He is not in love with her 2 weeks before wedding

[grassverge]

Alfie has decided 2 weeks before their wedding that he does not want to get married and doesn’t love Claire. They have a new 10 year mortgage together, a two year old and his 3 kids from a previous marriage. She has paid 300k deposit on house and 20k on wedding. He paid 0 deposit but needs his salary for the mortgage. She is in shock and is willing to go ahead with the marriage if he will agree. Claire has only told me, a friend and is too embarrassed to tell anyone else. She is hoping he will change his mind. I want to say end it no matter if he changes his mind AIBU?

Poor Claire. She absolutely must mot marry him. The guests will understand and sympathise with her.

PRENUP. PRENUP. PREEEENUUUUP.

She has spent a lot of money, still loves him and she is embarrassed. If she can't make herself see that she is better than that and come up with some BS reason to "let everyone down" (call off the wedding) and he actually agrees to marry her then she needs a prenuptial agreement written up ASAP.

Btw, by not calling it off, all her guests won't have a chance to get refunds on any travel tickets, cancel leave, hotels, return outfits and actually have all their money wasted on a bogus event, too. It would be selfish.

She needs you to be honest with her. Support whatever decision she makes but at least be honest and try to stop her making this monumental mistake.

Exactly this. Someone I know works as a wedding videographer (male) and was telling me about how he was filming the “getting ready” bit of someone’s day, and was horrified that even in the last moments before they were about to leave for the service, the mother of the bride said to her daughter “I just want you to know that it isn’t too late, if you have any reservations at all then you don’t have to go through with it, there is nothing that cannot be sorted, we love you”.

I flipped his horror on it’s head and explained that it was actually the ultimate act of unconditional motherly love to tell her daughter that even at the very last moment with everyone sat waiting for her to walk down the aisle, in the absence of any known problem, she still had options, love and support from her family.

Oh the poor woman, she must be distraught.

Agree with PPs that what she thinks she wants now is not what is actually on the cards. Understandably, she wants to cling on to the dream she DID have, but what's actually "on offer" is a sham wedding and the surety of just shunting the humiliation from now until later.

I think it would be reasonable to ask Alfie to take on the job of cancelling whatever can be cancelled and informing everyone, to at least spare Claire from that ordeal.

HE should be doing the cancelling and telling everyone. What a twat!

If they are in the UK prenups mean nothing.

But failing that, yes, she should definitely not marry him. Poor woman

I’d much rather a friend called off the wedding than went through with it and was miserable.

They're obviously pseudonyms.

The story isn't really so outlandish. But threads like this have some value, whether they are 'real' or not.

Clare needs to get away quickly and use the wedding as an excuse for a good party/break.

Is definitely not what caselaw says.

Sorry to hear the mortgage situation it’s tough times at the moment and a wedding costs a lot even if you are on £30,000 as the average salary, I would ask if friends and family
can combine their income and financial funds to raise enough for it , but yes if Alfie doesn’t love Claire then it’s not great sad to hear that and the pension and income , cost of living situations are so awful at the moment so we all have to help each other out. My brother had a small wedding at a Church with the closest pals and family.

If the relationship is on the rocks try and have a meal out and discuss which stage it is at don’t make hasty decisions but if it’s not working and terrible then admit that.

If you’re struggling there’s lots of help out there through Martin Lewis money podcasts.

Possibly Postpone the wedding until you are both ready and try living together under one roof first try cohabitation and if you are still not sure then admit it and be considerate if you do break up.

She can’t marry him.

She doesn’t need to take care of the details, family and friends a
can do that for her.

Who else has she told? The more people the better. Ignore anyone who isn’t on board with not proceeding. Circle the wagons, keep her in the middle, she needs to decide not to marry him then other people can deal with the details.

The £20k is probably gone (but she may be able to take action to get it back later (unjustified enrichment if in Scotland)) but it’s worth it for stepping away from what her life will be for the next few years.

Weddings do get called off at the last minute- reassure her that hers is not the only one!

She has lost some money but saved much more. We can see that and perhaps she will too- eventually,

This is very sad for her and I imagine that focusing on the embarrassment is easier than thinking about the grief of losing (what seemed to her) a loving and permanent relationship.

@grassverge can you contact Alfie and ask him to start contacting guests, venue etc telling them it’s cancelled?

It doesn’t sound like Claire is going to accept this is over until it’s inescapable.

Alfie has actually done the right thing here, and one day she will see that.

People will lynch Alfie but at least he's letting her know before the marriage (granted very close to the marriage)
Claire should cut her losses and look at the silver lining of being able to do this rather than adding a divorce into the mix.
It happened to my husband's friend just a week before her wedding. She is very happy with a lovely partner now and she kept the diamond (something she's keen to tell people though I'm not sure why)

If Claire was my friend and in this situation, I wouldn’t give a toss about leave booked, money spent on dress/hotel/presents whatever. No one who actually cares about her would. I’d really rather she didn’t marry this pillock, I’d want to give her a hug and I’d be helping make the cancellations.
I’m so sorry for Claire but at least he’s done it now - I really hope you manage to help her see that “convincing him” is absolutely not the right way to go.

I know she's uncomfortable about cancelling but people will understand.
Sometimes weddings get cancelled.
We had a friend who sent round cards to us all (weeks before the wedding should of taken place) that said:

Our wedding won't be going ahead because [groom] can't control his gambling or lying and has spent all the wedding money on his habit. Dick.

So she could be blunt like that if she wished....

This. Lock her up to save herself.

Agree.

There is a YouTube video of a wedding in which the bride reads out the cheating lying groom’s texts to the OW instead of saying the vows. The look on the groom’s face….

Human rights be damned....this man needs to have 'Not Partner Material' tattooed on his forehead.

He's already walked away from one marriage and he'll do it again.

I hope Claire is OK and coming to terms that the dream she had is over. Time to make a good life for herself and her precious LO.

What can you and other friends do to help her? I have a close friend whose fiancee left her 4 weeks before the wedding. Her parents and friends jumped into action and did all the work of cancelling everything and ringing all the guests to let them know. She didn't have to deal with anything herself and pretty much just hid until she could face life again.

This