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Original poster

To ask what's the worst wedding you've ever been to?

322 replies

WashingMatilda · 21/08/2017 01:25

I've just come back from a really gorgeous wedding. It was one of those joyous, real life affirming ones IYKWIM.

However, during the speeches I randomly remembered a wedding I went to years and years ago where the grandmas wheelchair was left without its brakes on at the top of a big flight of steps outside the registry office. She rolled forward, all the way down, cracked her head open on the slabs, ambulance took her off on blue lights, and the bride spent the reception scrubbing blood out of her train poor bloody woman. It was horrific. Sad (Nan fine in the end)

What's yours?

OP posts:
OlennasWimple · 21/08/2017 16:19

I'm still reeling from a grown woman not enjoying a wedding because it was on the same day as her birthday Shock

I once ended up chatting to the father of the groom, who told me that although he loved his children very much he would rather that they hadn't married the people that they had because "one's black and the other's a man". Shock Sometimes honesty isn't the best policy, though I suppose it was better to say it to a random guest than ruin his son's big day or let his daughter know how her father really felt about her husband

TriJo · 21/08/2017 16:35

Catholic wedding for an atheist couple where both bride and groom were bi and had a ton of queer friends (bride's conservative American parents offered to pay for the whole thing if they had a religious wedding) - priest makes multiple homophobic remarks through the ceremony and again afterwards at the reception (some Irish families invite the priest for the meal).

Spangles1963 · 21/08/2017 16:59

Probably my own. Grin way back in 1983. The best man and his DW had a screaming argument at the reception (can't even remember what it was about) and he punched a wall in a temper,breaking several fingers. My new DH (now exH) spent the second half of our reception taking him to the A and E.

Spangles1963 · 21/08/2017 17:02

Oh nearly forgot. Some thieving toad made off with litre bottles of vodka and gin. Angry

EllenJanethickerknickers · 21/08/2017 17:22

Worst one ever was my exBIL's wedding. He was nearly 50, she was 24. He was a complete arse who still thought he'd make it as a musician one day, sort of 50 going on 17. She was a beautiful but naive black American girl he'd met 'on tour.' They'd only ever spent a few weeks together but if she was going to move to the UK, they had to get married.

Her family disapproved so didn't come. Two of her friends, Puerto Rican sisters came as her bridesmaids.

The wedding was in a chocolate box church an hour's drive from the city, then reception in a barn conversion with catering by a few of BIL's friends. Nice enough food.

The bride was the only black person at the wedding. 50 guests, family and friends of exBIL, all white and just the 2 bridesmaids for the bride.

After the B and G set off for their honeymoon, we had to deal with 2 sobbing bridesmaids who had no transport, and no idea where they were. They were supposed to be staying at the G's flat back in the city until their flight home, but no one had arranged anything.

We had a car full, 3 DC under 8, so couldn't help, but said we'd ring a taxi for them. It turned out they had no money either. We and my other exBIL (nice chap) sorted them out.

I knew it would never last, gave them 18 months. They actually stayed together longer than my ExH and myself in the end. Never saw that one coming at the time. We're all divorced now, though.

spidey66 · 21/08/2017 17:27

pastapasta
The second worst one involved a school dinner style buffet which ran out half way through the guests.

I think we must have been at the same wedding.

MaxPepsi · 21/08/2017 17:28

Keeping it vague.

The worst thing to happen at a wedding is someone died. During the reception. In front of everyone.

The wedding itself was up to that point beautiful but it was obviously cut short.

Sparklesocks · 21/08/2017 17:42

I wasn't a guest but was staying at a busy hotel in Bristol which was hosting a huge wedding reception. When I arrived back to my room about 11pm it was in full party mode, lots of rowdy/Lairy guests shouting drunkenly and doing questionable dancing, I couldn't sleep - but didn't want to cause a fuss with reception as I knew it would be dying down soon and it was their big day after all.

About 1am I heard a woman a few rooms down from mine screaming and crying like she'd been attacked. I ran down to reception to report it and had to fight my way past all the wedding guests descending on the stairs/lifts to turn in.

As I was talking to the staff an older lady was staggering about shouting and laughing, clearly very drunk, as her family tried to escort her up the stairs. She reached for the bannister as she went up, someone lost her footing and fell backwards - smacking her head into the wooden floor.

Obviously we had chaos then as her family and the hotel staff descended on her to help. Her family insisted she just go to bed and sleep it off - but the staff were obviously worried about a concussion and wanted to call an ambulance. Such chaos!

I'm not sure what happened in the end as I went to bed, but the staff finally investigated the screaming woman on my floor who turned out to be fine - she was wailing like that as she'd lost her diamond earrings!!

Was a hugely eventful wedding and I wasn't even a guest...

RudeDog · 21/08/2017 17:51

None of mine have been spectacularly bad....

One of DHs female friends got married, we had to travel there in the morning and left home at 5am as we had no holiday to use. For some reason bride totally blanked me all day, very obviously! We'd always been friendly and she was all over friends girlfriend who she fucking despised.
Every time I saw her after she was fine with me? I was well pissed off

DH best man to his brother, I hadn't met hardly any of the family at time. DH disappeared with brother and he left me all day with random relatives who were absolutely paralytic - when I did see him he kept telling me what a brilliant time I must be having, he still tries to tell me I did - I really really didn't

Friends evening do - one of my closest, couldn't afford venue so didn't invite anyone.
Went into an empty, massive room, no atmosphere. Bride came and spoke to us for 30 seconds at most, never saw groom. Some people had travelled 4 hours for the evening so and had hotel rooms!
had actually done a joint present with my female friends (we were all pissed off about the whole thing).
DH (who had also known her years) had insisted on buying her an expensive voucher as we were so cheap - on way out he gave it to me and told me to take my friends for afternoon tea at the department store it was for - he was so annoyed we had driven an hour to be totally ignored.

Original poster
WashingMatilda · 21/08/2017 17:59

MaxPepsi How awful. I suppose it must happen more than people think though, all that stress and old family together Sad

I always wonder what would happen if the bride was ever really really ill - does it get cancelled or do you just plough on?

OP posts:
GallicosCats · 21/08/2017 18:13

I went to one that can best be described as 'all fur coat and no knickers'. It was the dead of winter. The venue was large and fancy. There was a full complement of wine glasses on the table but if you wanted wine you had to go and buy a bottle from the bar yourself. The dauphinoise potatoes tasted weird and foul, as if the sauce had been burnt at some stage, or the milk in it had gone off. The rest of the food was lukewarm and clearly cheap mass catering done badly. As for the atmosphere, this was the sort of family that were constantly talking behind each other's backs to each other and you sort of lost touch with who wasn't speaking to who after a while.

LaBrujaPiruja · 21/08/2017 18:34

Matilda, a friend of mine, the groom, was a nervous wreck on his wedding day. As they were sitting for lunch he felt violently sick and hat to go to the loo. After that he was really poorly and both bride and groom left just after the wedding cake was cut and told everybody to enjoy the party. This was a traditional wedding in Spain so speeches are not the norm. The bride and groom are both the quiet and shy type so the party continued without them, free bar until the early hours, DJ playing 80s hits.
I was not there because we were living in the States back them but my friends say it was a very good party. The sad thing is that it would not have been that fun with the newly weds in attendance, as they are too prim and proper for ANY kind of party... It would have been all champagne, waltz and ballads.
Still married, many years later, 3 children.
They are very nice, but have never been the soul of a party...

CheeseAtFourpence · 21/08/2017 18:36

Toss up between the one where feet stuck to carpet, hands stuck to tables and there was an entertainer whose act included a dildo Confused. Or the one on a Friday 150 miles away where I was instructed to book into the hotel for the night before as well as the night of the wedding so taking 2 days of my annual leave and which had a guy dealing drugs all night Hmm

DJBaggySmalls · 21/08/2017 18:36

The other woman showed up.

LaBrujaPiruja · 21/08/2017 18:38

Re the above wedding, in fact it was a terrific party! It is just that the newly weds had to leave early.

Now that I think of it, my mum postponed her wedding for a couple of weeks, as four days before the wedding she had a rash in her neck she didn't want shown and photographed. She says it was a nasty thing, my Gran used to say it was just some red spots on the neck of a vain girl, hahaha.

flippinada · 21/08/2017 19:11

Oh, I know a good wedding thread on MN! Not worried about finding mine on here as I've never married.

NothingRhymesWithOrange I think we may have been too the same wedding...sounds very familiar...

JT05 · 21/08/2017 19:13

BILs DCs wedding.
DH , me, his DB and his wife all invited. None of our adult children invited. We are BILs only family.
SILs whole family invited including their adult children. Sat at front of church and nearest top table.
We ( inc DB & wife ) were sat at the back of church and at the far end of the reception room, between the bar and door to the toilets! With other people who were distantly connected to bride and groom.
All this we could cope with, but we were not introduced to the bride, as she was busy!
After the school dinner meal, with tinned vegetables, we waited a suitable time before we left. Politely saying what a lovely wedding it had been.

ScissorBow · 21/08/2017 19:13

@CasperGutman I had a Welsh boyfriend once and everytime he took me home to South Wales no matter what local pub we went to once they heard my English accent they'd all start talking Welsh. True story so not even slightly surprised by the PPs story. Not prejudiced. No sweeping generalisations. Nothing against the Welsh language or indeed the Welsh people. But this definitely happened to me and I remember it because it genuinely never occurred to me that anyone would have anything against me simply because I was English. It had to happen in a few places before I realised it wasn't me being paranoid it actually was happening. I did an actual test as well cos that's the geek I am Grin and yup they changed language.

Drivemetofolkestone · 21/08/2017 19:15

I went to a wedding on my birthday. I thought it was great. Nice hotel, get dressed up, big party, no responsibilities.

When we went to sit down for the meal, the bride had sweetly left a tiny birthday present at my table.

MadameRaleuse · 21/08/2017 19:16

In France. Wedding in chateau grounds in summer. Freak cold weather blip so from 30 degrees in the afternoon shot down to about 10 degrees by 7pm.

Spent the afternoon dodging wasps. Gazillions of wasps.

Food came out at 7pm was all champagne and nibbles. Nibbles covered in wasps. Champagne ran out before we got to it.

Weren't invited to the evening meal so left hungry, thirsty, freezing and with a youngish baby.

On way home stopped at petrol station and bought a bottle of port and some rum and once baby was out for the night used them to warm ourselves up. AND deal with the wasp stings.

allegretto · 21/08/2017 19:32

I always wonder what would happen if the bride was ever really really ill - does it get cancelled or do you just plough on?

My friend had flu (real flu!) a few days before her wedding and amazingly managed to cancel everything and re-schedule it for the week after! The only thing that she couldn't change was that she had had her wedding date engraved on the inside of the rings so they are technically wrong.

chinam · 21/08/2017 19:39

An older married couple (mid 60s) decided to show the younger ones how to dance.
The husband spun the wife round, she slipped on something that had been spilled on the dance floor, fell and broke her hip.
40mins of lying on the floor waiting for an ambulance while other guests danced around them.

WashBasketsAreUs · 21/08/2017 19:48

I went to a wedding once where one of the guests wore a hi-viz waistcoat! Never found out why.

Original poster
WashingMatilda · 21/08/2017 20:05

lying on the floor waiting for an ambulance while other guests danced around them Sorry but I laughed at that.
The imagery is just too funny. Blush

Thanks to the PP's for clearing up the ill bride thing, I've always wondered!

OP posts:
Lazyafternoon · 21/08/2017 20:11

Oh a few stories but hard to say details.

One where my partner walked into the loos to find one of my relatives being sick in one cubicle and a couple of his mates doing drugs in next cubicle!

Two separate marquee weddings. Which were FREEZING cold. Coat on all day. Feeling miserable. Drink to get through it then feel rough!

And one were the bride was a right grump all day. Shouted at the bar staff in front of everyone for having Jagermeister behind the bar. Then at the bridesmaids for it being all their fault no one was dancing.

All not exactly fun, but not quite weddings from hell!