Husband Says He And His Wife Traveled Over 1,000 Miles To Elope But Her 'Crazy' Family Ended Up Crashing The Ceremony Anyway
Their special day was ruined after her family drove all the way to the ceremony and wreaked havoc.
Francis Sylvest / Shutterstock A new husband admitted that his wedding didn't go as planned due to his wife's overbearing mother and the rest of her "crazy" family.
Posting to the subreddit "r/weddingshaming," a 26-year-old man relayed the details of his elopement that ended in disaster after his bride's entire family showed up uninvited.
He and his new wife traveled to Colorado to elope but her 'crazy' family ended up crashing the ceremony.
In his Reddit post, the man explained that he and his wife, who have been together for 7 years, decided to elope after realizing they were expecting a baby. The two have always talked about having their elopement in Colorado, so when they found out they were pregnant, they decided it was the perfect opportunity.
Photo: Diana Lange / Shutterstock
"We planned for a month to bring our group of four friends with us to Colorado. We rented an RV, hired a photographer and videographer to shoot our entire trip, and rented a [huge] Airbnb on the mountain with an indoor hot tub and beautiful views. It was perfect!" he recalled. Except, the perfection quickly dissolved when her family made an unwanted appearance.
He and his wife chose Colorado for specific two reasons — the perfect views and the distance from both of their families.
His wife has a rather large family and paying for them all to come to a local wedding would've been far more expensive. On top of that, he admitted that his wife's family is "crazy," and "she is fully aware of it." His bride-to-be wanted to elope as well so that she didn't have to deal with any drama when it came to her mother and sisters.
"She was raised in a house with a manipulative addict," he shared. "The idea that 'family is all you will ever have' was burned into her brain at a very young age. Her mom knew if she didn’t, all her kids would abandon her."
Upon arriving in Colorado and while getting ready for their wedding ceremony, the couple got a call that revealed a dire mistake on his wife's part.
His wife's entire family, including her parents, sisters, and sisters' boyfriends had all driven across state lines to crash their wedding.
This happened because his wife made the mistake of mentioning their elopement plans to her youngest sister a week before leaving. It wasn't hard for them to find their Airbnb since she shared her location with all of her sisters.
"We really didn’t expect them to be crazy enough to crash a wedding that was strategically planned to avoid them and their baggage," he wrote. "We also didn’t account [that] her youngest sister is still brainwashed from the 'family is all you have' mentality. So she convinced her whole immediate family to crash it."
Her entire family showed up and interrupted their wedding ceremony.
"They showed up at our AirBnB, followed us to the venue, and proceeded to make our entire wedding about 'the importance of family," he explained.
During the actual ceremony, he recalled his wife's mother interrupting to "pray" for them. While he acknowledged the prayer was short and sweet, he found it ludicrous that "she interrupted a wedding to thank God she crashed a wedding."
"After the ruined ceremony they followed us back to our Airbnb where they insisted we were going to have a party," he continued. "My pregnant wife proceeds to tell them why she can’t drink. And immediately everything went much further downhill."
His wife's mother immediately focused all of her attention on the fact that she was getting a grandchild, and suddenly, the day was no longer about their wedding or the "happy" couple. "We spent the next two days after our wedding tending to her mother’s needs for attention."
By the time her family finally left, their elopement was ruined. They ended up not getting the number of photos they'd paid the photographer to take, and the videographer didn't get any footage because of how miserable everyone appeared to look.
"We didn’t get to go to the ice skating rink, no ice sculptures didn’t get to go to Denver, and our first dinner as a married couple was eaten separately. We were supposed to have 800 pictures, two videos, and one ‘movie’ of the whole weekend combined," he recalled.
After all was said and done, the man and his wife had wasted a lot of their money, were stressed out, and didn't even have the time to turn in their marriage certificates.
"Her mother and sisters almost cost us a marriage with zero remorse. It’s been a stressful month and I’m just glad it’s over," he admitted. It's disheartening that this couple wasn't able to enjoy a magical time in Colorado with their close friends to celebrate their love and commitment to each other.
Clearly, this couple must set some boundaries with her family — including turning her location off. Many in the comments agreed, with one user advising, "Your wife needs therapy and you need to have a serious conversation and set clear, explicit boundaries as a couple ASAP before the baby gets here."
While family is important, for some people, it can be a slippery slope. Toxic family members don't need to have a place on a person's special day if all they cause is stress, anxiety, and emotional turmoil. Weddings are an opportunity to surround yourself with the people in your life who uplift and support you, and sometimes, that doesn't necessarily include your immediate family members.
Nia Tipton is a Chicago-based entertainment, news, and lifestyle writer whose work delves into modern-day issues and experiences.