When my fiancé and I got engaged I was overjoyed. I was nearly done with my associates degree, he had a good job, we weren't well off but we were able to put money into savings every paycheck and still get to spoil ourselves with dinner and the movies every once in a while. Everything seemed perfect. We wanted a largeish wedding, to invite all of our friends and family, but nothing fancy. I wanted a pretty dress, he wanted a traditional catholic wedding. It seemed achievable if we were careful. Then, my fiancé injured his back. After several doctors visits they couldn't find the problem and because he couldn't work, he had to leave his job. My father was laid off in the same month. Then my mom quit her job due to stress (which is a whole different rant.) My parents were unemployed, we were unemployed, my fiancé still in pain. Then the worse news dropped. My fiancé's grandmother had terminal cancer. We couldn't even make it out to visit her because we couldn't even eat. She passed away without his getting to say goodbye. Most of his family and old friends are in Northern California and we are finding out many are unable to come to the wedding. We had originally been planning on putting aside a little money to help people pay for flights or anything, but again, our savings were gone, we were on food stamps and still no one was giving interviews. We tried selling our stuff but apparently no one was buying. My mom and grandmother are fighting every step we try to take, my grandmother being the only one in the family with any money, who is kindly offering to help pay for some of the wedding. She bought me the most beautiful wedding dress, which on sale was still more expensive than I had been hoping, and paid for the deposit of our venue. Beyond that, it is all fighting. My generous grandmother loudly announced I should go on a diet while I tried on wedding dresses, pinching my sides and asking if I ever thought about exercising or just not eating. My mom screams and yells at my grandmother for saying things like that, while yelling at me that I am selfish for even still wanting to get married, even though she and my dad were the ones who constantly kept telling me to keep planning and they would figure it out and not to worry, and now it is way too late to cancel because we would lose deposits and such! Not to mention a huge amount of our closest friends are in theater with me in school. This fall we were planning on doing a revival of a play we had previously workshopped and we were all asked to deprive our roles. Three members of the wedding party, one usher, and two people doing readings, plus me, were in the play in some way or another. They just released the 2015-16 theater schedule and the play is occurring on the weekend of my wedding, with a performance just hours after the wedding. Even though I had asked and asked if my wedding date would be a problem and if I should move it and being assured it was fine, this means not only can I certainly not do the play, but a good portion of guests will need to get through the wedding, rush through pictures, try to eat something and then rush to make call and be ready to perform. So much for celebrating. Oh also, as of yet we have no food, no booze, no music, no photographer and no flowers. My fiancé also had to wait for 6 months of being strung along by our priest to try to get baptized before the wedding so he can be catholic and have the catholic wedding he wants. Not to mention, one of my mother's friends is kindly donating her cake making skills for our wedding, asking only for the cost of baking supplies. We are soooooo lucky and I am so happy about it, but I really have zero say in what it looks like. Now two more of the fiancé's family have been diagnosed with cancer, his best friend/ best man says he can't come, and his aunt and uncle who he is very close with just told us they couldn't come but we have no idea why. It is turning into a disaster and thanks to the stress, my already fragile health has gone batshit and I have spent the past week in pain passing kidney stones. So... Yea. I need a nap. (Ps- good news, my mom got a crappy job about three months ago, I got a really well paying, but only two day a week job about four months ago, and both dad and fiancé got hired at poor paying, but full time jobs last week. So it is a start. It is something.)