In which I Loose it Three Times

Forgive me Blog Spot for I have lost it. Thrice now have I turned into that which I swore I would not. Bridezilla happened. She took me over and she made me her puppet.

Poor Bridechiller. She sat, huddled in fear, as the gargantuan monster she so swore to defeat rampaged across the landscape, destroying all in her path, strewing things in her wake and leaving a trail of confusion and mayhem.

To be fair, this wasn’t entirely my fault. And it also was.

BF was prepared to propose and he was prepared to marry me. Was he prepared to do it when I wanted him to….? Possibly not. Yes, I will admit reader; I massively pushed him into it.

BF still maintains that he had a plan. Sort of. Kind of. At some point. He was going to ask me at some time in the misty future, put it that way. Then he proposed. After we were engaged he wanted to leave it a few years for the wedding and I (knowing how my anxiety would build to fever pitch over one year, let alone two) was determined to marry the following year. We set a date within 48 hours of getting engaged. For some reason I felt I had to nail him down or we’d do that endless drifting of long term engaged couples where everyone wants to know when the wedding is but no-one likes to ask. Why? I don’t know. Fulfilment of a life plan? I enjoy a party? I would like to be married?

Anyway, long story short with minimal naval gazing, BF spent two months getting his head around it. By the time he had stuck his head up and gone ‘hey up babes, I’m ready to arrange stuff!’ we’d booked the church, chosen the venue, I’d practically bought a dress and had picked the colour palette. In all fairness I had tried to get him involved and he’d just gone a bit angrily vague whenever the ‘W’ word was mentioned – the way I go when a customer mentions that they read the Daily Mail. BF acknowledges this. But it doesn’t change facts that by the time he’d come to terms with it all, M and I had decided quite a lot of the main things about the wedding. We always checked with BF first of course (who would shrug and look slightly disinterested), but by the time he came out of his man cave and actually wanted to be involved, most of the main stuff had been done.

This hadn’t helped my stress levels and, having felt rightly or wrongly that I had done a lot on my own, to suddenly be told I needed to run everything we decided now by him and even find he disagreed with some things I was proposing (How could he?! Didn’t he know how IMPORTANT this was to me?! He doesn’t even LIKE flowers gnash growl flame smash), it only served to fan the flames building up inside me. All squashed up hidden away because of the unacknowledged guilt that somehow I had bullied him into all of this. What a mix of horrific emotions to keep locked up.

Added to work stress (I work in a stressful place and so does he), family stress (M is wonderful but she likes what she likes and knows how to push for it which is hard when you have a man who doesn’t want what she wants but are forced to do all the explaining to both parties) and trying to maintain social normality (no-one tells you you can’t), I was a powder keg.

1.     In which Bridezilla Makes her big Debut

One weekend in November we had had a wonderful tasting session with Harold who does a kind of Italian German fusion food – seriously lush. Both of Bf’s parents, BF, M & D and I had eaten like absolute pigs having polished off 6 courses (and several entrées) each. Afterwards, we retired to the sitting-room where we all sat around, slightly glazed, looking stunned at one another, polaxed with over eating.

Suffice to say, I can heartily recommend Pomegranate Catering for their amazing taster menu, their willingness to please and their encouragement that we were important to them. If you are getting married in the Kent area, go with them. They are great and I can’t wait to eat like a pig again at the wedding. Reminds me, speak to Mrs McW about putting an elasticated front on the dress….

So basically, we chose the menu from what everyone liked that night. Which was fine. Until we had to finalise it. Skip forwards two weekends when we were back down with my folks…..

I never knew M and would come to loggerheads over pork, but that’s what we did. M said lots of people didn’t eat pork. I said more people didn’t eat lamb (the pork was amazing – I wanted the pork), M said if we had the pork starter we couldn’t have the pork main. BF said why not. M got a mulish look on. D tried to put a word in and gave up – don’t think he cared about pork or beef. I said I didn’t want the beef I wanted the pork. Which is ridiculous, because I live for beef and am frankly ambivalent about pork.

Holy God, I swear, this is where it really kicked off.

Before I knew it I was out of my chair, screaming that everyone was ganging up on me before flouncing out and up to my room - it took 5 minutes with the word pork mentioned maybe thirty times and I was apparently sixteen again. I spread myself out on the bed (‘Like a Disney princess weeping’ I pictured in my mind) until BF came up, calmed me down and hugged me (which is, boys, what you do when your mad fiancée turns into a raging tower of insane hormones over beef or pork). It took me an hour to calm down, at which point I went downstairs and apologised. We all had a laugh, ha ha ha! And I thought that was it.

I’d never do THAT again!

2.    In which Bridezilla doesn’t like the cut or colour of your gib, Young Man!

BF and I went to look at suits. More on those later. Suffice to say we got a cracking deal on them at a local shop in Oxford. Anyway, he’d gone off with his Best Man (Bestie from now on) and tried a few on. He loved the style I liked too (win win - he looks like an actual penguin in formal wedding attire so is going for a Prince Edward style). And he fancied the dark blue. I laughed at this (ha ha ha!) thinking, ‘don’t dwell on that thought darling’ but he carried on saying it. He liked the dark blue, wasn’t the dark blue nice?

The colour palette I have picked (poor BF! I can’t even try and say ‘we’) is going to be stunning. Although the wedding is in August we are having essentially autumnal colours and calling it ‘harvest’. Think this.                                 

Then picture dark blue suits. Nooooooooooo.

But understandbly this, from BF’s P.O.V was the ONLY THING he got complete control of – what he and his ushers wore. Guess what. He still preffered the blue to the brown.

I went mental. In Oxford High Street. We stood at the traffic lights at the corner of Cornmarket and Queen’s street and just yelled at one another. YELLED.

Autumn colours and BLUE? Are you INSANE MAN?!

Well, mainly I yelled. And then he uttered the words which were sure to bring out the fangs and the claws; ‘why can’t we just change the colour palette?’ Oohhh. Ohhhh heck.

I lost it. People actually turned and stared. Poor BF. He whisked me around the corner to the White Horse and by the time we had got there, the tears had started. We sat down with a pint and had a little chat. The scales fell from my eyes.

I felt dreadful. Especially when he said he wasn’t really that bothered but just wanted to see how I’d react. Epic fail.

This would be the last time. The very last time I swore as we had a cuddle and went to catch the bus.

Until it happened AGAIN over the guest list.

3.    In which Bridezilla Appears for Act Three

The Guest List is what will test your ability to remain calm in any situation. Firstly, you know the people you have to invite. Yes, you WANT to invite them but you also know that you can’t NOT invite them. They take up half of the party.

Half.

So your 130 (which is massive for most wedding numbers) is down to 65. Add in a lifetime of friends who you have met while you were single for 29 years on both sides and then the people who your parents say you should invite (because there will be at least 10 of them on either side) and you’re out of space. Leaving 20 people who you actually really wanted to invite out in the cold.

That was one of the most incredible temper tantrums I have ever had. It took me an hour and a half to calm down, loose the scales and stop destroying Tokyo. And the sad thing is, most of it was pure frustration and lack of control. I knew (know) that in fact we will get lots of people who won’t be able to make the wedding and will therefore manage to invite a few on our second list, but when you have people asking you when the wedding is so that they can book their hotel and you know they are on the second list….awkward!

Don’t even speak to me about the fact that we have said ‘no children’.

The no children thing, to me is sensible. Not only do you have a more adult wedding but the idea of an enclosed space with a load of ragingly drunk adults and small breakable people charging everywhere makes me very nervous. Plus, we just don’t have the money or the space. We’re in our Thirties – a lot of our friends have children and we just don’t have the space for them. Plus, when you speak to most parents the idea of having a night off is much more interesting than having to look after little Jimmy, hyped up on cake and sweet food all day, then go home early with at least one of you sober.

So as we have the space and the marquee for the weekend, we have decided to do a second do on the Sunday for all people who have families and would rather come with their kids. Bouncy castle, ice cream van and I even get another frock. It can’t be all bad!

There we have it.

I think I have the solution now. First I started getting my back and stomach seen to as it turns out that they are a mess and this has helped my general stress levels. Second, I started seeing a hormonal reflexologist who is amazing and has serious helped smooth out the bumps life was causing meaning I take things more sensibly now. Karen is great. She is in Oxfordshire and is much recommended. You can find her website here.  And lastly, BF and I have slowed down. We’re trying to spend more weekends at home, more evenings at the gym or watching Futurama together. Just chilling.

I realised that you just have to sail through things, not just bump up against them until they give way.

So now, when M starts to get angry or pushes something which BF and I don’t want, whereas I would have maybe have reacted and started a fight which would have me looking like this in mere moments followed by a sobbing fit.

In fact I have tried to cultivate a general attitude to anything wedding related which leaves me feeling like this:

Look at Zen Bride. She is so relaxed she is doing YOGA in her WEDDING DRESS on a BEACH. How much more relaxed could you get?

Plus, what the hell?! This is something which doesn’t sit well with me in our sensible, enlightened culture. Why does a woman get to behave like an absolute bitch just because she is getting married? It’s absurd and frankly pretty pathetic for all women. Read this wonderful blog on Feminism and Bridezilla.

http://feministwedding.blogspot.co.uk/2010/11/bridezilla-is-anti-feminist-concept.html

It’s not fair on BF either when I go all Jackie Chang in a rage on him! He was more confused than I was all three times. M & D were similarly hurt by my increasingly aggressive rages and bouts of crying as all M wanted to do was make sure her daughter and future son-in-law had the best wedding they could have, and all D wanted was to not be yelled at.

Why the heck does it matter anyway? It’s one day in our lives; one. The birth of our first child, the day one of us gets that massive promotion, the day we buy our first house….these are things which are just as important as our wedding day and you’re not allowed to have stomping, screaming, fire breathing hissy fits over them. Does it matter if the groom suits are the wrong colour? Does it matter that the bridesmaids’ hair has fallen out or the only photo of you looking half decent shows your back fat?

We’re one of tens of weddings, all white, all as glossy and smoothly run as they can be and all trying to be perfect on that one weekend in August. There will be hundreds more that month and thousands that year. Why is our wedding so special? The only people it matters to are BF and I, with the parentals coming a quick second. Being a bride is not a right, it’s a privilege which you should treat as such. You are lucky to be doing what you’re doing, not entitled.

It’s certainly not worth upsetting my fiancée and my mother and my father simply because I can’t (let’s face it) have whatever the f*ck I want when I want it because I’m wearing a white dress.

That’s not Bridezilla; that’s just childish.