Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Post Wedding Thoughts on the Post Wedding Blues

The Post-Wedding Blues- sadness that your wedding is over, you miss planning, all the attention, blah blah blah.

Did I feel the post-wedding blues? Not immediately. Planning my wedding was not what I thought it would be. Before he dropped down to one knee on that cruise ship balcony (sounds romantic right? Now add a Bruce Lee shirt and my pre-cruise proposal nightmare that he proposed on said balcony and in my immense excitement I knocked the ring out of his hand into the blue abyss, never to be seen again except by those creepy fish in the deepest darkest parts of the ocean.), I thought wedding planning would be a blast. I love organizing events, so wedding planning should be right up my alley. I'm a bargain shopper, working on a small budget is not a problem. But where I pictured bridal magazines on the Starbucks table between myself and my closest girlfriends went up in a poof shortly after we returned from the cruise.

First the stress of setting the date. With family in five states, three friends in other countries and the military to work around, that was not so easy. Once accomplished, I realized that idyllic image of bridal magazines and closest girlfriends would be a lot harder with one of those girls in Eygpy, another in Canada, another in Texas, and the fact that bridal magazines cost the same amount as a trade paperback book (I'm a bookseller, I know these things). Being the budget conscious shopper I am, I couldn't bear to buy more than two. Luckily for me, my Canada-girlfriend Katya's dad somehow ended up with a free subscription to Modern Bride, which she so kindly forwarded to me.

Despite the distance, my girlfriends really pulled through. Looking through dresses online via phone and facebook messages was loads of fun. And my local friends went wedding dress shopping with me, which was also loads of fun. Even if we were on completely opposite time zone schedules, they were the best bridesmaids a girl could ask for--all 6 of them. (Oh yes, that's right-- our 50-guest wedding had a 17 person bridal party including bridesmaids, groomsmen, flower girls, ring bearer, bride and groom. That's how we roll. Our friends rock.)

Despite amazing friends, wedding planning kind of sucked. I'm all for negotiating and working out a deal-- wedding vendors aren't. Especially not in this economy. One photographer even called me names and said my wedding would be ruined because we didn't choose him-- keep in mind he responded to an ad I posted that stated what we could pay. He was probably the rudest person I have ever dealt with. I had to threaten to file for harassment to put an end to his obnoxious e-mails. Thankfully, a friend from class recommended her roommate, who was starting a photography business. We looked at their photos, and they were amazing. We truly lucked out-- we had the most amazing wedding photographers, and they were willing to work with us on every single detail.

The wedding ended up going well-- completely thanks to those amazing friends mentioned earlier. And it was such fun to see all the pictures taken, both my friends and by our superstar photographers. But even a month after the wedding, I did not have the post wedding blues. Then it hit me: my wedding was over. This special day I'd been dreaming about my whole life was over. So this is what people were talking about. It was sad. What do we dream about now? As renters not planning to buy for another 3 years, it's hard to dream of owning a house when it's still three years away. Babies are the same thing. So for the next three years it's just kind of like...now what?

So basically I learned that the post-wedding blues aren't all blah blah blah. It is sad. But on the other hand...you still end up married. To someone you love (hopefully). And you probably chose it. So I had a short little burst of the pos-wedding blues, but really-- the trade off is pretty great.

And maybe in ten years we'll renew our vows....in Hawaii. :)

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