Whether you hate the wedding-industrial complex, are a bride planning a wedding and want to feel better about your own demands, or just need something to read, we’re doing a new series where we share the craziest, most out-of-touch wedding story we found on the internet that week. Submit your own crazy wedding stories to [email protected] with the subject line Crazy Wedding Story, and we just might feature yours. And make sure to follow @BetchesBrides on Instagram and subscribe to our podcast, Betches Brides.
If you’ve ever attended a truly atrocious wedding, at least once the pain and suffering is over, you can walk away knowing that you have internet gold. Such was the case with one of our Betches readers, who went through the wedding from hell and then lived to tell us the tale, via our submissions inbox.
I truly feel sorry for any of the guests that attended this monstrosity, which was made even more incredible by the clear disregard for the 200+ people who attended. Let this be a lesson to any of you planning a wedding: It’s your day, but your guests should have a good time, too. Or at the very least, they should have actual plumbing. The bar is not that high here.
It Begins
Our brave reader (who requested to remain anonymous to protect the guilty) begins: “I was invited as a +1 to the most awful wedding I’ve ever been to, so I feel no shame in sh*tting all over it. So the wedding took place in Vermont on Lake Champlain, which really sounded lovely at first. The location was very remote with the closest hotels being not close at all with no transportation offered, so guests were encouraged to camp. I was none too pleased about that, but the invite touted ‘premium’ outdoor restrooms, shower facilities, and stations set up with electricity and mirrors under the wedding tent for ladies to use to get ready before the ceremony, so I thought this would be more of a glamping situation.”
It’s All In The Details
Here Comes The Bride And The Sh*tshow
“So come time for the ceremony—we all start cramming onto the stairs leading down to the dock, which holds like 20 people. People are precariously perched on the steep, slippery ground around the stairs. It’s raining, we’re standing, and of course there’s no cover for the guests. Someone slips and falls, because it’s raining and muddy and steep.
God knows how they chose the officiant, who I think was someone’s aunt. She talks for way too f*cking long, and at some point tactlessly dives into the story of how the bride and groom broke up for a while to f*ck other people, but they found their way back to each other. How romantic!
Finally time to drink! The reception was at least held under a big tent covered from the rain. There wasn’t a plated meal, but instead a food truck out front. Because we weren’t sitting down to dinner, there were about 50 chairs available for the 200+ guests, all packed like sardines into this tent trying to take shelter from the rain. Half the tent was taken up by the band’s stage—made up of some unpaid friend of the bride. We were allowed to choose up to 2 options from the food truck menu for dinner, all of which were toddler-sized portions. If we wanted more, we had to get back in line to order more and hope the food truck guy didn’t recognize you. I was smart enough to be literally first in line to get food (no f*cking shame), but other guests waited in line for over an hour, in the pouring rain, just to eat half a meal.”
Can you, for one minute, picture a bunch of wedding guests, trying to look nice, half of them in heels, standing on a set of slippery stairs and mud and slowly—ever so slowly—losing their balance and slipping? This image is giving me actual life. A tent for a wedding is like, no biggie, but to have your guests standing because you forgot or didn’t budget for chairs is absolutely atrocious. Someone call whoever’s in charge of the Geneva Convention. This wedding is akin to a war crime. Oh, and submitter? GOOD FOR YOU being first in line for food. As someone who prides herself on being extra petty 90% of the time, I can tell we’d be best friends.
Adding Insult To Injury
And if you thought this wedding could not get worse. I have news for you. It does!
“Towards the end of the night, they ran out of alcohol, surprising no one. I asked the bride’s mom if there was any water, and she told me they ran out of that too, at least managing to seem a little apologetic. I had to sneak into the house again and stick my face under the kitchen faucet. Luckily I had managed to get drunk enough to pass out in my sh*t-smelling tent.
The day after the wedding, they host a brunch under the same tent that is now covered in mud and sh*t. Someone (probably a random guest) did a water and beer run, thankfully. The groom comes outside and immediately grabs a beer just to demonstrate how he can now pop a bottle cap with his wedding ring. I honestly think that was his main motivation for getting married. We got the f*ck out of there. Obviously.
THEY RAN OUT OF ALCOHOL. Those are words that should absolutely NEVER be associated with any party, wedding, outing, or even a quiet night at home. Jesus Christ. And to be out of water? I’m pretty sure this couple should be reported to the f*cking FBI. Someone could have, in all seriousness, gotten really sick or just been extra hungover. Where is the decency here?! Who are these people??
Also—how could you stay for brunch after all of this? What was the brunch? Did someone hunt down some wild berries and shoot a deer on the front lawn of this horror house? If this couple is still married, I’d like to know. I’d additionally really like to know if the submitter is in therapy after putting herself through the absolute horror show that was this wedding. I have PTSD just from reading about it.
Images: Fallon Michael / Unsplash; Giphy (5)
I love the internet sometimes. Wedding and psycho bride stories are the gifts that keep right on giving, and I’m here to write about and make fun of them. Talk about a dream gig. I’m not saying I’m without fault here; I definitely had my own psycho bride moments. I may or may not have ordered 30 umbrellas, then called the company threatening them that they better arrive in 24 hours because there was a 10% chance of rain on my wedding day. Spoiler alert: It didn’t rain and I then had to return 30 umbrellas. But that’s neither here nor there. Today, we’re thanking Birch Event Design, an amazing wedding and event design and planning company, for sharing with us some truly insane wedding stories. Y’all are doing the Lord’s work.
Here we’ve gathered four of Birch Design’s favorite crazy wedding stories for your reading pleasure. Remember: If you don’t act like an entitled psycho on your wedding day or leading up to it, you won’t end up on the internet! Kisses.
A Literal Circus
Every wedding is a goddamn circus, but some people just take it to the actual next level. I don’t mean, like, there are 13 bridesmaids and a 20-tiered cake and six dress changes. No, I mean there’s an actual circus complete with animals and acrobats and whatever the f*ck else going on at your nuptials. And they say white people have no culture. But Birch Event Design told us about this particular wedding which, yes, included a f*cking circus, but also almost became a circus when the venue completely sh*t the bed. Read on…
“A recent bride and groom had outrageous ideas for their wedding including acrobats and aerialists, fireworks, a ferry ride, etc.—all in New York City! But no, none of these caused any hiccups or issues. It was the ceremony that was set to be on NYC Parks property, right outside the venue . With 30 minutes to spare before the bride walked down the aisle, the chairs lined up and a gorgeous floral backdrop in place, NYC Parks officers ordered everything to be removed immediately. It turned out the venue did not have the proper permits. Scrambling, we asked a local restaurant for permission to use their outdoor space with a view of the New York Harbor. They said yes! With all hands on deck, we carried the entire ceremony backwall and 200 chairs about 400 yards to the water, and the ceremony started on time.”
First of all, I find it hilarious that the acrobats and aerialists did not cause the issue here. It was, instead, the lack of permits needed to have a large outdoor wedding in a public space in New York City. Am I high, or should that have been checked on BEFORE the day of the wedding? Like, did the venue lie about having said permits? Inquiring minds need to know. Guess we all learned our lesson to double check e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g.
What Prenup?
I personally thought that prenups were just something for overly rich people who like, knew for sure that they’d probably end up divorced. Nope, apparently not. Birch Event Design told us about this amazing moment when the groom got super pissed about hearing about this supposed prenup for the umpteenth time.
“At one event, the groom punched the father of the bride…in the face. The couple was meant to sign a prenup before the wedding and never did, and when they were signing their marriage contract, the prenup was casually mentioned. The father of the bride was being very sarcastic, making passive-aggressive comments, and the groom turned around and punched him in the face. The couple is still married to this day, but they never speak about their wedding.”
I am dying. The fact that this couple literally doesn’t want to or can’t talk about their wedding to this day is hilarious. Also, I feel like they can now never get divorced because it would just prove the father of the bride right, and we all know that, at the end of the day, pride is the most important thing of all.
A Runaway Groom
I feel like everyone gets cold feet right before their wedding. Like, this sh*t is (supposed to be) for life. You are literally about to tie your wellbeing and personhood to another human being. That’s f*cking terrifying. Apparently, for this groom, it was almost too much to handle.
“We’ll never forget when a groom refused to walk down the aisle. He was having cold feet, and was very high strung the entire day. The guests were seated at the ceremony, waiting for it to begin, but the groom was not in sight. We found him in his room and let him know he had to walk down the aisle. He was very adamant about having a cigarette, and walked outside to smoke. We watched him closely the entire time, and we noticed he started to walk away into the parking lot. We ran after him and asked him what was going on. ‘I can’t do this now, I’ll do it tomorrow,’ he said. We ultimately had to pull him back into the building and remind him, in the nicest way possible, that he was getting married that minute.”
I picture this guy like that v relatable pic of Ben Affleck, just trying to run from it all:
Right?! The guy just needs a break. I find it extra funny that the Birch folks LITERALLY had to watch and guard said groom from making a break for it. How does the bride feel knowing all this? Like, my now-husband got sh*thoused the night before our wedding, spent the whole morning throwing up, then, when I got to the top of the aisle, looked at me and said, “You look beautiful. I love you. I may throw up.” That sh*t’s pretty funny now, but I have a hard time believing I’d ever be 100% over knowing that my intended nearly RAN AWAY the day of our wedding.
More Flowers, Fam
Every bride has those last-minute wants and needs. Like, “ugh, I should have bought more eucalyptus for the ceremony space” or “dammit, I wish I’d decided to grab a second pair of shoes because these are f*cking brutal.” Like, we get it. But Birch Event Design spilled the tea about a bride who literally decided on an elaborate change the day of her wedding.
“At the last minute, a client requested a never-before-seen flower wall for their wedding. And by last minute, we don’t mean a week before or a day before—we mean 4 hours before the start of the wedding. We had discussed creating one previously, but they decided against it. When the couple finally walked into their elaborate ballroom, they changed their minds and asked if we can put one together. No big deal! We propped up an extra triangular mirrored table and covered the entire surface in white flowers (that we ran around to find.) We finished with time to spare, thanks to our unbelievable team.”
What planet am I on? The audacity of this couple to ask event planners to go through an elaborate change THE DAY OF THE WEDDING is beyond me. Like, I get a little change here or there—move Aunt Milly next to cousin Bob or away from Grandma —that sh*t is reasonable. But to decide against a trend like a flower wall and then change your mind AS THE WEDDING IS STARTING is absolutely insane. I’m also kind of stunned that this all worked out, so jazz snaps for Birch Event Design. Still, have some respect for your event planners and the people working to make your dreaaaaaam wedding a reality.
Images: Sweet Ice Cream Photography, Unsplash; Giphy (4)
