Hi all!
This topic has been extremely anxiety producing for me as I am worried we might face judgment regardless what decision(s) we make. It has been a very stressful time for us both.
My FH is from the UK and has been living here for over 4 years on Visa. A year ago his company began sponsoring him for a green-card and things were looking great. Covid came along and while causing delays there seemed to be no worries that his immigration would become an issue. Fast forward a few months we are engaged and have set our wedding date and booked a venue for 2022. Come June the sitting president at the time froze all green-cards for most visa types (excluding medical and migrant workers), we tried to stay calm as the lawyers assured us that they were possibly still considering already filed applications. By September we learned this was not the case and his application was thrown out. More discussions began and we were presented with two options, to get married legally by the spring of 2021 or wait for the ban to be done and work could re-sponsor him. This would require him to leave this summer until TBD. We are not in a situation where him returning to the UK is feasible, we share finances, a mortgage, not to mention his job and other responsibilities.
We have decided to get married on our wedding date, but a year early, at the courthouse. The act of being married is important to us and I will wear a small white dress him a shirt and tie and the wedding photographer we booked offered to come take some photos so we can remember the day. My parents will come, his sadly can not travel from the UK.
People have been telling me I need to reprint my wedding invitations to say vow renewal and not call our originally date our wedding. I am also being told I should not have bridesmaids or other traditional things since we will already be married.
What is the right thing to put on our invites? We aren't ashamed of having to married early and know it best for our situation, but still very much considered our 2022 date our wedding since it was when everyone we would want there will be able to celebrate with us. I don't want to offend people? But I also don't want to throw away a wedding I have been planning since last spring before any of this was a known problem.
What should I do? Any advice would be helpful.
