We have a 6 mo. engagement, wedding this June. Bride has been planning it herself (no local wedding planners and her Mom threw a fit over day of help, more on that later) and paying for it out of pocket. That alone is a lot to handle with a full time job. But on TOP of that, I haven’t been able to work during the school year( I play football because I’m going to school to be a coach.), so she’s covering my duties as well (found and pays rent for our house, utilities, and furnishing appliances). Bride moved back home with her family between graduating college and the wedding, while I live in the house vs. going to my family home 4 hrs away. Her whole paycheck is gone before she gets it. She’s doing a really great job. And she is so laid back about the wedding. She arranged it so that we can didn’t have to limit our guest list at all (awesome, bc my family is 3x the size of hers and our list climbed into the hundreds, ntm my football team). She designed and printed all the paper stuff herself, she even ordered a bridesmaids dress in white instead of a real wedding gown for herself so that it would be one of a kind and save the budget for more important things. The wedding is going to be so cool, but I’m worried about her stress level. Her MOH isn’t around, actually none of her bridesmaids are, 2 of who are my sisters. And her family isn’t making it easy. Her Mother is contributing one item under 100$ every month. Most months she’s only given 20 or so, ½ the postage, for example. Bride would say that it’s more than they have to do and that its gracious. But when Bride mentioned that she may use a possible bonus from a project to hire a college kid to help out on the big day, a few hundred bucks, her Mom threw a fit and said that ”if you have that kind of money to throw around, I just want all mine back”. Her Aunt is CRAZY beyond belief and is emotionally terrorizing her, and literally trying to have a “My Baby vs. Your Wedding, Battle Royale”. Her baby is due MONTHS after the wedding, but she asked her to reschedule the wedding because she predicted it was coming on our exact wedding day initially, and scheduled all her showers (way to many for a 2nd kid) during Bride’s important dates and showers. Her father, whom she is close to, has been distant and disapproving ( said her “June Bride” sweatshirt-that she made- seemed needy), and even though he’s a chef, and they had looked forward to planning a menu together, he told her to find someone else. AND during premarital counseling my pastor and his wife put her down very badly for the entire two hours, I rarely see her cry but she did, the whole time. They even told her she had to redo her entire workbook, because they weren’t satisfied. And… she has to get her wisdom teeth pulled. We’ve got 5 weeks to go.
It sounds like the worst time a bride could have. She seems to not want to talk about planning at all, sleeps a lot, and isn’t really herself. She seems really down, I don’t know how she can even be looking forward to a wedding (other than getting it over with) anymore and I’m terrified she’ll call it off. What can I do? She gives me jobs to do, registries, music, seating, but I have to ask so many questions that it doesn’t really take a load off at all. How can I help her, what can I do to cheer her up and get her back to her normal self. She’s got a brave face on but I’m not sure she can hold up. Sorry that's long! I need helpf rom other brides for perspective, thx for responding!