AIBU to be disillusioned about weddings?

[supersop60]

The more I read on here (and, granted, no-one is going to be on AIBU about their perfect wedding), and the more I encounter IRL, I think that weddings are an enormous source of stress and unhappiness.
For eg My DN had a lovely destination wedding in September -( it cost a lot for me to go and my family stayed at home). Two days ago she announced she'd met someone else and was leaving her husband. It now appears that the wedding was a band-aid.
So many wedding that I've attended, have ended after a relatively short time. What on earth was all that fuss and expense about? All the family and friends wishing them well, supporting them in their relationship.
On MN - worries about money, invitees, cf bridesmaids etc.
AIBU to think - just don't do it? Go to a register office and make your commitment legal in private.

I've been told in threatening, venomous tones that I needn't think she'd pay a penny for me to get married (I never assumed this) and there would be no point in trying to involve her in any planning or detailing in terms of her opinions. She would just say how much she hates weddings and say things to undermine me and make ke doubt my choices and not bother to hide her disdain. I am ok with this... but I am an only child with few relatives. It's not about the money, I just want her to care.

Weirdly, she loved her wedding.

My wedding cost £100 about 10 or so years ago. I think that was just the cost of documents and ceremony - most basic ceremony possible. I object to it really as I never wanted to be married. The legal stuff makes so much difference if things go wrong.

@Bungalowbeth - yes it is a bit like that sometimes! I think the thing is it's horses for courses. Eloping's the right thing for some people, having a massive wedding with all the trimmings is right for others. I think sometimes people need to realise that just because it's not the way they'd do it, it doesn't make it less 'real'. Yes, there are times you go to a wedding and you know (either because you've been told or you can feel it), that the couple have been pushed into the sort of day they don't want, but I think most people do get what works for them. And I have been to everything from a registry do with a reception at a rough East-End pub (full of broken furniture after a fight the night before!) that we all travelled to by bus, to aa black-tie 5-course-meal wedding at the Savoy Hotel. Both couples still happily married.

My first wedding was lovely register office, lovely photos and very nice meal for 25 guests for lunch. Everyone was local.

Second wedding, bloody awful. We did it on a caravanning holiday and went to the clubhouse on the campsite in the evening.

If i try to get married for the third time please someone shoot me.

Lovely photos from wedding number one though

I find the whole £20k wedding just ridiculous. I have DC and would rather put that money in an account towards their future.
It's all about showing off

Our wedding in July was the best day of of our lives, we LOVED every minute! It was a classic white wedding, which cost a lot of money, but we could afford it so why not, we plan to be married forever so we wanted something amazing to look back on and it really was a dream day.

I was a v calm bride and don’t understand why some people become Bridezillas. Being surrounded by friends and family and marrying a wonderful man made me feel on top of the world. We also wanted our guests to have a blast too so provided lots of booze, food and entertainment.

The post wedding feedback (that was not sought by us and was freely offered) was incredible and it made immensely happy that others felt the same about the day as us.

How anyone wouldn’t want to have such joyful memories to look back on I don’t know

notonefunkgiven*

Showing off

mushroom Because I can have more amazing memories with £20k than a wedding day would give me.

We eloped and I have amazing memories to look back on it wasbjustbus two, a registrar, a photographer and piper who doubled up as witnesses. Absolutely what we wanted, no debt accrued and we splashed out where needed. I wanted the dress and the veil etc that was my dream as a little girl.

abacucat fair enough, I would never suggest spending a fortune that someone doesn’t have on a wedding, but if money isn’t an issue, my advice would be go for it as the memories we have from the day are so amazing.

We also have other memories aside from the wedding day

The older I get the more I think that the stress and expense of a wedding is the worst way to start a marriage.

@mushroomsarehorrible ((they aren’t bh the way) I had a tiny elopement and my memories are wonderful. I didn’t need to spend £20k and I bet my memories of standing in a beach making my vows are just as nice as your memories of your bigger wedding. Smell dies not mean lesser. I over the whole 3 days we had, we arrived one day, for married the next day and left on the 3rd for our honeymoon. I loved it and if I could do it again I really would do exactly the same.

*small does not mean lesser.

I bet my wedding was every bit as good as yours, just different.

We married in secret. I'd never wanted a big wedding, or a small family wedding for that matter. My boyfriend did want to be married though and I kept turning him down. We had a holiday in New York booked and shortly before we went I read in a magazine about a British celebrity (possibly Julie Walters?) getting married there so I made a few calls to the relevant office in Manhattan - this was in the days before we had internet - and was told how easy it was to marry there so that's what we did. We asked strangers to witness for us and our one year old son was a guest. We called family and broke the news from the observation deck on the 107th floor of one of the Twin Towers.

The holiday was already booked and paid for, the wedding itself cost us around the equivalent of £35 and I have no regrets whatsoever about doing it that way, and neither does my husband. We have wonderful memories of a special day, done just as we wanted it to be.

Mine was a middling sort of wedding. Local ceremony, local reception, inc. some stuff for children, disco, separate area for those not into the wonders of the The Village People and Earth Wind & Fire. Far as I remember it was about £7k, 10 years ago (been together way longer).

But we did it because my mum was dying and we knew she wanted family and friends there.

It was great. We still laugh at lots of the pictures. And I cry when I look at mum so happy.

There are lots of considerations in wedding choices.

(But to any woman who says “won’t get married, no point”: go down the local county court, listen to a few family cases and see if you still think the same.)

Really interesting replies here!
@jayne310 the reason that you have generated so many replies is that your very first post gave us the impression that you think weddings are only about changing your name.
I am not married, although I have been with DP for 19 years. The house is in both names and I pay for life insurance which means that if he dies we will have some security. 2DC. He has always said he never wanted to get married and that's fine by me.
Some of the wedding I have been to in recent years:

1. DN, lovely wedding in Spain, sticking plaster wedding, infidelity after 3 months
2. Dsis - lovely wedding, nominated for bride of the year, infidelity after 15 months with now DH
3. Friend of xbf - her H turned out be a fraudster and bigamist.
4. Friends of DP - very musical wedding - bride having long-standing affair with another mutual friend, who attended the wedding. Now married to him.
5. Mutual friends- minor celebs, huge wedding paid for by Hello! Groom was in a bi phase. Is now married to a man. Bride married a much more major celebrity quietly in Italy. All happy. These are the ones I can think of instantly. I'm sure there's more. It's that phrase in (church) ceremonies - marriage should be entered into seriously, thoughtfully and reverently Yep..

We are guests at a small wedding next month and I can't wait.Its a registry office ceremony then canapes,drinks and a meal at a smart hotel with the function room available all evening.Each to their own with weddings imo.

I'm in Ireland where every wedding seems to cost €€€€ and 500 people are invited. Multiple hens and stags. Talked about for years in advance.
Most people dread the invite due to the cost involved. So weddings costs are usually recouped with very generous presents.

It winds me up completely and unreasonably so to have to fawn over and discuss people's plans years in advance. I really don't care.

We just went off the two of us and happily married 15 years later.

To balance things up, i had a great, cheap, enjoyable wedding that id do all over again tomorrow and people were commenting a year later on how good and different it was. I found it a joy to organise rather than stressful - i cut anything i wasnt happy with and went for simplicity and flexibility for guests - only regret was not having some key ppl there.

I tend to think the bigger and flashier the wedding, the quicker the divorce. Hello magazine being the prime example. All that fuss and display of wealth is often concealing a spiritual and emotional void. If you truly love each other, you care about the life-long marriage rather than the transient razzamatazz of the wedding. My DH and I had 2 witnesses and a registrar, back to work the next day. We had a loving happy marriage right up to his tragically early death at 36.

We paid for our own wedding so that it was ok our terms and apart from some very poor behaviour from my father it was an amazing day. It wasn't huge (50 guests) but it was beautiful and everyone who was there was there for the right reasons. We've been married for 4 years, going on 5 and we are happy. Wouldn't change it for anything.

mushrooms It is not whether you can afford it or not. Most people who have a big wedding save for a long time or get into debt. But that £20k can pay for a few very exotic holidays with amazing memories, versus one day. I would choose the former every time.

The week long hen holidays are ott Imo. It used to be a night on the lash followed by a kebab and hopefully a snog off a random.

If people want to spend £££s on their wedding and will thoroughly enjoy it, then good for them. Your post is more to do with people getting married for the wrong reasons AND spending a fortune on it, which of course is daft. Well, just getting married for the wrong reason is daft anyway. I should know, I did it!