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Just Said Yes August 2014

Need Advice: Feeling Guilty for wanting a small, intimate wedding...

Private User, on April 23, 2014 at 12:32 AM Posted in Etiquette and Advice 0 3

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My fiance and I have decided at the onset of our planning to have a smaller, intimate wedding of only family and our closest friends. This is very important to me as I am an introvert and am not a big fan of being the center of attention. I also envisioned looking out and seeing only our nearest and dearest during our wedding vs. looking out into a sea of unfamiliar faces on one of the most special times of my life. I don't know how many times we've mentioned this and talked about this with my fiance's family (we even solidified the guest list fairly early on in the planning process), but each time we see them, the topic of the guest list gets brought up somehow and I end up feeling guilty for wanting a smaller wedding.

It actually upsets me quite a bit because this is our wedding and we are footing the bill and not asking for any financial help from either side of the family. Has anyone had this problem? If so, how did you handle it?

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3 Comments

Latest activity by Alejandra, on April 23, 2014 at 1:23 AM

Devoted May 2014
HappyGirl · on April 23, 2014 at 12:55 AM
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I'm having a wedding with 12 people total. I wanted it that way from the beginning; but I almost got talked into doing a big wedding. I had my venue picked out and everything but fortunately didn't put a deposit down before I reverted back to my small wedding plan.

Here's the deal: No matter what you do, people are going to make you feel guilty for it. Accept that fact right away. Read that funny post that's going on right now about "what's the craziest thing people have said to you about your wedding" and you'll see what I mean. If you decide to do a big wedding, a bunch of people are going to assume they're invited/cause you drama if they're your bridesmaids/get upset cause you don't want kids at the wedding/think your dress is ugly/say that the date you picked is inconvenient for them/etc etc etc. Once you accept the fact that no matter what you do, people will be unhappy, it will be much easier not to feel guilty about whatever you DO decide to do.

So stick with your smaller wedding because even if you go big, you'll end up feeling guilty about something else eventually anyway, so you might as well have the small-wedding guilt!
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Dedicated April 2015
Anonymous · on April 23, 2014 at 1:16 AM
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I completely and 100% agree with HappyGirl. I was going through the same thing you were. FH and I wanted a small wedding, close family and friends (20-30 people). But everyone started putting their 2 cents in and it started to become everyone else's wedding. Which sorry for me I think its stupid I have to pay for other people to celebrate my marriage/wedding...but that's another rant, sorry. Anyway so now my FH and I are going to elope (courthouse style) and we are just going to have a small reception at a later date for family and friends when we can take the time and save the money, and only worry about inviting whom we want and everything else the way we want.
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Master May 2014
Alejandra · on April 23, 2014 at 1:23 AM
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With the cost of weddings and the size of families, it's just not possible to invite everyone we would like. We are in the same situation (FH and I are paying for everything, always envisioned an intimate wedding with only those closest to us).

Our guest list still ended up including about 20 more people than we originally wanted. We wanted a 50 person wedding and invited over 70. Occasionally, FH's parents will bring it up by saying "Oh we wish so and so would have been invited". I usually say, "There are many people in my family who we could not extend an invitation to either, but it was just not possible to have everyone there" and quickly change the subject. FH's dad kept bringing it up so much that we finally had to tell him how much we are paying per person. He changed his mind about who NEEDS to be there after that lol

My grandma was not happy about this since she wanted her whole extended family invited. By this I mean all of her nieces/nephews (there's too many of them to count) plus their adult children with their spouses AND kids. Yup, 3 generations. There was no way this was happening. I spoke to my mom about it and she handled things with my grandma. To ease the issue a bit, we opted for a semi-destination wedding in Vegas (we are from Los Angeles). Most people understood it would be a small guest list after we told them it would be in Vegas.
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