Wedding nightmares

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I'm almost ashamed to admit this, but one week before my wedding (to James), I crashed and totalled my car after picking up my wedding veil from the dressmaker's shop (I was stressed and tired beyond words). Every damned muscle in my body was sore as I walked down that aisle and my poor mother had a broken collar bone (she was my passenger that day). I guess worse things can happen, right? Yeah, that's your cue and you can take it from here. Tell me about a wedding planning nightmare of your own (or someone you know) that'll make the hair on the back of my head stand on end.

-- Anonymous, June 02, 2000

Answers

We had a late morning wedding, a noon-ish reception. And then we drove about seven hours to our honeymoon location. We arrived at our hotel. We unpacked the car. I went into the bathroom to change into my fancy nightie while my new husband popped open a bottle of champagne.

So I'm in the bathroom, I take off my clothes, wash my face, comb my hair. Sit down on the toilet. And start my period. Right then. All day we'd been driving, nothing. Bummer.

It wasn't like it was our first time together, but still...it was our wedding night and sex is supposed to, well, you know, be somehow magical or something.

Anyway, I don't know if this is exactly hair-raising, but it was sort of a drag.

My advice is that if you count the days and realize you'll be OTR on your wedding day AND you're taking the pill, start taking the new pack a week early...It won't kill you to pharmaceutically delay your period a little bit....

-- Anonymous, June 02, 2000


Sasha, either you ask very interesting questions or I have a flipping story about everything.
The wedding was in a Presbyterian church down the street from my childhood home. I had attended a service there once so I could use the church.
The night of the rehearsal dinner, we noticed that the cold air return was in the middle of the aisle I was going to walk down. My friend, ever prepared for an emergency, donated her car mats to put over the grating so that no high heels would get caught.
Um. Yeah.
So, I was walking down the aisle, nauseated, sweating and tearful when my 3 inch heel slipped off the mat and jammed into the cold air return grate. I paused for a millisecond and tried to tug it out, but all that accomplished was lifting the grating up and letting it drop back again, with a bit of a crash.
I left the shoe and walked the rest of the way up the aisle on my right toes to compensate for the left shoe.
My uncle slipped out of his seat and in a crouch, pulled my shoe out of the grate with a spectacular bang and crash which was documented on the video of the wedding.
He then crabwalked several feet and delivered the shoe to my dad, who put it back on my foot.
Behind me I could hear, "Only Vonnie Lee..."
Von



-- Anonymous, June 03, 2000


Now let me just tell you before I get started, that despite the things I'm about to tell you, I had a lovely wedding. Having said that, here goes.

First off, we had a Catholic wedding. My husband is Catholic, and I'm not. And the priest was one of these that thought if you weren'tCatholic, clearly you were some kind of lesser being. The man took a potshot at me in his homily (is that how you spell that?). My dear husband remembered to secure the organist's services, and then didn't tell him anything about selections. The organist was unsure as to whether or not he was actually supposed to be there. Luckily for us he decided he should be and arrived exactly as the wedding was supposed to be starting. That in itself was cause for a near heart- attack. Then I went right down the aisle with my train bustled up. Yep, we forgot to let it down. My maid of honor undid it after I reached the fron of the church. The guests seemed to believe we's planned it that way. My parents got lost on the way to the reception, and of course hubby and I couldn't go in until the formal introductions... which they needed to be present for. But all that aside, the crowning glory of the whole day was the fact that my wedding cake was the ugliest thing you have ever seen. Yes, it was hideous. It was supposed to be a lovely little concoction with delicate sprays of wildflowers on it. Instead (after we'd placed our order and pad in full) the lady decided *she* thought it would look nice if half of the cake was covered in huge, garish, plastic, red white and blue flowers. It's every bit as awful as it sounds... possibly worse. If you want to see it, just e-mail me.

Heh, but honestly, bythe time we got to the ugly cake I didn't care anymore. And it was still a lovely wedding.

-- Anonymous, June 05, 2000


I'll also preface this by saying my wedding was wonderful overall, but the hellish moments are of course the funny parts.

We had a morning wedding, with a pre-reception for the guests to know each other a little, and to make sure everybody had at least met both my husband and me. The guests thought the ceremony started at 10, but really it was planned to start at 10:30. So they would probably get there 10-15 minutes early. With that in mind, we told the photographer to be there at 9. There weren't that many posed pictures we wanted. At 9:20 I rounded everybody up and started the pictures. We had at least four unofficial photographers. At 9:45 the guy showed up, and claimed we'd set "between 9:30 and 9:40" as the time. Actually, firing him was quite cathartic and relaxing. Which was good.

Across the street from the lovely historic house in front of which (under a giant magnolia tree) we'd planned the ceremony, was a building in the early stages of construction. But it's 10 o'clock Saturday morning, right? They surely won't be doing construction then... To their credit, the workers said they would have stopped if they could. It was our ceremony, or the whole foundation of the building. But the jackhammers made it a little difficult for the guests to hear the ceremony.

It's been a year, and those are our favorite wedding stories, despite the fact that the rest was perfect, and lots of people since then have stolen aspects of our wedding. I think the horror stories are the best part.

Good luck, Sasha!

-- Anonymous, June 05, 2000


The worse thing that happened was the day before our wedding. We were setting up the hall. My husband had made our cake table (a huge wooden thing with seperate platforms). I went to move it. I heard something pop. My back. I destroyed several vertabrae. On the day of our wedding I could barely move. I walked down the aisle slowly with one hip raised due to the pain. I danced to 4 songs. In all our pictures you can tell I'm in pain.

But our wedding was still beautiful. I didn't feel any pain as we recited our vows, and the most important thing, I'm married to the man I love more than anyone else in the world. And when it comes down to it isn't that all that matters?

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000



My fiancee and I are getting married in October. All was going exceptionally well and planning was ahead of schedule until the Maid of Honor decided that it would be a good idea to come onto me by licking my face, trying to kiss me, and, after I tried to stop her, proposing we get a hotel room for a few hours. Like a good man I left and immediately told my fiancee what happened. Although our relationship is better than ever, planning the wedding has been a disaster ever since because she doesn't have any bridesmaids or family in the area to help her. Another problem lingers....should I tell our former Maid of Honor's husband what transpired? Revenge would be sweet, but why complicate matters?

-- Anonymous, March 26, 2002

Let me tell you that it has been a nightmare and we have not even had the wedding yet! So far, I have planned two full weddings, the first in Las Vegas and now the second (and final!)one to be held in Washington State (my home!). My fiance was born and raised in Las Vegas, so we both agreed to have the wedding in Las Vegas. After all of the planning behind us and the deposits made - we felt like the rest of the planning was smooth sailing for our Viva Las Vegas wedding. So far, everything was

-- Anonymous, September 16, 2002

Let me tell you that it has been a nightmare and we have not even had the actual wedding yet! So far, we have planned one full wedding in Oregon and are now in the middle of planning the wedding all over again in CA. My fiancé was born and raised in Oregon, so we both agreed to have the wedding there. After all of the major planning was behind us and the deposits made - we felt like the rest of the planning was smooth sailing for our wedding. So far, everything was on target! We felt so lucky and were so happy - we love each other, we both have great families that loved and supported us, and we had planned a beautiful wedding - we were happy and on our way to the isle.....so we thought! Two weeks after our Oregon plans were set in stone and we were in the midst of creating our invitations - one of our so called "once supportive" parents had started to have a mental breakdown at our expense and I am not saying this to be funny. My fiancé's mother had started to write nasty letters and leave nasty voice mails to both of us telling us how much she loved us in one sentence, how "morally corrupt, void of decent human skills and incapable of loving we were" in another sentence and how "she wanted to end it all (meaning her life) because we had not validated her" in the next sentence....there is much more she has said but I can't go into all the messy details! My fiancés mother was also contacting the wedding planner we were working with at the time to help us plan our wedding and telling her that everything we picked was "lacking in taste and style" and she did not want to see any of it at the wedding. One month before she had started to loose control, she was writing me letters telling me how much she loved me, how she couldn't wait to gain a daughter and how if she could pick anyone in the world to be with her son she would pick me. I was happy and faltered at her kind words and had told her how much I appreciated and loved her. It is very sad but now she is telling us that she and her husband (my fiancés father) do not want us to contact either of them again and to never ask for anything from them ever again and to "have a nice marriage". It is very sad to both of us that her mental illness has come to a head during a time of happiness and now she may not attend our wedding. My fiancé and I have decided that it would be best for everyone involved & our happiness to change the wedding plans and have it in CA. We are now in the middle of trying to get our money back from the deposits we have made to all of the vendors and are not succeeding and are trying to get someone to get her help - she won't talk to us! I know that this is drastic to change locations of the wedding after all is said and done but we have to distance ourselves from what is going on in his family and to try to get her some help. I just hope that by the time we have our CA wedding, she will be healthy and able to attend our wedding.

-- Anonymous, September 16, 2002

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