Should single women be forced to catch the bouquet at a wedding

[Mummblebee]

I went to a wedding yesterday for a friend I've known a few years. I am a single mother of a very young baby. Wedding was great until it was time for the bride to throw the bouquet. The dj made a big fuss and joke about it almost heckling single women before asking them to go up.. A few women went up and some chose not to. The dj literally walked round to every table and started asking women to see their rings to prove they are not single and trying to make them get involved. Very uncomfortable and awkward. I was sitting with my baby on my lap and the bride shouted out to me and singled me out of everyone to come up and join them. I just said no.

I felt it was unnecessary and insensitive.. Noone else was singled out by name and everyone can clearly see I'm here with a baby.

AIBU to be annoyed by this or was I just a Spoil sport.

I thought it was to be the unmarried women (single or in a relationship) it was thrown to. Because all unwed women are, apparently,desperate to be married. Totally cringe worthy and I would have refused also.

Duck90

This is true. I guess they don't know the details of my relationship status for certain and can only speculate.

I am over sensitive. Its a sore subject. I'm sure everyone was sizing each other up and I imagine some of the ladies with rings were feeling a bit smug. Ergh

The fact is not everyone is desperate for a ring but don't necessarily want to be called out and embarrassed. I was embarrassed for the women who were hearded up - it seemed really demeaning but that's just me

Mumblebee. I agree with you, it was an awful situation. Such an out dated concept.

Apologies if my post wasn’t clear.

God no this is so outdated. I think I've been to one wedding with a bouquet throw and it was when I was a child in the 80's!

This has made me howl with laughter from @ShotsFired :

He chucked it, the crowds parted like the red sea and it just limply lay there looking grim

🤣🤣

My friend just got married. She didnt do the bouquet toss. She want to keep it. She and her mum put a lot of effort in making her bouquet, like fuck was she gonna throw it.

I have only ever been to one wedding where the bouquet was thrown. I caught it much to the bride’s amusement. We are great Rocky Horror Show fans and ‘fighting the girls’ to catch the bouquet is a big joke in that. I returned the bouquet to my friend afterwards as I knew she wanted to keep it.

This was over 25 years ago ans still not married so it didn’t work!

I loath this tradition. I've also been to weddings where the small crowd of women forced to stand up and do this all took a step backwards and it ended up on the floor.

"In my community the bride never throws the bouquet, but instead it is tradition that she takes it the next day to a loved ones grave who wasn't there to see her get married." What a lovely tradition. That sounds really special.

At my brother's wedding, my sister-in-law went around the reception giving single flowers from her bouquet to all the female guests over the course of the evening. So we all got to share her bouquet and it was quite lovely. I dried my flower and kept if for years, as did some of our other mutual friends. It was a nice memory.

I was first a bridesmaid in the 1960s (I was a small child, honest) and I've never seen this done except in films.

Mind you, I was shocked to discover in my late teens that English weddings were so boring in that the bride and groom buggered off at tea time and the party stopped instead of going on till the early hours as in Scotland.

I've hardly been to any weddings but the ones I have, not one has done the bouquet toss - I thought it only happened in cheesy romcoms!

I know a lot of wedding services have outdated traditions, but this one seems a bit cruel - 'c'mon all you pathetic single women, catch the bouquet and you could be the next lucky laydee to snag a man!'. Pathetic.

I kept my bouquet. It cost too many £££ to give away.

I know a lot of wedding services have outdated traditions, but this one seems a bit cruel - 'c'mon all you pathetic single women, catch the bouquet and you could be the next lucky laydee to snag a man!'. Pathetic

^^ LOL This.

The bride dragged it out for so long aswell she did not just throw the bouquet.. she did a big dance/performance showing off her ring.. So smug and cringeworthy.

Come on ladies. Come up here and dance for everyone to see your single. Cat h the bouquet and one day you can have what I have!

One of my in laws got married a couple of years ago. The bride’s aunt, who is in her 60s and is divorced, was so desperate to get the bouquet that she ran across the dance floor to get it when it was thrown, shoving one of her other nieces (who has dwarfism) out of the way and sending her flying across the room. She then wrestled it off the person who had actually caught it and spent the rest of the night gloating that she’d got it.

So even when people do want to catch the bouquet it is a terrible embarrassment.

I’ve only every been to one wedding where the bride did this, it was my dh best friend and his wife, we got married the year before and she spent the whole run up to the wedding saying how much better hers would be than mine.
I had a very new baby by the time her wedding came along so hid at the back and didn’t take part but there was a bit of a mad rush to catch it.
I did however gloat that it pissed it down all day and they didn’t get to use the hotel gardens for the photos or do the dove release
My flowers were put on my dads grave the next day.

I don't know what happened to my bouquet, probably left it at the hotel. We also left the remainder of the wedding cake there and when we realise I made DH drive 10 miles back down the M8 ^and take the ferry* so we could go back and retrieve it.

Priorities

But yes OP I would be bloody outraged by that. It sounds like the situation with your DC's dad is not one you're yet comfortable with yourself never mind sharing it with all and sundry, and to say that your friend was extremely insensitive would be to be very generous in giving her the benefit of the doubt. She's not acting like a friend, that's for sure.

but yes OP I would be bloody outraged by that. It sounds like the situation with your DC's dad is not one you're yet comfortable with yourself never mind sharing it with all and sundry, and to say that your friend was extremely insensitive would be to be very generous in giving her the benefit of the doubt. She's not acting like a friend, that's for sure.

toomuchtooold thank you. This really summed it up for me

Said friend tried to call me yesterday 3 times and I didn't answer because Im not ready to speak to her until I cool off about it. At about 9.30pm she came and knocked my door to check on me. I guess because I am a single mum she thought she would check on me. None the less was not ready to speak to her as I'm still bloody angry/annoyed/upset quite frankly.

I could barely even speak to her but basically said that I wasn't happy at all being singled out in front of the entire wedding reception as being single when I clearly had a baby. She just said she didn't mean anything by it and everyone was being called up (not true it was only me called by name). She said did anyone say anything me? As if that's the issue. It is what will be said behind my back by our old school friends who really should be none the wiser as to my relationship status.
She just sad "babe it just means you're not married.. OK take care of yourself" and left.

This friend has been really supportive to me and my daughter since having her so I do really appreciate all she's done but that does not change the fact that she drew attention to me as being single in a room full of people including all our all school friends and that old school friends know too much information about my circumstances. I may sound over the top but I am an extremely protective and private person when it comes to my family and my life. I'm not on social media or anything so technically the only way anybody knows anything about me is through gossip! And she has added fuel to that!

I'm definitely sensitive abut this but whether intentional or not I think she should of known me better or had some common sense!!

That was a bit mean. When I got married I had two single friends and I asked them if they wanted me to throw my bouquet (before the wedding), they both said no.
I was at a wedding when I wanted to go up and catch the bouquet, my boyfriend at the time made a huge deal of standing behind me and holding me in my seat saying loudly there was no way I was allowed to go up. He was being silly, but it really upset me, because he was so loud, and kept holding me unil it was over and making jokes about me nagging for a ring. I actually snuck out after that and went home, which is funny because I was driving, and he had to spend $80 on a taxi.

It's in a lot of American films and TV shows isn't it? A group of desperate women fighting and elbowing each other for the bouquet! I'm shocked at the boyfriend above - "nagging him for a ring"! What an idiot.

Snitzelvoncrumb hahaha that you snuck out and left him.

I gave my bouquet to a good friend who was very ill. The incident mentioned is just bad manners on the DJ's behalf.

Why throw the bouquet at all?

I took mine to my nan's grave the next day as she would have loved to be at my wedding.