a full ballgown for our casual outdoor wedding without telling us and when she finally did, said, "I'm going to be the belle of the ball! I'm the princess”!
My future sister-in-law pesters us for months about what dress she gets to wear as a bridesmaid (without being asked to be a bridesmaid), never asks about how planning is going otherwise, and then a week ago, backs out of being a bridesmaid after we told her we'd pay for everything so she can focus on getting her own apartment and going back to school.
A few days after she bailed, she buys an extremely formal and very inappropriate bridesmaids dress from a different store. Literally goes to David's Bridal to shop in the bridesmaids' section even though she just said she didn't want to be one.
My aunts decided to throw an engagement party for us a year delayed (because of current world health issues) and my future mother-in-law threw a fit that she wasn't asked to throw one even though we told her countless times that it was a surprise to us (per the invitation) and we didn't ask for one.
And, finally, we've been asked multiple times if we plan to cancel the wedding because she may not be able to walk down the aisle or dance with her son because she refuses to get the surgery to fix her back now that the doctor said she had to go on a diet to be a candidate. This whole time I've felt like this isn't even my wedding anymore because everything I try to plan or get excited about is cloaked in 50 shades of their drama.
Either my fiancé and I are constantly thinking about and worried about their reactions to things or we get berated on the backend for not thinking about them. I told him I didn't want to talk about wedding stuff with them anymore, and he's ok with it. But I am so worried that will just mean a public display of their horrible behavior at the wedding.
It's just all feeling like it isn't even worth it to have this wedding that I've dreamed of because they've done everything in their power to take the joy from me and make it about them. I'm at a loss for what to do, and, short of uninviting them, I just know things will hit the fan that day.
31. All You Had To Do Was Show Up
My bridal shower came and went and my childhood best friend (and a bridesmaid) didn't show up. She texted me today and apologized profusely for not coming, because she has been in a horrible mental space. I'm not mad at her, because you can't control that kind of stuff. And I wouldn't want her to come if it was gonna make her sick. I'm just kinda hurt that it happened in general.
We met at eight years old in a karate class and have been best friends since. And when we stopped attending (around age 18), I feel like she stopped reaching out to spend time with me and upkeep our friendship. It was lame, and I was lonely, because she was my only friend, but oh well; you can't force someone to care.
Years later, she started engaging with me more and we started hanging out when we could. But it was a LOT of "Okay, meet you on ‘scheduled day’! Oops, nevermind, now that we've reached ‘scheduled day,’ I just really don't have it in me today”. It quickly became a pet peeve of mine: making promises and not keeping them.
But I just accepted this is how she functions, and when I see her, I see her. It's been like this for over six years. She got married two months ago, and I was a bridesmaid. I was so honored to be a part of her day, and I pulled any strings I could to make sure I was present at every wedding party of hers I was invited to in a town an hour away.
Her day was beautiful and awesome, I had so much fun. MY bridal shower was yesterday, and she didn't show up. No text. Just a no-show. I wasn't worried, cause I know her, so I knew it just meant she was having One Of Those Days. But still. She apologized to me today, and told me she "is still excited to be a bridesmaid, but would understand if I was mad and wanted to have her step down”.
I'm not MAD. But that apology kinda just hurt me a little more. Like...made me realize that she might very well not even show up to my wedding if she's having a bad day. And that's a really awful thought. It just feels really unfair that I feel like I really try to be physically present for her, and when it's my turn, she can't return the favor.
And again, I understand you cannot control your mental illness. You can't always "suck it up" and get stuff done anyway. But yeah argh I'm just really disappointed that she's failing to stand up for me the way I did for her. Like, after all these years, and a whole wedding together lol and it's the same old problem; still can't follow through with the promises.
I can't count on her to be there for me 100%. Still, I let her know that I can still leave a bridesmaid spot open for her, as long as she's able to come. Her answer shattered my heart into a million pieces.
She literally just texted me asking which of two bridesmaid dress options she should buy. Neither are from my list of 20 dresses that I gave everyone. Her reason? “None of those will come in time”. I gave my dress options months ago. My wedding is now three weeks away.
32. Stalemate
40 years ago, there was a big incident that was between my parents and my step-grandmother. They don't talk or acknowledge each other. Present day. I am the only one from my side that still talks to my step-grandmother. I absolutely adore her. My fiancé loves her too and we both wanted her at our wedding. I spoke to her about inviting my cousins (her biological grandkids) so she won't be alone.
I told her the ceremony and reception will be at my parents’ house. She has told me that she will not be attending because of my parents and will only come if I held the wedding somewhere else. She doesn't want to act smiley for one day with people she doesn't like. My initial response was that it will make no difference because my parents will be still at the wedding, regardless of the wedding location.
She told me she would only attend the ceremony and then leave, and not stay for the reception.
33. Winging It
My wedding is coming up in two months. One of my bridesmaids who I will call Jess and I have been friends for a little over two years, and are in school together. We were really close, we used to always study and do homework together, hang out, things like that. Recently as wedding planning/buying dresses and other plans are needing to be made, I’ve found that Jess has been distancing herself from me for some reason.
This is tough because three of my other bridesmaids are all a part of a group of friends, myself included. This has been primarily led by Jess, and I’ve found now that this has turned into small little backhanded comments about my wedding and how she’s too stressed to deal with it right now, to flat out ignoring me. But, Jess is still currently a bridesmaid in my wedding.
The biggest issue for me right now is the fact that she seems like she doesn’t care. For example, everyone has ordered their dresses already, and she got hers. Jess though has not tried it on saying, “She’ll try it on before the wedding, and if it doesn’t fit, she’ll get something on Amazon”. This rubs me the wrong way because it makes me think she doesn’t care.
I really tried to be accommodating regarding dresses and even offered to pay for them since everyone’s in college and money is tight. The dresses I picked are $80-100 each which is not expensive at all compared to others I’ve seen. This strange behavior from Jess is continuing despite me talking to her to see if she’s okay.
34. Make Up Your Mind
My husband and I eloped in 2020. Our wedding is in three weeks in Ireland where I am from and where I live. My in-laws are all in Texas. They have never been super easy people but not the worst—but I couldn’t get them to RSVP to this wedding. I know travel, Covid, etc, so gave them time.
Four days ago we said it was pretty close, and we really needed to give our venue final numbers and didn’t know if any of the five of them were coming. My husband was heartbroken. Pre-pandemic canceling and elopement, his brother was the best man and he had asked him to be again. They confirmed three would come. Then changed to two. Quickly back to three. And then six. But that was nothing compared to what happened next.
At that point, I said that this wasn’t really confirming anything and I was feeling stressed and confused and could I help with anything? I got a screaming phone call and an essay from his alcoholic mom about how this wedding was about their family and I wasn’t making her welcome enough.
My nice girl act cracked and I said that this wasn’t fair on my parents who were hosting, given that my dad is extremely unwell and we are just trying to organize something small and manageable for him (they needed transport, buses to venue, hotel rooms for extra nights that we had to sort).
So now nobody is speaking to me and I am sick to my stomach. I can’t eat or sleep. I never thought it would affect me this bad. My mum is throwing me a bridal shower on Thursday and I feel so embarrassed because I feel I cracked and now our wedding is a mess with potential drama.
35. Who Wants An Invite To The Boring Part Anyway
This past June, I got married and as I’m sure most brides would agree, I wanted to make sure this day was special. Given unusual protocols posed for Covid-era weddings, the health of our guests was certainly a priority but I also wanted to have as “normal” of a wedding as possible that I had been envisioning for so long. Our ceremony was at a church and the reception was at a separate venue.
The church had very strict capacity limitations which required us to drastically cut our guest list down. We decided to have an intimate ceremony at the church with our wedding party and families, but to invite everyone on our original guest list to the reception. We sent out two different invitations and assumed that those who we were not able to invite to the ceremony would understand the circumstances given the Covid situation.
Shortly after our wedding, I caught wind from many people that a few gals from one particular group of friends had been complaining during the entire reception about not being invited to our ceremony. Keep in mind, I am definitely not SUPER close with these gals but I do see them fairly frequently socially. While a big part of me felt like this was ridiculous and very rude of them to complain so blatantly, I chose to reach out to these gals to apologize if I had unintentionally made them feel excluded.
I explained that there were capacity limitations with the church so we, unfortunately, could only include a small group of people for the ceremony part of the day. In a lot of ways, I do not feel that I owed them any apology but I wanted to take the high road and clear the air because I certainly did not want to hurt anyone’s feelings.
After reaching out to apologize, I did not hear back whatsoever. I followed up a few weeks later to say, “Hey! Did you get my voicemail and text from last month? Just wanted to make sure and to again apologize for any misunderstandings about the ceremony. Would love to see you & catch up if you’re around”! Again, I was left with crickets.
It began to bother me after not hearing back so, after several more weeks passed, I reached out one last time saying something along the lines of, “Hi, so sorry to reach out yet again but I am a little worried that I haven’t heard back from you? Is everything ok”? Sure enough, radio silence.
This past week, over a month after that last text, I got a weird response from one of the gals essentially along the lines of, “I’m at a loss of words and haven’t known how to respond but didn’t want to keep you in the dark any longer. I was bummed about the ceremony and decided to take a step away from being your friend. Hope you’re doing well”! Well…that’s that, I guess.
36. Money Can’t Buy Happiness—Or A Good Wedding
First off, the bride and groom are lovely people and deserve no shame for any of this. They were failed by circumstances, their terrible vendors and a petty ex-husband. The bride has a very young toddler with an ex-husband. She was getting remarried shortly after a divorce.
The ex-husband was never spoken of but there were many references in speeches to how happy everyone was that the bride could finally be happy, how she got her prince charming and found such a good man. The bride was in tears, as was the maid-of-honor, the father etc. We as guests assumed the previous marriage had not gone well.
It’s a hot and muggy summer day. This is an expensive outdoor venue. Pulling up, you can tell they paid an outrageous amount of money for the place. The ceremony is supposed to start, the bride and groom have taken all their pre-wedding photos. There’s just one problem. Guests are waiting sitting in 90-degree full sun, baking and just melting in formal wedding attire.
There was a small appetizer tray and a few pitchers of water for guests as they arrived but it had long been pulled for everyone to get to their seats for the ceremony to start. The ceremony is supposed to start, and then there is a delay and we hear the generic orchestra music start back up again.
We can all see the bride and bridesmaids through the clear windows of the building. They are standing in line waiting to go but official people are scurrying about. More delays, and more delays.
It’s a full hour of everyone sitting and staring at the bride, waiting for this wedding to start. By the way, she had on a beautiful designer gown that was completely beaded from head to toe. She looked lovely. The groom and groomsmen are awkwardly standing at the alter the entire time. There is a lot of very worried shuffling going on between the bridesmaids and groomsmen groups.
At this point, I'm starting to wonder if older relatives are going to pass out. People start going inside the venue to fetch glasses of water and going to the bathroom for older people and pregnant ladies of which there were quite a few. The venue coordinator is very angry about this for a seriously stupid reason.
He wants no one to see the hall. The hall that everyone can see through 40 feet of clear glass windows with all the tables facing the ceremony site. The hall that everyone had to walk through to get to the outdoor garden in the first place. He starts barking orders at guests and yelling at them to leave the hall, water, and bathrooms behind.
He’s very forceful about it and rude. He actually at some point starts locking doors so people cannot enter. This is the only bathroom option on site. They do not put out more water for people outside at this point. Eventually, the wedding ceremony starts and the bride’s toddler is led out to participate in the ceremony.
During the ceremony, the DJ/sound guy massively fumbles the sound system. It cut in and out through the entire 40-minute ceremony loudly screeching and going silent the entire time. People were holding their ears in pain. I have no idea why the man didn't just turn the stupid system off.
It was painful and ruined any sort of videography the couple could have had. He never stops playing with the system. It was bad and if he wasn't the DJ for later on, I think he probably should have been fired on the spot. The ceremony is finished up and the couple are very clearly delighted and just so happy to be married.
The groom carries his new stepchild down the aisle with them—but there was something that we didn’t know...
We found out later, the bride's ex-husband had the toddler prior to the ceremony and had not brought/handed over the child several hours after he was supposed to for the wedding. He had clearly tried to spite the bride and groom by not showing up and delaying the ceremony start time over an hour because of his spite.
The bride insisted she was not getting married without her child in attendance. Pretty reasonable, and she stayed remarkably poised through the whole thing all considering. I suspect there was probably quite a bit of high drama behind the scenes finding that toddler and getting the child to the ceremony site.
Later, we the plebeians are all allowed by the event coordinator to enter the hall and find our seats. It’s a lot of people and a large wedding. The couple have clearly spent a lot of money on this. We all desperately gulp our ice water at the tables. I'm drinking mine when I make a chilling discovery.
I notice shards of glass in my water. I politely find a server and give them my glass and request a new one. Everyone at the tables starts eying their drinks. Then food service comes out. It's painfully slow. It takes well over an hour for everyone to get food. Everything is bland, unsalted, unsauced, and small meager portions. The cooked vegetables are raw. The potatoes are clearly instant.
What’s worse is we can't identify what meat we're eating. It's almost inedible. We eventually figure out eating two different types of sliced meat. We were all hungry. The cake was cut and served. Although beautiful, it was equally dreadful and stale. More speeches start and everyone cries about how great the groom is and how happy they are the bride found someone so wonderful.
It’s starting to get painfully awkward at this point. I and other guests are starting to wonder what sort of monster she was previously married to. Then the best man also makes an awkward speech saying he’s never seen the groom as happy as when he announced he was engaged to the bride. Here's the tricky thing.
The groom had also been previously engaged the year before to another woman. They had been engaged a long time. They broke up after some lifestyle differences. Which, fair enough, better to break up before than after the wedding. But the best man kept talking about how he had never seen the groom so happy to be engaged and in such a "healthy supportive relationship”.
Well, that was awkward. Talking about how his friend had just bloomed in the last year with the love of a good woman. Again also the groomsman talking about how he was so happy he could call the bride a friend and wanted them all to be a happy friend group together with him and their wives.
It should be noted the previous fiancé was also a nice lady, but they just decided to choose different life paths. So the highlight by the groomsmen of how much the groom loved this new woman and was soooo much happier after all these years was just a bit cringey. It felt a bit like he was saying he hated the other fiancé and this new one was so much better.
Through all of this, the bride and groom are just staring into each other’s eyes totally in love holding their toddler, and being a happy little family. Obviously, everyone was happy for them, but maybe the speeches could have been a bit more tactful about previous relationships. But the night wasn’t over yet.
Then comes the DJ with his music for dancing. He has decided he is going to crank the music all the way up in a concrete-built reception hall. The music is blaring. Again the sound system is not set up properly and the bass is vibrating the floors. It's physically painful to the ears again, something was clearly not balanced correctly with the speakers. No one can hear anyone speak. It’s bad.
People are screaming at each other in conversation. It's metal rock concert loud. It was bad enough after we left the wedding, I had ringing ears for hours after. I think it genuinely damaged my hearing. People begin to flee the reception room and the majority of all guests begin to stand in the foyer next to the bathrooms.
It’s actually a bit comical, if it wasn’t so sad. There are easily a hundred or more guests standing in the small foyer talking and drinking. The reception hall is essentially 25% full at this point. Everyone else has run away. The DJ still never read the room. All night, he kept the volume at the same level. Max. A few people try to dance.
But eventually, most of the guests tire of standing in the foyer and are hungry from lack of edible food. People start to leave at 8 pm. The evening wedding was supposed to start at 5 pm. We stayed as long as we could but by 9:30, nearly everyone was gone. It felt like it would be inappropriate to stay longer as the vendors had started cleaning up.
The venue also failed to set out the wedding favors in time for the guests. Nearly every guest had left without taking the custom bottled wedding favors. Walking away, I thought about all the money and time the couple had spent. They easily spent more than $50k, I would guess more on what was essentially a four-hour wedding day.
It was a beautiful venue, and with beautiful photo opportunities, a beautiful bride in a beautiful custom designer dress, and a happy groom. Everyone was thrilled for the couple. It had all the potential to be an amazing party. Honestly, if I had unlimited funds in the future I might have done something very similar for my own wedding. Even down to the decor and gown the bride chose. It was all of very good taste.
That’s when I determined, even if I had the funds, I wouldn't do this for myself in the future. I don't think my family are wedding people. I would be so disappointed if everyone had left my wedding four hours after they showed up. So much expense for so little in return. I would be absolutely crushed. Nope, I'm not setting myself up for that disappointment.
I'm probably going to elope somewhere in a fabulous destination. That way I can enjoy the experience and the expense of my own wedding. Family is welcome to join us for a barbecue after.
37. A Bloody Mess
This happened almost 10 years ago, but I still think about it from time to time. I was the wedding date to my male friend's family wedding. Let's call my date, J. It was a beautiful wedding at a hotel casino. As I only knew J and a couple other guests, I did not know what to expect. Turns out, his family really liked to party hard.
Before long, hard drinks and homemade moonshine were being passed around, mainly amongst the groomsmen and J. They all became incredibly rowdy rather quickly and after the cake was cut, the groom grabbed a handful of cake and shoved/punched J in the face with it. This is when drama erupted.
The cake to the face was meant to be fun and not malicious, but it caused J to start bleeding out of his nose profusely. Roughhousing can go too far, especially when intoxicated. Well, J became irate at being embarrassed and physically hurt by his cousin. He started yelling, then stormed out of the ballroom.
On his way to the bathroom, he sprayed blood all over the welcoming sign and then punched the metal door handle. It was one of those long horizontal push bars. Casino/hotel employees ended up having to rope off that area to sanitize and clean the blood. I felt really bad about that.
J went to the bathroom to clean up while still kicking up a fuss and many of us, including his mom and myself, followed him trying to help clean him up and calm him down. It soon became clear that no one was going to get him to calm down and he was too far gone to be reasonable.
His cousin tried to apologize many times, but J wasn't hearing it. Which is understandable considering J's present state. J's mom convinced us to leave him be and let him calm down without everyone around. I ended up going to hang out with some of the less rowdy cousins. I tried to wait for J outside, but it was getting really late and his mom told me that I could go back to our hotel room.
I was later woken up by J's mom, telling me that J had been arrested and that we would bail him out in the morning. I was upset by this, but there was nothing I could do but wait to figure out what happened in the morning. When I went to the county lock-up the next day, J came walking out in jeans and boots...that was it.
He had swollen hands and his button-up shirt he wore to the wedding was missing. I couldn't believe what had happened. I found out that he had ripped his shirt off due to getting so much blood on it, then left the casino and was wandering around outside because he was still messed up and angry.
He hit the side of the building with his fist and that's why one hand was messed up, and the other hand was swollen from when he hit the metal bar on the door. The authorities had picked him up outside the hotel. After picking him up from the lock-up, I drove us a few hours back home and then J went straight to the hospital for his hands.
He ended up shattering one of his wrists, I believe he still has a metal screw in it to keep it together, and he also broke a part of one hand, and a few fingers. I cannot remember the exact number of broken bits, but basically, he broke his hands and a wrist.
As far as I know, there is no animosity between J and his cousin. J knows he was off the rails and that if he had not been drinking so much moonshine, then the situation would have been very different. This was nowhere near my most favorite wedding I have been to, but it sure has the craziest story attached to it!
38. Thanks For Nothing
My husband’s cousin who lives near us is getting married to a lady that none of us want him to marry. She’s a boundary-stomping weirdo who has to control every situation and has very little idea of what she’s doing or social skills. First of all, the wedding is on Black Friday. Like, what the heck.
They want the rehearsal dinner on Thanksgiving, which is seriously rude, and also, we have Thanksgiving with my family since my parents are hosting. So, I’m livid. Now, they’ve decided that we need an extra rehearsal on Wednesday at a time none of us can attend. I think the bride scheduled it this way because she likes to be a victim and cause drama.
The best man (a close friend) is now no longer part of the wedding party. The bride has had beef with his wife for over a year and blocked her on everything a year ago before expecting her to do all of the wedding planning since it’s her day job. I wasn’t aware of any of this until she contacted me a little over a week ago super stressed over this and I told her to stand up for herself.
Her and her husband don’t deserve all the terrible treatment they were getting. Like, the bride was furious that the groom was getting a separate bachelor party than her? Wow. But the icing on the cake?
Right now, my husband and I are experiencing symptoms of Covid. We are both vaccinated, but I’m honestly hoping this gives us an out of the wedding. My husband says there’s no way we won’t be able to go, but I can dream.
39. Don’t Tell The Bride
This is a story about my cousin’s wedding last night. Nothing too horrible happened. However, there was a lot of talk going around at the wedding that perhaps some of the readers who are having a future wedding can avoid. So my cousin. She is utterly gorgeous. Extremely smart. And came from a super wealthy family. She is one everyone would be jealous of and was jealous of growing up.
Her wedding was expected to be no less than extravagant—and boy were expectations not met. Of course, she was the most stunning bride you ever saw, like right from a magazine and her ceremony was cute and simple. However, apparently unbeknownst to the rest of the family, her father (who was paying for the wedding) lost all his money the year before.
The cocktail hour with appetizers only lasted 15 minutes as they did not prepare enough apps for the entire hour between the ceremony and dinner. Our family is massive party people and an open bar is expected at any wedding when we are in attendance. Apparently, there were drinks only for up to $1,500 and that ran out also before the cocktail hour ended again.
So 30 minutes before the dinner was served, she had 150 guests tipsy, hungry, and bored. Something needed to happen. Some ran back to their cars to grab wallets. I was informed ahead of time that the bar had a limit and brought a TON of booze with me. I don’t drink but I knew it would be an issue and everyone sure enjoyed the things I brought.
Finally, dinner was served. It was supposed to be a steak filet mignon or chicken thing. Unfortunately, the steak was barely edible though. I ordered it and didn’t like the gravy they put on top. My mother didn’t like it, my father didn’t like it. Luckily my husband ordered the chicken so we all split that. But many people were again, left unsatisfied by dinner.
Thank goodness they had a dessert table…with only 50 cupcakes which were gone in five minutes once people discovered it. My sister started complaining the loudest (she works in hospitality) about how poorly this is all going. My other sister starts getting in her face about how this isn’t her wedding and none of this matters…the rest of the guests were divided.
What really got people complaining was when there was a huge gap between the dancing and the dinner. It was over an hour until the first dance and people could finally enter the dance floor. With no free booze or food, what were people supposed to do? We stood around and mingled, but most of the conversation was about how long we had to wait to dance.
During this time, grandma had a few too many and threw up and passed out in a car. She is frail and has dementia so she wasn’t keeping track of what she was drinking. Two glasses of vino put her out. But her mistake made things even worse.
After the first dances, they invited all the married couples to come to the floor and then do the year call-out, so at the end of the song, the couple who has been married the longest is dancing with the newlyweds and that is supposed to bring good luck and a long marriage.
Well, the DJ started the song and everyone went out, but he was quickly informed to not call out the years as the couple who has been married the longest (my grandparents) would not be dancing. A very big disappointment to both my grandpa and the bride. Once the dancing started going, the complaining didn’t stop.
See, the newlywed couple loved country music. So the DJ played four country songs back to back and that cleared the dance floor as no one else really liked that genre of music. Luckily my cousins stepped in and requested some “classic” wedding songs which got the party going. However, whenever a slow song was played…it was country and people were grumbling about it.
I don’t know how the rest of the night ended as I left a bit early. I said goodbye to the bride and she asked if I had fun which of course, you had to say yes. But overall, I have never been to a wedding with so many people complaining and unhappy. As long as the bride never finds out, people will forget and it will be remembered as a magical night.
40. Turning On A Dime
My best friend, let’s call her W, has been a staple person in my life since middle school. she’s been there through all of my relationships, heartbreak, and exciting moments and now she does not want to be my friend any longer. W became a pretty key member of our friend group at the beginning of 2021.
She came and hung out with my boyfriend and I multiple times a week and then would hang out with me and my BF and his best friend all weekend. We went on summer trips together and had a standing girls' night ever week. My boyfriend’s best friend, we will call him R, broke up with his long-term girlfriend of seven years back in March 2021, and of course, started going through women like no one’s business.
Long story short, W had her first time with R even though my boyfriend and I told her it was a horrible idea. R gave W a lot of heartache but she wanted to remain in the friend group because she didn’t want him to have the power to take her friends away from her. Now it’s been over three months since they got with each other and they both have their own partners now.
Except we don’t like W’s partner because he’s already showing red flags around us. He also doesn’t like her to come hang out with us on her own, and then if she does, he gets very upset with her and she leaves early. Yesterday, I bridesmaid proposed to W. Her reaction was devastating.
She says yes, but then spills the beans about how she hates R and never wants to see him again even though he will also be in the wedding. She texts me six hours later, saying she can no longer be my friend so she will not be at the wedding. I responded, telling her how much I loved her and want her there and she said it didn’t matter because of how much she hates R and apparently also my fiancé now.
I’m trying to just move on and not let her take my joy but it’s hard. Am I crazy to think it could all be her partner talking in her ear?
41. A Lesson In Rolling With The Punches
The mother of a good friend of mine is getting married next weekend. She's been widowed for about four years and has met a lovely man. We're in semi-lockdown so there are restrictions on numbers, etc, that they are following strictly. The drama? She fell over last week and broke her wrist and fractured her leg. She has a cast on one arm and a moon boot on one leg!
But they don't want to put it off so she's going to be limping down the aisle on her son's arm, happy as can be. She’s 78, he’s 82.
42. Unsupervised Minor
I am getting married in less than two weeks now. My soon-to-be mother-in-law has not been involved in any wedding planning, and didn’t come to my bridal shower. Yesterday, my fiancé and I went to their house for a little while and his younger sister (13) showed him her dress for the wedding, which is bright white. My dress isn’t even this white.
I know that it’s not her fault because she probably doesn’t know not to wear white, but I am annoyed with my mother-in-law for not telling her to choose a different dress for the wedding, especially when she didn’t ask me if it was okay. If they had asked I might have said it was fine. It just doesn’t feel good that she didn’t consider asking me how I felt about it.
I wouldn’t ask her to change it now, I just keep wondering if it’s wrong of me to be annoyed about it?
43. The Bait And Switch
My fiancé and I are planning our wedding. Three years ago, I moved across state lines five hours away from my hometown to be with my fiancé. Originally, when we started planning this wedding, we wanted it to be midway for the families (three hours for each of the families), however my family insisted that it's fine to go do it where we live now and the drive is not a problem, and if it is they don't have to come.
I'm thinking great, it's so nice that they are being flexible on this. It made planning everything else so much easier. The problem comes when we were planning the rehearsal dinner. My fiancé and I are private people, we are welcoming extended family to the wedding despite us wanting to keep the wedding small. With all the extended family invites, and random family friends, we have about 70 people.
We were happy with this number and were excited for our rehearsal dinner to be the core group of 30 we had initially wanted the wedding to be. We had this planned already, and everything was going smoothly until I went home for my bridal shower and mentioned that the rehearsal dinner is only 30 people.
At that point, my mom and stepfather are absolutely disgusted with me. They said you can't do that, all those people are coming from our state to see you, you have to invite them to the rehearsal. She kept telling me that they are booking a flight and a hotel to be at your wedding, so I need to invite them to the rehearsal as well.
That this needs to be treated as a destination wedding for MY side of the family. I kept getting harassed about this until I gave in. I told my fiancé about this and he got angry because this was the ONLY intimate moment we will probably ever have with all our close friends.
It's wrong to only invite one-half of the guest list and WE have made that drive the day of and stayed overnight at a hotel and left the next day, there's no need for them to be there for two full days early.
44. Actions Speak Louder Than Words
I need help deciding if I should tell my maid of honor I don’t want her in my wedding anymore or if I’m just overreacting. I am getting married in five months and have been having some issues with my maid of honor. So let’s start off with dress shopping.
I planned way in advance to go dress shopping and with restrictions, I was only allowed to have three people with me so I chose my maid of honor, my mom, and my sister. Day of, my maid of honor calls me one hour before the appointment to tell me she could not come because she is fighting with her boyfriend.
I just asked maybe she would like to come along anyways and vent while we shop as it was a big day for me and really wanted her opinion that day. She still said no and that was that. I ended up buying a dress that day and afterward, she has not yet asked me about that day or if I found anything. Next would be my bridal party’s dress shopping.
Day of, she called and told me she couldn’t make it due to she was having a mental breakdown I asked what was going on and she didn’t want to talk about it so I gave her some space. I have asked her plenty of times if she was doing okay and she said she’s fine. She has also given me a hard time with what she could wear for the wedding.
I let all the girls choose their style of dress as long as the color was the same but she said since she’s a maid of honor she should be able to decide what she wants to wear. I have talked to her about everything and told her how I felt like she didn’t want to be a part of the wedding and I said it would be totally fine if she wanted out but she said she wanted to be a part of it and a part of every step but her actions say otherwise.
After that talk, she still hasn’t reached out about anything. She told me she was planning something for me, but when I asked one of my bridesmaids about it, they said nope. I also found out my bridesmaids are planning my bachelorette party and wedding shower and that she hasn’t reached out to help with that.
I also don’t want or expect her to do any of that I just want her to be there for the important parts I just don’t get why she would lie.
45. Rubbing It In
My sister got married last Saturday. It was a nightmare. She and my mom spent nearly the entire year in the lead-up to the event talking about it. This wouldn’t have bothered me if it was excitement fueling all of those conversations, but instead, it was stress. I’ve never seen the appeal of a big wedding, but watching this play out has solidified my point of view.
My husband and I got married in a small ceremony in front of only close family and friends (maybe 25 people there at most), hosted a slightly bigger reception for others we also wanted to celebrate with, and called it a day. There was no anxiety about planning, no looming dread that this perfect day we had built up in our heads might not go 100% as planned. Just us celebrating our love with people we love.
My sister’s wedding was the antithesis of that. It was over the top. The guest list was already massive, and then she allowed children there on top of that. If you can imagine 200+ people plus kids running around what is supposed to be a peaceful event and NOT get anxious, I envy you. I already knew the whole thing was going to go terribly, as much as I hate to say it.
You can’t welcome that level of mayhem while also having your itinerary planned down to the minute. There was nothing intimate or personal. It seemed she was inviting “friends” she hadn’t spoken to in years just to fill out more seats. The whole thing was ostentatious and I have no idea who she was trying to impress.
Myself and the rest of our siblings are all in similar financial situations. Just because you have the money to pay for something doesn’t mean you should. My husband and I were ready to head home right after the ceremony, but we played nice and stuck around. At one point over the course of the night, she ended up in tears, unsurprisingly.
I got roped into trying to comfort her, and I asked my sister if it was worth it. Was all the planning and stress and money dropped on this event worth the final outcome. My mom told me that my attitude the entire day had been terrible, the comments from my husband and I were distasteful, and that the question I had asked was awful and rude.
I haven't spoken to either her or my sister since.
46. Cry Uncle
My mother had four sisters and five brothers biologically. She is adopted but invited all of her siblings and the ones who were going to attend RSVPed like normal people. The wedding was five days long and on the second day, one of my uncles turns up. We are going to call him Vincent. My husband Bill is the one who greets him, and he is very dismissive, he pretends that he doesn't know Bill.
A couple of hours later we come downstairs, we have dolled up and it is basically time to start kicking off the celebrations. We come downstairs and we hug everyone who was present. My mother results in telling Vincent that this is the Groom (Bill) and Vincent suddenly has a moment of clarity and blurts out, "I did not think you would have recognized me".
We proceeded outside to do a prayer recognizing the Earth as the mother who nurtures and provides for us. I heard him exclaim to the Priest that the women in his family do not know how to do anything right. For the Turmeric ceremony, Vincent started yelling at my second oldest sister—there are four of us.
He was yelling because according to him we were not doing things the right way. Like he knew better than the priest. When he put the turmeric on me, he basically was hitting me and he told me he is just going to the “Om Namah Shivay” mantra because he does not want my marriage to fail because my family did not have the sense to do things the right way.
All of my cousins who came to the wedding were given a role. My sisters were front and center but that is because we live in different countries and are absurdly close, and we are sisters. On Saturday I did his name tag/place holder thingie, while my sister did my hair. And when I walked in with an absurdly heavy and big three-piece Indian lehenga, he called me fat out loud.
My twin's fiancée was ticked off and spoke to him. He boasted about his wealth to one of my mother's friends and that resulted in the biggest insult of all, telling people that my mother has only achieved something because of his help. He also told people that my mother sleeps around.
Just after the Hindu Ceremony, he pulled my mother aside and yelled at her, telling her that had we (Bill and myself) invited his kids personally they would have come and they would have the same amount of fun as my other cousins. At the group photo, he proceeded in directing everyone on what to do, and continuously shouted at me "Can't you smile”?
I basically had a panic attack and fainted. I had also only had two hours of sleep. He told the priest that he was the black sheep of the family to which the priest responded, "Well, have you done anything to be the black sheep”? Basically, if he was the black sheep of the family he would not have been invited.
Our wedding favors were placed in little bags with the recipients' names on them. A few people were late, so he ended up taking multiple programmes and other people's wedding favors (my grandmother saw and was happy to report back). Then, he found my mother once more and told her that he would not stay for the Humanist wedding because he is very religious.
What does a Humanist wedding have to do with religion? I do not know. Since then, he says that he regrets not having brought his family to the wedding and they would definitely be coming for my twin's wedding. Cannot wait for what he does or says next...
How do you manage people like this? I wished he had stayed home with his obnoxious family. He always gives me weird vibes.
47. Mean Girl
There’s a lot of drama with my fiancé’s sister. She’s always been rude to me and I don’t know why. When I first met her she seemed nice and I liked her, my fiancé’s friends told me to be careful because she always acts that way at the beginning and then she shows her true colors, which she did.
Even my fiancé told me not to trust her and not share much with her because she tends to use and twist whatever she sees and hears from other people. Despite all that, I always treated her with respect and was nice to her, until I got tired of her behavior.
She started with mean looks, mean comments about my accent to other people, not saying hi to me when she saw me, completely ignoring my presence and talking to whoever was next to me but not me, and then she started making comments about my family (we all speak Spanish so we have an accent when we speak in English).
She started saying things to my fiancé like, “Do you even understand what they are saying”?, which he ignored, then she one day just closed the front door when I was walking towards it after watching me struggle with grocery bags, complaining to her friends about how much she wanted me to go away even though I was engaged to her brother.
She's constantly making offensive jokes at lunch with her grandparents, she even insulted me in Spanish and when I called her out for it, she just laughed and ignored me. My fiancé has talked to her multiple times, but nothing changed, she just got defensive and started yelling at him, which seems to be what she does whenever someone tells her something she doesn’t like.
Despite all that, I tried to be civil around her for her parents’ sake since we get along really well and love spending time together. That was until one night she went off on me when her parents mentioned our upcoming wedding.
We were talking about guests and she started saying who should go and who shouldn’t, how I should think about their family and not mine when it came to guests (mind you, there will be three times more people from my fiancé’s side than mine), all of this because she wanted to invite her friends, so we tried to tell her that it was our wedding and it was our decision to see who we invite.
She said, “Well, we are paying for it”, which is not true, my fiancé's parents offered to help pay for the wedding and we are incredibly grateful for that, but she’s not giving us anything. She even went as far as saying, “We are just doing this because of your dad”, and that set me off.
A little background: my dad can’t come to the US because he doesn’t have a visa so my fiancé and I decided to do our wedding in Cabo. It was our decision because of course I have to have my dad at my wedding, and Cabo is a beautiful place for a destination wedding.
Going back to that night, after she said that, I just lost it on her. Things went bad really quick. She started yelling, I raised my voice because I was not going to let her talk about my family and wouldn’t let her yell at me, and then my fiancé and I left. We saw her only once after that (of course, she never said hi to me or acknowledged my presence), and we avoided her since then.
Now our wedding is coming up in five months and, of course, she’s going. We didn’t want to invite her but we knew we had to in order to avoid a fight with his parents, but now we just really don’t want to have her there because we know how much she likes to start drama. We’re even more anxious because we rented a villa so both families can be together and make a vacation out of it.
We’ll have it for a full week but we totally forgot about having to deal with her, and now we’re regretting it. My mother-in-law said her daughter will only go for the wedding, but it turns out she decided to go for the full week and made (yes, made), her dad buy her a plane ticket for those dates.
Her mom suggested that we could have a sit-down talk with her to talk about these issues and make sure we “clear the air” so nothing happens during our wedding week, but she also said she can’t promise it’ll go smoothly because her daughter is very difficult to deal with, and I don’t know if I want to do that.
I really don’t want to see her again because I know it’ll turn into a fight if we decide to have that talk, I don’t feel like I want to deal with that.
48. Betty Vs. Veronica
Background: I grew up in a pretty affluent neighborhood with lots of jockeying for power positions in social/economic areas. Think high school on steroids. I was casual friends with ‘Betty,’ whose family lived in one of the most modest homes. Her mom ‘Kathy’ is a nurse and her dad ‘Ken’ is a mechanic.
They were hippy-ish with a modest house, and modest spending (comparatively). Not into the neighborhood scene. They did a lot of DIY which was considered déclassé. Years later I ended up working at the same place as Betty and we became good friends. So, Betty gets engaged to ‘Bob’ who was also raised in the old neighborhood.
He’s a few years older and I didn’t remember him growing up but is a great down-to-earth person as well, which surprised me because his family members that I knew were really vested in the hierarchy of the neighborhood.
His mom ‘Veronica’ was into the whole entitled Queen Bee stuff. Even my mom who had leanings in that direction thought she was too much. Betty and Bob wanted a small, quiet wedding which they planned on paying for themselves. Veronica was insistent that they have a bigger one that she and Bob’s dad ‘Vernon’ would pay for.
Betty and Bob conceded to keep the peace but told her they wouldn’t ask Betty’s parents to contribute to something they didn’t want. The only things out of Veronica’s hands were Betty and Bob doing the invitations and transportation from the church to Veronica’s house which Ken and Kathy offered to arrange. Veronica told people she was ‘hopeful’ the cars would be ‘decent’.
Veronica went all out. Everything had to be “the best”. Multiple tents, sit-down meals, flowers from the fanciest florist, a big band, and a wooden dance floor laid over their pool, copious decorations. Everything was formal and elegant and, I will admit, beautiful, if that’s your style.
Veronica, throughout the whole wedding lead-up, was snobby about Ken and Kathy not contributing financially—but in a very passive-aggressive way. Like telling people, “We’re so happy to be able to provide a lovely wedding since Betty’s parents can’t”. And, “It’s a shame Ken and Kathy haven’t been as fortunate as we are. It must be difficult for them”.
I went with Betty to almost all the planning (she told me she needed the moral support to not tell Veronica off) so I heard this stuff for myself as well as getting reports from my mom who is in on the neighborhood gossip. Veronica explained the “situation” to anyone who’d listen. It was really important to her that people understand that her money and taste was an incredible gift. She was rude to the service people too, in a patronizing way.
Day of the wedding: Pictures weren’t too bad if you discounted Veronica’s trying to tell the photographer what to do and Vernon making ‘jokes’ about the cost of the wedding in a way designed to point out he’d paid for it. The ceremony was lovely though. Now, the rest of the story is put together from both things I witnessed and from others.
That’s where things really hit the fan. The wedding party was in front of the church with guests spilling out behind. The cars taking the bridal party to the house start pulling up—every one a classic, perfectly restored, convertible—even if you knew little about cars you knew these were special. Quite a buzz from the crowd.
Veronica was told three of them were Ken’s. Every time someone gushed about the cars, she looked like she had indigestion. We get back to the house and there’s a reception line. Veronica meets guests on Betty’s side who are publicly known and wealthy. These are people she aspires to.
Veronica and Vernon are sitting at a table with Betty’s honorary ‘aunt’ and ‘uncle’ who, they learn, share business ventures with Ken and Kathy—business ventures out of Vernon’s range. They meet a local leading political figure who gushes about his friendship with Ken and Kathy and their charitable contributions to various city programs.
Veronica is looking stressed. Also, she’s had a few glasses of champagne. Veronica (with her Queen Bee cohort) runs into Betty’s brother ‘Karl’ and flat out says how it’s a shame Kathy and Ken couldn’t contribute to giving Bob and Betty their dream wedding (the one they didn’t want).
She was so upset over losing, in her head, some level of superiority that she was more overt than usual. Showing off for her friends and drinking probably factored in too. Karl knew exactly what to reply to put her in her place. He says, “They probably felt the house was enough”.
Yeah, Kathy and Ken gave Betty and Bob a house worth easily three-quarters of a million. They just weren’t people who thought an enormous amount of money spent on a wedding was worthwhile, especially since Betty and Bob didn’t actually want one. Or the kind to brag about a gift.
Veronica’s so-called friends gleefully spread the news. People kept mentioning Ken and Kathy’s generosity to Vernon and Veronica. Vernon stopped ‘joking’ about how much the wedding cost. Veronica spent the whole reception with that ‘I’m angry but I’m going to plaster on a happy face look’. Kept cracking. She still gets that look when the wedding is mentioned.
49. Say Yes To The Dress And No To The Man
Me and my fiancé are getting married soon. Wedding planning has so far been going alright except for a few things he and I argued about like the venue and flower girl. Now we've been arguing about my wedding dress.
This might sound cliché but ever since I was young, I dreamed of having my own beautiful wedding dress, I can afford it but my fiancé thinks it's not okay to waste a couple of thousands on a dress I'm only going to wear once. Yes, he might have a point there, but for one, this is the typical price for wedding dresses.
And two, because it's a once-in-a-lifetime thing then why not make sure it's special? My fiancé still wasn't convinced and suggested I rent a dress instead of buying one. He started saying that I'm being irresponsible with money and brought up how much money I've already put aside to "rent a face" (he means makeup) and wear "fake" hair (he means extensions).
I have this vision of what I want to look like on my wedding and I think that it's my right as a bride. I went ahead and purchased the dress, but a day later I found out that it was missing from my closet. I freaked out—but what he told me made me feel even worse. He said he returned it and got the money back.
I was shocked I asked him why he did that and he said he thought the dress was ridiculously expensive and that was wasting money and AGAIN suggested I go rent one. I blew up and went off on him which I've never done before. He literally took a few steps back and told me to calm down. I said he had no right, I'm the one paying for the freaking dress.
He got upset and said that there's no "I'm paying for it myself" in marriage and that my attitude is setting the tone for what type of dynamic we'll have in our marriage. He kept on about how I must expect to him to pay for everything while I keep "my money" or spend it irresponsibly (yet I never tell him how to spend his money).
I responded that he gets zero say in how I spend my money whatsoever. He told me that I should grow up and stop with the "dream wedding dress" cliché then stormed off to call his mom who chewed me out saying she won't let me ruin her son's financial stability with how I deal with money generally.
She too urged me to rent a dress or buy a cheaper one, way cheaper than the one I picked and move on—but I declined.
50. You Can’t Have Your Cake And Eat It Too
My friend Cassie has always loved my cakes and asked me to make eight for her wedding late last year. We agreed they’d be one-tier cakes to be used as table centerpieces, I loved the idea! We agreed that they’d be decorated in a particular way that wasn’t too elaborate. I was happy with the arrangement and super excited by the prospect!
In early January, she decided she wanted three-tier cakes instead and wanted them decorated much more intricately. The intricacy wanted is nowhere near my ability. I don’t really have the free time to learn how to do it either, I have a lot on my plate in my day-to-day life and I knew even doing the one-tier cakes would be a little tricky but absolutely manageable.
I politely said I couldn’t do that and tried to offer a compromise. I offered to find a way to do three-tier cakes, but more simplistic than she’d have liked. I also offered to get her in contact with a skilled friend of mine who I knew could do what she wanted, she’d have to pay but the price would’ve been extremely good and they’d be beautiful cakes. Worth every penny!
She got very angry at this compromise effort. She called me selfish and told me I was sabotaging her big day. Then demanded I do it for her while getting a few of her friends to send me rude and disheartening messages. This was heartbreaking for me but I told her I could no longer do the cakes and she got angrier. We haven’t talked since that—until yesterday.
I received a message yesterday, acting like nothing happened, asking me to do the cakes again because I owed her. She said I’d be a useless friend if I didn’t. I declined and she chewed me out again saying things that were unnecessary and I’d rather not repeat. I’d had enough, this had already been stressful for me and I hated being dragged into it.
I messaged her fiancé Adam sending him some screenshots asking if he’d please make her stop lashing out. She was hurting but I didn’t deserve the things said. I didn’t get a reply until today when he apologized profusely. What he told me next made my blood run cold.
He told me she’d done this to another friend before me and this was “the straw that broke the camel's back” for him and he was going to call off the wedding until they’d been to counseling together. I thanked him for being understanding but a few hours later Cassie and her friends started harassing and threatening me. It's been horrible.
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