Tired of peoples opinions

Hi Rachel,

Congratulations on your wedding, maybe speak with your H2B and see if he could speak with his mum. As the day gets closer you should be experiencing excitement not getting upset by other peoples unwanted opinions. Its so hard especially close family as they feel they can do this (My mum will be mine - She has already started) but like you said you have booked and planned a wedding to suit you both and that is all that matters. Don't let people get you down stay strong and remember its going to be an amazing day and all your hard work will be clear for all to see. Enjoy x

Hi, yes I have spoken to my partner as he feels the same way. He is different to me though and tends to get angry with her whereas I am pretty chilled and will have a cry after haha. 😂

I hope your wedding planning is coming along nicely and congratulations 😊 x

Hey, thank you

Unfortunately, after writing this she brought up again about people being invited who we don't want there (I must have jinx it haha) and now its all blown up and things aren't good. Hopefully things will settle down soon, I enjoy his mam being involved and have involved her with a lot of the planning like inviting her when I went dress shopping, hair & makeup trials etc. but then she gets too opinionated.

Today I don't feel very excited about the wedding and don't really want to talk about it or think about it. I can see why people have more intimate weddings or go abroad so they don't have this stress.

Thank you for your lovely words, I hope you are enjoying your wedding planning and congratulations x

People can only have opinions on something if you tell them what you are doing, so come up with a couple of deflecting phrases and use those when people ask you questions about your wedding.

I knew my mother would be negative about everything, given the chance, so when she asked for details, I would say 'oh, we're keeping that a secret so our wedding day is more of a surprise for you'. We chose a venue that was the exact right size for the number of guests we wanted to invite, and if we got pushed to alter the guest list, we just said 'We're so sorry, but we're at maximum capacity so we can't make any changes'.

And if you get any of the "I'm not coming to your wedding unless you have..." or "X won't come to your wedding unless Y is invited", just say "Oh, that's a shame - we'll miss you." and move the conversation on.

Make sure you and your OH are on the same page and use the same reasons for not discussing wedding details. If anyone pushes you, just repeat your stock phrase and move the conversation on.

You'll probably always get a little bit of hassle, but once people realise you are not going to respond to emotional blackmail or constant demands for information, they get a lot less demanding!

I think setting some boundaries around the wedding planning is very helpful. When you do go back to it, try allocating certain times each week which are totally 'wedding free' and make sure you spend some time with your OH that isn't based around the wedding - it doesn't have to be complicated, maybe as simple as going out for a walk or having a coffee somewhere nice, but you do not discuss weddings at all during that time.

Setting some boundaries around your wedding planning time not only helps you keep from feeling overwhelmed by it during the planning stage, but I'm sure it also helps reduce/eliminate the post wedding blues. If 100% of your free time for months beforehand is spent thinking and planning wedding, it leaves a huge empty gap once the wedding is over. But if you've consciously allocated time to non wedding things in the runup, it's less of an adjustment when all the excitement is over.