Wedding drama

[Hiimblahblah]

Myself and my DP are getting married aboard just after summer. My family have known we were planning a destination wedding for around a year now, and I had given them a heads up that they would need to start saving from when we first announced it. Several of them still have not booked flights, accommodation, or got their passports, which is upsetting as I know they've spent money on other expensive things in the meantime.

Our official marriage will take place in England, then we are flying out the next day for the abroad wedding. The only 2 people attending the English ceremony is my DPs DGF and DD as witnesses. The reason we're only having these 2 people is because my DPs DGF is paying for that part of the wedding, and we need 2 witnesses.

My DSis has asked if it would be possible to attend the ceremony in England due to her financial situation and the fact that she has her own wedding to pay for next year, but we really don't want our wedding to be the English one. We're not really treating it as anything special, we're just going out for a meal after and then going home to pack up.

AIBU to tell people they can't attend the wedding in England?

Note from MNHQ - please read OP's second post before responding.

YANBU that they are being bride/groomzillas OP, this is why destination weddings where you expect people to pay to come are so selfish. But I think you need to accept they don't want people at the English one and just not go if you can't afford the abroad one. I think you are already dancing around them too much - offering to delay your wedding by a year for them is madness. How much could it cost your family to attend an at home wedding?

It sounds like everyone is dancing around them and they need a reality check - ie, people being unable to come.

Gah reverses hurt my head!!

I mean, theure not getting married abroad are they? They’re having a fake ceremony and a reception abroad.

i reasonable to put pressure won and people should be able to say no, they can’t afford it.

destination weddings are selfish, shit and every guest bloody resents them in my experience. If you want to go off somewhere sunny, go on your own with no expectations.

No way would I miss a siblings wedding celebration
dh missed his brothers wedding. They planned it for a few days before my due date with dc2. I told dh there was no way we were travelling 5 hours to go to the wedding. We had a row about it ‘so you are expecting me to miss my brothers wedding’ etc. Er, yes. If they wanted us there, they would have considered the date. as it turned out dc was 5 days old and there’s no way we were in a position to travel.

I can think of several reasons I would miss a siblings wedding and finances are definitely one of them. When planning a wedding, you need to consider your families circumstances. If you want them there, no point trying to arrange it far away when they can’t afford to travel (although it’s not even about affordability, more if they actually want to spend that much money on a holiday of someone else’s choosing).

People go to see you get married - and to many, that means seeing you do the actual legal or spiritual bit and celebrating that moment with you in as elaborate or as frugal a manner as you like.

Just because you do a pretendy ceremony on a different day, add in sand pouring, candles and pinterest the fuck out of it and choose to spend stupid money on it, does not make it your "real" wedding, any more than the one you had when you were a child and your friend Susan married you to Jack from next door when you were 5 with a net curtain on your head. Your "real" wedding was the one where you stood in front of a real officiant, said the real vows in front of real witnesses, signed the real register and therefore are really declared to be married. By all means consider the pretend version to be the main event if you prefer but don't get your knickers in a twist because people decline to attend.

I wouldn't go abroad to a wedding unless the couple are actually from that country or live in that country as I think destination weddings where the couple expect everyone to turn up like it's the next village over is wanky. The only wedding I will ever "save up to attend" will be my own or for my sibling who lives abroad, if I'm invited. There may be people who live week to week and can't save up, couples who want to save for their mortgage, or save for IVF, or save for their own weddings. It's disgusting to expect people to cough up significant expense to attend something anyway, but even more disgusting to expect them to do it when it's not even a real wedding anyway.

Tell them to live stream it and you'll attend it online.

I agree!

Nobody gets to dictate to me a) where to go on holiday, b) what to spend on the holiday or spend while I'm there and c) what time of the year to go on holiday and d) what to do on that holiday.

No way am I using up all my annual leave doing something that's probably my idea of slow torture.

haha - I will never ever go to a destination wedding unless i was planning on going to that place at roughly that time anyway.
Everyone else gets told variations of "thanks, but no thanks". My sister? well her wedding was a whole drama, and I didn't go because i couldn't, and i have never ever brought it up (never congratulate them on their anniversary though because i am Queen Petty from the Land of the Petty People). If i had my time again? I'd use the words off and fuck. (his wedding, planned in a different country, at short notice, on my due date. Which she and BIL had known about since i did because it was such a massive shock to us all.)

YANBU to tell them they cannot attend the English wedding

YABU to expect people to attend a destination wedding or be upset if they don't - even if they spend money on other things you don't think they should.

Thanks for that note at the end of the opening post MNHQ. Knowing how reverses go I've read all the OP's posts and skipped most of the predictable responses.

Any destination wedding where the destination isn't related to the nationality/residency of at least one of the spouses has a degree of inherent unreasonableness unless the couple are paying for or subsidizing the expenses.

Your sister's being unreasonable, but does she genuinely know your financial position? What are the family politics implications of you not going to the Spanish event? - particularly given you own plans for next year.

You're also being unreasonable for dragging this out onto MN rather than resolving this between yourselves. The situation would appear to have a high Outing Potential, and nothing positive ever comes from airing family laundry in public.

English part is your only wedding.
Abroad part is very, very expensive ,time consuming, giant faff of a party. Entirely understandable that no one is that bothered.

Why not just stick with the English ceremony then go on honeymoon?

That is what normal people would do. But common sense isn't common anymore. It's all about instagram and money and thinking you're superior.

I’d try and step back from the drama. Think about you both as children growing up together. If got on with my brother I’d do what I could to attend his celebration (I went to mine’s wedding when really ill/just out of hospital - not full thing but I wanted to go to ceremony) Obviously if you can’t afford it then you can’t. But if you can I’d go.

👏👏👏 To every single word of this!

Exactly. And as for "I know they've spent money on expensive things in the meantime" - also totally unreasonable. Why shouldn't they - it's their choice!

You don't dictate what people should or shouldn't spend their money on,

Just because you want to get married abroad doesn't mean everyone else is obliged to shell out hundreds and hundreds of pounds they don't want to spend on a trip that they don't want to go on just to see you get married!!

This is a joke or a reverse!
nobody is this stupid.

This.

MN stepping in as they did here risks legitimatising reverses. Better to have the thread locked so people don't try to help the OP with the original situation she posted, than to have mods try and "rescue" a reverse thread. A lot of folk tried to help before the OP's second post.

Same here. I thought they were usually deleted, tbh.

Exactly. Reverse threads are so annoying.

Why is MNHQ standing over this particular one? They are usually deleted.

If someone told me I had better start saving so I could go to their wedding (especially one abroad where they have no family links) I wouldn't be going, even if family

If someone said to me that I had a year to start saving up so I could afford to go to their expensive overseas wedding, I think my only response would be "Jog on, Sunshine".

Your real wedding is the one in England and it's cheaper and easier for people to attend. Just let them come to the ceremony and then go off on your honeymoon with your groom.

@HoppingPavlova do you feel silly now quoting me when you hadnt RTFFT?
its a reverse

LOL, same here!

It’s not a destination wedding

they have got married. Or will. In Uk

it’s a wedding reception or holiday abroad

now I did have a destination wedding 😂

dh 1 and I got married in Antigua - as in had our vows there and had to go to the town centre to meet the officials

why isn’t your bother actually getting married abroad

Abroad. Not aboard. FFS.