Trying to elope, need encouragement

I'm so sorry. I can confirm that if you want to get married near your parents then you'd have to get your marriage license in the state and possibly even the city you plan to get married in. We live in MD, but we were getting married in PA. We had to travel to PA to get our marriage license. We both had to be present. This is a pretty common requirement. With Covid, there might be new rules, but you'd have to contact the county you'd want to get married at. I know a lot of churches also require you to be a member of their church. You could always find a venue that will allow you to bring your own officiant than try to locate a priest who will marry you outside of their church.

It sounds to me that to elope you would not be happy because being married in the church is important to you. Have you two considered postponing? I know that is not ideal but I feel like eloping should be a decision you are happy with and do not look back with regret otherwise it won't be fun. I am having a microwedding and I am in love because that has been my vision for years now. If the wedding with family and in the church is important then I would do that so you do not look back with regret. Or you can elope and plan the church symbolic ceremony with reception at a later date maybe?

Can you get around the travel bans by getting a test? I know Maine does something like that, for example. Getting tested is a huge pain, but worth it to be able to get married. It seems like your guest list will be quite small, so I wouldn't worry about actually putting people in danger. Some of these rules are so arbitrary...smh

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I think it would be possible to get married and have our marriage brought into the Church at a later date. I just think it would break FH's heart to not have his parents there, so we would have to work something out that fits within the travel restrictions.

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I have been trying to figure this out. I know you can in my parents' state, but not sure about FH's parents' state.

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That is understandable. Just mentally prepare that can come with postponing pending your state guidelines and people's health. My state partially acts like corona is gone lol. I will say most brides here that did elope even due to COVID loved their day. So I assume the parents cannot travel to you all for the elopement?

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We are in this odd position where both sets of parents live in different regions so, no matter where we choose to get married, one set of parents will be under travel restrictions. Of course, this could all change overnight. We actually accidentally broke the restrictions last week because we hadn't heard of them and went to see my parents. Oops...

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Which states? What are the restrictions? If it is just quarantine then that should be okay. How far are they from you? Is it driveable?

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My parents are in MA, which requires you to have a negative test if you are traveling from outside of the region or to strictly quarantine for 14 days. The rest of my family is in NY, which requires you to quarantine for 14 days, even if you test negative. The quarantine restrictions for both states are so strict that I couldn't accomplish them--they require you to be in a room alone for 2 weeks with food delivered to you and your own bathroom. Basically, they mean you can't travel from restricted states. FH's family is in two restricted states--Maryland and Virginia. They can drive to NY or MA, but they can't take off work for two weeks and find quarantine-compliant lodgings

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Honestly this is not what you wanna hear but if parents are going to be a deal breaker then you two need to postpone. What is stopping you from postponing? While it would be disappointing to have to wait but I feel eloping should only be done if you are okay with it being you two not because you have to because if you go into things with an upset mindset then you are not going to enjoy it. Even if on the day of God forbid *ish* hits the fan and my MOH, her husband nor my brother could not attend I am still going forward and we will still enjoy our day. Quite frankly I would have eloped abroad and get some cool views and experiences but that is my mind set. I can say my friend and her hubby went to NY this summer and yeah you will be asked questions at the airport but no one will follow you around to ensure you quarantine. I will of course encourage you to elope but really think about it because it sounds like on both ends it would not make you happy so then why not wait?