Wedding Regrets: Brides Who Wish They Did Things Differently

Weddings come with a massive amount of pressure. I’ve said it over and over, that when you announce your engagement it is like the floodgates open! Everyone you have ever met – and probably a few you haven’t – suddenly has an opinion on your wedding. Often couples end up trying to please everyone else. However, they end up being left with wedding regrets and lose out on their dream wedding day keeping others happy.

I recently came across an article by Amy Clark, which included a number of brides sharing their own wedding regrets and it really resonated with me. While researching my most recent book, BIG Weddings SUCK! I heard lots of horror stories from brides who had gotten so stressed out by wedding planning that they wished they could go back and do things differently. I heard about breakups, breakdowns, and everything in between! Let’s take a look at some of the wedding regrets brides shared with Amy.

Wedding Regrets About Budgets

One common topic that came up as a main wedding regrets was, of course, the budget! I’ve spoken at length about the stress wedding costs can cause here on my blog and in BIG Weddings SUCK! One of the brides quoted in Amy’s article spoke of her regret over having an extravagant wedding. She had spent a small fortune on her dress and other elements of the wedding. The pressure had pushed her to her absolute limit. “The days leading up to our wedding was the closest thing that I have ever felt to a panic attack,” said the bride. That isn’t how anyone should feel about their wedding day. It should be a day of love and celebration, not panic and terror!

This bride certainly wasn’t alone in her regrets over finances. Another bride noted that she spent far too much on disposable items like wedding invites that nobody even remembers! Another wished that they had kept the wedding small and had a BBQ with their closest friends so that they could have used the money towards buying their home instead!

Guest List Regrets

Another common theme that seems to have cropped up on Amy’s list of regrets is the size of the guest list! So many of the brides mentioned that they should have invited fewer people. Others wished they had put their foot down with parents about who should be invited. One bride noted that although they had a big wedding with lots of guests, they now never see those people! One bride even said she had given in and allowed two guests to be invited just to keep the peace. However, they ended up causing drama on the wedding day! One of the brides who said her one regret was not choosing to elope instead really hit the nail on the head when she said, “Looking back now, less than five years later, all that mattered was my husband and I, not all of the details.”

By Dave Westfall, the Alternative Wedding Planner