Drama continued

What do YOU want to do? Forget everyone else’s feelings for a minute. Your wedding is about you and your fiancé, and nobody else. Do you need your mom’s approval? She is making this about her. She’s pretty much saying if you don’t act a certain way or do certain things, she won’t be happy.


My advice is to focus on your fiancé and how happy that makes you feel. Invite who you want. If you end up not having an official engagement party, does it really matter? It seems like that comes with a lot of strings.

I agree with Kristen! It sounds like your mom is very butthurt, and truthfully, for most circumstances parents should be willing and able to put feelings aside to celebrate their children. I would look and see if maybe an aunt, sister, MOH etc could throw you an engagement party rather than your parents. I would try my best to not rely on your mom or dad for parties/plans as to not aggravate one or the other. You shouldn't have to do this, but to keep your sanity I would consider it.

I would just stop engaging with her about the guest list. If she brings it up again just say “mom I love you and I don’t want to argue with you, so I’d prefer to not speak about the guest list again. I will take care of it.” Then absolutely refuse to speak any further on it. If she tries, just keep repeating the same thing.

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THIS! Honestly this is what I started doing with both of our moms.

I am so sorry your mom is putting you through this! It is not fair when parents can't set aside what they want for their kids day. I honestly just started taking long breaks away from our moms and do what I want. If you don't need the money I would say just pay for it yourself. I wish I would've done that.

I read your other post on this, and the absolute best thing you can do is not to accept any money from her and finance things yourself. If I had a dollar for every time my parents told me "we paid for X, so we get to make the rules/ final say" when I was growing up, I could have paid for our wedding from that, and I knew I didn't want to hear it when I was trying to plan our wedding the way we wanted, not the way either of our parents wanted. Weddings have a way of magnifying people's emotions and bringing out the worst, so adding on people feeling entitled to call the shots because they're paying for things, and you're bound to run into situations just like this. You guys have about 14 months to save up, so try to plan the wedding you can afford and limit the amount of info you give people in the process.

You've got to draw strong boundaries here., Disengage in any conversation with her that makes you upset. Seriously. "Mom, I refuse to have negative conversation surrounding my wedding. Please do not bring up this topic again." If she brings it up again you stop engaging immediately. If you keep giving her the opportunity to explain herself and railroad you she will take it. I would also stop accepting financial contributions from her. Generally those gifts arent totally in good faith and parents will expect some sort of planning leverage in return for their monetary support.

Paige and Cece are spot on.



I never in my wildest dreams thought I would argue with my parents about freaking CAKE or that I wanted to address guests on the envelopes as “Mrs. Jane and Mr. John Doe”, but as Paige said, weddings do magnify emotions, bring out the worst, and some parents try to force their opinions on their children’s weddings. My parents did eventually let go and realized it’s OUR wedding so our choice, but some parents just can’t get there. Like Cece said, politely end the argument, repeat if she tries to reengage, and if it doesn’t stop, like Paige said refuse the money and finance on both of your terms.

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Lol in perspective, arguing about things like cake or addressing envelopes seems so trivial, but it always seems to happen. I gave my FMIL the reigns for our rehearsal dinner since she was super excited about hosting it, FBIL was a groomzilla to her over his rehearsal dinner when he was getting married, and I figured it would let her feel like she contributed without butting in about the actual wedding. Guess what has been the biggest headache during the whole planning process? Financial help is great, but it definitely comes with strings.

View Quoted Comment Oh man same here 😂 We did the same thing, but it backfired in our face when she decided it was ok to invite 2 of HER FRIENDS to ours 2 weeks out and said it was fine b/c she’s “the one paying for it” and assured us she told them “sorry but I can’t burden the bride’s family by inviting you to the actual day.” They didn’t come to the wedding but I was still upset they were there listening to family speeches about us….

**speeches about us at the rehearsal

View Quoted Comment Lol I addressed my invites like that. My mom tried to say something and I just flat out told her “I don’t believe in that” and continued making my labels on her computer lol 😂
I agree with this comment though. If OPs mom is the type to hold it over her then don’t accept anything.