Money | A Hot Issue
We have an entire wedding budget area to talk about the complexity of money. No matter what your money views, there is no "right or wrong." This very simple award-winning game is worth the emotional awareness you'll gain. A few big "a-ha" moments may greatly help in wedding planning. Learn more
We're Going to Be One Happy Family...Or Else!
A very unique book written by a nationally respected marriage and family therapist who has worked with couples and families for over 30 years. Learn why a mother bought 25 copies for EVERYONE in her family to get everyone on the same page during the most intense, public, family event. Learn more
Wedding Discounts for Marriage Prep
Engaged couples are by their nature extremely happy. But as you know, after the honeymoon, marriage is hard work. We offer many options for marriage prep at many price-points(and wedding discounts from vendors who want to help!) Encourage your adult child to visit our website.Learn more
Wedding Vendors
Weddings & Relationships
Marriage Prep
4 part weekly class. Interactive, anonomous, online and by phone.
Top Ten Ways to Create Fights with Your Parents
(Get Help with Parents through our book, and our Wedding Stress with Parents article)
#10 - Pay for the entire wedding yourself and any time your parent expresses even a slight opinion or tries to give advice, slam down the "money trump card" by telling them they are not allowed to talk about the wedding because they aren't contributing
#9 - If your parents are helping contribute financially, make sure any opinion they have is met with, "that's nice mom and dad, but this is MY DAY and we're doing this MY WAY." Parents love to open their wallet and have no say in how the money is spent
#8 - If your parents try to claim more experience with weddings because they're 30 or so years older than you and have been to more weddings than you, insist they are completely out of it and have no idea how weddings are done today even if you've only been to 3 weddings in the last 5 years and they've been to 20
#7 - Be sure not to clarify the role of your parents. Let every discussion turn into a fight because nobody really knows if they have a role, what the role is, and what is really going on with the wedding plans
#6 - If your parents are bitterly divorced, be sure to tell them they are complete jerks to your other parent and you insist they act like a "good boy" or "good girl" for your wedding. Parents love to be told they're jerks by their kids, especially when it comes out around talk of the ex-spouse
#5 - If your parents are control-freaks and always have been, the best way to promote fighting is to waffle in your wedding decisions while never clarifying what needs to get done and who is doing it. This will ensure your parents feel justified in needing to take control and ensure you experience maximum rage at their audacious wedding planning actions like hiring a florist or photographer without your knowledge
#4 - If your parent has always been difficult , spend all your energy "wishing" they could have a personality transplant for just this one important event. Daydreaming about someone they've never been will ensure you are upset enough to lay into them around a particular wedding related discussion by saying something like, "Why can't you be there for me on the most important day of my life?"
#3 - If your parents insist on inviting relatives you barely know, remind them a wedding is about YOU and your parents will have plenty of time to visit the relatives at family funerals. Lecturing your parents on the importance of your friends and coworkers over relatives will lend to some lively fights and drama
#2 - Whatever you do, never admit there is anything sad for your parents about "losing their little girl or boy". Insist they be nothing but happy for you and demand their maximum enthusiasm for your spouse and new life without them
#1 - Make sure this wedding is ALL ABOUT YOU, even if it means creating family cut-offs or threatening your parents that they will never get to see their future grandchildren. The more you hold your ground around wedding plans the more stress and tension you'll create as you start your new marriage and new relationship as a married person with your parents. Harmony and good relationships are worth losing to maximize the "perfectness" of those 6 hours of your wedding day
Elizabeth Doherty Thomas, is a co-founder of The First Dance, along with Marriage and Family therapist father Bill Doherty. The First Dance is a 2007 Modern Bride Trendsetter award winner for taking on the complex family dynamics of wedding planning. See what engaged couples and wedding professionals are saying about our book Take Back Your wedding. Our entire website is dedicated to offering advice on working through the people stresses of wedding planning as a couple, with your families, and how to strengthen your upcoming marriage through this enormous first task of married life.