remember the guy

[miss piggy]

Weddings are fraught with drama, aren't they?

(I think that use of "fraught" is a first for me...)  Anyway, my parents were both the same and different, in that they were the same people they always were only more so.   My covert N mother's envy and female competitiveness sort of burst out of her like the creature in "Alien".    Totally unexpected because she kept it buried for so long, and just as scary.  The creature receded into the background within weeks after the wedding.  No one noticed except me, the target, because my Ndad's very apparent social anxiety and rage always provides adequate cover for anything else going on. 

BTW, my H and I are still married.    My H is very familiar with N rage and can fearlessly face it down.  Anyway, I agree with the decision to not go to something that would be so uncomfortable, and with the idea that a good friend would not put so much pressure on another esp. knowing the history behind the feelings.  Just my two cents.  MP

[vunil]

Bunny, you are probably just better adjusted than most people.  I have never seen a bride (or groom) who didn't get a little weird before a wedding.  Sometimes they get unweird on the exact day and sometimes they get weirder.  Then they get normal again but often they have no memory of how weird they were before.  It's a funny kind of dementia, I guess.  It has to do with all of the projections and worries and euphoria and reluctance surrounding such a big commitment.  As dementias go, it's pretty understandable.

Wanting a friend at a wedding my indicate the desire for approval of the union. It could also just be that you like your friend a lot and want them there.  Or both.  Remember that... family... (cue the ominous music) comes to weddings.  Lots of family.  It is nice to have friends there to balance things out, to have someone to laugh with, to help you get ready, to gossip with about how odd the family is acting (with each other and with the inlaws), etc. 

[bunny]

Bunny, you are probably just better adjusted than most people.  I have never seen a bride (or groom) who didn't get a little weird before a wedding.  Sometimes they get unweird on the exact day and sometimes they get weirder.  Then they get normal again but often they have no memory of how weird they were before.  It's a funny kind of dementia, I guess.  It has to do with all of the projections and worries and euphoria and reluctance surrounding such a big commitment.  As dementias go, it's pretty understandable.

Wanting a friend at a wedding my indicate the desire for approval of the union. It could also just be that you like your friend a lot and want them there.  Or both.  Remember that... family... (cue the ominous music) comes to weddings.  Lots of family.  It is nice to have friends there to balance things out, to have someone to laugh with, to help you get ready, to gossip with about how odd the family is acting (with each other and with the inlaws), etc. 


Vunil,

I am not better adjusted than most people, I am very neurotic. I just am SICK OF GUILT TRIPPING which I got all my life and I can't STAND IT anymore. My buttons are pushed by guilt-tripping and pressuring more than anything. Of course I had friends at my wedding! You are talking to me like I'm 5 years old - what is with that? I just did not pressure anyone to come to mine, did not blame anyone who didn't come, and didn't have a bunch of trips about it. In the past I had friendships that were abusive. That's over now, because I CUT OFF people who abused me. I now have certain standards and being pressured does not work with me. In fact it makes me question this person's idea of what a friend is.

bunny

[vunil]

HI, Bunny-- I wasn't talking to you in particular.  Which begs the question why I started the post "Bunny"-- sorry.  I just meant the first sentence as directed as you. I do think you are better adjusted over some things than others, seriously.  You just seem clear-headed about some stuff that others (like me) aren't.  This may be why you didn't get weird over your wedding--

I guess I read your previous post as being something along the lines of "who is this strange person who is getting so flipped out over a wedding?  People don't do that!  I didn't."  My comment was just to say:  well, actually, people do that.  It is good you didn't, but probably not a reasonable expectation for everyone, even nice people and good friends. 

I was just talking about my own experience-- people seem to really lose it at and over weddings.  I guess I didn't think this friend was necessarily being awful, just being normal in the range of my personal experience.  But really I was talking to Write-- I am not willing to say she should just cut this friend off.  I can think of simplistic reasons the friend might want her there (maybe the simplistic part made me sound patronizing, but I really wasn't being patronizing, I promise).  Or, she may be awful!  I don't know.

I shouldn't post so late at night, I guess... 

[bunny]

HI, Bunny-- I wasn't talking to you in particular.  Which begs the question why I started the post "Bunny"-- sorry.  I just meant the first sentence as directed as you. I do think you are better adjusted over some things than others, seriously.  You just seem clear-headed about some stuff that others (like me) aren't.  This may be why you didn't get weird over your wedding--

I respect that this is your idea about me, but it's inaccurate. At the time of my wedding I hadn't yet started taking antidepressants and I was VERY NEUROTIC INDEED. I still did not pressure or cajole people to attend. Maybe in that one area I had some sanity!! I've always been disgusted by brides who use their nuptials to be huge N's. I never could relate to that sort of behavior, even from childhood. This is one of the ways society promotes narcissism! Making a bride into some kind of movie-star celebrity diva who is entitled to act any way she wants and it's totally excused. I don't buy it.


I guess I read your previous post as being something along the lines of "who is this strange person who is getting so flipped out over a wedding?  People don't do that!  I didn't."  My comment was just to say:  well, actually, people do that.  It is good you didn't, but probably not a reasonable expectation for everyone, even nice people and good friends.

No, I think BAD FRIENDS pressure their friends all the time! If they have a wedding as an excuse, they will be 100x worse!! And I question that kind of friendship for myself. However, I don't know the bride, maybe she has a history of being "okay" and can be given a pass.

bunny

[Marta]

Bunny,

You often sound like my elder sister, with whom I have had minimal contact for many years. I can feel the pain in your words, which connects me to her pain. She’s so different from me, so it is hard for me to understand her point of view sometimes. But I see that we all come from the same place of pain, however we choose to deal with it.

Isn’t it amazing and wonderful, that through getting to know each other, we are getting to know our families better too?!

Big hug to Bunny. 
 

[vunil]

Actually, for what it's worth, I haven't been married and can't relate personally to Bridezilla, either.  I have trouble imagining even having a wedding, actually.  I just notice that people seem to get wrapped up in it.  I think it has to do with fairy-tale fantasies from childhood.  And of course the lure and flash of the wedding has to be at least a little bit implicated in the divorce rate!  Wanting this big party so badly must pull some folks into a marriage that doesn't make sense.

Anyway, Write, you still there?  We keep talking about your situation and you are probably moved on and fine with it

[Portia]

can't relate personally to Bridezilla, either.  I have trouble imagining even having a wedding, actually.  I just notice that people seem to get wrapped up in it.  I think it has to do with fairy-tale fantasies from childhood.

Me neither. Also sometimes see the bride as sacrificial. The dad who ‘gives her away’, like the piece of property she was until very recently in my neck of the woods, and still is, in many places.

Why do people get married? I don’t know. My only reason would be financial  – inheritance mainly, insurance. As for the big wedding with a dress and stuff, total waste of money. Social pressure, conformity, public displays of something which is supposed to be personal between two people. IMO/experience it’s mothers who drive weddings.

Yeah. I dislike fairy-tales a lot. Lies. Untruths. Dreams you can never have; monsters that don’t exist, or they do exist (but they’re your family), but you’re not allowed to tell about them, because if you do, the bogie-man will come and kill you. What we do to kids’ minds is amazingly cruel.

Anyway. Why do folks get married these days, in the west?

[bunny]

People get married because they feel honored, respected, and loved when their partner wants to make that formal commitment. Children want their parents to be married. Plus the legal reasons.

bunny

[Portia]

Thanks bunny. I thought it was for illogical ‘romantic’ reasons. I think kids want their parents to be stable together and their environment to be consistent, I don’t think this necessarily means a legal contract? Legal reasons I guess are financial, and probably relate a lot to the prospect of divorce. I wish getting married was as complex and coldly legal as getting divorced. I.e. I really dislike the fantasy of marriage being about honour, love etc when it’s actually a legal contract with sexual, ‘unreasonable behaviour’ and financial bindings.

My parents fell for the fantasy, believed that the other would supply them with the love they didn’t get from their parents. I would imagine they both felt loved, honoured and respected when the other wanted to make a commitment and they probably felt that throughout their wedding day. Then they fell apart because once the commitment was made, the adoration of the moment was over. They both wanted love, honour and respect but neither were prepared to actually give it.

How someone makes me feel wouldn’t be my basis for getting married. It would have more to do with how the other person actually is, I think, but then I’m older now. I wish marriage licences/contracts were full of warnings and contra-indications like drugs!

[vunil]

(small voice) despite my lack of interest in a wedding, I think marriage is very romantic.  I really like the idea of the legal commitment and the vows.  I like the idea of being linked with someone else in that official way. 

Can't explain why exactly, though...  there's something about it that is very enticing.  I guess that's why every single society does it, in one form or another.

[Plucky]

Bunny are you alright?  You normally sound so reasonable.

Marriage, and as the beginning of marriage, weddings, make all the hidden expectations and needs come out of the woodwork.  Not only for the bride and groom, but the parents, friends, etc.  The couple has a lot to deal with, and the bride most of all.  Just the planning, even if you start out wanting a simple, inexpensive wedding, can be daunting.  Then, all the feelings of all the friends and family.  The issues with the other family.  Your own fears and doubts.

People do it for various reasons, one of which may be that they want to have a formal commitment that will keep the couple together during the hardest times.  Another reason is to formalise the commitment before others so that people recognise it and know the partners are serious.  While partners may be serious while living together, or even not, that is not declared to the world.

Like many things, the practice of marriage does not always live up to its ideals.  But we don't have to say that marriage is bad in itself, do we?  That's like saying holidays are naturally bad.  They may be bad for us.  But for others they are good, and that means that one fine day, for us they will be good also.

an optimistic
Plucky

[Portia]

Hi Vunil. I don’t like the idea of having the description ‘wife’. Or being married to a ‘husband’. I’d rather have some partnership civil contract. I think it’s probably my mother’s indoctrination; added to my own logical view of the world growing up (i.e. totally cut off from any emotions). Plus I wasn’t exposed to much religious influence, and that that I did experience, was counteracted by my mother telling me it was worthless. None of the marriage things appeal to me, including the idea of life-long commitment. I’d rather have a partnership where my partner decides to be with me because he wants to, day after day, and if he doesn’t want to, so be it. Being alone isn’t so bad either, I don’t fear it (any more). Anyway. I just know that I’ll be alone when I die and I’m getting used to that idea. But I don’t want prolonged pain! Other than that….life is okay as it is I guess. Really.

Hey! In Papua New Guinea they used to live (not sure of they still do) in separate men’s huts and women’s huts. All the time. The religion was based around sex: sex being bad. When the men became randy, they projected that onto red parrots ( :shock:I am not making this up) and believed the parrots contained the souls of dead ancestors, who were urging them on in their desires. Marriage there must have been (still is?) a rather different affair than the one we’re probably thinking of!


Hi Plucky. I don’t think marriage is bad in itself. I think more marriages would last longer if the two most important people involved weren’t pressurised in any way into it. And if they could have time to think long and realistically about what they’re doing –especially, to the power of N (as in numbers,…not as in N…!)  - especially if they think they want to have children. But I know I’m talking of stuff that’s theoretical in the extreme. Not everyday, living the lives we lead, stuff. And with that, I’m out of words I think.


Write, how you doing? Was the wedding in that forsaken part of England? I’ve got a funny article about ‘The North’ which mentions that place. It’s amusing, I’ll email it to you if you like (don’t want to clog the board with very specific stuff). PM me if you want it and I’ll send you my email if you haven’t seen it already. It’s from this week’s Radio Times! So middle-England.


Bunny? Would you believe I think about ‘you’ a lot? I think about Bunny and ask questions. And I can’t apologise for that wondering/pondering because it’s what I am, it’s what I do. Just saying what I do.