So I need some advice here girls. When we first started planning our wedding I wanted something small (I was originally telling reception places 75 people). Craig wanted something bigger so I agreed to 125 max without a fight. He made his invite list and then talked to his mom. Once he got her list his was about double. We got in an argument and finally he agreed to cut some people out. He thinks that he needs to invite everyone from his past to the wedding, even if he hasn't talked to them in 10 years! It's just crazy to me. When it came time to order invites he told me 125 should be more than enough. So I order 125, that's over 250 people. A couple weeks ago I was making the master list and yep we were over the 125 invites we have. I only have 55, most of who are family since I have a really big family. So we sat down and I asked who people are on his list (come to find out that's me "having a death grip on our wedding"). All I was trying to do was help him figure out who he could cut. He has people who he talks to maybe once a year on there that he worked with 5 yrs ago. To me these people are easily cut out. Or people who if they get an invite that leads to 5 other people getting invites--gone in my mind. People understand if they don't get invited to a wedding, no one will be angry. Or eliminate the "and guest" for single people (this idea is absolutely absurd to him). Nope I am wrong. It doesn't matter that I want I small wedding, that I've already compromised on the number of people for him. It doesn't matter that we only have 125 invites, a number that he told me to order mind you. It doesn't matter that I never wanted something like this but am doing it for him. All that matters is he wants more people invited. He wants to not send his family invites and EMAIL the other people. Tacky if you ask me and pretty sure his family wants them as a keepsake. And I don't want 150 couples invited and with hope that there's still less than 125 that come.
What do I do? All that matters to me is that he's there. That we are making this commitment to spend the rest of our lives with each other. That our family and best friends, the people we love the most, are there. Who cares about all the other people. This wedding is way larger than I ever wanted, if I had my way we would be on a beach in Jamaica. We only have so many invites. None of that matters to him. He's so selfish, about anything we disagree on. If I don't just give in to what he wants it turns into an argument. I don't think he knows what compromise is anymore. So what do I do. Do I let him email invites out? Do I cut out even more of my people so he can invite people he hasn't talked to in years? Do I give in and say screw it and end up with 300 people at my wedding?
8 comments:
I've so been there. I knew we'd have a fairly big wedding, as both of my parents are remarried, so I knew I had a lot to invite. However, we were getting married 250 miles away from where 90% of my family lives, so I knew only aunts, uncles, and cousins I still see often would come, and that's what happened.
I was able to make my list, and had JR make his. Then I asked his mom. She had every Tom, Dick, and Harry that she'd ever talked to on there. She was inviting her coworkers, whom neither JR or I had never met! Even worse, JR and I were paying for about 65% of our wedding, and my parents were paying the remainder. She contribute NOTHING. The bitch didn't even offer to come help me with the kids so I could get invitations addressed and mailed. My mom had to drive 3.5 hours to help.
So I told her no, they weren't invited, and she ended up inviting them verbally, AFTER I had paid the final catering bill. This was one of the major catalysts that lead to us not talking to her for two years.
A general rule is that 80% of who you invite will say yes, and 80% of those will actually show. We invited 340 people, and the 80% rule held pretty true...of course a lot of that was because of the 3.5 hour travel in the winter.
But as far as agreeing on the final list, the only advice I have is to talk to him. It sounds like it's still a hot topic, so I'd let it rest a little bit since you have a few weeks before you have to mail out invitations. Then try to explain to him the best that you can why it's important to you to keep it small and what the day means for you, and why compromise is important to a relationship and marriage....like you did here. It's your day, and it's about you two, and you don't need the added stress of dealing with people you don't feel need to be there.
Good luck with it, I know what it's like dealing with a super stubborn guy;)
While I don't have experience planning a wedding I do have experience with giving in to someone. My gut is telling me that no, you shouldn't just give in and do what he wants because once you do that you will ALWAYS end up doing that. I agree with AJ that you should talk to him and come to an agreement. People you haven't talked to in years shouldn't be invited nor should people that you don't even really know (I get that you may not know his aunt or something but honestly some coworker from years ago should be an easy person to cut from the list).
If I had gotten married to jerkwhoshallremainnameless after college I would have invited every AGD that I was close to at school. Now though? I'm more inclined to invite those that actually talk to me via phone/email and those that I have a close friendship with. You should not feel obligated to invite people you don't talk to to your wedding - after all it is YOUR day and not to sound crass but why pay for people you aren't close to?
I've told him all the things I said here. He met it with no response. He can't say no to his mom, about anything. I know the 80% rule, we have even said 60% since my family is so far away and won't be able to come. That still leaves us with more than our 125 attending. I've let it rest (we first had the discussion in like january). When we talked about it last week he seemed fine, and then he talked to his mom yesterday and it blew up last night...
His parents are giving us nothing $$ wise. And it's not as much about the $$ factor as that I just don't want that big of wedding. But he doesn't care. He won't compromise. I feel like I have, but he won't.
Thanks for the advice though. And at least we aren't the only ones with this problem. :) But at least JR was willing to work with you. Ugh!
When Scott and I got married, we went by a few rules to come up with the invites.
Who to invite?
Anyone that we had to let know of our engagement right away and would be as excited as we were!
Who not to invite?
-Anyone that we had not talk to in over a year. Rule of thumb- If they didn't know us in the last year, they probably didn't know us together very well so why celebrate with us!
-If rule 1 was hard to answer, then we would ask ourselves, ok- we haven't seen them or talk to them in 1 year, will we talk to them after the wedding? If not, then we wouldn't invite.
Just remember that the day is about you two. It doesn't matter who else is there or isn't there as long as you two are. This is a celebration about the rest of YOUR lives together.
Coming from a girl who had a giant wedding, I totally understand the whole invite thing. J and I followed some rules like Yeimy did. We told all our single friends they couldn't bring dates, no one said a word. The only significant others that were invited had to be around for over a year and J and I both had to have met them. I didn't invite anyone from work because I had only been there a year and didn't think I knew them well enough. I also cut out a bunch of our families, cousins we hadn't seen, people we didn't know. With all that, we still ended up over capacity and put the phi kaps out in the tent, thankfully they could have cared less.
I really think this is something you need to satnd firm on. It's your wedding too.
And you're so right about the invites, family needs them and e-mails couldn't be any tackier.
I'm with Heather on this one. I see huge red flags. It sounds like you'll always lose and that's just not right. I was totally blind to all the red flags from Joe. Oy.
So if he can't compromise now while the madly in love thing is still in effect, will he ever be able to later?
You've already compromised - ball is in his court. You've done everything right, so it's definitely not you. Sounds like he has some issues.
I agree with what you guys are saying and I've explained it that way to him. I try to tell him if you haven't talked to them in over a year are they really that important to you? I have cut out people like that, hard as it may be. But he doesn't see it that way. How do I convince him of that? I tell him I don't want to be meeting everyone at my wedding for the first time and unforunately that's how it looks like it may be. How do I convince him who's important?
Since you’ve already brought up all the good points as far as the invites go maybe you need to look at it more from the point of view that you two have to talk about how you are going to resolve differences and not focus on the invitation situation. Tell him the things that have to do with your feelings and not the invites – like that you feel like you are giving in to what he wants and have to sacrifice what you want, and that he doesn’t seem to want to compromise. Frame it as a discussion of how are the two of you going to deal with compromise now and in the future. And use “I” statements (i.e. “I feel…” not “You make me feel…”) it helps the other person not feel attacked. Hopefully, you can get him to see your point of view!!!
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