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Dear Abby: Dear Abby Bride's Outrageous Demands Alienate Her Fiance's Sister
DEAR ABBY: I am a bridesmaid for my brother's upcoming wedding. However, his fiancee is throwing out some crazy mandates for the big day.
1. All family members must wear contact lenses. Glasses will not be allowed because they look ugly in pictures. (Both her mom and my parents wear glasses.)
2. She made my father get dental work to "improve his smile."
3. I recently tore my ACL, and she says I can't bring crutches to the ceremony because she doesn't want them in the pictures.
How much more of this should our family put up with? I love her as my niece's mother, but not as my future sister-in-law. Would it be better to tell them I won't be a bridesmaid? I am afraid to speak up because I want a relationship with my niece. -- AFRAID OF BRIDEZILLA
DEAR AFRAID: Your brother's fiancee appears to have gone off the deep end. Weddings are supposed to be about love, commitment and the joining together of two families, not the photo album.
While I sympathize with her desire for a "perfect" wedding, the idea that your parents and her mother must invest in contact lenses or miss seeing the ceremony and reception because glasses aren't "allowed" is ludicrous. And the suggestion that you leave your crutches and risk further damaging your ACL is off the charts.
Talk to your brother. Perhaps he can make his ladylove see the light. If not, I wouldn't blame you -- and your parents and her mother, by the way -- if you decided to skip the "show."
Mods: can I have an ableism tag?
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BUT, if she had made getting contacts part of the deal, my response would have been, "wow, I'm sorry: I can't really wear contacts, and I can't afford to get them for one night." Because for me, contacts=yet more headaches (and God, I can't imagine if someone required I wear them now, when I've just had two eye surgeries on the same eye), and just...NO.
And it suddenly occurs to me that this might be something worth talking to my daughter about now, when she's younger, before the wedding industry gets its fangs into her. Because this whole, "the most special day of your life that is all about you crap is seriously out of control.
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Oh, absolutely!
Obviously it's partly to con people into spending $30,000 to $40,000 on a wedding, rather than putting that money towards student loans/buying a house/saving for retirement/travel,
but I think part of the problem is that in every other arena of their lives, women are supposed to put their own needs *last* (after their partner/children/boss/parents/coworkers) and so there's all this pent-up pressure of wanting to have a say and express preferences and make decisions...
I often find myself thinking that if women were allowed/encouraged (not penalised/punished as they too often are) to express opinions and make decisions more in every non-wedding arena of their life, the Bridezilla thing would be much less of a thing...
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I do this with my older daughter. I want her to thoroughly enjoy her wedding, but I'm not paying thousands of dollars for a dress she'll wear once. If I'm spending that kind of money on her, it's going to be on a car or a down payment on a house or a trip for her honeymoon. We watch Say Yes to the Dress and discuss how over the top a lot of it is and how there are ways to have an excellent meaningful event that doesn't break the bank and that doesn't involve being a bridezilla.
We also talk a lot about body shaming and etc. that comes up in the course of watching that show.
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As in "Hey, X, I'm so sorry, but I think I'm going to have to bow out of the bridal party. I know you really want your photos to be perfect, but I just can't leave the crutches behind for this -- apart from the fact that my doctor would skin me alive, I'd probably have my knee go out at a crucial moment and fall over when we were following you down the aisle or something. I'd hate to ruin your big day by causing a scene, so I think it's just best if you replace me. Of course I'll be heartbroken to miss out on being a bridesmaid, but I'll be cheering you and $brother on from the sidelines."
Is it annoying to cater to Bridezilla? Yep. But it sounds like LW wants a way out without causing a conflict, and I'd bet five bucks that any other way of stepping out of the wedding party would be rife with more drama than anyone wants.
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I am just trying to imagine my reaction if a hypothetical SiL would demand that I not wear my glasses at her wedding. Wait no, I am imagining my brother's reaction if his hypothetical fiancee would demand that, that's way more hilarious!
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For the record, there are good reasons Miss Manners does not sympathize with anyone's desire for a perfect wedding, and the fact that this is the kind of thing that comes of such a desire is only one of them. Let's kill this "perfect wedding" idea with fire.
Dear LW,
I'd have maybe given the brother a pass for not putting his foot down at "All family members must wear contact lenses. Glasses will not be allowed because they look ugly in pictures." But once your brother let her make your father get dental work, the question is no longer, "should you be a bridesmaid" or even "should you welcome your sister-in-law," it's should you cut off your brother.
(Telling you that you can't bring crutches to the ceremony is beyond the pale, sure, but at this point we've all heard so many horror stories of casual ableism in weddings that my ability to be shocked about it is overtaxed.)