Vent: My sister isn't supportive of my wedding plans and now I'm depressed

MountainAmor

I'm editing this because the original post was really long and I don't think it got my issue across. I'm in the early planning stages of my wedding. Since I'm the youngest of three girls, but now in my 30s, having a local wedding isn't my thing. Both of my sisters had huge beautiful weddings, but that's not something I want, nor do I have the pressure to impress my parents' friends the way my sisters did. So now that I'm engaged, I started planning the dream destination wedding I've wanted in Colorado, only to be met with strong opposition from one of my sisters. She doesn't want the hassle of traveling with her kids, so would prefer I have the wedding close to her, or close to my parents since she's already planning a trip to see them. And I'm getting the sense that my dad isn't too keen on the idea either. He's now retired, and although he spent $$$ on my sisters' weddings, he apparently didn't plan to do the same for me. I can work with my dad on things like budget, but my sister's reaction was particularly upsetting. She's always been rather stubborn, but I didn't expect her to be so unsupportive of my wedding and ask me to plan around what's convenient for her. I guess I naively expected everyone to be just as excited about this dream as I was and 99% of people who I talk to about where we should have the wedding say, "do whatever makes you happy."

I don't want to compromise on having family present, because they are so important to me. But if it has to be a local wedding in order for them all to come, then I don't want to invest much time or money on it. I don't want to have any regrets either. So now I'm feeling really defeated and unenthusiastic about everything.

thejucheidea

Pay for it yourself and do whatever you want to do, end of story.

AddieCake

Ditto PP. If you pay for your own wedding, you get to call all the shots. Even if your wedding was local, there will be people who can't make it. You can't please everyone, and you have to decide if it's more important for you to have those you are closest to there or have a wedding where you want it. For me, I'd rather have a wedding where I could have the people closest to me be able to attend. Otherwise, I don't see much point in inviting people at all. 

Amyzen83

scribe95 you make a good point about it being difficult to pay for tickets for an entire family as opposed to only yourself and SO/spouse but I also think her family's being a bit selfish as well. This is the way I see it, OP is the last of her sisters to get married, her sisters all got the big beautiful expensive dream weddings that they wanted, but rather than following suit and having super elaborate, she wants something more low key but romantic, and instead wants to spend her wedding money on a beautiful location as opposed to fancy flower arrangements. I'm assuming family helped pay for sisters weddings? Even though parents don't have to technically pay for anything, I would honestly be hurt if they were willing shell out the dough for my sister's expensive weddings but weren't willing to buy a few tickets to attend mine. That does sound kind of hurtful.

Unfortunately though, PPs have a point that destination weddings are more of a hassle for guests than people who have weddings locally. I would just sit down and think about the pros and cons of each type of wedding, figure out what is most important and make the decision based on that. If you are paying nobody gets a say in your choice. If sister wants to throw a hissy fit because she has to pay for plane tickets for her entire family, why not just have a child free wedding? Honestly I find it kind of rude that she assumes her precious little snowflakes would even be invited to begin with.

HisGirlFriday13

DW are expensive, yes, but Colorado -- a state in the contiguous US -- is not as much of a hassle as, say Turks and Caicos. And if the sister doesn't want to travel with her kid, that's fine and reasonable. But just because the sister had a child doesn't mean OP needs to re-arrange her entire wedding plans to suit the sister.

Also, if the sister is willing to travel to see the parents, she can't complain she doesn't want to travel to see the sister's wedding.

And while it is hurtful that the parents were apparently willing to pay for the sisters' weddings but not the OP's, I think it gives the OP latitude to say, "This is what we want, and this is what we'll be planning."

OP -- I would suggest thinking about including in your budget the money to pay for plane tickets for family members you especially want there who might not otherwise be able to attend (financially).