Getting married without SD there
Sorry to post so much about this topic. I guess it's our hot topic at the moment.
We've decided that even if I do go down the retraining route, we can still afford for us to get married next year.
We've gone back and forth between eloping or getting married here. When SO married his ex, he said it was minimal effort and just picked a random registry office for the ceremony as he just didn't care about it. I know - he was an idiot for going ahead with it but I almost did the same with my previous bf as I was in a shit mental state.
Anyway so this time around he's said he cares a lot about us being married and wants the wedding to be meaningful. He is worried that if we elope and have a destination wedding just the two of us, it'll be some arbitrarily chosen place. He said he has considered us getting married in our local church. We have just started attended and if it becomes our regular than he says it will be a meaningful place.
My only concern with that is if we have it there I'd feel we'd have to include SD. Which leaves us with two options- we invite SD and the rest of our family (which causes immense stress) OR we have it just us two and SD, in which case the way she is would mean it'd be all about her instead of about us.
The thing about our families being included is - they'd distract SD so the ceremony would actually be about us BUT my parents aren't talking to us at the moment. Inviting some family without the rest would cause more hassle than it's worth. I feel deeply uncomfortable about either inviting my parents despite them being no contact at the moment or inviting some of my family and dealing with the judgments and my own personal feelings about my parents not being there. And if we do have SD there we'd either have to spend our wedding night with a tantruming SD or we'd have to see SO's ex in order to drop SD back to her - neither of which seems particularly appealing to either of us.
For me eloping abroad was my way of making it about just the two of us But also having a legitimate reason as to why we'd not invited others.
SO's suggestion was to get married in our local church with just the two of us. But the congregation and vicar know he has a daughter. I'd feel awful getting married so close to SD but her not being there.
Honestly, I wish we could just skip the wedding and just be married!
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Just tell them you'd rather
Just tell them you'd rather not have sd there. People who are divorced, so half the people you know, will understand. We didn't include the skids at our wedding but we did include mine. Mine knew how to behave and frankly I wanted mine there. We got married on our time and when the skids asked why they weren't there we told them the truth, we didn't want your mom to find out and try and ruin our day. It was our day and not theirs so quit complaining. They didn't listen and threw a fit so dh took them back to bm and told them they couldn't come bqck till they learned to respect our rules and listen. Dh didn't see them for 5 months. Bm didn't fix their behavior for 5 months. Instead she just told them how awful we were. She took the time they were supposed to be thinking about what they had done and fix themselves to bad talk dh and I. Your bm will do the same but it doesn't matter. Just ignore her.
well simply do not get
well simply do not get married, ...
invite your parents to the wedding and ask your Dad to walk you down the isle, it's then up to them to accept or decline, and they will have to explain to the rest of the family why they declined, it's much better this way then you explaining why you did not invite them.
For getting married when SD is not there, easy, the day is about you and SO, not about a child, this is the date you picked and it was not SO's visitation week-end. Who cares what the people think... it's your day!!!!
but seriously Hon, I would not get married till all step children are grown and out of the house
Gosh I can't think of
Gosh I can't think of anything worse than having my dad walk me down the aisle like I'm his possession.
What in the world.....
What in the world.....
A lot of people find the idea
A lot of people find the idea of the father "giving away" his daughter is outdated. And she said she is not even speaking to her parents at the moment so it makes sense that she would not want her father walking her down the aisle. Honestly I was never very close to my dad (he was very hands off my whole life and he got 3 daughters when we all knew he wanted at least one son), and I had him walk me down the aisle at my first wedding, because both my parents expected it, but I was glad to walk by myself at my second wedding, and had the excuse that he'd already "given me away" and it was not necessary a second time.
Not everyone is a daddy's girl.
Maybe it's a UK thing? Most
Maybe it's a UK thing? Most people I know here don't want their Dad walking them down the aisle as it's seen as outdated and as if a woman is the possession of a man to be passed on.
We don't plan on walking down an aisle as we are looking into heli weddings but if we were we would walk down the aisle together.
Well, I think the ceremony
Well, I think the ceremony it´s for you both. Try to find a neutral place, where you can go with your best friends and close relatives.
Is there a possibility to get married at home? Or at a venue?
About SD, it´s difficult to say, in my experience she ruined many important moments(Bauptism of my kids, holidays), so if you can include her after the ceremony, for a dinner/lunch and then she leaves. I think you will enjoy the moment without her.
About your parents, well, it´s up to you, and how you feel. May be it´s a good time for a reunion.
This is kinda one of those
This is kinda one of those damned if you do, damned if you don't scenarios.
SD is gonna be pissy either way. I say, do what you want. Killjoy ruined our wedding with her pouting and tantrums.
OTOH, if you really feel she has to be there, let her stay for the ceremony and have the party without her. It's your honeymoon and it's normal for a couple to want to be alone that night. Have someone else return her to her mom's.
Here is my advice and in my
Here is my advice and in my situation it worked really well.
Go have your destination wedding. Do not invite or take any family or friends with you.
Do your research and pick a spot that will be meaningful to you both. Spend all your time, effort and money on something that will be all about the two of you... no one else.
I also had issues with relatives and whether they could/would come or not. My brother was having addiction issues. Both SD's were fairly young too. We were paying for everything ourselves..so we spent every dollar on the trip that was going to benefit us both.
What he is suggesting is for the benefit of other people.. them being able to attend etc... I just feel like what we did allowed us to completely focus on us and no worries about anyone else.
Tbf he suggested just the two
Tbf he suggested just the two of us at our local church so I don't think for him it was about other people. He's of the "fuck it" mindset when it comes to the views of other people.
I think if we make it all about us then the destination does mean something.
Don't deal with BM on your
Don't deal with BM on your wedding day! DH and I eloped, just us and the courthouse. And it was alright, I mean I married the love of my life, but due to sports seasons we ended up having to deal with the demon that evening. She cussed me out... On our wedding day... Kind of ruined that on a cloud feeling I was having... In fact just made reality set in on how absolutely awful that woman truly was... And how much I wanted to punch the Narcissist. Not exactly the feelings I wanted to have on my wedding day... In fact honestly it really frustrated me. I felt like I didn't get a single day for just DH and I. Thankfully DH understands now and we're looking for a us only overnight trip where we won't have to deal with anyone else... But trust me, that day is special, the last thing you want is to deal with your husband's ex, ESPECIALLY if she's high conflict.
As for SD, the day isn't about her. As I said above, it's YOUR and YOUR SO's day. No one else's. So if you don't want her there, then don't have her there. If it's going to be an intimate, just you two wedding, why invite just one person? A marriage is between two people. Not two people and any child your So may have spawned before. You're not marrying SD. You're marrying your SO. So unless you're inviting the rest of your family, then have it be just a special day for the both of you and no one else.
I think that you both taking
I think that you both taking time to truly think about what would make your wedding meaningful for yourselves and what are true essentials that you really want at your wedding could help you two to make some decisions. It sounds like you have a bit of time however if you want to wait until you know about your church and that gives you a bit of time to see where your relationship with your parents is going too. So you can use that time to work out your priorities.
For myself the things that were important to me were having as much family at my wedding as possible (sadly not many of mine could attend as I got married far from home), having my grandmother’s recipie for the wedding cake and being able to dance the night away. My husband wanted us to write our own vows and for us to go on a nice honeymoon. So those are the things that we focused on and the other areas of the wedding are where we made the compromises when needed.
A marriage is between TWO
A marriage is between TWO people. No more no less. Any others are optional.
Your wedding day should only be the start of your marriage - not the highlight and pinnacle of your marriage.
Elope and then come back and
Elope and then come back and have a nice reception/party that everyone can attend. If they come great, if not more booze and food for you. Maybe you can do a small ring exchange ceremony at the reception.
We're going to look at
We're going to look at destination weddings this evening. He said with destination weddings he's worried that 1) it'll be an arbitrarily chosen place and 2) we're up shit creek if say the celebrant doesn't turn up and we'd be in a foreign country with no idea what to do about it. So he's worried about spending the first few days of our holiday fretting and then he feels he'll only be able to enjoy himself once we've arrived at the ceremony and all is well.
We're going to look into companies that arrange things for you and see what their policies are and things about what happens if xyz people don't rock up etc and he said it'll put his mind at rest that things aren't going to go wrong thousands of miles from home.
we used a company to
we used a company to coordinate our wedding and the documentation. We are US and chose a US virgin island.. because that seemed a bit more cut and dried.
In your case.. check out some places that seem affordable and attractive. Check out the wedding companies. Ours would do everything from a simple 2 person ceremony to larger affairs.. check out online reviews too. Maybe do some independent research on how difficult it may be to get the legal ceremony done in whatever country you choose.
You could also do what many people do and have a Justice of the peace officiate it for the legal aspect and then go and have a small ceremony on your vacation for the pics etc...
Maybe also check out whether there are any cruiselines that you could use that may have an onboard option for a service.
It will only be arbitrary if
It will only be arbitrary if you put no thought into picking the location. I don't really understand this worry at all. And it will be meaningful because it will forever be the place you got married. Just like you saying your church will be special if you get married there, even though it isn't special right now.
Your officiant can not show up at any place you decide to get married, even your own hometown, and you'd still be up shit creek because you wouldn't be able to find another on the street at a moment's notice. So this worry also doesn't make much sense to me.
Many island resort type places will throw you a wedding for free if you book their resort. I know some Jamaican island resorts do, or at least they used to. My DH and I considered this, but knew our families would not want to miss our wedding, so we ultimately decided to have a wedding in our hometown.
You can still have a special wedding even if it's low key. It's special because you're marrying the love of your life, not because of where it is or who is there. I've never understood people who make SUCH a big deal out of weddings, especially the ones who spend tens of thousands on ONE DAY (not saying this about you). It's like the wedding is more important than the marriage. DH and I also considered getting married at the county clerk's office the day we got our license, because we couldn't wait to just be married, but we'd already paid for the wedding venue so we didn't want to waste the money.
A destination wedding does
A destination wedding does not have to be out of the country. If you are in the US there are lovely places within driving distance of most locations in the U.S. Same for other countries too I'll bet.
DH and I stopped at a tiny town with an adorable county hall and got married in the office. Others have gotten married at a church in their chapel or even the minister's office. Some have gotten a beautiful hotel room and hired an officiant to come there and perform the ceremony.
We live in the UK which is
We live in the UK which is tiny in comparison to say US / Australia / most other countries
I have some experience with
I have some experience with this. My Partner wanted her kids (my skids) involved in the wedding. Bio-Daddy # 2 was high-conflict, and had visitation with SD the weekend of the wedding. He had just taken us to court to try and change visitation (so he would be "relieved" of child support), and got told to pound sand. He then refused to trade weekends (so that SD could be at the wedding) unless we agreed to the terms he wanted in the lawsuit. This caused a huge amount of turmoil and upset. We ultimately called his bluff and said he could keep SD that weekend. He backed down and ended up trading with us.
Due to the conflict and upset (and also the normal drama of getting relatives who don't like each other together), I would STONGLY encourage that you elope, and simply inform your skids of the wedding whenever you see them next.