or is my DB?

[littlemissstan]

Hello - I'm new so please be gentle - though am genuinely interested in what you have to say, as I really can't work this one out.

I got engaged this weekend (yay!) and have never wanted to have an engagement that lasted years and years. Though, need to save too, so was vaguely looking at April/May next year.

My DB is getting married next July, having got engaged over a year ago. I rang him and asked how he felt about me potentially having a wedding before his. He said he didn't really care. But it now turns out he's been to the rest of the family crying how unreasonable I am, I have now been accused of trying to upstage him, to have my wedding overshadow his. This is nowhere near what I was trying to do, but just wanted a spring wedding not too far away...

Am I just being totally selfish and U? The weddings would be 2 months apart, I would not have it like the week before or anything. They would be very different in tone, location. Yes, some family will attend two weddings in the space of a few months, but it is hardly as if they are going to turn round and say they're only coming to one! He also told me that his fiancee might want to move theirs to the winter anyway - so am I then meant to put all my plans on hold and wait some more?

Friends say he's just being precious, but I can sort of see where he's coming from. Though he has always always got his own way and been left alone and not made to do anything he doesn't want to as the precious baby (I'm the oldest) and I sort of feel that this is the same thing...

Argh! Any advice?

OP, has your DB actually booked a date in July and booked venue etc? If not, then he is being very unreasonable. But if he has got the date booked and is now talking about moving it to avoid your wedding then I am afraid you are going to look like the unreasonable one to your family and his friends.

I'm not into competitive weddings or the preciousness that some people attach to what often appears to be a wedding, rather than a marriage.

But I can see how irritating it would be to discover that a family member has suddenly booked their wedding for, say four weeks beforehand if this would play havoc with relatives coming to both.

I was prepared to accept that, OK, maybe a 2-month gap isn't perfect (although the other side of me says, fuck that, nobody has the monopoly on getting married) but if the OP's brother is now suggesting they cannot marry until after his wedding (regardless of when this is or the gap between the weddings) then this is unreasonable.

As for getting his mother's DP to phone up, I am aghast. Is the brother actually mature enough to consider getting married at all?

it does depend where you live

if you don't all live near each other I would find it hard to afford and take leave from work for 2 weddings, 2 ehn/stag do's etc

Can one wedding take the shine off another? No. Is a wedding any less special if there's another one before it? No.

I think he needs to get over himself. Both weddings will be special and lovely.

make sure you do all the organising for yours

your mother obviously is on his side so migth ot want to go dress shopping, be fankled looking at hire suits for 2 weddings 2 minths apart

You can't get married until after his littlemiss. What, even if it was this year? Literally, anything before his is a problem? If so, he is a child and needs to be informed that there isn't a queueing system!

your brother is the same age as me!!!

"I am usually firmly in the 'anything for an easy life' camp, but I would like people to think that maybe I deserve to have the day I would like too"

littlemissstan this is the reason you need to stand your ground.

Timothy, he has got a specific date that he wants, but hasn't booked a venue or anything. Him moving it to accommodate me hasn't come up - it's more he feels I have to fit around what he decides.

Gumby, we're both on the south coast, about an hour apart - nothing too dreadful I hope...

I think the worst thing is that it now seems to have become not that I couldn't do it two months before (which as people have pointed out, and I can see, is pretty close in the scheme of things), but that he doesn't want me to do it before him at all, as he's been engaged longer.

I just need to try and speak to him like an adult and sort it out I know, but, as might be obvious, adult behaviour is not always his strong point!

I also suspect a lot of it is coming from his fiancee...

While I can just about see him being a little iffy over you booking your wedding two months before his, this is the top of a very slippery slope. I have a friend who got engaged about a year ago. They have still not managed to pick a date because every time they suggest something it gets shot down by their (horribly difficult on both sides) family for being too close to another wedding or before someone who's been engaged longer. His elder brother threw a strop because he was the eldest and should thus get married first (he'd been engaged 7 years, you'd think he could've considered getting the hell on with it before now), a million cousins came out the woodwork who suddenly all had to be taken into account... I suggested they elope, and apparently it's a tempting idea but the family fallout wouldn't be worth it, or so they tell me.... :o

Agree with tardis- I mean there's a gap of two months, not two weeks! I can't even remember what I was doing two months ago.

IMO eighteen(ish) months is a nice length of engagement. It gives you time to shop around and decide what you want, and also save a bit of dolla'. He is effectively asking you to double the length if your engagement because he and his fiancé have loose plans to marry sometime next year set a date, tell him you're not moving it, and if they start complaining tell them some guff like, "But darling, we're going for a completely different feel". You need to talk to this groomzilla in words he understands.

littlemiss, that is incredibly childish of your DB. It is one thing to not want your wedding so close to his but to say you cannot get married until after him is insane. AND he hasn't even booked anything yet, just has a date in mind.

Initially I thought you were being unreasonable having a wedding so close to his but now I think you need to tell him that as he hasn't even booked anything yet he does not have automatic right to dictate to everyone else how they lead their lives.

Unfortunately as there is family history of him behaving like this and your family pandering to him you are going to have to stay dignified and argue your side of things in the event that your family continue to pander to him. What a horrid situation. I would be tempted to just bugger off abroad just you and your DP and sod the lot of them!

He actually cried?! Good grief. That's a little over the top..

Timothy and Naoko very tempting, but also might cause a few probs! I also really want to share it with my very lovely friends - perhaps I should just have a 'no family' rule :o

I shall gird my loins and go home and give him a ring...

YANBU. Your Bro is having a very long engagement. He can't have first dibs on all dates between now and then - that would be ridiculous. What if you'd got engaged the week after them would he have expected you to wait 3 years or whatever before you could get married? 2 months between the weddings is fine IMO.

Oh, and CONGRATULATIONS!

So he doesn't want you to get married until after he has, even though nothing is booked yet

He needs to grow up.

So he hasn't even booked it yet?

In that case yanbu.

I was going to say that I wouldn't do it to one of my siblings although I wouldnt have been bothered if they'd done it to me.

Your db said to you it was ok - but then "cried" to your mum. Did he actually ask her to ring or has she taken it upon herself to over protect her youngest?

If I were you i'd look at a Nov/dec wedding this year. Then you wouldn't have to wait, you might find it cheaper and it would be substantially different from the English summer wedding they seem to have their hearts set on.

You don't sound like a bridezilla (albeit you've only been engaged a few days). Book now before you have chance to start getting weird and obsessional.

Your db said to you it was ok - but then "cried" to your mum. Did he actually ask her to ring or has she taken it upon herself to over protect her youngest?

If I were you i'd look at a Nov/dec wedding this year. Then you wouldn't have to wait, you might find it cheaper and it would be substantially different from the English summer wedding they seem to have their hearts set on.

You don't sound like a bridezilla (albeit you've only been engaged a few days). Book now before you have chance to start getting weird and obsessional.

Your db said to you it was ok - but then "cried" to your mum. Did he actually ask her to ring or has she taken it upon herself to over protect her youngest?

If I were you i'd look at a Nov/dec wedding this year. Then you wouldn't have to wait, you might find it cheaper and it would be substantially different from the English summer wedding they seem to have their hearts set on.

You don't sound like a bridezilla yet (albeit you've only been engaged a few days). Book now before you have chance to start getting weird and obsessional too!

Ooooh yes a lovely winter wedding.

Or autumn this year would be nice too.

I do think considering family members paying out for accommodation/travel etc for two weddings in quick succession is a bit of a tall order.

Your brother being precious about it - one of those things that's a bit silly, but considering other people's feelings is just one of those things you have to do when you are planning a wedding.

I got engaged last summer and wanted to have a wedding quickly as we were in our 30's, could afford to have the small wedding we wanted and so there was no reason to have a long engagement like you might do in your 20's. All good so far. Then about 2 months later an old friend got engaged and is getting married soon after me. She has been married before so I did feel a bit like 'hey, you've had a wedding before, now you're stealing my thunder!'

I think feeling like that is a fairly natural reaction but of course I wouldn't have dreamed of saying anything to her - it would have been a really mean thing to do and I would never say that to a friend. It didn't stop me from feeling like that inside though!

She did discuss the date with me beforehand as she was originally looking at a date even closer to mine - it would have been a real struggle for us to get to the wedding after just getting back from the honeymoon, and in the end she didn't choose that date, so the whole thing was worked out fairly easily.

If you scale back the wedding plans a bit once you have looked into all the costs, or find some good money-saving options (lots of good threads on here about it!) perhaps have your wedding a bit earlier, in March maybe? That gives a bit more breathing space between the two - and perhaps if your wedding is going to be a smaller and less full-on affair, people will realise it's a different kettle of fish from your brothers and not keep comparing the two.

Congratulations and YANBU.

If he wants you to wait till after he's got married, you might never get married! What if their wedding gets called off? Or they keep putting the date back because they want to save for some crazy wedding? You can't trifle around with something as important as getting married - it's not just about the big day, it's about you and your DP making a life long commitment to each other. And if you don't want to wait to do that, then don't.

And he said it was OK before complaining to your family. Ridiculous.

I got engaged after my DB and married before him. No hard feelings on anyone's side. We are very different, his fiance wanted a traditional full-on wedding, I wanted something simple and home made. I also just wanted to be married to my DH, not spend years saving for one day! You go for it, whenever you want to do it.

PicaK's obviously keen for you to have a Nov/Dec wedding

I think you should point out to your family that it's also your DF's wedding too so he should get some say, certainly more than your spoilt brat brother.

i am shocked that anyone thinks you are being unreasonable! So someone can get engaged and decide on a long engagement and their siblings cant get married before them? How ludicrous.

People really need some perspective.

OP he is being a twat. Sorry i just can't bear people who think because they are getting married whole blocks of time belong to them, or everything must be approved by them. ffs!